Our God Acts

Introduction

If you have your Bibles please turn to

Isaiah 64:1–9 (NIV)

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,

that the mountains would tremble before you!

As when fire sets twigs ablaze

and causes water to boil,

come down to make your name known to your enemies

and cause the nations to quake before you!

For when you did awesome things that we did not expect,

you came down, and the mountains trembled before you.

Since ancient times no one has heard,

no ear has perceived,

no eye has seen any God besides you,

who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.

You come to the help of those who gladly do right,

who remember your ways.

But when we continued to sin against them,

you were angry.

How then can we be saved?

All of us have become like one who is unclean,

and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;

we all shrivel up like a leaf,

and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

No one calls on your name

or strives to lay hold of you;

for you have hidden your face from us

and have given us over to our sins.

Yet you, Lord, are our Father.

We are the clay, you are the potter;

we are all the work of your hand.

Do not be angry beyond measure, Lord;

do not remember our sins forever.

Oh, look on us, we pray,

for we are all your people.

It is hard to believe that the Advent season is already upon us. The word Advent means : the coming of a notable person. That is a bit of an understatement. Jesus is the most notable person that has ever walked this earth. He is the most talked about, the most written about and debated about in the history of our world.

There are about 400 years between the Old Testament and the New Testament. 400 years in which there was silence and then boom God acts in a huge way. The start of something new and the start of the salvation of man. The next time God acts it will also be in a big way, it will be the second coming of Jesus. So we look back to the prophet Isaiah in order to look forward for clues on how our God acts.

This morning we are going to look at 3 main points from these scriptures

The Awesome Things

A Remnant

A prayer to act

The Awesome Things

Man is so quick to forget what God has done. This was one of the main issues that the nation of Israel had during the Old Testament times. They constantly fell into idolatry. For modern readers it is easy to look at those people and wonder why they couldn’t get it together. However it is the sinful nature of man, that we can all fall into this type of idolatry. We try to live our lives in such a fast pace that we can forget to slow down and be with God. We can forget that this is our God is a God that acts. Let us look at

Isaiah 64:3–5 (NIV)

For when you did awesome things that we did not expect,

you came down, and the mountains trembled before you.

Since ancient times no one has heard,

no ear has perceived,

no eye has seen any God besides you,

who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.

You come to the help of those who gladly do right,

who remember your ways.

But when we continued to sin against them,

you were angry.

How then can we be saved?

God acted in the book of Exodus after 350 years of silence. He took Israel out of slavery. They couldn’t accomplish that feat on their own. So God broke into history. Time and time again God saved Israel , the Exodus story was so famous that all the nations heard about it. When the spies entered Jericho, it was Rahab that helped them. She helped them because she heard all the Lord had done. In return her family and herself were saved. God is the only God that acts. Let us look at a Biblical example we will look at the example of Elijah. Elijah challenges the prophets of Baal

1 Kings 18:25–26 (NIV)

Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose one of the bulls and prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your god, but do not light the fire.” So they took the bull given them and prepared it.

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. “Baal, answer us!” they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made.

No one answered their prayers. No one gave them any response whats so ever. It was only silence. Baal isn’t real. Now you maybe thinking , what does scarificing bulls have to do with modern times but it is a very important lesson for us. What , or who do you put your faith in? There were 450 prophets that put their faith in Baal. How many other people did the same? Where are we putting our faith today? Techonolgical advancements? In our intelligence? Who is your savior? Is it the coming Jesus? My faith is in God distrupting history again and Jesus coming back. God has a perfect track record. Everything leaves us like those prophets dancing and shouting to the air.

The remnant is always there. All throughout history up to including this very day there are believers that understand the truth.

Isaiah 64:5 (NIV)

You come to the help of those who gladly do right,

who remember your ways.

But when we continued to sin against them,

you were angry.

How then can we be saved?

How can we be saved? This is what advent begins that salvation process. Even the renmant sins, we all sin. How can we be saved, it takes God acting in a huge way.

Isaiah 64:6–7 (NIV)

All of us have become like one who is unclean,

and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;

we all shrivel up like a leaf,

and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

No one calls on your name

or strives to lay hold of you;

for you have hidden your face from us

and have given us over to our sins.

Now we come to the sad truth of humanity in Isaiah’s prayer to God. Like we talked about last week. We must deal with truth and realities. Western civiliation has turned away from God, faith is now in ourselves, faith is in the fact that we can control our enivronment, which by the way we can control very little. The normalization of sin has taken a hold of society, the break down of the family has been happening for decades and we can see the results of that breakdown all around us. Faith has been put in politics and laws which is a pretty bad bet. Even in each of our lives there are what I like to call spiritual blind spots. We have areas in our lives that we haven’t given over to God. However there is always good news, even when circumstances seem tough

Isaiah 64:8 (NIV)

Yet you, Lord, are our Father.

We are the clay, you are the potter;

we are all the work of your hand.

God works on us. He shapes us, His word cuts through worldly teaching and its to the core of our being.

God wants us to live with Him, to follow His will. This is what the garden of eden was about. Sin remolded us though. Sin blinds us to the truth and grabs ahold of us pulling us down to the depths of hell. God’s hands however mold us and shapes us, God does not leave us alone on an island to remake ourselves. That is is what modern society is missing out on, we can’t remake ourselves. Only the Gospel shaps and remakes. Only the Gospels takes a sinner and changes them into a saint. All believers are the work of the hand of God. Take a moment and think about this for a minute. The Hands of God, the Hands of the creator of all things is shaping you into a new creation. He never leaves us, He never gives up on us despite any shortcomings. We are the work of the God on the most high

Which leaves us with the final part of the prayer from Isaiah.

Isaiah 64:9 (NIV)

Do not be angry beyond measure, Lord;

do not remember our sins forever.

Oh, look on us, we pray,

for we are all your people.

Isaiah repents not just for himself but for all of Israel, do not remeber our sins, and do not be angry beyond measure. Both of these prayers were answered. His anger, His wrath and our sins were all taken care of on the cross. God has given us time before His wrath will come again. God looks on us, we know because of Jesus. We know this because Jesus came to us, He taught us about the Father. The Father looks upon us today breaking into our lives with answered prayers, with convictions put on our hearts. He breaks into our lives when He leads us to a church or leads us to serve in some compacity.

So as we start this Advent season it is very easy to get caught up in this very busy season of life. It is easy to put prorities on the wrong things like presents over fellowship. Even the word Christmas is being taken out of certain orgainzations. Remember what the term advent means: the coming of a notable person.

Remember that this is a time to celebrate the fact that God broke into the world and that it kick started our salvation.

Let us pray.