Nima - Isaiah - Crystal George

Transcript

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Okay guys, hello, my name is Crystal. We are, if you are new tonight and just joining us, what we're doing this year is we're doing a study called NEMA. NEMA means thread in Greek, and we are following a couple of threads through the entire Bible Kind of. We're doing a lot, most of the Old Testament all the way up to the book of Matthew. And so we are in the smack middle of the Old Testament right now. And we are looking at the prophets this summer. There are books that we have not studied just for the sake of time and because we are under constraints of like clarity and direction and things like that. So we are not looking at any of the wisdom books, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes. Those are all wonderful. And I really recommend reading them on your own if you haven't. We're also not doing all of the prophets because there was a whole lot so we're going to do just a few of them and um so if you guys are new tonight we have notes on the table if you guys want to go through them together that will help you just kind of stay on track with us and we're going to dive in guys i'm so excited to be with y'all tonight for real Okay, so this is, again, we want to always look at the context of history. What is happening in time on the earth while we, in the situation that we're gonna talk about. So here's where we are. If you look at your notes page, right where that sun is on the side, this is a timeline that puts together the kings of Israel and Judah and the prophets. And right where that sun is is right where we're picking up the story. So where we left off was the prophet Elisha. And he was right around like, Rehoboam, kind of Asa, he's right in that area. And we have come several more years down. We're now at the King Uzziah. And so what was happening in the Middle East around the time that King Uzziah is dying? So there was a lot happening. Uzziah, he's reigned for 50 years. He has been a good king. The country of Judah and the country of Israel have split. So there was a unified under King Saul, David and Solomon. There was a unified Israel. Israel and Judah were the same country. Under David's sons, the country has split into two countries. But for Judah, he's reigned for 50 years. King Uzziah has been a great king. And Judah has been prosperous. It's been peaceful. People have been happy, enjoying a good life. And he's dying. So there is some uncertainty in the air. He's dying, and not only that, the Assyrian Empire is rising in the north, and it's starting to wage war around the other countries that surround Israel and Judah. So I have a couple maps. Danny, can you pull up the map of Assyria for me? There it is. So Assyria is located in modern-day Iraq, and it took a little bit of the quarter of Turkey there. And if you go to the next one, Danny. And so this is the kingdom of Assyria as it conquered out. It started with that little just green spot, and then it went and conquered through the lighter green, and then it eventually had all the territory in the light green that you see there. So Assyria really went for it, and they really went after all of the neighboring countries. They conquered Syria, Phoenicia, Babylon, and the nation of Israel to the north. So there's some anxiety in people as they're looking at Assyria and how they are attacking the neighbors. And so Israel to the north becomes a vassal state to the Assyrians. Isaiah lives in Judah, and he is a contemporary with the prophets Amos and Hosea, who lived in Israel to the north. And the capital city of Assyria is Nineveh, which will be important for us later. So this is what's happening in the time and the period that Isaiah is living in. Okay, so now we're going to take a hard right turn. I want you guys to have some context. We're going to take a hard right turn. We're going to dive into what we're talking about tonight. But I'm going to pray because when you talk about the holiness of God, which is where we're going tonight, you just need some help. At least I do. So let's pray. Father, I want your help. I need your help to speak well, to speak the truth. about you. Lord, there's no word or words or collection of words that can truly, truly explain how great you are, how high you are above us, how awesome is your holiness, who you are, and how you love us. Lord, I know that I'm not sufficient, and so I ask that you would take the words of Scripture, the words that you have prepared tonight, and that they would be useful and helpful in every heart that is here, including mine, to See you the way that you are meant to be seen in reverence and awe. In Jesus' name, amen. Okay, how many of you guys know what Riz is? Yes, a few of us. So I was talking to somebody this past weekend, and I said the word slay, and then someone was like, please explain this word to my wife who's sitting here with me. I said, you don't know slay? I was like, do you know Riz? And I was like, I'm kind of cool. Not very cool, as my daughter often reminds me, but I'm kind of cool because I do know slay and I do know Riz. So it's new slang that the kids are using It means like charisma. It's short for charisma. It means like you have swag or you have game, like the kids would have said in my time. So I've seen memes a lot, as one does on the internet. And I've seen some memes about Jesus recently. Can you put the Jesus and the Riz meme up? Oh, yes. Yes. Jesus has risen. Yes, this is true. And then there were some more. If you don't mind, Danny, can you just come up? Yeah, this is the common one. There's more. Jesus is my homeboy. I think there was one more. Yes, I'll just take a water. Thanks. You know, just a water is all I need. And those like, I do believe that God has a sense of humor. So like, I'm not here to like, you know complain about the memes I think they're funny I think God thinks they're a little funny too but so I'm not going to jump all over them but I do think they portray a deeper truth that we're going to talk about tonight because there's nothing like impressive or scary or holy or important about the way that Jesus comes across in those memes and I think he's just another guy right he's just another dude he's just another person on the street maybe he has a little more celebrity status than most of the other people we are aware of and I think that the truth is the deeper truth is that the American church and I don't think we've all done this consciously but I think there's an element of the way that we approach God that has definitely seeped in that's reflected in these means because we treat Jesus a little bit like that like he's just a guy he's just a dude he's a bestie he's super approachable maybe a little bit like Santa Claus because we ask him for things that we need and we expect him to provide them and I think that we have lost sight of who God is truly and And maybe that's a little bit of the way that the enemy wages war on us in America. We put Jesus pretty far down the list of importance sometimes, and we don't see him. And the prophet Isaiah, he was given the gift of seeing Christ on his throne, and he saw Jesus with total clarity. And I want us to sit in that moment with Isaiah tonight. I want us to have a correct vision of who Jesus is. and what emotions that brought up in Isaiah, what reactions and then what actions out of that. And maybe it reflects a little bit on like, what should that mean for us? So we're gonna be reading in Isaiah chapter six. If you have a Bible, a phone Bible, and if not, it's on your notes on the second page. Isaiah chapter six, verse one. Isaiah is kind of in the middle, if you're looking for it. Isaiah, Jeremiah. Okay, so Isaiah chapter six, verse one, it says, in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and exalted, seated on a throne, and the trade of his robe filled the temple. So remember, the year that King Uzziah died, this is the year with anxiety, uncertainty, there's danger in the air. Isaiah is a prophet. That's his job. In that time frame, his whole job is to hear from God and to tell the people what God has said. So in this time of uncertainty, Isaiah sees the Lord. And so here's a question. Who is the Lord? Who is he seeing? Is he seeing God the Father? Is he seeing Jesus? What is he seeing? Who is he seeing? We've talked a lot about what a Christophany is, and this is a Christophany. I'm gonna show you guys how we know that in a second. But what is a Christophany? A Christophany is a manifestation or appearance of Christ in the Old Testament before his birth, before his incarnation into flesh. And remember, that's one of the threads that we've been following through the scripture is Christ in the Old Testament, where he appears how he appears. so isaiah has seen the lord he's seen christ where has he seen him he's in him high exalted on a throne lifted up so the first thing that we're going to do is look at john 12 that's on your notes page how do we know that this is jesus with clarity remember scripture is meant to be read as a whole one piece of scripture informs the other so john chapter 12 verses 37 and 38 says even after jesus had performed So many signs in their presence. They still would not believe in him. This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet. Lord, who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? And then he says, Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus' glory and spoke about him. So John the disciple says very clearly, Isaiah saw the Lord. He saw his glory. So Isaiah is seeing the pre-incarnate Christ. So I think he sees Christ on a throne. And where is the throne? Is it eye level? Is it like on a raised platform? Where is the throne? Is it on the earth? The throne, he says, is high and exalted. And I think that basically because he says the train of his robe is filling the temple, perhaps Isaiah is seeing Christ as he is in heaven seated at that moment on the throne. He's in a place of authority. He's above. So one of the questions I'm just gonna ask us to consider and think about tonight is, where is Christ in our lives? Is he in a place of authority? Who's in charge? And I don't think you guys need to share this at your table. I just want you to really consider that in your heart. And then Isaiah says, the train of his robe filled the temple. What does that mean? And why does it matter? Because it's kind of a weird detail, right? Like if I was writing, I saw the Lord, he was high and lifted up. He was sitting on a throne. I might talk more about like how his face looks, you know, who was with him. And he does say things about that. But the first thing he says is that he's trained to fill the temple. And I was like, why does that matter? So this is what I want to share with you guys. The temple had a very specific layout. And so in the olden days, it was based on the tabernacle, which followed the Israelites around in the desert. So there you see the tabernacle. They had a burnt offering altar. Then they had a holy place that was the biggest part right there in the middle. And then in the back, where the incense is rising, that is the Holy of Holies. And that is where they kept the Ark of the Covenant, which is where the presence of God resided. But the Israelites, as they traveled around the desert, And so in the Holy of Holies, that's where the Ark of the Covenant is, and the presence of God is still there in the temple at that time. And the top of the Ark, this is important, it's known as the Mercy Seat. It's known as the Mercy Seat. And it's known that way because it was the place that the High Priest of Israel would enter into one time a year, guys. Like the priests would go in and out of the Holy Place, that open chamber in the middle. in the front and they would do that often during the year but they would only go into the holy of holies once a year and they would go to offer atonement for their sins and the sins of the people of israel and they would take blood from the sacrifice and they would sprinkle it on the top of the ark of the covenant and the ark of the covenant on yom kippur that's the day that they would go in to do that and that's where they would receive forgiveness from their sins and that's why it's called the mercy seat because that's where sin would be forgiven So it's the most sacred part, the most holy part of the temple. And that's where like the lowest part of the glory of God is residing. Like the bottom of his garment is just trailing through the temple. That's where his presence is. And it's just like the tiniest sliver and piece of his holiness and his glory is there. But it's filling the temple. And that word that's translated train here is the word shul in Hebrew. And it also means hem. It can also mean the hem of a garment. Do you guys remember another story regarding the hem of Jesus's garment in scripture? Yes. So we're gonna look at that passage really quickly. It's Luke chapter eight and the scripture will be up on the screen for you guys. It says, as Jesus was on his way, the crowd almost crushed him. And a woman who was there had been subject to bleeding for 12 years, but no one could heal her. She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak and immediately her bleeding stopped. Who touched me? Jesus asked. So guys, I want to connect these two things for you, because again, scripture is meant to inform what you read in one book and another. So this woman, I had, I don't know if you guys all know this or not, I had a... a bleeding condition last year and from like the first half of this year. And it was awful, y'all. First of all, women go through it. We just go through it. My sisters, we go through it. We should be given medals for just existing. I'm just saying. Men do not understand. But because when you bleed day after day after day after day with no stopping, it saps all of your energy. And this woman had been doing it for 12 years and doctors couldn't help her. And I know she was at her wit's end. And I know she had no energy. So I imagined her like army crawling and just reaching out for the hem of his garment because that's all she had the energy to reach for and in that moment she's positionally touching the same place where the glory of god rests in the holiest place in her world in the tabernacle in the temple and she's touching it and it heals her she was positionally touching the mercy seat when she reached for him and she was instantly healed So that's verse one, guys. That's verse one in this passage. I love Isaiah 6 because there's so much richness and goodness in here. And what I want to share with you guys, which is on the bottom of your notes page, is that the mercy seat, it exists in both the physical and spiritual realm. I don't know where the Ark of the Covenant is. It doesn't matter at this point because Jesus has come in the flesh and he is our mercy seat. Scripture talks about him as our high priest. He's the offering and the sacrifice, and he is the high priest who offers it. He's both things. He's our mercy seat, and we can reach out and touch his glory whenever we need to. So Isaiah sees that infinite grandness, and he sees the glory of Christ. He sees his exaltedness. He sees God trailing down to touch the earth. He sees the authority of Christ over creation, and then he also sees the seraphim. So we're gonna continue in verse two through four. It says, above him were seraphim, each with six wings. With two wings, they covered their faces. With two wings, 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 the thresholds shook, and the temple was filled with smoke. The wings, this is what the commentaries say. First of all, this is an angel. They're not cute and pretty like the cherubs that we see illustrated. They're not like kind of normal looking as we often see angels portrayed. They look very different. And the commentaries say the wings have specific meaning, that they cover their face to convey reverence for the majesty of the Lord. They cover their feet to convey humility before the Lord. And that the wings that are flying represent a willingness to do service. Positionally, I think that we can learn from the angels. I think we have a lot to learn here. Because how do we approach the Lord? Proverbs says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And I know people are like, well, scripture also says perfect love casts out fear. Like, how do those two things go together? Like, what are we talking about here? What we're talking about is reverence, respect. Not terror. Not fear of like... I can't approach him. He's our high priest. He's our father. He's our king. He's our friend. He's all of these things to us, and we have freedom to approach him. But how do we approach him? The angels cover their faces. There should be a little bit of respect when we come into the presence of the Lord. And Proverbs says that respect that we have for him, that's the beginning of wisdom. That's the beginning of learning how to live life. Jesus is not Christian Santa Claus. He's not our homeboy. He's high and lifted up. He is worthy of our respect, worthy of our reverence, and worthy of acknowledging that he has authority in our lives. One of my favorite worship songs says, like, he's the breath in our lungs so we pour out our praise. I love that song. And there's scripture that says, like, he sustains our life. Like, his word right now is sustaining in this moment as I'm talking to you guys, sustaining you, sustaining me. Like, he's sustaining the atoms in our body that are holding together. Hebrews 1 verse 3 says, the Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. And after he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty in heaven. So he's the radiance of God's glory. So Isaiah, in this moment, he's looking up. He's seeing Christ as he should be seen positionally. He's seeing the mercy seat covered. He's seeing the angels singing, holy, holy. And he's looking at them and he understands that reverence and humility and obedience are appropriate responses to the majesty and holiness of Christ. I think there's nothing wrong with honesty. I really value honesty with the Lord. I tell him when I'm mad. I tell him when I'm sad. I tell him when I feel all the feelings. But I think that humility and obedience are necessary too for us to grow. We have to understand who God is and we have to give him the right that he has earned in our lives to tell us what to do and when to do it. So what does Isaiah do? What does Isaiah, how does Isaiah respond? He sees all this, like imagine it's like a normal Friday afternoon and you're just going to like, you know, temple service and you're kind of scared and worried, but you're the prophet and so you ask God for a word and suddenly all of this opens up in front of you. What would you do? Isaiah 6, chapter 6, verse 5, he says, woe to me. He says, woe. I would say woe to. He says, woe to me. I'm 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. There was a line in one of the commentaries I read that I loved this past week. It said, in the presence of God, degrees of sin become irrelevant. That is a really deep truth I want us to sit with, guys, because it's human nature. It is human nature for us to go, you know what? You know what? I've been pretty good this week. But my friend Dawn, this is a lie. She hasn't done anything wrong. My friend Dawn, I've seen what she's done. I think I'm all right. I think I can walk into the church. And God will look at me and her and be like, girl, you did all right. I don't know what he's going to say to Don, but he's going to say, oh, good job to me. I'm just kidding. I know. I'm just kidding. It's a lie, guys. She's wonderful. But it's human nature to say that the holiness of our neighbor is our standard.

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So

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we can either be above it or below it. And both things are wrong because they both create wrong emotions in us. Comparison is a thief of joy, but it's also a very inaccurate moral compass, guys. Comparing ourselves to our neighbors will do a couple things. It will either create false pride because we think we're doing better than other people or it will create despair because we think we're not doing good enough. And God is not interested in either one of those because we as human beings are not the standard. The holiness of God is the standard and nothing we achieve or don't achieve make us right with God. Both ways of thinking are wrong thinking. Jesus tells a parable about two men who go into the temple to pray. One is a teacher of scripture. He starts his prayer. He's a Pharisee. They were the holy men of the day. They were the pastors of the day. They were the teachers. And so this pastor, in our contemporary thinking, he goes into the church to pray. He starts his prayer by thanking God for some things. So this is what he says. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed, God, I thank you that I am not like other people. Robbers, evildoers, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.

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First

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of all, I could pray that too, y'all. Listen, God, I thank you that I have not murdered anybody this week. And I know this is an extreme example because I don't think any of us really come to the Lord like, God, what I haven't done this week is rob somebody of their money. For us, it's smaller things, but we all do the comparison thing. If we're really honest in our heart of hearts, we know that we do it. So seeing God in his holiness helps us to have a right perspective, not only about ourselves, but also about our neighbors. Not better than them, also not worse than them. We are on the same playing field before the Lord. We need to kill comparison and it dies the best and the most when we understand that he's the standard and we need him to make us holy. The second man in the parable, the tax collector, scripture says, he stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but he beat his breast and said, God have mercy on me, a sinner. I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God, For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. Humility is the key, you guys. What do we bring to the Lord? The tax collector, he was somebody in that society who was thought very poorly of because he worked for the Roman Empire. He was thought of as betraying the people that he was coming from. They would have looked at him as someone who had no morals, no compass, And he went into that temple and he said, God, I need your mercy seat. And he walked away with it. He walked away with what he'd asked for. And what I want to also say to you guys is that humility isn't shame. We have a tendency to look at ourselves, again, in extremes. It's not shame. Humility and shame both acknowledge the truth about our position before God and his holiness. And humility understands that we are unworthy. but we still reach out for mercy because we trust the love of God. But shame will hide and shame will run away. Adam and Eve, the first thing they did when they sinned in the garden was hide from the Lord. That's shame. Humility is the tax collector. Understanding but reaching forward because the promise is there. So humility isn't shame. Humility reaches For mercy. Oh, can you go back? Shame hides and runs away. Humility reaches toward God, and then pride tries to bypass God completely. There's no humility or shame in pride. Pride just says, I got this. I don't need you, God. I got this. That was the Pharisee. God, look at me in comparison to all my neighbors. I'm doing okay. He didn't ask God for anything. There are three little passages that I want you guys to look at at your table. Job 42, 5 through 6, Luke 5, 8, and Revelation 117. Each of these are reactions to people as they encountered Christ and his glory. And I want you guys to have a minute to look at those and then to talk about what you see. And then I'm going to give you about four minutes. And then we'll come back and finish up. Okay, guys. Let's have a conversation. What did you see? What did you read? Did anybody see anything interesting? Oh, Meredith saw

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something

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interesting. Hello, friends. In all of the passages, the response is involuntary. It's like an assumption of a posture that you have no choice but to take.

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Yeah, that's really good. We don't have a choice when we're confronted with the glory of who God is. Yep, that's good. Anything else?

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Crystal, what was your question?

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Just what did you see? What did you take away from the passages? I

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think the fear is important. When Faith was reading, which one did you have, Revelation? She read it and he fell down as though dead. And because I wasn't reading along, I was just listening. Did he faint? Did he pass out? Is that why Jesus touched him? But the fear is real. And I think, it's like you said, is it the reverence or is it the fear? I think it's like physiological fear and reverence. But when Faith did that... Yes.

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High above us. That's good. Anything else? And

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there could be both operating in us at the same time. You know, fear of the holiness of God because you know where you are. You know the things you've done. And then, especially if you hadn't believed in them and now you see that, oh, wow so you are real yeah you know and his holiness and his majesty wow okay i'm in trouble

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yeah like if you think about like saul de paul he had that moment christ confronted him and it totally changed his life in his world yep yeah the same awesome any other thoughts final thoughts before we keep going just an unworthiness to be in his presence yep yeah So we're going to continue. So we've seen how other people have responded, and now we're going to see what Isaiah does. So in verse 6, we're going to pick back up. He says, I'm unclean. He says, I live among unclean people. There's a dilemma. And then it says, 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. Isaiah, he recognized and confessed his sin before the Lord, and then it's burned away by a coal. And my question when I was reading this, I was like, where is this coal coming from randomly? So if you, Danny, can you put the tabernacle back up? Because the temple and the tabernacle were laid out the same way. It's coming from the altar of burnt offerings. And that's where people would bring an animal to offer as atonement for their sin on a daily basis. And all of the Old Testament laws around the altar and the temple and the tabernacle, they're a foreshadowing of the sacrifice that Jesus offers for us. And so in touching Isaiah's mouth with that coal from the altar in the presence of Christ, the angel is offering Isaiah a shadow of the sacrifice that Christ himself is gonna provide. And he's offering that forgiveness to Isaiah freely. so i love that guys christ both high priest and sacrifice offers himself and he stands between us now he stood for isaiah then and he stands for us now between our uncleanness and the holiness of the trinity hebrews 7 26-27 it says such a high priest truly meets our need one who is holy blameless pure set apart from sinners exalted above the heavens Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day for his own sin and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once and for all when he offered himself. And I don't really want to run past that, you guys. Like, we can just sit for a moment with that. Christ himself, both the sacrifice and the high priest, we're right where Isaiah is in this moment. We are right there with him. I am unclean, my friends and neighbors are not any better than me. We are all in need of, and what can we do about it? Nothing. And then we get to touch the mercy seat. And then finally, we hear the call that Isaiah heard, where it says, the voice of the Lord, you hear the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us? And Isaiah said, here am I, send me. Isaiah's process was really interesting. He had a correct vision. So on your notes page, you'll see some arrows. He had a correct vision of who God is, who Christ is. And then that led him to confession of his sin, to the cleansing of the sacrifice. And then that led to the right next step, his response to all of it, which was commission and mission. His last response left was obedience. We've talked a little bit tonight about other outcomes, other emotions that we often have as human beings when we encounter the holiness of God. We've talked about false pride, which is just ignoring who we are in reality, ignoring who God is, saying we don't need him. We've talked about shame, which is running and hiding. And we've talked about humility, which is reaching out for the mercy you see. When we reach out for mercy, when we receive the sacrifice, we receive the forgiveness, we receive the mercy seat, and we're in right relationship with God, the next right step is commission. Like, can you imagine Isaiah? He's just been forgiven. An angel has just touched him. He's seeing God with his eyes. And then he's like, you need something? I got you. Where are we going? Send me. I'm going to go. And that's when we have that response to what we know God is asking us to do, that is the right response. It is the right response. So I'm going to give you guys a couple of questions to talk about at your tables tonight, and then we'll wrap up. Question number one, why do you think Isaiah said, here I am? Send me without knowing what the mission would be. Question number two, have you ever felt unworthy to serve God? And how does Isaiah's story speak into that feeling? And feel free to talk about anything else that jumped out at you guys tonight. And I'll come back up and close this around 8.30.