Nothing to say, yet
Transcription
There is still angels flying around his throne singing holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and who is and who is to come. The whole earth is filled with his glory. There is worship happening 24-7 around the throne. That has never stopped. There's chaos down here. There's craziness going on down here. But God is still on the throne. Welcome to Elevate from Authentic Life Church in Mobile, Alabama with Pastor John DeQuatro. We hope it fills your faith. It helps you to live a life for God that you've always wanted to live. We hope it inspires you to be a fully devoted, authentic follower of Jesus Christ. Enjoy the message and welcome to Elevate. We are continuing in the story today. Hopefully, you are caught up, up through Chapter 17. Today, we're going to talk about Isaiah. Isaiah, one of the major prophets of the New Testament. He was a man of great wisdom. He was a man of great wisdom. He was a man of great wisdom. He was a man of great wisdom. 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This is the true and real King of Israel. And if you remember, Israel was never meant to have an earthly king. God never wanted them to have a king. They begged God for an earthly king, and God finally relented to their stubbornness and gave them Saul and then a succession of evil kings, right? And now, here they are in this mess. But Isaiah, he sees the King of kings. He sees the true leader of Israel. Let me tell you something, folks. The answer in our nation, in the chaos that we're facing right now, is not another king. I'm telling you, Donald Trump or Joe Biden or Republicans or Democrats or any other earthly power that promises that they have the answers, that's not where the answer is. In a world where morality is declining and evil is rising and the church is being minimized as having any authority and any voice, there is still one King, and His name is Jesus. And if we can get on His agenda, if our nation can get on the true King's agenda, we're going to be okay. Let's move on. Verse 2. Above Him were seraphim, each with six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, and two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying, and they were calling to one another, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord Almighty. The whole earth is full of His glory. At the sound of their voices, the doorposts and thresholds shook, and the temple was filled with smoke. This is a picture of the glory and the majesty and the splendor of Jesus in heaven. Angels flying around crying, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord Almighty. It's an amazing picture and glorious, what we see as a snapshot of what's going on in heaven. Today, right now, I want you to know this, today we are inundated with cancel culture, threats to free speech, inflation, high gas prices, high unemployment, abortion, issues that we never thought we would be dealing with, like the whole transgender thing and the attempted destruction of basic biblical and biological truths about men and women. It's crazy. Things seem bleak. And the future can seem very fearful. Yet, through all of this, that scene is still going on in heaven. That hasn't stopped. He is still just as worthy. He is still just as much the King. There are still angels flying around His throne singing, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty Who was and Who is and Who is to come. The whole earth is filled with His glory. There is worship happening 24-7 around the throne. That has never stopped. There's chaos down here. There's craziness going on down here. But God is still on the throne. And He is still worthy of our worship. So don't get distracted by the culture and the fear that the enemy wants to put on you. God is still King. And He has a plan. And we're moving closer and closer to the culmination of that plan when Jesus comes to claim His bride and set up His kingdom and He will destroy all evil and pronounce judgment on Satan, the perpetrator of all this wickedness. Be encouraged today. Isaiah, he needed to see this. He needed this vision. He needed this upward vision. He needed to see into the heavenly realms. Yeah, the times were different. The issues that they were facing were different than what we face now. But Isaiah needed to be reminded that Israel didn't need an earthly king. They needed a heavenly one. And they had one. So now, Isaiah has seen this heavenly vision. He's seen the Lord's glory in this scene of heavenly worship around the throne. And he has a response. In verse 5, he says this, "'Woe to me,' I cried, "'I am ruined, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.'" Let me tell you, Isaiah's response here is not how we typically respond to the Lord when we are convicted or have an encounter with Him. Most of us would say, God, I'm sorry. I haven't been very good. I've done this and I've done that and things are just so hard and I've been influenced by so-and-so and I've made some bad decisions and the devil made me do it. But I'll try harder. I'll really be good this time. I'll get my act together. But that's not how Isaiah responded. In seeing the glory of heaven and the majesty of the King of kings and the Lord of lords, he says, oh, it's me. I'm ruined. I'm unclean. He just comes face to face. No excuses. He just comes face to face with his condition, his sinful condition. And I think the problem in Isaiah's day and we're facing the same problem today is that we have become numb and insensitive to God. We don't really feel convicted much anymore. We live in a society where anything goes and don't you dare tell me what I can't do. Just a little cheating. A little greed. God understands. Just a little anger. Just a little selfishness. Just a little compromise. Surely God didn't understand the culture we'd be living in in 2023 when He told us what was right and what was wrong, what was good and what was evil. Surely. Charles Finney, the great revivalist of the 19th century, made a list of some indicators that we are living in a compromised state and slowly falling away from our relationship with God and thereby our effectiveness in this world. And so if you have a pen and a slice of paper or you have a notes app on your phone, now is a really good time to take some notes. So he gave us this list of 10 indicators that we are living in compromise and we are slowly beginning to fall away from our relationship with God. Number one is a lack of spiritual enjoyment. Listen, when Jesus stops becoming your greatest joy and you've lost your first love, this is an indicator that your heart is slipping into a backslidden state. Number two is outward formality. When our serving of the Lord is the result of habit rather than the outgushing of heart love and we no longer feel emotion for Jesus, we've turned away from God. When we're just coming to church and we're punching the clock and we're doing the thing because we're supposed to do the thing, that's a sign that you're slipping. Number three, an ungoverned temper. When we just find ourselves in an irritable, uncontrolled temper, where anger is the first thing that rises up in us, it's an indication that you're compromising and you're separating yourself from your relationship with God. Number four, when your conversation changes and it stops being about Jesus and spiritual things and you just talk about everything else, but Jesus is never uttered from your lips, it's an indication that your heart has found another love. Number five, searching for worldly amusements. When everything else but Jesus is giving you delight and joy, it's an indicator that you've begun to lose Jesus as the center of your life. Number six, when we have lost our concern over lost souls or over the poor and the needy, it's an indication that the Spirit of Christ within you, that you're beginning to separate from that and you're beginning to live in your flesh. Number seven, a fault-finding and critical spirit. When you blame and judge and doubt others, it's evidence that the fruit of the Spirit in your life is missing. Number eight, a self-indulgent spirit, gratifying our appetites and passions in our flesh, showing that you are putting your flesh over your spirit and over your relationship with God. Number nine, when prayer is seen as a duty rather than a privilege, it's a sad indicator of a back slit in heart that prayer is something you only do because you have to. And number ten, a lack of interest in God's Word. You know, to a Christian, no book in the world should be more precious than the Word of God. But when our love for Jesus begins to dissipate, the Bible not only becomes uninteresting, but often it can become repulsive to us, an indicator that your heart is becoming separated from your relationship with God. Now I don't know if you recognize yourself at all in any of those ten things that Charles Finney put together for us to kind of gauge how we're doing, but if you identify with any of those things, today is a day that you can get that right and we'll give you that opportunity today. But Isaiah's response in this moment is to recognize his sinfulness, to recognize his compromise, to recognize his apathy. And rather than make excuses and plead with God, he utters these words, Woe to me! I am ruined. I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips. Listen, he just gets honest. And I think that's the first step for all of us. Whether we have never placed our faith in Christ for the forgiveness of sins, or we have begun to fall away from our relationship with God and allowed sin to once again dominate our lives, listen, just be honest with yourself and with God. And when I say be honest, I don't mean be accommodating. It's not a confession of, well, this is who I am, but God loves me anyway. I'm good enough. I'm smart enough. And doggone it, people like me. It's not an opportunity for positive confession. It's an opportunity for repentance. God, there's no excuses. I'm a sinner and I need You. Recognize your sin. Be honest about it. And put it in perspective of the holiness and majesty of the Lord. You see, Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up in all of His glory and majesty. He was on His throne. His holiness, His perfection, His utter worthiness was on display and Isaiah's only response was one of humility and an honest recognition of sin. Friends, that's what we've got to get in our own lives. Many of us are displaying some of this list that Charles Finney gave us and we may not even realize how far we are in our relationship with God. But with a little humility and a little repentance, we can return back to that vibrant relationship or turn to Him for the first time. Humble yourself and allow yourself to see just how sinful you are. It's okay. Be honest about it. So, so far, Isaiah has seen upward. He's gotten this heavenly vision. And it's caused him now to look inward. He's got this inward vision, the state of his own heart. But then we move on to verse 6. And it says, Then one of the seraphim flew to Me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched My mouth and said, See, this has touched your lips. Your guilt is taken away and your sin is atoned for. Listen, prayers prayed with humble, repentant hearts like Isaiah's, Woe to me, I'm a man of unclean lips. Prayers prayed with humble and repentant hearts are the prayers that God answers most readily. David knew it. Look at what he wrote in Psalm 51. He says, You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it. You do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise. God here responds to Isaiah's brokenness and He sends one of the angels to the altar to pick out a live coal and to cleanse Isaiah's lips. Now this altar, that would be the brazen altar. Now this is a heavenly vision. So this would be the brazen altar there. Now we see the same thing in the replication in the temple. The brazen altar. And this was the altar of worship upon which sacrifices would be made to atone for sin. The coal from that altar represents substitute sacrifice. The fire itself always represents the wrath of God, which must fall on the sacrifice. But it wasn't Isaiah in this moment doing the sacrificing. The coal, the fire of sacrifice, was used to cleanse Isaiah from his impure lips, his sinful heart, his wandering affections. The substitute sacrifice. Biblical scholar Raymond Ortland Jr., author of the book Isaiah, God Saves Sinners, wrote this. He says, A seraph peels off from his flight path around the throne, diving straight for Isaiah. He's holding a burning coal that he took from the altar with tongs, but not because it is hot. After all, a seraph himself is a burning one. He took his coal with tongs because it is a holy thing. It belongs to the place of sacrifice and atonement and forgiveness. But this holy thing touches Isaiah's dirty mouth and it does not hurt him. It heals him. And what we must see in the context of the whole Bible is that this burning coal symbolizes the finished work of Christ on the cross. Substitute sacrifice. It wasn't Isaiah that was making himself righteous. It wasn't Isaiah trying to be a good boy in order to become worthy of being the oracle of God, the mouthpiece of God. No, it was the substitute sacrifice that God Himself cleansed him. After touching his lips with the coal, the angel declared in verse 5, your guilt is taken away and your sin is atoned for. This was an act of mercy and of grace toward Isaiah. It was a pardoning love. It was not good works that brought about his healing and his transformation. Do you need that this morning? Are you tired of the same old sin day in and day out, week in and week out, year after year, just eating away at you? There's forgiveness and there's atonement for you made possible by the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. It was substitute sacrifice. A sacrifice that you should have made, but don't have to. And it's there to heal you and to cleanse you of all sin and unrighteousness. And so, he's cleansed now. His sin has been atoned for. And then we move on to verse 8. Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send? And who will go for us? And I said, here am I. Send me. And this is where the whole heavenly vision was leading to in this moment. Isaiah had an upward vision, the heavenly scene, the heavenly vision. He had an inward vision. He was able to see the filthiness and the dirtiness of his own heart. And now, because he has been cleansed because of substitute sacrifice, he is challenged to have an outward vision. God has shown Isaiah the glory and majesty of the throne room. Isaiah has been confronted and humbled by his sin. God pays for his sin for him and cleanses him. Why? Because he needed to get to this question. Who will I send? And who will go for us? Listen, He saves, forgives, and rescues you. Not just so that you can be saved, forgiven, and rescued. That's not the only reason. It's so that you can go for Him. That's purpose. That's authentic identity. That is the why behind all of this. And so I'll ask you this morning, come to church. Look what it says in Ephesians 4, and this ought to be why. This ought to be why you come to church. Beginning in verse 11, so Christ Himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers to equip His people for works of service so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Listen, Paul says it. He says, I give you these spiritual leaders not to pacify you or placate you or entertain you. I gave them to you to equip you to be mature believers that are about the Father's business, that can answer the question, Here I am. Send me God. Let me tell you something. Your pat on the back and you say, Good sermon, Pastor. I mean, it feels nice. I'm just like all of you. I like words of affirmation. It's one of my love languages. It feels good, but it means nothing to me if you don't act on the Word and allow yourself to move on towards maturity in Christ. I am not interested in accolades for a well-crafted sermon or for good stage presence. I am not moved by your agreement with the words that I have said, because when I lay my head on my pillow at night, I don't rehearse your praises in my mind. I think about the ones that I see that are being discipled, whose lives are being changed, who are finding their place in the Kingdom. That's what brings me joy. That's what excites me. Not the praises. And why is that? Because that's my calling, according to this Scripture, to equip you. And so when you are being equipped and you are doing and being what God has called you to be, I've done my job. So why do you come to church? Let me tell you, it's so that you can go from this place. Because God is looking for someone. Who will go for me? Whom shall I send? And while we're so busy, worried about the trappings of this world and keeping our eyes focused downward, looking at our feet as we walk around, rather than having our eyes squarely set on Jesus Christ, we're not doing anything for Him. We've got to get into this place where when He says, Who will go? Who can I send? And we say, Here I am. Send me. Listen, it's all about multiplying the Kingdom on the earth. Save people. Serve people. Save people. Save people. Save people. Seek God. Save people are about the Father's business. That is what He is looking for. Whom shall I send? Who will go for me? He's asking you about your availability. So bring the family. For Pastor John DiQuatro, I'm Scott Chestnut. Thanks again for listening and God bless you.
