Keep that there and then if you've
got 2 Corinthians 26 open too. I hope you got both of them open.
You know it said in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw
the Lord. Now Uzziah was a king. Reigned 52 years in Judah. But when he got to be older he
committed a great, great sin. A great sin. As we deal with
Old Testament pictures of Christ. And down there in verse 23 of
2 Chronicles 26 it says this. So Uzziah 2 Chronicles 26 verse
23 So Uzziah slept with his fathers
and they buried him with his fathers in the field of the barrow
which belonged to the kings. Now, King Uzziah died. Now we're going to look at these
first five verses over here and second and Isaiah and then we're
going to go over there and see the connection between Isaiah
and what he saw this day and the death of Uzziah. That's what
he saw when Uzziah died. That's what the first thing he
said. In the year that King Uzziah died. Uzziah died. That's gonna happen to everybody.
Gonna happen to everybody. I listened to a message, Brother
Henry, this week. Our long journey. Our long journey. And I tell you what, if it was
a, if it was a, It touched me very, very much dealing with
the reality of how brief life is. How brief life is. But anyway, in the year that
King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord. And when he stands
here, he saw the Lord. He's talking about the Son of
God, the Lord Jesus Christ. God's only seen in Christ. He's
never seen outside of Christ. And he's seen God the Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ sitting upon the throne. And when he's sitting
there, he's sitting in the posture of a judge. Sitting in the posture
of a judge. He's going to hear causes. He's
going to execute judgment. and they talked about his train
filled the temple and like his train that's the borders of his
judicial robes spread abroad and they filled that whole temple
filled the whole temple and so in the next verse it says this
and above it above the throne stood this paying homage glory
to the Lord sitting upon his throne above it stood the seraphims
Each one had six wings, with two he covered his face, with
two he covered his feet, with two he did fly. The seraphim,
they were ministers, messengers of our Lord. They were bright,
bright, bright, glorious, glorious beings. And they had great zeal
for the Lord's service, great zeal for the Lord Jesus Christ
and His glory. And they covered their faces,
they covered their faces. Why did they do that? Because
they had such reverence, such profound reverence for God, such
profound reverence for the Lord Jesus Christ. And we don't, I
want us to have reverence, and I believe we do have reverence
for the Lord Jesus Christ. But these men, these angels,
these seraphims covered their faces. God is so... He says no man has seen God.
They covered their faces to show their profound reverence for
the Lord. And then they covered their feet
to show their imperfections. To show that they were full of
imperfections. And with their wings they did
fly to do the will of God and to execute God's blessed wills
and do His commandments. And then in the presence in the
presence of the Lord. And this is what he says when
he saw this now. These seraphims began to cry
one to another. They cried back and forth one
to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of His
glory. One cried to another, holy, holy,
holy. We talk about the thrice holy
God. This is what we're talking about.
God's holy as the Father, He's holy as the Son, and the Holy
Ghost. They're all holy, but God is
holy. And they cried that one to another. God is infinitely, eternally,
immutably holy in all His ways. And they repeated for the greater
assurance and establishment of the fact that God is holy. You
know His angels are called holy. His word is called holy. His
throne is called holy. Everything about God is holy.
And if there's one thing that you can say about God is holy,
and you can put holy in front of every one of His attributes.
Every one of them. Holy love. Holy wrath. Holy righteousness. God is holy. Holy, holy, holy. And I tell
you what, if there's one attribute that the Word of God emphasizes
more than anything else about the nature of God is God is holy. Paul told Timothy, he says this,
said, when the Lord Jesus Christ appears, he shall show who is
the only Potentate, and that's capitalized. I know they have
these lodges and stuff where they call them Potentates. There
ain't but one Potentate. That means one that has all power,
all authority, unquestioning power, unquestioning authority.
And then He'll show who is the King of kings and Lord of lords
and that He dwells in a light that no man can approach unto,
that no man has seen nor can see at any time. Now that's who
He's talking about here. And I'll tell you that's why
You know that's why, you know that's one reason why our service
is so reverential. I remember somebody come to our
service, I don't remember exactly who it was, but they said those
people reverence God. They reverence God. They're quiet,
they're reverential. Most preachers couldn't preach
unless somebody was shouting and hollering and carrying on.
They couldn't have anything to say. But that's the point. You're communicating with people
and God communicates with us through His Word and through
the Gospel. And we want to sit and we want
to hear what God says. We're in God's presence. We're
here sitting beside one another but we've gathered here in the
presence of the Lord Himself. That's a wonderful place to be.
And you know why we can feel so full of joy and reverence
and awe is because we can approach God. He's made a way for us to
approach Him. Even though He's holy, infinitely,
eternally, immutably holy, we can approach Him. How? By and
through His blessed Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Huh? And look what Isaiah done now.
How's his response to seeing the Lord? Watch his response
to seeing them seraphims. Watch his response to hearing
about God's holiness. Look what he said in verse 5.
Then said I, woe is me. You ever felt that way? Oh my,
woe is me. I'm undone. I'm undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. You
know what he means by unclean lips? Out of the abundance of
the heart, the mouth speaks. And my lips expose what's in
my heart. My lips tell what I am as a person. And that's why he said, woe is
me, my lips are unclean. What comes out of this mouth
is what's in the heart. And I tell you, look what he
said now. And he said, oh, listen, woe
is me. And not only of our men of unclean
lips, but everybody I live among is a people of unclean lips. And how did you come to this
conclusion? For mine eyes have seen the King,
the Lord of hosts. You can't see Him high and lifted
up like He did and not see yourself as low as you can go. You can't
get low enough. You can't get low enough. Alright,
now look over here in 2 Chronicles 26. Let's look at a few things
over here now. He's talking about in the year
that King Uzziah died. Is there a connection between
the death of King Uzziah and Isaiah's vision? Who was King
Uzziah? What relationship did he have
with Isaiah? How did he die? Well, I'm going
to try to tell you. I'm going to try to tell you.
Look what it says there in verse 22 here, 2 Chronicles 26. What's
the connection between Isaiah and King Uzziah? Now the rest of the acts of Uzziah,
first and last, did Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amos, write. So Isaiah wrote down the things
that Uzziah did. He was a prophet in the time
of the reign of Uzziah. And he wrote about the acts and
the rule. The acts that he done and the rule that he had as a
king. But now let's start here in verse chapter 1 and go down
through here and just deal with a few things at a time. And we'll
see the relationship between Isaiah and how Uzziah died. Then all the people of Judah
took Uzziah, who was sixteen years old, made him king in the
room of his father Amaziah. He built Eloth and restored it
to Judah. And after that, that king slept
with his father. His father did. Sixteen years
old. was Uzziah when he began to reign.
He reigned fifty and two years in Jerusalem. His mother's name
also was Jecolah of Jerusalem. Now listen to this, and he did
that which was right in the sight of the Lord according to all
that his father did. Uzziah was a good king, a good
king. Oh boy, you know, It's a good
thing, we don't have kings, but just giving aside, I've always
cared about my country. I've always loved my country.
But I've got a heaviness for my country now in the last few
months that I've never had before. A concern for it, a burden for
it. I really do. I really do. And
you know we, Uzziah was a good king. A very good king. And he
did that which was right in the sight of the Lord. He sought
the Lord and God made him to prosper. And even helped him
in battle. Look down verse 7 and 8. Look
what it said. And God helped him. against the
Philistines and against the Arabians that dwelt in Jeroboam and Manum
and the Ammonites gave gift to Uzziah and his name spread abroad
even to the inner end of Egypt for he strengthened himself exceedingly. Oh my, he sought the Lord and
God made him to prosper. God helped him defeat all of
his enemies. And he served the people. He
loved the people that he was serving. He built towers. Look
down at verse 10. He built towers and dug lots
of wells and planted vineyards for the people. Also, he built
towers in the desert, digged many wells, for he had much cattle,
both in the low country and in the plains, husbands also and
vine dressers in the mountains and in Carmel. And so listen,
he was a good, good king, done lots and lots of wonderful things.
And he had a huge army. He had a great army. Look in
12 verses 12 and 13. The whole number of the chief
of the fathers of the mighty men of valor were 2,600. And
under their hand was an army 300,000 and 7,500 that made war
with mighty power to help the king against the enemy. Oh my! He was not only that but
he was a brilliant leader. He was a brilliant, brilliant
leader. Look what it says down there in verse 15. And he made
in Jerusalem engines, invented by cunning men to be upon the
towers, upon the bulwarks, to shoot arrows at great stones
with them. And his name spread abroad, far
abroad, for he was marvelously helped, for he was strong." Look
what it says there, marvelously helped till he was strong. But
now I tell you they have all these wonderful things that they
said about Uzziah. Good king. Wonderful king. Loved
the people. Served them well. God prospered
him. God blessed him. Started when
he was 16 years old. Ruled for 52 years. 52 years. But he made a serious,
serious, serious and fatal I won't say mistake, I'm going
to say he did an awful, an awful and fatal decision which led
him to his utter destruction and led him to his death. Now
look what it says here in verse 16. Here's where he messed up,
but when he was strong, when he was strong, Oh my, when he
was strong, as long as God was helping him, as long as God was
meeting his needs, as long as God was helping him up, but then
he got strong. He got strong in his own power,
got strong in his own mind, got strong in his own idea, got strong
in his imagination. Thought he had the power to do
anything he wanted to do. He was mighty. He was awful proud
of his accomplishments. He was free, free from the fear
of the enemies. But his heart was so overcome
by his importance. Look what he did now. When he
was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction. Oh my. You know what God does to a proud
heart? He won't put up with a proud
heart. He won't do it. He won't let me and you have
one. And I tell you what he'll do, he'll break that thing again. Don't get proud sometimes. Oh yes, it gets full of itself.
We're pretty good about getting pretty full of ourselves. But
I'll tell you one thing, when we feel like we're strong, that's
when God's gonna let us know that we ain't got no strength
at all. And when he was strong, his heart, his heart was lifted
up. To what? His own destruction.
How in the world can that be? For he transgressed against the
Lord his God. Well, how did he do it? He went
into the temple of the Lord to burn incense upon the altar of
incense. Oh my, he was feeling so good
about himself. He is mighty, proud of his accomplishments,
free from the fear of all of his enemies. And I tell you why
he was filled so full of himself and so full of his own importance
that he went into the temple, into the holy place, where the
altar of incense was. He went in there with incense.
The scripture says the Lord went in there to burn incense upon
the altar of incense. And I tell you what, and none,
none, none but the priest might enter to offer incense upon that
altar. But he decided he was going to do it. Now look what
happened here in verse 17 and 18. And Azariah, the priest,
he was a high priest. He went in after him. He saw
him go in, went in after him. And he took 80 priests with him.
of the Lord that were valiant men. And they withstood King
Uzziah the King. They said, King, don't do this.
Do not do this. Do not burn incense under the
Lord. It's only the priests, the sons
of Aaron that are consecrated to burn in sin. You've not been
consecrated to that. You've not been set aside to
that. For thou hast trespassed, and listen to what he says here
now. Neither shall be thine honor before the Lord God. And you'll
not get no honor from God by doing this. And oh, I mean listen
to this now, beloved. No man, no man, not even a king
was permitted to offer incense, to offer sacrifices, to do anything,
to do anything. And then priests went in there,
the high priest and 80 other priests, surrounded that king
and said, stop! Don't do this! You're not getting
no honor, God's not going to get no glory out of this. You're
not going to come out of this very well. and they told him
that such an act would destroy him and dishonor him before God
and no matter I'm telling you beloved you know this well as
I do no matter how sincere nor how great a man may be this utter
and absolute foolishness to violate God's holiness it really is it
really really is you know That's one thing I love about the gospel
that is so precious about the gospel. The gospel deals with
everybody exactly the same. Exactly the same. And that's
why, you know, for somebody to say that they're taking some
bread and some wine and they actually turn that into the body
and blood of Christ. They transform it into the body.
If you take the bread, you're actually eating the body of Christ.
If you drink the wine, you're actually drinking the blood of
Christ. Now, that's called transubstantiation. And our Lord, when He talked
about eating His flesh and drinking His blood, He was talking about
spiritually speaking. Because He said that when He
got down to sin and all, He said no flesh in glory in His presence.
Well, here was a king that was glorying in himself, in his own
self-importance, And I tell you what, and then the priest went
in there and said, King, I don't care who you are. You may be
a king. You may have all power. You may
have the greatest authority. You may be sincere as you can
possibly be. But you're a fool to come in
here and try to do this. You're a fool to come in here
and try to do this. But you think the king would
stop? And turn around and leave? No, he didn't do that. Look what
it says now then. And then verse 19, well he got
angry. He got angry. Who in the world
of you fellas think you are? I'm the king. I'm the king. And he had a censer in his hand.
He took a censer in there with him to burn incense. And oh my. Instead of listening to the priest
and leaving the temple, look what happened to him. And while
he was angry with the priest, listen to what happened. The
leprosy even rose up in his forehead before the priest in the house
of the Lord from beside the altar, incense altar. Instead of he
just going to bullhead his way in there, he had his senses going
to do it. God smote him. Ain't that what
it says? God smote him. And that's what
it says down there in the last part of verse 20. Because the
Lord had smitten him. Now we say all the time that
God's the first cause of everything. But there's a good instance of
it. There's a good instance of it.
God's got the instrument to take us out of this world already
fixed. Already fixed that that's wonderful. That's wonderful and all listen
to what he says here now and he became leprosy He became a
leper Then look what he says about him in verse 23 Suaz I
slept with his fathers and they buried him with his fathers in
the field of the bear which belonged to the Kings where they said
he is a leper and he is a leper and I tell you what when he died
and he had to they thrust him out in verse 20 they thrust him
out because the Lord has smitten him and Uzziah the king was a
leper under the day of his death and he had to dwell in one house
because he was cut off from the house of the Lord Oh my, God
said you went too far. You went too far. Now let me
tell you a few things here. Isaiah, when he saw Uzziah, and
when he saw how Uzziah died, and the reason he died, and how
presumptuous he was, and how full of his self-importance he
was, Isaiah learned some things in the year that King Uzziah
died. He said, I saw the Lord. I saw myself. You can't see the
Lord and see yourself. Most people say that they got
it backwards. They got the cart before the horse. They say they
see their sinfulness and then they start seeking the Lord.
No, you see the Lord first. That's when you see your sinfulness. People that don't see the Lord
and ain't never seen the Lord, they don't know a thing in the
world about sin. You know what sin is to them?
The way you dress, where you go, what you do, what you don't
do, what you say, what you don't say, what you chew, what you
don't chew, what you smoke, what you don't smoke, what you drink,
what you don't drink. It's always touch, taste, and
handle not. Everything's, you know, but here
he said, I saw the Lord, when I saw the Lord, I saw myself. You cannot see the Lord and not
see yourself. And I'll tell you something,
beloved, the more we see of Him, the higher He gets and the holier
He gets to us, the more we see of how wretched we really are. That's why we desperately, desperately
need Him. Why do we need Him? Because of
who we are. And I'll tell you what, He said,
He saw myself and then I saw the condition of everybody else
around me. Said everybody I lived among,
right in the midst of the people I live among. I thought I was
bad, but I look around and everybody is as bad as I am. I know they don't know it, but
we know it. And here's what he learned, he said, God is holy. When he saw Uzziah died and he
went in that temple, he said, I found out God is holy and he
will not be intruded upon, even by a king. God is holy, infinitely,
indescribably holy in all of his ways, in all of his acts,
in his very nature. And the scriptures teaches us
that he will in no wise, no wise clear the guilty. And he will
not, listen to me, he won't receive any man unless that man is holy
as God himself. People say, be ye holy as God
is holy. How are you going to be holy
as God is holy? You can't do that by the flesh. You can't
do it by church membership. You can't do it by being a Calvinist.
There's only one way for God to make a man holy and that's
to regard him and view him in his blessed son. Christ is our
righteousness. Christ is our sanctification.
Now the only way... When I first come down here,
you know what they call me? They call me that little homeless
preacher. When I come down here, I was a bench-jumping Pentecostal. And I'll tell you what, if it
moved, I had a double barrel shotgun. Boom, boom, boom. I
just blasted it and everything. God had mercy on me. Oh, God
had mercy on me. Oh, I finally saw the Lord. And
when I saw the Lord, I put my shotgun down. I put my legalism
down. I put all them works down. I put all my false hopes down. I put all my preaching down.
I put everything down. Put it away! Because God won't clear the guilty
until He makes that man holy. And God called us with a holy
calling. Not according to our works. And
I tell you beloved, He will not speak to nor be spoken to by
a sinful creature. He's unapproachable except through
a mediator. And that mediator is the Lord
Jesus Christ Himself. Here's the second thing he learned.
When he saw the Lord, he saw himself and he saw the condition
of everybody around him. And here's what he saw. He said,
men are sinners. All men are sinners. Well, you
know, all men are sinners. There's none that do a good no
not one. There's none righteous no not
one. And every imagination of the man's heart is only evil
continually. A man, a woman asked this man,
this preacher to come and visit her husband in the hospital.
He's dying. Would you come visit him? Yeah,
I'll come visit him. He sat down and started reading the Bible
to this man. Talking to him about Christ. talking to him about
a Savior. And God commanded, this is what
he said, this is the commandment that we have received. He that
believeth on the Son hath life, he that believeth not hath not
life. One preacher used those verses,
went down through there. And he asked that man, he said,
are you a sinner? And he replied real quickly, no I'm
not. I've got a lot of things wrong with me, but I'm not a
sinner." Closed up his Bible and walked out. Never said another
word. Why'd he do that? Because Christ
came to save sinners. And you can read a Bible to them.
You can bring the best preacher you want to to them. You can
quote every Bible verse under the sun. Watch somebody raised
from the dead. And they can see a miracle. And
it will not bring them to Christ. The only thing that will bring
a man to Christ is to see the Lord. And only God can make a
man see the Lord. Huh? And I tell you, all men
are sinners. And I tell you, He found this
out too. That there is a way to God. There is a way to God. Our God in His blessed grace
and mercy determined, determined to redeem a people. To pay their
sin debt, to sanctify a people. And to bring a people to Himself
out of every tribe, every kindred, every tongue. But He can only
do it now consistent, consistent with His holiness, consistent
with His righteousness, consistent with His truth. He's got to be
just. He's got to be just. And He's
got to be the only one that can justify you. He'll be both merciful
and righteous. He's a just God and a Savior. Look in Isaiah 45. Look in there with me for a moment. Isaiah 45. You know, there is
a way to God. And I'm so thankful there is.
It'd be awful to not have a way to God. Most folks, they think they've
got it all figured out. The preachers that's done told
them, said, you know, you made a decision for Jesus back when
you was 15 years old. You're all right. And then if
they go back to the world, you know what they say? And if they
go out there and they die, they say, well, I was there. I was
there. I know they're saved. I was there.
I don't care who was there, if God wasn't there and you was
a sinner, you don't know God, you don't know Christ. You leave
the gospel, you leave Christ, you leave the gospel and you
leave the only hope you have. Ain't that right? There ain't no more sacrifices.
And what a shame, what a shame to tell somebody because they
made a profession when they was a kid, but that fixed them up
for eternity. Isaiah when he saw the Lord he
was a prophet of God. He wrote down what it was I did
And then he said when he died, I saw something I never saw before And oh my look here in Isaiah
45 look down here in verse 20 and This is what the Lord says here
for us to do. Assemble yourselves. Get yourselves,
assemble yourselves and come. And all of you draw near together. Ye that are escaped out of the
nations, and they that have no knowledge, that set up the wood
of their graven image, and pray unto a God that cannot save. Tell ye, and bring them near. Yea, let them take counsel together.
all these folks and their false gods who hath declared this from
ancient time who hath told it from that time have not I the
Lord and there is no God else beside me a just God and a Savior
there is none beside me and look what he says look unto me look
unto me and be ye saved go to the ends of the earth wherever
I go I said I'm the God and there's nothing else and I've sworn by
myself the words going out of my mouth and it went out in righteousness
and it ain't coming back that under me ever knee shall bow
ever tongue shall swear surely surely shall one say in the Lord
have I righteousness oh God gave me a righteousness and he gave
me strength Even to him in Christ shall all men come and in verse
25 and the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified He
could save all his people. Oh my so he there's a way to
God he found that out And he found out this when he saw the
Lord on that throne He said the Lord Jesus Christ has to be the
only way and Our Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God,
came down to this earth made of a woman, made under the law
to redeem us out from under that law. He is our surety. He is our righteousness by His
obedience. He is our sacrifice. He is our
sin offering. He is our atonement by His blessed
death. He is our risen justifier. And our great high priest, who
right now, God's right hand intercedes for us. And you know what he
says? No man cometh unto the Father,
but by thee. Ain't you glad God taught you
that? Ain't you? You know, we're all a bunch of
Isaiahs. We saw the Lord, and oh my, we
ain't got over yet, have we? No, we ain't got over it yet.
And I'll tell you why. The Old Testament priests, they
were appointed, consecrated, set apart by God Himself. And
they were just pictures and types of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
is our Great High Priest. They entered the holy place that
Christ entered heaven. The incense they burned is the
prayers of Christ. The sacrifices they offered is
the blood of Christ. And the fact that only the priest
could offer a suitable sacrifice reveals that only Christ himself
can effectually bring a sinner to God. We know Uzziah the king
presumed upon himself he ignored the priest he ignored God's way
he ignored everything that they told him and he looked to his
own person I'm the king and he looked to his own works and I
tell you one thing Don't never do that. If you're going to come
to God, come to Him the way He appointed, through His blessed
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And if you ever come that way,
you know what you'll do? You'll just keep coming that
way. You'll just keep coming that way. Huh? Ain't that right? You're just going to keep coming
the way you first come. You first come as a sinner, and
you first come to a Savior. And we're sinners, keep coming
to us. Amen. Amen. Our Father, oh, blessed, blessed
Savior, thank you for allowing us to meet here tonight. Thank
you again for your Word. Oh, your Word is such a blessing.
Oh, what a blessing your Word is. Lord, please keep us back
from presumptuous sins. Keep us back from secret faults. Lord, let our thoughts always
be of the highest when we think of God. We think of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Let us always exalt Him in our
thinking. Exalt Him in our words. Exalt
Him in our actions. Never come, never come except
through and by and because of Him and what He did. Lord, we
thank You for our Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for our
great high priest. We thank you for him that sits
upon that throne now. And because of him, we now come
to a throne of grace to obtain mercy and find help in a time
of need. Amen. Amen. There is a name I
love to hear. I love to sing its word. It sounds like music in my ear,
the sweetest name on earth. Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus. Oh, how I love Jesus. See you, son.