WEBVTT

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 J.B. Phillips, one of the great translators of the Bible in the 20th century, wrote a small book

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 in the 50s entitled, Your God is Too Small. And he opened that book with this observation,

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 we can hardly expect to escape a sense of futility and frustration until we begin to see what he is

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 like and what his purposes are. God will inevitably appear to disappoint the man or woman who is

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 attempting to use him as a convenience, a prop, or a comfort for his own plans. God has never been

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 known to disappoint the person who is sincerely wanting to cooperate with his own purposes.

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 So my question to you this morning is, is your God too small? And the answer has to be yes,

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 because whatever your estimation and whatever my estimation of God is, by definition, it is too

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 small. Our estimation, our knowledge, our awareness, our appreciation is inadequate, because it is God

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 that we are considering. There are examples throughout the history of the church of those

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 whom God has endowed with great intellects. In the 17th century in Oxford, one of those big minds

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 was John Owen. And John Owen put it this way, we speak much of God. The truth is that we know very

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 little of him. We know so little of God because it is God thus to be known. God is so great. God is so

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 majestic. God is so glorious that this subject is so big that whatever our estimation of him is by

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 definition inadequate, insufficient. I'd like to just make a few observations on the passage Isaiah 6.

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 We'll look briefly at Isaiah 52, 53. And then we'll consider some of the data in the New Testament.

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 Because the Bible is a book of 66 books. It was composed roughly over a period of 1,500 years,

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 1,600 years. And yet there is a continuity and a coherence from beginning to end, from old to new.

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 The themes that are introduced are developed and applied. So as you read this book, this book holds

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 together. I want to notice first that God is great in his glory. Chapter 6 of Isaiah,

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 in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and exalted, seated on a throne,

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 and the train of his robe filled the temple. God is great in his glory. And I don't think it's a

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 coincidence. I don't think that Isaiah is just giving us a date here. He is. 738, give or take,

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 is the date of Uzziah's death. So we have a point in time when this encounter occurred. But I think

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 Isaiah is doing something more, or rather God through Isaiah is doing something more. Uzziah

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 died. King Uzziah died. Isaiah saw the Lord. Now, in Judah, the history of Judah, remember we have the

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 northern kingdom of Israel, we have the southern kingdom of Judah. The kingdom has been divided into

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 two parts. This is a golden age of Judah. This is, this is the going is good, folks. Politically,

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 strong, stable. Economically, vital. Militarily, secure. So Uzziah had a long and a prosperous reign,

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 and yet that reign came to an end. So this golden age came to an end. Now, in the ancient Near East,

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 Uzziah was a big deal. I'm not going to speak on your behalf, but I can go weeks, even months,

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 without thinking of King Uzziah. You know, he's a footnote in history. He was significant in the

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 7th century, 8th century BC, but he's insignificant. He's a footnote today. But what do we see? We see the

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 Lord. And the Lord is not finite. The Lord is not limited. The Lord has no beginning. The Lord has no

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 end. And we see him in his glory. And we're told that the Lord, it's not that he filled the temple.

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 We're not told that his robe filled the temple. But we're told that the train of his robe, or in some

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 translations, the hem of his robe filled the temple. So God is so big. It's not that he fills the space.

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 It's not that his robe, his outer garment fills the space. But the very hem of his garment fills the

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 space. One of my tasks this week, I had a pair of trousers. And the hem had come out. You know what

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 the hem is. It's this little part at the end of the trousers. The hem comes out. I should have the

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 ability of sewing a hem. I don't. I take it to Stitches and Brunsfield. My friend will return those

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 trousers in a week with the hem sewn. But it's a small part of the trousers. It's the very bottom

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 of the trousers. Almost insignificant. This very hem of the robe fills this huge space. Isaiah has this

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 encounter with the greatness of God in his glory. And if the vision wasn't enough, the angelic chorus

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 would seal the deal. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty. The whole earth is full of his glory.

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 Not only does the hem of his robe fill the temple, the whole earth is filled with his glory.

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 God is majestic. He's high. He's lifted up. God is great in his majesty. Great in his glory.

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 The second observation comes from that angelic chorus that I just read is that God is great

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 in his holiness. The idea of holy is something which is set apart. Set apart from and set apart for.

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 So if you're a Christian, you are a holy person. You are set apart from this world and you are set

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 apart for God. That's one of the definitions of a Christian. You are a holy person. You're set apart

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 from the world and you are set apart for God and for his service. If you know the scenes of the Old

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 Testament, again, one of the very vivid scenes, Belshazzar's feast in Daniel chapter 5. Remember,

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 there was writing on the wall, quite a dramatic scene. But the key in that story is that Belshazzar,

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 the king of Babylon, is throwing a party. And Belshazzar says, we're not going to use the ordinary

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 glasses. We've got some goblets. We brought them from Jerusalem. We brought them from the temple of

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 God. They'd be perfect to use in our party. So Belshazzar wanted to impress his nobles, his wives, his

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 concubines. And they began to drink and to make toasts with these goblets to gods of gold, silver,

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 bronze, wood, and stone. Mistake. Belshazzar, that was a mistake. That's something you shouldn't have

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 done. These goblets were holy. They were set apart for God. They were not for your party. And just like

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 goblets and people are set apart, God is a holy God. He is set apart from this world. He is the creator

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 of the world. He's the creator of us. And he's distinct from and separate from the world that

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 he has created. He's not just part of it. He is set apart wholly. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty.

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 I mean, we could spend all of our time on that little phrase there. Whenever the Bible repeats

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 something, the repetition is for a purpose. Now, as a teacher, sometimes I set an essay, 2,000 words on,

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 and I give a topic. Now, you can tell pretty easily when somebody has 1,800 words and they fill out the

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 200, you know, they're repeating themselves or, you know, fluffing it. I can, I understand that.

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 God is not adding extra words because he doesn't have anything else to say. When the angels say,

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 holy, holy, holy, it is a way of emphasizing and underscoring and highlighting this truth.

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 Just like when the Lord Jesus says, verily, verily, I say to you, or literally, amen, amen, I say to you.

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 He's saying, you can take my word to the bank. You can trust what I say, completely reliable,

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 completely trustworthy. So, when there's repetition, the repetition is always for a reason.

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 And notice here one of the many titles that we have, the Lord Almighty. Lord is the personal name

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 of God. Almighty emphasizes that he has all power, all authority. What he says goes, what he wants

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 to do? What happens? He is not contingent. He is not dependent. He is not reliant. You see, you and I

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 are contingent, reliant, and dependent. We need oxygen, for example. We are dependent upon a supply

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 of oxygen. We are dependent upon water and upon food. God is not a contingent being. He requires nothing.

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 He needs nothing. He needs nothing. He is completely self-sufficient in and of himself. He doesn't need

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 us. He doesn't need the world. He doesn't need the universe. Whatever he does, he does graciously,

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 not dependently. He has no limits, and he has all power and all authority. And isn't that an encouragement?

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 Because when we pray, we are speaking to the one who has all authority and power, who is all wise, all good,

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 all holy, all great. So he is both willing to help, and he is able to help. He has the authority. He has

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 the power. And what he says goes. God is great in his glory. God is great in his holiness. And God is great

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 in redemption. What I love is that so often in the Old Testament, we have picture. We have a picture

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 that's painted that describes the gospel so vividly. Because when we have this encounter, right, you have

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 Isaiah going to the temple. Whatever he expected, his expectations were blown out of the water.

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 He sees the Lord high and lifted up. He hears the angelic chorus. He doesn't step back and say, wow,

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 this is wonderful. This is great. I never expected this. No. What is his reaction? Because not only do

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 you have the angelic chorus, you have the doorpost and the threshold shook, and the temple was filled with

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 smoke. Woe to me. Woe to me. I am undone. I am in trouble. This is not good news for me. Why? I am ruined,

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 for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the

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 King, the Lord Almighty, the Holy One, and I'm not holy. I am not a holy person. We are not a holy people.

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 And I have encountered the Holy One with my eyes. Therefore, I am in trouble. I am ruined. I am undone.

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 That is a vision or a picture of the problem. When we come into the presence of the Almighty God,

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 who is great and holy and good and awesome, we are not great and holy and good and awesome.

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 We are ruined. We are undone. And in this particular case, Isaiah emphasizes lips.

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 Isaiah is a preacher, a prophet, a spokesman, and he's very much aware that as a spokesman,

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 the organ of his speech, his lips, that he is unclean. And he represents a people that are equally unclean.

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 So the problem is ours, but notice the solution is God's. That's why this picture is so vivid and so

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 true because the problem is ours and the solution is God. Isaiah doesn't suggest a problem. Isaiah

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 doesn't solve the problem. All Isaiah can do is recognize the problem. Then one of the seraphim,

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 one of these angelic creatures, flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs

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 from the altar. With it, he touched my mouth and said, see, this has touched your lips. Your guilt is taken away

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 and your sin atoned for. The motion is from the altar to the person. That's the gospel, from God to us.

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 It is not what we do for God. It is not our commitment to God. It is not our resolutions to God.

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 It is not our recognition of sin. None of that. The gospel, the good news, the atonement is what God

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 does for us and what only God can do for us. Isaiah says, I've got unclean lips, God, and I live among

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 a people who are unclean. Their lips are unclean too. And God says, I've taken away your sin. Your guilt

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 is taken away and your sin atoned for. As an educator, I'm reminded of the three R's.

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 We're told that, particularly in primary education, the three R's are reading, writing, and arithmetic.

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 Now, I know writing has a W and arithmetic really begins with an A, but it's a handy saying,

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 reading, writing, and arithmetic. These are the three R's of education. One of the great preachers of the

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 19th century was a man called D.L. Moody, a great evangelist. And Moody had this ability of summarizing

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 the gospel quite memorably. And he says there are three R's of the gospel. The first R is that we are

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 ruined. Same language as Isaiah 6. Ruined by the fall. Sin has messed up everything, and sin has messed

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 up everyone. We are ruined. Secondly, we are redeemed. Redemption, God is great in redemption.

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 You see, redemption is the payment of a price. We are redeemed now by the blood. And Moody went on to

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 say this. He said, there is nothing, my friends, that brings out the love of God like the cross of

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 Christ. It tells of the breadth, length, height, depth of his love. If you want to know how much God

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 loves you, you must go to Calvary to find out. And the final of those three R's was regenerated by the

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 Spirit. Every dead soul brought to life must be brought to life by the power of the Spirit. The

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 idea of educating people into the kingdom of God is not the way. You may educate them and educate them,

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 but they will be as far from conversion as ever. The Holy Spirit must quicken. We are ruined by the fall,

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 we are redeemed by the blood, and we are regenerated by the Spirit. God is a redeeming God. Now, some of

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 the older people here among us will remember that when you used to buy iron brew or other soft drinks,

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 you can maybe still do this, you would pay for the iron brew, 59p, let's say, but you would be charged 79p

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 because there was a 20p deposit on this bottle. Because the vendor, the shopkeeper, wanted the

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 bottle back and they would send the bottles back and they would come, you know, you get the idea.

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 So when you drank your iron brew or your red cola, you didn't throw the bottle away. You took it back

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 to the shop where you bought it and they gave you 20p. They paid you for the bottle back. That's what we

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 call redemption. They redeemed the bottle, the payment of a price to get something. Now, when we're

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 looking at the gospel, the payment of a price was a big payment and a big price. You see, your sin and

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 my sin, my guilt, my shame, your guilt, your shame, required a price to be paid. And that price was the

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 life and the death of Jesus. He died, his blood was shed so that your sin and your guilt could be

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 atoned for. That's why our God is great in redemption, great in his glory, great in his holiness, and great

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 in his redemption. It's just remarkable, isn't it? What God has done. The problem is ours, but the solution

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 is his and his only. There's no joint effort here. There's no cooperation here. There's no kind of,

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 okay, God, you'll do this and I'll do that. No, absolutely. Isaiah has nothing to offer and we have

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 nothing to offer. We come to God with empty hands. We come to God with guilt. We come to God with sin.

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 He alone saves. He alone redeems. He alone sets free and he alone can make us alive. So this is the

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 great God. The God who we underestimate. The God who we undervalue. The God who is far greater than we

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 could ever imagine. Now in this greatness, we come to verse 8. And this is quite remarkable. Verse 8 says,

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 then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us?

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 It doesn't make sense. God is great. He's almighty. He's holy, holy, holy. The whole earth is filled with

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 his glory. And he says, I am sending ordinary people. I need someone to go for me. I need someone

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 who'll speak. I need someone who'll serve. I need someone who'll go, who'll go. Isaiah said, here I am,

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 send me. The great God who is great in glory, great in holiness, and great in redemption, he uses

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 ordinary people to accomplish his extraordinary purposes. Why he does that, I do not know.

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 But I think when he uses ordinary people to achieve extraordinary results, the obvious conclusion

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 must be, it's him. It's his strength, not my strength. It's his wisdom, not our wisdom. It's his grace. It's

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 his power. It's his authority. So you have the great God who says, I'm going to use an ordinary person

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 to speak to speak to this people. And God continues to use ordinary people. I mentioned D.L. Moody a moment

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 ago. D.L. Moody was educated to the fourth grade, which P4 at age 10 in the United States. He had a very,

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 to begin with, he had a very limited ability to read, a very limited ability to pronounce difficult words.

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 And yet he had a passion. He said, I have one passion. I want to serve Jesus Christ. I want to tell people

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 about him. Now, if you have a passion to serve God, if you have a passion to make Jesus known, watch out.

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 Because God can take an ordinary person like you and do extraordinary things through you. So this ordinary

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 man, D.L. Moody, and one of his great quotes was, can God use ordinary people? And his answer was,

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 of course. Because most of us are ordinary. There are very few extraordinary people. And just to round

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 out the picture, the ordinary D.L. Moody wasn't well-educated, didn't know the Bible to begin with,

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 poor pronunciation, somewhat rough habits. By the end of his life in 1899,

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 God had used him to preach in person to 100 million people. That's not bad. Not bad for an

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 ordinary person. Not bad for an uneducated person. What does that say about D.L. Moody? Not much.

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 What does it say about God? Quite a bit. God uses ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary

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 purposes. Now, before I close, I want to just highlight a few things here. Because we could

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 stop with Isaiah 6, and we'd be quite content to stop with Isaiah 6. There's plenty here for our

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 consideration. But I want you to notice those opening, that opening verse of Isaiah 6, in the year that King

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 Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and exalted, seated on a throne. Turn with me for just a moment

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 to Isaiah chapter 52 and verse 13. This is the beginning verse of the four servant songs.

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 In the Bible, the chapter numbers and the verse numbers were added many years later.

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 So, the 53 in Isaiah 53 is not well placed, because it separates the fourth and final servant song. The

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 fourth servant song begins at 52.13. It doesn't begin at 53.1. Because if you look at 52.13,

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 see, my servant will act wisely. He will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted. Interesting.

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 The same language of 6.1 and 52.13, identical. Exalted, highly lifted up. But you say, as I read the rest of

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 that song, it doesn't seem like he is exalted, it doesn't appear as if he's lifted up. Why? Because he

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 is pierced. He is crushed. He has been beaten. He is suffering. There's nothing attractive about him.

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 And you would not necessarily put 52, 53, and 6 together. These are two different images.

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 Here's the high and exalted one in chapter 6. And here is the low and humble one in 52, 53. But no,

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 the same language, the same honor is given to them both. So that, in some profound way,

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 the Lord who is high and exalted in chapter 6 of Isaiah is the same Lord who is high and exalted in

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 his suffering, in his sacrifice, in his being pierced and crushed and giving his life as a ransom,

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 that same honor and that same glory is afforded to the same character. He is one in the same.

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 Now, you don't just have the internal evidence of those two chapters in Isaiah,

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 but when we turn to the New Testament, when we turn to the New Testament, the most quoted book

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 of the Bible, Old Testament book in the New Testament is the book of Psalms. That's not

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 surprising. There's 150 Psalms. So it's not surprising that the biggest Old Testament book is the biggest,

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 most frequently quoted book in the New Testament. But the second most quoted book was the book of

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 Isaiah. And when you look at the four gospel writers, Matthew and Mark and Luke and John,

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 each of those gospel writers quotes Isaiah chapter 6 and Isaiah chapter 52, 53 as fulfilled in Jesus.

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 I mentioned earlier in my time of prayer, this could be a coincidence, each of the four gospel writers

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 quoting the same two portions of Isaiah. I don't think it's a coincidence. I think each of the four

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 gospel writers gets that Isaiah 6 is Jesus and gets that Isaiah 52, 53 is Jesus, that his glory,

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 his honor, and his majesty, and his suffering, and his sacrifice, and his death are equally worthy of our

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 praise, glory, and honor. So just to prove the point, if you look at Matthew, we'll just choose

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 Matthew because it's most obvious in Matthew because Matthew name checks Isaiah. If you look at Matthew

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 chapter 8, so Matthew chapter 8 at verse 14, when Jesus came into Peter's house, he saw Peter's mother-in-law

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 lying in bed with a fever. He touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she got up and began to wait

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 on him. When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits

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 with a word and healed all who were ill. This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah.

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 He took up our infirmities and bore our diseases. Isaiah 52, or 53 in this case. But again, here's an

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 insight into hermeneutics, how we read the Bible. If the New Testament quotes a portion of an Old

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 Testament song or Old Testament chapter scene, it's not just the verse that's being quoted, but it's the

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 whole scene that's being quoted. So if I were to just say offhand that we will fight on the beaches,

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 you might think, okay, right, I've heard that before. Right, Churchill, House of Commons, 1940,

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 we will fight on the beaches, on the landing feet, you know, we will never surrender.

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 If I were to say, you know, just kind of as an illusion, I have a dream. You might, okay, I've

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 heard that before, 1963, summer, Martin Luther King, Lincoln Memorial, I have a dream. Right? So that

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 little reference references a speech. It references a scene. So what Matthew is doing is he's referencing a

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 portion of Isaiah 53 and saying, that's Jesus. The whole servant song is Jesus. The whole four servant

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 songs are Jesus. And then you move a few chapters ahead in chapter 13, Matthew 13 at verse 10.

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 The disciples came to him and asked, why do you speak to the people in parables? People just

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 weren't getting it. Right? He replied, because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven

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 has been given to you, but not to them. 13 verse 11. Whoever has will be given more,

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 and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.

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 This is why I speak to them in parables. Though seeing, they do not see. Though hearing, they do not

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 hear or understand. In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah. You will ever be hearing, but never

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 understanding. You will be ever seeing, but never perceiving. For this people's heart has become calloused.

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 They hardly hear with their eyes. They have closed their ears. Otherwise, they might see with their eyes,

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 hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn, and I would heal them. So, Matthew is

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 quoting from the second half of chapter 6, Isaiah, but he's quoting the whole scene. The high and lifted

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 up one, holy, holy, holy, glory, redemption, is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John

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 quotes Isaiah 6 and Isaiah 53. Either it's an unusual coincidence, or they are all saying with one accord

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 God that God that you view in Isaiah chapter 6, and the suffering servant you see in 52-53 is none other

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 than Jesus Christ. That's what Paul described his ministry. We preach Christ crucified. That's the

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 source of our hope. That's the source of our comfort. The one who is high and lifted up has become low.

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 The one who is majestic has suffered. Why? So that we might be a people whose guilt has been atoned for.

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 That we might be a people who are forgiven, who have been redeemed, who have been ransomed,

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 who have been renewed, who have been restored. J.B. Phillips, in his book, Your God is Too Small,

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 put it this way. He said, many people who have a vague, childish affection for a half-remembered Jesus

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 have never used their adult critical faculties on the matter at all. They hardly seem to see the

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 paramount importance of his claim to be God. Yet if for one moment we imagine the claim to be true,

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 the mind almost reels at its significance. Jesus Christ is God. Jesus is worthy of all honor because

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 he's God. Jesus is full of glory because he is God. Jesus is God and he does the work of God. And Jesus

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 does all things well. So this morning we have a vision of the one who is high and lifted up and the

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 one who was suffering. And this Jesus is the Jesus who has come to seek and to save the lost. This is the

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 Jesus who has come to pay a price to set you and me free. This has nothing to do with us. This has

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 everything to do with him. And because he is who he is, we can place our lives in his hand. We can place

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 this church in his hand. We can place this city in his hand, this nation, this world, because he is

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 almighty, all-powerful, all-glorious, all-holy, and what he purposes and plans, he achieves, not 99% of

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 the time, but 100% of the time. And he uses people like us to achieve his perfect, his powerful plan.

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 Amen. And may God bless his word to us. Let's pray.

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 Father,