Preached at Abundant Life Silicon Valley on Sunday, December 22nd, 2019

Isaiah 40:1-5 

Hey Isaiah, come on back.  I need to get some things off my chest with you for a moment.  Okay, God.  As you know, we’ve been having some issues with my bride Israel, and especially one of the tribes of Israel- Judah.  Yeh, you know about that.  Judah has gotten herself into one world of a mess.  I mean Isaiah, when are my people going to stop being so hard headed and learn to trust me?  Remember the Assyrians?  Of course you do.  Those big, bad, brutal Assyrians who had amassed this huge army, and pioneered savage techniques like crucifixion.  Well, they start gaining momentum and making their way towards Judah and Jerusalem, and I could just see the fear on Judah’s faces, but I told them to calm down, don’t fear, I got this.  Just trust me.  But does she?  No!  When Assyria gets like eight miles outside of Jerusalem my people decide to make a treaty with them and to put their trust in the Assyrians, and not me.  Man.  Oh, and when Assyria breaks their treaty you would think Judah would come to her senses and turn to me, but she doesn’t.  Instead she turns to the Egyptians for salvation and deliverance and enters into agreement with them.  And when that eventually falls through do they decide to trust me?  No, they turn to the Babylonians for salvation and deliverance, placing their trust in them.  And what do the Babylonians do, Isaiah?  They break their agreement, attack them and then carry them off in exile to Babylon.  Man.  Just look at them Isaiah.  You can see the sadness on their faces.  I don’t get it, Isaiah.  The thing that frustrates me to no end is my people refuse to trust me.

 

Now before we get all self-righteous and start shaking our head at Judah we should take a look inside ourselves and realize Judah ain’t the only one in here today who has trust issues.  We all know what it’s like when life backs us up against its proverbial rock and a hard place to look around instead of looking up with our trust.  And I get it, there’s no literal Assyrian, Egyptian or Babylonian army threatening to wipe us out, but we’ve all made our silent deals with our own version of Assyrians, Egyptians and Babylonians. 

 

For some of us that means when life disappoints me, or I’m triggered, that’s when we go and make a treaty with our “Assyrians,” those things we turn and put our trust in like alcohol, or pornography, hoping to find comfort.  Or others of us we hate the sense of loneliness, so instead of using these alone seasons to look up to God, we look around and find Egyptians and Babylonians to put our trust in- like unhealthy relationships.  For others of us our finances have become our Egyptians.  We’ve made a treaty with our bank accounts where we will find our sense of security and comfort not from God, but from what’s in our banks.  You know your money has become your security when the base for all of your decisions is money, where you refuse to take steps of courageous faith, or to give sacrificially when God is calling you to.  Like Judah you’ve made a treaty where your trust has been re-routed from God to money.  Others of us relationships have become our Babylonians, our source of trust.  Some of you are married and your mom and dad still play too much of a prominent role in your life, and your kind of good with it and it’s just weird.  You call them all the time telling them intimate things about your marriage they shouldn’t know.  And when life gets hard you just pick up the phone and call and boom you got what you need.  Others of you, you’re not married, but single and still living with mom and dad not really out of survival but out of fear and comfort.  Instead of trusting God by getting out of the house and pursuing the dream, you’re cool with just staying home, trusting them for provision while you’re on social media all day pontificating on the problems of the world.  Your parents have become your Babylonians and it’s kind of weird. 

 

On and on we can go with the examples.  But someone once said we often turn to God when our foundations are shaking, only to discover it’s God who is shaking them.  God will sometimes send or allow tough times to come our way to reveal to us where our trust really lies.  Trials are like turning on the lights in our hearts revealing any Assyrians, Egyptians or Babylonians we have made treaties with.  And what Judah had to learn is a lesson we all must learn- there can be no lasting security in this world outside of an intimate relationship with God where he becomes our ultimate sense of trust. 

 

GOD’S COVENANT- ISAIAH 40:1

Isaiah, it pains me that my people just don’t trust me.  I mean I’ve been nothing but faithful to them.  And I’ve been patient.  Remember Isaiah I sent you to plead with them to turn from trusting other things and people and to trust me, but because they refused to listen to us we are in this mess.  Now they’re in exile in Babylon, and you know how miserable and sad they are.  One of them just wrote these words in Psalm 137, “By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion.  On the willows there we hung up our lyres.  For there our captors required of us songs, and our tormentors, mirth, saying, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’  How shall we sing the LORD’s song in a foreign land?”- Psalm 137:1-4.  Hear the sadness, Isaiah?  My people are hurting, and it’s all their fault.  So here’s what I want you to do- look at verse 1- “Comfort, comfort my people”.  The Hebrew word for comfort literally means to breathe.  It’s a picture of a person who is so distressed, so beaten up and miserable that they are heaving and sobbing, and someone comes alongside of them and rubs their back telling them to breathe.  In fact, God says it twice, it’s his way of saying, “Breathe, breathe”.  The word is actually a command.  God is commanding Isaiah to be an extension of his hand on the back of his distressed, sobbing, heaving people, rubbing them and telling them to breathe, that everything is going to be okay.  There’s no semblance of I told you so here.  He’s comforting them, even though this is all their fault!

 

When I was six years old my father told me to go upstairs and bring him his shaving kit.  But he was very clear- he told me not to go in it because there was a razor and I could cut myself.  Well of course you know what I did, right?  Disobeying my father I went in it, found the razor and eventually cut myself, and boy was I bleeding.  I got some tissue and tried to stop it and it wouldn’t stop.  I must’ve taken a long time because dad called for me to come downstairs immediately.  So reluctantly I did and I was a sight for sore eyes.  Dad saw the blood and I braced myself to be yelled at or worse.  But surprisingly he picked me up and set me on his lap and comforted me.  There was no I told you so’s.  Dad saw my distress and figured that was enough.

 

We’ve all been there haven’t we?  We all know what it’s like to sit down by the “waters of Babylon,” and know that the horrible stuff we are going through is all our own fault.  This morning God is saying, I saw you in the abortion clinic years ago, and I see you now.  I know the distress you’re in when you see a child that’s the same age your child would have been, and you’re beating yourself up as you sit down by the waters of Babylon.  I’m not here to judge or condemn you.  I’m here to comfort you.  Yeh, you over there, I see you.  You’re divorced, and let’s just keep it 100, you were the one primarily at fault.  You stepped out on your spouse, compromised your vows.  You were abusive, and now you look through the rearview of all the carnage and heartache you’ve caused and you’re in distress as you sit by the waters of your Babylon.  I’m not here to judge you, I’m here to comfort you.  Breathe, breathe.  Hey you with the addiction you can’t kick and all the lies you told, and now you’re in distress.  I’m not here to judge you, I’m here to comfort you.  Breathe, breathe.

 

My People

But as powerful as the word comfort is, it’s not the most powerful word in verse one.  You want to know what the most powerful word is?  It’s my.  God doesn’t tell Isaiah to comfort “this people,” but instead he tells him to comfort, “my people.”  Now if I’m Isaiah I’m going to be like, wait a minute God.  You still claim them as your own?  Don’t you realize how awful and for how long they’ve been?  I mean I’ve been prophesying against their rebellion through five different kings.  They’ve gone to the Assyrians, then the Egyptians and finally the Babylonians.  In fact God, they’ve been sinning since before I got here, and you still call them, “my people”.  God’s like yep.  Judah’s my bride, and not my girlfriend.  Girlfriends audition for the ring, brides don’t.  No matter how bad she’s been, and no matter how long she’s been bad, she’s MY PEOPLE.

 

Early on in my pastoral ministry I sat down with a young husband we’ll call Jack.  Over the course of several years of walking with Jack our counseling sessions would go like this: How’s it going Jack?  Not good.  Caught Ashley cheating again. Again, Jack?  Yep.  Walked in on her in my own home.  Or watched her go into the hotel.  What did you do Jack?  There were times he’d throw the guys out of the house or the hotel.  Over time he’d sit patiently in his car and wait until things were over.  So what did you say to Ashley Jack?  Well she was very apologetic and promised this was her last time, and really sorry for how she hurt me.  Did you take her back?  Yes pastor, I did.  Why do you keep taking her back, Jack?  I can’t explain it.  I guess, I love her so much.

 

Now I know what some of you are thinking- Jack is a fool!  This woman by her repeated affairs is making him look like a fool!  But now let me ask you, if we are married to God, and our sins are likened to cheating on God, aren’t we Ashley, and God, Jack.  How many of us made God look like a fool just this week?  And God does to us what he did to Judah.  In the midst of our cheating, he rubs our back, comforts us and takes us back saying you are my people.  You are my bride.  God, why do you keep taking us back?  I can’t explain it.  I love you! 

 

CENTRAL IDEA:  Don’t ever forget, when you find yourself seated by your waters of Babylon and the reality of your sin comes crashing in on you: WHEN DISTRESSED, REMEMBER GOD’S LOVE IS GREATER THAN YOUR MESS. 

 

GOD’S CALL- ISAIAH 40:2-4

Now I know what I just said may sound scandalous, or that it looks like I or God am not taking sin seriously.  We know this isn’t true.  God takes sin seriously.  I mean just look at verse two.  God calls it what it is when he says that Judah’s iniquity is pardoned.  You know what iniquity is?  It’s sin.  The word pardoned is very interesting: It means to receive with pleasure.  It’s a technical temple term that was used of priests who were presented with an animal to sacrifice for a person’s sins.  If the animal met the standard of being without spot or blemish, they would receive it with pleasure and the persons sin would be covered.  God says that he can claim Judah and you and I as “mine” because he’s paid our debt.  But what’s interesting is that nowhere in the text do we find Judah even asking for their sin or debt to be paid.

 

Some weeks back I was eating at PF Changs in Atlanta’s airport, terminal A of course.  I didn’t’ eat a lot, maybe about twenty bucks worth of food.  Anyways, it was time for me to catch my flight and so I asked the server for the bill and she said, “Sorry sir, can’t do that.  Someone else has already paid.”  I’m like, “What?”  So I’m looking around and around and around, and didn’t see anyone I knew.  So I grabbed my bag and finally left. 

 

Oh if you’re in Christ your bill has already been paid when Jesus died on the cross!  Yes we confess and ask for forgiveness, but nonetheless the bill has already been paid!  So stop looking around and around and start looking up, because I’ll tell you where to find the person who paid your bill!  It’s God in Christ on the cross.  Because of this, God claims you no matter what.  The bill has been paid!  The war has been settled!  The anger is satisfied!  WHEN DISTRESSED, REMEMBER GOD’S LOVE IS GREATER THAN YOUR MESS!

 

Ah, but it’s here where things get even more interesting.  God says, hey Isaiah, tell my people I need them to prepare the way of the LORD.  This is a command.  God is saying, Isaiah, I’ve got work for my people to do.  I’m not through with them.  I’ve got a call on their life.  In fact, God says these words to them while they are in distress in Babylon for not trusting him, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope”- Jeremiah 29:11.  WOW!  God says to Judah in the midst of her misery and failure, I’m not finished with you, I’ve got plans for you, there’s a call on your life!

 

So imagine I come home from my trip in Atlanta and I get a call from the woman who mysteriously paid my bill at PF Changs asking me to fly to Pittsburgh where she lives and babysit her kids.  I’m going to be like, slow your roll. It was only like twenty dollars missy!  I’m not flying to Pittsburgh.  I’ll get you a thank you note with like a gift card to 7/11!  But now imagine this person paid off my mortgage and she asked me to babysit her kids.  I’m on the next flight out and I’m like I’ll watch your kids and Pookie anem’s for a whole month!  Why?  Because the greater the redemption the greater the response. 

 

Don’t you see; God has forgiven us all of our sins, and now he’s saying, I’ve got a call on your life.  Your daddy may have abandoned you, but I have adopted you.  Your mama may have treated you like dirt, but you’re my masterpiece.  I’m not finished with you!  WHEN DISTRESSED REMEMBER GOD’S LOVE IS GREATER THAN YOUR MESS. 

 

GOD’S CHRIST- ISAIAH 40:5

Well, what’s the call on my life?  Look again at verses 3-5.  Whenever a king in antiquity would come to a part of his kingdom for the first time he would never travel on already built roads, but a new road specially made for him.  What we have here is the building of a road for the king, but it’s a special road, a road where mountains are brought low, valleys lifted up and rough places being made plain.  In other words, and here’s the point behind all the imagery- this road will not go into any troublesome spots, but will be built on level, straight and even ground, guaranteeing the arrival of the king.  Don’t you see the beauty here?  God is saying this king is coming for sure.  His arrival is guaranteed.  Who is this king?  It’s king Jesus!!!  You know this is written 750 years in advance of Jesus coming?  You know why we are here today?  We are celebrating the truth of these words.  Jesus actually came.  And just as he came once, he is guaranteed to come again.  And this is your call and my call no matter how messed up we maybe.  God is choosing to use we wayward sinners to prepare the way for king Jesus!

 

I’m in my seat.  I have a friend who lives in Palm Beach, Florida where our presidents golf course Mara Lago is.  And my friend says living there is a bit of a nuisance now, and I asked why.  He says that when the president comes to town the city goes from peace to chaos.  I said, what do you mean.  He says when Air Force One is about to land, all air traffic in the area stops.  Flights are often delayed.  The airport is in chaos.  Not only that, streets are in chaos.  When he gets in his car, streets are barricaded, traffic is jammed and re-routed, and what was once normal has totally shifted because the president is there.  In fact, he says he has a friend who is on the local police and one of his jobs is to set up the barricades.  When people ask him what he’s doing he says he’s making things ready for the president. 

 

Oh friend, soon and very soon someone greater than any president or earthly king is coming.  And when he comes the script will be flipped.  Advent is about reversing the order of things, and when king Jesus shows up on the scene our world will go from chaos to peace, from division to harmony, because King Jesus is here.  But in the meantime he’s called you and I to set up the barricades and to prepare the way of the LORD.  There’s a call on our lives, and that call is bigger than paychecks, likes on IG posts or social media followers.  The call is about Jesus!  Will you be ready?