Isaiah 40:12-31

We're going to read the whole chapter to start

out with, so it's a really good one,

so it shouldn't be that hard. Alright, Isaiah

40 verses 1 through 31.

"Comfort, O comfort, my people, says your God.

Speak kindly to Jerusalem and call out to her

that her warfare has ended, that her iniquity

has been removed, that she has received the

Lord's hand double for all her sins. A voice

is calling, clear the way for the Lord and the

wilderness, make smooth in the desert a

highway for our God. Let every valley be

lifted up,

and every mountain and hill be made low, and

let the rough ground become a plain,

and the rugged terrain a broad valley. Then

the glory of the Lord will be revealed,

and all flesh will see it together, for the

mouth of the Lord has spoken."

A voice says, "Call out." Then he answered, "

What shall I call out? All flesh is grass,

and all this loveliness is like the flower of

the field. The grass withers, the flower fades

,

when the breath of the Lord blows upon it,

surely the people are grass. The grass withers

,

the flower fades, but the word of our God

stands forever. Get yourself up on a high

mountain, O Zion,

bear of good news. Lift up your voice mightily

, O Jerusalem, bear of good news. Lift it up,

do not fear. Say to the cities of Judah, 'Here

is your God.' Behold, the Lord God will come

with

might with his arm ruling for him. Behold, his

reward is with him and his recompense before

him.

Like a shepherd, he will tend his flock. In

his arm he will gather the lambs and carry

them in his

bosom. He will gently lead the nursing ewes."

And our passage starts here. "Who has measured

the

waters in the hollow of his hand and marked

off the heavens by the span, and calculated

the dust

of the earth by the measure, and weighed the

mountains in a balance and the hills in a pair

of scales? Who has directed the Spirit of the

Lord, or as his counselor has informed him?

With whom did he consult, and who gave him

understanding? And who taught him in the path

of justice, and taught him knowledge, and

informed him of the way of understanding? Be

hold, the nations

are like a drop from a bucket, and are

regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. Be

hold, he lifts up

the islands like fine dusts. Even Lebanon is

not enough to burn, nor it's beast enough for

a burnt

offering. All the nations are as nothing

before him. They are regarded by him as less

than nothing,

and meaningless. To whom then will you liken

God, or what likeness will you compare with

him?

As for the idol, a craftsman casts it, a gold

smith plates it with gold, and a silversmith f

ashions

chains of silver. He who is too impoverished

for such an offering, selects a tree that does

not rot.

He seeks out for himself a skillful craftsman

to prepare an idol that will not totter.

Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it

not been declared to you from the beginning?

Have you not understood from the foundations

of the earth? It is he who sits above the

circle of

the earth, and its inhabitants are like grass

hoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a

curtain,

and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.

He it is who reduces rulers to nothing,

who makes the judges of the earth meaningless.

Scarcely have they planted, scarcely have they

been sown, scarcely has their stalks taken

root in the earth, but he merely blows on them

,

and they wither, and the storm carries them

away like stubble. To whom then will you liken

me,

that I would be his equal, says the Holy One.

Lift up your eyes on high and see who has

created

these stars, the one who leads forth their

hosts by number. He calls them all by name,

because of the greatness of his might, and the

strength of his power, not one of them is

missing.

Why do you say, O Jacob, and assert, O Israel,

my way is hidden from the Lord,

and the justice due me escapes the notice of

my God? Do you not know, have you not heard,

the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of

the ends of the earth, does not become weary

or tired? His understanding is inscrutable. He

gives strength to the weary, and to him who

lacks

might, he increases power. Though youths grow

weary and tired, and vigorous young men

stumble

badly, yet those who wait for the Lord will

gain new strength. They will mount up with

wings like

eagles. They will run and not get tired. They

will walk and not become weary. Let's pray.

Hey, Father, thank you for your word. Thank

you for the opportunity to come and worship

you in song

and giving and reading your word and hearing

your word preached in fellowship. I pray that

you bless the rest of our service, your word

to our hearts and our minds for our growth and

grace

and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We thank

you for him. In Christ's name, amen.

All right. Now, that was a long passage, but

we've been going through Isaiah 40 in the past

two

services in the past two months. And in those

two months, I don't know about in your, I do

know in

your life, a lot of things have happened in

the past two months. In the United States

alone,

about 602,000 babies were born in the last two

months. And about 568,000 people have died

in the last two months alone, in our nation

alone. And in my immediate circle of friends

and family

and people that I know, I've had three people

pass away. One, a very sad story. And I'm sure

that if we would go through each of our lives

in the past two months, we could find similar

stories. We have all had someone in our lives

who have had very life-altering situations and

circumstances happen in the past two months or

maybe just a little bit longer if the past

two months have been good for you. And we take

prayer requests on Sunday morning and on

Wednesday

nights in a prayer meeting. And some of us don

't share those with everybody, but we may go to

someone that we're close with and ask for

prayer on certain personal things. And

sometimes there's

things that are on our hearts that we don't

mention to anyone, difficulties that we're

going through just in our lives. All of us are

that way, because there's always something

happening and there's always some struggle or

difficulty. In our culture, we seem to have

this

idea that we just go through life and that we

'll never hit any brick walls. We don't plan or

save

money for rainy days anymore. And we just go

have this idea that as we go through life that

nothing

bad will happen, no accidents, no pain, no

suffering. And then when the inevitable pain

and

suffering happen, we're just so taken aback

and so surprised that it did. And our culture

doesn't

have a real answer for this. Our culture looks

to the government to fix those problems. And

it's

always the government that is the one that's

supposed to rescue us in order to some kind of

therapy for somebody just to talk to. We have

people that just pay money to people because

they have no serious friends and no serious

close person in their lives that they can

really bear their hearts to. And that's

necessary for human flourishing. And the last

two messages

that we went through in Isaiah have drawn a

line in the sand between those that are

outside of Christ

and their lack of true comfort and consolation

and strength and those that are on this side

of the line with Isaiah, that even though they

're facing this great struggle and pain to come

with

the empire coming and bringing them into exile

, but Isaiah is saying, hey, we still have

comfort

and consolation on this side of the line, even

with all that pain and suffering to come. In

April,

we looked at the first two verses and the true

comfort for God's people. Isaiah was told to

point God's people to rest in him and in his

eternal love, to trust in his word and

trusting,

not just in his word, but what he has done for

them in the past. Then he spoke, if you

remember,

of a future comfort that was to come as if it

had already happened. And we talked about that

being

the prophetic future tense. Remember that? And

that God will use these prophecies and the

prophetic,

the words will be in past tense, but they

haven't happened yet because it's just as if

it had already

happened because God was the one that was

promising it. And then last month in May, we

saw the three

fold comfort of God as Isaiah heard a voice

call out a message from God to hear about God

's comfort

and trust, to call his people, to trust in him

and what he was going to do. And the Lord, the

call,

the message was that the Lord will come in

glory. The message was that the Lord's word is

forever,

his promises last forever. And also the

message was to behold, is to step back and

behold your God

and what he would do in these situations in

their lives. And ultimately that situation was

their need

of salvation and look towards the Messiah that

would come. The comfort is to be taken by God

's

people at all times, not just the direct

people that Isaiah was talking to. The Holy

Spirit

orchestrated this where that message was

directly to them and directly to us as his

people in the

future. The Hebrew were told of the coming emp

ires for the last 39 chapters. Isaiah preached

judgment

and punishment to them for their breaking of

God's laws. They're turning away from him and

following idols that the Babylonians and the

Assyrians would come and bring them into

slavery

and exile and defeat their nations. And he was

telling them to take comfort in the promises

of

God for after that. And the promises in Isaiah

, the comfort was to those in the New Testament

who

were waiting for the Messiah. And there was

the Messiah and they would trust him no matter

what

was happening with the government around him.

The Jews took care of him and put him on the

cross.

And the trust and the coming comfort of God,

it was to the early church that we're going

through

suffering and persecution. As we see it in 1

Peter, as we see in the Corinthian church, as

Paul imprisoned

in Rome, they could trust in the coming

comfort of God. And it's to us in 2025 as well

that no

matter what happens, our nation, the United

States is just like a wind or a root that God

could just

blow out. No matter what happens to our nation

or the nations around the world, we can trust

and look forward to the comfort that is to

come. Although we're surrounded by voices that

call

to us to complain, to fear, to worry, 24 hour

news cycle, worry, worry, worry, we as

Christians are

to be rooted and grounded in the comfort that

is to come because of who Christ is and what

he has

done. We have the voice of God through his

word, which has the opposite voice of our

culture around

us. It calls us to faith, to trust and to hope

and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Romans

15

12 says again, Isaiah says, "There shall come

the root of Jesse and he who arises to rule

over the

Gentiles and him shall the Gentiles hope."

That's us. Now, may the God of hope fill you

with all

joy and peace and believing so that you will

abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit

.

And we have the Almighty, Everlasting, Sovere

ign, Creator, Holy God as our source of comfort

and

strength. 2 Corinthians 1-5, "For just as the

sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance,"

and that

true sometimes. So also our comfort is

abundant through Christ, and that is also true

in Christ.

Isaiah gives us many reasons in this chapter

to look to our true comfort and our true

strength

in the only source where it can truly come

from, and that is God, the Almighty God,

Creator

of the universe. And I've done my absolute

best to get all of this into three points

in 30, 40 minutes, and so we're going to get

after it, but I will not be able to touch the

surface of this unless I do take months of

going verse by verse by verse. So my

recommendation,

my homework is for you to take this passage

home with you, and just for seven days, just

read it

in the morning before you go to work, before

you start your day. It's only 31 verses, and

see if

it doesn't change your outlook on what's

happening in the world around you, what's

happening in your

family, what's happening in your mind, in your

heart, and in your life. God's Word is truly a

gift

to us, and we take it for granted so often.

Let's avail ourselves of this gift and these

truths,

the source of comfort and strength as the Holy

Spirit through Isaiah is telling us to do here

,

that all of us, everyone who believes, must

look to God as their only comfort and their

only source

of strength. The first reason is in verses 12

through 26, because God is the one and only

sovereign Creator. Now, I normally read the

section that I'm going through, but I'm not

going to do

that because it's so many verses, so I'm going

to read the last two that kind of summarize

this part of the passage. Verse 25 says, "To

whom then will you liken me that I would be

his equal?"

Says the Holy One, "Lift up your eyes on high

and see who has created these stars,

the one who leads forth their hosts by number.

He calls them all by name because of the

greatness

of his might and the strength of his power.

Not one of them is missing." That's an amazing

fact.

Isaiah is giving here in these 14 verses a

beautiful poem that we're not going to be

able to dissect every one of these verses. We

're just going to go over them, but the reason

that

it's so much, and this one point takes up so

many verses, is because our God truly is big.

Our God

truly is almighty and huge and great, not just

compared to us, to man, but compared to all of

creation, all the universe. God is so high

above it, and God is so much bigger than our

universe,

which we cannot even fathom the size of. There

's a catechism where there's questions and

answers,

and you remember these questions and answers,

and they help build your faith and they help

build

your understanding. And there's a children's c

atechism that has really simple questions and

answers, but it really says a lot in those

simple questions and answers. And the very

first three

questions and answers in the children's catech

ism are, "Who made you?" "God made me." The

second

question is, "What else did God make?" The

answer is, "God made all things." The third

question is,

"Why did God make you and all things?" "God

made all things, including me, for his own

glory." And

as we said in Sunday school, if you get your

little child to remember those three questions

and answers,

they're already wiser than the biggest

scientist or whatever on TV or in our culture.

So from

Genesis to Revelation, the very fact that God

created everything, the universe and

everything

in it, the heavens and the earth, it is

understood to be one of the main reasons why

we are under

him and why we should listen to him and why he

deserves all the glory from his creation, why

he

is above all things, and why he is sovereign

over all things. Colossians 1.16 says, "For by

him

all things were created, both in the heavens

and on earth, visible and invisible, whether

thrones

or dominions or rulers or authorities, all

things have been created through him and for

him. He is

before all things, and in him all things hold

together." And so the next time you read the

book of Revelation, the last book in our Bible

, don't just read it and read the newspaper to

see

what it says. Read it specifically and see how

many times God has praised and worshipped and

bowed

down before and mentioned as the Creator of

all things, the Creator of man, the Creator of

earth,

the Creator of heaven. Revelation 4.11 says, "

Worthy are you, our Lord and our God, to

receive glory

and honor and power for you created all things

, and because of your will they existed and

were

created." Now this is the reason if you've

ever wondered why there's so many alternative

creation

stories and origin stories for man and the

universe is because it's one of the main ways

to get after God's sovereignty, to get after

the fact that he rules over our world, our

universe,

and us individually, whether we like it or not

, he is the king and he is the sovereign

because

he created all things by the power of his

voice. And it's not more rational or easier to

believe

that everything was created with no purpose

and no end from nothing in the universe and

everything

that we can hear and see and taste, smell and

feel came from nothing for no purpose all by

itself and all on accident. That is not more

rational than believing that an almighty God

who has the power inside of himself to create

spoke everything into existence in the way

that it is,

that he is our sovereign God and he has the

power and the sovereignty because he is the

creator.

Isaiah isn't describing God's wonderful power

and control over his creation to defeat and

debate against people who don't believe he was

the creator. He was talking to God's children

who did believe that he was the creator. He's

showing us his power and his sovereignty

because it reaches down into the lives of his

people. Everything is under his power and

everything

is under his sovereignty. If God created all

things, then he can hear and answer our

prayers.

If God is over all things and in control of

all things, then he knows what exactly you're

going

through and in his goodness and his wisdom and

in his power, he can orchestrate them all

together

for his glory and our good in ways that we can

't even fathom. This includes the coming

judgment

that Judah was facing through the Babylonian

Empire and the Assyrian Empire and exile. It

includes the suffering of his people in 2025.

Let's look at our passage and we're going to

go

through some of it. Isaiah is showing God's

greatness and creation by extolling God's

wisdom

and his power and complete control that he has

over his creation and all powers in the

universe.

That is the overarching point as we go through

this. Isaiah is going to build and build and

build

to make that point very clear. In verses 12-14

, he lifts up his God's wisdom in creation. We

're

going to read verse 12. It says, "Who has

measured the waters in the hollow of his hand

and marked off the heavens by the span?" The

span is like an inch and calculated the

dust of the earth by the measure and weighed

the mountain in a balance and the hills in a

pair of

scales. In the next section, in verses 15-17,

Isaiah shows the greatness of God and how he

dominates all creation, including all the

nations, including all the principalities and

the powers

and the governments. Verse 15, "Behold, the

nations are like a drop from a bucket and are

regarded

as a speck of dust on the scales. Behold, he

lifts up the islands like fine dust." Verse 17

, "All the

nations are as nothing before him. They are

regarded by him as less than nothing and

meaningless."

Then that capture a lot of, especially in this

time, the wars of nations on the other side of

the world. That captures our imagination, our

fear, and our worry. What's going to happen

is my son going to get drafted and all this

stuff. We start thinking about it. I don't

know,

but God does. It's in his hand. He dominates

it. Verses 18-20, "God alone is God. Idols are

nothing

but gold or wooden trinkets created by his God

's own creation." It really is amazing. Verses

18-20,

"To whom then will you liken God or what liken

ess will you compare with him?" As for the idol

,

a craftsman casts it. A goldsmith plates it

with gold and a silversmith fashions chains of

silver.

He who is too impoverished, too poor for such

an offering, selects a tree that does not rot.

He seeks out for himself a skillful craftsman

to prepare an idol that will not totter. The

man

makes his own God out of wood or stone or

metal and fashes it in what he thinks God is.

God is way farther outside. He's way bigger

than that. He's the only God. He is the only

deity

that's transcendent and above all of creation.

In verses 21-24, "He rules all earthly powers

and is by his hand that they rise and fall."

Verse 23, "He it is who reduces rulers to

nothing,

who makes the judges of the earth meaningless

." And finally, in 25 and 26, he controls all

of

his creation down to the last detail. "To whom

then will you liken me that I would be as

equal,"

says the Holy One. "Lift up your eyes on high

and see who has created these stars,

the one who leads forth their hosts by number.

He calls them all by name because of the

greatness

of his might and the strength of his power,

not one of them is missing." Now, we have

another

space telescope or another telescope that just

came online a couple of weeks ago that has,

and I can't even remember, like 35,000 megapix

els. And we have cameras that are really good

for

professional photographers that have like 20

megapixels. This has like 3500 or 35,

some ridiculous amount of resolution that they

can capture with great clarity, the stars and

the different galaxies. And one of the first

images they released is, it's this whole field

of not just stars. The only stars you see are

the ones that are in our own galaxy that are

in

between the other hundreds and thousands of

other galaxies that this telescope is looking

at.

And God spoke to each of those into existence

in the place where they are,

and he knows the name of every one of those

stars. And you're going to take and this piece

of rock

or this piece of metal or this piece of wood

or this idea of communism or this idea of

evolution

or this idea of whatever culture is putting up

as an idol and say, "Behold your God." No,

behold your God. Take this into your mind

every morning this week, as we said, and I

promise

your outlook on everything will change. It's

going on in the world. We have the only true

source of consolation, of comfort and strength

in our God who is worthy of all of our praise.

He created all things and not only that,

nothing that he's created is outside of his

control.

Nothing is an oops or a, oh, I missed that,

not one maverick molecule. We also look to him

as our

only source of comfort and strength because

God sees everything and forgets nothing. Vers

es 27-28.

"Why do you say, O Jacob, and assert, O Israel

, my way is hidden from the Lord,

and justice do me, escapes the notice of God.

Do you not know? Have you not heard?

The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of

the ends of the earth, does not become weary

or tired. His understanding is inscrutable."

One of my favorite psalms is the 73rd Psalm,

and it was written by either Asaph himself,

who was the leader of music for the temple of

the

Levites under David the king, or somebody who

came after him. They kind of created a guild

of

musicians and called themselves the Asaphites.

He looks around at his culture at the time,

and he sees the wickedness around him, but it

wasn't just that he was questioned. He looked

at the culture, he saw the wickedness, and

those who were doing the wicked acts were the

ones that

were prospering, were the ones that were

wealthy, were the ones that weren't sick and

lived long

and happy lives. And one of the wicked things

that they did was believe that there was no

justice

with God. He said this in Psalm 7311, and he

said, they say it's the wicked. They say, how

does God

know? And is their knowledge with the most

high? They didn't believe in God. They didn't

believe

that there was judgment coming. They didn't

believe that there was true justice. They did

what they

wanted to do. And so the Hebrew and Isaiah,

the Jews at the time were looking at the same

lens

that Asaph was. They looked around them and

said, look, I didn't do all this. I'm not

worshipping

the idols. There's no justice here. Why am I

being judged as well? It looks like God was

sleeping,

or that he was missing what was happening to

them. He just looked over them. He didn't see

their plight, or worse, that he wasn't being

just. But look what the people are saying in

verse 27.

Why do you say, Oh Jacob, and assert, O Israel

, my way is hidden from the Lord, and the

justice do me

escapes the notice of my God? So these two

questions show two things about these people,

or about their faith. One, that it was very

frail. And in light of the previous passage

that we just read, how how absurd it is to ask

these questions about the Creator God who sees

everything. Mottier says, the particular value

of the doctrine of God the Creator is, of

course,

that it brings all that is true about God to

bear on this world. Consider then the absurd

ity

of losing faith in one who in relation to

earth is all powerful, all wise, dominant,

with no God to challenge him, check or rival

him, king of kings, sovereignly in charge of

his world,

down to the smallest detail, so that

everything is in its place,

nothing overlooked, nothing lost. But how

often is our faith so frail that we end up in

some way

questioning, does God know what's happening?

It happens to me. But the absurdity of that

doesn't

overrule sometimes our emotions. So God

answers those who are a frail of faith like me

in verse 28.

He said, "Do you not know? Have you not heard?

The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of

the

ends of the earth, does not become weary or

tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He is

the

everlasting God. He doesn't become winded on

his way to your problem. He doesn't pause to

take a nap

in the middle of trying to help you out. He

does not become weary or tired." Now, we're

going to

take a look at those two words because they

become very important in this part and in the

next part

of the passage. The word weary could also be

translated as exhausted. It's someone who's at

the end of their strength. They've exerted all

that they had and they have nothing left.

There was a wicked ruler and judges that was

fighting against the Hebrews named Cicera.

He was so weary from fighting and before the

battle was over, he just couldn't do it

anymore.

So he had to go back to his tent to take a

rest and to sleep. He trusted this woman named

Yael

to guard the door for him while he slept. He

had nothing left. Judges 421 says, "But Yael,

Heber's wife, took a tent peg and seized the

hammer in her hand and went secretly to him

and drove the peg into his temple and it went

through into the ground for he was sound

asleep

and exhausted." That's the same word for weary

. So he died. "God is not like Cicera. He's not

fighting our battles and then he gets tired

and exhausted and has to go take a nap. He

will never

run out of energy trying to fulfill the

promises that he's made and he'll never come

up short."

That's weary and exhausted. Tired could also

be translated as labored.

You may be able to just barely lift the weight

, but it takes everything you got and you

strain

against the weight. Nothing that God has

before him makes him strain whatsoever. As we

have said,

everything in this universe came into

existence by the power of his word and he was

not winded

when he finished speaking the universe into

existence and he doesn't get winded when he's

orchestrating all that has happened for the

Jews at that time, for the Jews in Jesus' time

and for

us in this day. When he's working out his plan

, there's no breaking of any sweat. He doesn't

get

weary. He doesn't get tired, but maybe he

doesn't get weary or get tired, but maybe he's

just not

smart enough to handle our problems. They're

just so complicated and twisted that we just

don't see how we can be helped in these

problems. Maybe God is coming to the end of

his knowledge

or wisdom. May it never be. Isaiah says his

understanding is inscrutable. I love that word

.

ESV says his understanding is unsearchable.

How can we, as feeble as we are, plumb the

depths of his understanding and his wisdom?

Romans 11-33, "O, the depths of the riches,

both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How

unsearchable are his judgments and unfathom

able

his ways." Psalm 147-5, "Great is our Lord and

abundant in strength. His understanding is

infinite."

Over and over again, we see the working out of

the wisdom of God throughout all of history in

the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, but

also in our lives in amazing ways that we pray

and God answers. We see how that works. We may

think that our lives are going to go a certain

way and have things figured out, but then God

moves in a different way. Then in the end of

it,

we see, "Hey, that really was the right way.

The best way is his way. Please consider who

you

are serving. He does not run out of knowledge

or wisdom in orchestrating his universe. He is

not

a aloof. It's not like he missed where you are

. He knows exactly where you are and what you

need,

and he doesn't get tired of orchestrating the

things in our lives, weaving that tapestry

of our lives together as a church individually

, as families in our workplaces, all those

different

things. He is working out according to his

infinite understanding." That was the same

thing that Asaph

saw in Psalm 73. He was really wrestling with

this, and he as a leader, if you read Psalm 73

,

he as a leader said, "Man, if I speak this, I

'm going to betray your people. If I say how I

'm

actually feeling, I'm going to let your people

down." Then he went to the temple, and then he

understood that it wasn't just how they were

living now in this temporary thing. He saw the

end

of the wicked. He saw the big picture. He saw

the wisdom of God, not just in their little

lives,

but he stepped back at the bigness of the

temple, at the bigness of the worship of God,

at the bigness

of who God is. He saw their end, and that's

when he opened his eyes. The Lord opened his

eyes. He

wrote this in Psalm 73.25, "Whom have I in

heaven but you and besides you? I desire

nothing on earth.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the

strength of my heart and my portion forever."

When we don't understand what's happening, we

can understand and rest in the fact that God

does

only understand, and he has the power to take

care of whatever the need is in his way and

for

his glory. We don't understand what's

happening. We can find our strength and our

comfort in God's

strength and in his wisdom. Lastly, in verses

29 through 31, "Because God gives his people

strength."

Verse 29, "He gives strength to the weary, and

to him who lacks might, he increases power.

Though

youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous

young men stumble badly, yet those who wait on

the Lord

will gain new strength. They will mount up

with wings like eagles. They will run and not

get

tired. They will walk and not become weary."

One of the most misused Bibles, or excuse me,

verses in the Bible, is plastered all over pla

ques and coffee mugs and inspirational

Christian calendars. Philippians 4-13 says, "I

can do all things through him

who strengthens me." That verse wasn't written

by Paul to encourage you to push just a little

bit

harder to get the position of starting line

backer or to get the next promotion at your job

. He was

talking specifically about suffering in the

Christian life and that God would strengthen

through the suffering of the Christian life,

the persecution, when the things aren't going

good, when you won't get the position that you

wanted. He said in verse 12, "Because I know

how to get along with humble means, and I also

know how to live in prosperity. In any and

every

circumstance, I have learned the secret of

being filled and going hungry, both of having

abundance

and suffering need." Paul knew that the source

of his strength through the suffering wasn't

from an

inward motivation to push it just a little bit

harder, but the reality that the Almighty God

that he served that saved him, that put him in

the very positions that he was in in his

sovereign

plan, not just wanted his good, but delights

in his ability to give his people strength to

get

through the suffering. It brings God joy to

see his people come through pain and hardship

and trials

and on the other side trust him more, glorify

him more. Remember in the last section we

looked at

the words weary and tired and that God doesn't

get weary and God doesn't get tired. If you

look at

this passage that we're in now, these three

verses, weary and tired are repeated in every

one of these

verses. God doesn't get weary or tired, but we

do. God gives us out of his abundance of

strength,

the strength to get through the times when we

lack power and we all lack at certain times.

God has given us this beautiful passage to

look at. I'm coming up on the ripe old age of

44

and in just a couple of weeks, next month. I

can remember back in my younger days,

I am getting older, look at the gray. Rachel

cut my hair yesterday and there's gray on both

sides

and a little stripe of color left there. I

remember that even in my age of 44 and right

in the middle

at the Lord of the Wills, that back before I

was stronger when I was younger. I could do

more physical exertion. Isaiah recognizes this

same fact that even the young people here get

exhausted. Even the youth runs out and gets

weary. Sometimes we can feel that reality of

our age and

our bones and the difference between our

strength and energy level when we were young

and is now.

When I was younger, I always wondered why

older people woke up so early. But now I know

it's

because if you don't wake up earlier, back

hurts all day. But even at a certain point,

the young, the youth tires out. Verse 30, "Th

ough youths grow weary and tired," there's that

phrase,

"and vigorous young men stumble badly," but

those who put their faith in God, those who

find their

comfort in this life and their strength in

this life in Him and not in their external

circumstances,

things that happen to them, they will find

their strength in God. Verse 31, "Yet those

who wait for

the Lord," you could say, "who hope in the

Lord, who trust or have faith in the Lord will

gain

new strength. They will mount up with wings

like eagles. They will run and not get tired.

They will walk and not become weary." And

again, I'm repeating this because Isaiah did.

It's very

important for us to see that God doesn't get

weary or tired and He has excess that He loves

to give

His people. So we, when we get weary and tired

because we will, He will lift us up. He will

transform us from a tired being into the

picture of strength and majesty in the eagle.

The eagle,

the apex predator, doesn't worry about the

things that are around him. His prey worries

and fears. The eagle doesn't. And look how he

says in verse 31, if you can bring it back up,

babe,

"That they will run and not get tired. They

will walk and not become weary." We run when

there's

something extra hard, something extra

difficult that we're going through, but we won

't get tired.

When we walk, that's the every day, the daily

walk, the daily grind that we have to go to in

and out every day, but we won't get weary or

exhausted from it after trusting in God. That

doesn't mean that we won't experience the

suffering or the pain, but it means that God

will be there

in delights to help His people. Hebrews 12, 1,

"Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of

witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay

aside every encumbrance and the sin which so

easily

entangles us, and let us run with endurance

the race that is set before us." He sets the

race

before us and provides the stamina and

endurance for us to run through it because of

Christ and

through His Holy Spirit. So, as I said before,

that was a bunch of verses. I had it written

down

somewhere, and we've raced through this

passage today and in the past two sermons. So

please,

take this little tidbit and go and read it and

study it yourself. Isaiah starts with a call

to

comfort the people because of the plan of God

was not for their destruction, that the exiled

of Babylon and Assyria wouldn't be their end.

That wasn't the end of the story for them, but

God

would show Himself through the struggles and

through that slavery and through that exile,

that He

would bring them back to the land, and He

would show Himself to be great and glorified

in those

situations. And not only that, through the

future, when He would bring the Messiah, He

would show

Himself to be great. The people would come

back and rebuild, but now that the Messiah has

come,

and if you have placed your hope in Christ

alone, then that strength that He promises,

that comfort

that He promises is only found in Him and

nothing else. And so, rest in that and trust

in that. So

many sufferings that we have to face in this

life. So much persecution and trial and

hardship,

pain, death and sickness and poverty. All

those things happen, but we have the Creator

of the world

that has promised His goodness to us. We have

the one who is all wise and all strong who

provided

His Son to face the wrath of God in our place.

So trust Him if you're a believer. Trust Him

as

you go through those things. And if you're not

a believer yet, then trust Him that He

promises,

that He will if you place your faith in Him

and follow Him in biblical repentance.

We can rest in these truths from Isaiah 40 as

we are commanded to do as we're given these

promises

to take comfort and rest in. Let's pray.

Father, thank you for your mercy and your

grace. Thank

you for your great Son who you've given us in

Christ. All that He's done for us to provide

for

all of our needs in Him. I pray that you bless

us with the Holy Spirit. We're going to face

these fears and worries even in the coming

weeks. We have no idea what's going to happen

this week, but we know that you do and that

you are in control. I pray that our faith

will be placed in you in a more complete way

this week because of the truth of your Word.

And may you get all the glory in Christ's name

. Amen.