The Reasonable Justice and Ridiculous Grace of our God.

I’m told when you buy real estate there are three things that are most important to look for before you purchase anything. You know what they are don’t you? Location, Location, Location.

Why is the location so important? because it doesn’t matter how nice that little three bedroom house is if it’s located next to landfill people are probably not going to want to live there. It also doesn’t matter how run down the home is if it’s located right off the coast in California it’s probably going to go for several million dollars. It’s all about location.

Well there are three important things to look for when it comes to studying your Bible as well. Context, Context, Context. Why? Because it doesn’t matter how amazing the promise might be if it’s not meant for you then it probably doesn’t make sense to claim it… Context matter.

People have claimed Jeremiah 29:11 which says, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

Go to Hobby Lobby sometime and you will find 10 different versions of that verse in art form ready to be hung on your wall.

But there is a slight problem. That verse was written specifically to the people of Israel… not us. Context matters…

Another popular verse taken out of context is Philippians 4:13 which says, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”

It doesn’t matter how many basketball shoes Steph Curry writes that on it has nothing to do with shooting three’s. The context is Paul being able to persevere through hunger and need, through persecution and torture. It’s through contentment in Christ that Paul can do “all things.” Context matters….

How many of you have heard 1 Corinthians 13 read at a wedding before?

It’s a beautiful passage about love. The problem is the context has nothing to do with marriage and everything to do with the church. Now in that case I still think it gives a beautiful depiction of love and is probably worthwhile to be read at weddings, but it is important to know the context because context matters.

Because the context of a verse determines it’s meaning.

The context of a verse determines it’s meaning.

Well this morning I’d like to ruin another verse for you. Because today’s passage is another verse that is often taken out of context and used to say something different than what the passage means.

Although, in regards to this passage it’s not that we take it out of context to say something inhheritently wrong but rather because it is taken out of it’s context so often we miss the deeper meaning or rather the more powerful main point of the passage.

Turn to Isaiah 55 and we are going to start by reading verses 8-9. If you are using one of the Bible’s provided for you it is one page 615.

8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways

and my thoughts than your thoughts.

What a beautiful passage of scripture. It’s my guess that for many of you here this morning that passage of scripture has gotten you though some very difficult times.

Because it is my guess that for almost all of you here this morning that verse has been shared with you in the context of God’s plan for your life being different than your plan for your life.

Something traumatic happens or something unexpected happens in your life and as you are struggling with your new found reality some nice soul comes along and reminds you that your thoughts are not His thoughts. That your plans are not His plans and God must have something better for you out there.

I don’t want to ruin that for you because that is true. God’s ways are not your ways and he does have a better plan for your life and in some sense that passage can be taken that way. However, that is only the surface level understanding of this passage.

It’s like the difference between going snorkeling and scuba diving.

If you go to the ocean and you do snorkeling you will find real beauty. But it will only be so deep. You will only be able to see so much.

However, if you put on some scuba gear you will be able to dive to depths far deeper than you ever could with your snorkel and the resulting beauty and glory you will find there will take your breath away.

That’s what we are going to try to do this morning. Let’s put on our scuba gear and let’s dive deeper into the context of this passage and see the glory and the beauty that is found there.

Let’s back up a few verses and read…

Isaiah 55:6–9 (ESV)

6 “Seek the Lordwhile he may be found;

call upon him while he is near;

7 let the wicked forsake his way,

and the unrighteous man his thoughts;

let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,

and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways

and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Now that we have the context of this passage how does it add to our understanding?

But first here’s where we are going to go today.

We are going to look at who God is and what our response should be.

Who God is and what our response should be.

And we see that the context of verses 6 and 7 better help us understand who God is which is found in verses 8-9.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

That declaration from the Lord. That message that God’s ways are different than our ways comes directly after a call for sinners to repent.

“Seek the Lord while he may be found;

call upon him while he is near;

7 let the wicked forsake his way,

and the unrighteous man his thoughts;

let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,

and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

Verses 6 and 7 are a plea for the wicked to find forgiveness.

Seek the Lord, Isaiah says, call upon Him while he is near. Wicked men abandon your evil ways. Unrighteous man let go of your evil thoughts.

Why does Isaiah desire for these evil men to seek and call on the Lord. Why does he call them to turn from their evil ways.

Because if they would simply repent of their sins and turn to God they would find a God that would have compassion on them. They would find a judge that would abundantly pardon them.

At its core verses 6-7 is a plea for evil men to accept the grace and forgiveness of our God. Just turn back. Just repent. Just call out to the Lord. Seek him while he can be found. Come to God, He will forgive you the author pleads with His readers.

And it is in that context that we find verses 8-9.

Here’s what I think is happening. There is this unbelievable call to repentance and assurance of forgiveness and it’s like the Lord is assuming that the hearers would be dubious.

I think the Lord is assuming, or better yet because the Lord knows all, the Lord knows that the people reading, are questioning whether or not this offer of forgiveness is legit. Could God really forgive me for what I’ve done. Could God really accept me.

Why would people think this way? Why do people question the mercy of God? Have you ever asked yourself that question?

I think it is because we think God is just a better version of us and that is the great danger to our theology. We have the natural tendency to project our natural expectations on God. But the goal of our theology the goal of our bible reading must be to fight against our natural expectations and fight to see God for who is he clearly displayed in scripture.

You see we are far more lawish than we care to admit. We say we want grace but only for us. In reality we are for more comfortable with justice then we care to admit.

We generally want people to get what they deserve. They had it coming we find ourselves thinking.

You drive by someone sitting on the side of the road with a sign asking for money and you think, “Maybe if you just got a job you wouldn’t have to ask me for money. Maybe if you had just made better choices like I did you wouldn’t be in this situation” you may be tempted to think.

Someone speeds past you on the high way and the next second you see lights start flashing. “Ha that’s what you get” you may be tempted to say.

You see your co-worker that you can’t stand in your bosses office getting chewed out for poor performance. “It’s about time” you find yourself thinking.

California passes another law that inevitably makes no logical sense and it inevitably fails and makes life worse for the people living there and you find yourself happy that peoples lives are worse off. Because they got what they deserved.

You yell at the TV because another politician talks about raising taxes in order to provide more well-far for people that don’t have jobs. "Why should the government take money that I’ve worked for and give it to people you sit at home all day. It’s not fair you think. It’s just not right.”

My point isn’t to debate taxes or well far or California laws. I quite frankly know very little about any of it. I’m trying to show that in reality we care far more about justice then we care to admit.

This isn’t all bad. We are made in the image of God after all. We desire order over chaos. We want fairness over injustice.

But one author writes, “But that impulse, like every part of us, has been diseased by the ruinous fall into sin. Our capacity to apprehend the heart of God has gone into meltdown. We are left with an impoverished view of how he feels about his people, an impoverished view that (once more, due to sin) thinks it is in fact an expansive and accurate view of who he is.”

Because of sin we think that this “impoverished view” of God this under developed picture of God is in fact the true or accurate version of who he is. But His ways our not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. The reality of who He is, is different than what we assume.

Why do we question the mercy and grace of God towards sinners? Because we are tempted to think God is just a better version of us and we are for more lawish then we realize. We want people to get what they deserve or at least close to it and we assume God is the same way.

And it is because we believe this “impoverished view” of God this under developed picture of God is in fact the true or accurate version of who he is. That we question the mercy and grace of God towards sinners.

But His ways our not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. The reality of who He is, is different than what we assume.

This is most clearly seen when it comes to His compassion towards sinners.

The Lord says, For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

That phrase as high as the heavens are above the earth is a Hebrew way of saying there is an infinite gap between the way you think and the way I think. Specifically, when it comes to God’s compassion for sinners.

There is this tendency however, even for people who care about justice like we naturally care about justice to think that God is unreasonably or uncomfortably just and lack luster in His compassion and grace.

There is this tendency to think that God is unreasonably or uncomfortably just and lack luster in His compassion and grace.

Could God really send people to hell. Could He really punish them for eternity? That seems harsh. Even for people who want others to get what they deserve. It seems unreasonably just. Why cant God be more forgiving we are tempted to ask….

So there seems to be this weird thing that sin does to the human mind. We think it’s wrong for the guilty to go unpunished and yet we think God is harsh for being willing to send people to hell.

So even though we desire justice there is this tendency to think that God is unreasonably or uncomfortably just and lack luster in His compassion and grace.

That is the natural tendency. However any amount of self-reflection will find that God’s justice is the only thing that really makes sense to us. It’s God’s justice that is the only thing “reasonable” about God.

God is this infinite, all-mighty, all-knowing, being. Who from the kindness of His heart saw fit to create us. But we who were formed out of the dust of the ground had the audacity to rebel against Him.

God created a perfect world. Created a perfect garden for man to live in. He gave Adam and Eve everything they could ever need and how did they respond to God’s gift? Rebellion. Sin. Disobedience. And for the rest of mankind generation after generation have continued in their rebellion against God. Those created out of dust have rebelled against their creator.

Think of the many ways you sinned even this morning on your way to church. God has given you everything you could ever need. But instead of just obeying Him you sin against him. You spurn his love and His kindness towards you and you sin.

The audacity we have to sin against God is profound.

Parents you feel this don’t you. You do everything for your kids. You clothe them, feed them, play with them, take them to school, pick up after them, make them dinner and all you ask of them to do is obey. Just be quiet in the morning until I’ve had my coffee. Oh maybe that last one is just me…

But they disobey you! They don’t listen. They spurn your love and they sin against you even after all of the things you have done for them.

The audacity. The audacity that kids have to disobey their parents is profound. The audacity they have to disobey you is rivaled only by your audacity to disobey God.

So you see the justice of God is the only thing reasonable about Him. The punishment of sinners makes sense. Of course we should pay for our sins against a holy God. Of course the punishment for our sins against an infinite God should be infinite.

But as you read the scriptures what you find is a God that is not too just but too gracious. You find a God who is reasonably just but ridiculously gracious. A God who quite honestly is uncomfortably kind.

I think this is most clearly seen in the story of Jonah. Jonah kind of gets a bad rap. Jonah is looked down on because he didn’t want to preach to the Ninevites. He didn’t want to see them forgiven. And when they are forgiven there is this famous line in the book where he says, “O LORD, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.”

Jonah is complaining because God was gracious to these people and we look down on him. But can I defend Jonah for a little bit. In this story, Jonah is the reasonable one. It’s God that is being ridiculous. (if that sounded wrong to say be patient with me) But it’s true Jonah was being reasonable God was being ridiculous.

These Ninevites weren’t just an unreached people group somewhere in the heart of Africa. The Ninevites were evil people. They were known for their cruelty. They were called the Lords of torture. Let that sink in. The Lords of torture.

I can’t even begin to describe to you in this setting the evils of these people. It would be inappropriate to share. I began studying about what they were known to do and I had to stop because it was so repulsive. Here’s what I’ll say. Take what you are thinking right now about how bad these people were and multiply it by about 10 and you may come close to how bad they really were.

But these weren’t just an evil people in some distant land. Nineveh was the capital city of Assyria which border Israel. And Assyria had been tormenting Israel for years at this point and was a direct threat to Israel as a nation.

So Jonah is called to go to the capital city of a country that is enemies of his homeland and who are known for their evil and tortuous ways and are an eminent threat to the safety of Israel.

Yet we look down our noses for Jonah wanting justice instead of mercy shown towards Nineveh. Justice is what makes sense for these people. Fire from heaven is what they deserve.

This illustration I’m about to use isn’t perfect. Israel is not America so it doesn’t quiet work. But bear with me. How many of you still remember where you were on 9/11? How many of you still remember how you felt on 9/11? Now imagine if a politician suggested we send missionaries to the Taliban instead of soldiers…. How would you feel?

Well Nineveh makes the Taliban look like reasonable people and yet God doesn’t send an army he sends a prophet.

God’s grace is ridiculous. It’s uncomfortable. He’s justice makes sense. We can wrap our heads around that. It’s his grace that confounds the mind.

And so we see the Lord telling us that when it comes to the compassion of the Lord towards sinners. His thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways His ways,

9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are His ways higher than your ways

and His thoughts than your thoughts.

God is not like you. He doesn’t love like you love. He doesn’t forgive like you forgive. He doesn’t have compassion the way you have compassion. He doesn’t think of others the way you think of others.

He different. He’s not like you. Even the most intense of human loves is like the feeling of the sun on your arm on a bitterly cold day compared to the heat of the sun’s surface.

In both instances the sun is giving off heat. But one is just the slightest representation of the other. The greatest most intense human love in all of history is nothing compared to the love God has towards sinners.

As high as the heavens are above the earth so is God’s love greater than our love.

Why does God call on sinners to repent? Why does God call on men to seek after him. Why is God willing to give us pardon. Because his ways are not our ways.

We deserve fire from heaven to consume us where we stand. In no way, shape, or form should I be able to stand in front of you and tell you about this God. I should in this very instant being burned in hell for all eternity.

I have sinned against God in more ways that I can even comprehend.

I have taken the love and the goodness He has shown me, and I have rebelled against Him.

I have been given clear direction from God and chosen my own way.

I have seen the beauty of obedience clearly displayed for me in the scriptures and have rejected it.

I have been dealt with, by God, with such patience and gentleness and yet I have been impatient and harsh with others.

I have been forgiven by God for more than I understand and yet I have harbored bitterness in my heart towards others.

I have lied.

I have lusted.

I have stolen.

I have coveted.

I have been jealous.

I have thought evil despicable thoughts towards others.

I have done all that and much more.

And I come back to the Lord and I question Him and I ask Lord how could you forgive me for this again? Lord why are you willing to forgive me again?

He tells us, “Because I’m not like you. My thoughts are not your thoughts. My ways are not your ways. I love different than you. I have compassion on sinners different than you. I forgive more than you forgive.”

This is how we must come to the Lord. We can’t understand His grace. His justice I get. But His grace. That makes no sense to me. But we are not called to understand we are called to trust.

It’s like God is asked but how Lord could you forgive me and God just responds, “you wouldn’t understand just trust me.”

And so we see from this passage who God is. We see the reasonable justice but the ridiculous grace of our God.

But how should we respond? What should we do with knowledge of God’s grace

The text gives us five responses to our sin in light of the grace of God.

Seek

Call

Forsake

Return

Be pardoned

We see the first two in verse 6. “Seek the Lord while he may be found;

call upon him while he is near;

The Lord tells us to seek him and call upon him. But notice the way the verses is worded. Seek him while he may be found. Call on him while he is near.

This implies that there will be a time when you can seek after the Lord and you will not be able to find Him. This means there will be a time when you call upon Him but he is far away.

Our time to accept this ridiculous grace that God offers us is not infinite. There will be a time when His offer for forgiveness runs out. We are not promised tomorrow. We are not promised the next hour. You are not promised to live to the end of the sermon. Seek Him while he may be found. Call upon Him while he is near.

That phrase seek him while he may be found doesn’t mean to look for something difficult to find. As one commentator writes, “To seek in the religious sense is not to look for something that is lost but to go where something is known to be found.”

God is not a needle hidden in a haystack. He’s not your keys lost in the bottom of your purse. He’s telling you where He is. He tells you how to find him.

Have you played hide and seek with a child before. There’s not much drama. They often tell you where they are going to hide. They say something like count to ten and I’m gong to hide in the closet and you have to try to look for me. Then they make noises to make sure that if you didn’t catch their earlier hint you can still find them. Why do they do this?

Why do they tell you where they are going to hide? Why do they make noises to make sure you find them? Because they want to be found. They don’t want to stay hidden. That’s no fun for them. They want to be found.

And so does God. God desires to be found. He’s told you where He is. He’s making quit the ruckus to make sure just in case you didn’t get His earlier hint you can still find Him.

But our pride blinds us. It makes us think we have to earn His love. It makes us think it’s too easy. If He’s told us He’s in the closet then He must not be there I must have to work really hard to find him somewhere else. And so he screams no don’t go downstairs, don’t go in the bathroom, I’m here in the closet. Just come find me.

But in our pride, we refuse. In our pride we make it harder than it has to be. In our pride we assume that God is just a better version of us and therefore if he is just a better version of us we must have to earn his love. We must have to earn His forgiveness.

Because we know that it doesn’t matter how good of a person we think we may be someday. It doesn’t matter how good this better version of us is. We know that we could never forgive anyone that has sinned as much as we have sinned against God.

But his thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways are not our ways. God is not just a better version of us. He is infinitely different then us. God doesn’t just love more than us. He loves infinitely better than us.

Seek Him while he still may be found. Call upon him while he is still near. You don’t have eternity. Do it today.

What does it look like to seek the Lord and call out to Him. I think the rest of the verses help with that.

let the wicked forsake his way,

and the unrighteous man his thoughts;

I think a simple reading of this means that if we are going to seek the Lod while He can be found we must be willing to forsake the way we are going. Typically there is one of two directions you can go when it comes to not following God.

You can live a life of obvious sin. Pursuing all of the passions of the world. Living for the moment. Following your heart. The Lord tells us if you are going to seek me you must be willing to forsake those evil ways and call upon me.

The other way is by living a very good life. Desiring to do everything right so you don’t need God. In our pride we try to live up to an impossible standard because we don’t want to admit that we need God. So as Tim Keller says, “To truly become Christians we must also repent of the reasons we ever did anything right.”

Forsake the ways of sin. Forsake the ways of Self-righteousness. And Call upon the Lord while he is near.

But there is this other phrase that I think is interesting considering everything else we have already discussed.

and the unrighteous man his thoughts;

We’ve just discussed that our thoughts are not His thoughts our ways are not His ways. Our love and compassion are not his love and compassion.

But we have to fight to remember this. We have to fight to remember that God is not like us. We need to be willing to forsake all that we assumed we knew about God and only let scripture dictate what we believe.

We the unrighteous need to be willing to forsake our limited thoughts of who God is and accept God for who he is displayed in scripture.

Stop trying to put God in a box. Stop trying to limit his love. Forsake your limited thoughts. Accept God for who he is. A God of ridiculous grace.

The verse goes on.

let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,

and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

When the prodigal son ran out of all His money and was eating the feed for the pigs. He had a thought. He figured maybe I can go back and be a servant of my father. So he returned to the his father’s land and you know what happened.

The father had been waiting for him and when he sees that is son had returned he runs to meet him. He wraps him up in a hug and he welcomes him back home.

But the son says to his father, “I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.”

But the father doesn’t even respond to his son’s reasonable statement. He exudes ridiculous grace. He speaks to the servants tells them to bring the best robe, put a ring on his finger, sandals on his feet, and to kill the fatten calf.

His son has returned and he lavishes him with compassion and grace.

But the story for the youngest son didn’t have to be over. He could have refused. He could have insisted to the father that he must earn his way back. That he must be a servant because he is not worthy to be his son. He could have said your grace and compassion to me doesn’t make sense. I must earn your love.

HE could have done all of those things and it would have hurt the father more than the first time the son left.

He could have said wait father. Stop the party. How could you still love me. How could you forgive me after all I’ve done.

How would the Father have responded. “Son your ways are not my ways. Your thoughts are not my thoughts. I love different than you love. I forgive different than you forgive. You can’t understand it son but you have to accept it.”

You see it wasn’t enough for the son to just return he had to accept the compassion. He had to receive the grace. He had to believe that he was loved.

It’s not enough to just forsake the paths of sin and return to the father. It’s not enough to pursue a righteous life. You have to receive the compassion and grace of God regardless of the way you live. You have to believe that God loves you not because of the good things you do but simply because he loves you.

The great puritan John Owen once said, “The greatest sorrow and burden you can lay on the Father, the greatest unkindness you can do to him, is not to believe that He loves you.”

You may be thinking but you don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t know how far I’ve gone. How could the Lord still love me. How could God still have compassion on me.

Because his ways are not your ways. His thoughts are not your thoughts.

There are some of you here that don’t seem to get this. Don’t seem to understand that God loves you. Don’t seem to understand that no matter what you’ve done you can find forgiveness for your sins at the cross.

Can I just plead with you this morning. I don’t get it either. I don’t know why he loves you. I sure don’t know why he loves me. But he does. He loves you. Just accept it. Allow the Lord to have compassion on you. Receive his gift of forgiveness. Stop trying to earn God’s love.

What happens to those who return to the Lord?

let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,

and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

I love the way scripture assumes our low view of God’s forgiveness. There isn’t any real difference between a pardon and an abundant pardon is there. You’ve either been pardon for something or you haven’t. It’s a black and white kind of thing.

But the Lord knows that we will assume that this pardon this forgiveness from the Lord will be halfhearted. Almost like God can’t believe he is actually forgiving us. But that’s not what the text says. The Lord has abundantly pardoned us. He’s gone above and beyond to forgive us for our sin.

I did a little research into the court system this week. There are two ways a judge can dismiss a case, with prejudice or without prejudice. If you are like me you may think you’d want your court case dismissed without prejudice. Sounds better doesn’t it. But apparently if your case has been dismissed without prejudice it can be brought back up again and again and again.

However, if the judge dismiss your case with prejudice it means that never again can that case be brought back up. It is done with permanently.

If you have returned to the Lord and received his love and compassion than you have been abundantly pardoned and your case before the Lord has been dismissed with prejudice never to be brought back up again.

You sins have been forgiven.

Did you know that exact phrase found in Isaiah 55, “as high as the heavens are above the earth” is only used one other time in scripture. It’s found in Psalm 103:10–12 (ESV)

10 He does not deal with us according to our sins,

nor repay us according to our iniquities.

11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth,

so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;

12 as far as the east is from the west,

so far does he remove our transgressions from us.

There are two phrases in these verses that convey infinitude.

As high as the heavens are above the earth

So is his steadfast love toward us. His love for those who fear him who believe in him is infinite.

And your sins they have been removed from you as far as the east is from the west. There is in infinite distance between you and your sins. You have been abundantly pardoned. Your case has been dismissed with prejudice.

If you only you would ask God for forgiveness.

If you haven’t put your faith in Christ for salvation and the forgiveness of your sins then today is the day. Don’t put it off any longer. Don’t leave this building before getting right with God. Seek the Lord while he may be found;

call upon him while he is near;

Do it today.

For the Christian struggling to understand the grace of God this morning. You may have put your faith in Christ for salvation but you are tempted to think that God has grown tired of forgiving you.

Fight the tendency to assume of God what is not in scripture. Fight to see him only as he truly is. Forsake you impoverished view of God. Let go of your under developed picture of his grace.

He’s not like you. His ways are not your ways. His thoughts are not your thoughts. He does not love the way you love. He does not grow tired of forgiving you.

So the next time you sin and you and that thought comes into your mind. “Maybe God is done forgiving me. Maybe this time I’ve gone to far.” I want you to remember this phrase. My thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are my ways your ways.

Then let the glory and beauty of God love for you drive you to repentance and continued obedience to his will.

Pray

Sing like you’ve been forgiven because you have.

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