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Responding to God’s Presence
Isaiah 6:1-8
Every person can understand God’s holiness by looking at the responses to God in this passage.
Introduction:
About 7 years ago I took my family to an amusement park.
We found a lot of reasons not to go to the park.
It was day with some threatening weather.
It was going to cost some money to go, but we decided to go anyway.
As we were preparing to enter the park we had one person sell us some ticket at greatly reduced price and another person gave the rest of the tickets we needed.
So we got into the park at a greatly reduced price.
We had fun and very few lines to wait in.
At about lunch time it started to rain.
We found a restaurant and sat down inside and had our lunch while it rained.
When we were done eating, it was done raining.
At the end of the day I went to look at the pictures they took of us as we entered.
Julie and kids when off in another direction.
When I asked if we could come back and look at the pictures together she offered to let me keep the pictures at no charge.
It seemed that for everything we did that day we were in the right place at the right time.
That seems to be the story of Isaiah in this passage.
He was a man who was placed in the right place at the right time with his meeting with God.
As we see this we can learn about our relationship with God as we look at the responses to the presence of God.
Response I. Faces covered
A. In the movie “A Christmas Story” Ralphie wants a Red Rider BB gun, but every time he tries to tell anyone he is told things like, “you’ll shoot your eye out.”
His parents don’t seem to be responding to his please, so he decides that he needs to talk to Santa Claus.
When he finally gets to Santa, he is so overwhelmed that he can’t speak.
Santa suggests that maybe Ralphie gets a football, to which Ralphie numbly nods his head.
Perhaps there have been times in your life when you felt that you wanted to say something to someone, but the words escaped you as the opportunity presented itself.
B.
This is a bit of what the Seraphim are expressing as they are flying around the throne.
They recognize that there is such a gap between them and the God that they are worshipping that they cover their faces.
They are not worthy to have their faces seen in the presence of such as awesome God.
This same thing happened with Moses.
As he spent time with God he covered his face, while in the presence of God.
It was a simple attempt to cover the gap that existed between him and God.
When Elijah heard the voice of God, he covered his face before he came into the presence of God.
C.
I don’t see a lot of people really grasping the gap between us and God.
Rather than viewing God as the one who created us and sustains us, many see God more like an appliance.
He is something we use when we need something.
He is where he is for our convenience.
The sense of awe is missing as is the realization that God created us.
We don’t see a gap between us and God.
I wonder if we realize what a great God we have.
Instead maybe we have dumbed down our God.
Response II.
Feet covered
A. Have you ever been embarrassed by something and you wanted to cover it up?
When I went for my senior pictures in high school, I went into the photographer’s studio, where his wife proceeded to use makeup to cover some of the blemishes on my face.
Being of the age when acne is prevalent, this was an attempt to cover that before we began taking pictures.
Sometimes people will use the same sort of a technique to cover a black eye or some sort of bruise.
They do that to cover their embarrassing feature, and hope that fewer people will notice it.
B.
If these seraphs were humans they would be covering their feet as an indication that they were trying to keep something hidden from God.
Our feet are what we use to take us from one place to another.
Sometimes our feet take us to places of dignity and honor, and at other times they might take us places where sin abounds and where we find ourselves wrapped up in that sin.
The seraphs would be indicating the sinful activity that a man might be involved in that separates him or her from God.
So in order to cover the sin, the feet are covered as an indication of sin that needs to be forgiven.
It is another way of indicating that we are far separated from God.
We are all sinners and are not worthy of coming into God’s presence.
We might do like Adam and try to cover our sin with something like a fig leaf.
We know that Adam was not really keeping anything from God.
He knew what was happening.
Even so, there needs to be a recognition that we are apart from God.
There is a gap that we cannot bridge.
C.
Maybe you are trying to keep something hidden from God.
We need to realize that it is impossible for us to really hide anything from God.
He can see right through us, and he knows what is happening at the heart level of the person.
Maybe we try to hide our sin from God, but we need to realize that it is a wasted exercise.
D.
I think that a greater tragedy that is happening today is that we don’t try to hide our sin from God.
In many cases we see people wearing their sin on their sleeve as a badge of honor.
They are proud of the wrong they have done, and they are willing to let the world know it.
This sort of activity will only lead to deeper separation from God.
The only way for reconciliation with God is for a person to recognize their sin, confess it, repent and receive God’s forgiveness.
Response III.
Calling to one another
A. Isaiah has been given a beautiful glimpse of what is happening in heaven.
You have the Lord seated on the throne and these winged creatures are flying near the throne.
While they are in the presence of God they begin calling to one another.
"Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory."
This looks to be something that happens spontaneously at the presence of God.
I assume it is not something they had rehearsed and perfected, but it was an automatic response when God appeared to them.
They recognize the greatness of their God.
Can you imagine something so awesome that it causes these being to cry out like they do?
It had to be an amazing feeling.
B.
In v. 4 we see the result of this act of worship.
It appears that the place shook and the temple was filled with smoke.
These events were not happening to impress Isaiah; I think he was impressed to be in the presence of God.
It was not an exercise for the Seraphs.
They were doing what they were created to do.
This was God.
It was about God.
The focus of this time was God.
It was for God’s glory.
He was the center.
C.
Our society has become so self centered that we might even try to worship without God.
If the focus is self, God might just get in the way.
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