So we are going to Isaiah chapter
43, and this is the word of the Lord. But now, thus saith the Lord
that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel,
fear not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy
name, thou art mine. When thou passest through the
waters, I will be with thee, and through the rivers they shall
not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. For I am the Lord thy God, the
Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour. I gave Egypt for thy ransom,
Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Since thou wast precious in my
sight, thou hast been honourable, and I have loved thee. Therefore
will I give men for thee, and people for thy life. Fear not,
for I am with thee. I will bring thy seed from the
east, and gather thee from the west. I will say to the north,
give up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from
far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth. even every
one that is called by my name, for I have created him for my
glory. I have formed him, yea, I have
made him. Bring forth the blind people
that have eyes and the deaf that have ears. Let all the nations
be gathered together and let the people be assembled. Who
among them can declare this and show us former things? Let them
bring forth their witnesses that they may be justified or let
them hear and say it is truth. Ye are my witnesses, saith the
Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that ye may know and
believe me, and understand that I am he. Before me there was
no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even I, am the Lord, and beside
me there is no Saviour. I have declared and have saved,
and I have showed when there was no strange God among you.
Therefore ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, that I am God. Yea, before the day was, I am
he, and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. I will
work, and who shall let it? Thus saith the Lord, your Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel, for your sake I have sent to Babylon,
and have brought down all their nobles, and the Chaldeans, whose
cry is in the ships. I am the Lord, your Holy One,
the Creator of Israel, your King. Thus saith the Lord, which maketh
a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty waters. which bringeth
forth the chariot and horse, the army and the power. They
shall lie down together, they shall not rise, they are extinct,
they are quenched as tau. Remember ye not the former things,
neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new
thing. Now it shall spring forth, shall
ye not know it? I will even make a way in the
wilderness and rivers in the desert. The beast of the field
shall honour me, the dragons and the owls, because I give
waters in the wilderness and rivers in the desert to give
drink to my people, my chosen. This people have I formed for
myself. They shall show forth my praise. But thou hast not called upon
me, O Jacob, but thou hast been weary of me, O Israel. Thou hast
not brought me the small cattle of thy burnt offerings, neither
hast thou honoured me with thy sacrifices. I have not caused
thee to serve with an offering, nor wearied thee with incense.
Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast
thou filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices, but thou hast
made me to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine
iniquities. I, even I, am he that blotteth
out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember
thy sins. Put me in remembrance. Let us
plead together. Declare thou that thou mayst
be justified. Thy first father hath sinned,
and thy teachers have transgressed against me. Therefore I have
profaned the princes of the sanctuary and have given Jacob to the curse
and Israel to reproaches. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word. We saw yesterday in our little
sermon introduction how that there is a sense in which everything
belongs to the Lord. Everything belongs to the Lord
as the maker and creator of all things. All things were made
by him, and without him was not anything made that was made. And so everything belongs to
the Lord. It is all his. That's true. In fact, we could
press that point a little bit more and we could say this, that
not only is the Lord Jesus Christ the creator of all things, so
that nothing exists except he made it, so too, nothing continues
to exist except He maintains it. So our Lord Jesus Christ,
as far as this world is concerned, as far as the fabric of creation
is concerned, and everything that dwells in this universe
that He has created, Everything created in earth or heaven is
sustained by the Lord's upholding all things by the word of his
power. We have no concept of the omnipotence
of our God, the greatness, the majesty, the glory and the scale
of God's power. Men and women, foolish, foolish
men and women imagine themselves capable of self-determination. They imagine being entitled to
some personal autonomy, some free will, able to live as they
please, answerable to no one. But the Word of God tells us
men and women cannot even take a breath. except the Lord actively
and deliberately grants them working lungs and the very air
that they breathe. What we do most naturally is
a function of God's mercy and of the Lord's upholding and sustaining
power. There is nothing that the Lord
does not know about us. The days of our lives, the hairs
of our head are numbered and the Lord will hold all men and
women accountable for all we do and say and think in this
life. We have just remarked about the
fact that God will judge sin. How presumptuous. little men
are. Do you not know that it is a
fearsome thing to fall into the hand of the living God? Do you
not know that being God's enemy is a fearful thing? Everything belongs to the Lord
as maker and creator and upholder of all things. And yet, and here
really is the thrust of our message today, and yet, as we have seen,
there is a distinct and separate ownership and possession that
the Lord himself expresses in the holy scriptures concerning
the people of his choice, the people whom he loves. The Lord
himself says, Ye are mine. You are mine. Speaking to these
people, he says, thou art mine. And so here we have the premise
of our thoughts today. While there is this separate
ownership, The Lord has created a new creation. He has made a
people for himself. He has set apart a people for
himself. In the covenant of grace and
peace, he has sanctified that people unto himself in a distinct
and in a peculiar way. a people concerning whom the
Lord says, I have called thee by thy name, thou art mine. And let me say here, just as
we begin our thoughts today, so that there isn't any misunderstanding. This chapter is speaking about
God's elect. It is speaking about the church
in gospel days. Yes, I acknowledge that they
are called Jacob and Israel, but these are names that are
applicable to the Church of Jesus Christ. The references to the
Old Testament people are symbolical of the fact that God has chosen
them and separated His elect from out of this world. This is not speaking about the
Jewish nation or the land of Israel. It wasn't then in the
time of Isaiah and it is not now. It is speaking of God's
elect, his people chosen from amongst all nations of the earth
by sovereign Fiat and called the children of Abraham. because
they have the faith of Abraham, or the same faith that Abraham
had, that is, faith in God, faith in Jehovah, faith in the Messiah,
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is faith. and the people of
faith that distinguishes whose are the Lord's and whose are
not, who is within the covenant and who is outside of it. So Paul in Galatians chapter
3 verse 7 says, Know ye therefore that they which are of faith
the same are the children of Abraham. They which are of faith, the
same are the children of Abraham. Or as is elsewhere described,
the children of promise. The children of promise, those
who are called Jacob and Israel in this passage, are not the
Jews of old or the Jews of today. but those who come within the
ambit of the covenant promises of God. They are Jacob and Israel
and they are received by faith. Nothing to do with genetics,
nothing to do with natural descent, nothing to do with geography
or national borders. The trouble that we are seeing
today in Israel and Gaza has nothing to do with Christ and
it is nothing to do with end time prophecy. It is all to do
with man's sinful heart. Don't look to Israel for Christ's
covenant people or for fulfilment of prophecy. Look to his church. We who believe are the true Israel
of God and all who have faith in Jesus Christ are heirs of
the promises of God. James, the writer of the little
epistle, he says in chapter 2 verse 5, Harken my beloved brethren,
hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith
and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that
love him? It is faith that distinguishes
between those who are the chosen of the Lord and those who are
not. And if any... Israeli or any
Jewish person has faith, then they are within the blessings
of the covenant of grace. But this has nothing to do with
national Israel. This is the Lord's people who
are in view. Our verses relate to grace and
faith, not nations or geography or lineage. And this is a warning
because there are many, many voices who will direct gullible
people to think other things. Satan will happily rob the church
of comfort and joy by stealing the gospel of our inheritance
and applying it to somebody else. These are your promises and mine
and we shall not give them to another. Here are five headings
and a few thoughts upon each which I trust today will gladden
the heart of the Lord's people, the church. And we are going
to think about them in the context of God's covenant people because
these are the ones of whom the Lord says, thou art mine. God's covenant people, the people
that he has chosen for himself. And this is what we are taught. This is what we learn from this
chapter concerning God's covenant people. Number one. They are
precious to the Lord. They're precious to the Lord.
You and I, brother and sister, all of those who are men and
women, boys and girls of faith, are precious to the Lord. Sometimes we say that the Lord
is precious to us, and I trust He is, but we are precious to
the Lord. What a thought that is. What
an amazing thing, because you are precious. I have loved you. I have chosen you. I have redeemed you. I have created
you. And I have called you. I doubt,
this is in the first four verses of this little chapter, I doubt
we could amass a finer collection of divine undertakings than those
collected here for our pleasure. Because we are precious in God's
sight, he has honoured us and made us honourable He has adopted
us into his family. He has made us his sons and daughters. He doesn't call us servants,
he calls us his sons and his daughters. We're going on to
that a little bit later, but he's going to call his sons and
his daughters from the uttermost parts of the earth. Not his servants,
his people, his children. He has loved us unconditionally. He has honoured us by loving
us. He has honoured us by choosing
us to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. He has loved
us by redeeming us from all of our sin by the precious blood
of our Saviour. How much does the Lord love us?
How much does the Lord own us? How much does the Lord delight
in us? How precious are we to Almighty
God? We are as precious as the precious
blood of his own dear son. He has created us anew. He has created in us a new spirit,
a new heart, he has given us a new hope, he has filled us
with new passions, he has given us new friends and he has placed
a new song on our lips and he calls us to follow him. He calls us to follow him because
we are precious to him. Because thou art mine. This is a powerful call. This is not a general call. This
is not the world's weak, inconsequential call that it makes to man's supposed
free will. This is not a vague hope that
we might possibly follow after the Lord. This is the Lord who
regards us as precious, the Lord who regards us as precious, who
has loved us and chosen us and redeemed us and created us, who
now calls us by his gospel. calling his people with a call
that is powerful to quicken the dead in trespasses and sin and
cause us to rise up like an army of dead bones and to cover us
with flesh and sinew and blood and quicken our lives and cause
us to follow him. This is the Lord who says, come
away. Many imagine the blessings of
grace come to them when they choose to trust in Christ. As
if that act of believing, that act of our will is the beginning
of all the blessings that flow to us in Christ. That is so wrong
to think like that. That's the wrong way round entirely. All the blessings of grace belong
to the elect before they are called in time to experience
them. God's love is everlasting love.
The electing choice of God is a choice that was made before
the foundation of the world. The redeeming mercy of God is
applied as a result of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ on the
cross, but he is as the lamb slain from before the foundation
of the world. That all was seen in the mind
of God as being that limited, atoning work that the Lord Jesus
Christ would perform. He makes us a new creation even. before that effectual call of
the Holy Spirit in the Gospel first brings to light the spark
of grace in the soul of a sinner. All these blessings are freely
ours who have faith in Christ because we are precious in the
sight of God. so precious that we are loved,
chosen, redeemed, created anew and called by him to experience
the Lord Jesus Christ in time. That's the first thing. We are
precious to the Lord. Here's another thing that we
can say from this delightful chapter. The Lord Jesus Christ,
or God, tells us that His covenant people will be gathered in by
the Gospel's success. They will be gathered in by the
success of the Gospel. The Lord tells Isaiah to tell
the people of his age to write down these things in a book,
to declare to the remnant people, the faithful amongst the Jews. how their numbers would be added
to in the times of the Messiah and in the gospel age by the
ministry of the apostles and preachers whose message would
be broadcast to the Gentile nations so as to call my sons from afar
and my daughters from the ends of the earth. You see, even in
the days of Isaiah, that remnant people, that oppressed people,
that pressed down people, were given these words of comfort,
that there would be a day coming in the times of the Messiah,
when the gospel of grace would go forth, and sons and daughters
would be called from all nations, from the ends of the earth, to
find in God their Lord and Saviour. I am sure that we measure success
all wrong. I think I've said this before
and doubtless I'll repeat myself again, but gospel success is
not about numbers or membership or church budgets. The Gospel
will bring to glory, exactly, exactly, not one more and not
one less, exactly the predetermined and predestinated number of the
elect. The Gospel is an absolute 100%
success. The Lord knows them that are
his, and he gathers them by name through the preaching of the
gospel. Remember when the Lord was going back to heaven, he
said to his disciples, or he was anticipating his crucifixion
and then his return to heaven, and the fact that he would be
leaving his disciples, he said to them, I'm going to prepare
a place for you. I'm going to prepare your mansion
in heaven. Let me tell you, think about
those mansions. There will not be a mansion left
unoccupied in heaven. Nor will there be any squeeze
due to more coming to faith and to Christ than might have been
expected. The mansions that are being prepared
in heaven right now are perfectly matched to those who will enter
in. Paul knew his gospel was God's
power unto salvation. The gospel preached and applied
will bring many sons unto glory. It's a direct quote from the
word of God. I count it a privilege to be
able to broadcast this gospel, to preach this gospel. Nowadays,
with this technology, to the ends of the earth. Because while
these are My faltering words, I nevertheless believe that this
is God's command. This is God's means. To the north, give up. To the south, keep not back. To the east and to the west,
that the seed of faith shall be gathered and the body of Christ
shall be complete. They shall be mine, saith the
Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels. This gospel
is not intended to convert the masses. It is designed perfectly
to inform and convince God's elect concerning the person of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at verse 10 in our chapter. He says, Ye are my witnesses,
saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen. For why? That ye may know, and believe
me, and understand that I am he. Knowledge, faith, and understanding. These are the three things that
the Lord gives to his elect by the gospel. Before me, he says,
there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even
I, am the Lord, and beside me there is no saviour. This is
the message that the gospel 100% successfully imparts to the Lord's
elect. Oh, I have no doubt it is a double-edged
sword. It renders rebellious-hearted
men and women without excuse, but it is designed to accomplish
and achieve the ends whereunto it is sent. It is the Word of
God. And to that end, God's covenant
people thirdly, will behold a new thing. This is the third thing
that Isaiah tells the people that the Lord tells us in this
chapter. What is this new thing that Isaiah
is speaking about, that the Lord declares? Why, it is God incarnate. Isaiah is still teaching that
the Messiah would not be a mere prophet. or another earthly king,
or some religious leader. Christ who would come is Emmanuel,
God with us, God in flesh. This is what Isaiah is telling
the people. This is the new thing that will
be performed. A woman will compass a man. This is the work of God. Christ's coming in the incarnation. God in the flesh, having taken
the nature of man, the flesh of a virgin, appearing in the
likeness of sinful flesh, being made sin and a curse for his
people, that they in turn may obtain eternal redemption. The Old Testament people looked
forward to God coming in the flesh to die as their Redeemer. We look back on that self, same
fact, and this single event, this life and death of Jesus
Christ is the most significant and meaningful event in the history
of the world. John in his Gospel says, chapter
1 verse 14, the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and
we beheld his glory, the glory as the only begotten of the Father,
full of grace and truth. God incarnate is this new thing
and we see and we know and we understand what God has done
in the person of Jesus Christ. All the elect do. All of the
elect have faith in what God has done. Fourthly, here we find
also that God's covenant people are taught in this passage by
Isaiah that they will bring glory to their saviour. Again, we so
often see this from a man-centred position. Just as we regard God
as precious to us, He regards us as precious to Him. And just
as God glorifies us in giving us so many blessings, so we bring
glory to the Saviour. It's a precious thought. The
Lord gives the reason why this new thing will take place. Christ
has come to gather the Lord's elect, listen, listen, for his
own glory. Christ has come to gather the
Lord's elect for his own glory. Children, used to be taught,
maybe sometimes they still are, but they used to be more widespread,
that children would learn their catechism, their questions and
answers. It was a good practice. The first
answer in the Westminster Shorter Catechism, the first answer is,
man's chief end is to glorify God. And we might think to ourselves,
how can we glorify God? But this is what the work of
redemption accomplished. We have glorified God. This is
what the Lord says here. It says, a people have I formed
for myself, they shall show forth my praise. We, by our redemption,
we by our being set apart, our sanctification, our justification,
by all of these things which God has done for us, we redound
to his praise and glory. Verse seven says, everyone who
is called by God is created for my glory. For mine own sake,
verse 21 says, this people have I formed for myself. They shall show forth my praise. We who are saved are saved to
glorify God and enjoy him forever. Now, for our comfort and for
our encouragement, just as it was for the believers in Isaiah's
day and for all believers. For us today, who might be tempted,
who might have doubts, who might be caused because of the circumstances
and affairs and troubles and trials in our life, and Lord
knows there are many, We have this glorious promise. Our salvation, this salvation
that we have, our safety and security in Christ is as sure
as God's own glorious nature. The day that God's glory fades
and falters, will be the day that our salvation fails. Not until then, because we are
called, redeemed, and brought into peace with God for His glory. The last thing that I want to
mention to us today is that Isaiah brings another thought for our
encouragement here in the fact that God's covenant people are
pardoned and justified. We are cleansed and made holy
by the sovereign mercy of Almighty God. Look at verse 25. It says
there, I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions
for mine own sake. and will not remember thy sins. Why have we got this atonement?
Why have we got this peace from God? Why have we been redeemed
by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ from all our
transgressions? Not for one moment because we
have in any way merited it. On the contrary, we weary the
Lord with our unworthiness. We have nothing to recommend
ourselves to him, we have nothing to offer to him, but for his
own sake, for his own good pleasure, he has blotted out our transgressions
and will not remember our sins against us. We might think that
God blots out our transgressions for our sake, and sure it is
we benefit from that, But the Lord says, he blotteth, I am
he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake. When we think
about this, it is obvious, surely, because no soiled, filthy, corrupt
soul could show God's glory and praise out of that natural depraved
state. As the Lord said to Nicodemus,
ye must be born again. Ye must be born again. It's the
only way that you can bring forth the glory of God and be appraised
to His name. The Lord has done this for His
own sake that we might glorify His name. We must be pardoned,
we must be cleansed, we must be justified to glorify God. It is the consequence of His
love towards us and His choice of us. We serve His purpose, we honour
His name. This is what Isaiah is telling
the Old Testament church. It's the gospel in the Old Testament. They knew, as we do, that we
need our sins removed and we need a perfect righteousness
applied. Righteous in the sight and presence
of God is essential. We all have wearied the Lord
with our iniquities, then and now, and yet the Lord encouraged
the Old Testament church to plead the merits of the Messiah, and
he calls you and me to do the same. All who need forgiveness
plead the blood of Jesus Christ and the righteousness of God
in him. This we do, this we do, and we
will continue to do as the Lord grants us grace. Amen.