Seeking for the help of the Lord, I pray for your prayerful attention to Isaiah chapter 13, and reading for our text, words in the middle of verse 21. We shall speak the whole verse, but I don't want to lose the message of these words. This is the way, walk ye in it. The whole verse reads, Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left.

The text is in a portion of the word that begins verse 18, Therefore will the Lord wait that he may be gracious unto you. And right through these verses there is that expectation of the Lord's gracious hand, gracious dealings with His people. In the earlier part of this chapter, the Prophet speaks of the people as being a rebellious people, a people that kept turning out of the way, that would not hear the word of the Lord. But when we come to our text, we have a picture of the Lord's gracious dealings even when they turn out of the way, in fact, giving them clearly to know what is the Lord's way.

You might wonder how is it in the context here that the word that is heard is actually behind. We have in John 10, The Lord saying that my sheep they hear my voice and they follow me. So the Lord is in front of them, the voice of the Lord is going before them, how is it then behind them? But then you read the latter part of our text, it is when he turned to the right hand and when he turned to the left. So in other words, they're turning away, instead of their face toward the Lord, their backs are being towards Him, they're turning out of the way, and that is when they hear the word behind them that is bringing them back into the One. Now, the context again.

Verse 20, Though the Lord give you the bread of adversity. There are many times that the way that's We are called to walk as a way that the flesh will turn away from. We don't want to walk in that way. And the propensity is to turn from it. Or it may be that we are mindful of the Word. There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death, and we might fear that that way, though it is such a rough and such a hard way, maybe that is not the way after all.

And then it is most comforting, reassuring for the Lord Himself to say, this is the way. What a blessed thing it is that it is the Lord that will tell his people what is the way for them and not them choosing the way themselves. And so we have in our text the identification of the way, this is the way, and then the exhortation and the command to walk in that way. And I hope it will be a strength, maybe a word of direction, and a help to some here. to have this word opened as I hope the Spirit will help to open it up. So on to the three points. Firstly, the Lord's affirming the way for us. And especially in the context when we are likely to be turning away and thinking that's not the way. We need the Lord to confirm it is the way.

And then, when that is done so, to have the exhortation or the command to walk ye in it. And then lastly, the grace promised. If we look at verse 19, He will be very gracious unto thee. at the voice of thy cry, when he shall hear it, he will answer thee." If the Lord gives us a way and tells us to walk in it, he will give us grace to walk in it.

I want to look then, firstly, the Lord's affirming the way for us. And this is why we read John 14, in verse 6 especially, because I believe it is as good as right to begin there where our Lord Jesus Christ Himself so clearly in the Scriptures of truth sets forth before us the way. The Lord Jesus saith unto him, this is Thomas, when he said, we know not whither thou goest, how can we know the way? And our Lord answers, I am the way, the truth and the life, no man cometh unto the Father, but by men. Maybe in a gospel day, Having been brought up under the sound of the truth, perhaps this chapter being read many times, you say, well, of course we know the Lord Jesus Christ is the Word.

But do we? Do we really know? No, the Lord had to say to them that He'd been with them a long time. Has they not known Me, Philip? If they have seen Me, they have seen the Father also. We can have as it were the truth right before us, but not see it or perceive it.

The Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, the Eternal Son of God, the only Name given among men whereby we must be saved, it is through Him, and through Him alone comes the salvation of the people of God. The Gospel instead of the Law. We always do remember that. The preaching of the cross is the preaching of the gospel, good news for sinners. And it is a way of following a suffering saviour. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

Yea, my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. And in our text there's a command to walk in a way, but we need to know that way. In Maitre says, his track I see, the narrow way I will pursue till him Paul, he says, let us run the race that is set before us looking unto Jesus. Paul also says, be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ.

And then we have in Hebrews 11, a long cloud of witnesses and they all died not having seen the promises or had them realized in seeing the Lord come, but embraced them, seen them afar off and embraced them, confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims in the earth. And they're those that say such things, they declare plainly that they seek a country, but they walk the way of faith, but not any faith, the faith of Jesus Christ that came from the Lord Jesus Christ and that centers in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And that is the way they walk through this world. And in one sense, it is the mindset, the aim of the people of God. And you think of Hebrews 11, They outwardly, they didn't all build arcs, they didn't all leave their place as Abraham did to go where he was told. They didn't all walk that same outward path, but they all walked with the same mindset of faith with their eye upon the Lord. His way, His promises, His guidance, what He had planned, and purpose for their lives. And you cannot read Hebrews 11 without thinking how different were all of their lives.

But they all had one aim. And they all had one way that they were walking. Walking after the Lord Jesus Christ. Seeking to know Him. Seeking to walk in His way. a gospel way, under the covenant of grace, not under the covenant of works. It's a beautiful thing to realize those two covenants, Old Testament, New Testament, covenant of works, covenant of grace, that is right through the Word of God. Our first parents and we under the covenant of works, we're under the sentence of death. The wrath of God is upon us. We have broken that covenant. It cannot be repaired. It can only be fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And so right from the very start, the Lord starts to reveal and open up a covenant of grace. He gives a promise in the Garden of Eden of the seed of the woman that should bruise the serpent's head. Why should He do that? What has there been in Adam or Eve and in their works to merit any such promise?

Nothing. All of grace. They've rebelled, they've served Satan, they've followed him, and the Lord comes in with a gracious promise. Grace stamped upon him. Let me think of Noah, and coming out of the ark was the grace of God that gave a deliverance, an ark, a hiding place where The rest of the world was destroyed. But after the flood, the Lord still says that the imagination of man's heart is only evil continually.

But then He sets a bow in the cloud. He makes a covenant. He makes a promise. He smells the sweet smell when the sacrifice is offered. I will not again smite the earth with a curse. Again. a covenant of grace and agreement that is all of God's free unmerited favour.

And then he unfolds the covenant to Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, beautiful promises to Abraham in thee and in thy seed shall all nations be blessed. And Paul says, he says, not unto Caesar's of many, but of seed which is one, which is Christ. And so it's opened up through the prophets, Isaiah especially, all of their promises. We think of David, although my house be not so with God, yet hath he made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.

This is all my salvation and all my desire, although he make it not to grow. I love that verse. The beautiful promises in the center of it are hemmed with an although. Although his house wasn't so with God. There is his faults, his failings, then comes the beautiful promise, and after it, though it's all his salvation, all his desire, the Lord made it not to grow. How many of the Lord's people would say, I've got the promises of the Lord, how I've improved them, how I've been blessed unto them, how I'm so much better, Much rather we look and we say, I'm profitable servant. We haven't done that which we should. We haven't walked in the way that we should have walked in.

But that covenant is just as sure. It stands not on a strength of the obedience of those for whom it is made, but on the obedience of the one who made it, the Lord Jesus Christ. And so when the Lord sets forth himself, I am the way. It is a way of grace. It is a way of the provision of himself. As Abraham was told, my son, God will provide himself a land for a burnt offering.

And we have to remember this. If we think of Paul's epistle to the Galatians, They were a people that first received the way as Christ alone. And then in come teachers, oh you need to still fulfill the law, you need to do this, you need to be circumcised. And he said, that's another gospel. That is not the way. The way is in the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Gospel is those healing streams, it's oil and wine to heal and cherish. It is that which comforts a poor sinner, that bears him up. And when he looks for wrath, it shows him mercy. When he beats upon his breast, God be merciful to me a sinner, it sends him home justified rather than the other one. Now the way is highlighted in the Word of God. May we never Never mar that blessed way of grace, of mercy, the way of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I believe that was one reason why Moses was not allowed to enter into the land of Canaan. He was told to speak unto the rock. It had already been smitten once. But Moses, it was said, he did not sanctify the Lord before the people. Moses struck the rock twice and said, must I bring you water out of this rock, you rebels? The water came out abundantly.

But you know, the Lord doesn't say, must I die for you rebels? Must I show mercy to you rebels? Must I help you? Must I show grace to you? He doesn't begrudgingly give the blessings of the gospel. He gives them with a smile. He gives them lovingly, freely. It's not enough.

Say if we had something we wanted someone to give, to a friend or relative of ours and that person that we were going to have her given to, they'd been quite rebellious and maybe a son or a daughter and they hadn't been very good and this friend that we asked to give the gift to them knew what that son had done to us. But we gave them that gift and said, give it to her. We give it with love. And then we heard that that person said, here you are, this is from your father or so, all your rebelliousness, your hardness, here you are, you have this gift. And we think, that's not the spirit I gave that gift in. They haven't represented me rightly at all. I wanted that given with love and freely.

And you admire that. The Gospel is given. We're the greatest of love by the Lord to his dear people. And we have to remember that way. Law and terror do work hard, and all the while they work alone, but a sense of blood fought partly soon dissolves the heart of stone. I believe there's some of you here. You've proved it, and you've known it. Well, this is the first way. Then I want to look as being in this way of the Lord and in the way of the Gospel, those things that are bound up with the way. And I begin first with the context here, the path of affliction.

Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivereth them out of them all. Our Lord says that in the world you shall have tribulation or great trouble. These things I have spoken unto you that you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation. But it is the Lord that chooses that tribulation, not ourselves.

He chooses it as the way for each one of His particular people. whether it is pain, illness in themselves, whether it is affliction in a loved one, so that there is caring, so that then there's a burden of seeing a loved one afflicted and trying. There's those afflictions that are in the body, The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but then there is afflictions in the mind, but a wounded spirit who can bear. And all of these things are brought into the path of the people of God. And often, when first coming into it, or perhaps when it continues for a long period of time, the soul starts to turn aside from the way, stop recognizing it as the way, fretting against the way, looking for some other way. But what a confirmation when the Lord shines upon that particular affliction, particular burden, and He says, this is the way. What a difference when the Lord puts a stamp on it. You're not out of the way, this is the way.

Then we have the way of holiness. We have an old nature, sinful nature, nature that loves the things of this world. We're told without holiness no man shall see the Lord. And it's important for us to remember two aspects regarding holiness. The first is this, the holiness of a child of God by which they will stand faultless before the throne is in Christ alone. It's His righteousness, His perfect holiness that we stand before God.

The second is where we are exhorted to walk holy, godly lives and where God works in our lives to sanctify us and to make us more like Him, to vessel and to honour and not dishonour, where He uses trials and tribulations, chastening, to make us as His bride, to present unto us through the washing of water by the Word, us as spotless before Him. And of course our standing is in Christ alone, but they, we are told, to make the profession of Christ, they that name the name of Christ, depart from iniquity.

But to walk in that way, the flesh hates it, it doesn't like it. You get a picture in Hebrews 12, ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin." Is that a nice way to walk? To have to resist all the time, day by day, a defiled nature? To be like David in Psalm 38, my loins are filled with a loathsome disease? You read in that Psalm how he mourns over the sin and that which is in him. And the old nature doesn't take kindly to be told, no, you're not going that way, you're going a different way. And it kicks against him.

But to have the Lord say, no, my way is a holy way. You say, yes, but I've tried and tried to walk in it, and I've failed so much, I'm still as sinful, still as base as I was at the beginning. But the Lord still says, that way you go is a way of holiness.

Follow after me, Paul, he says in Romans 8. The law is fulfilled in us, which walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. To be spiritually minded is life and peace, to be calmly minded is death. And yet for a poor sinner walking in that way, even the Apostle Paul says, he says, I keep under my body, lest if I preach to others, I myself should be a cast away.

If any think that the way of the Lord is an easy way, A way that gets no opposition from the world, the flesh or the devil. You are mistaken. The way of the Lord is one with constant warfare. One of our hymns speaks of that. When a child of God is first quickened from that moment, his conflict begins. And you might think, and you might think, well, surely I'm out of the way. I couldn't be so sinful, couldn't be so vile, couldn't have to have, after I've been in the way 40 years, still to wrestle, still, this trouble with my old nature, still feel such a sinner.

To have the Lord say, this is the way. Death, which puts an end to life, will also put an end to sin. but not before. Then we have the way of truth. Our Lord said that, I am the way, the truth and the life. Pilate asked Him, what is truth? A good definition of truth is the reality viewed from God's perspective.

We were to go down to the sea and look out over the sea, and we saw two ships. One was going one way, and the other was going towards the other one. And we'd look, and we'd hold our breath and wait, because they're going to hit. They looked like they were going to hit. But then, lo and behold, they passed, and one is going away, and they're going away from each other now. And if we were to look up from the sky and look down, it's probably two miles between those ships. But from our perspective, it looked like they were going to hit.

How do we know God's perspective? How do we see things in His light? Is it not in the Word of God? Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path. That's God's perspective, that is the truth, and that is what faith holds on to. Faith, the evidence of things not seen, but faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of the Lord.

That there's some way, sometimes, you might have the word, might be applied through the ministry, might read it, brought to our remembrance by the Holy Spirit, and think, How can I walk that way? And we start to reason then, we start to go over in our mind, we think, that can't be the right way, surely, surely that direction is not right. Now often like in the life of dear Jacob, you know, Jacob is a pattern through his life, where he ventures He starts out and then the Lord meets with him and confirms and blesses him.

He did it right at the start. He left home, he don't read any word from the Lord or any direction or assurance or anything and then he lies down stone through his pillows and the Lord appears for him. It's almost the same when he came back from Laban. It certainly was the same when he saw the wagons. He was told that Joseph was alive. The spirit of Jacob revived and Israel said, Joseph is yet alive, I'll go and see him before I die. All he'd seen was the wagons and he'd heard his sons. Seemed to be impossible. But then as he ventures the first night, the Lord meets with him, blesses him, shows him in a vision, Joseph is yet alive, you'll see him.

I'll bring you down into Egypt, I'll bring you back again." For there's a venture in first, and then the Lord appeared for him. Going because the Word of Truth set you in that way. As you walk in that way of truth, you walk it because it is the way of truth. Another way is the way of obedience, really in a way quite attached to it. I want to split up with the ordinances. Sometimes when we speak about obedience, we immediately think, oh, open profession. But dear friends, in all of our life, we are to be obedient to the word of the Lord. Solemn case of Saul of Tarsus. No, sorry, not Saul of Tarsus, King Saul. King Saul. He was sent to destroy Amalek. Everything. Samuel comes and meets him when he comes back.

And Saul says, I have performed the commandment of the Lord. So Samuel says, well, what means this pleading in my ears then? So Saul makes excuse for that if the people kept the best facts and offerings for the Lord. But Samuel says to obey is better than sacrifice. Rebellion is the sin of witchcraft. Saul it appeared had in his own head that he was obeying. He had walked in the way of the Lord. He chose what to obey. He chose how to obey. And he thought that was acceptable.

You've got the solemn reminders of Aaron's son struck dead for offering strange fire. Why, the Lord said, I commanded it not. Wasn't fire from heaven that kindled on the altar? They kindled it themselves. Sparks of their own kindling. Lord struck them dead. You think of Uzzah struck dead for stabilizing the ark when the oxen shook it. Why? Because it should have been carried on the shoulders of the Levites. David heard the rod. He heard the direction. The next time when they bought it, he made sure they did it in the right way.

We can have an obedience and think that we are obeying God, but really all we're doing is we are choosing what we are going to do and saying to God, you've got to accept what I'm doing. I'm doing it with a sincere heart. I'm doing this as a sacrifice to you. But the Lord hasn't commanded that. It is not obedience to Him.

And so when the Lord shows us the way to then be obedient, whatever that is in our lives, that we are called to do and called to walk in, our Lord spoke of those that, too, that were told to go and work in His vineyard. One said, I go, but he went not. The other said, I go not, but afterward repented and went. And the Lord asked those around, He said, which of these did the will of His Father? The one that went, the one that repented. How many, as it were, resist what they, even in their heart, know is the way of the Lord.

It's a good thing. If we have turned to the right or to the left, And then we hear the Lord's voice, this is the way, that then there is a turning, then there is a walking in it. Maybe it's a word for some here. Here's one thing is sure, if we've turned out the way and the Lord brings the Lord's servant with the word to assert what is the way, then you will hear it. Our text says, Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee. God has a way of causing his people to hear. Hear ye the rod and who hath appointed it. It is a blessed thing if we do hear and do take and do obey what the Lord has bid us to do.

And then there is of course the ordinances of the Lord's house. Baptism and the Lord's supper, the command of the Lord to his servants to preach the gospel, he that believeth and is baptised shall be saved, he that believeth not shall be damned. It is the Lord's will. It is the way the Lord would have for his people to walk in that ordinance. It is only given through ordinances to the house of God Baptism and the Lord's Supper, one showing forth his death, burial and resurrection, and the other showing forth his shed blood and broken body.

Ordinances that unite the Church of God absolutely completely. We might all have very, very different experiences, very different things that we've been through in life. that every one of the Lord's dear people have been buried with the Lord, crucified with Him, risen again.

That's the first resurrection, you know. I once used to think that the first resurrection was a call by grace. In one sense it is. But the first resurrection is our Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead. And in Him rising, His people rose with Him. And so those that are called, those that are blessed with eternal life, they have a part in that first resurrection. And baptism signifies that, a union with Christ in His death and in His rising again. And not every child of God has that same interest in Christ and in that blood that was When I see the blood, I will pass over you.

Dear friend, if you know and love the Lord, He's called you, He's blessed you with His grace, then this is the way in the ordinances of God's house. Let me think of a marriage. Young man, young woman may be exercised concerning marriage, concerning a young person.

How needful that there be that clear from the Lord that He say, this is the way. It is His ordinance, His way, not like today, living together unmarried or whatever. But for a particular person, This is the one God has appointed for me to live the rest of my life with, to walk together with. One that fears the Lord, not unequally owed together. It's a good thing to really have that mark upon the beginning of a marriage union. This is the way.

What about providence? And I just close these ways in this way because, as the Himalayas said, providence unfolds the book and makes its counsel shine. Many of you will have known in either schooling or employment, a place to live, a place to worship, the Lord's direction, this is the way.

And it's a good thing to be able to see the Lord's appointment. It is not chance, it is not just something that has happened without the Lord's guidance, without the Lord's appointing. And to have this stand. I've often said, I would much, much rather be in a way, whether it is in church or pastored or wherever it is, that was in much trial, perplexity, disappointment, sorrows, but no, it was the way the Lord had appointed me to be in, and to be in a place where everything was smooth and prosperous and going well, but there was this thought within, I am not sure whether I should be here or not. I'm not sure whether the Lord really brought me here.

And we know the law doesn't make mistakes, and providence, it will show that, but it is a blessed thing, especially when there's trials in the path, to be able to look back and see many, many way marks, and to be sure that I am, I haven't made a mistake in the way, I am in that way. We'll want to look then, secondly, it must be brief, but the exhortation to walk in it. It's one thing to identify the way, it's another thing to walk in it. Do remember that. You may hear a sermon and you say, I recognize that, that's me. But you go home and you're no different. There's no change. You don't actually walk in it. There's not a taking up of the cross. There's not an obedience to that way that you actually acknowledge is the right way.

There's some excuse. There's some reason why not. But if the Lord's made the way clear, The two things are joined together here. And there's a reason why there's the two. He doesn't say, Thine ear shall hear a word behind thee saying this is the way when ye turn to the right hand and when ye turn to the left. You could read it and you'd think that flows together nicely, doesn't it? But it's left out, the walking in it then. How are we to walk in it?

Fretful? Rebellious? Unwilling? Doubting? Angry? What is our spirit in walking in the way of the Lord? It doesn't make it an easy path. but our third point shows really how. You know, our flesh, we are not called to, just with the strength of our mind and will, to do things.

That's the world, we'll do it that way. We have a living God, a God who hears and answers prayer. God who has appointed the way and knows our frame, remembers that we are but dust. God who will be glorified and honored in helping us, in appearing for us. You think of Abraham.

The Lord had shown to him a way, he was to have a son. And the promise was through that son, but the son doesn't come. Sarah's barren, she's getting older and older. So Abraham puts his hand to it and he gets a son through Hagar, Ishmael. But God says that's not the way, that's not the promise.

My way is through an impossibility, something that you cannot perform and you cannot do, but I can. And the Lord did in His time and in His way. Don't think that if we've identified the way and want to walk in it, then we've got to look at self and think, well, how can I? I have not the skill, ability, I cannot do this.

The Lord will make sure you cannot. You make sure that you need Him, you need His grace, you need His help. A people dependent upon the Lord. It doesn't mean to say that we always think, well, the Lord's way is going to be the hardest way. But it will be a way that we will need His grace and need His help. But I just with this second point, If the Lord has made clear the way, joined to it is to walk ye in it. Well then thirdly, the grace promised. Go back to verse 19. He will be very gracious unto thee. It doesn't stop there. at the voice of thy cry." When he shall hear it? Is there reluctance to cry? Himmler says, then at last to him they call. Yeah, we are backward, aren't we, in calling, in asking, in praying.

Large petitions with thee bring thou coming to a king. May we be helped to cry and to ask of the Lord, very gracious unto thee. Giving that grace, giving that patience, giving that help in the midst of pain, infirmity, affliction, and weary afflictions and trials. Giving that grace to take up the cross, to overcome the fear of man, to overcome the many fears within, because we have the Lord that has appointed the way, directed us in it, and promised us that grace and help to all in it. If this is the picture of our way and our life, right through to the end, how can we How can we miss the word?

When you think of the context here, even a rebellious people, the Lord will still, when they turn out the way, will cause them to hear this word. You show them the way, even in these things as tokens for good, marks for good. Humbling for us, we have to say when we're rehearsing the Lord's blessing of showing us the way and giving us grace to walk in it, we say, well, I was ready to turn away.

I was rebellious, I kicked. But the Lord is merciful and gracious to me. May this word be a help, especially to those who find the way rough and hard, who are already in a way of affliction. Have the Lord sweetly come and say, this is the way for you, dear soul, this is the path. Walk in it, walk in it, hard as it is, troubling as it is, walk in it. And cry unto me daily for grace, daily for help, and you'll prove me a gracious And as you turn, turn from that way that you've turned away to see again the Lord Jesus Christ going before.

See again that suffering Lamb of God. See again that dear one entering into heaven and saying, Father, I will, that they who thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory. He read in Psalm 107, So he bringeth them unto their desired haven, or in this manner and in this way, through this much tribulation. These are they that came out of great tribulation, washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne. For the Lord bless this word and make it a real help. The Lord knows how. Help thine upon one that is mighty. Amen.