Isaiah 3-5, "The Bad News in the Good News"
Notes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Have you ever had all your support and comfort taken away and found yourself stronger as a result?
In our passage today, we’ll see that God uses discomfort to purify a remnant of believers who will work for restoration in our world. Isaiah prophecies disaster brought on by Israel’s sin, but also the promise of a remnant God is purifying to become His embodied presence on earth.
God Uses Discomfort to Purify the Faithful
God Uses Discomfort to Purify the Faithful
When you want to wake someone up, you have to create discomfort. If you have a light sleeper, it can be a nudge on the shoulder. But for someone that is deep under, fast asleep, nothing else will work, you need a bucket of cold water.
In Isaiah 1 and 2, we saw that God has a plan. His plan is His people, who would be a light to the nations, to awaken the nations to the knowledge of God. The nations would stream to God to learn to walk in His ways. But God’s people were rebellious children, and the book begins with God telling them,
Isaiah 1:3 (ESV)
The ox knows its owner,
and the donkey its master’s crib,
but Israel does not know,
my people do not understand.”
The people of God were going through the motions of worship, but their hearts were given over to idols. Instead of being a light to the nations, they were walking in darkness. What happens when the redeemed people of God are distracted by idols of their own making? There isn’t any hope for the nations to know the Lord and to learn from Him.
Israel has become comfortable in the darkness. In chapter 3, God says, “I will not support you in that.” He won’t let His redeemed people become comfortable in the darkness of their idolatry.
In Isaiah 3:1-7, Isaiah says the Lord will take away all of their comforts. In verse 1, Isaiah says,
Isaiah 3:1 (ESV)
For behold, the Lord God of hosts is taking away from Jerusalem and from Judah support and supply,
The Hebrew words for support and supply are actually just the masculine and feminine of the same word, “mashen and mashenah”. It’s Isaiah’s way of saying, God is removing every kind of help. And this word has the connotation of something that makes your life more comfortable. You could paraphrase it as God is taking away couch and cold drink, or home and hearth, or as Isaiah spells out, bread, water, mighty warrior, judge, prophet, oracle and elder, etc. All of the means Israel has used to make herself comfortable, the Lord is removing.
God is creating discomfort to awaken His people, to purify them. In just the last two years, we have been made more and more uncomfortable as Christians. We can get angry and blame somebody, or we can ask, “Why?”
Isaiah makes clear why. In Isaiah 3:8, he says,
Isaiah 3:8 (ESV)
For Jerusalem has stumbled, and Judah has fallen, because their speech and their deeds are against the Lord, defying his glorious presence.
Israel could blame her leaders, they could blame the godless empires around them for the trouble in the world. But really, the problem lay within them.
Isaiah tells a parable to explain. In chapter 5, Isaiah says Israel is the garden of the LORD, a vineyard.
Isaiah 5:7 (ESV)
For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah are his pleasant planting;
He planted it, He cultivated it, He cared for it, and protected it. But instead of bearing good grapes, it bore bad grapes. Isaiah uses another play on words. God was looking for the fruit of justice, “mishpat”,
Isaiah 5:7 (ESV)
and he looked for justice (mishpat), but behold, bloodshed (mispah); for righteousness (tzadaqah), but behold, an outcry (tzaqah)!
but instead, He found bloodshed, “mispah”. He was looking for righteousness, “tzadaqah”, but instead He found an outcry, “tzaqah”.
God had redeemed Israel from slavery in Egypt in Exodus, and He had been faithful to His promise to protect and provide for them in the Promised Land. And He had called them to do justice and righteousness in that land.
But their security and prosperity had made them too comfortable, and they began to make worship idols of their own making rather than being true to God. And idolatry always leads to injustice. Because idolatry is really about worshipping self, and self always wants more at the expense of others.
So Israel had become unjust and unrighteous. The rich were taking advantage of the poor (3:14-15), the young were disrespecting the old (3:5), their criteria for choosing leaders had become about appearance rather than character (3:6-7).
So, God will cause some discomfort by removing His protection and support for their lifestyle.
Isaiah 5:5 (ESV)
And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.
God was going to allow Israel to feel the consequences of living against the Lord. He didn’t really have to do anything.
Isaiah 3:9 (ESV)
For they have brought evil on themselves.
And when God stops protecting you from the consequences of your sin, you’d better be prepared for discomfort. This “devouring” that was going to happen to Israel is fleshed out in chapter 3. Isaiah says Israel is going to be chewed up by its own leaders. He says in 3:5 that “the people will oppress one another”. But when that includes those with power and money, the oppression goes to another level.
Isaiah talks about societal oppression with devouring language in 3:12-15. First, he says their leaders who should be guiding them would mislead them by “swallowing up” the course of their path.
Isaiah 3:12 (ESV)
My people—infants are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, your guides mislead you and they have swallowed up the course of your paths.
We should understand that Isaiah isn’t equating women with infants in their ability to lead. He’s saying Israel’s leaders are infants, so confused that the right path for the nation has been swallowed in a fog. Sound like anything we’re experiencing today? And there are some women in the ruling class too, and he’s going to single them out.
In verse 16, Isaiah says these women have misplaced values. They are caught up in the latest fashion and are holding themselves above the common people. Isaiah prophesies wars with Assyria and Babylon that will decimate the ruling class of its men and leave the women humiliated.
But it’s worse than just misguided leaders. These leaders are predatory, like wolves feeding on the sheep rather than feeding the sheep. Isaiah uses imagery like this,
Isaiah 3:14–15 (ESV)
The Lord will enter into judgment with the elders and princes of his people: “It is you who have devoured the vineyard, the spoil of the poor is in your houses. What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?” declares the Lord God of hosts.
The rulers have been chewing up the poor by taking what little means they had to live on for themselves. We find out in chapter 5 when Isaiah pronounces six “woes” upon Israel the extent of what was happening. Isaiah doesn’t exactly name names, but he does name sins.
1. The first woe is against the ruling class for confiscating the properties of poor families to build estates for themselves, most likely through predatory lending (5:8-10).
2. Celebrating the good life instead of celebrating God. Isaiah says (5:11-12) people were rising early in the morning to drink and party, but
Isaiah 5:12 (ESV)
They have lyre and harp, tambourine and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord, or see the work of his hands.
We’ll come back to this in a moment. The final woes name the sins of
1. Predatory lending (5:8-11)
2. Extravagant lifestyles while ignoring God (5:12-17)
3. Mocking God’s patience and grace (5:18-19)
4. Calling evil good and good evil (20)
5. Being wise in their own eyes (21)
6. Perverting justice with bribes (22-23)
If any of these remind you of our own times, you have discovered one reason we are looking into this book right now.
“Sin is no longer sin, it is the new morality. Thus it is that societies collapse.” - Alec Motyer. Motyer, Alec. Isaiah (p. 72). IVP. Kindle Edition.
But before you and I point the finger out there at the world, remember that Isaiah is preaching to the redeemed people of God. This is God’s household, and it’s a mess. Isaiah isn’t afraid to confront the sins of God’s people, because this is the only hope for the world to ever walk in the light of the LORD, for God’s kingdom rule and reign to bring justice and righteous into a world in need. God’s judgment begins with His own household as the Apostle Peter says,
For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
As we think about our own situation, the last couple of years have demonstrated two things: the church getting up in arms over ills in our culture has made us no more effective at expanding the kingdom of God with the gospel, and worse the ills in our culture have been discovered at the highest levels of the evangelical church. And as we learn from Isaiah, God’s judgment begins with the leaders of His people,
Isaiah 3:14 (ESV)
The Lord will enter into judgment with the elders and princes of his people:
The Lord God of hosts desires a pure people walking in the light of His word and ways to be a light to the nations. A corrupt household of God will be powerless, anemic, and more harm than help in God’s plan.
I believe the great sin of the American church is the idolatry of comfort. As long as things go our way, and no one rocks the boat, we’re happy to go on with our worship service and never even wonder what God might be up to...
Isaiah 5:12 (ESV)
They have lyre and harp, tambourine and flute and wine at their feasts, but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord, or see the work of his hands.
This idolatry has led us into other sins. We have discovered sexual abuse and cover up of that abuse at Kanakuk Kamps, Ravi Zacharias and his ministry, the Southern Baptist Church, and the abuse of power by well known mega-church pastors. That puts us right in the context of Isaiah 3-5. So what are we to do?
Embrace the discomfort. There is bad news in the good news. God is purifying us. God might be judging the world, but He always starts with His own house. Instead of blaming others, He wants us to examine ourselves. But here’s His strategy…right in the middle of all this graphic condemnation of Israel’s sins in Isaiah 3-5 there is one hope. Isaiah 4:2-6 promise restoration, even holiness,
Isaiah 4:4 (ESV)
when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion and cleansed the bloodstains of Jerusalem from its midst by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning.
That doesn’t sound very pleasant. But it could very well be that God is visiting us with a spirit of burning, not to destroy us, but to purify a remnant of the faithful. Are we following our infantile leaders by kicking against the pain of our times, or are we regarding the deeds of the LORD and seeing the work of His hands? Where is He working in us?
2. Embrace Jesus. Isaiah says this purifying of the remnant of the faithful comes in the time of the Messiah. He uses one prophetic title for Messiah, “the branch of the LORD”.
In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land shall be the pride and honor of the survivors of Israel.
He’s talking about the branch on the family tree of King David, the person whose heart will completely belong to God. Israel is redeemed by God, but they have lost faith. They’ve gotten distracted, and they’ve failed in their calling. But God is faithful. The Messiah is faithful in all the ways Israel was faithless. He bears the fruit of justice and righteousness. He bore that fruit in His death on the cross, and He continues to bear it through the church that prides herself in Him over its own wisdom, prosperity, or pastor.
The vineyard of the Lord was destroyed in the form of national Israel, but God is growing a new people from one branch. Every leader of every mega-church pastor can be proved faithless, but Jesus Christ remains faithful.
The good news of the good news is that even though you cannot fix all that we have broken, Jesus is still faithful to restore us and makes us agents of restoration.
3. Embrace the Word of God. Isaiah says where Israel went wrong was,
English Standard Version (Chapter 5)
for they have rejected the law of the LORD of hosts, and have despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
But in the section promising restoration, He describes the restoration with language that reminds us of the time God came to live with His people, and spoke His word to them.
Then the Lord will create over the whole site of Mount Zion and over her assemblies a cloud by day, and smoke and the shining of a flaming fire by night; for over all the glory there will be a canopy.
When the people of God pride themselves in Messiah more than their own wisdom, or righteousness, or prosperity, God will once again attend the worship services of the redeemed. They will hear His words once again. And His presence will be
There will be a booth for shade by day from the heat, and for a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain.
If God shows up in our midst, it may be uncomfortable as He purifies us. But when the purification is done, He restores the comfort too. And if God is in our midst, and His word is going out from us, we can become agents of restoration too.