Isaiah 51:1-52:12
Amen. Turn to Isaiah 51, Isaiah
51 1 through 52 12, kind of a chapter and a half will be our passage
for tonight. So last week we looked at servant
song number three and next week when we get into 52 verse 13
and into chapter 53, you’ll see Servant Song number four,
the one you are probably most familiar with. And then we are,
believe it or not, getting in the homestretch, the backstretch
of Isaiah. It is a big, long book, and it
is something else. Anytime ministers get into a
book of the Bible, they always have regrets about midway through
and how they wish they handled it. And I don’t know that I have
any regrets, but there was one commentary that took a thematic
approach. So it wasn’t verse by verse, but it went through
the major themes and pulled them together. That might have been
hard to get through, but man, it sure would have been simpler.
But it’s God’s word, good for us. So let’s give our attention
there. And I think we’ll see some parallels
tonight between what we heard this morning from Paul in 1 Corinthians
and now Isaiah to the exiled people who are preparing to return.
You’ll notice the word listen and give attention and wake up. These are the common words. And
so God’s word, Isaiah 51 verse one, listen to me, you who pursue
righteousness, you who seek the Lord, look to the rock from which
you were hewn. and to the quarry from which
you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who
bore you, for he was but one when I called him, that I might
bless him and multiply him. For the Lord comforts Zion, he
comforts all her waste places and makes her wilderness like
Eden, her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness
will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song. Give attention
to me, my people, and give ear to me, O my nation, for a law
will go out from me. I will set my justice for a light
to the peoples. My righteousness draws near.
My salvation has gone out. My arms will judge the peoples.
The coastlands hope for me, and for my arm they wait. Lift up
your eyes to the heavens and look at the earth beneath, for
the heavens vanish like smoke, and the earth will wear out like
a garment, and they who dwell in it will die in like manner.
But my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never
be dismayed. Listen to me, you who know righteousness,
the people in whose heart is my law. Fear not the reproach
of man, nor be dismayed at their revilings. For the moth will
eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool. But my righteousness will be
forever, and my salvation to all generations. Awake, awake,
put on strength, O arm of the Lord. Awake as in days of old,
the generations of long ago. Was it not you who cut Rahab
into pieces that pierced the dragon? Was it not you who dried
up the sea, the waters of the great deep, who made the depths
of the sea away for the redeemed to pass over? and the ransomed
of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing, and
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain
gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
I, I am he who comforts you. Who are you that you are afraid
of man who dies, of the son of man who is made like grass? and
have forgotten the Lord your maker who stretched out the heavens
and laid the foundations of the earth and you fear continually
all the day because of the wrath of the oppressor when he sets
himself to destroy. And where is the wrath of the
oppressor? He who has bowed down shall speedily be released. He
shall not die and go down to the pit. Neither shall his bread
be lacking. I am the Lord your God who stirs
up the sea so that its waves roar. The Lord of hosts is his
name. And I have put my words in your
mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand, establishing
the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth and saying to Zion,
you are my people. Wake yourself, wake yourself,
stand up, O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the
Lord the cup of his wrath, who have drunk to the dregs the bowl,
the cup of staggering. There is none to guide her among
all the sons she has born. There is none to take her by
the hand among all the sons she has brought up. These two things
have happened to you, who will console you? Devastation and
destruction, famine and sword, who will comfort you? Your sons
have fainted. They lie at the head of every
street like an antelope in a net. They are full of the wrath of
the Lord, the rebuke of your God. Therefore, hear this, you
who are afflicted, who are drunk, but not with wine. Thus says
the Lord, the Lord, your God, who pleads the cause of his people.
Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering. The
bowl of my wrath you shall drink no more. And I will put it into
the hand of your tormentors who have said to you, bow down that
we may pass over. And you have made your back like
the ground, like the street for them to pass over. Awake, awake,
put on your strength, O Zion, put on your beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city. For there shall no more come
into you the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake yourself from
the dust and arise, be seated, O Jerusalem. Loose the bonds
from your neck, O captive daughter of Zion. For thus says the Lord,
you were sold for nothing and you shall be redeemed without
money. For thus says the Lord God, my people went down at the
first into Egypt to sojourn there and the Assyrian oppressed them
for nothing. Now therefore, what have I here,
declares the Lord, seeing that my people are taken away for
nothing. Their rulers wail, declares the Lord, and continually all
the day my name is despised. Therefore, my people shall know
my name. Therefore, in that day, they shall know that it is I
who speak. Here am I. How beautiful upon
the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who
publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes
salvation, who says to Zion, your God reigns. the voice of
your watchman. They lift up their voice. Together
they sing for joy. For eye to eye they see the return
of the Lord to Zion. Break forth together in singing.
You waste places of Jerusalem. For the Lord has comforted his
people. He has redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord has bared his holy arm
before the eyes of all the nations and all the ends of the earth
shall see the salvation of our God. Depart. Depart and go out
from there. Touch no unclean thing. Go out
from the midst of her. Purify yourselves, you who bear
the vessels of the Lord. For you shall not go out in haste.
You shall not go out in flight. For the Lord will go before you,
and the God of Israel will be your rear guard. Amen, God’s
word. There’s a question you have to
ask when you read an Old Testament passage like this. You have to,
You have to ask what’s in it for me, right? It’s a terrible,
selfish question, but God wrote the Bible for us. He wrote it
for his people. So it’s worth asking what’s in
this passage for me. Think about this in every, uh, every several years, decades,
whatever, um, millennia in the Christian history of God’s people,
we see God doing a mighty and redemptive act. So we see a little
bit of redemption in the garden when Adam and Eve sinned, God
came and found them, God clothed them, God made them promises.
You see Abraham go down into Egypt a couple of times. God
rescues him out of Egypt. You see Joseph and his family
down in Egypt. They become mighty and great,
and God rescues them out of Egypt. You see David in the Philistine.
You see the nations in the promised land when Joshua and Caleb lead
Israel into their inheritance. And now you’ve got this exodus
from Babylon, from exile after 70 years. Then, of course, Jesus
speaks of his own exodus, his own departure when he is up on
the Mount of Transfiguration with a couple of disciples and
Moses and Elijah. So if you look through the whole
Bible, exodus is a pretty big feature. There’s another exodus
that will soon come. It will be our exodus from this
world and into the eternal promised land. And so you catch glimmers
of God’s salvation throughout history, but there’s still a
really big one that has happened to no one yet. And so what’s
in this for me? Well, we can recognize who God
is. We can recognize what God is
able to do. We can recognize what God will
do and what we will enjoy in the next life, but how that helps
us in this life. And in this passage of scripture
tonight, uh, you have several, um, encouragements for believers
to take heart and be ready, uh, several encouragements for believers
waiting for the Exodus, whether it’s from Babylon here or us
waiting for our departure. Um, I believe that’s what the
Apostle Paul called it, too, at the end of his life when he
spoke to Timothy. But we can take heart and be ready, understanding
who we are and what we have in God. In this passage, there are
seven calls, seven calls to wake up or to listen up, and they
appear in verse one, verse four, verse seven, verse nine, verse
17, that’s in chapter 51, and then over in 52, they appear
in verses one and seven. And so tonight we want to take
a quick guided tour through these, but I want you to first look
at verse 11 of chapter 51 and then we’ll look at verse 7 of
52 just to kind of get a theme in mind. Verse 11, verse 11 brings
back big memories. When I was a kid, we sang in
church a lot of, I think what they were, were the Calvary church
movement songs from California. During the day we sang a song
the redeemed of the Lord shall return design was singing and
joy and gladness will be on their head I Think we had people from
inner varsity Elon students that play guitar and remember singing
those at prayer meeting on Wednesday night and But verse 11 is a big
one. The ransomed of the Lord shall
return. Okay. That’s the exiles that
God has rescued or will rescue. They shall return and they shall
come back to Zion with singing. Remember the Psalm. Hey, uh,
Hey Israel, we, we captured you. We brought you to Babylon and
we want you to sing your Zion songs. And what did they say
by the waters of Babylon? We wept, we hung up our harps
in the willow trees and while our captors tormented and taunted
us, And we said, how can we sing the Lord’s songs in a foreign
land? So they get to go back and they
get to go back with singing. Everlasting joy shall be on their
heads. They shall obtain gladness. They shall obtain joy. Sorrow
and sighing shall flee away. Some of this is in this life
and some of it is ultimately in the next. And then we know
from Romans 10, Isaiah 52 verse seven, how beautiful upon the
mountains are the feet. of him who brings good news,
who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes
salvation, who says to Zion, God reigns. It has been said
that the job of the preacher is to herald the king so that
the people of the king will revere him as such. And they will then
desire to live out the principles and values of that king. That’s what Jesus came to do. He came to preach the good news
of the kingdom and to bring people into it. And that is our continuing
work. as the church of Jesus Christ. It’s rejoicing God’s
salvation, but to preach the good news. So let’s think just
briefly of these awake passages. Verses one to three speak of
Abraham and Eden. Abraham and Eden, he says, of
comfort and encouragement to Israel. Remember your roots. When I called Abraham, he was
but one. And he, he says, you know, he’s like a quarry. Um, he was but one, but then there
was Isaac and then there was Jacob. And then there was, uh,
Joseph and on and on it went. And what do we find in the first
chapter of the book of Exodus? The people grew and increased
so much so that Pharaoh, the one who didn’t know them was
scared out of his wits. He thought they’ll rise up. There’s
so many of them and our kingdom, our dynasty will be. And so our first little section
here reminds us that God blessed him and multiplied him. And so remember what God is able
to do. He’s able to take a man, a childless
man, an old man of the Chaldeans and make a nation and you’re
that nation. And so don’t forget your roots.
And he speaks of the land, a land that is now barren and it will
be lush. Now, certainly they knew about
the garden of Eden. Certainly they knew the stories
of how beautiful and wonderful it was. They knew about paradise
lost, but he speaks at least in a local or Jerusalem level
of paradise gained. Hate to rip off John Milton,
but it’s a good, Compare, contrast. Paradise in the garden lost,
but paradise gained, ultimately in heaven. But they get to go
back to Jerusalem. They get to go back to the waste
place, the desolate place, and rebuild it and make it again
a place where God dwells and a place of beauty. So that’s
the first listen up. And it’s got that twofold Abraham. and Eden picture. And then you
have another in verses four through six, it’s an inclusion of the
Gentiles. You’re going to wonder when we
get through this. Where did he think of all this stuff from?
Well, it’s the mind of God, so there you go. He says, my law
will go out, set my justice for a light to the peoples, my righteousness
draws near. Salvation goes out, and in verse
five, my arms will judge the peoples. Coastlands, hope, lift
up your eyes to heavens. He then speaks of what lasts
and what doesn’t last. But here he’s promising worldwide
salvation. It’s not just the Jews who will
be saved through faith in God, but it is every nation as well. And he says, if you don’t believe
me, look around you. What you see wears out like a
garment, it goes up in smoke. Um, but my salvation is forever. My righteousness never, never
dismayed. So it’s kind of a, another two
fold deal, worldwide salvation, whatever I do doesn’t get moth
eaten or destroyed. So that’s a second confidence
that pops up in the passage. Uh, there’s a third one. There’s
a call in verses seven, eight, uh, to the faithful ones. And
again, it’s like verses 1 through, I don’t know, 1 and 2, where
he’s referring to the wheat, not the tares. So you understand,
not everybody who’s off in Babylon is of the true faith. Maybe they’re children of Abraham,
maybe they’ve been circumcised, and maybe they’re in the covenant
community. And you know how us Presbyterians, us covenant minded
people get approved. Baptism means they’re saved,
right? Baptism saves them. It’s guaranteed. No, not everybody
in the covenant community possesses faith. They may profess it, right?
But they may not possess it. And so there’s a special call
here. Hey, faithful ones. And how does he in verses seven
and eight differentiate them? Well, you who know righteousness, you who in your heart is the
law, Don’t worry about man, don’t be dismayed. They’re going to
get eaten like moth and worm. They’re going to be like garments
and wool. But my righteousness will be
forever, my salvation to all generations. You know, you’re
sitting in the promised land, or I mean, sorry, you’re sitting
in Babylon, or here we are in this present evil world, and
you say to yourself, why does everybody else have it so good?
We have a home on another shore. where time stands still. They
have a home on another shore that’s a sure and lasting city
whose foundations are forever. And so the call here to the faithful
ones who know the law of God and who have it written in their
hearts is here. I think of Elizabeth and Zechariah. You know, you read about them
in early chapters of Luke. They feared God and they kept
the commandments. They were righteous in all that
they did. Or Enoch, who walked with God. That’s the simple call
to be a Christian. Fear God, keep the commandments.
Fear God, know the righteousness of God, the law of God. Not only
know it in your brain, but live it out of your heart. Kind of
the Psalm 1 and 2 way of life. Blessed is the man who does not
sit, walk, or stand in the way of the ungodly, but his delight
is in the law of the Lord. He meditates on it day and night,
the wicked are not so. or he’s like a tree planted by
the streams of living water, but the wicked are not so, they’re
like the chaff that the wind blows away. So the call here
is to faithful ones whose heart is right. So that puts a question
in our mind, doesn’t it? Do I love God’s law or do I just
have a perfunctory reading of it? Do I really worship God or
do I just come sit in a pew? Because it’s Mother’s Day or
because it’s Easter or because that’s what you do in the South.
Or what you used to do in the South, maybe. Or do I really
love God? Do I love the stones? This week,
this past week, my psalm to read and kind of think about every
morning was Psalm 102. And it said something about loving the
rubble stones of Zion. That’s a pretty interesting image,
isn’t it? In our world, we love big, we love perfect, we love
shiny, flashy, all the rest. But if it got down to little
to nothing of God’s people, just a teeny tiny remnant with nothing
to be proud of or brag about, would we love the waste stones
of Zion? That’s who he’s speaking to here.
Then we have a long call and response in verses nine through
16. They speak to God and then he speaks back to them. What they do here in verses nine
through 11 is say, hey God, remember what you did way back in Egypt.
Remember what you did when Rahab or Egypt had us. What did you
do? Well, you roused yourself. The arm, the arm of the Lord
pierced the dragon. The arm of the Lord cut Rahab
into pieces. And so there’s a sense here where
it’s saying, show us your old Exodus power in the new Exodus. And certainly God is going to
do that here with the Babylonian exile. And definitely God is
going to do that through the person and work of his own son,
our savior, Jesus. And then when we all make it
to the heavenly city, won’t that be a grand exit from all this
oppression and hardship? And so God’s might always wins
out over the opposition of the enemies. And verse 11 gives a
song, the ransom of the Lord shall return. Those are big words. And how are they going to come
back? Are they going to march back as prisoners? That’s how
they left. They’re going to they’re going
to be striking up the band. I mean, this is going to be one loud
thousand mile trip where God is at the rear of their their
traveling band, he’s their rear guard, and they’re going to be
playing the harps and the tambourines and all the rest, and all the
people who spot them on their thousand mile journey back are
going to wonder about them, but they’re going to be coming into
Zion with singing, they’re going to come into Zion with joy and
with gladness. What’s our little saying, saved
people? sing. And so we got to know what we’re
saved from, what we’re saved to, but it makes us, uh, it makes
us a singing people. And then in verse 12, God responds,
I comfort you. Don’t be afraid. You know, men,
men are like grass. Um, they’ve forgotten their maker.
He’s the one that stretched out the heavens. He’s the one that
laid the foundations of the earth and you continually fear me all
the day. Um, So the wrath of God is who
will take care of their enemies. It’s the wrath of God that’s
been against them. Now it’s the wrath of God who’s against the
enemies. Think about this. The more we
read the Bible, the more we know God’s name, his titles, his attributes,
his words, and his works. And when that God is the object
of our faith, When that true and living God is the object
of our faith, the surrounding things that seem to overwhelm
us are as nothing. It just flees away. It sheds
off of us because we know. And that’s why it’s good to sing
good songs. It’s good to read the scriptures. It’s good to
know who God is, what he’s done, and what he’s promised to do.
And that gives us great hope, great confidence. Okay. The cup
of wrath is the next one. That’s what you find in verses
17 to 23. So Israel has been drinking the
cup of the wrath of God. Now that, of course, makes our
brains go straight to the cross. What did Jesus do? He drank the
cup of God’s wrath. What’s Israel and exile been
doing? Well, they’ve been drinking the cup of wrath, loss of city,
loss of home, loss of worship. They’ve been in famine. They’ve
been in sword. They’ve been in destruction and
death. They’ve lost everything. I mean, absolutely everything.
And there is no one who can show them compassion. There is no
one who can show them comfort, even mothers. who have boys are
caught like a deer or gazelle in the net. And so who can comfort
them? Who can take away the cup? Only
God, only God. And then what will he do? He’ll
turn the tables. He’ll turn the cup of wrath onto the oppressors. And how will Israel get out of
their place of exile? They’ll walk on the backs of
their enemies. And so the oppressors turn into
the oppressed. All right, now we’re getting
to the end, and you have two big encouragements in chapter
52. Verses 1 through 6 tell us about
their freedom. You need to wake up. Uh, the
city of righteousness, the Jerusalem, the holy city, uh, is going to
be inhabited by you. You’re going to make it back
the thousand miles. Remember Cyrus, the Persian, he’s going
to send you back. He’s going to send you with money.
He’s going to send you with a decree. He’s going to send you with all
the temple, uh, the temple stuff. Um, and you, you can start the
celebration now. When I was a kid, we used to
joke when it was our birthday that we had birthday week. And
then we stretched it out to birthday month. And then we always had
a joke, we’re going to stretch it out to birthday year. And
that’s the sense that God is giving to Israel is you’re not
back yet, but you can start partying. You’re not back yet, but it’s
guaranteed. And so start the celebration now. What about we who will be one
day in the new Jerusalem? Do we start the party now? Yes,
we do every single Sunday. We come together to sing songs
of Zion and to get our hearts and our minds ready for that
day when we will be there. That is a guaranteed destination. We’re guaranteed safe passage
and so we can recognize that we’ve been cast
off or punished for our sin, that misery and that hardship,
that dishonor will one day be over. And that’s what God is
encouraging the Babylonians. They’re going to be free, free
at last. Then verses seven through 10, you have the good news, the
good news of peace, the good news of a king on the throne.
Uh, what are the watchmen doing in Jerusalem? And the funny thing
is there actually not any, remember there’s no walls to stand on.
Everybody’s been run off and hauled off. But he, but he has
this picture of Jerusalem has some watchmen there, like maybe
the prophets and they’re supposed to watch and see the return.
It’s, it’s almost like, um, they’re setting it back up. It’s not
the reality yet, but the watchman see the return. They see the
song singers, the pilgrims, And so they see the saved and they
see the city and the people saying, even the Gentiles. Now Paul quotes
verse seven in Romans chapter 10. How will people hear without
a preacher? I have this little saying that
gets me in trouble, but missionaries really ought to be preachers.
missionaries really ought to be preachers who go preach the
good news. It’s one thing to go be a Christian
professional in another part of the world and do lifestyle
evangelism. It’s one thing, you know, to
go and set up a school or hospital or that kind of thing. But if
there are no preachers, there is no good news of salvation
proclaimed, not downplaying evangelism. But the church needs to go in
the world and we need to send preachers out into the world.
And that’s what Paul was saying in Romans 10. If you want them
to hear, send a preacher. And what should the preacher
preach? It should be good news. It should be good news of salvation.
Now, this little feet business. Remember, this passage always
cracks me up when you’re reading through the life of King David
and, you know, they’re off at battle and they say, oh, we see
a messenger running. And they say, it looks like the
feet of a Hithofel or something like that. Did he have on his
pink Nikes or how was it that they could tell it was his feet?
Um, but the, he was running and they could see his feet and the
swiftness. He must be bringing good news.
That’s the idea. We run and we tell the good news
of salvation. And so that’s the business of
preaching. And we have something to preach
the redeemed. of the Lord get redeemed by Jesus, and they get
to go sing songs of redemption forever in the presence of the
Redeemer, the Lamb of God. Well, in verses 11 and 12, it’s
time to go. Depart. Depart and go out from
there. Touch no unclean thing. Go out
from the midst of your captors. Go out from the midst of Babylon
and bear the vessels of the Lord. It’s going to be not just a loud
sing-songy bunch, but there’s going to be lots of rattling
It’s like when the tin peddler comes to town with his buggy
full of rattling pots and pans. All the vessels of the temple,
all the vessels of the Levitical Old Covenant law would be rattling
their way back. But it’s time to go, it’s time
to depart. Get Ready. We don’t sing Get Ready songs
too much, second coming songs. But you hear it in other cultures
that live under oppression. On the way to church this morning,
I always listened, or on the way to church every Sunday morning,
did happen this morning, I always listened to 89 point something
out of maybe the Durham area, it’s the classical station, and
they have some Lutheran sacred music playing. And this morning
they had, since it was Mother’s Day, they were recognizing a
lady who was a mom, she was an African American lady, and she
had done a lot to promote black Voices black singers and you
know the songs of the old black community are often Zion songs
often redemption songs often we’re gonna We’re gonna walk
out of our oppression someday kind of songs I think of one
people get ready the train and It’s kind of a marching song
and we don’t sing those, but we need to be ready. We need
to be ready to depart. We need to be ready to march
to Zion. And this time it’s not going
to be in haste. I don’t know if you caught that in verses 11
and 12, there’s no Pharaoh chasing them. And they’re also not going
to plunder because the vessels of the household of God have
been preserved through the Babylonian captivity. And now through the
Persian, occupation. It’s by decree of Cyrus, but
ultimately by decree of God, they’re going to go back. And
so they’re going to leave everything behind, nothing unclean. Will
they touch or go with them? Only the vessels. So how do we
think of a passage? What’s in it for me? We might
say, well, what’s in store for us in heaven? Everything. It’s a perfect city. It’s a perfect
size. It’s a perfect place. It’s going
to be a place with Jews and Gentiles both. It’s going to be the place
where God dwells with his people, the lion and the lamb. It’s going
to be a place of Edenic beauty. All the things that we have been
listening to along the way in Isaiah. Now, as you get to the
end of Isaiah, you’re going to get that. bigger, louder, more
clear. But we need to understand, start
to finish who God is, start to finish what Christ has done,
start to finish what is in store for us in heaven. And this is
an encouragement to do so. Let’s pause and pray together. Lord, thank you for a glimpse
of the return of the band of exiles. And it gives us a nudge
to be reminded of our one day departure. Perhaps it will be
through our death from natural causes, where we will go to sleep
in Jesus and awake with that first resurrection in heaven,
our spirits made perfect, and we open our eyes in glory and
see everything that we cannot imagine now. Or it may be that
the trumpet sounds, and that blast of the trumpet, the dead
in Christ rise, and the ones who are alive are caught in the
air, and we are brought in, body and soul, into the heavenly place.
where we like it down here too much. So give us a glimpse of
what’s up there that we might look forward to it. And sing
and pack our bags now, we pray in Christ’s name, amen.