Encountering God

Isaiah 6:1–13 ESV

In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.” And he said, “Go, and say to this people: “ ‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’ Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.” Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said: “Until cities lie waste without inhabitant, and houses without people, and the land is a desolate waste, and the Lord removes people far away, and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land. And though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned again, like a terebinth or an oak, whose stump remains when it is felled.” The holy seed is its stump.

Introduction: What must I know to live in the joy of this Comfort?

First, how great my sin and misery are, second, how I am set free from all of my sin and misery, and third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance.

In Isaiah we see all three, Our Grief, God’s Grace, and Our Gratitude.

Our Grief.

Isaiah’s Life: - Temple Prophet - A part of the system not a freelancer.

Started during the reign of Uzziah, a decent king - time of peace, but still maintained some of the idols set up during Solomon’s reign - lukewarm,

Assyria on the footsteps to come and Destroy Israel

The Message of Isaiah to Israel. - Because of Israel’s turning away from God, and not “Repenting” Turning back to God, God is lifting his protection from them. They will be totally annihilated by a nation - “Not Assyria” but Babylon later down the road.

Picture of a Forrest being completely burned down - It is a cleansing.

Good News, however, God is preparing from one of the burnt down stumps a shoot will rise up to restore the people of God.

Israel’s Story is our Story, and it is Isaiah’s story, and Isaiah’s story is Israel’s story, and our story.

After Isaiah preaches the summary of what God is going to do we get this vision.

God Enters the Scene and it is frightful.

God is huge - God does not fit into the temple - Just the Hem - Jewish Prayer Shawl. Picture or show.

Seraphim - Strange Creatures - Burning One’s - so the imagery of fire - Which judges and purifies. - Their singing is so loud it shakes the temple basin - earthquake from their sound. - Anyone struggle with loud worship music, you might struggle in the presence of God :).

Their Song testifies to God’s “Holiness” and that God is ultimately King.

God’s Holiness frightens this “Good Jewish man.” God’s Holiness is intense not because it is bad, but because it is sooooo. good. Like the Sun. The energy contributes to life on earth, it is soooo good, but the closer you get to it, the closer you get to your annihilation.

: It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

John Calvin: Why were people afraid that they would die when they saw God? God created humans to be in His presence. So something must have changed, it isn’t God. His holiness has not changed. So the change must have been in us to fear being in God’s presence.

In fact this is the pilgrimage we have said we have been on to be in God’s presence. - Why would we fear it?

Moses, Isaiah, Paul when they have an encounter like this immediately realize that God is perfectly Holy, His character is perfectly good, but they are dreadfully full of sin, and sin can not survive the presence of God’s goodness his holiness.

Israel should be doing what came natural to Isaiah is to be humbled before a perfect God. - Isaiah was in Misery, Grief because of the realization of God’s holiness, and his Sin, to the point of death. Isreal will in fact have to die.

When we consider Coronavirus it may cause fear....- 1. Is this a direct link to our sin, in other words if you get it, was it specifically because you did something wrong, “No not necessarily.” 2. Is God judging the world because of their sin? Is this the apocalypse?

To Be sure, things like Coronavirus is a result of a world that has not turned to God. Let me be clear - It is likely not a direct thing God is doing to our world, but rather the consequences of the human race who has decided for themselves not to be led by God, but rather their own sense of right and wrong. We are not as good at managing the world as we think. - Jesus spoke of a tower falling on people and them not being more sinful than others.

This is our Grief, and when we enter the Holy Presence of God it becomes painfully clear.

But God does something amazing to restore us from death...

God’s Grace.

One thing that is interesting about Isaiah’s response to God’s presence. - He does not bargain, nor does he apologize. Somehow he realizes he is powerless to do anything to change his death sentence.

But we see God’s grace, that although he is completely Holy and can not tolerate sin in his presence, God is also perfectly gracious and is desirous that Isaiah be restored and live.

The same is true for Israel - They are powerless to change their situation, they will need to experience a death, and the message is that God wants to restore them.

The same is true for us - We are powerless to change our situation - And we must come to that realization or we are not facing reality, the truth, we will die to ourselves, but God wants to restore us.

The fire of Judgement becomes the purifier - Fire destroys, and it purifies - Kills germs, makes glass, Makes pottery, destroys excess fat on a grill, cleans overgrown forests, it sterilizes. - This is the imagry of “Atonement”

Grace is unmerited Favor - There is nothing we can do about to earn this, God purifies Isaiah’s lips (a symbol of what comes out of the heart) because God wants to, no trick and pony show that we perform, or any good thing that we do, or anything ritual we may perform.

The trouble with grace is it is so easy to fall into the trap of thinking that we bargaining with God: if we do X (good deeds), then God must give us Y (grace) or Z (blessings). But that is not how grace works. The atonement that Isaiah experiences shows that grace is one-sided: it is initiated by God and performed by God, and the only thing anyone contributes is their sin. Martin Luther, one of the great teachers on grace, struggled with the temptation to see his work as some sort of contribution to his standing toward God. In his Commentary on Galatians, Martin Luther wrote, “I myself have been preaching and cultivating [faith in the one mediator] through reading and writing for almost twenty years and still feel the old clinging dirt of wanting to deal so with God that I may contribute something so that He will give me His grace in exchange for my holiness. Still I cannot get it into my head that I should surrender myself completely to sheer grace, yet I know that this is what I should and must do” (Martin Luther, Commentary on Galatians, quoted in Scotty Smith, “Surrender to Sheer Grace” [blog], The Gospel Coalition, August 14, 2008, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/scotty-smith/surrender-to-sheer-grace/). During this season of Lent, it is good to step back and have a time of honest reflection. Do you struggle to accept there is nothing you can do to make yourself right with God? That your right standing with him, the gift of his grace toward you, and your eternal salvation are free gifts completely outside of your control? If that bothers you, remember that it bothered Martin Luther too and take comfort.

Isaiah’s picture of atonement is a foreshadowing of the Gospel. - Jesus is that hot coal for those who receive him. Jesus’ death and resurrection is vicarious - In other words it is in our place. - The Holy Spirit is the one who applies that Hot Coal to our lips - John the Baptists words -

- He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing shovel is in his hand, to clean out his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his storehouse, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

Harris, W. H., III, Ritzema, E., Brannan, R., Mangum, D., Dunham, J., Reimer, J. A., & Wierenga, M. (Eds.). (2012). The Lexham English Bible (). Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.

Many don’t feel the humility, because they know Christ.

What if Jesus never died for our sins?

Many of us have fear over cornavirus, just as Israel was facing an enemy who would come and exile them. but again back to that building that Jesus talked about and said the people who died from it were not more sinful then others, he then said, but he used that as a wake up call to repent - Turn to God....

It does not have to be coronavirus, it could be a car accident, it could be a freak accident, it could be another disease, it could be a heart attack. All of these are reminders that this world is not as it should be, and we do not know the day or hour when our time in this life will come to an end.

Therefore, the time is always urgent to receive God’s Grace, to receive God’s atonement in Jesus, to receive God’s purification through Jesus.

If we fully grasped how great our grief is, and How much greater God’s grace is, our response would be

Our Gratitude.

God does not need us, He wants us. - Who will I send....

Isaiah moves from minding his business, to being in the presence of God, totally humbled and unable, to renewed, to totally willing and able to be sent by God.

For those of you who have been a christian for a while, many really do not serve God, Perhaps you have not realized how great your grief really is apart from Christ, and you don’t realize How Great God’s Grace is. You still see serving as a religious point system that you can’t measure up to, rather then a response of tremendous gratitude for God’s Grace. - We like Martin Luther have not fully surrendered to Grace.

Who would want Isaiah’s service? It is hard… Most of us would quite, but why doesn’t Isaiah, because he knows God’s Grace. We are only be able to serve in difficult ways because we know our grief, and we know God’s Grace.

We have an unprecedented opportunity to live out of God’s Grace during this season of Coronavirus. - We can server our neighbor in the following ways as a Church.

Social Distancing - Follow the Executive Orders....

You have received some information from me this week about how we can serve our neighbors and each other during this time. Here is another Martin Luther Quote to help us navigate how to serve with Gratitude.

“Use medicine; take potions which can help you; fumigate house, yard, and street; shun persons and places wherever your neighbor does not need your presence or has recovered, and act like a man who wants to help put out the burning city,” “If my neighbor needs me, however, I shall not avoid place or person but will go freely, as stated above,” he wrote. “See, this is such a God-fearing faith because it is neither brash nor foolhardy and does not tempt God.”

Conclusion: Have you come to understand our Grief? Have you come to see how Gracious God is? If yes, receive his Grace with Faith. And If you have known it for a While, How can you Live with Gratitude in these times?

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