Let us open our Bibles today
to the book of Isaiah chapter 6. Isaiah chapter 6. In the year that King Uzziah
died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted
up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims,
each one had six wings. With twain he covered his face,
and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another and
said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth
is full of his glory. And the post of the door moved
at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with
smoke. Then said I, woe is me, for I am undone because I am
a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. For mine eyes have seen the king
and the lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphims
unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken
with tongs from off the altar. And he laid it upon my mouth
and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips, and thine iniquity
is taken away, and thy sin purged. These words that I've just finished
reading record a vision that God gave unto His prophet Isaiah. In Hebrews chapter 1 and verse
1, we read God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake
in time past unto the fathers by the prophets. This is one
of those divers manners in which God spoke in time past. He spoke
to them through dreams and visions, and many times the word of the
Lord came to them. In looking at this vision, I
want us this morning to consider three sites that Isaiah had in
this vision. Three sites. The first, a blessed
site. Isaiah saw the Lord, a blessed
sight. The seraphims, who are angels,
cried one unto another, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. Now the seraphims themselves
are holy beings, but to emphasize The greatness of God's holiness,
we read that they had three sets of wings and they covered their
faces with their wings and they covered their feet with their
wings. So as to speak in this way, to
emphasize the holiness of the Lord. that he is holy in such
a way, a being of such holiness that no other being can approach
unto him. In Revelation chapter 15 and
verse 4, we read that part of the song which is sung in heaven
is this. who shall not fear thee and glorify
thy name, for thou only art holy. For thou only art holy. God only is the uncreated holy
one. These seraphims were holy, but
their holiness is an uncreated holiness. God only is holiness. This is who he is. Holiness is his nature. And without
holiness, he would cease to be God. Now, one of the ways that
we may be sure of the inspiration of the word of God is this very
truth. Because uninspired men would
never have written a book that speaks to us of a God who is
holy as the Lord God is. Uninspired men may have written
a book that would have spoken of a God of love. And yes, God
is a God of love. But these seraphims did not cry
one to the other, love, love, love is the holy Lord God. But they cried, holy, holy, holy
is the Lord of hosts. Now we learn this truth from
the word of God, the truth about him being holy as we look and
as we compare scriptures. For instance, in Hebrews chapter
six and verse 13, in reference to an oath that God took, remember
he has given us assurance by two immutable things in which
it is impossible that God should lie or God should change. One
of those immutable things is His Word. He's given us His Word,
but He's also given us an oath. And here in Hebrews chapter 6
and verse 13, concerning that oath, we read, because He, that
is God, could swear by no greater He swore by Himself. God swore by Himself because
there's none other. When we go into a court of law
and we give our testimony, we put our hands on the Bible and
we swear to tell the truth. But we're not swearing by ourselves. We're swearing upon the Word
of God, something greater. But there is nothing greater.
There's nothing superior. There's nothing above God. So
when He took an oath, And think about this, the God who cannot
lie, the God who cannot promise, in order that you and I, us,
his children, those of us who know him as our Lord, as our
Savior today, that we might have a strong assurance. We might
have a strong assurance of our salvation. Why? Because God has taken an oath. He swore by himself. He will
not deny himself. But then in Psalm 89 in verse
15, verse 35, we read God speaking and he says, once by my holiness. Oh, but in Hebrew
six, we read he swore by himself. And now here in the psalm, he
says that he swore by his holiness. This has to be a contradiction.
No, no, it's not a contradiction. It is a confirmation of his holiness,
his absolute holiness. I want you to keep your places
here in Isaiah 6, but go with me to Isaiah 45. I'm sorry, Isaiah 40 and verse
25. In Isaiah chapter 40 and verse
25, God asks this question, to whom
then will you liken me? Or shall I be equal, saith the
Holy One? When he asked, to find anyone,
if there is anyone, to whom he might be compared. You notice
it is, he cites his holiness. He doesn't call himself the powerful
one, although he is omnipotent, he is all powerful. He doesn't
call himself the omniscient one, although he is all knowing. He
doesn't call himself the omnipresent one, though he is omnipresent
and fills heaven and earth. He doesn't call himself the loving
one, though God is love. But when he asked, to whom would
you compare with me? It is the holy one. There's none
holy as he is holy. Now we speak of his holiness
and if you buy a book of theology or body of divinity and you look
at the various attributes of God you will see this is listed
as one of his attributes, one of his characteristics, but most
men are in agreement this is his chief attribute, his chief
characteristic. One of the older writers, he
said this, this may be said to be a transcendental attribute
that, as it were, runs through the rest and casts luster upon
them. It is an attribute of attributes,
His holiness. Every attribute of God, you can
say it is holy. His love is holy. His mercy is
holy, His grace is holy, His justice is holy, His anger is
holy, His wrath is holy. This is a transcendental attribute
of God. It gives luster to all of the
other of His attributes. Stephen Charnock said, it is
the glory, this is the glory of every perfection of God. as his power is the strength
of every perfection, so his holiness is the beauty of them. And then he went on to say that
his name, his name, that is the name of God, it signifies all
that is his attributes, all of his attributes in conjunction
when we read of his name. And then in Psalm 103, in verse
one, the psalmist said, bless the Lord, O my soul, and all
that is within me, bless his holy name. His holy name. God is holy, but what does this
really mean? What does it really mean? Well,
the apostle John declares his holiness in one verse. And there's a positive and there's
a negative in this verse. God is light. That's the positive. God is light. And the negative
is there is no darkness in Him at all. You know, even the sun,
they tell us, has its dark spots, don't they? We can't see them. Not with the natural eye. But
in God, who is light, there are no dark spots. In Him is no darkness
at all. You know, His holiness is manifested
in various ways. One way is it is manifested in
the fact that He loves righteousness. God's not indifferent to righteousness
and He's not indifferent to sin. God loves righteousness. Why? Because He is the holy Lord
God. And God hates iniquity. Why? Because He is the holy Lord
God. The greatest manifestation of
God's holiness, we know, is at the cross. Look back with me,
if you will, to Psalm 22. This is his greatest manifestation
of his holiness. Isaiah, or Psalm 22. This Psalm begins with the words
that our Lord Jesus Christ spoke when he was hanging upon the
cross. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping
me? and from the words of my roaring.
O my God, I cry in the daytime, but Thou hearest not, and in
the night season, and am not silent, but Thou art holy. Why hast Thou forsaken me? Here's the answer, Thou art holy. It was at that time when the
Lord Jesus Christ was upon the tree. The scripture says, he
hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. God who is absolutely
holy, who we read is of pure eyes and to behold evil and can't
not look upon iniquity. It was at that moment that the
Lord Jesus Christ was bearing the iniquity of us all, according
to Isaiah 53 and verse 6. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his
own way. Think of that, all we like sheep. In the beginning, all, all men,
all men, and our father Adam, we all turned to our own way. But when we come into this world,
all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his
own way. that know anything about the
word of God, they want to blame Adam for their sin. And yes,
the scripture says, for by one man sin came into the world and
he was our head, he was our representative. And when he sinned, we know that
his sin, his guilt was imputed onto everyone of his posterity. But men are not going to go to
hell for Adam's sin. Men who go to hell are going
to go to hell for their own sin, for their own iniquity. As this
verse tells us, we have turned everyone to his own way, no exception. No man's going to stand before
God and claim as an excuse for his wickedness, for his sin.
Well, my father Adam, He's the law. That's what Adam did in
the beginning, wasn't it? The woman said the husband, or
the man rather said the woman, which thou gavest unto me. And
the woman said, Satan. But no, every one, the scripture
says, has turned to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him
the iniquity of us all. If you are a child of God today,
The reason you are is because God Almighty laid your iniquity
upon His Son, Jesus Christ. And when He was made to be sin
for us, He who knew no sin, God, His justice fell upon Him. He knew what it was to be separated
from the Father. And I know that's very mysterious. We don't claim to understand
it, but we believe it. And we see here God manifesting
his holiness, that he is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. Even when his darling son was
made to be sin, God turned away. And he cried, why hast thou forsaken
me? What am I saying this morning?
I'm saying that Isaiah, he had a blessed sight, he saw the Lord. And what he saw is the Lord God
who is absolutely holy. Now this is the God, make no
mistake about it, everyone here this morning, I'm talking to
you, I'm talking to myself, just as personally as I know how. This is the God all of us are
going to face one day. This is Him. Not some God that
is the product of the imagination of man, but the God of the Bible. The God who manifested His absolute
holiness in forsaking His darling Son, that's the God you and I
are going to stand before one day. There's only one way to be accepted
in that day, and that's to be found in His Son. accepted in the beloved. Any other refuge, any other hope
is a false hope and a false refuge, a refuge of lies that will be
swept away in that day when we stand before him. So the first sight No, God may
show mercy. He may. He may be gracious. But he is going to be holy. He is. Now the second sight, the first
sight was a blessed sight. But the second sight was a troubling
sight. Isaiah saw himself. a blessed sight when he saw the
Lord, but a troubling sight when he saw himself. And his words
were, Woe is me, for I am undone. Now, we must keep in mind that
Isaiah was a prophet. Isaiah was a prophet when he
had this vision. And as you notice in his prophecy,
if his prophecy is given in a chronological order, and I assume that it was,
that this is not the first time that this prophet had cried,
whoa! Wasn't the first time. But it's
the first time that he cried, whoa is me. I want you to turn back just
a page or two to chapter 3, Isaiah chapter 3, verses 8 and 9. For Jerusalem
is ruined, and Judah is fallen, because their tongue and their
doings are against the Lord. to provoke the eyes of his glory. The show of their countenance
doth witness against them, and they declare their sin as Sodom.
They hide it not. Woe unto their soul. You see, the first time in this
prophecy he cried woe, it wasn't woe is me, it is woe unto their
soul. And then look in chapter 5. We'll just go through these verses.
Chapter 5, verse 8. Woe unto them! Verse 11. Woe unto them! Verse 18. Woe unto them! Verse 20. Woe unto them! Verse 21, woe unto them. And verse 22, woe unto them. But now, having seen the Lord,
it is woe is me. It was seeing the Lord that he saw himself. And in the
light of the Lord's holiness, the only thing he could say is,
woe is me. You know, the prophet Daniel,
later after Isaiah had passed off the scene, the prophet Daniel,
he also was given a vision. And this is what he said took
place when he was given a vision. of the Lord, my comeliness."
What's he talking about? My beauty. My comeliness. My brightness. My holiness. My righteousness. My comeliness
was turned into corruption. In other words, in the light
of the holiness of God, he saw himself, just like Isaiah here,
My comeliness was turned into corruption. A person, now listen,
a person who has never seen to some degree God's standard of
righteousness, that person may boast of his own righteousness. But if God ever gives a man through
the word of God, through the preaching by the power of the
Holy Spirit, a glimpse of God's holiness, he will no longer boast
in his own righteousness, in his own goodness. You know, the Lord Jesus told
of a man one time, who went up into the temple and he did that
very thing. He boasted of his own righteousness. He said, I thank thee, Lord,
that I am not as other men. And then he began to list a list
of things that he felt like he had accomplished and that he
was that gave him a good standing with God. He didn't say that he needed
a mediator. He didn't see that he must have
a propitiation. There must be a sacrifice for
his sins. And that other man in our Lord's
parable, you remember, he did see that. And that's what he
said, God, be merciful, be propitious to me, the sinner. A man who
never sees, a woman who never sees anything of the holiness
of God. They may boast, they may brag,
they may pat themselves on the back about how good they are,
how righteous they are, how they've kept God's commandments, how
they've done everything perfectly, or if not perfectly, almost perfectly,
and surely good enough for God to accept. But if God gives a person just
a glimpse of His holiness, It'll bring to an end that kind of
boasting. Think about Job. Let me give you two verses of
Scripture from the book of Job. One verse is God speaking about
Job. And this is what God said, My
servant Job, But there is none like him in the earth, a perfect
and upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil. But in the end of the book, let
me give us another verse, and this time it's not God speaking,
it is Job speaking. God said that about Job, but
now listen to what Job says about himself after seeing the Lord. I have heard of thee by the hearing
of the ear, but now might I see of thee. Wherefore, I abhor myself
and repent in dust and ashes." Think of the Apostle Paul, what
he said about himself. He was a saved man when he said
this. He said, for I know that in me
that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. For the will is present with
me. He had a new nature. He was a regenerate person. The
will is present with me, but how to perform that which is
good I find not. Isaiah spoke of being undone. because he said, I am a man of
unclean lips. Now remember he was a prophet. A prophet uses his lips. He uses
his mouth. He speaks of God and he speaks
about God. And yet this was what he saw
of himself. My lips are unclean and I dwell
in the midst of an unclean people. You know, when I looked at this
and prepared these notes, I thought, you know, this reminds us of
a sin that is so prevalent in our day. It's so prevalent and
sad to say that most people do not even recognize it as a sin. And it is a sin that is worked
with the lips, with the tongue. What is it? It is taking the
name of the Lord God in vain. It is so common, it's so commonplace,
I fear for our children. I fear for the young people who
have been raised in such an environment where God's name is used and
taken upon the lips of men as though it was just a very common
name. God's name is holy. When we use
his name, and a preacher uses God's name quite often in preaching,
and we use the name of Jesus, I prefer always to say the Lord
Jesus Christ, because that's who he is. Take the time this week to sit
down for just a few minutes and think of the number of different
sins that may be committed with the lips, with the tongue. The most glaring one, of course,
is lying. How many men across this country
today are lying on God, standing in pulpits, speaking about a
God who is no more, than the figment of their imaginations. A God who wants to do, who wants
to do, who wants to do, but oh, sovereign man stands in his way
and keeps him from doing what he wants to do. Is that the God of the Bible?
It's not the God that I read about in the Word of God. He
doesn't try to do anything. He does His will, both in the
armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. Lying. Boasting. Boasting. That's a sin that's committed
many times with the tongue, isn't it? Boasting. Slander, slandering someone. Isn't that the same many times
as hate, murder, slandering someone's reputation? There's so many sins. And you know that our Lord said
that out of the mouth or out of the heart, the mouth speaketh. What's in our heart comes out
at the mouth, doesn't it? And because most people have
no reverence of God, no fear of God in their heart, they take
His name in vain. We take His name in vain. And I thought about this verse
also in James that speaks about preachers. Isaiah was a prophet. This is what concerned him when
he saw the Lord. For in many things we offend
all, all of us, in many things. If any man offend not in word,
the same is a perfect man, a mature believer. And James said, let us not be
many masters, teachers. Why? Because our responsibility
is greater. So that's the second sight that
Isaiah had. First, a blessed sight. Second,
a troubling sight. But third, a welcome sight. A welcome sight. Isaiah saw God's
remedy. It was a live coal taken from
the altar and applied to his lips. It was in this way that
his iniquity was taken away and his sin was purged. What should
we learn from this? Well, I have two lessons. Number
one, all of us should see, and it's so clear, the remedy for
Isaiah's sin problem came from above. It came from above. The seraphim with a live coal
from off the altar came to Isaiah. So for our sin problem, and we
have one, all of us do. And the remedy is not going to
come from this earth. It's not going to come from anything
that men around us can do for us or anything we may do for
ourselves. But it comes to this world through
God coming into this world. He came from above in His incarnation
when that body that was prepared him by God the Holy Spirit, he
took into union with his person, the eternal Son of God came into
this world. And he came to give his life
a ransom for many. The cure, the remedy for our
sin problem, it's going to come from above. Don't look for it
in education or environment and all of these things that people
want to believe is going to lift man up. No, man was already at
the top when God created him. Problem is we fell to the bottom
and there's no way up unless he comes into this world. He who is from above and above
all, and he lifts us up. Isaac Watts wrote these words
in a hymn. He said, till God and human flesh
I see, my thoughts no comfort find. The holy, just, and sacred
three are terrors to my mind. But if Emmanuel's face appear,
my hope, my joy begins. His name forbids my slavish fear. His grace removes my sins. And the second thing we should
learn from this is the remedy for Isaiah's problem came from
the altar. First, the remedy for sin came
from above. The remedy for Isaiah's problem
came from the altar. It was a live coal, the scripture
says, taken from the altar, which has to be significant of that
altar Remember the tabernacle that was given to Moses in the
wilderness, in Hebrews we learn, was a pattern of things in the
heavens. And in that tabernacle, there
was a golden altar, and no sacrifice was ever offered on that golden
altar. But what did take place is that
every morning, the priest from off the brazen altar, The altar
that was outside, where there was sacrifices made, every morning
a lamb slain, a lamb offered on that altar, and every evening
a lamb offered on that altar. Live coals from that altar were
carried in and placed upon the golden altar, and on that altar
is where the priest put the incense, burned incense, the high priest
did. every morning and every evening.
And that incense, as it rises up, is what? It is a picture
to you and I of our intercessor, the Lord Jesus Christ, who ever
lives in heaven today. Yes, he gave himself, if you
please, on that brazen altar, a sacrifice for our sins on the
cross. But my friends, he continues
to live. as our intercessor in heaven,
continually making intercession for us. We are saved by his death
on the cross, yes, but we are also saved by his life, the scripture
says, his life of intercession. And Isaiah had that experience. He was cleansed and day by day,
you and I who know him, We have a mediator, we have an intercessor,
and we are cleansed. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth
us. That's ongoing, isn't it? Not
just in the past tense, but we're cleansed from our sin. That fountain
that's filled with Emmanuel's blood, it'll never lose its power. till all the ransomed church
of God be saved to sin no more. He continues to make intercession
for us. Well, I pray the Lord would bless
these thoughts to us here this morning, the three sites of Isaiah,
a blessed site, a troubling site, and then a healing site. A welcome sight. Now, some of you may be wondering
why this guitar is up here. It's not because I'm going to
play it. It's because I forgot. Brother David Culbertson, you
come and sing that hymn for us now, if you will. That'll be
a hymn of dismissal. open mine eyes that I might see."
And that's what I pray for all of us here today, that God would
open our eyes to His holiness and to His Son, that Lamb that
took the sins of His people and bore them on the tree. Thank
you, David.