Doug McMasters: Let's take our Bible and go to the book of Isaiah.
Doug McMasters: We're going to look at two chapters this morning chapters 46 and 47.
Doug McMasters: If you don't have a Bible, you can find one in the pew in front of you and you can turn right around the page 643, 4, somewhere in that region you'll find chapter 46 and 47.
Doug McMasters: There was once a man in the 20th century who seemed to have everything fame, fortune, power.
Doug McMasters: His name was Howard Hughes, and for much of the 20th century he was the symbol of American success.
Doug McMasters: He built airplanes that broke records, he produced films that dazzled Hollywood.
Doug McMasters: He had the power to make or break an actor's career.
Doug McMasters: He amassed the fortune that made him one of the richest men in the world.
Doug McMasters: But behind all of that glamour was a man who was slowly being crushed by the very things he worshipped.
Doug McMasters: Fame, which was once to him very intoxicating, became unbearable, and later in life he withdrew from the public eye, terrified of germs and judgment, and would hold himself up in dark hotel rooms for months at a time.
Doug McMasters: Wealth, which was once a sort of pride, lost its luster and he lived an austere life.
Doug McMasters: At the end of his days.
Doug McMasters: Control, which was his ultimate idol, left him empty.
Doug McMasters: His days spent micromanaging every detail and obsessing over perfection found him left at the end of his days, pathetically trying to control the uncontrollable.
Doug McMasters: He spiraled into paranoia, fear and isolation, and by the end of his life, Howard Hughes was an emaciated wreck, addicted to painkillers and left utterly alone.
Doug McMasters: This man, who once literally soared above the clouds, was buried by the things he tried to grasp.
Doug McMasters: He was weighed down by things he was never meant to carry and he tried to carry things that were never meant to carry him.
Doug McMasters: We live in a world full of burdens ourselves today and instead of learning the lesson from people like Howard Hughes, we seem to continue to repeat them over and over and over again.
Doug McMasters: We stack onto our shoulders crushing burdens that we think will lift us, but actually bow our neck and our back and eventually bury us.
Doug McMasters: Social media gods can be cruel.
Doug McMasters: You can just ask Natalie Reynolds, who was an influencer on TikTok.
Doug McMasters: She had millions of followers and she got upset, and a couple of months ago it was in the paper she was banned on TikTok, and I'm not sure exactly why, but she was, and there's a little clip of a film showing her outside the social media's corporate offices, on the phone to her dad, screaming in agony Dad, they won't let me in, I need my account.
Doug McMasters: Whatever they do reinstate it, we're not any different than Hughes or Reynolds.
Doug McMasters: Whether it's the pursuit of fame, or the illusion of control, or the pressure to maintain an image, our culture keeps handing us burdens disguised as blessings.
Doug McMasters: We chase those things that promise to deliver us and we find ourselves weighed down by them, and they can't sustain us.
Doug McMasters: And it's into this burdened world, not only in Isaiah's day, but also into our day, that Isaiah 46 and 47 speaks, and it speaks to us with clarity, a piercing clarity here in Isaiah, as we'll see, isaiah steps into this cluttered marketplace in Babylon where idols are bought and sold and hauled around like oversized luggage, and into the midst of that he declares a message from God that God is the one who carries, that God is the one who accomplishes his salvation and that God is also the one who humbles the proud.
Doug McMasters: These two chapters will confront the idols that they carried, and it confronts the idols that we carry.
Doug McMasters: It confronts the empires that we trust or fear, but not just with condemnation alone, but with a wondrous, wondrous statement that he is the one who carries and he never falters.
Doug McMasters: And as we look at these two chapters, we're going to discover more about God.
Doug McMasters: We're going to discover that, as he exposes the futility of idols and the fragility of human pride, that he is going to reveal himself as the king the king who can carry his people, the king who can accomplish his purposes and the king who can humble.
Doug McMasters: The proud.
Doug McMasters: And the implications of that are extremely important for us, because if he alone can carry, then we can drop the burdens that are weighing us down.
Doug McMasters: If he alone can accomplish salvation, then we can rest in that redemptive plan.
Doug McMasters: And if he alone can humble, we can trust him to bring justice.
Doug McMasters: And if he alone can humble, we can trust him to bring justice, to destroy Babylon, yes, but also to destroy all those powers which seek to oppress us.
Doug McMasters: Let's take a look at these two chapters.
Doug McMasters: First of all, in the first seven verses of chapter 46, we see that the Lord carries his people, and it begins in verse 1 with this remarkable statement Bill crouches, nebo, cowers.
Doug McMasters: Idols depicting them are consigned to beast and cattle.
Doug McMasters: The images you carry are loaded as burdens for the weary animal.
Doug McMasters: Isaiah mentions two of Babylon's most revered gods, bel and Nebo, and he declares from the outset that they're not rescuers, they're burdens.
Doug McMasters: These idols of them are paraded through the streets in ceremonial processions and they lie helpless.
Doug McMasters: They have to be carried, and Isaiah describes them as being loaded onto beasts a burden hauled off like oversized luggage, and it's a scene that's dripping with satire.
Doug McMasters: These movers of these idols are seen to be like a bunch of guys trying to push a grand piano up a narrow staircase.
Doug McMasters: It's just a burden, a hardship.
Doug McMasters: These gods of Babylon, once symbols of power and permanence, are dead weights.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 7.
Doug McMasters: They lift it to their shoulder and bear it along, they set it in its place and there it stands.
Doug McMasters: It does not budge from its place.
Doug McMasters: They cry out to it but it doesn't answer.
Doug McMasters: It saves no one from his trouble here.
Doug McMasters: These gods cannot walk, they cannot speak and they cannot say.
Doug McMasters: And then the camera pans out.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verses three and four.
Doug McMasters: God speaks about himself.
Doug McMasters: Listen to me, house of Jacob, all the remnant to the house of Israel, who have been sustained from the womb, carried along since birth.
Doug McMasters: I will be the same until your old age.
Doug McMasters: I will bear you up when you turn gray.
Doug McMasters: I have made you and I will carry you, I will bear and rescue you.
Doug McMasters: And what a contrast.
Doug McMasters: This is right, and this whole section of Scripture is about this remarkable contrast of these idols and Yahweh.
Doug McMasters: Let's just take a moment to sort of review this very quickly, sort of review this very quickly.
Doug McMasters: These idols are burdens that we have to carry and yet God says that he's the Father who carries us.
Doug McMasters: These idols need saving.
Doug McMasters: They need picked up and brought up somewhere and set down somewhere.
Doug McMasters: But God is the one who does the delivering and says he will pick us up.
Doug McMasters: These idols sit silent, but God speaks and hears and acts.
Doug McMasters: These idols begin when we pay for them.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 6.
Doug McMasters: Those who pour out their bags of gold and weigh out their silver on scales and hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a god.
Doug McMasters: These idols begin when we fund them.
Doug McMasters: But God carries us from the womb and will not forget us in our old age.
Doug McMasters: This is not a one-time rescue either.
Doug McMasters: The Lord here is talking about a lifelong embrace of his people, from your strongest moments all through your weakest ones, from the time when you just emerged out of the womb to the time when you are about to face your death, he will carry you.
Doug McMasters: He's not a burden that needs to be managed.
Doug McMasters: He's a bearer of burdens.
Doug McMasters: He's not a person that needs to be restful because he grows weary.
Doug McMasters: He's the one who gives strength to the weary, and he doesn't need saving.
Doug McMasters: He is the Savior.
Doug McMasters: Now Isaiah's audience needed to remember this.
Doug McMasters: He's projecting them into the future and speaking about their time in exile For decades, surrounded by Babylonian pomp and pagan power.
Doug McMasters: And they must have wondered has God forgotten us?
Doug McMasters: Has he grown tired of us?
Doug McMasters: But here Isaiah speaks to them in this appeal and says no, he carries you in every step.
Doug McMasters: He'll carry you still if you turn to him.
Doug McMasters: And here the Lord speaks with his covenant love language that he's not merely a rescuer in crisis.
Doug McMasters: He's a father who desires to be in relationship with them, and he is committed to His people from beginning to end.
Doug McMasters: His care is not just momentary or seasonal.
Doug McMasters: It's lifelong and it's personal.
Doug McMasters: And His love is not motivated simply by our need.
Doug McMasters: It's motivated by His love and it's rooted in His promises and it's fulfilled by His character.
Doug McMasters: And all of this statement about the Lord being one who carries points us forward to how that's realized in our day, this image of God being the one who carries his people finds ultimate fulfillment in Christ himself.
Doug McMasters: We go to Luke, chapter 15, and we find that he's the good shepherd who carries the lost sheep on his shoulders.
Doug McMasters: We find that he's the good shepherd who carries the lost sheep on his shoulders.
Doug McMasters: We go to Isaiah 53, and we find that he's the suffering servant who bears our griefs and carries our sorrows.
Doug McMasters: We go to Hebrews, chapter 1 and verse 3, and find that he is the Lord who upholds all things by the word of his power, and that he is the one who sustains the church by his spirit.
Doug McMasters: The idols of Babylon, you know, they collapse under their own weight.
Doug McMasters: But Christ, what does he carry?
Doug McMasters: He carries the full weight of our sin, of our shame and our sorrow, and he continues to sustain us by walking alongside of us and, most wondrously, after he rose from the dead and ascended into the heavenly places, he tells us that he brings us with him.
Doug McMasters: There we are, sat in heavenly places with Christ Jesus.
Doug McMasters: He carries us into the very throne room of God.
Doug McMasters: So let me ask you a question what are you carrying that's not able to carry you?
Doug McMasters: What are the things that you thought would be a blessing have now turned into a burden, perhaps the way to control.
Doug McMasters: Maybe you're like a lot of parents on Long Island who are trying to manufacture a future for your child, rehearsing every decision that this child's going to make, having every single step lined out about where they're going to go to preschool, what instruments they're going to learn, what places they need to be, at just the right time so they can be at a place postured and stationed for another place of success.
Doug McMasters: Long Island is just filled with people doing that exact thing, probably right now, trying to script their children's future like a director behind the scenes, and children often choked by it, wondering if their parents even love them for who they are or what they could be.
Doug McMasters: Or perhaps you're a leader who can't delegate, because if it's not done your way, then it just can't be done at all and you feel like you need to control everything.
Doug McMasters: Maybe not at work, maybe at home.
Doug McMasters: Or maybe you're carrying the burdening idol of image, lugging this idol around, curating your life so others can see you smiling all the time, polished all the time, while inside you're exhausted and, like an influencer who's terrified of being ordinary or a professional who can't be overlooked, you're trying to perform so that others can see you.
Doug McMasters: God's not asking for performance.
Doug McMasters: He's inviting you to rest in his unchanging love here.
Doug McMasters: Or perhaps it's the idol of success, always climbing, always seeking, always trying to prove, like Howard Hughes, yet living in fear and isolation.
Doug McMasters: These idols promise glory, but they deliver nothing.
Doug McMasters: All they deliver is anxiety.
Doug McMasters: And God is saying here lay them down.
Doug McMasters: Lay them down.
Doug McMasters: The true King came to carry you.
Doug McMasters: Lay them down before the one who carries his own cross, who carries your soul and who will carry you home if you trust in him.
Doug McMasters: But this God who carries doesn't just merely offer his comfort.
Doug McMasters: He also speaks about moving history and if he can carry us, he can certainly carry out his promises to completion.
Doug McMasters: So let's take a look at the rest of chapter 46 and verses 8 to 13.
Doug McMasters: And there we see that he is Yahweh who accomplishes his redemptive plan.
Doug McMasters: After declaring to us that he carries his people, god is now lifting our eyes to the horizon of history and he's inviting us to step back and see reality through the eyes of faith.
Doug McMasters: And he does so very strongly because he's speaking to a rebellious people.
Doug McMasters: You'll notice this in verses 8 and 12.
Doug McMasters: Remember this and be brave.
Doug McMasters: Take it to heart.
Doug McMasters: Remember this and be brave.
Doug McMasters: Take it to heart, you transgressors.
Doug McMasters: And then also, in verse 12, listen to me, you hard-hearted, far removed from justice.
Doug McMasters: These were people who had listened to the invitation and yet were still determined to carry their own idols.
Doug McMasters: And he wants to let them know that only his purposes will be fulfilled.
Doug McMasters: And this is not a gentle suggestion, it's a summons.
Doug McMasters: And he's calling us to remember that he's not just exposing his character.
Doug McMasters: He's also showing us that he will demonstrate his mighty acts in history itself, that he is a God who's not reacting to events, he's orchestrating them.
Doug McMasters: That he's not simply adjusting to empires, he's summoning them to fulfill his purposes.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 9 and 10.
Doug McMasters: Remember what happened long ago, for I am God and there is no other.
Doug McMasters: I am God and no one is like me.
Doug McMasters: And this is not just poetic exaggeration, this is God speaking of his divine prerogative over all people.
Doug McMasters: He's not just guessing the future, he's authoring it.
Doug McMasters: And he's not just predicting outcomes, he's decreeing outcomes.
Doug McMasters: And in verse 11, he gives a concrete example of that.
Doug McMasters: I call a bird of prey from the east a man, for my purpose, from a far country that bird of prey that's mentioned here is Cyrus, a pagan king, and God says that he's summoning him to the glove like a hawk, him to the glove like a hawk, and as he holds Cyrus there, staging him for a future event, god says this is the one that I've called, now, babylon's idols, especially Nebo, who is supposedly the god of wisdom and writing, who claims to hold the tablets of destiny, is rebuked.
Doug McMasters: Here, god says I write history, I declare the end from the beginning, and the irony is very, very thick and dripping here, nebo, this God of the future, is silent, but Yahweh is speaking and he is accurately predicting that he has a man who will fulfill His purposes.
Doug McMasters: I have spoken, he said in verse 11, and I will bring it to pass.
Doug McMasters: I have purposed and I will do it.
Doug McMasters: Now the question we have to ask ourselves is what is that purpose?
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 13.
Doug McMasters: I am bringing my justice near.
Doug McMasters: It is not far away, and my salvation will not delay.
Doug McMasters: I will put salvation in Zion, my splendor in Israel.
Doug McMasters: What a remarkable statement.
Doug McMasters: This is Now the God who has designed history, the God who controls empires, has called a man to his glove like a hawk, is going to unleash him, so that the day would come when righteousness and salvation and restoration would be found in Jerusalem, on Mount Zion, which at this point in time is nothing but a scrap heap of rubbled stone.
Doug McMasters: This pagan, as we looked earlier in Isaiah 44, is called my shepherd and in chapter 45, it's called Christ, our anointed, is indicating to us that Cyrus holds a pivotal role in history, and that pivotal role is that he is going to be the instrument of God's plan to release the people from the clutches of Babylon in order that they might be brought back to the land of promise.
Doug McMasters: What a remarkable thing that the mightiest power on earth in that day would crumble in an instant and that these weak and frail and feeble captives, the Israelites, would be brought into a place of liberty and freedom, to return to their land and to be able to restore their worship.
Doug McMasters: And all of that, as dramatic as that is, is but an echo, an prophetic echo, of a greater deliverer to come.
Doug McMasters: I am bringing my justice near.
Doug McMasters: It is not far away, and my salvation will not delay.
Doug McMasters: I will put salvation in Zion, my splendor in Israel.
Doug McMasters: And so, in 539 BC, cyrus opened the gates of Babylon, but Christ shatters the gates of hell.
Doug McMasters: Cyrus released the captives to rebuild Jerusalem, but Christ frees the souls to become the temple of the living God and to be able to say to them you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem.
Doug McMasters: You're there.
Doug McMasters: And where Cyrus was summoned to fulfill a moment in history, the scriptures tell us in the fullness of time, christ came.
Doug McMasters: Of time Christ came.
Doug McMasters: You see, isaiah 46 ends with salvation drawing near, and Isaiah 53, as we'll look at in a few weeks shows us how that salvation will be revealed through a suffering servant who will bear our iniquities.
Doug McMasters: So this statement, this hawk called to the glove, it's just a tool pointing to a future treasure who is Christ himself.
Doug McMasters: This Cyrus was summoned, but Christ was sent into this world in order to save sinners.
Doug McMasters: Cyrus delivered a remnant, but Christ will deliver people from every kindred, tribe and tongue and nation.
Doug McMasters: This speaks of a future day that his salvation will come.
Doug McMasters: And he says I am bringing it near.
Doug McMasters: Now listen.
Doug McMasters: But now the scriptures say the righteousness of God has been revealed.
Doug McMasters: There is no other future, there's only the present fulfillment of this righteousness that's come, and this is why Paul said behold, now is the acceptable time.
Doug McMasters: Today is the day of salvation.
Doug McMasters: You see, we are to respond now, because the righteousness has come through faith in Christ Jesus, to all who believe, both Jews and Gentiles, to all who believe both Jews and Gentiles.
Doug McMasters: We don't respond to this.
Doug McMasters: Righteousness has come with religious performance but faith.
Doug McMasters: And we don't do it by climbing up to God but by receiving the one who came near to us.
Doug McMasters: The scriptures say the word is near you, and if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved.
Doug McMasters: You see, this righteousness is not earned, it's received and it's not reserved for the elite.
Doug McMasters: It's gloriously granted to sinners, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Doug McMasters: For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Doug McMasters: And it says they are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
Doug McMasters: You see, the Lord has not left us to grope in the dark or try to find him through whatever means we think is best.
Doug McMasters: He's already presented Christ to us as the mercy seat and his place where justice and grace are met together.
Doug McMasters: In Christ and through His death on the cross, we live and we're declared righteous by God, by belief on Him.
Doug McMasters: And so maybe the idols of control and the idols of success and wealth and power might not be your idol, maybe it's the idol of self, the idol of self-righteousness, but inside you're carrying a burden of guilt and shame.
Doug McMasters: And the scriptures say lay that burden down.
Doug McMasters: Lay it down and receive the righteousness that's found in Christ alone.
Doug McMasters: Confess him as Lord, receive him as your Savior.
Doug McMasters: The scriptures say he's near, he's ready and he'll deliver.
Doug McMasters: Look, if he can summon Cyrus, he can certainly handle the complexities of your life.
Doug McMasters: And if he can orchestrate the movements of empires, he can fulfill his promises to you.
Doug McMasters: And if he sent Christ, who is the servant king, his righteousness is not just near, it's now available.
Doug McMasters: See, god is not just improvising in response to the things that happen, he's implementing His plan.
Doug McMasters: And it's not just through history's empires that he does so, he's also doing so in our day and age, through the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Doug McMasters: So here, chapter 46 shows us Yahweh who carries his people, yahweh who controls history.
Doug McMasters: But now in chapter 47, we see Yahweh who confronts proud resistance.
Doug McMasters: As we step into chapter 47, we find the message moving directly toward Babylon itself.
Doug McMasters: Babylon who had built her identity on dominance, on its luxury, on its self-sufficiency.
Doug McMasters: But God exposes in chapter 47 just how fragile Babylon is behind its facade.
Doug McMasters: Verse 7, chapter 47.
Doug McMasters: You said I will be the queen forever.
Doug McMasters: You did not take these things to heart or think about their outcome.
Doug McMasters: Right, there is the heart of rebellion outcome.
Doug McMasters: Right, there is the heart of rebellion.
Doug McMasters: Babylon speaking about it being sovereign, ignoring the warnings that have been provided and trusting in its self-made security.
Doug McMasters: This Babylon that was a glittering empire is going to face judgment and she who once sat in luxury is going to be summoned to lay in the dust.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 1.
Doug McMasters: Go down and sit in the dust.
Doug McMasters: Virgin daughters Babylon, sit on the ground without a throne, daughter Chaldea, for you will no longer be called, pampered and spoiled.
Doug McMasters: In verse 8, she makes a radical claim about herself.
Doug McMasters: So now hear this lover of luxury who sits securely, who says to herself I am and there's no one else.
Doug McMasters: I will never be a widow or know the loss of children.
Doug McMasters: This proud, arrogant empire had used a phrase that only God himself could speak of himself about.
Doug McMasters: Babylon was so full of itself that it ushered itself out onto the world stage and said I am, and there's no one else.
Doug McMasters: Now hear this lover of luxury.
Doug McMasters: That phrase belongs to God and God alone.
Doug McMasters: And Babylon is here trying to usurp divine identity and sovereignty and power and privilege.
Doug McMasters: Babylon here is seen as stealing Yahweh's words, and now they're going to taste his justice.
Doug McMasters: This queen who sat on a luxurious throne is going to be made a slave to sit in the dust.
Doug McMasters: This Babylon, which thought it could see the future, is going to find itself frustrated.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 13.
Doug McMasters: You're worn out with your many consultations, so let the astrologer stand and save you.
Doug McMasters: Those who observe the stars, those who predict monthly what will happen to you Look, they're like stubble.
Doug McMasters: Fire burns them.
Doug McMasters: They cannot rescue themselves from the power of the flame.
Doug McMasters: This is not a coal for warming themselves or a fire to sit by.
Doug McMasters: This is what they are to you.
Doug McMasters: Toll for warming themselves or a fire to sit by?
Doug McMasters: This is what they are to you.
Doug McMasters: Babylon trusted in their seers, their spells, their astrologers, their sorcery.
Doug McMasters: And Babylon is so comfortable in its position that, in verse 8, it makes some I am statements about itself and some I will statements about itself.
Doug McMasters: I will never be a widow, I will never know.
Doug McMasters: The loss of children.
Doug McMasters: What is that saying?
Doug McMasters: Our military might is so powerful, nothing will ever, ever conquer us, ever, ever.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 9, though these two things will happen to you suddenly in one day Loss of children and widowhood.
Doug McMasters: They will happen to you in their entirety.
Doug McMasters: In spite of your many sorceries and the potency of your spells, the Lord is going to bring this wicked, proud heart to nothing through his wrath.
Doug McMasters: This is a righteous exposure, and it's not just the tearing down of an empire, it's a ripping down of an illusion of self-protection.
Doug McMasters: Look at verse 15.
Doug McMasters: No one can save you.
Doug McMasters: That's how this chapter ends.
Doug McMasters: They didn't think they needed saved, but now they're told no one can save you.
Doug McMasters: Babylon's walls were legendary.
Doug McMasters: I don't know if you've done any reading of ancient Near East history or studied any words, even in a summary form, about Babylon.
Doug McMasters: Their walls were legendary.
Doug McMasters: Some 25 meters wide For Americans that's over 75 feet, okay.
Doug McMasters: Some 100 meters high, higher than a football field.
Doug McMasters: No wonder they felt so proud of themselves.
Doug McMasters: No wonder they felt inconquerable.
Doug McMasters: But Yahweh had called a hawk to his glove.
Doug McMasters: His name was Cyrus.
Doug McMasters: Just one man, the son of a cattle herder from a faraway, small little province that somehow, miraculously, was able to defeat kings and kingdoms and was marching toward Babylon.
Doug McMasters: But Babylon didn't worry.
Doug McMasters: They didn't worry at all.
Doug McMasters: The king even left the city and had put one of his sort of underlings in charge.
Doug McMasters: His name was Belshazzar and you can read about him in chapter 5 of the book of Daniel.
Doug McMasters: Belshazzar didn't feel any fear.
Doug McMasters: He threw a party on that night and he said bring all the instruments of Yahweh's worship and let's fill them with wine, let's drink in their cups, let's have a party.
Doug McMasters: But Yahweh had a hawk.
Doug McMasters: Yahweh had a hawk and he said go, and he unleashed that hawk, said go, and he unleashed that hawk.
Doug McMasters: And while Belshazzar partied, cyrus and his armies diverted Euphrates and entered in in the riverbed that had flowed through Babylon and that city fell in a single night.
Doug McMasters: The book of Daniel says that very night Belshazzar, the Chaldean king, was killed.
Doug McMasters: Babylon thought it was formed on bedrock.
Doug McMasters: No, it wasn't Yahweh who, in chapter 46, said I have spoken and I will bring it to pass.
Doug McMasters: I have purposed and I will do it.
Doug McMasters: Did it, and that was the end of Babylon's story, right there.
Doug McMasters: But it's not the end of God's story.
Doug McMasters: You see, the destruction of Babylon had the purposes of restoring a rebellious people from Israel to bring them back to a land so that they could rebuild a temple.
Doug McMasters: But that wasn't the end of the story either, because the Lord Jesus walked into the temple that was there in his day and said destroy this temple.
Doug McMasters: In three days I will raise it up again.
Doug McMasters: You see, all Cyrus was doing was clearing the field for a greater exodus that was to come.
Doug McMasters: The exodus in Egypt is used as an example and type of this exodus from Babylon to Jerusalem.
Doug McMasters: And this exodus from Babylon to Jerusalem is only speaking in prophetic types of an exodus that's going to come when Jesus Christ brings people from the slavery of sin and the captivity of the dominion of darkness into his glorious light.
Doug McMasters: You see, this is bringing together a gospel crescendo.
Doug McMasters: I told you that when we looked at these passages, these chapters in Isaiah 40 to 55, it's like a symphony, with these threads of topics that get played out little by little.
Doug McMasters: Well, the song is starting to move and all the threads are starting to converge.
Doug McMasters: This thread of God doing a wondrous new thing, this thread of God using a servant to accomplish his purposes, a God who's going to fulfill his promises, a God who is going to cut down the enemies.
Doug McMasters: It's all here, but it's still building.
Doug McMasters: The crescendo hasn't happened yet and it will happen soon.
Doug McMasters: When we read about this servant who would be stricken for our sins and yet would be justified, isaiah cannot contain himself.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 4.
Doug McMasters: He burst out in praise the Holy One of Israel is our Redeemer, the Lord of armies is his name.
Doug McMasters: You see, it's not.
Doug McMasters: It's because it's not just about Babylon, the city.
Doug McMasters: It's about that better Exodus that Isaiah is looking forward to.
Doug McMasters: And Babylon is not just a city.
Doug McMasters: Babylon is a symbol of human pride and self-sufficiency and spiritual rebellion.
Doug McMasters: And this is why the book of Revelation picks up that word Babylon Fallen, fallen Babylon, the great Revelation 8.
Doug McMasters: Come out of her, my people, lest you partake of her sins in Revelation 18.
Doug McMasters: Of her sins in Revelation 18.
Doug McMasters: You see, god wanted to be more than just a liberator through Cyrus.
Doug McMasters: He wanted to be a redeemer through Christ and this lamb who conquers and where Babylon says I am, christ comes meek and lowly and says I am, I am.
Doug McMasters: And just as Cyrus breached those walls in BC 539, christ destroys and will destroy the spirit of Babylon and free us all in a moment, on that final day.
Doug McMasters: And so here we learn in chapter 47, not to envy Babylon's glitter, not to fear Babylon's power.
Doug McMasters: The Lord humbled them in a day and he'll humble all the Babylonian-like powers in our day too.
Doug McMasters: And if he brought this city down, he can certainly bring down every stronghold that resists his grace.
Doug McMasters: And let me make this personal If you're sitting here rebelling against the grace of God offered to you in Jesus Christ this morning, he will crush your rebellion too.
Doug McMasters: The scriptures here speak of deliverance, today being the day of salvation.
Doug McMasters: But mark these words the word of God says the day will come when he will bring His wrath against the ungodly, and that doesn't mean the wicked, just those who are without God.
Doug McMasters: You may think yourself to be a good person, but in the eyes of God we are all the same, and the Scriptures say there's none righteous no, not one that every one of us deserve the eternal wrath of God, because compared to Him we are less than nothing.
Doug McMasters: So here is a statement and I pray that you hear the warm invite of it before you feel the eternal sting of it that this is a message to be received, not refused.
Doug McMasters: You see, isaiah 46 and 47 is not just a tale of ancient empires, it's a theological symphony.
Doug McMasters: It's declaring that the Lord alone is God and that he wondrously promises to be those who fall into him and their weakness, that he will carry them even into their old age.
Doug McMasters: And so let's bring this to a close by remembering that our response is to trust this God who carries, to trust this God who orchestrates, to trust this God who redeems, and to trust this God who orchestrates.
Doug McMasters: To trust this God who redeems, and to trust this God who judges, he carries his people.
Doug McMasters: These burdens we think will carry us have to be carried, but God lifts us up, he orchestrates history, he summons kings, he shapes empires and he brings his salvation.
Doug McMasters: Cyrus was just a shadow.
Doug McMasters: He is also a king who brings his deliverance.
Doug McMasters: In chapter 52 and verse 10, as we'll see soon, the Lord has bared his holy arm.
Doug McMasters: As we'll see soon, the Lord has bared his holy arm, and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God.
Doug McMasters: You see, this message is not just for Israel, it's not just pointing to Christ in that day.
Doug McMasters: It's also pointing to us in our mission, because this Lord has determined that his salvation will be brought to the ends of the earth, and this passage of scripture tells us that we are part of that now, which is why he said to the church before he ascended into the heavens go, preach.
Doug McMasters: Preach the gospel to every nation.
Doug McMasters: But this is also the God who confronts proud resistance.
Doug McMasters: Babylon glittered, but it also fell.
Doug McMasters: Babylon thought it was secure on its throne, but it also was thrown into the dust.
Doug McMasters: You see, the Lord alone reigns, and he will not share his glory with anyone else.
Doug McMasters: I am God and there is no other, he said.
Doug McMasters: And so, while we're given this, now is the accepted time.
Doug McMasters: Today is the day of salvation invitation.
Doug McMasters: Let us collapse ourselves into Christ and receive him as Lord and Savior and say Lord, carry me, carry me today, carry me tomorrow, carry me into your presence through Christ, my Lord, let every false I am be silenced in your heart, let every idol that you thought would carry you be cast down and fall into the arms of Christ, and let all of our hearts be lifted up to him, who is both the wondrous Savior but also the Lamb who conquers.
Doug McMasters: Let's pray.
Doug McMasters: Let's pray, father.
Doug McMasters: We feel often in Scripture the wondrous tenderness of your heart, with sweet invitations.
Doug McMasters: You do not break the bruised wreath or snuff out the smoldering wick.
Doug McMasters: But we find in this passage of Scripture some of that.
Doug McMasters: But we also understand that that's not all you are.
Doug McMasters: You are holy and just and you carry with you a righteous indignation against all that opposes you, and that you will rip down the facades of false securities.
Doug McMasters: Father, we feel the pull of grace and the weight of judgment in this passage and so, lord, we awe and wonder, knowing just how holy you are, that you would speak to the rebellious, call them to hear these words, to not stop their ears and to remember, to remember the things that were of old, that you're the God who sustains from the womb, that carries people along since birth and who will be same through their old age, who will bear up those who trust in you, even when they turn gray, that you will bear them and rescue them.
Doug McMasters: Father, I pray for anyone hearing these words will gladly surrender their heart to you, the God who carries, the God who completes your purposes, and the God who confronts false idols.
Doug McMasters: And we ask this in Christ's name, amen.