Isaiah 11

Christmas in Isaiah  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented   •  39:31
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Introduction:
If you have your Bibles let me invite you to open with me to the book of Isaiah chapter 11.
Much of the book of Isaiah was written to be read by a hopeless and hurting people.
Judgment was coming.
The King of Assyria was going to blow through Israel like loggers clearing a forest.
Assyria is described to be like an axe in the hand of God chopping down the nation of Israel.
Isaiah 10:33–34 ESV
33 Behold, the Lord God of hosts will lop the boughs with terrifying power; the great in height will be hewn down, and the lofty will be brought low. 34 He will cut down the thickets of the forest with an axe, and Lebanon will fall by the Majestic One.
Only a remnant of God’s people would return to a land that was scorched by the fires of Assyria.
If you were to draw a painting of this scene described in Isaiah 8-11.
You would see a small handful of broken, impoverished, hurting, grieving, Israelite people standing in a wasteland of what used to be their home.…
We have all scene pictures of the devastation that hurricane Helene inflicted on the small towns of Western North Carolina.
What were once charming mountain towns probably all lit up with Christmas lights during this season with small boutiques and coffee shops and diners….
became piles of mud and debris…
Imagine standing in that town gazing at the rubble - what was once your home, your business… your life reduced to nothing
Perhaps you recognize that feeling of hopelessness …
What was once a beautiful forest of trees you had planted in hope….
Now feel as though they have been chopped down and burned to ash…
and there you stand among the rubble of your life - a remnant…, still breathing, still alive.., but discouraged and without hope.
Isaiah was written in part for the remnant of God’s people who would one day dwell among the devastation.
Imagine with me gathering together amongst the rubble of that destroyed kingdom.
There is no king,
no kingdom,
no temple,
no security,
no safety,
only destruction
and you gather with others among the remnant and you remind yourself of these promises from the prophet Isaiah.
We will begin our time by reading verses 1-10
Isaiah 11:1–9 ESV
1 There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. 2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. 3 And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, 4 but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. 5 Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins. 6 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. 7 The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den. 9 They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Lets pray
Isaiah 11:1 ESV
1 There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
From the stump
a shoot is coming that will bear fruit
God’s people have been chopped down,
But from what appears to be an ash heap,
a dead stump of a people,
a branch of life is going to spring forth and bear fruit.
What appeared to be dead, will bear fruit.
When Isaiah refers to a shoot from the stump of Jesse…,
the original readers knew what kind of branch that Isaiah was referring to.
Jesse was the father of King David
and to King David God made a promise…
an offspring of David would establish an eternal kingdom.
That offspring would be the messiah,
the promised king of a never ending kingdom
From the chopped down and burnt stump of Israel, the promised one would come,
We get to read this chapter from the perspective of knowing just who that is.
The shoot from the stump of Jesse is King Jesus.
Though his ministry would come from a dead stump and at first it would appear only as a small shoot…
his ministry would grow to bear fruit to the ends of the earth.
Don’t miss the way in which God works according to this word picture.
Don’t miss what this text says about Jesus.
We will highlight four descriptions ofJesus in this text.

#1 Jesus Resurrects What is Dead

From a dead stump, a branch of life shoots up.
Isaiah does not want his readers to assess God’s faithfulness to future promises by their temporary situation.
It may appear to Israel that God has forgotten his promises,
but God gets glory through great reversals.
God gets glory through resurrections.
He is the kind of God who builds his eternal kingdom from the ashes of the burnt, and chopped down stumps of the world.
He is the kind of God who sends the King of Kings to be born in a barn in Bethlehem.
He is the kind of God who sends the King of Kings to wear a crown of thorns, and to die, and to be buried, to be chopped down by the wrath of God….,
and then on the third day to burst forth in resurrection life to bear much fruit.
That is the miracle work of King Jesus.
He resurrects what is dead.
It is the miracle he works in the heart of every believer.
Our sinful hearts might as well have been dead stumps chopped down and burnt in judgment,
but by his grace, he makes our hearts alive so that we can give him glory. .
Christian when you placed faith in Jesus, a shoot from the stump of your heart sprang forward with fruit bearing life.
Paul describes Jesus’ work in us like this.
Our very lives are testimonies to the God of great reversals.
For Isaiah’s original readers, this fruit bearing branch is the future they hoped in.
But For us this chapter is a description of the Jesus we have relationship with right now…
Isaiah wanted his original readers to look to the future king and be filled with hope.
God wants us to have hope in the present by looking to this king who has come and who is coming again.
Pause for just a moment and think about your most hopeless situation
What is the unfixable pain?
What is the irreversible burden?
What is the seemingly hopeless circumstance?
What is the chopped down stump of a situation?
Does it feel to you as irreversible as the grave itself?
Take heart …, even the grave is overcome by King Jesus.
#1 Jesus Resurrects What is Dead
He reverses what the curse destroys.
now, the question is, more specifically, what kind of fruit will this shoot from the stump of Jesse yield?
What will his reign over God’s people be like?
How will he be different then all the kings who have come before him?
Verse Isaiah 11:2 begins to explain.
Isaiah 11:2 ESV
And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.

#2 Jesus Rules with Wisdom

Israel needed a King who would walk in the Wisdom of God.
King Solomon had showed a lot of promise.
He was blessed with divine wisdom,
he wrote the book of proverbs,
but he could not walk according to the wisdom he had been given.
He fell into the folly of sin, as did every king after him.
But Jesus was and is different.
Its not that Jesus had a few wise moments.
Its not that he had wise seasons of life.
It is rather, that The Spirit of the Lord,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding and counsel and knowledge and true fear of the Lord….
This Spirit of the Living God Rested on him…
Colossians 1:19 ESV
19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,
Wisdom resided with Jesus.
Wisdom Made its home with Jesus.
In his earthly life, Jesus never had a foolish moment…
He never gave bad counsel.…
He never took bad counsel...
He never had a lapse of knowledge or understanding.
Jesus lived the wise life, no king of Israel had ever lived.
Jesus lived the wise life, no human being had ever lived.
And that same Jesus has all authority over heaven and earth.
And that same Jesus has promised that he is with you aways to the end of the age.
Let those words from Matthew 28 land a fresh on you this morning.
Matthew 28:18 ESV
18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Matthew 28:20 ESV
20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Christian, be encouraged.
Your life may feel chaotic.
It may feel as if the axe of Assyria has chopped down hopes and dreams.…,
but Jesus is King described in Isaiah 11… and he is with you.
His spirit of wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge and fear of the Lord is with you
You may not know what the future holds….
but you can know this…, the King of all wisdom holds you.
Jesus Resurrects what is Dead
Jesus Rules with Wisdom
and that is good news for you…
Jesus wisdom is not just a matter of having knowledge, His wisdom overflows from him with righteousness.
look at verse 3.
Isaiah 11:3–5 ESV
And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.

#3 Jesus Rules with Righteousness

Unlike any king before him, Jesus totally delights in the fear of the Lord
In his earthy ministry, Jesus’ greatest joy was to honor God the Father.
Jesus did not fear man or the approval of man or the persecution of man.
God the Son most ultimately delights in his relationship with God the Father.
His food was to do the Father’s will.
Unlike any king before him, King Jesus judges the world not with a fear of men, but with a delight in the glory of God.
Unlike any king before him, King Jesus judges the world not by the limitation of what his eyes see and what his ears hear.
He judges with perfect justice and righteousness
He always does what is the most right.
Isaiah articulates Jesus justice in two directions:
Firstly, He cares for those whom the world does not care for.
He acts justly for the poor and for the meek.
What does that mean for you?
It means that the way the world judges you and your value is not the way King Jesus judges your value.
While the rest of the world may treat you differently by the appearance of your body, your performance at your job, or the number in your bank account,
this king does not lead you or care for you according to those things you think are most important.
He does not judge by what the eyes see or the ears hear.
He cares for the least of these.
The poor,
the humble,
the meek.
The Christmas story includes wisemen bringing riches, and shepherds bringing nothing to worship Jesus.
All are welcome to approach this King.
On the other hand.
Justice and righteousness do not just work themselves out in the positive care for the hurting,
they also work themselves out in the right judgment of the evil.
The comfort of looking to the perfection of King Jesus,….is also a comfort of knowing that all evil will give an account before the eternal judgment seat.
Jesus will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth.
The breath of his lips shall kill the wicked.
The apostle Paul uses this language in 2 Thessalonians 2 when he describes the future judgment
2 Thessalonians 2:8 ESV
8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming.
There should be something somewhat encouraging to us when we think of the justice of King Jesus.
All wrongs will one day be righted.
All evil will one day be avenged.
No guilty person who rejects Jesus will walk free from the judgment they deserve.
What does that mean for you this week?
For the Christian, the justice of Jesus means you are free.
You don’t have to punish people for the ways you think they have wronged you this week.
You don’t have to get even.
You don’t have to have the last word.
You don’t have to harbor bitterness.
You don’t have to take that matter into your own hands.
Jesus judges justly,
so you can rest easy that all wrongs will be righted by him, not you,
and all judgment will either be absorbed by Jesus on the cross by his grace and for this glory for those who believe…
or it will be justly executed on the unbeliever.
Because of this, Paul encourages us to live in this way.
Romans 12:17–19 ESV
17 Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. 18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. 19 Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”
We are freed to live in this way because we trust that Jesus rules with Righteousness, and we don’t
Jesus resurrects what is dead
Jesus rules with wisdom
Jesus rules with righteousness
Thus far this future kingdom sounds wonderful, but in verse 6, the text takes a turn to describe the ultimate fulfilment of this future Kingdom.
Jesus does more than rule, he will restore creation itself.
Isaiah 11:6–8 ESV
The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den.

#4 Jesus Restores Creation

Listen to the words of pastor Ray Ortlund as he comments on this passage:
“At the close of chapter 10, what do we see? The infestation of human pride like a vast forest cut down. God swings his axe, and the whole evil system fails. Bare stumps as far as the eye can see. No branches waving in the wind, no birds flitting around, no life, no movement, no sound. The world is dead. But wait. Something new appears… From one stump a little shoot grows and becomes a branch and bears fruit. And the fruit it bears is a whole new world… The victory of Jesus will be the awakening and the purifying and the restoring and the gladdening of all things human.” - Ray Ortlund
The New Testament describes the resurrection of Jesus as the first fruits of the work that Jesus will do.
He will reverse all that the curse destroyed so that the world itself will experience a resurrection of sorts.
One day, Jesus will return to restore creation to its original design.
When I was younger I imagined heaven to be an eternal choir practice while floating on clouds, but that is not the story of the Bible.
The story of the Bible is that of a creation that was corrupted by sin…
A creation that is groaning with sin’s corruption.
Romans 8:22–23 ESV
22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
I have recently been watching a season of the show Alone… The season I am currently watching is the 100 day challenge where 10 contestants are dropped off in the wilderness all alone, and they have to survive for 100 days.
6 have dropped out before they even got to day 50.
and they are dropping out because of the hostility of creation itself.
The weather, the animals, the ground, are all hostile to their survival.
But Isaiah says, that the coming Kingdom we set our hope on will not be hostile.
Children will lead lions around like pets and they will play over the hole of a cobra.
Tim Keller writes:
There is a single point toward which all of history is flowing, at which everything sad will become untrue. Everything will be purged. Everything will become new, and everything will dance and everything will be in fullness and wholeness. - Tim Keller
Nothing will hurt or destroy on that final day.
Not even humans.
Something will fundamentally change about every creature.
Verse 9, gives us the fundamental change.
Isaiah 11:9 ESV
9 They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Why won’t there be wars, or fights, or relational conflict, or hurt feelings, or murder?
The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
We will all know God perfectly and fully.
We will have such a relationship with him, that our very nature will be perfected in his presence.
He will be with us in a way we only experience in part here and now.
John describes that future reality in the book of revelation.
Revelation 21:3–4 ESV
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
Conclusion:
Now what do we do with all this?
Why did Isaiah write these verses with future promises that none of his original readers would live to see and experience on this side of eternity?
What purpose do these verses serve?
Well in Romans 15, Paul quotes Isaiah and then he makes the application for us.
Romans 15:12–13 ESV
12 And again Isaiah says, “The root of Jesse will come, even he who arises to rule the Gentiles; in him will the Gentiles hope.” 13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
What is Isaiah’s intent with writing this?
How does Paul want us to respond by meditating on the shoot who comes from the stump of Jesse?
He wants us to be full of joy, peace, and hope as we exercise our believing in who Jesus is and what Jesus will accomplish as King of Kings.
What do you do with this morning’s message?
You meditate upon your most pressing problems…, and then spend a moment believing what you have been promised.
And through your believing, you pray for and you experience in real time… hope, joy, and peace gifted to you by the Holy Spirit as you wait for the fulfillment of all these things.
Lets pray for that Holy Spirit miracle to work in our hearts.
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