The State Of The Union – Part 1
Isaiah 1:1-31 (1-3)
February 5, 2023
So this morning we’re going to begin a new study together
And it is a study through the book of Isaiah.
I realize that it is a daunting study to begin simply because of it’s length
And so with us finishing up Psalms tonight we will study Isaiah
Both on Sunday morning and Sunday nights.
Isaiah is certainly the most well-known of the Old Testament prophets.
• His 53rd chapter is one of the most recognizable chapters in the whole Bible.
• Many a missionary has echoed Isaiah’s “Here am I. Send me!”
• And quite frankly Isaiah is even one of the favorites of the New Testament writers since his name is mentioned 22 times in the New Testament.
This morning we want to first introduce the book
And then begin our study.
Very important to your understanding of the book,
As with most of the Old Testament prophets,
Is the MEANING OF HIS NAME.
Isaiah means – “The LORD is Salvation”
And far from just a theological fact,
It is also the call of the entire book of Isaiah.
It is a reminder to God’s people
That though this world offers a multitude of would be saviors,
THERE IS ONLY ONE.
And that is the LORD.
Isaiah 43:3 “For I am the LORD your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior; I have given Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in your place.”
Isaiah 43:11 “I, even I, am the LORD, And there is no savior besides Me.”
Isaiah 45:15 “Truly, You are a God who hides Himself, O God of Israel, Savior!”
Isaiah 45:21 “Declare and set forth your case; Indeed, let them consult together. Who has announced this from of old? Who has long since declared it? Is it not I, the LORD? And there is no other God besides Me, A righteous God and a Savior; There is none except Me.”
Isaiah 49:36 “I will feed your oppressors with their own flesh, And they will become drunk with their own blood as with sweet wine; And all flesh will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior And your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.”
Isaiah 60:16 “You will also suck the milk of nations And suck the breast of kings; Then you will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior And your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.”
It is the driving point of the entire ministry of Isaiah.
And to make sure you rightly apply his message you also need to know
That Isaiah is preaching TO A COVENANT PEOPLE.
That is NOT to say that he is preaching only to saved people,
For he most certainly is not.
It becomes quite apparent that
Though these people occupy the Holy Land
And though they call themselves the people of God,
THEY DO NOT KNOW GOD.
• As Paul would teach us in Romans, “they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel” and that becomes apparent in the book of Isaiah.
• God will actually refer to them in chapter 30 as “false sons”.
SO ON ONE HAND
We read Isaiah sort of like we would John 14:6 or Acts 4:12.
John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”
Acts 4:12 “And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.”
We often quote those verses TO THE LOST as a way of revelation to show them that there is no other way to be saved than to trust in Jesus Christ.
HE IS THE ONLY SAVIOR.
And certainly that is a major point of Isaiah throughout this book
As he calls unbelievers to trust in the LORD.
YET ON THE OTHER HAND
It’s not only an evangelistic book. It’s also a book of revival.
For the call that God is the only Savior
Is also a message for the wayward redeemed.
Even those who knew the LORD had grown very cold toward Him
And had begun to look in other places for their salvation.
During the ministry of Isaiah the nation will face 2 MAJOR CRISIS.
1) When Aram and Israel unite to try and wipe out Judah.
• That one they will refuse to trust God, instead turning to Assyria, and the results will be nearly totally fatal.
2) When Assyria invades Israel to destroy her.
• That one Hezekiah will determine to trust the LORD and Judah will be delivered.
SO THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE BOOK VERY MUCH DICTATE
THE CALL TO TRUST IN GOD AS YOUR ONLY SAVIOR.
Only God is the Savior.
Only in Him do we find salvation.
Both the lost and the redeemed alike need to know this.
Of course Isaiah also DOESN’T STOP THERE.
Not only does Isaiah remind continually that the LORD alone is the Savior, Isaiah will INTRODUCE THE ONE through Him God will save.
While Jesus is pictured and promised throughout the Old Testament,
Perhaps no prophet gets more specific or gives more information
About this coming Savior than Isaiah does.
• It is Isaiah who announces His virgin birth.
• It is Isaiah who announces this child called “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace”
• It is Isaiah who writes that He will come to set the captives free and give freedom to the oppressed and to open the eyes of the blind.
• It is Isaiah who speaks of His suffering and how they will beat Him and mock Him and even pluck out His beard.
• It is Isaiah who gives such great detail of His substitutionary atonement on the cross.
• It is Isaiah who speaks of His zeal to put on the armor of God and to come and crush His enemies.
• It is Isaiah who speaks of His kingdom when He comes to reign upon the earth.
ISAIAH IS HERE TO SHOW YOU THE SAVIOR.
Namely because WE ALWAYS NEED A SAVIOR
AND THERE IS ONLY ONE.
THIS IS THE DRIVING FORCE OF THE BOOK.
THIS MORNING we want to begin our journey through it.
First let’s just examine THE SETTING.
(1) “The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz concerning Judah and Jerusalem, which he saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.”
Perhaps you notice a little DIFFERENT TERMINOLOGY
Than the last prophet we studied.
• Malachi was said to bring an “oracle” or a “burden” from God to the people.
• We talked about how burdened God was and indeed the prophecy of Malachi bore that out.
But Isaiah isn’t credited with a burden, he is credited with “The vision”
WHAT IS THIS VISION?
You are familiar with the beginning of Isaiah’s ministry.
Isaiah 6:1 “In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple.”
Isaiah said: “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne”
Isaiah’s vision is NOT primarily about future events,
Though he will reveal a number of them.
ISAIAH’S VISION IS ABOUT THE LORD.
Isaiah is revealing who God is.
ISAIAH SAW THE GLORY OF THE GOD OF ISRAEL.
And to make sure we are traveling down the correct track
Let’s make sure you understand exactly WHO IT WAS that Isaiah saw.
John 12:36-41 “These things Jesus spoke, and He went away and hid Himself from them. But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him. This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet which he spoke: “LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT? AND TO WHOM HAS THE ARM OF THE LORD BEEN REVEALED?” For this reason they could not believe, for Isaiah said again, “HE HAS BLINDED THEIR EYES AND HE HARDENED THEIR HEART, SO THAT THEY WOULD NOT SEE WITH THEIR EYES AND PERCEIVE WITH THEIR HEART, AND BE CONVERTED AND I HEAL THEM.” These things Isaiah said because he saw His glory, and he spoke of Him.”
John quotes Isaiah twice in that passage.
• The first quotation is from Isaiah 53 and the second is from Isaiah 6.
But notice what John added at the end.
“These things Isaiah said because he saw His glory,
and he spoke of Him.”
Who is the “Him” John is talking about?
JESUS.
John says that when Isaiah walked into that temple and saw the Lord
It was Jesus whom he saw.
That’s who this book is about.
It is about the Savior.
Isaiah is shown a vision of Jesus
And his objective is to drive Israel to that Savior.
Now we also note that this vision was NOT primarily for everyone.
It was “concerning Judah and Jerusalem.”
Isaiah will give several prophetic details about the northern kingdom.
Just as Isaiah will give prophetic oracles about many nations like:
• Babylon (ch 13)
• Moab (ch 15)
• Syria (ch 17)
• Ethiopia (ch 18)
• Egypt (ch 19)
• Edom (ch 21)
• Arabia (ch 21)
• Tyre (ch 23)
But it’s not like those nations heard (at least not initially) these prophecies
Isaiah was not a foreign missionary like Jonah.
Isaiah spoke of all these nations and their fate,
But the message was for God’s people.
WHY?
1. To show that in their false gods they had no Savior.
2. And to show Israel that those nations would be no Savior to them.
How many times was Israel tempted to run to Egypt for deliverance?
How many times did they want help from some other nation?
But those nations were a false hope and could not save.
Isaiah not only pointed to the real Savior,
But he goes to great effort to expose false ones.
He is preaching to Judah and to Jerusalem
Seeking to get them to trust in the LORD and to trust in Him alone.
And we also see the TIME PERIOD
In which Isaiah ministered, and this is important to grasp.
“during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.”
Isaiah received His commission from the LORD in the year Uzziah died
So he barely ministered during Uzziah’s reign,
But knowing about Uzziah is still important
To understanding the spiritual condition of the people.
LET’S DO A QUICK HISTORY LESSON
On those 4 kings so you’ll know what Israel was like in Isaiah’s day.
WE START WITH UZZIAH.
• From a political standpoint…
• From an economic standpoint…
• From a military standpoint…
• UZZIAH WAS AS GOOD AS THEY COME
You don’t have to turn there but you can read 2 Chronicles 26
And find how he restored the borders of Judah.
• One town in particular named “Eloth” had been stolen from Israel and Uzziah recaptured it.
• Uzziah (also called Azariah) subdued land from the Philistines into Judah.
• The Ammonites were so in awe of him that they sent tribute to Judah while he was on the throne.
• He fortified walls and towers.
• He built engines of war on the towers that would fling large amounts of arrows or stones.
• He stocked up on military supplies.
• And it was said in his day that he amassed a great and skilled army of 307,500 soldiers.
In the days of Uzziah the borders were secure the economy was stable and Judah was the envy of her neighbors.
He reigned on the throne for 52 years and from a purely worldly perspective it was a great time to live in Jerusalem.
However, from God’s perspective Uzziah was a dud.
When we studied through the books of the kings
We called him “The King Who Accomplished Nothing”
For all that Uzziah did and for all that is listed about him in the book of Chronicles THIS IS ALL the writer of Kings had to say about him.
2 Kings 15:1-7 “In the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Azariah son of Amaziah king of Judah became king. He was sixteen years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-two years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Jecoliah of Jerusalem. He did right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father Amaziah had done. Only the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places. The LORD struck the king, so that he was a leper to the day of his death. And he lived in a separate house, while Jotham the king’s son was over the household, judging the people of the land. Now the rest of the acts of Azariah and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? And Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David, and Jotham his son became king in his place.”
To say he did right like Amaziah is not much of an accommodation
Since Amaziah’s heart turned away from the LORD.
But the glaring failure of his reign is that despite all his economic and political success “the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.”
We also learn of his arrogant maneuver when he tried to offer sacrifices in the temple
And God struck him with leprosy.
His epitaph in the book of Kings reads like if someone at my funeral said,
“Rory preached in Spur for 20 years and did good in the sight of the Lord as those before him. He remodeled the sanctuary and the kitchen and the women’s bathroom. His sons painted the trim of the church. The church finances were stable during his leadership. Nevertheless sin was never confronted and no one repented and no one in the church trusted Christ.”
That would be a horrible legacy, but that was Uzziah.
If you’re in to worldly comfort and ease, he’s your guy,
But Israel took some major strides backward spiritually during his reign.
And in the year he died Isaiah is commissioned to preach.
And then we come to his son JOTHAM.
• Jotham would reign for 16 years in Jerusalem
• When we studied the kings we called him “The Ineffective King”.
Like his father, he had much political success,
But also like his father the nation continued to regress spiritually.
2 Chronicles 27:1-6 “Jotham was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. And his mother’s name was Jerushah the daughter of Zadok. He did right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father Uzziah had done; however he did not enter the temple of the LORD. But the people continued acting corruptly. He built the upper gate of the house of the LORD, and he built extensively the wall of Ophel. Moreover, he built cities in the hill country of Judah, and he built fortresses and towers on the wooded hills. He fought also with the king of the Ammonites and prevailed over them so that the Ammonites gave him during that year one hundred talents of silver, ten thousand kors of wheat and ten thousand of barley. The Ammonites also paid him this amount in the second and in the third year. So Jotham became mighty because he ordered his ways before the LORD his God.”
Jotham did some really good things just like his father had done.
However:
2 Kings 15:34-37 “He did what was right in the sight of the LORD; he did according to all that his father Uzziah had done. Only the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places. He built the upper gate of the house of the LORD. Now the rest of the acts of Jotham and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? In those days the LORD began to send Rezin king of Aram and Pekah the son of Remaliah against Judah.”
You read it again don’t you?
The writer of kings treats his accomplishments like a big – “SO WHAT!”
• SO WHAT he built the upper gate…
• SO WHAT he subdued the Ammonites…
• SO WHAT he built cities and walls…
“the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.”
Like his father Jotham did everything but the main thing.
Not a bad guy but totally ineffective.
His 16 year reign was the first years of Isaiah’s ministry.
It was a prosperous time.
But Israel, due largely to her feeling of security, was drawing further and further away from God.
• They were enamored with the high places.
• They were enamored with these pagan deities.
And it was during the reign of Jotham
That God started to say, “ENOUGH!”
We read that “In those days the LORD began to send Rezin king of Aram and Pekah the son of Remaliah against Judah.”
God started attacking their precious security and prosperity.
This attack comes full force during the reign of Jotham’s son AHAZ.
While Uzziah and Jotham were good men, though ineffective,
Ahaz was a product of their tolerance and apathy.
Ahaz, due largely to the complacency of his father and grandfather,
Had no desire for God at all.
2 Kings 16:1-4 “In the seventeenth year of Pekah the son of Remaliah, Ahaz the son of Jotham, king of Judah, became king. Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem; and he did not do what was right in the sight of the LORD his God, as his father David had done. But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and even made his son pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had driven out from before the sons of Israel. He sacrificed and burned incense on the high places and on the hills and under every green tree.”
His father and grandfather left the high places and Ahaz used them.
Judah’s apostasy was now going full force.
The nation was departing from God.
So God began to afflict Jerusalem and Judah.
He sent Israel and Aram to attack Judah and to try and overthrow Ahaz.
It was at that critical moment that Isaiah approached Ahaz and told him to trust God
• Ahaz would not.
• Instead he employed the king of Assyria to come and fight on his behalf.
• He did, and it worked.
• Ahaz was so grateful he even traveled to Assyria copied the pagan altar to the Assyrian god and had an exact replica built in the temple court in Jerusalem.
• Jerusalem was turning pagan.
• It appeared to be a shrewd move by Ahaz, for the king of Assyria would totally annihilate the northern kingdom and carry them off into exile.
The problem was that the king of Assyria wouldn’t stop.
The son of Ahaz would face the battle of his life.
THAT WAS HEZEKIAH.
Unlike his father before him Hezekiah was a king who trusted God.
He is definitely in the top 5 of the great kings of Israel.
2 Kings 18:1-6 “Now it came about in the third year of Hoshea, the son of Elah king of Israel, that Hezekiah the son of Ahaz king of Judah became king. He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah. He did right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father David had done. He removed the high places and broke down the sacred pillars and cut down the Asherah. He also broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the sons of Israel burned incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan. He trusted in the LORD, the God of Israel; so that after him there was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor among those who were before him. For he clung to the LORD; he did not depart from following Him, but kept His commandments, which the LORD had commanded Moses.”
In his day Assyria would attack and nearly completely annihilate Judah,
But Hezekiah trusted God and God delivered Jerusalem from his hand.
And Hezekiah represents THE GLORIOUS UPSWING
That occurs at the end of the book of Isaiah.
You can follow the mood of the book as you follow the kings who sit on the throne.
• It begins in apathy and false religion with threats of God’s judgment.
• It walks through times of hardship and suffering wrath.
• It ends with God’s promises of redemption for those who trust Him.
It follows the pattern of the men who sit on the throne.
But this cultural backdrop is important to your understanding
Of why Isaiah is saying what he is saying.
Isaiah is preaching to a comfortable people.
• Their land is prospering
• Their borders are secure
• So calling on God and seeking His salvation is far from their minds.
• Because of their ease they are running into paganism and idolatry.
But as Isaiah warns, times grow increasingly more difficult.
• Their ease and comfort is stripped away
• They fall nearly to the brink of annihilation
• The only thing that saves them is faith in the only Savior.
And while many in Judah are destroyed
God begins to separate the wheat from the tares
And it is the remnant who emerges secure because they trust God.
And Isaiah’s preaching walks through every ounce of that with them.
FOR US there are very relevant warnings and almost eerie similarities.
We are NOT going to compare Israel to the United States as we study,
Though certainly circumstances seem similar.
No, we compare Israel to the church.
• And we see how times of ease and safety can so quickly lead God’s people to grow lazy and complacent.
• And we see how God may very well begin to bring about hardship and danger to drive us from our idols back to our only Savior.
The message is a good one for God’s church
And one that we eagerly begin this morning.
SO YOU HAVE THE SETTING
Well, in the short time we have left,
Let’s introduce this INAUGURAL SERMON of Isaiah.
Here’s the new preacher and this is sermon number 1.
I like to call it “The State of the Union”
There are 3 main topics that God will discuss with the nation.
#1 REBELLION
Isaiah 1:1-9
(2) “Listen, O heavens, and hear, O earth; For the LORD speaks,”
God calls all of creation, almost like in a courtroom
To bear witness to the news that He is about to announce
About this nation of His people.
In an almost shocking revelation
God takes the podium in front of a global stage
And announces that Judah has been taken by rebel extremists.
• There is a group of anarchists that has arisen.
• There is a rebel faction who is walking in opposition.
• They have in effect seceded from the union and war is brewing.
It is somewhat of a shocking announcement from God
To a NATION THAT WAS CURRENTLY IN SUCH A PLEASANT SITUATION.
• All their external enemies were currently at bay.
• Uzziah had defeated the Philistines.
• Uzziah was receiving tribute from the Ammonites.
• The defenses were strong.
• The army was large.
• Judah was enjoying peace and prosperity.
But God is announcing that Judah is falling and falling from within.
Then God begins to lay out the details of this rebellion.
1) THE REBEL’S IDENTITY (2-3)
“Listen, O heavens, and hear, O earth; For the LORD speaks, “Sons I have reared and brought up, But they have revolted against Me.”
This is not a foreign army invasion.
This is a civil war of sorts.
“Sons I have reared and brought up,”
It brings to our minds
All that we know about ISRAEL’S SOVEREIGN SELECTION by God.
Throughout their history Israel has always been referred to as
“God’s Chosen People”
We’re reminded of passages like:
Deuteronomy 7:7-8 “The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but because the LORD loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”
Or:
Hosea 11:1 “When Israel was a youth I loved him, And out of Egypt I called My son.”
There Israel actually referred to as God’s son.
Or that famous passage in Ezekiel 16 where God so graphically outlines His grace to save Israel when she was but a disregarded baby.
TURN TO: EZEKIEL 16:1-14
Our minds travel back to Genesis 12
• Where, for no apparent reason,
• God approached a pagan idol worshiper named Abram
• And promised him descendants and land and great blessing.
THE POINT WE REMEMBER IS SIMPLE.
Israel didn’t approach God for the relationship, God approached Israel.
• He chose them.
• He saved them.
• He cared for them.
• He became a God and Father to them.
IT WAS NOTHING BUT PURE GRACE.
The beginnings of the nation of Israel
Was a 90 year old pagan idolator with a barren wife,
But God chose them.
• He made them His children.
• He delivered them from Egypt.
• He gave them the Promised Land.
• He subdued their enemies around them.
And now in a shocking move those sons have rebelled.
“Sons I have reared and brought up, But they have revolted against Me.”
It’s the shock of that younger son in the parable of the prodigal.
• Who terribly disgraced and humiliated his father by demanding his half of the
inheritance.
• He took all that was his and then abandoned the father to go live up the world.
It was unthinkable disrespect.
It was totally undeserved
Anyone watching objectively from the outside would be shocked.
That is the type of shocking rebellion mentioned here.
To further explain the shock we read:
(3) “An ox knows its owner And a donkey its master’s manger, But Israel does not know, My people do not understand.”
An “ox” is a beast of burden.
• It is a hard-working animal and incredible strong,
• But it’s not known for its great intellect.
If you see a big guy doing manual labor and you call him an “ox”
He might not be flattered by the comparison.
A “donkey” is also a beast of burden.
• It is also a hard-working animal but it comes with a definite reputation.
• A donkey is stubborn.
Many of you have actually seen the phenomenon of a donkey that determines to just sit down. And it doesn’t matter what you do to it, it won’t move.
And God turns to the “ox” and the “donkey”
To make an analogy about His people.
Even a dumb ox “knows its owner”
That is to say, even the ox knows who is in charge.
Even a stubborn donkey knows “its master’s manger”
That is to say, even the donkey knows who to trust and follow for care.
“But Israel does not know, My people do not understand.”
WHAT IS GOD SAYING?
My people are dumber than the ox and more stubborn than the donkey.
You’d think after all I have done for them that they’d understand
What a good thing they have going with Me and yet they don’t.
They don’t know Me and they don’t trust Me.
Now we’ll have to stop here for the time being,
BUT LET’S LEAVE WITH THIS THOUGHT.
What is it that Israel doesn’t know about God?
What is it that Israel doesn’t trust about God?
What is it that they “do not understand”?
NAMELY THAT GOD IS THEIR SALVATION
It is a tragic thing when even the people of God
Fail to realize that God is their only hope and salvation.
It is a tragic thing when God’s people begin to trust the world
And look to the world for their deliverance
Instead of to the God who has shown nothing but good to them.
We sing sometimes that song, “I Lay It All”
I love the second verse which says:
“When questions rise, when faith wears thin
When fears come fast, and truth grows dim
The One Who saved will not forsake
I’ll trust His word and trust His way
For He Who bore my blame
Can bear each care I name”
https://sovereigngracemusic.org/music/songs/i-lay-it-all/
THIS IS THE QUESTION OF ISAIAH.
DO YOU BELIEVE THAT?
If you can trust God for salvation can you not also trust Him for provision and deliverance and for your marriage and in raising kids, etc.
Israel had apparently decided that they could not
And they were running to the world for worldly solutions.
AND GOD SAW THIS AS REBELLION.
May we be reminded that God is the only Savior in your life
And that includes more than just salvation from hell.
LEARN TO TRUST HIM.
