Isaiah 6:5-7 Man and Jesus
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Man is Sinner, Jesus is Savior
Man is Sinner, Jesus is Savior
Introduction
Let’s open the Bible now, to
Greeting, introduction, etc.
Last week Allen showed us that the first 4 verses of Isaiah tell us that God is Holy
He is glorious and majestic, exalted on his throne, so magnificent that even the heavenly temple can hardly contain the train of his robe
Want to examine the entirety of Isaiah chapter 6
His presence shines such glory that even the heavenly beings, the seraphim, cannot look at him; they have wings to cover their faces.
Particularly verses 5-7
In this text, Isaiah finds himself in the direct presence of this holy and perfect God and that is where we pick up tonight.
Normally approach this in small sections, now want to get big picture
Now here is why I think is so significant; it is the gospel, plain and simple
It shows us that God is holy
It shows who man really is
It shows us that man is sinner
It shows God’s work in salvation
It shows us that God saves sinners
It shows us what the response to God’s saving work looks like
And it shows the response that the gospel produces
And on a larger scale, it shows us how God faithfully works among a sinful people to accomplish his purposes and fulfill everyone of his promises.
But we have a lot of
That is a lot, so as you can imagine, we are going to have to move rather quickly through each of these points
And since it is directly from him, that means it contains no error and is perfect?
Well, since that is true, we are actually tackling two topics tonight—Man is Sinner and Jesus is Savior—because that is what the text does.
I promise you, my best thoughts apart from this Word are pretty much worthless
POINT: GOD SAVES SINNERS
You don’t want to hear what I have to say; but we desperately need to hear what God’s Word says, because only it is God’s power for salvation
So that is our only goal here tonight, to hear the Word, and to understand
Provide brief overview of why Isaiah’s call comes in ch. 6 after 5 chapters of prophecy
So now lets look at , and we will begin with verse 1 again, so that we can recall the full context
He used his later prophecy of 1-5 to help his readers to understand the situation he came into
No dates, no names, no historical markers, just situational overview
Rampant sin, false religion, rejection of God, etc
Also, promised judgment, yet promised restoration in fulfillment of God’s promises made to Israel through the covenants
READ
PRAYER
Father, we are humbled that we may live in your presence.
I know we can’t even comprehend the great blessing and privilege we have in this context to freely study your Word, to worship you, and to proclaim your gospel
But we also know that we can do none of those things properly or effectively until we first know who you are as God, and who we are as sinful men
Holy Spirit, please press those truths into us this morning; break us with your truth
Humble our prideful hearts and create in us a pure heart that desires you and to make you known.
Work through your Word at this time and in this place, we ask in Jesus’s Name, Amen.
God is Holy
This is the foundation of the gospel
Otherness, separateness, altogether different
Foundation of all other attributes
In the year that King Uzziah died
Generally prophets mark their ministries by the year of the kings reign
Not Isaiah; this is specially significant
, also , tells us about Uzziah
He ruled for 52 years and the Bible says “he did what was right in the sight of the Lord,” but he did not destroy the high places
His reign brought stability and relative prosperity
He did not abolish pagan altars and sacrifices, and the Lord afflicted him with a terrible disease
Even a devout king of Israel fell terribly short of God’s holy, perfect standards
So his death would have brought great distress
Compare to JFK’s death
Israel knew the promises, but hope was fading
Was judgment all that awaited them? Were they like King Uzziah, God’s chosen one, yet destined to perish under judgment?
For many, the answer was yes; but the promises were not lost
This vision shows who the king truly is
He does not sit on a throne made by human hands
He is not in the earthly temple, or in Rome, or in the White House;
He reigns from from heaven and the earth is his foot stool and his name is Yahweh, Lord of Armies, Creator of the Universe
So then hope is not anchored in a human king, but in the Sovereign King, who reigns over all rulers and authorities according to
It is this God who Isaiah sees in this vision
Amazing: even in this exalted vision, God has condescended
1 “No one has seen God,” because God is Spirit
God graciously manifests his presence for Isaiah here, to accomplish his purposes
The purpose in this vision is to show how high, how exalted, how powerful God is!
NOTE: Isaiah is outside the temple
V2 Then we see these heavenly creatures, the seraphim, angelic beings
“Standing above him” - In a position of service to a seated master
“two wings covered their faces” - Not their ears; they made no attempt to look into what God is like, into his secret things
But they left their ears uncovered so as to receive what the Lord would say (let us learn)
“two wings covered their feet” - Not necessarily humility, for angelic feet were not directors of sinful action
Feet represent the means of activity and life direction
Covering feet = rejecting any intention to choose their own path and vowing to go only as God commands
V3 The seraphim proclaim God’s holiness
Only here in the entire Bible is an attribute of God elevated to the 3rd degree
Above all else, holiness defines God
Glory fills the earth
God’s glory is his holiness on display
Even among sin, pain, destruction…God’s holiness shines forth in creation
Augustine on the sunset “if God affords such beauty to sinful men, what awaits those who love him?”
And his goal is to further promote his glory among his creation, which was the very purpose of all creation to begin with
V4 The doorways shake and the temple filled with smoke
Isaiah is outside the temple, looking from afar
As a sinner, he is removed from up close, personal relationship to God
MOVE ON TO THE NEXT POINT, VERSE 5
God’s Holiness Exposes Man’s Sinfulness
So Man is Sinner; do you see that in what we just read?
As far as we know, Isaiah the Prophet was a devout and God-fearing man
Yet verse 5 reports that Isaiah’s first action when he comes before God is to express serious, painful grief because of who he is; sinner
Verse 5 exposes the first point that I want you guys to really latch on to and it is this: “God’s Holiness Exposes Man’s Sinfulness”
I have up here on the screen a picture that I hope will help to illustrate this truth
What is it? The Sun
Now let’s consider some things about the Sun:
It what the Earth and all the planets in our solar system orbit around
It is the object that God provided in order that this planet could sustain life; in that sense it is God’s life-giving gift to all people and animals and plants
But how about this: the closest planet to the Sun is Mercury at roughly 36 million miles away; if anything gets closer than that, it is burned up, consumed
Now consider that the Earth is 93 million miles away from the Sun; nearly 3 times as far as Mercury is from it
Yet even at that distance, if you look directly at the Sun for just a few seconds, you can cause serious permanent damage to your eyes
Beyond that, even at 93 million miles away, the Sun is able to produce scorching heat on this earth so severe that it can kill people in a matter of hours
The point is, the Sun is quite a force to be reckoned with:
Now I need you to use your imagination for a moment, are you with me?
Imagine, for the sake of illustration, that simply being in outer space wouldn’t kill you.
Now the fine folks at NASA strap you to the front of a rocket and send off into outer space traveling directly toward the Sun at a ridiculously fast rate
The closer the get, the hotter your skin gets;
You get closer and closer, your eyes are closed because the shear light would burn your eyes out, yet the radiance of the Sun is so intense that the light seems to go right through your eyelids
Closer and closer, and you begin to be consumed; the energy fo the Sun is too much for you, and when you are still millions of miles away from it, the great intensity of the Sun kills you.
What are some things you would be thinking leading up to that final moment?
I can’t handle this?
I need to get away?
I wish I was protected?
All your thoughts would flow out of your realization that you, in your weak skin and bones, are utterly insignificant, helpless, and defenseless before the mighty Sun.
Kind of some gruesome imagery, but do you get the picture?
Now consider this: who is greater than the Sun? Who formed the stars out of nothing and set each one of them in their place? Who made all that there is and holds it in the palm of his hand? GOD
1 The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the expanse proclaims the work of his hands.
That means the everything, even the powerful Sun, was created by God so that we may stand in awe of him
He is far greater than all his creation; he is unimaginably more powerful and consuming than the Sun.
And it is he that Isaiah is standing before here.
The result is his proclamation that he is “ruined;” literally destroyed by the presence of God
Ruined can mean “silenced”; can’t join in the heavenly choir, can’t participate in anyway; proved unworthy!
That is the true gospel experience of every person whom God calls to himself
Perhaps it is more gradual than it was with Isaiah…
But the true testimony of every Christian is that they have seen the King
They have seen God’s perfection and realize to some degree his mind-blowing, all-consuming power!
And compared to him and his perfection, they see themselves; people of unclean lips who live among people of unclean lips;
NT Example
38 He was in the stern, sleeping on the cushion. So they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher! Don’t you care that we’re going to die?”
39 He got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Silence! Be still!” The wind ceased, and there was a great calm. 40 Then he said to them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
41 And they were terrified and asked one another, “Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!”
Why were they terrified? Because they realized they were in the very presence of God
Like Isaiah, they feared not because they were conscious simply of divine power, but because they were conscious of their abominable sin in the presence of absolute moral purity
Do we see ourselves that way before God?
What does that mean? “Unclean lips”
It is a metaphor; Jesus said
45 A good person produces good out of the good stored up in his heart. An evil person produces evil out of the evil stored up in his heart, for his mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart.
34 Brood of vipers! How can you speak good things when you are evil? For the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart.
Meaning, what comes out of your mouth is just a testament to what is truly inside of you, to who you truly are
So if everything you have said, both to others and to yourself, even in the last week were placed on this screen for all of us to read, what would it tell us about your heart?
If you put mine up there, you would see that I am a sinner like Isaiah; that I deserve nothing of God’s blessings and grace
THAT IS; they see their wicked sinfulness exposed before God, and they know that they cannot stand before him; they deserve to be destroyed
I deserve to be on the front of that rocket, up close to the Sun, consumed
You cannot know gospel salvation, until you see your need of that salvation
And it is not a one time deal; once you see it, you live in it…that is called faith
God Saves Sinners
This brings us to the second half of the text; after Isaiah has seen God and himself, it says in verse 6:
6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, and in his hand was a glowing coal that he had taken from the altar with tongs. 7 He touched my mouth with it and said:
Now that this has touched your lips,
your iniquity is removed
and your sin is atoned for.
Interesting imagery; a firey hot coal, seared against Isaiah’s lips
Remember his mouth represented his wickedness, his sinfulness, but now it has been burned away, so that his eternal guiltiness because of sin against God, is atoned for
That means it was covered, paid for
There is a debt you owe, and until you pay it, your punishment for the debt is eternal suffering and affliction.
The problem is, you can’t pay that debt, ever.
So God
But God comes and he pays it for you, so that your guilt is removed and so is the punishment. That is atonement. Does that make sense?
The point I want you to grasp here is this; “God saves sinners”
And he does through the work of his Son, Jesus Christ
Go back to the Sun illustration;
We said one of the things we would be thinking as our flesh was burning off before the Sun is; “I wish there was something to protect me!”
“I can do nothing to save myself, somebody save me!”
That is Isaiah’s exact predicament here as we have already seen
But what happens?
A seraphim, an angel of sorts, takes the coal and uses it to atone for the sins that made Isaiah unworthy to be in God’s presence
Track with me here: the book of Hebrews in the NT tells us that angels are simply servants of God who minister, or serve God’s people
So then we can know that God himself sent this seraphim in verse 7 to do what he did
You know what that tells us? God is the one, the only one who can atone for sin
God didn’t hand Isaiah the coal and say “all you gotta do is touch it to your lips Isaiah, but you have to do it yourself, I can’t do it for you.”
He doesn’t say that; what does he do?
He sends the seraphim to do his work; God himself sovereignly atones for Isaiah’s sins.
You see, God provides Isaiah the protection and mercy he desires, by atoning for his sin. God does it.
And that is exactly how he works in salvation;
This text is a prophecy of sorts that shows us that God saves sinners
And it points us to the ultimate work of salvation which God performed through his son Jesus Christ.
14 “I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep.
John 10
18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own. I have the right to lay it down, and I have the right to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”
He was not forced to do this work, or compelled in any way. He chose to do it.
In our earlier example, the Sun represents God’s burning holiness, and the horrible affliction it causes us represents God’s punishment of our sins.
But God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, decided from eternity past to set his love upon a certain people and to save them from his own wrath that must be poured out on sin.
The only way to accomplish this was by atoning, or satisfying justice, for the sins of those people.
So he gave himself up for those people; Jesus Christ, the Son, fully God, took on a human body, denied himself the exalted glory of heaven, lived perfectly in our place, and endured the wrath of God due our sins on the cross.
If you see your utter need for this saving work, and if you trust fully in Christ for having performed that work and saved your soul, then you are his.
And that means he looked at you personally, declared you his, and paid your debt SO THAT you may have unhindered joy by knowing him and worshiping him forever!
In this way, Jesus is the protection from the burning Sun in our example.
He steps between us and the flames of God’s wrath, having endured it on our behalf
And his blood is the covering that provides protection
Like the coal on Isaiah’s lips, Jesus’s blood atones, pays for our sin debt.
The only role we play in that, is to rest helplessly and joyfully in this love and mercy of our Lord, through faith, trusting that he has done it all for this wicked sinner.
THE RESPONSE
In every Gospel presentation, in any consideration of who God is, there is a response
Reject, or submit; there is no in between
Here God calls for the response; “Who shall I send? Who will go for us?”
Isaiah’s gospel response is that of all whose cold, dead hearts have been brought to life by the saving power of God;
“HERE I AM. SEND ME”
Would we say that? I pray we would, but consider what Isaiah is being sent to...
Chapters 1-5 show the dire condition of Israel at this time, and God further explains starting in VERSE 9 exactly what Isaiah is signing up for
9 And he replied:
Go! Say to these people:
Keep listening, but do not understand;
keep looking, but do not perceive.
10 Make the minds of these people dull;
deafen their ears and blind their eyes;
otherwise they might see with their eyes
and hear with their ears,
understand with their minds,
turn back, and be healed.
Isaiah 6:9
You say “wait, I thought the gospel is supposed to be a positive message, uplifting, etc”
And it is, to those who are being saved!
But look at
2 Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “You have seen with your own eyes everything the Lord did in Egypt to Pharaoh, to all his officials, and to his entire land. 3 You saw with your own eyes the great trials and those great signs and wonders. 4 Yet to this day the Lord has not given you a mind to understand, eyes to see, or ears to hear.
Deuteronomy
Deuteronomy 29:2-
2 Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “You have seen with your own eyes everything the Lord did in Egypt to Pharaoh, to all his officials, and to his entire land. 3 You saw with your own eyes the great trials and those great signs and wonders.
But then in the very next chapter he says this
Deuteronomy 30:
6 The Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the hearts of your descendants, and you will love him with all your heart and all your soul so that you will live.
33 “Instead, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days”—the Lord’s declaration. “I will put my teaching within them and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
Ezekiel 36
26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will remove your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will place my Spirit within you and cause you to follow my statutes and carefully observe my ordinances.
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us, 5 made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace!
Ephesians 2:4-5
So what is the point of Isaiah’s gloomy message?
1 Unless the Lord builds a house,
its builders labor over it in vain;
unless the Lord watches over a city,
the watchman stays alert in vain.
In the same way that man cannot atone for his own sins, neither can he give himself ears to hear, eyes to see, or a mind to understand
Only God can do this work, which is exactly what Isaiah saw when he entered into God’s presence
So there is both challenge and hope in the gospel message
Challenge; to live in a world that hates God
to live out truth and be rejected by the world
to proclaim truth only to be ignored, marginalized, or persecuted
Hope; V13, the stump which is the holy seed
that it is God’s just duty to punish sin, but it is his merciful prerogative to save by grace
that though you enter a walk with him into temporal suffering, his promises will be fulfilled
Like a vinedresser tending his vines, he cuts away that which is bad and produces no good fruit
Further, he grafts in new branches to bear fruit
To Isaiah’s audience, the stump is hope; it is the source of the shoot of Jesse, the coming king who will sit on the throne forever, Messiah, the Savior
It is a reminder that our hope is not in the things of this world, nor is our salvation found in any of those things
Our hope is found in God alone
So no matter how bad things may seem, no matter how evil the world is, no matter how flawed the church becomes. We have this ever present hope in the Lord, who has fulfilled every one of his promises in Christ our King.
And so the Lord bids us, come and die. Forsake the world and its temporary pleasures that are empty and void of life. Die to the passions of our sinful hearts, and live in him who has paid the penalty for sins, that we may have eternal life with him.
May we see with the Apostle Paul that the insignificant sufferings of this life cannot compare to the glory that awaits in heaven in the presence of the king, and proclaim “here I am Lord, here I am.”
Lets pray