Sermon Tone Analysis

Hope, God is with us!

Author Max Lucado tells a remarkable story of the son of a rabbi who battled severe emotional problems.

One day the boy went into his backyard, removed all his clothing, assumed a crouched position, and began to gobble like a turkey.

He did this, not just for hours or days, but for weeks.

No pleading would dissuade him.

No psychotherapist could help him.

A friend of the rabbi, having watched the boy and shared the father’s grief, offered to help.

He, too, went into the backyard and removed his clothes.

He crouched beside the boy and began gobbling, turkey-like.

For days, nothing changed.

Finally the friend spoke to the son.

“Do you think it would be all right for turkeys to wear shirts?”

After some thought and many gobbles, the son agreed.

So they put on their shirts.

Days later the friend asked the boy if it would be acceptable for turkeys to wear trousers.

The boy nodded.

In time, the friend redressed the boy.

And, in time, the boy returned to normal.

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What an amazing story.

What amazing love.

Do you understand that this is what Christmas is all about?

It’s more than the birth of a special baby, it is more than an angels’ song.

It is God invading our world, stripping himself of all His power and dignity that he might die naked on a cross in our behalf.

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Hope is not just getting everything on our Christmas lists.

Hope was all wrapped up in that baby that was born in Bethlehem, Immanuel, God with Us!

Jerusalem need hope.

If you back up to the beginning of this chapter.

The King of Israel and the King of Aram had gathered for war against Judah.

Isaiah wrote in verse 3

The people were afraid and need of a sign of hope.

To give you an idea, biblical histories identify that King Pekah of Israel and his forces killed 120,000 or Judah’s soldiers.

They took 200,000 captives back to Samaria.

That was an awful time to be living in Judah.

The people needed their king to do something, they were surrounded.

Ahaz for his part is doing something.

He is inspecting the water supply.

Knowing how much water they had was an indicator of how long they could hold out against this attack.

That is where Isaiah and his son meet up with him.

God gives him the words to say to King Ahaz in verses 4-7

Is 7:4-7 “4 and say to him, ‘Be careful and stay calm.

Don’t fear, and don’t lose heart over these two pieces of smoking torches, over the burning anger of Rezin, Aram, and Remaliah’s son. 5 Aram has planned evil against you with Ephraim and Remaliah’s son, saying, 6 “Let’s march up against Judah, tear it apart, capture it for ourselves, and install Tabeel’s son as its king.”

7 But the Lord God says: It won’t happen; it won’t take place.”

King Ahaz was someone who took charge, who got things done.

Now he was not one of the good kings of Judah.

He marched to the beat of his own drum.

God says through Isaiah to “Be careful and stay calm.

Don’t fear, and don’t lose heart over these two pieces of smoking torches.”

God totally reverses things.

Ahaz would have gladly responded to the command “Don’t just stand there, do something.”

Instead, God reversed it all and said “Don’t do something, just stand there.”

It is interesting to note how God finished out that diaglouge between Isaiah and Ahaz.

Isaiah said to him there in verse 9

Isaiah 7:9 (CEB)

If you don’t believe this, you can’t be trusted.’

”

Faith is the foundation for faithfulness.

Ahaz was not faithful to God.

He made a pact with Assyria.

The Bible records that he went to Assyria to pay homage to the king and swear his allegiance to the Assyrian king and Gods.

He even brought back worship aspects of the Assyrians.

It is written that he took a “fancy to an altar which he saw there, he had one like it made in Jerusalem, which, with a corresponding change in ritual, he made a permanent feature of the Temple worship.

Changes were also made in the arrangements and furniture of the Temple, "because of the king of Assyria" (2 Kings 16:18).

Furthermore, Ahaz fitted up an astrological observatory with accompanying sacrifices, after the fashion of the ruling people.

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In 2 Kings we read this about him

A total lack of faith in God.

Ahaz should have been looking to God for help but was doing everything but.

Ahaz needed to have increased faith in God so that he would learn to be faithful in obedience to God’s will.

God would then be able to lead the people into a greater stability.

The plight of King Ahaz is a common one.

It takes courage to do the will of God in times of temptation and trouble, and courage must be based on faith in God’s assistance and providential care.

So a lack of faith can be the source of disobedience and unfaithfulness.

The transition from verse 9 to verse 10 is a demonstration of the patience of God.

Ahaz was stubborn.

He was bent on doing things his way.

Do we ever act that way?

God through Isaiah says there in verse 11

God is giving Ahaz permission to ask for a sign from deep down in the earth as high as the heavens.

What was the purpose of the sign?

It was for proof that what God had said in those earlier verses were true.

God is taking the initiative and gives Ahaz permission to ask for some miraculous sign.

David McKenna wrote: No one can ever claim that God is unfair.

When He asks us to “stand firm in our faith” against the evidence of circumstances and our natural impulses, He will also give us a sign of His faithfulness.

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Ahaz was not going to do it because he had already made an allegiance with the King of Assyria.

Ahaz says there in verse Is7:12 “12 “I won’t ask; I won’t test the Lord.””

He is not suddenly following the law about not testing God.

He is not suddenly being faithful.

Ahaz was trying to justify the decision that he has already made.

He was already compromised.

He was compromised because he looked to a foreign king and he looked to foreign gods and pagan worship.

McKenna went on to write “As so often happens, a political alliance with the secular world includes a spiritual allegiance to its Gods.”

If Ahaz had really believed that God was God then he would have accepted Isaiah’s invitation to ask for a sign.

If had asked for a sign it would have been evidence that he had some faith in God’s ability to help him.

If he had some faith he was unwilling to show it.

He did not want to trust God, he wanted to trust Assyria.

What happened is important to understand.

It is important because we can fall into the very same trap.

Ahaz was turning his back on God and setting himself up as a better judge of what he should do.

How easy it is to do that.

We think we know better than God and end up making a mess out of life.

The truth of the matter is that God is with us even we feel like he is far away.

The writer of Hebrews wrote