Micah McCormick: Turn to Isaiah.
Micah McCormick: If you have a Bible with you, turn to Isaiah, chapter 41.
Micah McCormick: If you want to grab the Pew Bible there, if you don't have a Bible today, you can find our passage starting on page 636.
Micah McCormick: Isaiah 41, we're continuing to move through this book of Isaiah, and the passage we're going to look at today begins in chapter 41, starting with verse 21.
Micah McCormick: And then we'll look down through chapter 42, verse 9.
Micah McCormick: And we'll focus especially on those first seven verses of chapter 42.
Micah McCormick: Now, it's a little unusual to be in the middle of one chapter or the middle of the next, but keep in mind, there's no chapter divisions.
Micah McCormick: When Isaiah first composed this, it was all one book.
Micah McCormick: So we're going to take that chunk of the scripture today Isaiah 41, verses 21, through verse 42, 9.
Micah McCormick: I'll read this for us Submit your case, says the Lord.
Micah McCormick: Present your arguments, says Jacob's king.
Micah McCormick: Let them come and tell us what will happen.
Micah McCormick: Tell us the past events so that we may reflect on them and know the outcome.
Micah McCormick: Or tell us the future.
Micah McCormick: Tell us the coming events, then we will know that you are gods.
Micah McCormick: Indeed.
Micah McCormick: Do something, good or bad, then we will be in awe when we see it.
Micah McCormick: Look, you are nothing and your work is worthless.
Micah McCormick: Anyone who chooses you is detestable.
Micah McCormick: I have stirred up one from the north and he has come one from the east who invokes my name.
Micah McCormick: He will march over rulers as if they were mud, like a potter who treads the clay.
Micah McCormick: Who told about this from the beginning, so that we may know, and from times past, that we might say he is right?
Micah McCormick: No one announced it, no one told it, no one heard your words.
Micah McCormick: I was the first to say to Zion look, here they are, and I gave Jerusalem a herald with good news.
Micah McCormick: When I look, there is no one.
Micah McCormick: There is no counselor among them.
Micah McCormick: When I ask them, they have nothing to say.
Micah McCormick: Look, all of them are a delusion.
Micah McCormick: Their works are non-existent and their images are wind and emptiness.
Micah McCormick: Look, this is my servant.
Micah McCormick: I strengthen him.
Micah McCormick: This is my chosen one.
Micah McCormick: I delight in him.
Micah McCormick: I have put my spirit on him.
Micah McCormick: He will bring justice to the nations.
Micah McCormick: He will not cry out or shout or make his voice heard in the streets.
Micah McCormick: He will not break a bruised reed and he will not put out a smoldering wick.
Micah McCormick: He will faithfully bring justice.
Micah McCormick: He will not grow out a smoldering wick.
Micah McCormick: He will faithfully bring justice.
Micah McCormick: He will not grow weak or be discouraged.
Micah McCormick: Until he has established justice on earth, the coasts and islands will wait for his instruction.
Micah McCormick: This is what God, the Lord, says.
Micah McCormick: Who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk on it?
Micah McCormick: I am the Lord.
Micah McCormick: I have called you for a righteous purpose and I will hold you by your hand.
Micah McCormick: I will watch over you and I will appoint you to be a covenant for the people and a light to the nations, in order to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the dungeon and those sitting in darkness from the prison house.
Micah McCormick: I am the Lord.
Micah McCormick: That is my name, and I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols.
Micah McCormick: The past events have indeed happened.
Micah McCormick: Now I declare new events.
Micah McCormick: I announce them to you before they occur.
Micah McCormick: Let's pray again, lord.
Micah McCormick: We're seeking you today.
Micah McCormick: The God who knows our hearts, knows our hearts in ways that we can't even know our hearts.
Micah McCormick: Yet all things are open to you, the one that we give account, to Give us listening ears today.
Micah McCormick: Thank you that you give us scriptures that bring us such hope and consolation.
Micah McCormick: May we find that here through your word in Jesus' name, amen.
Micah McCormick: What do you do when you fail?
Micah McCormick: Well, if at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
Micah McCormick: What happens when that doesn't really work and you seem to keep failing?
Micah McCormick: People are often looking for some kind of hope.
Micah McCormick: It could be something as silly as when I feel down, I just I go eat a Nathan's hot dog and then I know everything is right in the world again.
Micah McCormick: Or it could be something more significant, like you go and talk to a friend about whatever's going on in your life.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes people find hope in songs, some kind of combination of the lyrics, the poetry, the melody.
Micah McCormick: It lifts their spirits, spirits.
Micah McCormick: In our passage today in Isaiah, we come to the first servant song, and it's a song of hope against a backdrop of failure.
Micah McCormick: Listen for the song of the servant.
Micah McCormick: Isaiah has four particular passages that are often identified as servant songs Isaiah 49, verses 1 to 6, isaiah 50, verses 4 to 11, isaiah 52, 13 to 53, 12, and then included in our passage for today, isaiah 42, 1 to 7.
Micah McCormick: Now they're called servant songs because they're poetic, lyrical passages and they all bring out God's servant, this figure that is described in different and complementary ways.
Micah McCormick: Who is the servant?
Micah McCormick: Well, back in Isaiah 20, the prophet Isaiah himself is called God's servant.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes kings like Nebuchadnezzar or Cyrus could be described in some sense as a servant of God.
Micah McCormick: If you look back to chapter 41 of Isaiah, verse number 8 from last week, even Israel as a nation is called a servant of God.
Micah McCormick: But then, as chapter 42 begins, this is my servant, or some of your translations might even say behold my servant.
Micah McCormick: God is pointing us to a servant that is much greater than Isaiah or kings of the world or even nations like Israel.
Micah McCormick: Some of you that are a little more familiar and acquainted with your Bibles might recognize those first four verses of chapter 42.
Micah McCormick: The verses that I read there in part.
Micah McCormick: Those are verses that Matthew quotes in his gospel.
Micah McCormick: In Matthew chapter 12, matthew cites those verses.
Micah McCormick: I read behold my servant.
Micah McCormick: I put my spirit on him.
Micah McCormick: He will not cry aloud.
Micah McCormick: He quotes those verses and applies them directly to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: So we know where this is going, but don't rush to the end of the song too quickly.
Micah McCormick: There's these people that always want to rush to the end of the song.
Micah McCormick: You've got that friend Every time Stairway to Heaven comes on, they want to rush to the conclusion.
Micah McCormick: Let the song build, but listen for the song of the servant.
Micah McCormick: It's a song of great hope but, as I said, it's set against this backdrop of failure.
Micah McCormick: Verses 8 and 9 of chapter 41 from last week Israel, my servant Jacob, whom I've chosen.
Micah McCormick: Why did God choose Israel to be his special servant?
Micah McCormick: One of the reasons, one of the purposes that he announced to them was they could be a light to the nations as they loved God and worshiped him and obeyed him.
Micah McCormick: Other nations could look and see wow, I want to be like them, I want to serve and know this God.
Micah McCormick: But they failed.
Micah McCormick: They actually became more like the other nations.
Micah McCormick: They turned to idolatry, just like the other nations.
Micah McCormick: Now, before we clock our tongues too much at Israel, have any of us done much better?
Micah McCormick: I don't mean have you gotten a good grade on a test, or have you ever won a softball championship, or have you ever gotten that job promotion.
Micah McCormick: I mean in our moral condition before God, when God tells us things like be holy as I am holy, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you.
Micah McCormick: Haven't we all failed?
Micah McCormick: Israel's problem is really humanity's problem.
Micah McCormick: But listen for the song of the servant, listen for this beautiful hope that God offers to us.
Micah McCormick: Now we're going to look especially at this first servant song today, but before I dive into that song, I want to spend just a little more time talking about the composer of the song.
Micah McCormick: I don't mean Isaiah.
Micah McCormick: He's the human author, yes, but I'm speaking of the God who inspired Isaiah to write these verses.
Micah McCormick: God is the one who orchestrates all of history.
Micah McCormick: These verses, god is the one who orchestrates all of history.
Micah McCormick: And, as the passage that we read opens, in chapter 41, verse 21, the Lord says submit your case.
Micah McCormick: Let me hear your arguments.
Micah McCormick: This sounds a little more like a courtroom drama than a music studio, but it's important for us to understand the gravity of who this God is.
Micah McCormick: And the very first thing God does is issue a future telling challenge.
Micah McCormick: You see that in verse 40, in chapter 41, verses 22 and 23, where God there invites these other so-called gods yeah, come in, tell us the past, tell us the future, then we'll know that you're legitimate.
Micah McCormick: Tell us the past, tell us the future, then we'll know that you're legitimate.
Micah McCormick: But they can't because they're worthless.
Micah McCormick: Then, if you look ahead to the last couple of verses.
Micah McCormick: I read chapter 42, verses 8 and 9,.
Micah McCormick: There God reiterates the unique ability that he has.
Micah McCormick: I am the Lord.
Micah McCormick: That is my name.
Micah McCormick: I won't give my glory to another.
Micah McCormick: The past events have indeed happened.
Micah McCormick: Now I declare new events, I announce them to you before they occur.
Micah McCormick: So God's telling Israel this is who I am.
Micah McCormick: I can tell the future.
Micah McCormick: That's what makes him God.
Micah McCormick: There was a movement called open theism.
Micah McCormick: It still exists.
Micah McCormick: It was a little more well-known a couple decades ago, but these were people who said we're Christians but we believe God doesn't know the future, or at least there's significant amounts of the future that God doesn't know.
Micah McCormick: And in their minds that made God more able to live life alongside of you in a relatable way, like if something bad happens to you, god is just as surprised as you are, but he's going to walk right there beside you.
Micah McCormick: Now there's a lot of problems with that viewpoint, but a big one is that it makes God not really God.
Micah McCormick: Our passage makes it very clear that that's what it is to be.
Micah McCormick: The true God is to know the future exhaustively, perfectly, and God does that.
Micah McCormick: And if God doesn't know the future with certainty.
Micah McCormick: How can that provide hope?
Micah McCormick: Why would we think the future is going to be any different than the present?
Micah McCormick: But God knows the future because he's ultimately in control, and you can see that here in our passage.
Micah McCormick: Look at chapter 41, verse 25, where God says I've stirred up one from the north and he has come.
Micah McCormick: God knew that Israel would be attacked by nations like Assyria or like Babylon, because he was in control and because he's in control, when he offers a song of hope, it's bound to come to pass.
Micah McCormick: Listen for the song of the servant.
Micah McCormick: When we look at these first verses in Isaiah 42, this first servant song, we see that God's servant carries out God's purposes.
Micah McCormick: How does he do that?
Micah McCormick: I'm going to give you four ways.
Micah McCormick: I'm going to highlight four ways that God's servant carries out God's purposes here in this first servant song carries out God's purposes here in this first servant song.
Micah McCormick: If you want to think of these as sort of four lines of music that perfectly harmonize if that's helpful to you.
Micah McCormick: If that's not helpful to you, don't worry about it.
Micah McCormick: Number one the servant shows the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: That's in verses one to three of Isaiah 42.
Micah McCormick: Number two the servant establishes justice.
Micah McCormick: In the first four verses Number three the servant fulfills the covenants.
Micah McCormick: That's from verse number six.
Micah McCormick: And then number four the servant restores what was lost.
Micah McCormick: So let's consider first how this servant shows the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: Verse 2 again he will not cry out or shout or make his voice heard in the streets.
Micah McCormick: He will not break a bruised reed.
Micah McCormick: He will not put out a smoldering wick.
Micah McCormick: He will faithfully bring justice.
Micah McCormick: Put out a smoldering wick, he will faithfully bring justice.
Micah McCormick: When the text says here that the servant doesn't cry out or lift up his voice, it doesn't mean the servant is shy.
Micah McCormick: It means he's not the guy at the beach on the 4th of July blasting music like he owns the whole beach and he doesn't care about anyone else.
Micah McCormick: Right Proverbs 9, verse 13,.
Micah McCormick: The woman folly is loud.
Micah McCormick: The servant of Isaiah 42 is not a fool, he's wise, and part of that wisdom is a tender heart.
Micah McCormick: He does listen, he does understand, he does sympathize with his people.
Micah McCormick: Verse three gives us two additional images breaking a bruised reed.
Micah McCormick: Additional images Breaking a bruised reed, putting out a smoldering wick.
Micah McCormick: Maybe when you were younger I did this sometimes.
Micah McCormick: But you're in a marshy area and you want to build something, or you want to maybe have a play fight with your brother or some friends and you go to grab a reed and you can't always tell by looking at it.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes you grab a reed and it's wet and just flops over in your hands.
Micah McCormick: What do you do?
Micah McCormick: You discard it.
Micah McCormick: That's not going to work for what I need to do here.
Micah McCormick: What happens when you've got a candle and the candle's down towards the end and it just doesn't seem to stay lit?
Micah McCormick: Well, you just discard it and get a new one that works.
Micah McCormick: Our Lord doesn't discard people that are bruised, he lifts them up.
Micah McCormick: Our lord doesn't clap a cup over a flickering flame.
Micah McCormick: He blows on it, he restores it.
Micah McCormick: It that's the heart of the servant we find here in this passage.
Micah McCormick: And I say that the servant is showing the tender heart of God because in verse 1 of chapter 42, god says that he puts his own spirit on the servant, not a different spirit, his own spirit.
Micah McCormick: If you've forgotten Isaiah 30, verse 18, let me remind you of that verse.
Micah McCormick: Therefore, the Lord is waiting to show you mercy.
Micah McCormick: He's rising up to show you compassion.
Micah McCormick: The servant is not the nice guy who's trying to calm God down.
Micah McCormick: The servant is the son sent from the father's side, who reveals the very heart of God, same nature, a nature filled with tender mercy.
Micah McCormick: God wants to show us who he is.
Micah McCormick: How often did Jesus reach out to touch people that were untouchable, to restore people who were wounded?
Micah McCormick: Are you sick and sore today?
Micah McCormick: Jesus, ready, stands to save you.
Micah McCormick: Are you bruised today?
Micah McCormick: If you're not today, you will be one day.
Micah McCormick: The servant's there for you.
Micah McCormick: God is there for you.
Micah McCormick: If you're interested in thinking more about this wonderful attribute of the Lord's servant, I could recommend a book called Gentle and Lowly by Dane Ortlund.
Micah McCormick: Or there's another older book by a man named Richard Sibbes.
Micah McCormick: The language is a little more difficult, but it's a great book of compassion called the Bruised Read, drawn right from the language of our passage here today.
Micah McCormick: Listen to a few of the things that Richard Sibbes says.
Micah McCormick: None are fitter for comfort than those that think themselves furthest off from that comfort.
Micah McCormick: Again, there's more mercy in Christ than sin in us.
Micah McCormick: A mother who has a sick and self-willed child will not cast it away for that reason.
Micah McCormick: And shall there be more mercy in the stream than there is in the spring?
Micah McCormick: Shall we think there is more mercy in ourselves than in God, who plants the feeling of mercy in us.
Micah McCormick: And then one last quote from Sibbes the consciousness of the church's weakness makes her willing to lean on her beloved and to hide herself under his wings.
Micah McCormick: The servant shows us the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: Second, the servant establishes justice.
Micah McCormick: You see three different times in the first four verses of chapter 42 that motif.
Micah McCormick: So listen for that as I read again this is my servant, I will strengthen him.
Micah McCormick: This is my chosen one.
Micah McCormick: I delight in him.
Micah McCormick: I've put my spirit on him.
Micah McCormick: He will bring justice to the nations.
Micah McCormick: He will not cry out or shout or make his voice heard in the streets.
Micah McCormick: He will not break a.
Micah McCormick: There it is again.
Micah McCormick: He will not grow weak or be discouraged until he has established justice on the earth.
Micah McCormick: Now already we're hitting a potential tension between this second way the servant carries out God's purpose and the first way.
Micah McCormick: When we think of people that establish justice, we think of people that get things done.
Micah McCormick: When we think of tenderhearted people, we don't always think of people who get things done right.
Micah McCormick: Imagine just a hypothetical example.
Micah McCormick: Imagine you have a country and a leader who seemed kind, but he seemed a little bit feeble right Now imagine purely hypothetical example.
Micah McCormick: Let's imagine you've got a country and they have a leader that seems a little more energetic and effective in some ways.
Micah McCormick: But maybe compassion isn't really his strong suit.
Micah McCormick: What's impossible with man is possible with God and with human politicians.
Micah McCormick: We don't know what's in their heart, we don't know how much of their display is in their heart or what's just for show.
Micah McCormick: But God is showing us his heart here.
Micah McCormick: He's tenderhearted and yet he's able to accomplish all of his holy will.
Micah McCormick: He's able to bring about justice.
Micah McCormick: So the servant establishes justice and as he does that, he carries out God's missionary purpose.
Micah McCormick: Let me unpack that argument In this particular passage, isaiah 42,.
Micah McCormick: I don't think here that Isaiah is emphasizing God's final judgment against his enemies.
Micah McCormick: That's true, that's coming.
Micah McCormick: Christ returned with a rod of iron to take vengeance on those who don't trust in him.
Micah McCormick: But here Isaiah is focused on the servant's redemptive rule, his saving rule.
Micah McCormick: Now why do I say that?
Micah McCormick: Well, first I'll give you a few reasons.
Micah McCormick: First, in Hebrew, the word that's translated here as justice multiple times in this passage, is a word that has a lot of variety in Scripture.
Micah McCormick: It's used an awful lot in the Old Testament.
Micah McCormick: It sometimes does have the idea of retributive justice.
Micah McCormick: In other words, you did something wrong, now punishment's coming, or tribute of justice.
Micah McCormick: It has that in scripture, but that's not the only way that it's used.
Micah McCormick: It's also used at other times to refer to laws or ordinance, god's plan for what justice would look like as it's lived out.
Micah McCormick: Leviticus 18.5 says keep my statutes and my justices.
Micah McCormick: To say it kind of literally like that, a person will live if he does them.
Micah McCormick: Here in Isaiah 42, the servant's bringing about a right state of affairs where his law is loved and honored.
Micah McCormick: And what does the Bible prophesy about the new covenant?
Micah McCormick: He'll write his law on our hearts.
Micah McCormick: Another reason I emphasize this saving rule of the servant is in verse 4, there are parallel clauses.
Micah McCormick: Not trying to bore you with fancy words, but I want you to see this.
Micah McCormick: This is a section of poetry words, but I want you to see this.
Micah McCormick: This is a section of poetry.
Micah McCormick: Often in poetry one line says something similar to the previous line to help expand it and confirm it in some way.
Micah McCormick: So if you look at the second line of verse four, it says that he will establish justice on the earth.
Micah McCormick: And then the third line running parallel to that says the coasts and islands wait for his instruction or for his law, depending on what your translation might be.
Micah McCormick: So earth in that second line goes with coasts and islands, all people everywhere.
Micah McCormick: But then that means that justice goes with instruction or law.
Micah McCormick: Do you see that how?
Micah McCormick: Instruction and law is another way of talking about what God's justice looks like here in this passage, the people far off need to hear God's instruction, his law.
Micah McCormick: That was true in Israel's day.
Micah McCormick: It's still true in our day.
Micah McCormick: They need to know who God is and what he wants for them to know him and how to honor him and love him and obey him.
Micah McCormick: A third reason I'm arguing that justice here is focused more on God's rule of redemption is because it fits the context of the following verses.
Micah McCormick: So if you look at verse six, it says the servant is a covenant for the people, not a covenant against the people.
Micah McCormick: He's a light to the nations, he's not judgment against the nations.
Micah McCormick: And then verse 7 also speaks more of his saving activities.
Micah McCormick: Okay, so the servant is establishing justice, he's bringing about a right state of affairs, the well-ordered desires that God wants.
Micah McCormick: You might say, okay, mike well and good.
Micah McCormick: You might say, okay, mike, well and good.
Micah McCormick: The servants?
Micah McCormick: Peace on earth, goodwill to men.
Micah McCormick: He's bringing in God's rule.
Micah McCormick: I don't see it.
Micah McCormick: What I see are wars and rumors of wars.
Micah McCormick: Keep in mind we haven't seen the end of everything yet.
Micah McCormick: God is patient.
Micah McCormick: He's slow to establish his work and his rule and his reign.
Micah McCormick: And in this age, the age before Jesus Christ returns, where we should see God's laws lived out the best, the best are in our churches, not in our parliaments.
Micah McCormick: Now we want politicians to be saved.
Micah McCormick: We want movie stars and athletes and social media influencers.
Micah McCormick: We want them to get saved.
Micah McCormick: We want God's law everywhere, but where we see it especially lived out are the people who have those new hearts and the law written on their hearts.
Micah McCormick: So that should be first and foremost in our churches in this present age.
Micah McCormick: That should be first and foremost in our churches in this present age.
Micah McCormick: And yes, sadly, sometimes even churches can look more like an ornery and bickering world than like this redemptive rule of God.
Micah McCormick: But we want to ask if a church is a place more about division and discord than about Christ's tender heart and just laws, we have to ask are we really, then showcasing the glorious rule and reign of Christ, the way that we should be?
Micah McCormick: Or you could personalize that question.
Micah McCormick: If I'm so consumed with my own personal idea of what I think justice needs to be and there's no aroma of Christ in my life, do I really know him?
Micah McCormick: Has he given me that new heart?
Micah McCormick: Or am I just saying I'm a Christian?
Micah McCormick: And this is where I have to warn you, as Isaiah does often throughout the book if we live simply professing to know Christ but our hearts are really far from him, we don't know him.
Micah McCormick: If we live under that hypocrisy, then there's only an expectation of judgment.
Micah McCormick: If you're here today and you just don't listen for the song of the servant you just plug your ears to that song then there's judgment coming for you.
Micah McCormick: Then there's judgment coming for you.
Micah McCormick: But when you come and kneel, there's mercy, because there's more mercy in Christ than there is sin in you.
Micah McCormick: God's servant.
Micah McCormick: Number one shows the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: Number two he establishes justice.
Micah McCormick: Number three he fulfills the covenants.
Micah McCormick: I'm getting this from verse six.
Micah McCormick: I am the Lord.
Micah McCormick: I've called you for a righteous purpose.
Micah McCormick: I will hold you by your hand, I will watch over you and I will appoint you to be a covenant for the people and a light to the nations.
Micah McCormick: I'll appoint you to be a covenant for the people.
Micah McCormick: That's an unusual expression.
Micah McCormick: The Bible talks a lot about covenants, but here's God speaking to his servant and saying that he'll appoint his servant to be a covenant.
Micah McCormick: What does that mean?
Micah McCormick: A covenant is an agreement between two people, like a contract, but covenants are more personal and in scripture, god is usually the one who comes and sets the terms of his covenant with his people.
Micah McCormick: But how do you make a servant a covenant?
Micah McCormick: If you're going to buy a house and you show up, sign the contract, what are the issues here?
Micah McCormick: And the owner says, oh, there's no contract, but here's my son, he's the contract.
Micah McCormick: What does that mean?
Micah McCormick: I don't know that.
Micah McCormick: I was bargaining for this.
Micah McCormick: You got to explain that to me.
Micah McCormick: Well, in order to understand.
Micah McCormick: If we're going to understand this verse and it's so powerful when we can grasp what God is saying here In order to understand what it means for God to appoint his servant to be a covenant, we really have to understand the whole history of God's covenant dealings with his people in the Bible.
Micah McCormick: Now don't say, oh boy, I thought we were in points three or four.
Micah McCormick: We're doing well, but this refreshing leftover watermelon is going to have to wait a while, more than I thought.
Micah McCormick: If we're going to go through the whole, we're not going to do a deep dive into every aspect of God's covenants with his people, but let me just summarize it for you.
Micah McCormick: God comes to people and says this is how we're going to relate.
Micah McCormick: I'm going to do these things and you're going to do these things.
Micah McCormick: And God always holds up his side of the bargain, but humans constantly fail.
Micah McCormick: God blesses Adam and Eve, and they sin.
Micah McCormick: God blesses Noah he goes and gets drunk.
Micah McCormick: God blesses Abraham he says, well, I'll have a son through my servant in order to really help things out.
Micah McCormick: God blesses Israel, and they go make a golden calf.
Micah McCormick: Do you understand that?
Micah McCormick: Covenant failure after covenant failure?
Micah McCormick: God is the faithful, divine covenant partner and he's looking for the faithful human covenant partner, but he can't find one, so he provides one.
Micah McCormick: The servant is the faithful human covenant partner.
Micah McCormick: He has to be truly human to be what God is looking for.
Micah McCormick: But if he's merely human, he's just going to fail, like all other humans fail.
Micah McCormick: So the servant is human and yet he's also divine.
Micah McCormick: The servant is the fulfillment of all of those covenant obligations.
Micah McCormick: He's not just a model for us.
Micah McCormick: This is very important.
Micah McCormick: God is not saying all right, humanity here having some problems, I'm going to send my servant now.
Micah McCormick: Watch and learn.
Micah McCormick: He'll teach you how to obey.
Micah McCormick: He does do that.
Micah McCormick: But if you think the gospel is that God will help you to obey him better, you don't understand the gospel.
Micah McCormick: Yes, christ will put the law on our hearts.
Micah McCormick: We'll slowly and progressively begin to want to know him and obey him more and more.
Micah McCormick: That happens, but that's not the good news.
Micah McCormick: The good news is Christ has come and done it all.
Micah McCormick: That's the first and glorious thing to understand.
Micah McCormick: He is a perfectly fulfilled covenant, signed, sealed and delivered to you as a gift.
Micah McCormick: Last line of music in this first servant song, the servant restores what was lost.
Micah McCormick: Verse 6 says that God will make the servant to be a light for the nations.
Micah McCormick: Well, that was part of Israel's purpose.
Micah McCormick: And now here's a servant coming along and doing it.
Micah McCormick: They were blinded by idolatry.
Micah McCormick: He's going to open blind eyes.
Micah McCormick: God had already told Abraham, the very father of the Israelite people, in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed.
Micah McCormick: It's not just Israel.
Micah McCormick: It was God's intention to bless all kinds of people.
Micah McCormick: This goes back well before Israel, to Adam and Eve in the garden.
Micah McCormick: Be fruitful and multiply that his image might be filling all the earth.
Micah McCormick: The servants restoring what was lost.
Micah McCormick: Verse number seven the servant brings prisoners out of the dungeon.
Micah McCormick: The Lord brought Joseph out of the prison house in Egypt.
Micah McCormick: The Lord brought his people out of slavery from Egypt and took them in the promised land.
Micah McCormick: And our Lord Jesus Christ frees those who were held captive to evil.
Micah McCormick: Hebrews, chapter two.
Micah McCormick: We're no longer prisoners If we trust in Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: We've turned from our sins.
Micah McCormick: We're sons and daughters of God through faith in him.
Micah McCormick: And there's more.
Micah McCormick: Throughout Isaiah We've seen these themes of a new creation.
Micah McCormick: We'll see them as the prophet continues on in future chapters.
Micah McCormick: That begins by turning from sin, because if anyone's in Christ 2 Corinthians 5, he's a new creation.
Micah McCormick: But one day all the effects of sin in the world will be gone forever.
Micah McCormick: One day will be perfected in every way spiritually, emotionally, even those physical stains and blemishes gone because of the work of the servant.
Micah McCormick: The Lord declares it in Isaiah's day.
Micah McCormick: The Lord declares it in Isaiah's day and he knows the future and orchestrates all of history.
Micah McCormick: So the song is surely going to come to pass.
Micah McCormick: What has been lost will be restored, and the end is even greater than the beginning.
Micah McCormick: This should be music to our ears.
Micah McCormick: Are we listening for the song of the servant?
Micah McCormick: The servant shows us the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: He establishes justice, he fulfills the covenants, he restores what was lost, and we'll see more in future.
Micah McCormick: Servant songs in the book of Isaiah.
Micah McCormick: These songs don't necessarily come with a John Philip Sousa marching band loudness.
Micah McCormick: They come with the Spirit's work in our hearts.
Micah McCormick: Listen for the song of the servant.
Micah McCormick: There's a story that's told.
Micah McCormick: I think it's a work of historical fiction, but it illustrates something.
Micah McCormick: In this story it's World War I and there's a man who works for the British army but he's constantly being monitored and watched by German spies and he tries to figure out how can I let the British soldiers know?
Micah McCormick: I have information and I'm with them, without the Germans knowing?
Micah McCormick: And he comes up with an idea to sing a song.
Micah McCormick: Well, how is that going to help?
Micah McCormick: He sings a song.
Micah McCormick: That's an old Scottish tune that's not known by everyone, but it works.
Micah McCormick: And the Germans, the enemies, don't know, but the people that have ears to hear the British.
Micah McCormick: They recognize it and that helps him get the information that wins the battle leads to great success for Britain.
Micah McCormick: Who knew that a little song could reveal so much?
Micah McCormick: The people of Israel are in desperate trouble in Isaiah's day and left to ourselves.
Micah McCormick: We're all in much worse trouble, but help has come because the servant has come.
Micah McCormick: Christ has come.
Micah McCormick: Do we have ears to hear?
Micah McCormick: Let's pray that we do.
Micah McCormick: Lord God, oh Lord, how we praise you for tuning our ears to sing your praise and the song that might be despised by the world.
Micah McCormick: We understand that our Christ himself was despised and rejected by people, but how beautiful he is, if not beautiful in outward splendor and majesty while he lived, yet beautiful nonetheless to those whose hearts are aching for redemption, who find the guilt and weight of our own repeated failure, and to know that this Christ draws near to us and it's part of your plan, oh Lord, thank you, father, son and Spirit, for being a God of such deep compassion and to provide a way, when there was no way, to provide yourself as a substitute for us.
Micah McCormick: Lord, would our hearts abound in praise, would our hearts be filled not most with our guilt but even more with the saviors.
Micah McCormick: Who's come to take that away?
Micah McCormick: That there's no condemnation to those of us who are in Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: Lord, as we continue to press on through this book of Isaiah, we thank you and we pray that you would indeed tune our hearts to sing your praise, to sing this song of the servant.
Micah McCormick: And even now we thank you that these elements show us about the tender heart of God.
Micah McCormick: These elements show us about forgiveness and compassion and reconciliation.
Micah McCormick: So we take these elements with musical joy in our souls.
Micah McCormick: We pray in Jesus' name, amen.