Our reading is on the second page of the hymn sheet. It is Isaiah chapter 58. Prophet Isaiah and chapter 58. Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet and show my people their transgression and the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God. They ask of me the ordinances of justice, they take delight in approaching to God.

Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? Wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness. Ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high.

Is it such a fast that I have chosen, a day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down with his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast and an acceptable day to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I have chosen?

To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free. and that ye break every yoke. Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him, and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh.

Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine hell shall spring forth speedily. and thy righteousness shall go before thee, the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward. Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer, thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity, and if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul, then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noonday. And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones, and thou shalt be a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places, thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations, and thou shalt be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in. If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable, and shall honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words. Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. as far as the reading of God's Holy Word.

You see on the front of the sheets, I've highlighted the words, Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.

The reading that we read, the beginning of it, is a very searching passage and I felt this for myself and for you as well. It's very easy for things to appear like we're delighting in the Lord, but we're not. We can be like Martha, very busy about religious things and even about the Lord, but not like Mary that sits at the Lord's feet and hear His word. And the children of Israel, this is what Isaiah was called to warn them because We read in verse two, they seek me daily, delight to know my ways as a nation that did righteousness and forsook not the ordinance of their God. They ask of me the ordinances of justice, they take delight in approaching to God. That comes very close, doesn't it?

Because you'd think that is a godly people, it's a good people, but then They're turning it around and virtually saying to God, well, because we're doing all of this and because we're fasting, then you should take notice and you should bless us and you should be with us. And they were doing it as putting God in debt to them. They weren't delighting actually in God. They were actually delighting in their own performances, in their own religious.

You know, I could delight in just how I prepare my sermons and how I give the message and for the accolade perhaps I receive and it could be nothing to do with my actual delight in the Lord and it is very searching in that way so this chapter goes from a reproof to how we should and how we can delight in the Lord and of course I'll use other scriptures as well but firstly there is that preparation isn't there for because in verse 14 where our text comes from then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord so what has gone before well the first thing it's not just outward it's not just an outward performance and there is a real worshipping coming before the Lord in the way that he has chosen. And so we have in verse 6, the fast or the worship that he has chosen, lose the bands of wickedness to undo the heavy burdens. And I think of how many are held in idolatry or superstition.

When I was 24, I started in a new job. And one day, and I'd only been in there a week or so, and I noticed how the Lord gave me opportunities so that I could profess my faith. I'd come into that job, they knew I held faith, I loved the Lord, and I saw the secretaries, the ladies in the office, they were very distressed, and they were running around, they were taking photocopies of this thing, and I said, well, what's the matter? And they got a chain letter, a letter that was supposed to be written by a missionary to Africa, and if you didn't copy it and put it through to 20 people, some terrible things would happen in your life. And it made me angry, and I took this and I put on the bottom 10 reasons why this was not written by a missionary, but was written by one of the devil's agents, and put it on the main notice board.

And immediately it stopped all the trouble. I overheard the finance manager, the director, he said, shh, shh, shh, don't say anything, don't say anything. But their thought was, well if this man is going to defy this, and going to take no notice of it, then we're not going to be worried about it either. And when you could see the bondage and the fear that they were under, to come and bring the truth and to defy that which is no God's at all, it was a real honour to do. It marked me out in that company very quickly. But I looked upon it as given by God.

And that is one of the works of the Lord's people, to testify the reality of the Lord, that He is ready to save and to deliver from these things. Then we have in verse 7, the very practical giving bread to the hungry, and James speaks of that as the real evidence of faith in helping, practical help for people. And then in verse 10, there's a drawing out by souls of the hungry to the afflicted soul, to those that are troubled in their souls, and have soul trouble, and to draw out their souls to them.

And so, then there's in verse 13, remembering the Sabbath day. You know, it's very difficult for you here in the way you have as I come and take sometimes the Lord's Day services. We know the Sabbath changed from the last day to the first day of the week with our Lord rising from the dead. But the pattern of the week For us that are able to go to the house of God, we have our working week as it were, the weekend very different, for you there's an element of the sameness right through. So it's a good thing to be reminded again of the Sabbath, of the day the Lord rose from the dead and the Lord's blessing and presence to be with us.

So those are some of the preparation things that are there. in the passage, but then we have, and I want to think of how it is that we are to delight in the Lord. We're having Psalm 37 and verse 4, delight thyself also in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. And so I want to think of six things. The first thing is this, to delight in the persons in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. To actually delight in them. Psalm 103 says, Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. And it's to have communion with God.

In Matthew 6 verse 6, Our Lord says, But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou have shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. We need to ask ourselves, you have the morning devotions here, how much time do you spend in secret with the Lord, delighting to be with Him, loving to be with Him?

These are things that the Lord led the way. We read in Luke 21 verse 37, In the daytime He was teaching in the temple, and at night He went out and abode in the mount that is called the Mount of Olives. Our Lord spent whole nights in prayer, whole nights in communion with the Lord, and in the very place He knew that He would have the sins of His people laid on Him and where Judas would betray him in the Mount of Olives. He spent much time in that Mount.

And so, if we are to delight ourselves in the Lord, to come before him as he is, spend time with him. You think back to courting days, or days when you're married, or days when you've had a really good friend. It's the time you spend with that person that shows how much you delight in them.

The second thing is to delight in the perfections of God. To think of His power, His goodness, His faithfulness, His wisdom, His love, His grace and His mercy. It's to think of those things, to meditate on those things of God. and then in the third place in his works the works of creation making the world we've got a beautiful day today and that gives us to be able to meditate on his works especially in spring when we see new life spring forth from what was dead and it comes in stages so over a period of month or so we see first one flower coming out, first one tree breaking into leaf, and then another tree, and all the time is the reminder of life from the dead. And then in Providence, God's ordering of all things in our lives, to actually delight in that, to watch what the Lord does, and how he does it, how you came into this home, how he provided for it, going back over your lives, there's many things where the Lord has done that work. And then of course redemption, how the Lord suffered, bled and died, how He redeemed our souls, and delight in that. So in the fourth place, in His Word, in His Gospel and the truths and ordinances of it, we can delight in that. Psalm 1 is a very lovely psalm, Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night. It is added to that he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that bringeth forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. whole gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, and we meditate on that, we think on it. David says that he prevented the night watchers that he might meditate on thy word, and it's good for us.

Maybe some of you find it hard to sleep, you have hours maybe awake, and maybe led to think and meditate upon the Lord during that time, during those hours. Miller is in his house and the worship of it, and of course, with you here, very many of you, you can't get out to the house of God, and yet we are able to gather like this, and may we still delight in it. Like David in Psalm 84, when he couldn't get to the house of God, he still had a love to it, and he still felt a blessing on those that were gathering at that time.

And then in His people in the last place, the excellent of the earth, I hope you can look upon one another and esteem one another as those for whom Christ has died, those who are heirs together with Him and to be with Him in glory. In Malachi chapter 3 verse 16 to 18, and may this be true of you here, Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another, and the Lord hearkened and heard it. And a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name. They shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels. and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him. Then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not."

So each of these, each of these things we've mentioned, they give really a field of delight and pleasure to attend unto, to contemplate, to meditate upon the Lord and to delight ourselves in Him, our Lord, our Saviour, our Redeemer and our Friend. And may the word this morning be a help to you to renew that delight, not just be content in outward things or even outward worship, how lovely that is, but to have that time with the Lord, here below with whom God willing we will be with for eternity in heaven.