I mentioned last week that we’d return to Matthew today, but I have had a change of heart, and we’ll return to that study in a few weeks. Instead today, I’d like to take us to a passage of scripture that is very dear to my heart and I think should be dear to the heart of any believer. Stand with me as I read from the holy, inspired, inerrant, trustworthy, infallible word of God.
Isaiah 66:1-6 Thus says the Lord:
“Heaven is my throne,
and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest?
All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the Lord.
But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.
“He who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a man;
he who sacrifices a lamb, like one who breaks a dog’s neck;
he who presents a grain offering, like one who offers pig’s blood; he who makes a memorial offering of frankincense, like one who blesses an idol.
These have chosen their own ways,
and their soul delights in their abominations;
I also will choose harsh treatment for them
and bring their fears upon them,
because when I called, no one answered,
when I spoke, they did not listen;
but they did what was evil in my eyes
and chose that in which I did not delight.”
Hear the word of the Lord,
you who tremble at his word:
“Your brothers who hate you
and cast you out for my name’s sake
have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified,
that we may see your joy’;
but it is they who shall be put to shame.
“The sound of an uproar from the city!
A sound from the temple!
The sound of the Lord,
rendering recompense to his enemies!
Isaiah 66:1-6 Thus says the Lord:
In other words, what we are about to hear is directly from the mouth of
God. This is God Himself speaking. A prophet is one that speaks not his own words, but the word of God. God places His very word on their tongue in order to speak to the people exactly what God wishes to say. Isaiah, as a prophet, would not have taken lightly the third commandment of God
Exodus 20:7 “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.”
We in our culture tend to think of this as one who curses using God’s name. Now I am not saying that using God’s name as a curse word is a good thing or that we should do that, but I just want to point out that this is not what the commandment means. What God is saying here to the Israelites as He gives this command is this: “Don’t say that I have said something when I haven’t said it.”
We can see this all over the O.T. For example,
Jeremiah 14:13–16 Then I said: “Ah, Lord God, behold, the prophets say to them, ‘You shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine, but I will give you assured peace in this place.’ ” And the Lord said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds. Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name although I did not send them, and who say, ‘Sword and famine shall not come upon this land’: By sword and famine those prophets shall be consumed. And the people to whom they prophesy shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem, victims of famine and sword, with none to bury them—them, their wives, their sons, and their daughters. For I will pour out their evil upon them.
Jeremiah is full of such kinds of statements and is particularly interested in presenting false prophets as those who say “God has said”, when God has not said. Allow me to digress for a moment, and please notice in this text, it is not only the false prophets whom the Lord deals with, but also those who listen to their false claims. That puts some responsibility on us doesn’t it. We will be held responsible for even a willingness to hear out false teachers. I have heard people tell me that we should be very careful in our use of the “H” word, heresy or heretic, but God seems to say that our giving ear to them will bring about our own judgement. And some say that we should only call a man a false teacher if he speaks against the gospel itself or disagrees with the gospel of grace, I ask you to notice these were not speaking against how a man is saved, but simply putting words in God’s mouth which God had not spoken. As the N.T. specifically declares, have no fellowship with such.
2 John 9-11 Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever greets him takes part in his wicked works.
We could see the same idea in the writing of Paul. For example in Romans 16:17-18 I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.
The doctrines in view are not merely salvation by grace alone through faith alone as if we could only call someone a false teacher if they deviate in that specific area. A false teacher is one who teaches that God says one thing, when God has not said that. So, one who speaks for God when God hasn’t spoken, or one who twists what God has spoken to make God say something other. Be careful, don’t intentionally give ear to those saying other things. Don’t keep the door opened slightly for other perspectives, why on earth would you do that? And I know some who intentionally do just that, and you know what happens, they get sucked into believing false teachings and in the end it leads to turning away from the truth and eventually, judgement. I have heard people tell me that it is not very loving
to say one is a false teacher, why not leave that to God. And my question to these would be this: Not loving toward who? Toward the false teacher? Correction is their greatest need, so I’d say that is loving. But what of God’s flock, I think it to be very loving, in light of the passage I just read, to call out false teachers giving warning to those maybe lesser discerning. In a pastoral role, this is not only loving, it is specifically assigned by God to the role. Shepherds are to give charge to the flock not to listen to false teachers, and further even to silence them if they have the opportunity, read Paul’s letters to Timothy and Titus. Not popular with people who want everyone to have an equal say, but very much biblical, and out of a heart of love.
But let’s come back to the prophet. The role of the prophet was to speak for God, to the people. Its not like everything the prophet spoke was God’s word, but when He spoke, particularly declaring it to be God’s own words, it was just that, infallibly God speaking.
We see that in the Bible there were a lot of false prophets. A false prophet was someone who said God has said, when God had not spoken. This is what the command is warning against. Therefore, Isaiah would have taken this very seriously as a prophet of God. Here he says: Thus says the Lord!
How would you feel saying this? What would be going through your head as you make this statement? James for this very reason says James 3:1-2 “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. For we all stumble in many ways. And if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body.” James’ point is this; the one area you don’t want to stumble with your tongue is in teaching error, because God will judge teachers more strictly. Isaiah knows this and takes it very seriously. You see a false prophet is not only one giving a new revelation claiming to be from God, but one misrepresenting God’s word in any fashion. Thus, be careful James says, don’t rush to be a teacher, because if your not called to that you might just be walking into your own judgement.
Ok. So Isaiah has probably had these things going on in His mind too. But He say it: This is what the Lord says…
I want to point out that as we look at what God has said, we should read this in the context of the entire book of Isaiah. As we do, we will see that this is in fact the summary of the entire book of Isaiah. Here is what the prophet gives as the Word of God.
Isaiah 66:1-2
Thus says the Lord:
“Heaven is my throne,
and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest?
All these things my hand has made,
and so all these things came to be,
declares the Lord.
God says… I am above creation. This is in many ways a simple summary of Isaiah chapters 40-45… In these chapters we see statements like “you people are like grass that withers, but God is forever. You people are so small in your abilities, in your knowledge, in your strength, in your imagination… but the Lord He knows everything there is to know, He has a never ending reservoir of strength, and He is big, He is above it all even naming the stars and calling them out one by one, even measuring out the waters of the oceans. There is none like Him. In your imagination you can’t even create a God as big as He is.” This is the great problem of man-made religion, we can’t think big enough to create a God that even comes close to His enormity. So don’t bother trying. The best you can do is blasphemy. Don’t try to draw pictures of Him in your mind, rather let Him draw the picture. He declares “I will show you who I am.” And He does this in these chapters of Isaiah very well. If you haven’t sat and read Isaiah 40-45 in a while, go home today and refresh your memory of the magnitude and glory of this God. It is amongst the highest pictures given anywhere in scripture.
Acts 17:24-25 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by
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And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed
hands.
anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.
God doesn’t need us. He doesn’t need anything we could ever do for Him. He doesn’t need the intelligence we have. How many times do we try to
council God. “well God if you only knew, well God let me tell you about…” He knows, He doesn’t need our thoughts to give Him added knowledge. He knows it all. I think of this in terms of ministry for my life and the work He has laid before me. He doesn’t need me. He can do as Ephesians 3:20 says… “far more abundantly than all that we ask or think”. To reach people for Jesus, He doesn’t need me. To help people that are hurting, He doesn’t need me. To improve the condition of our city, doesn’t need me. He doesn’t need us, yet He chooses to use us. I read a quote the other day, can’t remember who said it, but it went like this, “The moment you think God needs you for anything, is the moment you become useless to Him”. So true.
And so Isaiah goes continues…
But this is the one to whom I will look:
Remember this is God speaking here. “But to this one I will look” The Hebrew word used here is nabat /naw·bat which we translate to show regard for, to pay attention to, to watch out for. It is sometimes used to signify shining. Last week we looked at the blessing of Numbers 6, that God’s face shine upon you. It is a different word used, but it’s the same idea. To show favor, to give consideration. So Isaiah is about to tell us how we can know that God is watching over us with the eyes of a Father. Here it is: To this one I will look.
he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.
So let’s break this down a little. He who is humble. We all know what this means. Humility is so important to our walk in this journey of faith. Humility is our confession that we aren’t smart enough, that we aren’t strong enough, that we aren’t big enough, but He is. That we need Him. Not just in the really big thing that come at us, but in everything. Paul as He spoke before the men of Athens said we should look to God in humility “, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.” We can’t even breath on our own. The humility of our lives should reflect this. I need you God for everything, because without you, I am nothing but dust. In fact lower than dust, I am corrupted dust.
We have seen this in Matthew 5, poor in spirit, seeing ourselves rightly, mourning over sin’s reality in our lives, and submitting ourselves in humility before a righteous holy God who is perfect in all that He is. It is our responding to seeing self correctly and seeing God as He truly is. Taking our rightful place before this One true living God, and that rightful place is on our face before Him. Humility.
The contrite in spirit. We hear this word “contrite” and we try to picture what Isaiah is saying. We think of Psalm 51 where David says:
Psalm 51:17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
So we see this imagery again but what does it mean? A broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. The word that Isaiah uses, and that David uses in this psalm is the word nakeh /naw·keh from which we translate lame, crippled, smitten, and stricken. This same word is used in 2 Samuel 9:6 in reference to Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan, son of Saul who is “crippled in his feet”. So, applied to a man’s heart, this is a heart not able to walk. Broken, smitten by the conviction of God.
2 Cor. 7:8-11 For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it—though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you,
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without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.
earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.
Contrite. The word says that the heart of man is wicked. A contrite heart is a wicked lame heart, crippled, broken and reset like a doctor sets a broken arm in order to mend it properly. A heart in knowledge of its own condition and mourning over it and of itself unable to do anything about it, and so mourning.
though only for a while.
grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. For you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us.
10 For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation
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As it is, I rejoice, not because you were
For see what
But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.
And trembles at my word. I’ll tell you, one of the scariest things I have ever done in my life is to open this book and preach a message from the Word of God. This isn’t just a book. It is fearful thing to say this is what God is saying. I don’t want to misuse His name. I don’t want to proclaim a message that is not faithful to what this book says. I tremble, I pray, I look to my life to see if this is something God needs to deal with me on, before I speak it, and I speak it in humility knowing that it is not my thoughts that matter, nor my ideas that are important, but His truth which I must very carefully speak. 2 Timothy 2:14-17 Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene. Care is needed on my part lest I myself fall into the category of false teacher; God help me.
Trembles at my word. In the message of Isaiah, God has been saying I am showing you who I am in my word. There is one place where we are going to see an accurate picture of God. If we are looking anywhere else, we are just not going to see it. If we are looking for signs and wonders, if we are looking at the great thinking of the wisest of men, if we are looking at our conscience, our imagination, or at what has been made, we will surely see something of God in these, but if we want to see a picture that we can absolutely trust, if we want to see a picture as complete as possible that was painted specifically to give us what we need to know, look to the Word of God. And we should tremble. As we open the pages of this book we should do it knowing there is nothing in the whole world like this book. There is nowhere else where we can get what this book offers. This book is out of this world literally. God breathed, the scripture says. We should tremble. I had one person a number of years ago, who claimed to be a Christian, who accused me and those like me of “worshipping the bible instead of God”. Boy that might sound real spiritual, but it is very undiscerning, you see, you cannot separate the two, if you worship the God of the Bible, He is found in the Word of God. You cannot find the Lord of the Word, without seeking out the Word of the Lord.
We should approach this book asking God to open our minds to the truth He wishes to speak to us, realizing that as He speaks and directs our lives, when we exit this book it is God that has spoken, and we are called and responsible to respond. We tremble because when He speaks, He is right. When He speaks of our lives, He is right, and we are to respond to Him in great humility submitting ourselves to His voice.
How do we respond to this book? Confess, acknowledge our sin, repent, make restitution, bow down, surrender. And because of what this book is, we should find ourselves as children of God finding it difficult not to be sending our time in this book. That if we go without it a day, it is like we suffer like not eating. We become malnourished without it and we will die. Malnourishment kills. Many believers are walking around malnourished. No strength, no courage, no hope simply because they are not feeding on the Word. And when that happens, we start living more on what we think than on what He says. Do you tremble when you come to the Word of God. This is a good trembling. This is not something that drives us away from the Word, but rather something that draws us to be in it.
This is the person that God look on and watches out for. Humility, a lame broken spirit, and a fear and hunger for His Word. The hunger that I can’t live without it, the fear that I will walk away from it and not allow it to change who I am.
Now, let me say something, just to bring clarity here. I don’t at all want us to get the idea that it is something in us, our response to sin in us, our response to the word of God, or anything else that God somehow sees and evaluates which motivates or that enables or moves Him to save us. God’s salvation is not in any way conditioned upon our response to Him, rather, God’s salvation, and God’s working of the Holy Spirit in us moves us to respond to Him in these ways. Don’t get that order confused. We must be very careful that we don’t put our response, in any way, ahead of God’s working in bringing about our salvation. These things that Isaiah has mentioned; humility, contrite in spirit, and trembling at His word, do not precede regeneration, in fact they cannot. Before regeneration occurs we are suppressors of the truth of God. Outside of God’s work of regeneration in a man, which the Spirit of God works through the hearing of the gospel of Jesus Christ, there will never be any of these. No conviction of sin, no mourning over it, no fear of the Lord, no humility before Him, no trembling at the truth of His word. If you wait to see these in any man before
preaching the gospel to him, you will wait for all of eternity and never see it come to pass. These are the workings of regeneration, of new creation, and apart from that new creation it will never occur.
Isaiah then goes on to tell us about another major theme that goes along with this in His prophetic message in this book, and that is the thoughts of God toward men’s ideas of religion.
“He who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a man;
he who sacrifices a lamb, like one who breaks a dog’s neck;
he who presents a grain offering, like one who offers pig’s blood; he who makes a memorial offering of frankincense, like one who blesses an idol.
These have chosen their own ways,
and their soul delights in their abominations;
I also will choose harsh treatment for them
and bring their fears upon them,
because when I called, no one answered,
when I spoke, they did not listen;
but they did what was evil in my eyes
and chose that in which I did not delight.”
Hear the word of the Lord,
you who tremble at his word:
“Your brothers who hate you
and cast you out for my name’s sake
have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified,
that we may see your joy’;
but it is they who shall be put to shame.
“The sound of an uproar from the city!
A sound from the temple!
The sound of the Lord,
rendering recompense to his enemies!
Apart from regeneration, this is all that man will come up with in thoughts of religion. This is the picture of man-made religion, man coming to God on man’s terms. Coming in pride, honoring not God but the offerings he brings God. Like God somehow is blessed because I showed up to bring this offering to Him. We see this is Isaiah chapter 1 as well, where the prophet talks about Israel and their worship and God says “I hate your worship”.
Isaiah 1:10-15 Hear the word of the LORD, you rulers of Sodom!
Give ear to the teaching of our God,
you people of Gomorrah!
“What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the LORD;
I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts;
I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats.
“When you come to appear before me, who has required of you
this trampling of my courts?
Bring no more vain offerings;
incense is an abomination to me.
New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations— I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.
Your new moons and your appointed feasts
my soul hates;
they have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
When you spread out your hands,
I will hide my eyes from you;
even though you make many prayers,
I will not listen;
your hands are full of blood.
We see something similar in the book of Amos.
Amos 5:21–23 I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the peace offerings of your fattened animals, I will not look upon them. Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen.
I am not going to hear your songs or your prayers. Why? Because you are not humble, you’re not broken, and don’t tremble at my Word. You approach God on man’s terms and God will not accept it. This is a great picture of the natural man. What does 1 Cor. 2 tell us about the natural
man? 1 Corinthians 2:14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
This is the best the natural man can do. He can’t understand spiritual truth, so He devises his own means of appeasing God by his acts of religion. He creates a god appeasable, and in his creation it is the acts the man is willing to offer which most satisfy this imaginary god. We, who have come to know the one true living God, we thank Him that He doesn’t leave us in that. (BTW I ask you to notice in that passage in Isaiah 66 and man’s terms for coming to God that these hate those whose relationship to the Lord is purely based on grace. It has always been this way).
God will only embrace those who come on His terms, and those who come by His terms are only those in whom God so works as to move them to come by the work of regeneration within as He, by His Spirit, brings understanding of Spiritual truth. Don’t expect any conviction or turning in a natural man, it won’t happen, not ever. He does not accept the things of the Spirit, why? Because He doesn’t have the Spirit and it requires the Spirit to understand spiritual truth.
2 Cor. 4:3-6 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
That says exactly the same thing as 1 Cor. 2:14. The natural man is blind and unable to see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, but God… just as He spoke in creation to bring about all that is, speaks light in the new man, and he does this through His Spirit working in conjunction with the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Humility, contrite in Spirit, trembling at His word, none of this is possible apart from the working of the Spirit in a man first. The man in whom God brings new life has new ears to hear, a new mind to understand, a new heart to bow before the rightful King of the universe. Humility, contrition of
heart, and proper response in trembling before God’s word, these are in fact by products of God’s work of regeneration. As stated in Ezekiel 36, God causes us to walk in his statues and keep His commands as a result of the removal of the heart of stone and replacing it with a heart that loves Him and longs to live for Him. On those in whom the Lord so works, this is the one to whom the Lord looks.