People unfamiliar with our assembly
and others like it see the videos, the webcast, and they often ask
why we do the things the way we do them, why our worship services
are so simple, nothing obviously to attract the flesh. There's
a reason. Everything involved in the public
worship of God ought purposefully to move our hearts Godward. The folks who sing special music,
Brother Lindsey, others who lead singing will acknowledge that
I rarely, very, very rarely suggest they sing some specific hymn.
I leave that to God to give them direction. We don't choreograph
anything, plan things to fit together so that everything runs
smoothly. But had we done so, we couldn't have done as good
a job as we've had in experience tonight already. How blessed
our hearts are to move toward God in the singing of our hymns,
in the reading of scripture, in the public prayer, and in
the special music And it all is designed and intended, all
these various things to prepare the way for the preaching of
the gospel. And preaching that does not move
your heart Godward is just a lot of noise. Preaching that does not move
your heart Godward is just a lot of noise. That's the great burden
I carry before God all the time and ask you to carry with me,
that as I speak to you from the Word of God, God may speak by
this instrument of clay, this dirty, dirty instrument. His
Word, and move your heart Godward. Reading the 22nd chapter of the
Gospel of Isaiah, We're given instruction by God the Holy Ghost
about the Valley of Vision. The Valley of Vision in this
chapter is Jerusalem. Jerusalem is called the Valley
of Vision because Jerusalem was the place where God's prophet
was found. The Valley of Vision is the place
where God gave out his word to the people. There the seer, inspired
of God, gave out his vision just as he had received it from the
Lord. The valley of vision is the house
of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and
ground of the truth. That is where you will find God's
prophet. That's where you will hear God's
message. Let's read the message together that was given in the
Valley of Vision as Isaiah the prophet writes by inspiration
of the Spirit of God and gives us this word from God. Isaiah
22 verse 1. The burden, the heavy, heavy
weight, the crushing load of the Valley of Vision. What aileth
thee now that thou art wholly gone up to the housetops? Thou
that art full of stirs, a tumultuous city, a joyous city, thy slain
men are not slain with a sword, nor dead in the battle. All thy
rulers are fled together. They're bound by archers, the
very weakest of the enemies. All that are found in thee are
bound together, which have fled from far. Without our fighting,
within our wars, But those things will never destroy the holy city.
Jerusalem, however, is in trouble. When the professed people of
God, those who are called the church of God, are a people who
have forsaken God, forsaken his gospel, forsaken his Christ,
forsaken his glory, and forsaken his word. Instead of worshiping
God and seeking his glory, the church of the 21st century is
brought to her knees under the judgment of God and doesn't know
it. She is brought to her knees under
the judgment of God as Isaiah here portrays her by the frivolity
of disobedience and idolatry. Dancing on the housetop while
the foundations crumble and the walls of the city fall. For this,
Isaiah wept. He had faithfully warned the
people of the judgment of God impending. He had faithfully
warned them, if they didn't hear God, God would send judgment. But when the judgment came, the
prophet wept the more. Verse four, therefore said I,
look away from me, I will weep bitterly. Over the years, I have often
heard preachers say, usually young fellows who didn't have
enough sense to think beyond themselves, I don't care whether
you hear me or not. I care deeply whether you hear
me or not. I care deeply. I wept bitterly. Labor not to comfort me because
of the spoiling of the daughter of my people. For it is a day
of trouble. and a treading down and a perplexity
by the Lord God of host in the valley of vision. This trouble,
this is God's doing. Breaking down the walls and of
the crying to the mountains. And Elam, that's Persians, modern
day Iranians, the sons of Ishmael. Elam bear the quiver with chariots
of men and horsemen. And Kerr, again referring to
the sons of Ishmael, a city in what's now modern Iran, in northern
Iran. Kerr uncovered the shield, and
it shall come to pass that thy choicest valleys shall be full
of chariots, and the horsemen shall set themselves in array
at the gate. When judgment begins at the house
of God, as the scriptures plainly teach, judgment must begin at
the house of God. Faithful prophets and faithful
people are found weeping before the altar of God. Listen to these
words from Joel 2, let the priest, the ministers of the Lord weep
between the porch and the altar. and let them say, spare thy people,
O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen
should rule over them. Wherefore should they say among
the people, where is their God? Then will the Lord be jealous
for his land and pity his people. Read Isaiah 22, beginning of
verse eight. And he discovered the covering
of Judah And thou didst look in the day to the armor of the
house of the forest. Ye have seen also the breaches
of the city of David, that they are many. And ye gathered together
the waters of the lower pool. And ye have numbered the houses
of Jerusalem. And the houses have ye broken
down to fortify the wall. Ye made also a ditch between
the two walls for the water of the old pool. but ye have not
looked unto the maker thereof, neither had respect unto him
that fashioned it long ago. Now, let me tell you something
that we need to understand and bear in mind. As you read the
Old Testament scriptures and the history of Israel given to
us by divine inspiration by the writing of the prophets, as you
read those histories, understand that the historic data recorded
in scripture by inspiration is precise and accurate. You will search in vain to find
one word of historic data, whether it's written after the fact or
written prophetically. You will find it absolutely impossible
to find one record of historic data, even given prophetically,
that is not precisely accurate. But the Word of God was not given
to us, and this record of Israel's history was not recorded by inspiration
in the Book of God just to teach us lessons in history. The Word
of God is not given to teach us what you can get by reading
a historic book at the library. The Word of God is given to teach
us the Gospel of Christ, to show us our need of Christ, to show
us our sin, to portray our substitute, to set our hearts upon our Redeemer,
to give us understanding in spiritual things, to give us understanding
in the day-by-day experience of God's elect in His grace,
always teaching us to look to Christ. I say that because sometimes
folks get the idea, and preachers who like to appear to be smart
and intellectual deliberately give the idea, that in order
to understand the teaching of Scripture, you've got to be sharp,
or you've got to be, you've got to have a good IQ, and you've
got to be a good student, and you've got to study this and
study that. This book was written for ordinary, plain, simple folks
like you and me. And you don't have to have a
degree in history or science to understand the message of
the book. You don't have to have a factual
knowledge of all the various things with regard to history
that it refers to. But rather, you have to be born
of God. and taught of God. You have to
have the mind of Christ to understand the things of Christ, and that's
given by God's free grace so that the simple child, born of
God and taught of God, reads the book and sees things as they
are in the book. You see, children receive things
with simple honesty. Some years ago, I told you about
an incident when Doug and Will were looking at some doors at
one of the, I don't know whether it was Lowe's or some other place
in Lexington. Will was about four or five years old, and they
were looking at doors. I don't know why. I guess Doug
was needing to buy some doors, and Will stood there with Daddy
for a little bit, and he'd look at this door and that, and Will
said, God made the doors, and Doug started to explain to him. He said, well, son, men, Went
out in the woods and cut down the trees, and sawed it up at
Sawmill, and they sanded the woods, sent it to the factory,
and they processed it, and then they molded it into these doors.
And that's how we got the doors here, they were shipped here.
And Will stood there for a second, and he said, that's what I said,
God made the doors. God made the doors. Understand
the book here is written. for you and me to behold our
Redeemer and God's grace and to teach us concerning His grace. So I'll leave it to others to
search out and tell you about the historic data to which Isaiah
here refers. My business, my responsibility,
my desire is to move your hearts toward God in the worship of
our Redeemer. The covering of Judah And the
breaches of the walls of Zion refer to more than physical things.
They speak of spiritual things. Matters that concern you and
me. They refer specifically to Judah's
hypocrisy. The inhabitants of Jerusalem
claim to be worshipers of God. They claim to trust the Lord
God, but their actions in the face of danger uncovered their
hearts. That was what God was determined
to do by sending these instruments of evil to work upon them. They claimed to trust Jehovah,
but actually they trusted their own strength. They trusted their
arms, their walls, their water supply, their wisdom and ingenuity,
the fortifications they had made, the ditches they had dug. But
the Lord God declares, you've not looked to me your maker,
the one you claim to trust. When I read this, I think to
myself, oh my God, how like Judah we are. Ever inclined to put
on a covering to cover our sin. If we are gods, he won't allow
it. Thank God he takes away the covering of hypocrisy. and graciously
forces his own to turn to him. That's what the Song of Solomon
is all about. Song of Solomon, fifth chapter
particularly, you remember the Savior knocks and the bride says,
I'm asleep, don't bother me now. And he puts his hand in by the
hole of the door and she arises and he's withdrawn and hidden
himself and she goes about the streets of the city seeking her
beloved and as she does, the watchman The watchman found me
and they took away my veil. They exposed my sin. They uncovered
my hypocrisy. Oh God, graciously do that for
you and me. The prophet said, thine own wickedness
shall correct thee and thy backsliding shall reprove thee. Know therefore
and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken
the Lord thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the
Lord God of hosts. The hymn writer put it this way.
Prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I
love, here's my heart. Oh, take and seal it. Seal it
for thy courts above. Isaiah 22 verse 12. And in that day did the Lord
God of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness,
and to girding with sackcloth, calls his people to repentance.
and behold joy and gladness, slaying oxen and killing sheep,
eating flesh and drinking wine. Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow
we die. God calls for repentance. And
we stop our ears and go about life with frivolity. And it was revealed in mine ears
by the Lord of hosts. Surely this iniquity shall not
be purged from you, till you die, saith the Lord God of hosts. The God of all grace performs
his merciful designs toward his people in all ages, and he does
it the same way. The same way today as in Isaiah's
day, the same way in Isaiah's day as in the days of Moses,
the same way today as he will tomorrow. He visits their offenses
with the rod, He chastens His children for their sins in His
displeasure for their sins. He sends us trouble and trouble
and trouble and trouble, sweetly forcing us to our knees, sweetly forcing us to Himself
in prayer. He calls for weeping. but we
turn to laughter. He calls for sackcloth and we
turn to partying, but he graciously causes us to return to him, weeping
with the sackcloth of repentance. If we seek to deaden the strokes
of his rod, if we defy his chastisements and refuse to be healed, Blessed
be His name. He refuses to take no for an
answer. He will not let you go. Not if
you're His. Read carefully the 26th chapter
of the book of Leviticus. This is what God says He will
do in the day when you refuse to hear His voice, if you're
His. If you're His, Bill, He won't let you go. He won't let
you go. This is what he says. I will
break the pride of your power. Then I will remember my covenant.
I will not cast thee away. Neither will I abhor them. And
he gives this for the reason. I am the Lord their God. What a great picture we have
of this over the book of Hosea. Hold your hands here in Isaiah
and turn to Hosea too. You see, God, the God of all
grace, he who says, I am gracious, makes our need for his grace,
the reason for his grace. Gomer has forsaken Hosea, just
as God said she would, and she stands as a picture of us. and
Hosea's love for her as a picture of God's love for his people
Israel, his chosen, his elect, his church. And when Gomer's
gone back to her lovers, fled from Hosea, verse six begins
with a word that seems strange, therefore. Because she left me. Because
she is running after her lovers. because she won't hear me. Therefore,
behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns and make a wall that
she shall not find her paths. She shall follow after her lovers,
but she shall not overtake them. She shall seek them, but shall
not find them. Then shall she say, when she's got nowhere else to
go, Oh God, so I confess it. It is my common way. I turn to
you when I've got nowhere else to turn. Thank you for fixing it, that
I have nowhere else to turn. Then shall she say, I will go
and return to my first husband, for then was it better with me
than now. Verse nine. Will I return and
take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season
thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover
her nakedness? Now will I discover her lewdness.
I'll uncover her in the sight of her lovers, and none shall
deliver her out of my hand. I will also cause all her mirth
to cease. her feast days, her new moons,
her Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. And I will destroy her
vines and her fig trees whereof she said, these are my rewards
that my lovers have given me. And I will make them a forest
and the beast of the field shall eat them. Verse 14, therefore,
behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness
and speak comfortably unto her. I'll bring her into the wilderness,
just me and Gomer, just God and you, and I will speak to her
hearts. Now, let's read Isaiah 22, verses
15 through 19. Thus saith the Lord God of hosts,
go, get thee unto this treasurer, even unto Shebna, which is over
the house, and say, What hast thou here? And whom hast thou
here, that thou hast hewed thee out a sepulcher here? As he that
heweth him out a sepulcher on high, and that graveth inhabitation
for himself in a rock. Behold, the Lord will carry thee
away with a mighty captivity, and will surely cover thee. he
will surely violently turn and toss thee like a ball into a
large country. There shalt thou die, and there
the chariots of thy glory shall be the shame of thy Lord's house.
And I will drive thee from thy station, and from thy state shall
he pull thee down. Removing Shedna from his office
as treasurer, God opened the way for Isaiah to speak of one
infinitely greater than Shebna. Shebna stands here in this passage
as one who appeared to be a nail in a sure place. He's the representative
of every man who sets his rest upon anything this side of the
land to promise. The man who places confidence
in anything short of Christ. Oh, for grace to make a better
choice than Shebna. You and I need to learn this
and be reminded of it frequently. No man is an island to himself. No woman is an island to herself. Nothing we do affects us alone. Would to God you could live with
that heavy monkey on your back with every breathing hour. Nothing
we do affects us alone. just as Hezekiah's sin and his
folly affected all who were influenced by him. Everything we say, everything
we do affects other people. We really do affect folks for
good or for evil. particularly those who in God's
providence are placed under our influence and under our government,
our families, those who work for us, those who are in some
way subordinate to us. Such is the order and constitution
of human society by divine purpose. And let me tell you what that
means. If a father forsakes the worship of God, as I wrote those
words and read them over a hundred times in the past two weeks.
If a father forsakes the worship of God, this is what he does.
He takes his sons and his daughters by the hand and he takes his
wife by the hand and says, come on, let me show you the way to
hell. That's what a father does when
he abandons the worship of God. If a husband becomes a drunk,
his whole family suffers the pain, the shame, and the poverty
of his actions. And he's without excuse. If a
man forsakes his wife, or a woman forsakes her husband, the whole
family suffers for it. I know we live in this day when
men and women change husbands and wives like most of us change
socks. But you won't so live and stand
before God. It won't happen. It won't happen. So it didn't affect anybody but
us. It affects everybody you know, especially your children.
Well, the children are all grown. You try to get them to deal honestly
with you and tell you it doesn't affect them. Wise is the man,
wise is the woman, who understands the consequences of their actions
upon others. I suspect that Brother Lott,
before he died, greatly lamented the fact that
he failed to consider the consequences of his actions on his family
when he pitched his tent towards Sodom. Here in Isaiah 22, God
called Judah to repentance during the reign of Hezekiah. But the
nation had no regard for God, had no regard for his word or
his prophet, because the leaders of the nation under Hezekiah
were self-serving, godless men. The treasurer, Shebna, was signaled
out by God for his sin. He appeared, as I said, to be
a nail in a sure place. He was the treasurer of the nation. He held the power and the riches
of the nation. And Shebna, thinking himself
such a great man, engraved a stone and made a sepulcher for him,
placed himself on high to have a stone set on there, saying,
he's somebody. And God pulled him down and destroyed
him. and set up Eliakim in his place.
This man, Eliakim, who was exalted in Shebna's place is held before
us in verses 20 through 25 as a marvelous, beautiful picture
of our Lord Jesus Christ. When Shebna was removed, there
was room for Eliakim, but not until Shebna was taken down.
And Eliakim is fastened by God. a nail in a sure place. Verse
20, And it shall come to pass in that day that I will call
my servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah, and I will clothe him
with thy robe, and strengthen him with thy girdle, and and
I will commit thy government into his hand, and he shall be
a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of
Judah, and the key of the house of David will lie upon his shoulder,
and he shall open, and none shall shut, and he shall shut, and
none shall open, and I will fasten him, God says I will fasten him,
as a nail in a sure place, and he shall be for a glorious throne
to his father's house, and there shall hang upon him all the glory
of his father's house, and the offering and the issue, all the
vessels of small quantity from the vessels of cups even to the
vessels of flagons. In that day, saith the Lord of
hosts, shall the nail that is fastened in the sure place be
removed, be cut down, and fall, and the burden that was upon
it shall be cut off, for the Lord has spoken it." What is
all this given to teach us? The Lord Jesus Christ had been
set up by God as a nail in a sure place. Upon Him we confidently
hang our soul. upon Him we are wise to confidently
hang all things concerning our lives in this world and in the
world to come. Let me show you four or five
things just briefly. They'll be worth remembering.
Eliakim clearly is a type of Christ. If you want to turn to
Revelation chapter 3, you don't need to, I'll read it to you.
We know this is the intention of the Spirit of God in giving
us this history because our Savior Himself uses the very words of
verse 22 to speak of Himself. These things saith he that is
holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that
openeth, and no man shutteth, and shutteth, and no man openeth. That's Revelation 3, verse 7. The house of David is the church
and kingdom of God. Christ is the ruler. He's the
king. He's the sovereign in his kingdom.
The only way, the only door of access into this church and kingdom
is Jesus Christ, the Lord. When he opens, no man can shut. And when he shuts, no man can
open. He tells us to seek the Lord
while he may be found. He tells us to strive to enter
in by the straight gate and to walk in the narrow way for the
day is coming when the king shall arise and shut the door and no
man can enter in. Christ's throne is glorious to
his father's house. To all who believe, The most
glorious thing we can think of, the most glorious thing we speak
of is that He who loved us and redeemed us by the sacrifice
of Himself, He sits on the throne of the universe. So in His exaltation,
Eliakim is typical of our Savior, but there's more. Look at the
next thing, verses 17 and 18. Before Eliakim could be set up,
Shebna had to be removed, cut off, and destroyed. That which
seemed to be a nail in a sure place had to be destroyed. That which was Israel's confidence,
That which was her strength, that to which she turned instead
of to the Lord, that which she trusted instead of her maker,
Shemna, representing her power, her wealth, her strength, had
to be destroyed. Even so, in the experience of
grace, in order for Christ to be established in the heart,
there must be an overthrow of someone else. The strong man
must be that bound. The devils of self-righteousness
must be cast out to make room for Christ in the city of man's
soul. Whenever the Lord Jesus comes
to set up his throne in the city of man's soul, something takes
place inside a man. It's a war, a conflict, a battle,
a painful experience. It's amazing how we overlook
illustrations given in scripture. In scripture, the new birth,
conversion, repentance, faith, those things are illustrated
for us and described for us, the work of the Holy Spirit in
a man in ways depicting great conflict and pain. Talks about the old man, Satan,
being bound and cast out and Christ sitting up his throne.
That new birth is described as circumcision. Circumcision is
a painful thing to experience. It's a painful thing to experience.
And the new birth involves difficulty and pain for God's people. You won't be stripped of your
fig leaf righteousness without feeling that you've been stripped.
You won't be slain, your hopes dashed in pieces without knowing
that your hopes have been dashed in pieces. Paul said, I was alive
without the law once and then the commandment came and sin
revived and I died. God Almighty, sinners in saving
grace and strips them of every hope. He destroys every crutch. He knocks out every prop. He
breaks up every foundation. We lay for ourselves. He destroys
our own imaginary goodness and righteousness and uprightness
and strength by which every man deludes himself into thinking
that he has acceptance with God. Read the third chapter, Philippians,
and you read about a man who was born and raised in religious
morality and uprightness. He was on church rolls from his
infancy. He was trained in the best church
schools society could make. He was raised up a brilliant
man, a leader among religious men. And he said, those things
that I counted gained. Those things that were my benefit,
those things that gave me strength and confidence before God, now
I count them but dung. Just waste. The filth and excrement
of the body, just dung. My righteousness, my knowledge,
my experience, my goodness, my works, just dung. You see, Christ
will never go shares in the business of salvation. As he was alone
in his suffering, he will be alone in his saving. All self-confidence
must be cast down if you would trust Christ. The reality is,
you will never cast it down. God has to pull it out. And when
God pulls it out, you'll turn and spit on it. Some seem to
have the idea that we trust Christ in the beginning for the past,
but for the future, we have to look to ourselves. We've got
to keep ourselves. We've got to persevere. We've
got to hold on. We've got to hold out. The future
depends on you. Oh, no. Our only hope for the
future is Christ as well. If I am kept, He must keep me. If you're kept,
He must keep you. And if I perish trusting Christ,
He's the one who loses me. I love what John Jasper said.
Somebody asked him about his assurance and how he could be
so sure, trusting the Lord. And he said, he said, I trust
the Lord Jesus. And they said, but Jasper, what
if you should lose your soul trusting Him? He said, that won't
happen. He's got more to lose than I do. Jasper just lose his
soul, Jesus lose his glory. God's glory is attached with
the salvation of his people. And there's no possibility that
the sinner trusting Christ shall perish. Having cast away all
self-righteousness and self-confidence, we continue to do so all our
lives. You see, self-righteousness is
like a web. I walk behind Shelby and she
misses webs that are strung up during the night. I catch them.
And you just, you know what, see David's mouth? Catch them
all the time, don't you? Just wipe them. There's some more
there. Look up during the day. Self-righteousness
clings to us like that. And we must continually seek
grace from God to cast it off. We must look to Christ alone
as our Savior. Third, as Eliakim in the house
of Hezekiah was a nail in a sure place, Christ had been fixed
by God in his house as a nail in a sure place. We can't hardly
get a picture of this, but I remember seeing a picture on the news
of that fellow who used to be a dictator over in Libya. And he set up his harem and his
tent in Washington when he came to visit the United States one
time. A huge thing, a huge thing. That's how those folks live.
And a tent, a large tent is set with stakes all around it, but
there's a pole right in the middle on which everything hangs. Everything
hangs. The whole structure hangs on
that one pole. That's what Christ is, a nail
in a sure place. The ancient nomadic people would
hang things on that pole. They'd come in and drive a nail
in it, put a hook in it. They'd put something in it. When
it just hangs on, you can't hang it on the cloth. You can't hang
it on the wall. You gotta hang it on that pole.
And they'd hang everything, little cups, flagons, pots, everything. That's what Christ is in the
house of God. God hangs on him all his glory. God hangs on him all his work,
so that all the work of creation is done by and through Christ. All the work of redemption and
grace is done by and through Christ. All the work of salvation
is done by and through Christ. All the work of judgment is done
by and through Christ. All the work of the new creation
is done by and through Christ. God hangs everything on him,
even the glory of his house, everything. And believers imitate
God. God teaches us by His grace,
Jimmy, to hang everything on His Son. And He keeps on teaching
us, graciously forcing us to hang everything on His darling
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And He is the glory of the house. One more thing. Look at verse
25. As Eliakim had to be cut down,
So Christ, our mighty nail, that one upon whom the glory of the
house hangs, that one upon whom the glory of God hangs, that
one upon whom we hang our souls had to be cut down. Now notice
the language, in that day, in the day that God set him in his
house as a nail in a sure place, saith the Lord of hosts. shall
the nail that is fastened in the sure place be removed and
cut down and fall. And the burden that was upon
it shall be cut off for the Lord has spoken it. The nail, the
nail in the sure place had to fall. It has to be cut down. It must be removed. And the burden
on that nail must be cut off with it. What does that mean? What is that talking about? There's
not a hint that any of the vessels hanging upon the nail are injured. Only the burden that was upon
the nail, it shall be cut off. What was the burden that was
laid upon our Savior? The burden of our sin was laid
on Him. All was hung on him, our sin,
our guilt, our debt, our sentence. And when the nail was removed,
cut down, felled by the wrath and justice of God, so too was
our sin, which he bore in his body on the tree. Because the
nail fell and rose again, those who hang themselves upon this
nail shall never fall and never be cut off. This is called substitution. The Lord Jesus, God's dear son,
was made sin and failed under the wrath of
God for our sin. And sin being cut off by him,
put to an end by him, finished by him, all for whom he died
at Calvary are made the righteousness of God in him. And believing
on the Son of God, we are made free in Christ. as we hang our
souls on this nail fixed by God in His house on which God hangs
His glory. Amen.