I want to begin reading in verse
1. I want to look at this this morning and finish it up this
afternoon, if the Lord is willing. Comfort ye my people, saith your
God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem,
and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished. that her iniquity
is pardoned, for she hath received of the Lord's hand double for
all her sins. The voice of him that crieth
in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight
in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted,
and every mountain shall be made low, and the crooked shall be
made straight, and the rough places plain. And the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The boy said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry?
All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the
flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely
the people is grass. The grass witherth, the flower
fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand forever. O Zion that
bringeth good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain. O
Jerusalem that bringeth good tidings, lift up thy voice with
strength. Lift it up, be not afraid. Say
unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God. Behold, the Lord will
come with strong hands, and his arms shall rule for him. Behold,
his reward is with him and his work before him. He shall feed
his flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arms and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead
those that are with young." In our first verse it says, Convert
ye, my people, Webster says this word comfort
means to strengthen, to strengthen, to strengthen the mind, especially
the depressed mind that's been enfeebled, to console, to give
new vigor to the spirit, to cheer, to relieve from depression or
trouble. Randy began the book of Job this
morning and his friends came to comfort him. They came to
console him. And the Scripture says here,
comfort ye my people. Something is wrong with the Lord's
people. They're being depressed. They're
discomforted. And the Lord gives this command
to comfort my people. Now why would the Lord's people
be discomforted? Well, let me give you four or
five reasons quickly before we get into the comfort. How about
the corruption? of their natures, the corruption
of their own nature. I wish when the Lord saved a
man that He just blessed him real good, took all knowledge
of sin and self and sense from him, and just let him float on
cloud nine, as it were, until He took him to heaven. But it's
not that way, is it? Not long after the Lord saved
me, I realized that I still possessed this old nature. And I began
to feel His workings in my heart. And it became a discomfort to
me. The Apostle Paul said this, When
I would do good, evil is present with me. Can you imagine what
a holy man he was? And how he loved the Lord? Ye
that love the Lord hate evil. This man loved the Lord and he
hated evil, and yet he said, evil is present with me. You know, we read over that sometimes
and we don't stop to think how that made that holy man feel
when he felt the evil stirred up within him. He said, in me,
in my flesh dwells no good thing. That's what every Christian says
about himself. What do you think about yourself?
No good. No good. Ain't that what he says?
And it discomforts him. God's saints, they delight in
the law of God after the inward man. And there's a new creature
within their bosom that delights in holiness, delights in love
and in God and in goodness. But there's another man there.
There's this old man, this outward man that can do nothing but think
evil. He is evil. And that's enough
to discomfort a person, is it not? It made the Apostle Paul
say this, O wretched man that I am. And this so discomforts
the Lord's people. Sometimes the Lord comes and
says, Comfort him. Comfort her. She needs comfort. Secondly, how about the temptations
of Satan? Well, Peter found out something
about that, didn't he? I tell you, Satan would have
destroyed Peter if the Lord Jesus hadn't have prayed for him. Satan
desires to have you that he may sift you like wheat. And if you've
ever fallen into the temptations of Satan, and you've been there
very long and they've been very deep, you know what it is to
be discomfited. And you know what it is to need
comfort. Look how he handled Job. Well,
look how he handled David when he came to David and tempted
him. Look what he did to wise Solomon. I tell you, we're no
match for Satan, are we? We're no match for him. And boy,
sometimes when the Lord lets down the hedge and lets Satan
have his way with us, we figure we're goners, don't we? If we didn't have a high priest
in heaven to pray for us, we could never endure the temptations
of Satan. He's too much for us. But when
he comes and tempts us, we know then that we're in need of comfort.
How about this? Don't this discomfort us? The
hiding of God's face. How often in the book of Psalms
you read these phrases like this David wrote. Hide not thy face
from thy servant. For I am in trouble. Hear me."
When, David? Speedily. Speedily. Why? When He hides His face from us,
it's trouble. When I can't see Him with the
eye of my understanding, when He hides His face and you can't
see Him, David said it's like going down to the pit. If you
hide your face from me, I'll be like those who go down to
the pit. There's no difference between
me and them. We can take some trouble. We can bear tribulations. But if He hides His face, the
littlest temptation, the smallest trouble will get us down. I tell
you, when the Lord hides His face and we're troubled, then
we need comfort. And you add to this physical
troubles, physical trials, sickness of the body, trials in the family,
the loss of a loved one, Trouble in the church family? I tell
you, we need comfort, don't we? The Lord says, comfort ye, comfort
ye My people. Let me give you four means that
God uses to comfort His people. And these are just four. These
are just four. I'll give these to you this morning.
What does God use to comfort His people? Well, we have one
right here in our text. My people. My people. Comfort you, My people. Isn't it a comfort to you to
know that you're one of His? I'm His. That's comforted enough
if we'd think upon that. The Lord said this in John 13.1,
having loved His own, which were in the world, He loved them until
the end. If you just live in the faith
of this, That I'm His. He loves me. He's redeemed me. He's called me. He's saved me.
I'm His. That's enough to comfort a person,
is it not? The Scripture says that God has
a people in this world. He chose them to salvation before
they had a being. The Son of God came into this
world to redeem them. The Holy Spirit has come and
called them and given them life. He's given them repentance and
faith. He's implanted in their hearts
the graces of the Spirit of goodness and love and joy and peace. And isn't it a comfort this morning
when you can know and believe that you're one of His? I'm His,
but you know that's such an honor. I mean, that's an understatement
to say it's such an honor. What a glory it is to be one
of His. And that's why I guess He comes
here and in verse 2 He said, Speak ye to the heart. Speak
ye tenderly to Jerusalem and cry unto her. Cry what unto her? That you're His. It's difficult
sometimes, is it not? Especially when we're in great
afflictions. Sometimes when the Lord's hand
is heavy upon us, chastening us, it's difficult to say with
any amount of assurance, I'm His. I'm His. And the Lord has to keep saying
this over and over again to us, that you're mine. You're mine. I don't know how many times in
the book of Isaiah the Lord says such things like this. Listen
to Isaiah 43.1. But now thus saith the Lord that
created thee, O Jacob, and he that farmed thee, O Israel, fear
not, for I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name. Thou art mine. You're mine. I've redeemed you. I've called
you. You are mine. You are mine. Then he said in another place
in Isaiah, Come my people, enter thou to thy chambers, and shut
the doors about you, and hide yourself for just a little moment
until the indignation be passed. And he said in another place,
The beast of the field shall honor me, the dragons and the
owls, because I give water in the wilderness and rivers in
the desert to give drink to my people My chosen, My people. He has a people, doesn't He?
And isn't it wonderful to believe that you're one of them? That's
comfort in and of itself, is it not? He said in Zechariah
chapter 13 in verse 9, listen to this, Thou shalt call on My
name, and I will hear thee. I will say, It is my people. And they will say, the Lord is
my God. You're mine. You'll call on me
and I'll speak to you and I'll say, you're my people. It's my
people. And they'll say, you're my God.
I am my Beloved's. And my Beloved is mine. And you
know that's who Christ come to save. He came down from heaven.
And who did He came to save? His people. He came to save His
people from their sins. This brings us to the second
comfort, and that's this. Not only that we're His, His
people, God's people. But secondly, He causes those
who are His, by redeeming grace, to know themselves. He causes
them to know themselves. And this is comforting to them.
I read to you there in verses 6 through 8 about the grass.
The Lord said, ìCryî in verse 6, and He said, ìLord, why do
you want me to cry?î And this is strange to this world. This
is really strange to this world, that the Lord would teach us
what kind of people we are. Weíre like grass. Weíre not like
the beautiful grass. Weíre like withering grass. We're
like the fading flower of the grass, he says there in verse
7 and through verse 8. We can apply this physically,
can't we? And physically, boy, I can look at you and you can
look at me and you can see a picture of me and I can see a picture
of you. Esther had some photographs on her mother's funeral down
there and you always look at those when they're young and
you don't realize who that is. Who is that person thirty-five
or forty years ago? They've changed so much. What's
happened? The flower. The flower has faded. You come
into this earth and you're so strong and you're so handsome
and you're so beautiful, but give it a few years and your
strength begins to weaken and your beauty begins to fade and
you stoop. We're just like that, aren't
we, physically? But you know, we're just like that spiritually
too, aren't we? Some of us knows what it means
to have had a measure of confidence in our flesh. Paul said, if any
man thinks he has to, we're ought to trust in the flesh, I'm over. But hasn't some of us here in
the past trusted in our flesh? You hear a lot today people talking
about the power of their free wills, bragging about that. What is that? That's flash, isn't
it? Some people today, they give
a few dollars, they give a little time in the cause of God, they
do a few good deeds, and to them it's like a beautiful bouquet
of roses. The most beautiful thing they've
ever seen in their life. They've done a few good works
that they think, They give a little. They prayed a little. They read
a little. They visited a little. And boy, they look at that and
they're amazed. Did I do that? How beautiful
all of that is. Until the Spirit of God blows
upon it. And then what happens? Boy, it
fades, doesn't it? I know and some of you know what
it is for the Spirit of God to blow upon us and make us realize
that we're nothing. All our righteousnesses are filthy
rags. He makes us to understand this. Let the Spirit of God blow upon
our self-righteousness, upon our strength. And all our power
and our beauty fades right before our eyes. And we become weak
and wielded and undesirable. in our own eyes as a dried up
rose? What do you do with dried up
roses? All of us know what we do. We throw them in the trash
can, don't we? Or we throw them on the fire heat. Why? They're
fit for nothing. They're not beautiful anymore.
Is this what the Lord teaches His people? Cry. Cry to who? Cry to Israel. Make them know their weakness.
Make them to know that they're nothing. How can this comfort
God's people? Well, it's comforting for them
to know that the Lord knows what they are. Wouldn't it be a frightful
thing to be so depraved and God not realize? Ain't that a fearful
thing? For God to come to you and demand
of you what you must be? He demand of you what you must
do? And expect you to be that? And
expect you to do that? And not lift a finger? Not give
you any grace to be that and to do that? Expect you to be
it and do it in yourself? That's fearful, isn't it? That's
the most fearful thing I can think of. That God would expect
me. to be anything that would be
pleasing to Him. Or to do anything that could
be pleasing to Him. Isn't it a comfort to know that
God knows that you're nothing but a faded flower? That if you're
ever going to be anything, He has to make you? If you're ever
going to do anything, He has to give you grace to do it? What
did the Lord Jesus say? Without Me, without Me, you can
do nothing. And we say, Lord Jesus, without
you I am nothing. I am nothing. The world can't
understand this, can they? They think when the Lord comes
and begins to open a man's eyes and teach him and convert him
that he begins to think well of himself. He begins to pump
up his ego. But that's not it at all, is
it? The Lord comes to us and what
does He do? He begins to make us see ourselves as we really
are. And then He comes to us and says,
everything you need, I'll supply. Everything I expect you to do,
I'll give you grace to do it. I don't trust you to do anything
by yourself, on your own. That's a comfort, brothers and
sisters. That's a comfort. Do we need righteousness? God
has supplied it in Christ His Son. Do we need faith? He gives
us grace to believe. Do we need a broken heart? The
sacrifices of God are a broken heart. Do we need love? The love
of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit that's
given to us. Do we need good works? God has
created us in Christ Jesus unto good works. It's Him that worketh
in us. both to will and to do of His
good pleasure. Without Christ, we're nothing.
But in Christ, we're complete. Without Christ, we're a fading
flower. But in Christ, we're a beautiful
rose. Without Christ, we can do nothing.
But with Christ, we can do all things. It'd be a fearful thing
for God to come to us and say, I really don't know you. It's
a great comfort to us when He says, I know you thoroughly.
I know you thoroughly. That wonderful passage in Psalms
107, 12, He brought down their hearts with labor. Sounds like
the Spirit of the Lord blew upon them, doesn't it? And listen
to this, they fell down and there was none to help them. None. That's where He brings us to,
isn't it? He brings us there over and over
again to make us see we're helpless. It's not just a one-time deal.
He brings us there almost continually. We fall down and there's none
to help. And then what happens? We cry
unto the Lord in our trouble. And He saved them out of all
their distresses. And He comforts them. He comforts
them. How does He comfort His people?
Not only letting them know that they are His people, teaching
them what they are in and of themselves to show them that
He's everything to them. He comforts them by His Word. There in verse 8 He said this,
The grass withereth and the flower fadeth, but the Word of our God
shall stand forever. Everything around us is fading,
ain't it? Everything's fading. We bought, you and I bought a
little car a couple of years ago, 8,000 miles on it. Two years
and that thing is almost, it's just wearing out. Things are
going out on it. It's wearing out. Everything's fading, isn't
it? Wonder what this old building's
going to look like 25 years from now. You reckon it's going to
stand that long? We're here now and it seems so comfortable.
I wonder what it'll be here 25 years from now. I probably won't
be here 25 years from now. Everything's faded and fallen
and fellen. Everything around us is, isn't
it? Even the earth. In the beginning you've laid
the foundations of the earth, the writer said to the Lord.
They're the works of your hands. But what's going to happen to
this earth? It's going to fade. It decayeth and waxeth old. I was talking with a man over
in Maryland and he has an organic farm and he has this piece of
equipment that checks the quality of fruits and vegetables. He
has to do that before he can sell them. And he says sometimes
he goes to the store and he buys fruits and vegetables just to
Just examine them and check them with his checker and see if it
has any qualities about it. And he says there's no quality
in the fruits and vegetables that we're getting now. And the
reason it is, the earth is wearing out. It's just wearing out, it's
failing. There's only one thing that will
stand forever. And you know what it is? This
Bible. The Word of God shall stand forever. And that's why we're comforted
when we read this blessed Word. The Bible says whatsoever things
were written aforetime were written for our learning. The last book
of the Bible was written somewhere around 1900 years ago. How could
a book that was written that long ago help us today? It's because the Bible is like
no other book. It never gets old. It stands
forever. It tells us how things used to
be. It tells us how things was. It
tells us how things are. And it tells us how things are
going to be. And you know, it can tell us
how things are going to be in the end. And it can say it's
already happened. That's how sure this Bible is.
I want you to look at a passage, two or three passages, wait me
to see this. Look in Revelations chapter 11. Over in Revelations
chapter 11. And look in verse 15. Here's
the example of what I'm saying, and I want to go back to our
text in just a second. But look what he's saying. in verse 15 of Revelation chapter
11. And the seventh angel sounded,
and there were great voices in heaven saying, The kingdoms of
this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ,
and He shall reign forever and ever. And you know the thing
about verse 15? It hasn't even happened yet.
Ain't that amazing? The Sabbath trumpet, the Sabbath
angel here, the Sabbath trumpet is the last one that will sound. It hasn't even sounded yet. But
yet he says the Sabbath angel sounded as though it's already
happened. Christ is reigning right now,
but you know he hasn't put all of his enemies under his feet.
Look what he said in verse 16, And the four and twenty elders
which sat before God on their seats fell upon their faces,
and worshipped God, saying, We give thee thanks, Lord God Almighty,
which art was and art to come, because thou hast taken to thee
thy great power, and hast reigned, and the nations were angry, and
thy wrath is come. Well, not yet. It hasn't come
yet. Thank God it hasn't. But it says
here it is. and the time of the dead that
they should be judged. Well, they are still in the ground
right now. And that thou shouldest give rewards unto thy servant
the prophets, and to thy saints and to them that fear thy name,
small and great, and shouldest destroy them that destroyed the
earth. See how certain the Bible is. It can speak of things that are
not yet to come and we have no idea when they are going to happen.
But it says it has already happened. They call that prophetic perfects. I don't know why they call it
that. But some of our old timers says, when you find a prophecy
in the Old or New Testament, it's as though it's good as done. And only the Bible can do that.
I can't even tell you what the next minute will bring. Can you? You don't pick up your newspaper
in the morning and say, next Monday this is going to happen.
They don't know. But the Bible can say that. Let
me show you two or three more places. Look in Jeremiah chapter
29. Jeremiah chapter 29. This is
an amazing prophecy. Jeremiah chapter 29 and look
in verse 10. The children of Israel were ready
to be carried away into captivity to Babylon. And the Lord told
them, He said, when you get there, I want you to build your houses.
Build houses in Babylon. I want you to marry a wife and
you ladies marry a husband and raise children and give your
sons to daughters and your daughters to sons and pray for the peace
of that place. Settle down there. And then he
tells them in verse 10, For thus saith the Lord, that after seventy
years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you and perform
My good word towards you in causing you to return to this place.
For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, saith the
Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you an unexpected
end. Then shall you call upon Me and
go and pray unto Me, and I will hearken unto you." And here's
the wonderful thing about this. He predicted how long they would
be there. before they went there. And Daniel, he was reading this
passage. They had been there for 70 years.
And they said, how long is this going to last? How long are we
going to be in captivity? And Daniel was reading these
very verses that I read to you. And he said, the time is accomplished. Ain't that amazing? He said,
70 years shall be accomplished. And Daniel was reading that and
said, it's accomplished. It's accomplished. What am I
saying? When the Lord tells us something,
He can tell us in past tense. Just as though it's already taken
place. Now turn back to my text. This
is the reason I want you to see that. Turn back to my text in
Isaiah chapter 40. Because there's three things
here that they call prophetic Perfects. And look at what they
are. How appealing these things are
to us. And this is so much comfort in these three things. And He
speaks of them in past tense. Look in Isaiah chapter 40 and
look in verse 2. Speak ye comfortably. This word
means tenderly, lovingly. Speak tenderly, lovingly. Speak
to the heart of Jerusalem. and cry unto her, look at this,
that her warfare is accomplished. You're in a warfare this morning?
In a struggle with sin and self and Satan and the world and all
that goes along with that? Well, He comes to us this morning
and says, Dear child of God, your warfare is accomplished. That means it's fulfilled. If you went and joined the armed
services and they trained you and sent you off to some war
in a foreign country and your life was at risk, now this can
happen with man, but how would you feel if when they gave you
your papers to go to war, you also got a look at your discharge
papers? At a certain time, you're going
to be discharged with an honorable discharge. What does that mean?
That means while you're at war, you're not going to be killed.
You're going to come home, you're going to be discharged. Your
warfare will be successful. That wouldn't make you slothful
while you were at war, would it? But I'll tell you what it
would do. It would give you confidence
to know you're coming home. And here's the wonderful thing
about this passage. While we're here in our struggles
and in this warfare, here's the comfort. He says, tell them that
their warfare is accomplished. It's been determined how long
the war lasted, when it began, who the enemy was, and when it's
to end, it's already finished. The Lord Jesus was riding to
the church at Smyrna, and He said this to them. He said, Don't
fear any of those things that you're going to suffer. Now isn't
that amazing? They tell us, and I don't know
how they get some kind of statistic like this, but they tell us most
of the things that we fear are in the future. And most of the
things that we fear never come to pass. That's us, isn't it? You have something you fear about
the future. I tell you, I don't want to get cancer, do you? I
don't want to lose my mind. I don't want to suffer. And when
I think about the future, sometimes I think, boy, it's full of trials
and tribulations. Well, whatever it is, it's already
accomplished. So the Lord says, fear none of
those things which you shall suffer. Why? It's accomplished. And listen to what he says. The
devil shall cast some of you into prison, and you shall be
tried, and you shall have tribulations, but listen to this, for ten days. Ten days. He knows, doesn't he? He knows. And that's not very
long. Why does he know? Everything
comes from his hand, does it not? His people don't suffer
anything that don't first come from His hand. And this is their
comfort. It's all determined. Now isn't
that comforting to you to know that? It is for me. I tell you,
when you get your heart's heavy and you think, I just can't go
on. I just can't go on. I can't make one foot step in
front of another. And He comes and He says, Bruce,
it's already finished. It's already accomplished. And
you survived the war. You survived. You're still alive.
And here's a wonderful thing, here's the second thing, and
he speaks of it in fast tense. He said, Speak ye comfortably
to Rosalind, cry to her that her warfare is accomplished,
that her iniquity is pardoned. Isn't that wonderful? I have
spent almost 43 years, and I don't know that there's a day that's
going by that I've not confessed some kind of sin. We spend a
great deal of our time confessing sins, do we not? And we confess
it with a hope that for Christ's sake, He forgives it. And after 42 years of confessing,
when I come down and you come down to our deathbed and we look
back over our life and we see that for the most part it's just
a mess. We've just failed so often. We've
sinned to come short of His glory so often. But this verse comes
to us and it says, I'm going to comfort you with something.
Lord, what is it? All your iniquity is pardoned. It's pardoned. Isn't that wonderful?
All the sins of your past, all the sins of your present, all
the sins of your future, it's pardoned. You know when the Lord
Jesus died, all of our sins were future ones. They were future. And He purged them all. He purged
them all. Pardoned. Pardoned. There is
a wonderful verse in Jeremiah chapter 50 verse 20. In those
days and in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel
shall be sought for, and there shall be none. And the sins of
Judah, and they shall not be found, For I will pardon them
whom I reserve." All of His people are pardoned. What a wonderful
comfort that is. And lastly, He says this, "...speak
ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, for she hath
received of the Lord's hand double for all her sins." Sometimes
when you see the Lord dishing out double, it's not a good thing.
He said in Jeremiah 17, 18, Let them be confounded that persecute
me, bring upon them the day of evil, and destroy them with double
destruction. Now, I don't know what that means,
but it sounds bad. But here is something good. Here
is something comfortable. In our text, he says this, For I'm telling you that I'm
going to give you double, double. And in Isaiah 61, verse 7, here's
what he means. Listen to this. For your shame, you shall have double. You would
thank Him if you didn't read on. Boy, that's double shame.
He's going to give me what I deserve. He's going to make me doubly
ashamed. And for your confusion, you shall rejoice. in your poor
ship. Therefore in their land they
shall possess the double. Everlasting joy shall be upon
them." Instead of giving us what we deserve, He doubles the blessing. In other words, where sin abounded,
grace did much more abound. Through the offense of one, many
be dead. Much more, the grace of God and
the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded
unto many. I'm going to pay you double.
I'll pay you double. Our light afflictions, which
are but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and
eternal way of glory. I remember he paid Job double. Remember that? He paid Job double. You know, when you hear things
like this from the Scripture, it encourages you to go ahead
and suffer in patience. Be patient in your suffering,
your trials, and when you're confused and you don't know which
way to turn, He's going to reward you. I guess the darker the time
is here, the more glorious it'll be up there. Because He's going
to reward you. Reward you. Berta Mitchell just died the
other day. We went over and had her funeral. I'd go out to her
and John's home sometime. She'd play the piano for John
and I and sing. And she would give me the song
that she sang. Sometimes she would write on it. She wrote
on this old song here, John likes this song. And this is what it
says. Beyond the gates of life so fleeting,
there is for us a better home, a place where peace shall reign
forever, and sighs and tears shall never come. Beyond the
gates, beyond the sorrow, beyond the care of life's vain store,
we'll have new joy Beyond expression, glad praise will sing on heaven's
shore. Beyond the gates of all sad pardons,
where grief and pain our hearts make sore, we'll meet again,
our dear Christian brothers, and see their welcome smiles
once more. And I like this one. Beyond the
gates in Jesus' likeness, For evermore we shall live on. I
want to meet you, Christian brother. I'll look for you when morn shall
dawn. Beyond the gates, beyond the
sunset, you life immortal for us waits. We'll be at home on
life's far morning. Beyond the gates, beyond the
gates. And what makes you so happy about
that? In God's purpose? In God's plan, it's done. The warfare is accomplished.
The sins are all forgiven. And I have rewarded them double
for all their trials. We'll look at that just a little
bit more this afternoon.