Isaiah 57

SERMON TEXT:

Let’s open our Bibles again this morning in our gathered time of worship.

We will be looking at Isaiah chapter 57 this morning.

I know we read the chapter earlier in our service, but I want to review it once again together now.

It can be a challenging chapter to understand, so I invite you to follow along in your copy of the Scriptures.

[READ ISAIAH 57]

[PRAY FOR LIGHT]

One of the most challenging things about this chapter is how it comes immediately after the Servant Songs and the songs of the church.

I will remind you that we have just finished a great section of Isaiah, chapters 42 through most of 56, that speak largely of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, His work, and His church.

But then quite suddenly in the ninth verse of chapter 56, the subject changes, returning to warnings and prophecies toward the sinful.

We don’t have the original scrolls, but I have a suspicion that this new section we are going into had a divider or was on another physical scroll entirely, like a book with multiple volumes.

The best of a transition we can make is that now the Holy Spirit, through Isaiah, is explaining in great detail WHY this Messiah is needed.

What the situation is that the Messiah will be born into.

It is a tale told a little in reverse - the advent of the Messiah, then the wickedness He would come into.

But why might the Spirit of God give it to us in that way?

I would not presume to guess at His full motives, which would be far higher than we can understand.

But I can see one possibility this morning:

that the situation in the world itself would be much the same AFTER the Messiah has come as is described here.

Take a look at the facts:

Prior to the Messiah’s coming, there was idolatry - here in verses 3-8.

In our day, there is idolatry, and it is more widely practiced than even in Isaiah’s day.

Even so-called Christian religions make and bow to crucifixes, statues of divinities, and man-declared “saints”.

Pagan religions flourish, even those who claim to be monotheistic (worshipping only one god), bowing before images or making pilgrimages to holy sites.

Prior to the Messiah, there was selfishness and greed - just like today.

There were lying, and stealing, and adulteries.

There were murders and rebellions;

In short, all the sins we have today rampant in our world.

Often rampant in our churches.

I would remind you we saw last week that the Messiah came to purify to Himself a holy people, set apart for good works acceptable to God.

But it is clear that this righteousness did not extend to the whole of mankind;

It is ONLY ever intended for God’s people.

Look around to the world today, and see for yourself:

We are no better today than the world of Isaiah’s day.

Our sins are still as obnoxious before God.

Our rebellions against Him are still as sharp.

The grave and stinking sins of the world of our day are just as putrid and rotting a stench to God as any sin of the Canaanites, Egyptians, Babylonians, or Romans.

Even more, there has never been a “golden age” of the world where the society was made better by being controlled by the church.

The sins we see today were just as rampant.

Perhaps you could cherry-pick some period of time, like Victorian England, where laws made a closer match to the Mosaic Law,

But even in those days, the sins weren’t STOPPED because of the laws.

There was promiscuity in the 1950’s and in the 1050’s.

There was great hypocrisy in the churches in the 1920’s, 1520’s, and the 320’s.

That is the point of verse 1 of our text today:

Isaiah 57:1 “The righteous man perishes, and no one lays it to heart; devout men are taken away, while no one understands.”

If you read that verse like it refers to a single righteous man, it doesn’t match the rest of Scripture.

It doesn’t even agree with the END OF THIS VERSE:

Isaiah 57:1–2 “For the righteous man is taken away from calamity; he enters into peace; they rest in their beds who walk in their uprightness.”

So you are left asking: does the righteous man PERISH, or is he protected and comforted?

But if instead of reading this as an individual righteous man, you read it as, for lack of a better term, the RACE of righteous men, it makes sense.

The accusation is that in the nation, whatever nation, EVERY nation, doesn’t notice when the righteous men disappear.

It doesn’t really affect them, certainly not to the point they would mourn the fact.

For the wicked, for the pagans, for the idolaters of this world, their lives will go on just fine without the Christians to bother them.

If you look at the last verse and a half of the chapter 56, you see the world’s attitude toward God’s people:

Isaiah 56:11–12 “The dogs have a mighty appetite; they never have enough. But they are shepherds who have no understanding; they have all turned to their own way, each to his own gain, one and all. “Come,” they say, “let me get wine; let us fill ourselves with strong drink; and tomorrow will be like this day, great beyond measure.””

That’s why no one is laying to heart the passing of the righteous, the disappearance of the devout.

They are just happy not to be bothered with that gospel of Jesus Christ ever again.

They don’t have to hear about the Christ who came to save His people.

They have mocked until their faces have frozen:

Isaiah 57:3–4 “But you, draw near, sons of the sorceress, offspring of the adulterer and the loose woman. Whom are you mocking? Against whom do you open your mouth wide and stick out your tongue? Are you not children of transgression, the offspring of deceit,”

It reminds you of the reaction to the two witnesses in the Book of the Revelation:

[READ REVELATION 11:1-13]

They will indeed be happy to no more hear of the mercy of God toward sinners: at least for a little while.

Everybody hates God’s Law until it is broken TOWARD them.

Then they will demand justice, even if they have to make up their own laws by which to condemn others.

But we must return to our text.

Time after time in the Scriptures, the final stage of God’s judgment prior to His condemnation of the wicked is this: He withdraws His witness from them.

Noah preached a century of repentance, but then God closed the door to the ark, and the waters broke forth.

Lot’s heart broke for the people of Sodom, but God removed him and his family before the fire fell.

Elijah is carried away to the desert and Shunem while the drought and famine rages in Israel.

Ezekiel laments the glory of God departing from the temple.

The Apostle Paul quotes Isaiah 52 in 2 Corinthians 6:16–18 “What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.””

And then, to summarize God’s action, Paul tells us in Romans 1:24–32 “Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.”

That is the state of the people in our text this morning:

Practicing idolatry and all manner of sin,

Approving those who practice it with them, and rejecting those who would speak of these things as sinful.

And they reject the truth - until it’s too late. Until they look up and realize they are no longer safe in this world.

Until, perhaps, they finally feel the weight of their sin and cry out to God in repentance and belief in Jesus Christ, because that is the only way they can be saved.

Sin is heavy.

The great weight that Christian carries in the Pilgrim’s Progress is a good picture of it.

But those who have not been awakened and called by the Holy Spirit of God don’t realize how heavy it really is.

Sin costs.

But until you love something enough to value it over your sin, you will never realize what you are missing.

So God tells us in Isaiah 57:9–10 “You journeyed to the king with oil and multiplied your perfumes; you sent your envoys far off, and sent down even to Sheol. You were wearied with the length of your way, but you did not say, “It is hopeless”; you found new life for your strength, and so you were not faint.”

Those who live in disobedience will always find strength to practice their sin,

But they will consider doing any good thing, anything God has commanded, to be a great burden.

I remember years ago witnessing to an exchange student from Brazil, who was a practicing Catholic.

He asked me whether I thought his promiscuity was so sinful that he needed to give it up.

I told him God thought so, and I showed him many Scriptures that said so.

He walked away very sad, saying “If it were anything but that...”

In these verses, God is telling them that they don’t think it too much to curry favor with a king or some other authority,

But to seek God EVEN IN HIS GRACE was too much, too heavy a burden.

They would spend themselves to gain favor with man, but to seek favor with God was hopeless.

Especially seeking favor in the Way God demands we come to Him - repentance and belief in Jesus Christ.

How many of us consider the simplest things before God great works, heavy lifts?

Often we don’t consider the things you do for THIS world to be a great burden, even though they exhaust you. They are just “things we have to do.”

For example, we will rise early for work, hunting, or football, or yard sales, but the mid-morning hours of church tax many so much.

When we vacation, our thoughts are often to the final enjoyment or to the arduous trip home; but do we take time to remember the Lord on His day?

Many skip church for sports or recreation – because the perceived payoff for worship is far off, while the enjoyments of the moment seem grand.

Any excuse you have to miss worship should be sufficient enough to justify the preacher not attending.

When you skip the assembly of the saints, ask yourself if it would be ok for the preacher to do the same thing.

Or do you consider yourself less valuable in gathered worship than others?

The gathered worship of the CHURCH is YOUR offering of praise to God.

Worship is vital to you.

And we worship as the gathered body of Christ, not as a bunch of people who happen to show up the building at the same time each week.

What other duties of the believer are a hardship to you?

Giving offerings to God through the church?

Why is it harder to be generous to the work of the ministry of God than it is to spend the same amount each month in restaurants or coffee or events?

Reading your Bible? Is that harder than reading a novel or another book?

Praying? Is that harder than surfing social media?

Reaching out to those who are struggling? Is it harder for YOU to reach out than it was when someone reached out to you?

You get the point, I hope.

We have plenty of energy, time, and money to do the things our flesh wants to do;

And those things will profit you nothing.

Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.

Not for the sake of the work, but to demonstrate your love and adoration to God.

Because we ALL know what is really important - both believer and unbeliever:

Isaiah 57:11 “Whom did you dread and fear, so that you lied, and did not remember me, did not lay it to heart? Have I not held my peace, even for a long time, and you do not fear me?”

God’s point here is that everyone KNOWS implicitly they will answer to Him.

That is why sin is practiced, as often as possible, in the dark.

And even his longsuffering, His great patience toward all sinners, is not taken as mercy by the wicked.

They expect that is what He SHOULD do.

And they are wrong.

Isaiah 57:12–13 “I will declare your righteousness and your deeds, but they will not profit you. When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them all off, a breath will take them away. But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain.”

God will declare fairly EVERY GOOD THING a person has ever done, and it will not be good for them.

Our greatest efforts, apart from Christ, are filthy stained rags.

It has been often said we seek justice from God when we should humbly beg for mercy.

Only someone who is truly and fully righteous, that is, Christ alone, has any right to plead for justice.

And He died, the just for the unjust, so that the justice of God would be satisfied and paid for among His people.

He says in Isaiah 57:18 “I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will lead him and restore comfort to him and his mourners,”

We see the difference, then, between those who are in Christ and those who are among the wicked:

Of those redeemed by Christ, God declares in Isaiah 57:2 “he enters into peace; they rest in their beds who walk in their uprightness.”

But of those outside, He warns in Isaiah 57:20–21 “But the wicked are like the tossing sea; for it cannot be quiet, and its waters toss up mire and dirt. There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.””

Even if you are, right now, numbered among the wicked, among those who can anticipate only the eternal condemnation of God,

God has given you this moment, this breath, this heartbeat, to cry out to Him in repentance,

Turning from your sin, your wickedness,

And turning to Him in faith, trust, in Jesus Christ, who has paid for all the sins of all His people.

Feel the burden of your sin, the hopelessness of your life, and come to Him in humility,

Confessing your utter poverty of anything good,

Begging for His mercy on you.

And He will save you.

To those who cry out to Him in faith, He promises:

Isaiah 57:19 “Peace, peace, to the far and to the near,” says the Lord, “and I will heal him.”