Come back to Isaiah 52. Isaiah 52. We want to remember
Andy Johnson in prayer. Andrea called me and said that
he's got lung cancer. So we want to remember him. I
don't know more Friday, but I'm so glad we've got good news.
Good news in the scriptures. Good news from God. I'm so glad
of that. It may be rough getting there, but we have a good end. The journey might be a little
tough along the way, but we have a good end. Have a good one.
I title this message, Good Tidings. Good Tidings. The gospel is good news from
heaven. It's good news straight from
heaven. The angel came and told him. Joseph and him about it
and the shepherds about it. It's good news. And it's good
news sent down from God himself. He sent this good news to us
sinners. He sent it to us. In fact, if
we can lay hold of this, he came into this world and took upon
himself flesh and he himself preached the good news to us.
God himself. came into this world and preached
the gospel to sinners. I'm telling you, that's something
to think about now. And this chapter is full, full
of goodness. And the first thing that is said
in that first verse is awake. He says, awake, awake. And here
I believe what he's saying, awake out of spiritual death. God must
first call us and awake us out of spiritual death. To hear this
good news. Dead people can't hear it. He's
got to awake us. Awake out of spiritual sleep.
Sometimes we fall into a spiritual slumber, don't we? Sometimes
we do. Awake to righteousness. That's
what he's saying. Let me show you these in a scripture.
Turn to Ephesians chapter 5. Ephesians chapter 5. In Ephesians chapter 5 and verse
13, But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light,
and whatsoever doth manifest is light. Wherefore he saith,
Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ
shall give thee life. He said, Awake, awake from spiritual
death. Now turn over to Romans 13. Romans chapter 13. This is what we are to awake to. In
Romans 13, look in verse 11. Well, look in verse 10. Love
worketh no ill to his neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfilling
of the law. And that knowing, the time, that
now it is high time to awake out of sleep. How that slumber,
for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. I heard the gospel, around 27
years ago, I can base it on their age, around 27 years ago I heard
the gospel. I'm 27 years closer now to the
time when I believed. Now is the time nearer than when
you believed. Every day brings that. Every
day brings that event closer. Now look over at 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Let me get over there. In 1 Corinthians
15, look in verse 34. He says here, look in verse 33,
be not deceived, evil communication, evil companions, corrupt good
manners, awake to righteousness and sin not. For some have not
the knowledge of God. I speak this, he says, to their
shame, but awake to righteousness. That's what he's saying. Awake,
awake. People have to be awakened if they are to hear the gospel.
There is an awakening that goes with the preaching of the gospel
that God gives. And then he says this, put on
thy strength, O Zion. What is the strength of Zion,
the church, God's church? What is her strength? What is
our strength? Turn over to Psalm 37. Psalm
37. Here is our strength. Psalm 37,
verse 39. But the salvation of the righteous
is of the Lord. He is their strength in the time
of trouble. Put on thy strength. God is our strength. Now look
in Psalm 59. Psalm 59. Put on thy strength, O Zion. In Psalm 59, 17. Unto thee, O my strength will
I sing, for God is my defense and the God of my mercy. But
he says, unto thee, O my strength. God's my strength. Oh, he said,
put on thy strength and put on thy beautiful, beautiful garments. Oh, I tell you, if we could see
the church as God sees her in Christ, she's beautiful. She's beautiful, man. He's bright,
He's beautiful. And He says, put on thy beautiful
garments. Put on the garments of praise in thanksgiving. Is
there any more beautiful garment than that? Can anyone wear a
more beautiful garment than that of praise and gratitude to God
for what He's done for us in Christ? Oh, put on the garment
of praise in thanksgiving and get rid of that mournful spirit
That moaning, groaning spirit, for thy deliverer is come. Christ
has come. I read that to you in Luke. There
in the Gospel of Luke. Put on the wedding garment. And
he says here, and no more shall the uncircumcised and unclean
come in unto thee. You know what he's saying here?
They shall never take you captive again. Sin, Satan, the law, will
never take you captive. You'll never be no one's captive
again. Never. Isn't that good news? How many times did Israel of
all go into captivity? And our Lord says this. And He's saying this to His church.
That's who He's talking to. His church. My church, Zion,
will never ever go into captivity to anyone else again. Never. We're no one's captive but His. His. And we're glad to be so.
And shake, in verse 2, and shake thyself from the dust. Arise
and sit down. Dust yourself off. Get off the
ground. Get out of the dust. And shake
off the dust of despair and the dust of unbelief. And shake those
things off, he says. And rise up. And here's what
he's saying. Get out of the dust and sit down. Now listen. Sit down like the dignified lady
I've made you to be. That's what he's saying. Get
out the dust, get out the dust, rise up and sit down like the
dignified lady I have made you to be. You're the daughter of
the king. You're the bride of the son of
God. He said, now act like it. Act like it. God's people, now
I'm telling you the truth, God's people are a dignified people. They are a dignified people.
And then he says here, eluce thyself. You're free. Israel of old dear. They were
going to go into captivity to Babylon. And they were going
to be there for a number of years. And he says to them, and he says
to the whole church, you're free. You're no one's captive now.
In Christ we are free indeed. If God would have enabled us
to get a hold of that. I tell you what, we could if
we were serious about it. It says in Galatians 5.1, Stand
fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. Don't you get taken back into
bondage again. Don't you get caught up in all
this do's and don'ts. You stand fast in the liberty
wherewith Christ hath made you free. Then it gives the promise
of redemption in verses 3 and 6. It says here in verse 3, For
thus saith the Lord, You sold yourselves for naught. You did
not profit by selling yourself. You got nothing out of it. We
sold ourselves to sin and Satan. You know how it is when we came
into this world. He said you profited nothing by it. And you
shall be, listen, redeemed. There's the promise. You shall
be redeemed. I'll redeem you. I'll buy you
back. You shall be redeemed. We sold
ourselves without money. We didn't gain from the sale.
And God did not gain from the cell at all. Everything about
us by nature is a loss. Isn't that something? It takes
God to convince a person of that. It takes God to do it. But everything about me by nature
is a loss. I'm in the negative column. It's
a loss. And it says, I'm going to redeem
you without money, that is, without silver and gold. I'm going to
redeem you, here's how I'm going to do it, by the precious blood
of the Lamb. I'm going to send my Son in the
flesh, and He's going to shed His blood, and His blood is the
price of your redemption. That's the price of our redemption,
the blood of the Lamb of God. And we shall be redeemed, it
said, out of the hands of those that make us, how? That's why
it says there, look here in verse five. Now, therefore, what have
I here, saith the Lord? That is, what have I profited
by yourself, that my people is taken away for nothing? They
that rule over them make them to how? Sin makes us smart, doesn't
it? I tell you, you know, the Lord
can forgive us of sin, but sometimes the effect of it lasts a whole
lifetime. sometimes effective. He says here that He's going
to redeem us out of the hands of those that make us howl. He's going to redeem us from
sin. He's going to redeem us from
being slaves to Satan. He's going to redeem us from
the curse of the law. And we are not going to howl and hurt
no more. Because He's going to redeem
us. He said, you're mine, I purchased you, I'm going to have you. He
says in verse 6, therefore my people, this is who he's talking
to, my people, shall know my name. You're going to know my
name. Therefore they shall know that
in that day, that day that I redeemed them, you're going to know in
that day that I saved you by my grace. You're going to know. that I am he that speaks. You're
going to know the one that spoke from heaven. Behold, he said,
it is I. When God shall have redeemed
us by his blood and lifted us from the dunghill and set us
on high, we shall know that he is the one that did it all. All,
how does that song go? All to him I owe. All to him
I owe. All of it. We shall know his
name. There's a lot of people out in
this world. They can talk about God, but
they don't know His name. They don't know Him. They don't
know Jehovah, the Savior. They don't know Him. He says,
My people shall know My name. We shall know Him as a just God
and a Savior. We'll know Him as that. And we
will know that, listen, we will know the great I Am. Now we know now in part, and
I preach in part, that one day we're going to know God as even
as we are known. We're going to know the I Am.
He said, Moses, you tell them I Am sent you. We're going to
know. Now, he says here in verse 7,
now, how beautiful How beautiful are the feet of them that bring
such glad tidings. How beautiful are the feet of
those whom God sends this message by, this message of grace and
this message of mercy for the guilty. I tell you, he said how
beautiful are the feet of them that bring such glad tidings.
How blessed is that people to whom God sends his messenger. He does not send them to everyone.
There are many people meeting tonight listening to a bunch
of garbage. I'm serious, they're listening
to a lot of garbage. This is the gospel. This is the
gospel. This is the truth. We worship
the true God. We do. And it says here, how
beautiful upon the mountains this message of grace for the
guilty. It's not to be kept in some monastery.
is to be proclaimed on the top of the mountains for all to hear.
Lord willing, we're going to probably be on the radio next
week. Probably end of next week. We're going to be on the radio. We're on the internet now. Freegraceradio.com. You'd be surprised how many downloads.
I was featured today. This church featured me today
on sermonaudio.com today. Larry had emailed me around 2
o'clock and said it had already been downloaded over 70 some
times. That's how beautiful it is up on the mountains. Proclaiming
it by all the means that God puts in our hands to do it by.
I want everybody to know this. I would to God that we could
tell everyone that walks on this earth this gospel, this good
news. I wish we could. And he says
here, how beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him
that bring good tidings. Even the least gifted will be
a welcome blessing. Even the least gifted of us will
be a welcome blessing. Right. But I thought this, why
feet and not a face? As I was reading that today and
yesterday, I thought, why? He says, how beautiful are the
feet of him? Well, first of all, I thought
this, because feet are used to carry the man who has the message. It carries the man that has the
message. And then I thought of what John the Baptist said. He
said, I'm just a voice. I'm just a voice. We are just
messengers carrying the message. That's all we are. And then I
thought, a face reveals a person. And the only face you and I need
to be taken up with is his. You won't be taken up with my
feet, I guarantee you. We're not taken up with feet.
But if we're going to be taken up with a face, let it be His. Let it be His face. His face
who is altogether lovely. And what does He bring? What
does this messenger bring? It says here, glad tidings publishes
peace that bringeth good tidings of good that publishes salvation. He puts it out there. You know
when you publish something, you make it public, don't you? If you're
going to publish it, you've got to make it public. That's what
we're doing. We have a great message for sinners
who need mercy. That's what I'm looking for.
The Lord willing that we're able to get on the radio and that
comes to fruit. I'm looking for sinners that
need mercy. I'm not looking to straighten
a bunch of people out. I'm not going to try to straighten anybody
out. I'm looking for somebody. I'm looking for a guilty sinner
that needs forgiveness. I'm looking for a guilty sinner
that needs to be washed. That's what I'm looking for.
I'm not trying to straighten anybody out. We have a message. We bring a message of deliverance.
A real deliverance from sin and the power of sin and the power
of Satan. It sets the captive free. We declare that in Jesus Christ
We have a real, genuine forgiveness of sins. And that means something
to somebody that knows what sin is. If God's made you to know
something about sin, that really means something. Sin is the reason we are in the
mess that we're in. And we have a real forgiveness
for it. We have sinned against God, but
there is forgiveness within, it says, that he may be There
is forgiveness with Him through the blood and the righteousness
of His Son of all sins. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. His blood is the atonement for
our sins. Here is a message of reconciliation.
God has reconciled us in Christ. Now be you reconciled to Him.
The banishment is over. Tell Him to come home. Tell him
to come home. The Father is reconciled. No
one's mad at him. Tell him to come home. No one's
mad at him. That's what I want to tell sinners. Come on home. God's people have been reconciled
and justified in Christ. That's good news. That's good
news. His message here is, it says,
publish of salvation. There is a real salvation from
sin. There is a real salvation from
the curse of the law. And there is a real salvation
from the power of Satan through the Lord Jesus Christ. God planned it, the Son purchased
it, and the Holy Spirit applies it. And brethren, it's real.
And it's sure. We can preach with confidence.
We can get up on the highest mountain with the fullest confidence
and declare this message. We can do that. This is what
the messenger of God will constantly declare to Zion. Thy God reigneth. I don't have the answers. I've got more questions than
I do answers. But I don't have the answers
to why this, why this, why that. I don't know. But I can tell
you this. Thy God reigneth. He knows. He's got the answers. And He reigneth. This is good
news to Zion, to the church. Thy God reigneth. Look over at
Psalm 96. This was said so many times over
in the Psalms. I'll just read a couple of them.
Psalm 96 and verse 10. He says, say among the heathen
that the Lord reigneth. The world also shall be established
that it shall not be moved. It's not going to fall apart.
It's under his control. He shall judge the people righteously.
You know, he says over here in this In Isaiah, saying to Zion,
thy God reigneth. Here it says, saying to the heathen.
You tell them both. You tell those who believe and
those who don't believe. God's on the throne. I told Tom Harding
today, I said, I want my first message to be on God who's sovereign. I want to be on the sovereign
God of heaven and earth. Thy God reigneth. You tell it
to Zion and you tell it to the heathen. You tell them who's
running this show. Look in the chapter of Psalm
97. Psalm 97, let me just, in verse 1. The Lord reigneth,
let the earth rejoice. Oh, this whole earth ought to
rejoice because he reigneth. It would have been over with
a long time ago if he was not on the throne. Let the earth
rejoice. Let the multitudes of the Isles,
the Gentiles, be glad thereof." I'm glad. Are you glad, Dr. Raymond? Are you glad that the sovereign
God of heaven and earth is on the throne ruling and reign over
everything? I'm glad he is. I'm glad he is. I'm glad of this. I'm glad that
none can stay his hand or say unto him, what are you doing?
You can say that to me if you want to, because you probably
have a right to. I don't know what I'm doing half the time,
but he knows what he's doing all the time. All the time. None can stay his hand. Who can
stand and stay a snowstorm? Who can stop the wind from blowing?
Who can block out the sun? I'm glad no one can but God,
because He's infinitely wise and infinitely powerful and infinitely
holy, and we can rest in that. Zion's God, which is our God,
is God. He is God. That sounds like a
simple statement, doesn't it? I tell you this, you're standing
in a windstorm, By God is God. I remember one time we was, this
was back in a football game when the boys were just, they was
in high school, or junior high, I think, junior high. And they
called the game because of the lightning. We were walking down
the field to get out off the field. I mean, it was lightning,
big time. And I remember, I don't know which one of them it was,
but I told them, I said, we don't have to worry about that. The
lightning goes to him and says, here we are. The lightning says,
here we are. He won't strike anybody that
he has appointed to strike. Then in verse 8, listen to the
watchman. This is the watchman's message.
Lift up the voice. He said, don't be backward or
bashful about this. Don't be apologetic for sure.
Don't be apologetic about it. Lift up the voice. And with the
voice together, sing. It's a joyful message. When you
have good news to tell, you can sing, can't you? You can sing. And he says this
about his watchmen. The true watchmen of God, they
see eye to eye. They see on the gospel now how
God saves sinners, how God can be a just God and a Savior. They
see eye to eye on the gospel. The message is
the same throughout all the ages. I'm preaching the same gospel
message that Whitfield preached, Sturgeon preached, all the way
back to the Apostle Paul. All the way back to when he was
first preached in the garden by God Himself. Talk about the
seed of the world. See, eye to eye. Verse 9, break
forth into joys. Sing together. Sing like a free
people ought to sing. A free people ought to sing with
a lot more joy than a captive people. A free people ought to. Why? Because the Lord hath made
bare his arm. You know, when men go to war
and battle, they put on armor, don't they? They put a lot of
armor on and they put these bulletproof vests on. You know what God does?
He bares his arm. He doesn't need the armor. He
bears His arm. He makes it bare. He needs no
help. God in the person of His Son
came into this world and by Himself, by His bare arm, He purged our
sins and went back and sat down at the right hand of the Father
Almighty, the Majesty Almighty. And He says this in all nations
in Celsius. Sassu and Jason got a little
taste of that in Mexico. Those men see. Those men all
across this world see this salvation that God has wrought through
His Son. And here's His command, and I'll wind this down. In verse
11, Depart ye, depart ye, go ye out from thence. Touch no
unclean thing. They are getting ready to leave.
He's telling them as they go out of Babylon, He's saying,
Depart! Get out! Don't hang around here. Go out from them. Don't you try
to pick something up and take it with you. Don't you try to
pick something up. Remember who was it? Aiken that
picked that spoil up and hid it in his tent? Don't, he says,
don't do it. What he's calling here, he's
calling on here for repentance and belief and faith. Go out. Don't you touch any of the unclean
things. You leave it alone. Don't try
to take any of the spoils with you. Don't try to hang on to
this world of God, too. That's what he says. Don't try it. Be ye clean, he
says, that bear the vessels of the Lord. Our Lord said this.
Be ye holy, for I am holy. Be ye clean, separated, that
bear the vessels of the Lord. God's people are holy people.
They're holy people. And their repentance is real.
And their heart is fixed trusting in the Lord. Trusting Him. It
says this in the Scriptures. He that loves the world has not
the love of the Father in him. He says go out and don't try
to take any of it with you. Leave it behind. It's unclean.
That's what I'm saving you from. For you shall not go out, he
says in verse 12, for you shall not go out with haste nor go
by flight. You know what, here's the image
you have to get into your mind. When you go out and you are delivered,
Cyrus delivers them, Christ has delivered us. You're going to
go out not with fear and trembling, looking behind you, looking over
your shoulder like they're going to come back and get you. I'm
not looking over my shoulder to see if something's going to
get me. You're going to go out with confidence. You're going
to go out quietly. You can go out like a people
that believe God. You're going to go out like a people that
have been saved by God Almighty, not some PR. I'm talking about
God saved you. You're going to conduct yourself
in an orderly manner. In a gracious manner. That's
right. You're not going to go out with
haste. You're not going to just jump up and run out afraid if you
don't hurry up and get out. You're not going to make it. We walk, don't we? We're walking.
We walk through the valley of the shadow of death. We're not
running through it, we're walking through it. Because we fear no
evil. Why? Because now we're with Him. That's why. We will go out also
like this. You will go out willingly. We're
going to go out willingly. And consciously knowing what
we're doing. Willingly and consciously knowing
what God has saved you from. and who He is and walking throughout
your life with that confidence. And the God of Israel, listen,
will be your reward. You know what that says? You
look over in your margin. And the God of Israel will gather
you up. Can you think of anything better
than that? The God of Israel will gather you up. God has been
gathering up His children in Christ ever since the fall. Ever
since the fall. And listen, sooner or later,
in a little while, He'll gather up this little group of believers
here and take us home. In a little while, He'll gather
us up. And He's done with us. And He'll take us home.