Isaiah - Being with God

Kings Isaiah – Being with God Isaiah 7:1-17 Pastor Pat Damiani September 3, 2017 This last week, we’ve all seen the horrible destruction that Hurricane Harvey has inflicted in Texas and Louisiana. Because that has dominated the news cycle, many of us might have missed some of the other news this week. On Monday, a teenager armed with two handguns entered a library in Clovis, New Mexico and killed two people and injured four others. On Tuesday, North Korea launched another missile – this time right over Japan and overnight they claimed to have successfully tested a hydrogen bomb. And despite the way our nation, and especially the state of Texas has come together to help each other out in the wake of the hurricane, the deep divisions in our country continue to fuel protests and counter protests, which seem to increasingly become violent. Closer to home, we see loved ones diagnosed with cancer, or dealing with other serious health issues. We see marriages that are on the rocks and families struggling with serious financial problems. And when we see those things all around us, I think we’re all tempted to ask, “Where is God?” TENSION The simple answer to that question is that God is with us. But let’s face it – in the midst of all these things going on around us, in the midst of our own trials and difficulties - it doesn’t always feel like it, does it? But, as we’re going to learn this morning, that is not God’s fault, it’s our fault. I know this meme is rather clichéd, but it nonetheless is true. [If you ever feel like the distance between you and God is getting bigger, just remember that God hasn’t moved an inch] Or, as we’ll discover this morning… God is with me, but I must choose to be with Him Last week we looked at the account of Elijah, who prophesied to the northern kingdom of Israel under the reign of King Ahab. If you still have your handout from last week, you’ll see that today we’ll go forward about 125 years and move our focus from the northern kingdom of Israel to the southern kingdom of Judah under the reign of King Ahaz. As we discussed last week, and as you can see on your handout, while all of the kings of Israel were evil, the southern kingdom of Judah alternated between kings who followed in the steps of David and obeyed God and those who did not. There is little doubt about which of those camps Ahaz was a part of: In the seventeenth year of Pekah the son of Remaliah, Ahaz the son of Jotham, king of Judah, began to reign. Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem; and he did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord his God, as his father David had done. But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel; indeed he made his son pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord had cast out from before the children of Israel. And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree. (2 Kings 16:1-4 ESV) But this morning, rather than looking at the account of his reign as recorded in the books of Kings or Chronicles, we’re going to study one chapter in the book of Isaiah, the prophet whose ministry spanned about a half century during the reigns of four different kings of Judah, including that of Ahaz. Isaiah’s name means “YHWH is salvation” and that name proves to be quite appropriate since that is the theme of his ministry and the book that he authored. The book of Isaiah is one of the longest in the Old Testament. It contains the most comprehensive picture of the Messiah in the entire Old Testament, which is why it is quoted more times in the New Testament than any other Old Testament book except the Psalms. When Jesus preached His first sermon, it was from the book of Isaiah. So obviously it is an important book for us to study. Unfortunately, however, our schedule is only going to permit us to look at one chapter, albeit a very important one. Before we do that, let me give you a brief overview of the entire book, which answers the question – Who can deliver Israel? – and the one that is even more relevant to us – Who can deliver us? OVERVIEW OF ISAIAH · Chapters 1- 5 – Israel in need of deliverance · Chapter 6 – Isaiah’s prophetic call (pattern for Israel’s deliverance) · Chapters 7-39 – It is YHWH who delivers o Chapters 7-12 – Historical account of King Ahaz (who doesn’t trust God and Judah is defeated) o Chapters 13-23 – Oracles addressed to the nations o Chapters 24-27 – Oracles against the entire earth o Chapters 28-35 – Oracles against Israel and Judah o Chapters 36-39 – Historical account of King Hezekiah (who repents and Judah is saved) · Chapters 40-55 – How YHWH is going to deliver (Servant) · Chapters 56-66 – Ramifications of Servant’s Work Today we’ll be looking at chapter 7, which is right at the beginning of the section where Isaiah is emphasizing that it is YHWH who delivers. So even before we read that chapter, we already have some idea of the idea that Isaiah is trying to communicate and we need to keep that in mind as we study that chapter today. [Read Isaiah 7:1-2] According to 2 Chronicles 28, Syria, in alliance with Israel, had previously attacked Judah and inflicted some serious damage, killing 120,000 in one day and taking captive another 200,000 men, women, and children. But at the command of the prophet Oded, those captives had been sent back to Judah. Now those same two kings are poised to attack Judah again. But Isaiah already gives us a hint in verse 2, that they are not capable of mounting another attack, which, as we will see, is due to God’s intervention in order to fulfill his promise to David to keep one of his descendants on the throne. But the people of the house of David, Judah, are understandably afraid, based on what they’ve already experienced at the hand of those two kings. [Read Isaiah 7:3-9] God commands Isaiah to take his son and go meet king Ahaz. The name of Isaiah’s son, Shear-jashub is a prophecy in itself since his name means “a remnant shall return”. That should have been a clue to Ahaz that a calamity was about to befall Judah, but that God would preserve a remnant who would eventually return there. God gives Isaiah four commands that he is to pass on to Ahaz: · Be careful · Be quiet · Do not fear · Do not let your heart be faint Isaiah assures Ahaz that he can obey those commands because he needn’t worry about the alliance between the kings of Syria and Israel. He calls them “smoldering stumps of firebrands”. In today’s language we would probably say, “There’s a lot of smoke there, but no fire”. We’ll return to those command a little later. We learn here that Rezin and Pekah, whose name isn’t even mentioned, are planning to attack Judah for the purpose of installing a puppet king so they can form a three-way alliance to stand up to the real power in that region – Assyria. Then in verse 7-9, Isaiah reassures Ahaz again that he doesn’t need to worry about Syria and Israel. They are both only headed by human kings who incapable of preventing God from keeping His promise to keep a descendant of David on the throne in Judah. At the end of this section, in verse 9, there is a word play that is really difficult to translate into English. Essentially God is telling Ahaz that even though God is with Him, He has to make the choice of whether or not he is going to be with God. If he chooses to put his faith in other men rather than in God, his kingdom will not be firm. If he makes that choice, It will not be Pekah and Rezin who will remove him from his throne, but rather God Himself. If Ahaz refuses to put his faith in God, that is not going to affect the outcome of the attack by Syria and Israel because God has already determined their attack will not succeed. But his misplaced faith will affect his closeness to God and the course of his life and his reign as king of Judah. God’s word to Ahaz should be sufficient here. But in His grace and mercy, God is about to offer to do something unprecedented to confirm everything that He has just communicated to Ahaz. [Read Isaiah 7:10-17] God tells Ahaz to ask for a sign that will confirm that everything he has heard from Isaiah will come to pass. In the Bible a sign is something concrete that serves as a symbol of another reality. And God pretty much gives Ahaz a blank check to ask for any sign he want – no matter how spectacular or miraculous. But Ahaz refuses. His answer sounds very pious – he is not going to put God to the test, perhaps even citing the command in Deuteronomy 6 as justification for his response. But as we’re going to see, the reason Ahaz doesn’t want a sign is because he has already decided to do what he had purposed in his heart to do and trust in man for his help instead of putting his faith in God alone. So he didn’t want any sign that would make it so obvious that he had strayed so far from God. Although it’s really tough to determine the exact order of events here, we do know that Ahaz had already decided what he was going to do, and we see him carry out that plan in 2 Kings 16: So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria and from the hand of the king of Israel, who are attacking me.” Ahaz also took the silver and gold that was found in the house of the LORD and in the treasures of the king's house and sent a present to the king of Assyria. (2 Kings 16:7-8 ESV) There is such irony here. Ahaz, faced with a minor threat that actually wasn’t a threat at all, decides to trust in the king of Assyria, who was actually a much greater threat to Judah. Ahaz even takes gold and silver from the temple and his palace and sends it to Tiglath-pileser, but history reveals that even that bribe is not going to ensure Judah’s safety. As we read in verse 17, God will eventually bring the king of Assyria against Judah. And in the remainder of the chapter, Isaiah describes the devastation that will come to Judah as a result. Even though Ahaz is not willing to ask for a sign, God is going to give one anyway. Isaiah now turns to the house of David as a whole and gives that familiar sign in verse 14. I love what the great preacher, Charles Spurgeon wrote about verses 14-16: It has been said that the passage I have taken for my text is one of the most difficult in all the Word of God. It may be so—I certainly did not think it was until I saw what the commentators had to say about it and I rose up from reading them perfectly confused! After reading a number of commentaries this week, I can certainly relate. But if we’ll just stick with what we find in the text, I think we’ll find this passage is relatively straightforward. We have often talked about how Biblical prophecy often has both a near-term and far term fulfillment, and that is certainly true here. But this morning I want us to consider a slightly different way of looking at prophecy that I think will really help us with this passage. I’m indebted here to Biola University Professor Jeffrey Volkmer for these ideas. We often think of Biblical prophecy as “predicating future events” or “foretelling”, And some prophecy certainly does that. But the greater purpose of prophecy is to show that what God has done in the past is a pattern and a promise for what He will continue to do. In order to accomplish that purpose, most prophecy tends to function on three levels: 1. The historical/literal level – what we’ve often called the near-term fulfillment 2. The symbolic level – the prophecy points to themes previously introduced in the Bible 3. The referential level – what we’ve often called the far-term fulfillment. This is often a theological point rather than just a prediction of the future. I know that might leave you more confused that when we started, but I think as we apply the idea to this passage, it will eventually become much clearer and more helpful. Let’s begin with the historical/literal level. In order to understand that, let’s just suppose for a moment that we don’t have any idea that Matthew later quotes this verse with regards to the birth of Jesus and that we just put ourselves in Ahaz’s shoes. What was the meaning of this prophecy for him? In order to help answer that question, we need to address the word translated “virgin” in verse 14. And if you’ve ever done any kind of detailed study of this verse, you probably know that there is some controversy concerning exactly how this Hebrew word should be translated. The underlying Hebrew word is “almah” and its basic meaning is a “young girl of marriageable age” or “a maiden”. It is used nine times in the Old Testament and in six of those nine occurrences it is translated “virgin”. But there is another Hebrew word, betulah, that unequivocally means “virgin” and it is used much more frequently in the Old Testament. So the word “almah” has a degree of ambiguity to it. It could describe a young girl who is a virgin, but the word itself would not require that she be a virgin. But as we’ll see in a moment, I believe there is a reason that Isaiah, under the direction of the Holy Spirit, uses that somewhat ambiguous word here. With that in mind let’s think about this sign from Ahaz’s perspective. For Ahaz, this sign serves primarily as a measure of time. God is revealing to Ahaz that some maiden, one who is undoubtedly known to Isaiah and to Ahaz, but not necessarily to us, is going to give birth to a son. Because that aspect of this sign is only relevant to Ahaz, there is no need for the Biblical text to reveal her identity. By the time that son is able to discern good from evil, the threat from Israel and Syria will have passed. So for Ahaz the purpose of the sign is to remind him that he should choose to put his trust and God and stay close to Him rather than put his trust in the King of Assyria. And that sign was literally fulfilled over a relatively short time during Ahaz’s reign as king of Judah. Now let’s move on to the symbolic level. This sign is symbolically significant because the child would be a reminder of God’s earlier promise to David that one of his descendants would remain on the throne. God was going to protect that lineage by preventing Pekah and Rezin from installing a puppet king who would not be from David’s line. In promising to protect Judah from Syria and Israel, He was also reinforcing His promise to raise up a righteous perfect king from Judah. One of the shortcomings of the near-term/far-term approach to prophecy is that we miss this crucial intermediate step which points to this important theological truth that undergirds the third level – the referential level. Obviously in this case, Matthew gives us a lot of help understanding the referential level since he quotes verse 14 in his account of the birth of Jesus. All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). (Matthew 1:22-23 ESV) The verb “fulfill” that Matthew uses here is a word that means “to proclaim fully” or to “fill up”. So the idea here is that the birth of Jesus “fills in the gaps” in the meaning of the sign that had been given to Ahaz over 700 years earlier. It is important to note that the word translated “virgin” here is a Greek word that unequivocally means “virgin” – a woman who has never engaged in sexual relations. It is now apparent why Isaiah chose the more ambiguous term he used in Isaiah 7. That same term could refer to both the young maiden that would be a sign to Ahaz and to Mary, who would literally be a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus. But even if we didn’t have Matthew’s reference to Isaiah, we would be able to make some connections between the birth of Jesus and the sign given to Ahaz. The circumstances surrounding the birth of Jesus are remarkably similar to the situation in Judah over 700 years earlier. In Isaiah’s time, there were two enemy kings trying to disrupt the God ordained line of David. In Matthew’s time, Herod was in an alliance with Rome that threatened to destroy the Jews. In Isaiah’s day, two kings threatened to remove Ahaz and snuff out God’s promise of a future king. In Matthew’s day, Herod’s plan to slaughter innocent babies threatened to take out that promised king. And in both cases, the answer to those threats was Immanuel – God is with us. For Ahaz, that name was actually a rebuke. It was a clear reminder from God that even though God was with Ahaz, Ahaz had not chosen to be with God. But in spite of Ahaz’s misplaced faith, God was going to preserve Judah for His own purposes and another Immanuel would be born from that line centuries later. The sign that “God is with us” in Matthew’s time obviously had much more far reaching implications. It was the sign that God was not only going to deliver his people from advancing armies, but from a far more dangerous enemy, our sins. So the same is true for us as it was with Ahaz: God is with me, but I must choose to be with Him Jesus made the choice to be Immanuel, God with us, by coming to this earth, living a sinless life, dying on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins and then rising from the grave to prove that He had the power to do that. So Jesus did everything He needed to do to be Immanuel for us. But if I want to be with Him, then I have to do what Ahaz failed to do and make the choice to put my faith in Him alone. But how exactly do I do that? Fortunately for us, we don’t have to guess because in this passage, Isaiah has already given us some clear directions about how to do that. Remember the four commands we saw earlier? HOW TO CHOOSE TO BE “WITH GOD” 1. Be careful This command conveys several related ideas. It is a call for Ahaz to get his eyes off his circumstances and to pay close attention to God instead. It also means that Ahaz is to be on his guard and to proceed cautiously. He needs to take the time to make a careful consideration before He decides who or what He is going to trust. This is very similar to the advice Jesus gave His followers to consider the cost before making the decision to become His disciple (Luke 14:25-34). That advice is still relevant to us today. There is a cost of choosing to be with God and to trust in Him alone. But if we’ll take the time to make a careful consideration of that cost, we’ll always find two things: 1) The benefits of being with God far outweigh any costs 2) There is a far greater cost to putting our trust elsewhere But the only way we can see that clearly is to get our eyes off our circumstances and pay attention to God instead. 2. Be quiet One of the voices that was causing Ahaz to trust in man rather than God was no doubt his own voice. Perhaps there were others who had counseled him to go to the king of Assyria, too, but the main problem here is that Ahaz had already made up his mind what He was going to do before He ever listened to God. This command can also mean “calm down”. The implication here is that Ahaz had allowed the apparent urgency of the situation to lead him into making a very bad decision. When we’re faced with a difficult situation, it’s always good to make sure we’re not listening to our own voice instead of God’s. And it’s certainly a good practice to take some time to calm down and not let the urgency of the situation lead us to make poor choices. If we don’t do those two things, we certainly risk making choices that will lead us away from God rather than drawing us close to Him. 3. Do not fear Fear can lead us to make some really poor decisions. When we face seemingly insurmountable problems, we tend to focus only on what we can see, just like Ahaz did. And so, like Ahaz, we end up focusing on what we can do to remedy the situation, rather trusting in God, who we cannot see. Like Ahaz, we also have a tendency to fear things that haven’t happened yet or even things that will never take place. Even though God had already assured Ahaz and the people that they didn’t need to fear the Syria and Israel, they were still afraid. And unfortunately, they did exactly what fear often causes us to do and run from God rather than to draw near to Him. So once again the remedy is to quit focusing on my circumstances and get my eyes on God. 4. Do not let my heart be faint This is a case of Hebrew parallelism where this phrase essentially means the same thing as do not fear. So we don’t really need to cover this any further. The next time we look around at what’s going on in the world and are tempted to ask “Where’s God?”, we need to remember that we already have our answer. God is with us. The question we need to be asking instead is “Am I with God?” Perhaps right now you’re going through some difficulty in your life. And it may very well be that there is nothing anyone can do to change those circumstances. Chances are that I can’t tell you why that is happening. I may or may not be able to give you some counsel from the Bible that is going to help you in that situation. But the one thing I can tell you for sure is that no matter what that trial is, God is with you. Later in his book Isaiah, reminds us of that truth again. So as we close this morning, will you read his words out loud with me: But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I give Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in exchange for you. Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life. Fear not, for I am with you; (Isaiah 43:1-5 ESV) Discussion Questions for Bible Roundtable 1. What questions do you still have about the sign in Isaiah 7:14? Are there other things that you’ve read or heard about that passage that you would like to discuss? 2. What is the “big picture” that Ahaz doesn’t see here that leads him to fear and to trust in someone other than God? What steps can we take to make sure we don’t make that same mistake? 3. Why do you think we tend to worry about things that haven’t happened yet, or even things that will never happen? What did you learn today that can help keep you from doing that? 4. Why is it so easy to try and implement our solutions and so hard to trust in God when faced with a difficult situation? How do we overcome those natural tendencies? 5. What are some ”smoldering stumps of firebrands” in your life right now that are keeping you from trusting in God alone and being close to Him?