WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.319 All right, so let me set the scene. 00:00:02.319 --> 00:00:11.679 In January of 588 BC, King Nebuchadnezzar, the ruler of Babylon, the most powerful nation, 00:00:11.679 --> 00:00:14.919 one of the most powerful nations that had ever existed, and the most powerful nation 00:00:14.919 --> 00:00:23.199 that did exist at the time, he arrived at the gates of Judah and Jerusalem with all 00:00:23.199 --> 00:00:30.600 of his army with the explicit intent of seeing that city brought to its knees. 00:00:30.600 --> 00:00:31.879 And he did just that. 00:00:31.879 --> 00:00:38.799 He set up a siege work around the city, and he waited, and he waited, and he waited until 00:00:38.799 --> 00:00:44.079 the famine was unbearable in the city and chaos reigned. 00:00:44.079 --> 00:00:50.799 And then after 18 months had passed when they could no longer stand it, the king of Judah 00:00:50.799 --> 00:00:56.599 at the time, Zedekiah, made a last-ditch effort to escape from the city. 00:00:56.599 --> 00:01:01.399 And so he and some of his soldiers in the middle of the night board a hole through one of the 00:01:01.399 --> 00:01:05.399 walls in the city, and they escaped. 00:01:05.399 --> 00:01:12.599 But eventually they were caught, and Zedekiah, the king of Judah, was brought before Nebuchadnezzar, 00:01:12.599 --> 00:01:20.519 and his punishment for standing up against Nebuchadnezzar was that he was made to watch 00:01:20.519 --> 00:01:28.319 all of his sons executed before his eyes, after which Nebuchadnezzar had his eyes put 00:01:28.319 --> 00:01:35.679 out, and then he was carried in chains to Babylon where he lived the rest of his life. 00:01:35.679 --> 00:01:40.799 And the symbolism of that act, it was a symbolic act, would not have been lost on anybody. 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:48.879 The last thing the last king of Judah would see was his kingly line ending. 00:01:48.879 --> 00:01:55.719 That was a symbolic act meant to destroy hope, and it was a message to the rest of the world 00:01:55.719 --> 00:02:01.799 to say, this is a country, Judah, that has no future. 00:02:01.799 --> 00:02:06.159 And shortly thereafter, they confirmed that fact by absolutely destroying the city of 00:02:06.159 --> 00:02:07.359 Jerusalem. 00:02:07.359 --> 00:02:09.800 They tore down its walls brick by brick. 00:02:09.800 --> 00:02:11.760 They burned the city to the ground. 00:02:11.760 --> 00:02:15.840 They tore down the temple of Yahweh, the living God. 00:02:15.840 --> 00:02:21.120 They carried away the city's wealth, and any Hebrew who had any political or religious 00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:28.600 value that had not already been executed was carried in chains into Babylon for exile for 00:02:28.600 --> 00:02:31.120 the rest of their lives. 00:02:31.120 --> 00:02:36.880 And so what you have left of Jerusalem, the great city of David, is a heap of ashes, and 00:02:36.879 --> 00:02:41.759 the only people that were left were the poor who are now, were now as poor as they had 00:02:41.759 --> 00:02:46.159 ever been and completely leaderless. 00:02:46.159 --> 00:02:50.680 And so if it's not already apparent, that was probably the lowest point in the life 00:02:50.680 --> 00:02:56.319 of God's people in all of the Old Testament, and when hope was completely lost, completely 00:02:56.319 --> 00:02:57.879 gone. 00:02:57.879 --> 00:03:02.800 And the natural question that anyone would have asked, and people did ask in that moment, 00:03:02.800 --> 00:03:08.320 was how could this have happened to God's chosen people? 00:03:08.320 --> 00:03:13.640 And that's where our passage, Isaiah chapter three and Isaiah chapter four come in, because 00:03:13.640 --> 00:03:18.360 Isaiah was writing more than 100 years before that day. 00:03:18.360 --> 00:03:24.800 But somehow in some way, he saw that day coming, and he saw the downward spiral that was leading 00:03:24.800 --> 00:03:30.400 to that one day, and he provides an answer to that question, how could this happen to 00:03:30.400 --> 00:03:31.560 us? 00:03:31.560 --> 00:03:34.560 And so what we're going to look at tonight is Isaiah's answer to the question, how did 00:03:34.560 --> 00:03:35.560 Jerusalem fall? 00:03:35.560 --> 00:03:40.640 So we're going to look at the question, he answers two questions. 00:03:40.640 --> 00:03:43.240 One, why the fall? 00:03:43.240 --> 00:03:48.280 And it's an answer that is, there's basically no good news, that it's painful and it's necessary 00:03:48.280 --> 00:03:50.480 to hear. 00:03:50.480 --> 00:03:56.560 But Isaiah doesn't stop there, because in chapter four he makes the claim that in the 00:03:56.560 --> 00:04:01.680 circumstances would have actually been the hardest claim to accept, which was the fall 00:04:01.680 --> 00:04:06.680 was not final, that this was not the end of the story for Judah. 00:04:06.680 --> 00:04:09.400 So that's what we're going to look at tonight, these two points. 00:04:09.400 --> 00:04:13.680 Why the fall and why the fall is not final? 00:04:13.680 --> 00:04:15.400 So first, why the fall? 00:04:15.400 --> 00:04:17.319 And the answer that Isaiah gives is really simple. 00:04:17.319 --> 00:04:22.399 He says, Judah and Jerusalem had rejected God as their righteous king. 00:04:22.399 --> 00:04:26.599 And you know, let's be honest, this is a prophet of Yahweh, that's not the most surprising 00:04:26.599 --> 00:04:29.519 thing that you could imagine a prophet might say. 00:04:29.519 --> 00:04:35.159 But the reason that it needed to be said, and the reason that it needed to be said so explicitly, 00:04:35.159 --> 00:04:40.159 was because there were a lot of other reasons that you could imagine why Judah fell that 00:04:40.159 --> 00:04:41.839 you would have put before this. 00:04:41.839 --> 00:04:47.679 Namely, the greatest army in the world who is evil is standing at your gates and just 00:04:47.679 --> 00:04:48.959 tore down your walls. 00:04:48.959 --> 00:04:52.879 That's a good answer to the question, why did Judah fall? 00:04:52.879 --> 00:04:57.879 And there's other reasons like the kings of Judah were generally getting worse and worse 00:04:57.879 --> 00:04:58.879 as leaders. 00:04:58.879 --> 00:05:02.439 There was political turmoil inside the city. 00:05:02.439 --> 00:05:05.159 The rich were oppressing the poor, all these things. 00:05:05.159 --> 00:05:10.000 And Isaiah never says that those are irrelevant to the fall of Judah. 00:05:10.000 --> 00:05:13.959 But what he says is none of those get to the heart of the issue. 00:05:13.959 --> 00:05:19.839 The heart of Judah's fall is that they had rejected God as their rightful king. 00:05:19.839 --> 00:05:26.240 And what you could, chapter three is a classic example of what prophets do, because we often 00:05:26.240 --> 00:05:30.560 think about prophets, maybe because we've read a lot of fiction books. 00:05:30.560 --> 00:05:36.319 We often think about prophets as that their sole purpose is to predict the future and 00:05:36.319 --> 00:05:40.759 just to show off how awesome their predictions can be, how accurate they can be. 00:05:40.759 --> 00:05:45.439 But that's not what prophets are primarily meant to do. 00:05:45.439 --> 00:05:50.959 Prophets help us see the world the way that it really is, whether that's the past or the 00:05:50.959 --> 00:05:52.519 present or the future. 00:05:52.519 --> 00:05:54.839 They help us to see the world with God's eyes. 00:05:54.839 --> 00:06:01.000 And you could say that what the prophets do for us is they give us corrective lenses to 00:06:01.000 --> 00:06:04.279 see the world the way that it really is. 00:06:04.279 --> 00:06:07.399 And sometimes that correction is drastic. 00:06:07.399 --> 00:06:11.919 So Isaiah, he's living over 100 years before the fall of Jerusalem. 00:06:11.919 --> 00:06:15.639 And he's living at a time when things are not going that bad. 00:06:15.639 --> 00:06:20.199 Judah was a nation that was doing well, especially compared to its neighbors. 00:06:20.199 --> 00:06:27.099 Isaiah, as far as we can tell, he lived through the fall of Judah's sister nation, Israel. 00:06:27.099 --> 00:06:30.439 And Israel was always the wicked step-brother. 00:06:30.439 --> 00:06:34.159 It was always the one that you could point out and say, well, at least we're not Israel. 00:06:34.159 --> 00:06:35.599 We're Judah. 00:06:35.600 --> 00:06:38.840 And when Israel fell, they could point to Israel and say, well, they fell because they 00:06:38.840 --> 00:06:40.680 were unrighteous. 00:06:40.680 --> 00:06:41.879 But we're doing okay. 00:06:41.879 --> 00:06:46.760 We've stayed together because God is with us and we're righteous. 00:06:46.760 --> 00:06:53.439 And it's to that nation that outwardly seems to be doing so well that God, through Isaiah, 00:06:53.439 --> 00:06:57.040 says, you have a problem. 00:06:57.040 --> 00:07:02.040 And if you don't address it now, this sickness that's inside of you will eventually destroy 00:07:02.040 --> 00:07:03.840 you. 00:07:03.839 --> 00:07:08.399 And the heart of that sickness, again, I'll say it again and again, is that Judah had 00:07:08.399 --> 00:07:13.599 rejected God as her true king. 00:07:13.599 --> 00:07:20.879 The picture we have in Isaiah chapter 3 is of a people who consciously tried to live 00:07:20.879 --> 00:07:25.120 completely independently from God. 00:07:25.120 --> 00:07:31.199 And so what you see in the way that Isaiah talks about the judgment that's coming on 00:07:31.199 --> 00:07:36.759 Judah in chapter 3, and what he says about all their sinfulness, you can see that he's 00:07:36.759 --> 00:07:39.039 trying to do it with a corrective lens. 00:07:39.039 --> 00:07:43.240 And he's trying to help them see the world the way that it actually is, but the way that 00:07:43.240 --> 00:07:45.599 they have ignored the world. 00:07:45.599 --> 00:07:48.159 And so in verse 1, he opens with this. 00:07:48.159 --> 00:07:53.839 He says, behold, the Lord, the God of hosts. 00:07:53.839 --> 00:07:59.120 He's reminding them to look up and to see that there is more to this world than what 00:07:59.120 --> 00:08:00.560 they can see with their eyes. 00:08:00.560 --> 00:08:04.720 There's more to this world than the army that's at the gate. 00:08:04.720 --> 00:08:05.720 There's more of an explanation. 00:08:05.720 --> 00:08:07.120 So he tells them to look up. 00:08:07.120 --> 00:08:11.959 And when you call God the Lord of hosts, hosts is another word for armies. 00:08:11.959 --> 00:08:17.800 So he's saying, you've forgotten how powerful this God is and how powerful he is and active 00:08:17.800 --> 00:08:20.759 in this world. 00:08:20.759 --> 00:08:25.319 And it's that God who is so powerful that he says in verse 1 and 2, it's this God who's 00:08:25.319 --> 00:08:28.120 taking away his support from you. 00:08:28.120 --> 00:08:30.959 There's more to this world than you can see. 00:08:30.959 --> 00:08:32.120 And God is active in it. 00:08:32.120 --> 00:08:36.000 And he's part of the explanation for what's happening to you. 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:42.600 And then in verse 8, you get to the heart of Isaiah's indictment against the people. 00:08:42.600 --> 00:08:49.360 He says in verse 8, for Jerusalem has stumbled and Judah has fallen because, here's the reason, 00:08:49.360 --> 00:08:55.320 because their speech and their deeds are against the Lord defying his glorious presence. 00:08:55.320 --> 00:08:59.960 And you may have a footnote in your Bible that says that what it actually says in Hebrew 00:08:59.960 --> 00:09:06.800 there is not defying his glorious presence, but literally defying the eyes of his glory. 00:09:06.800 --> 00:09:15.320 So what you have is this picture of a people whose idea of God is so small that they no 00:09:15.320 --> 00:09:16.920 longer fear him. 00:09:16.920 --> 00:09:21.640 And they don't mind sinning to his face because they see him as irrelevant to their lives. 00:09:21.639 --> 00:09:28.679 It's a picture of a people who no longer feared God, and it's a God for them has no practical 00:09:28.679 --> 00:09:30.319 relevance whatsoever. 00:09:30.319 --> 00:09:36.279 So in verse 9, it says, for the look on their faces bears witness against them. 00:09:36.279 --> 00:09:38.399 They proclaim their sin like Sodom. 00:09:38.399 --> 00:09:39.840 They do not hide it. 00:09:39.840 --> 00:09:42.559 So these are people who sin shamelessly because they don't fear God. 00:09:42.559 --> 00:09:44.600 They don't think anything of God. 00:09:44.600 --> 00:09:46.879 They don't hide it. 00:09:46.879 --> 00:09:50.080 And then what you see in the rest of chapter 3, and we can't go through every verse, but 00:09:50.080 --> 00:09:56.720 what you see in the rest of chapter 3 is a laundry list of other sins that show how 00:09:56.720 --> 00:09:59.639 far Judah has fallen. 00:09:59.639 --> 00:10:05.080 And what you, the picture you get is of a city that has fallen into complete anarchy 00:10:05.080 --> 00:10:07.600 and oppression and lawlessness. 00:10:07.600 --> 00:10:14.720 So for instance, in verse 14, Isaiah says, excuse me, in verse 11, woe to the wicked, 00:10:14.720 --> 00:10:16.520 it shall be ill with him. 00:10:16.519 --> 00:10:22.279 Verse 12, my people, infants are their oppressors, and women rule over them. 00:10:22.279 --> 00:10:24.679 Now I know someone's going to ask me about that afterwards. 00:10:24.679 --> 00:10:27.000 What's so wrong about women ruling over? 00:10:27.000 --> 00:10:35.240 And what most commentators say is that what this is a reference to is the harem of the 00:10:35.240 --> 00:10:36.360 king. 00:10:36.360 --> 00:10:42.799 So what you have is a king who has basically abdicated all of his wisdom and all of his 00:10:42.799 --> 00:10:43.799 thinking. 00:10:43.799 --> 00:10:50.199 And he's, the scriptures call him an infant because he can't think for himself. 00:10:50.199 --> 00:10:54.839 He's not worthy of being a leader. 00:10:54.839 --> 00:11:01.559 And when you bring all these things together, what you have is a society that has fallen 00:11:01.559 --> 00:11:03.759 apart. 00:11:03.759 --> 00:11:07.759 The oppressed, the poor are oppressed. 00:11:07.759 --> 00:11:12.639 It says that their face are ground into the earth. 00:11:12.639 --> 00:11:18.600 All consequences of the fact that Judah has rejected God as their king. 00:11:18.600 --> 00:11:23.199 So let me stop there and say, why would we care to talk about this? 00:11:23.199 --> 00:11:28.480 Why talk about all this judgment that happened 3,000 years ago? 00:11:28.480 --> 00:11:29.919 Is there a lesson here? 00:11:29.919 --> 00:11:35.480 And I think there's at least one lesson in all this judgment which tells us about the 00:11:35.480 --> 00:11:42.279 human experience, which is that all of us were made to live independence on God as our 00:11:42.279 --> 00:11:43.720 king. 00:11:43.720 --> 00:11:47.559 We were made to live in conscious dependence on God. 00:11:47.559 --> 00:11:50.600 Yes, the Bible commands it. 00:11:50.600 --> 00:11:55.519 Yes, it's right that we live in conscious dependence, but it's the reason that we're 00:11:55.519 --> 00:11:56.799 made. 00:11:56.799 --> 00:12:01.439 And if we don't live in conscious dependence on God, I think what this passage illustrates 00:12:01.439 --> 00:12:06.079 in vivid, painful imagery is that things will go wrong and it will often go wrong in places 00:12:06.079 --> 00:12:09.759 that we don't expect it to go wrong. 00:12:09.759 --> 00:12:13.559 But when I say that we were made to live in conscious dependence on God, that's actually 00:12:13.559 --> 00:12:17.480 a really specific claim because if you think about it, that's not true of any other animal 00:12:17.480 --> 00:12:20.919 in creation, not true of any other creature. 00:12:20.919 --> 00:12:22.480 It's not true of the deer. 00:12:22.480 --> 00:12:24.000 It's not true of the birds. 00:12:24.000 --> 00:12:26.240 It's not true of plants. 00:12:26.240 --> 00:12:33.679 God made no other creature in the world to live in conscious dependence on him. 00:12:33.679 --> 00:12:38.720 They all do depend on him for their lives, but we're the only creature that God made 00:12:38.720 --> 00:12:45.639 to know him and to love him and to be in a relationship with him. 00:12:45.639 --> 00:12:51.560 We know, unlike all the other animals, we know that we are dependent on God, and that's 00:12:51.560 --> 00:12:53.320 not a curse for us. 00:12:53.320 --> 00:12:55.879 It's not a punishment that God's given us. 00:12:55.879 --> 00:12:59.759 It's actually part of our glory that we're the only creature in all of creation that 00:12:59.759 --> 00:13:06.240 can look up to the heavens and talk to the Creator and worship Him and thank Him for 00:13:06.240 --> 00:13:09.639 what He's done and love him and feel that love reciprocated. 00:13:09.639 --> 00:13:11.200 No other creature has that. 00:13:11.200 --> 00:13:14.759 That's a gift. 00:13:14.759 --> 00:13:20.080 But it's also a necessity so that if we're not living in dependence, things begin to 00:13:20.080 --> 00:13:22.639 go wrong. 00:13:22.639 --> 00:13:26.159 And I can put it like this. 00:13:26.159 --> 00:13:35.320 If we are not living in conscious dependence on God, things will go wrong as sure as you 00:13:35.320 --> 00:13:38.720 will die if you do not take in oxygen. 00:13:38.720 --> 00:13:42.040 And often we think about one of those as far more serious than the other. 00:13:42.040 --> 00:13:45.720 You really need oxygen because things are going to go bad if you don't. 00:13:45.720 --> 00:13:47.440 But is that really true? 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:51.520 Is oxygen more essential to us than dependence on God? 00:13:51.520 --> 00:13:57.320 And you may not realize the symptoms of not depending on God immediately, but the consequences 00:13:57.320 --> 00:14:02.880 are far more dire than a few minutes without oxygen. 00:14:02.879 --> 00:14:09.679 The ironic tragedy of all of this judgment and all of this sin, the ironic tragedy is 00:14:09.679 --> 00:14:16.960 that the Bible over and over again portrays mankind as having this perpetual tendency 00:14:16.960 --> 00:14:23.919 to seek independence from God, but in doing so to make ourselves dependent on something 00:14:23.919 --> 00:14:27.039 else that in the end will totally destroy us. 00:14:27.039 --> 00:14:29.639 So we seek not to be dependent. 00:14:29.639 --> 00:14:34.399 And in doing so, we depend on something else that will in the end destroy us. 00:14:34.399 --> 00:14:37.199 And that's exactly what you see in Isaiah chapter 3. 00:14:37.199 --> 00:14:41.120 Judah doesn't want to be ruled by a divine king. 00:14:41.120 --> 00:14:46.439 And so what they do is they immediately put their hope, their dependence in other places. 00:14:46.439 --> 00:14:50.080 And there's two examples, two main examples that you see in chapter 3. 00:14:50.080 --> 00:14:56.919 In one place, Judah puts its hope in its human leaders. 00:14:56.919 --> 00:15:00.639 It gives all of its power to its human leaders. 00:15:00.639 --> 00:15:07.919 And what happens as an effect is its human leaders crush the people because they don't 00:15:07.919 --> 00:15:09.039 depend on God. 00:15:09.039 --> 00:15:10.679 They're not answerable to God. 00:15:10.679 --> 00:15:16.879 And so they use the power that they amass for themselves. 00:15:16.879 --> 00:15:23.240 And what God does in response is he punishes them in accordance with that sin. 00:15:23.240 --> 00:15:26.960 So the one thing they want is to be dependent on human leaders. 00:15:26.960 --> 00:15:32.680 And so the punishment that he gives them is he takes away those leaders. 00:15:32.680 --> 00:15:38.159 So that's what he means when he says in verses 1, he says, I'm taking away your support and 00:15:38.159 --> 00:15:40.240 your supply and your water. 00:15:40.240 --> 00:15:44.200 And verse 2, and the mighty men and the soldiers and the judge and the prophets. 00:15:44.200 --> 00:15:48.960 He says, all these things that you have given your truest hope to, all these leaders who 00:15:48.960 --> 00:15:51.519 you expect to save you. 00:15:51.519 --> 00:15:54.399 In the end, they have been the ones that have been oppressing you. 00:15:54.399 --> 00:15:56.600 And because of that, I'm going to take them away from you. 00:15:56.600 --> 00:16:01.319 And you see that very vividly in the fall of Jerusalem, where all the leaders of the 00:16:01.319 --> 00:16:04.679 city are taken away into exile. 00:16:04.679 --> 00:16:09.720 And then if you look in verses 6 and 7, there's this picture that's almost comical if it 00:16:09.720 --> 00:16:11.919 weren't true. 00:16:11.919 --> 00:16:17.079 Where there's this picture where Isaiah says, here's what's going to happen. 00:16:17.079 --> 00:16:20.960 A man will take hold of his brother in the house of his father saying, you have a cloak 00:16:20.960 --> 00:16:23.840 and you shall be our leader. 00:16:23.840 --> 00:16:27.680 And this heap of ruins shall be under your rule. 00:16:27.680 --> 00:16:33.200 Isaiah imagines a day when it will be so hard to find someone fit to lead in the city of 00:16:33.200 --> 00:16:39.360 Judah that for a man simply to own a cloak is qualifications enough for him to be a 00:16:39.360 --> 00:16:41.000 ruler. 00:16:41.000 --> 00:16:44.879 And then once they actually find that man, that man is not going to want to accept the 00:16:44.879 --> 00:16:49.080 job because he sees how futile it is. 00:16:49.080 --> 00:16:55.000 So what you have on one hand is the men of the city are placing all of their hope in 00:16:55.000 --> 00:16:59.520 leaders who are oppressive. 00:16:59.520 --> 00:17:03.200 And then he turns to the women of the city, which is a different picture. 00:17:03.200 --> 00:17:07.240 And he says the women of the city, towards the end of the chapter in chapter 3, he gives 00:17:07.240 --> 00:17:13.480 this picture of the women of Judah as seeking their independence from God, as manifesting 00:17:13.480 --> 00:17:25.200 their independence from God by having flashy wealth and by being haughty and by showing 00:17:25.200 --> 00:17:27.680 their pride. 00:17:27.680 --> 00:17:32.599 These are people who are consumed with, they've come to depend on their wealth as the source 00:17:32.599 --> 00:17:35.240 of their identity. 00:17:35.240 --> 00:17:41.839 And again, God gives them a punishment commiserate with their sin. 00:17:41.839 --> 00:17:46.000 And he says he's going to take away all the wealth, but then the saddest part is in chapter 00:17:46.000 --> 00:17:52.959 4 verse 1 where he says, and seven women will take hold of one man in that day saying, we 00:17:52.959 --> 00:17:56.399 will eat our own bread and wear our own clothes. 00:17:56.399 --> 00:18:01.399 Only let us be called by your name, take away our reproach. 00:18:01.399 --> 00:18:05.639 There's going to be so few men in the city, and these women who have been so independent 00:18:05.639 --> 00:18:11.119 of God are going to spend the rest of their lives begging to be dependent on any man they 00:18:11.119 --> 00:18:12.839 can find. 00:18:12.839 --> 00:18:17.359 Now the point of this is not to say, here's what men are like in a bad situation, and 00:18:17.359 --> 00:18:19.919 here's what women are like in a bad situation. 00:18:19.919 --> 00:18:25.479 What Isaiah is saying is everywhere you look in this city, there's wickedness. 00:18:25.479 --> 00:18:29.799 Whether you look to the men or you look to the women, wherever you go, people are living 00:18:29.799 --> 00:18:35.479 as if God is not their king. 00:18:35.480 --> 00:18:43.799 And it's this tragic proof that we are made to live independence on God, and that when 00:18:43.799 --> 00:18:51.640 these people seek to be independent through some other means, it eventually destroys them. 00:18:51.640 --> 00:18:52.640 And what do I do with this? 00:18:52.640 --> 00:18:56.240 Well on the one hand, it leaves me with hard questions to myself, because I don't think 00:18:56.240 --> 00:18:59.240 that these are another species of human beings. 00:18:59.240 --> 00:19:04.400 I think that they took their sins further than we have probably ever seen people take 00:19:04.400 --> 00:19:07.759 their sins. 00:19:07.759 --> 00:19:10.360 But the sin is the same. 00:19:10.360 --> 00:19:14.920 There's a longing in all of our hearts to be independent from God, and to that extent, 00:19:14.920 --> 00:19:21.280 I have to ask myself, where in my life am I seeking to be independent from God as my 00:19:21.280 --> 00:19:24.080 king? 00:19:24.080 --> 00:19:32.360 One way of framing that question is, are there places in my heart, secret sins that I harbor, 00:19:32.359 --> 00:19:41.240 anger, sin, anger, lust, bitterness towards other people? 00:19:41.240 --> 00:19:48.819 Are there things that no one else knows, but places that I don't even want God to see? 00:19:48.819 --> 00:19:52.799 Because if that's the case, what Isaiah comes to us and says is, behold your God. 00:19:52.799 --> 00:19:53.799 He's here. 00:19:53.799 --> 00:19:56.159 He sees all. 00:19:56.159 --> 00:19:58.679 So it makes me want to search my heart. 00:19:58.679 --> 00:20:00.599 But it also leaves me hopeless. 00:20:00.599 --> 00:20:05.000 And I think we should look at this chapter and feel a sense of hopelessness, because 00:20:05.000 --> 00:20:11.199 this is saying any man, any woman who has sought to be independent from God is worthy 00:20:11.199 --> 00:20:12.799 of God's judgment. 00:20:12.799 --> 00:20:16.919 We need to hear that, and we need to hear the power of that statement. 00:20:16.919 --> 00:20:23.039 And even if we don't take it as far as the people in Judah took it, we have to see what 00:20:23.039 --> 00:20:31.559 they did as the end of the road of anyone who wants to truly become independent from 00:20:31.559 --> 00:20:32.559 God. 00:20:32.559 --> 00:20:34.639 So that's a lot of bad news. 00:20:34.639 --> 00:20:41.319 And in the context, the people of Judah could have just accepted that, and they would have 00:20:41.319 --> 00:20:43.680 heard that and said, we understand. 00:20:43.680 --> 00:20:50.180 We understand that we've gone astray and we don't deserve God's love. 00:20:50.180 --> 00:20:57.279 And that's why chapter four is so stunning, because in chapter four, Isaiah comes to the 00:20:57.279 --> 00:21:04.880 people and he says, the fall is not final, which is in the context, the most impossible 00:21:04.880 --> 00:21:06.960 thing to hear. 00:21:06.960 --> 00:21:09.680 These are people who have deserved God's judgment. 00:21:09.680 --> 00:21:11.759 They've received God's judgment. 00:21:11.759 --> 00:21:15.640 And then Isaiah comes to them and says, no, the fall is not final because God is not done 00:21:15.640 --> 00:21:18.279 with you. 00:21:18.279 --> 00:21:23.160 And the reason that Isaiah gives is a simple one. 00:21:23.160 --> 00:21:27.639 He says, the reason that the fall is not final is because there's a branch. 00:21:27.639 --> 00:21:28.639 Simple enough, right? 00:21:28.639 --> 00:21:30.799 There's a branch, so you can take hope. 00:21:30.799 --> 00:21:37.160 And I so badly wish that I could have met Isaiah because if I could ask him one question, 00:21:37.160 --> 00:21:41.759 I would want to know, what did you think you were talking about when you said we can take 00:21:41.759 --> 00:21:42.759 hope in a branch? 00:21:42.759 --> 00:21:52.000 I believe that Isaiah had hope in Christ, but I don't know how clearly he had that hope. 00:21:52.000 --> 00:21:55.039 When God told him there was a branch and that was going to be the hope, did he know what 00:21:55.039 --> 00:21:56.039 that meant? 00:21:56.039 --> 00:21:57.200 Did he really know? 00:21:57.200 --> 00:22:04.279 There's a famous Jewish scholar in the 20th century who wrote a book about the prophets, 00:22:04.279 --> 00:22:07.240 and he opens his book with this one line that I've never forgotten. 00:22:07.240 --> 00:22:13.559 He says, the prophets were some of the most disturbing men who had ever lived. 00:22:13.559 --> 00:22:17.000 And that seems right, doesn't it? 00:22:17.000 --> 00:22:20.160 You read these stories, and these men do these strange things, and they have these strange 00:22:20.160 --> 00:22:21.160 prophecies. 00:22:21.160 --> 00:22:24.480 And if he came in through the doors, we'd sit him up here and we'd interview him. 00:22:24.480 --> 00:22:29.240 And we want to hear all about what he knew, what was it like to actually hear the word 00:22:29.240 --> 00:22:30.240 of God? 00:22:30.240 --> 00:22:31.720 What were these visions like? 00:22:31.720 --> 00:22:34.079 When you saw a branch, what do you mean you saw a branch? 00:22:34.079 --> 00:22:37.079 Tell me about these things. 00:22:37.079 --> 00:22:44.839 But I also think that if Isaiah were to come here this day, he would be really frustrated 00:22:44.839 --> 00:22:50.480 by the questions that we would ask him, because he would look at us and he would say, why 00:22:50.480 --> 00:22:53.119 are you asking me questions? 00:22:53.119 --> 00:22:57.839 You're the one who has actually seen this hope with your own eyes, and you've seen 00:22:57.839 --> 00:23:00.079 the word of God come and dwell amongst you. 00:23:00.079 --> 00:23:10.279 How dare you treat me like I'm the one who is more blessed by God than you are? 00:23:10.279 --> 00:23:16.159 Take for instance, chapter four, verse two, where he talks about this branch. 00:23:16.159 --> 00:23:22.480 He says, in that day, the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit 00:23:22.480 --> 00:23:25.839 of the land shall be the pride and honor of the survivors of Israel. 00:23:25.839 --> 00:23:26.839 Here's this cryptic language. 00:23:26.839 --> 00:23:29.439 There's a branch that's going to give us hope. 00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:35.640 And the idea of a prophetic branch is something that recurs over and over again in the prophets. 00:23:35.640 --> 00:23:38.360 Coincidentally enough, this is the first time you ever actually see it in the prophets, 00:23:38.360 --> 00:23:43.200 but it's in Zechariah, it's in Jeremiah, and it's later on in Isaiah. 00:23:43.200 --> 00:23:48.160 And a lot of times, and this helps us understand what's going on here, a lot of times whenever 00:23:48.160 --> 00:23:53.720 the prophets talk about this righteous branch, they'll call it the branch of David, or the 00:23:53.720 --> 00:23:56.120 branch from David. 00:23:56.119 --> 00:24:01.239 And when they do that, and we'll see this in a few weeks, what that means is it's ancestry 00:24:01.239 --> 00:24:03.519 terms like a family tree. 00:24:03.519 --> 00:24:10.319 And it's this prediction that someone is going to come from the line of David, and that person 00:24:10.319 --> 00:24:13.759 will be a Messiah. 00:24:13.759 --> 00:24:19.639 Which is incredibly hopeful if you think about what's happened in the fall of Jerusalem. 00:24:19.639 --> 00:24:24.239 The king was carried away in chains, and yet these prophets say that one day there's going 00:24:24.240 --> 00:24:28.120 to be a king, there's going to be someone from the branch of David. 00:24:28.120 --> 00:24:35.680 But that's not what this verse says, it doesn't say the branch of David, what does it say? 00:24:35.680 --> 00:24:39.799 In that day, the branch of the Lord. 00:24:39.799 --> 00:24:43.920 In that day, the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious. 00:24:43.920 --> 00:24:50.720 Now that tells us first of all, though it must have been hard to believe, that God would 00:24:50.720 --> 00:25:00.559 rescue his people by raising up a descendant, a branch, somehow from within himself. 00:25:00.559 --> 00:25:05.279 It's a divine claim about an earthly Messiah. 00:25:05.279 --> 00:25:10.039 And that's what I want to ask Isaiah, how clearly did you understand what you meant 00:25:10.039 --> 00:25:12.640 when you said a branch of the Lord? 00:25:12.640 --> 00:25:17.480 Because it almost sounds blasphemous, you know, if you're a Jew, what do you mean there's 00:25:17.480 --> 00:25:20.079 going to be a branch, a descendant of God? 00:25:20.079 --> 00:25:22.079 What can that possibly mean? 00:25:22.079 --> 00:25:28.519 And it's not until Jesus steps onto the scene in human history that we have a picture of 00:25:28.519 --> 00:25:30.480 what that could actually mean. 00:25:30.480 --> 00:25:34.119 A man born of a woman, but who's also the son of God. 00:25:34.119 --> 00:25:41.759 He is from the branch of David, but he's also from the branch of Yahweh, he's divine. 00:25:41.759 --> 00:25:46.799 And even so, that idea, someone from the branch of Yahweh was so offensive that they didn't 00:25:46.799 --> 00:25:54.759 let Jesus live, of course, because he claimed to be God. 00:25:54.759 --> 00:25:59.079 And that fact, that fact, what that prophecy does is on the one hand it tells us about 00:25:59.079 --> 00:26:01.200 the future. 00:26:01.200 --> 00:26:04.919 If you're from Isaiah's perspective, it tells you that one day there's going to be a branch 00:26:04.919 --> 00:26:10.519 that will come up from Yahweh and it will be a Messiah, he will be a Messiah. 00:26:10.519 --> 00:26:14.960 But it also tells us something else that's really important that goes beyond a historic 00:26:14.960 --> 00:26:20.039 event and it tells us about what it means to be human. 00:26:20.039 --> 00:26:24.799 It told them about what it meant to be human and it tells us too, because the fact that 00:26:24.799 --> 00:26:34.319 God had to raise up a branch of Yahweh meant that the salvation that Judah needed in the 00:26:34.319 --> 00:26:39.360 midst of its hopelessness was not going to come from within itself. 00:26:39.360 --> 00:26:44.920 At least it wasn't going to come exclusively from within itself. 00:26:44.920 --> 00:26:48.480 And isn't that the greatest indictment of the people of Judah? 00:26:48.480 --> 00:26:52.480 They so badly wanted to be independent from God. 00:26:52.480 --> 00:26:56.960 And God comes to them and says, listen, I'm going to save you and the only way that I 00:26:56.960 --> 00:27:06.160 can do it is not by raising up someone, it's by inserting myself into the human story. 00:27:06.160 --> 00:27:10.080 You cannot be saved from within yourselves. 00:27:10.079 --> 00:27:15.519 God says to Judah, in that day I will save you when you have no hope and it won't be 00:27:15.519 --> 00:27:19.519 because a great man arose exclusively from among you. 00:27:19.519 --> 00:27:25.319 Of course, Jesus was human too, but you're going to need God to save you. 00:27:25.319 --> 00:27:27.819 And the rest of chapter four emphasizes that point. 00:27:27.819 --> 00:27:30.319 What happens when the branch of Yahweh comes to Jerusalem? 00:27:30.319 --> 00:27:34.559 Well, it says, the people left in the city will be called holy. 00:27:34.559 --> 00:27:39.960 The Lord will wash away the filth of the daughter of Zion and cleanse the bloodstains of Jerusalem. 00:27:39.960 --> 00:27:44.720 God will come to a people who are not holy and who can never make themselves holy. 00:27:44.720 --> 00:27:45.960 And what does he do? 00:27:45.960 --> 00:27:47.559 He cleans them. 00:27:47.559 --> 00:27:53.279 So God comes into this city that's filled with wickedness and filth and wretchedness. 00:27:53.279 --> 00:27:58.579 And he cleans it and he calls the people that are in there holy. 00:27:58.579 --> 00:28:05.039 And that hope that Isaiah was looking towards is the same one that we look back on. 00:28:05.039 --> 00:28:11.440 This idea that Jesus Christ comes into the city of Jerusalem, a place that is representative 00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:15.399 of all of our wickedness and of all of our sinfulness. 00:28:15.399 --> 00:28:18.480 And he cleans the city. 00:28:18.480 --> 00:28:24.279 He does it himself and he offers his life on the cross to cleanse the sins of all the 00:28:24.279 --> 00:28:30.720 people who are meant to live and dwell in Jerusalem. 00:28:30.720 --> 00:28:34.960 And the final question as I'm working towards an end here is what are we meant to do with 00:28:34.960 --> 00:28:38.120 a truth like that? 00:28:38.120 --> 00:28:45.519 What are we meant to do with this idea that God is going to come and cleanse Jerusalem? 00:28:45.519 --> 00:28:51.960 And I only want to offer one answer tonight, which is that we as people who believe in 00:28:51.960 --> 00:28:59.360 that Messiah are called to live consciously in the shadow of our King and to find our 00:28:59.360 --> 00:29:04.680 true peace there. 00:29:04.680 --> 00:29:09.480 You see in verse six, the final prophecy that he makes about the branch, there will be a 00:29:09.480 --> 00:29:17.320 booth for shade by day from the heat and a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain. 00:29:17.320 --> 00:29:25.660 Isaiah prophesied that when Jesus comes, the symbol of his coming will be that he will 00:29:25.660 --> 00:29:28.120 overshadow all of his people. 00:29:28.120 --> 00:29:31.680 In verse five, it says, then the Lord will create over the whole side of Mount Zion and 00:29:31.680 --> 00:29:37.360 over her assemblies a cloud by day and smoke and shining of a flame fire by night for 00:29:37.360 --> 00:29:41.320 over all the glory there will be a canopy. 00:29:41.320 --> 00:29:47.120 And you have this picture of a people who so badly wanted to be independent from God. 00:29:47.120 --> 00:29:48.160 They're brought to their knees. 00:29:48.160 --> 00:29:50.480 They see that they have no hope. 00:29:50.480 --> 00:29:56.279 And rather than destroy them, God comes and he covers them and he gives them shade and 00:29:56.279 --> 00:30:03.519 he gives them a rest from all the things that they have caused and have led them astray. 00:30:03.519 --> 00:30:10.440 And that's what he calls us to do is to sit under the shadow of the King and rest. 00:30:10.440 --> 00:30:11.440 So what does that look like? 00:30:11.440 --> 00:30:13.599 It looks like a lot of different things. 00:30:13.599 --> 00:30:18.500 One you could say it looks like the opposite of everything that Israel did in chapter three. 00:30:18.500 --> 00:30:26.039 It looks like not trying to live lives independent from God, where we put our hope in exclusively 00:30:26.039 --> 00:30:30.879 in our leaders or in our wealth or in our pride. 00:30:30.879 --> 00:30:42.240 But it also looks like it also looks like trusting that that relationship is dependent 00:30:42.240 --> 00:30:45.480 not on what we have done, but on what God has done. 00:30:45.480 --> 00:30:51.680 Because the whole point of chapter four is God is going to come to you at your worst 00:30:51.680 --> 00:30:56.660 and he's going to rescue you and your call is to live in the light of that live in the 00:30:56.660 --> 00:30:59.440 shadow of it. 00:30:59.440 --> 00:31:08.000 And Judah in the end will receive the one thing that it lacked someone that they could 00:31:08.000 --> 00:31:15.519 depend on someone that can give them shelter and someone that can bring them peace. 00:31:15.519 --> 00:31:21.720 I'll conclude with this idea that the wonder of Isaiah chapter three and Isaiah chapter 00:31:21.720 --> 00:31:25.279 four is that they go together. 00:31:25.279 --> 00:31:31.440 That the same people who are worthy of destruction, who have gone so far astray, those are the 00:31:31.440 --> 00:31:37.879 people that God looks to and says, in that day, you are the people that I'm going to 00:31:37.879 --> 00:31:40.720 raise up a branch that covers. 00:31:40.720 --> 00:31:43.160 You're the people that I'm going to wash away your guilt. 00:31:43.160 --> 00:31:48.080 I'm going to cleanse you and you are the people that I'm going to give you shade. 00:31:48.080 --> 00:31:54.560 And the call on us tonight is to live in that shade and to live in conscious, conscious 00:31:54.560 --> 00:31:59.279 dependence on our King who gives us peace. 00:31:59.279 --> 00:32:03.800 Let's pray. 00:32:03.800 --> 00:32:08.840 Heavenly Father in all the distractions of this life, we pray that you would help us 00:32:08.839 --> 00:32:16.119 to remember you, that you would help us to look up and behold not only the God of hosts, 00:32:16.119 --> 00:32:21.559 but the God of grace and the God who shelters us under the shadow of his wings. 00:32:21.559 --> 00:32:22.559 In your son's name we pray. 00:32:22.559 --> 00:32:41.559 Amen.