Revival and Wrath

Pre-service Psalm: Psalm 87

Scripture Reading: Romans 12:14-19

Good Morning Church! I was Glad when they said to me let us go and worship in the house of the Lord!

FCF/Intro: Nativity and 2CV's - a quiet and peaceful and kind Jesus. - BUt is this Jesus? or is this a Jesus made up in my own mind?

THe issue is that Jesus is more complex than we can ever really understand, and when we begin to pigeonhole him into looking how we decide he does or should we will always miss the mark.

The PEACEFUL City

This portion comes from Isaiah 62:8-12

It is a city where Our enemies (whomever they may be…) will find no quarter or supply, but those who love the Lord will be well taken care of.

God will protect us, God will provide for us, God will lift us up and set us up as a “city on a hill”.

Yes this is a picture, yes this is spiritualized and yet, it is also just true. Here in the last few chapters of Isaiah it gets really hard to divide between the advents of Christ.

how do we know that this is Christ: verse 11 - note: our salvation comes in a person!

Yet here we have to see that what is in mind is NOT just the first coming, the whole work of Christ is in view.

So a portion is the peace of being saved, it is the act of being redeemed, it is the peace purchased for us AND it is the peace that we await when everything is made right again.

final note: look at the name, if ever there is encouragement, look at the name of the city, it is “SOUGHT OUT, A CITY NOT FORSAKEN”!

But now I want us to contemplate a question: :How will this happen, how will the city become a peaceful city, what happens so that the enemies are not going to prosper but yet the people of God are?

we see hints of it even here: verse 8 - the right hand and mighty arm of God, but we need something more to get there, so enter the JUST CONQUEROR!

The JUST Conqueror

This is Isaiah 63:1-6

Last week “The anointed Conquer” was introduced, but he was just anointed, you might have wondered, if you thought about it, where does the conqueror come in? - Well here it is...

A walk through:

Verse 1- a Question: who is this coming, he is strong, he is mighty, he is splendid and strong?

Verse 1 - it is the righteous one, who comes to save!

OK, identity confirmed, now we get a closer look, and the questions change,

Isaiah 63:2 ESV

Why is your apparel red, and your garments like his who treads in the winepress?

and the anointed conqueror answers, and well, its a bit rough.

verse 3 - Wine press, and for a split second we think: oh, OK, it is just wine, that's grape juice, makes sense. But a feeling of uneasiness might set in, because trampling the winepress is first of all not something a king and savior would do, unless… winepress language is synonymous with the wrath of God. but Peace is what we are talking about..

verse 3 continues - I tread THEM in my anger… uh oh, is this the peoples who would not help him, the people who would not join him, who else could “them be...”

and then graphically yes, but critically we cannot miss this, there is no wiggle room in our interpretation, its not wine, it is not grape juice that has stained the garments of the one speaking in righteousness who is mighty to save… it is the blood of his enemies.

if we look verse 5 and six say the EXACT same thing

so let me help us out, often Hebrew poetry has what we would call a chiastic structure, which is a super fancy way of saying it looks like a “greater than” sign. it is building up to a point in the middle, and it will go out the way it came in. so when two things match so closely we have to look at the middle, that is the point that is being built up to, here that is verse 4.

Isaiah 63:4 ESV

For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and my year of redemption had come.

SO how do we trust. two steps: verse 4 and we remember that God is bigger… and we REMEMBER THE STEADFAST GOD

The STEADFAST God

Taken from Isaiah 63:7-14

2 Timothy 2:11–13 ESV

The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.