The Savior’s Message to the Wicked

Introduction:

When two people love each other, feelings of deep pain and suffering can affect them even when they are apart—their hearts long for the companionship of the person they love. But what is most damaging, and even devastating, is when one partner stops loving the other. Or when a partner has become openly hostile, and the relationship has ended.

Unbearable pain often surges through the heart of a rejected partner. When unfaithfulness, whether caused by disloyalty, betrayal, a breach of trust, deceitfulness, infidelity, or treachery, enters a relationship, a very real and very harsh anguish is felt [raw, unbearable pain]. Few experiences cause as much distress as being rejected in love or having one's trust broken.

If this is how we feel, imagine the pain and heartbreak God experiences daily because of his children’s rejection and unfaithfulness. Isaiah 59 delivers a powerful prophetic indictment of sin’s ability to separate humanity from God. We observe this through a stunning vision of divine intervention and a covenant renewal by God for his people.

It reveals the nation’s corruption, admits the depth of human guilt, and culminates with God Himself stepping in as warrior and redeemer. Historically, we can see Judah as a people battered by invasion, exile, and moral decay. This morning, we will examine the problem of sin in our lives.

Isa 59:1-2: (1) Behold, the LORD'S hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: [In other words, God can save us by his hand and listen to us when we cry out to him] (2) But your iniquities [your perversity, your evil, your sin] have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear. [This does not mean God is hiding his face from you, but your sin has become an obstacle that, in reality, has obstructed God in your life.]

· First, the people needed to understand one unmistakable fact: God could save them. He could hear and answer their prayers. His arm (power) was never too short to reach out to help His people. He had the power to embrace them and deliver them from any hardship, difficulty, circumstance, or enemy. Second, His ear was not deaf. But Sin is a barrier that separates people from God.

· “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” (Psa 66:18).

Isa 59:3-8: (3) For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness. (4) None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity. (5) They hatch cockatrice' eggs, and weave the spider's web: he that eateth of their eggs dieth, and that which is crushed breaketh out into a viper. (6) Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works: their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands. (7) Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are in their paths. (8) The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked paths: whosoever goeth therein shall not know peace.

· People defile their hands through abuse, murder, and violence (3)

· People speak lies, gossip, and poison with their lips that deceive (3)

· People give false testimony, promoting injustice and dishonesty (4)

· People scheme and carry out evil plots

· People act out of malice or hatred, and through malice and hatred they become as deadly snakes or spiders (5)

· People deceive themselves and deceive others; they hide their sin and forget that God sees through every deception (6)

· People are reckless in their pursuit of fleshly and forbidden pleasures and desire possessions that waste away through property and wealth (7)

o This means that people kill senselessly and cheapen the value of life

o People flood the mind with immoral, vengeful, covetous, selfish thoughts

o People are destructive

o People act unjustly

· People mislead others and become a stumbling block in life (8)

o “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23).

o “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1Jn 1:8).

Isa 59:9-11 (9) Therefore is judgment far from us, neither doth justice overtake us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness. [Wicked people brings lawlessness: There is a spirit of lawlessness that pervades churches, pervades homes, relationships, and its desire as a principality is to bring you further into sin, so that the light of Christ is obscured by darkness. Lawlessness is the force behind the sins of oppression, injustice, and unrighteousness.] (10) We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes: we stumble at noonday as in the night; we are in desolate places as dead men. [When we are in sin, there is no salvation found in further sin.] (11) We roar all like bears, and mourn sore like doves: we look for judgment, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far off from us. [Sin always causes suffering in society, leading to hostility or mourning.]

· “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness” (Rom 1:18).

· “But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how greatis that darkness!” (Mat 6:23).

· “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal 6:7).

Isa 59:12-15 (12) For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us: for our transgressions are with us; and as for our iniquities, we know them; (13) In transgressing and lying against the LORD, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood. (14) And judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. (15) Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.

· The wicked have only one hope, and that is to confess their sins. We see here in this passage that sin births more sin, and the multiplication of sin brings greater transgressions. As we rebel from God and his ways, the very presence of righteousness in our lives is pushed back. And Isaiah reveals that God saw that there was no judgment. God knew that we needed a savior!

Isa 59:16-21 (16) And he saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: therefore his arm brought salvation unto him; and his righteousness, it sustained him. (17) For he put on righteousness as a breastplate, and an helmet of salvation upon his head; and he put on the garments of vengeance forclothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloke. (18) According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his adversaries, recompence to his enemies; to the islands he will repay recompence. (19) So shall they fear the name of the LORD from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the LORD shall lift up a standard against him. (20) And the Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, saith the LORD. (21) As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the LORD; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the LORD, from henceforth and for ever.

We have a promise from God. God will judge our enemies, and he will bring us a savior!

· “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works” (Mat 16:27).

· “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him” (Joh 3:36).

· “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness” (Rom 1:18).

Judgment and Redemption

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” (Joh 3:16)

“Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” (Joh 8:12)

Isa 61:1-3 (1) The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that arebound; (2) To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn; (3) To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.

🔥 Close & Altar Call

Isaiah paints a sobering picture: “Your iniquities have separated between you and your God… truth is fallen in the streets…and equity cannot enter.” It is a mirror held up to our own generation. We see corruption, injustice, broken homes, and hearts weighed down by guilt. We grope in the dark, longing for light, but our own strength cannot break the chains of darkness. Our strength cannot break the chains of bondage. Our strength cannot shatter the strongholds in our lives.

Isaiah declares that when no one could intervene, the Lord Himself put on our righteousness as a breastplate and salvation as a helmet. Christ came as our Redeemer, not because we deserved it, but because His Covenant Love would not let us go.

Isaiah declares that when no one could intervene, the Lord Himself put on righteousness as a breastplate and salvation as a helmet. He came as Redeemer, not because we deserved it, but because His covenant love would not let us go.

And that promise bursts into full light in Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; for the LORD hath anointed me to preach glad tidings unto the meek, to heal the broken in heart, to proclaim liberty to them that are bound, and the opening of the prison to them that sit in darkness.” What Isaiah longed for, Jesus fulfilled. He is more than the Warrior of Isaiah 59, and the Anointed One of Isaiah 61. He steps into our darkness, not only to expose sin, but to break its power and replace ashes with beauty, mourning with joy, despair with praise.

The Word is clear: sin separates, but Christ saves. The wall between you and God is not too high, the chains are not too strong, the guilt is not too deep. The arm of the Lord is not too short to save. He has already stretched it out on the cross. So I call you—come out of the shadows. Step out of the groaning of Isaiah 59 and into the freedom of Isaiah 61. Lay down the lies, the bitterness, the shame. Let the Spirit of the Lord clothe you with garments of salvation. This is not just poetry—it is promise. It is covenant. It is for you.

The altar is open. Come, confess, and be redeemed. Come, trade your ashes for His beauty. Come, let Him bind up your broken heart. Come, receive the oil of joy instead of mourning. Tonight, the Redeemer stands ready. Don’t leave the darkness behind only halfway—step fully into the light of Christ.