Isaiah 40:3-11

All right, if you open your Bibles with me

back to Isaiah chapter number 40.

Isaiah chapter number 40 will read verses one

through 11. And this will be a continuation

of the message I did a month ago. Isaiah 41

through 11. Our passage will be three through

11.

God's word says, "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 plane and the rugged

terrain

into a broad valley. And 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 its lovel

iness 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 youths. Let's pray.

Great say, Father. Thank you for your mercy on

us today. I pray that you'd have mercy on me

as I

preach your word. I pray that you bless our

minds and our hearts to your truth and you

bless your

message in spite of the messenger for your

glory in Christ's name. Amen. So last night,

like I said,

we looked at her last night. Last month, it

feels like last night, we looked at the first

two verses

of Isaiah chapter number 40 and a bunch of

stuff, a bunch of life has happened since then

. And I know

that sometimes it's hard for me to remember

last week's sermon much less, you know, three

or four

or five sermons ago. So we'll do a little

refresher. And we talked last time about how

these

sermons build on each other. That's the

intention is that they build on the things

that happen

in our lives and in our hearts. And as we go

through books, we build on those,

that knowledge that we go, we learn more about

the books. And that helps us over a period of

time to

grow and be transformed by the word. And this

is how we are made to learn. Our great God who

created us made our minds to think this way

and to act, to understand and learn this way.

But that being said, I want to build upon what

we looked at last month about the comfort

of our God. And Isaiah chapter number 40 is a

transition chapter in the book of

Isaiah. It's different. It goes from the first

part and begins the second part of the book.

For the previous 39 chapters of the 66

chapters in the book of Isaiah, for the most

part, Isaiah

has spoken about judgment on the people of

Israel and the people of Judah because of

their sin,

because they forsook the worship of the one

true God. And God had specially chosen a

people.

God had picked them out through Abraham and he

had brought them and given them

so many physical blessings. They were a

wealthy nation and then spiritual blessings

that no other

nation in the world had, especially at that

time. They were a nation that he, by the power

of his

mighty arm, brought out of Egypt miraculously.

He rescued them from slavery. He gave them

after

that after he protected them through the

wilderness, he gave them their own land and

Canaan and gave

them victory over the other nations there to

have the land that he promised them. And many

times

when he did that, all through that saga of

their lives, he did that miraculously. There

was no

mistaking that it was Jehovah God who was

working in their nation. They were given

prophets, seers,

as they were called earlier in the Old

Testament, that would hear his voice and tell

his will

to the kings and to the leaders and to the

people of their time. And then they were given

his word

in the Pentateuch, in the books of that Moses

wrote down. He wrote down the law of God. He

wrote

down how this special God who was unique out

of all the other false gods and the other

nations

wanted to be worshiped. If you have a true God

and he desires to be worshiped in a certain

way,

and there's a separation between true worship

and false worship, and all the other nations

worshiped falsely. And Israel was the only

nation that was able to worship truly because

they were

the only nation given the revelation of God in

his word and through his prophets. And in

spite

of all that, over and over again, they failed

to live up to those things that they promised

they

would do. They promised God they would obey

his law and they would worship him in the

correct way,

and they failed over and over and over again.

And they went after other gods and other idols

that the nations had around them. Back in

Isaiah chapter 3 verse 13, Isaiah early in the

chapter

shows us that God is going to judge his people

for their sins. He said, "The Lord arises to

contend and stands to judge the people. The

Lord enters into judgment with the elders and

princes

of his people. It is you who have devoured the

vineyard. The plunder of the poor is in your

houses. What do you mean by crushing my people

and grinding the face of the poor?" declares

the

Lord God of hosts. And this is in the middle

of a chapter's long tirade of God speaking

judgment

to the people of Israel for their sins. And

this goes on pretty much for 39 chapters.

And then, like we saw last month in the first

verse of chapter 40, immediately after God

pronounces judgment on King Hezekiah, God

tells Isaiah to proclaim comfort, to comfort

his people,

to comfort Jerusalem, because he will not

forget them. The message after chapter 40

turns to a message of comfort and rescue and

salvation. And as we saw, it was a message

that

directly into that time, they could look at

them going into the judgment of God and exiled

by the

Assyrians and looking to a future time where

they would come back, but also through that

prophecy

that Isaiah did. We could look into the future

and see the ultimate rescue and salvation in

Jesus

Christ. And so there's kind of a dual view

going on in this passage. And that message

changes so

drastically from the negative message of

judgment to the positive message of comfort

and rescue

and salvation that many scholars, and I'm not

talking about scholars that we like, but many

scholars say this is second Isaiah. In other

words, that there is a different author than

the

first Isaiah. There was one man named Isaiah,

or so-called, that wrote the first 39 chapters

,

and this is so different that this is a

separate man. And not only do they think it's

a second

author, because it was words of comfort, but

they also thought it was a second author,

because he was writing things about things

that wouldn't happen for another 150 years.

And we know that that can't happen, so it has

to be a separate author, right? But no,

it didn't just write things that came

specifically true, including the names of

emperors that weren't even born yet, hundreds

of years before they happened. He wrote about

things

for hundreds more years about Jesus Christ and

who the Messiah would be born, where he would

be born,

to whom he would be born, what he would do,

and what he would look like. Read Isaiah 53

and see if you don't see Christ in Isaiah 53.

And on top of all that, he wrote about things

that

haven't even happened yet. So, in the very end

of times, when all things come to an end, as

we'll

see a little bit today, he's prophesying about

things that happen at the very end, or the

lion

and a lamb will lay down together. Chapter 11

verse 8 says, "The nursing child will play

by the hole of the cobra, and the wean child

will put his hand on the viper's den.

They will not hurt or destroy in all my holy

mountain, for the earth will be full of the

knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the

sea. Then in that day, the nations will resort

to the

root of Jesse, who will stand as his signal

for the peoples, and his resting will be

glorious."

So, he's prophesying about Christ, the root of

Jesse, who would come several hundred years

after

this, and about the very end of all times,

when God will rule and reign and bring

complete and

full salvation, rescue, and comfort to us. Now

, I guess when that day happens, there might be

a

scholar that says this was a third or fourth

Isaiah, because he could have known about that

before

it happened. But no, his prophecies were given

to him by the God who was arranging for all

this to happen. He has orchestrated all of

history for his glory and for his purpose.

And so, when the Jews, the Hebrews, were

looking at all the judgment coming down the

pike, and now he says, "Comfort, my people,"

as in verse number one, they can say, "Well,

he is in control of everything." And so, we

can go through this exile, through this

judgment,

with that in mind. And so, those two verses

that we looked at last time were very simple

to understand. God is saying, "Just have

comfort, have peace, rescue will come." But

Isaiah is a

prophet, and the Holy Spirit is riding through

him, and he's going to expand on that

understanding,

and that concept of comfort in a very

beautiful and a very dramatic way. And we're

looking at

verses three through eleven, but all of the

rest of this chapter, he's going to expand on

this idea

of the comfort that God will give, and the God

who gives comfort. And so, today in these

verses,

we're going to look at the three-fold comfort.

There's three, this comfort is not just an

easy

comfort, it's just not pat on the back. God is

promising in three ways that he is going to

comfort his people, the three-fold comfort of

God. And we can look at the comforts that were

promised to the Hebrew people, God's people in

the Old Testament, and then apply those,

and look at their lives, and apply those to

our lives, especially through Isaiah, as he's

looking

through the immediate future, and then into

our future as well. So, they were the modern

men,

and the modern women of their time, like we

are. They were, at one point, they were strong

, and

they were wealthy, and the land of the Kingdom

of Judah lived, and they saw that the northern

Kingdom of Israel had been taken into exile by

the Assyrians. The Assyrians came in and took

the

northern kingdom into slavery and exile. So,

Isaiah prophesied that Judah would also go

into exiles, and they would also be taken as

slaves into another nation because of their

sin,

just like the northern kingdom. So, they got a

preview of what was going to happen to them

by looking at their brothers, their tribes,

their other tribes of Israel, to the north.

And so, they didn't have the 24/7 news like we

do. Well, we know what's going on on the other

side of the world immediately as it happens,

or the story that they tell us. We have

terrible

instances of murder, and even terrorism, in

the past couple of weeks, that we were able to

know

about. We're in the past. They didn't come to

us. Now, East Baton Rouge Parish and Living

ston

Parish don't have those direct threats to us,

but even so, we see them on our TVs, and we

know

that it causes us fear, and it causes us

trouble, and it causes us tribulation. And so,

the Judahites looked up at Israel and said, "

Israel took them, Assyria took them,

and they're also going to come take us." We

don't live under that direct threat. We live

pretty nice, cushy lives, but there is a

direct threat that we will all face, the same

as them,

and the same as every other person. The direct

threat that one day, all of us, every single

one

of us will close our eyes in death under this

sun, and most assuredly, without a doubt and

without

fail, when our eyes close in this plane of

existence, we will open them in another plane

of existence

before a holy God who will judge us for every

deed that we have done, and we'll have to give

an

answer for our lives to that holy judge. And

when that happens, what will we say? What will

we say

to that judge? The Hebrew people thought that

they would say to that judge, "Well, of course

,

I'm good. I'm Hebrew. I was born into the

people of Abraham. Of course, I'm fine." And

so now,

the Hebrew people who were so proud of their

Hebrewness, God would punish and bring into

exile, and then God would rescue and bring

back. And you would think that after that

great punishment,

that they would wake up and that they would

turn, but they didn't. So in Jesus' time, this

is post

exile, those Jews still believed that they

would be justified based upon their birth

as children of Abraham, as Hebrew people, John

8.31. So Jesus was saying to those Jews who

had

believed him, "If you continue in my word,

then you are truly disciples of mine, and you

will

know the truth, and the truth will make you

free." They answered him, "We are Abraham's

descendants

and have never yet been enslaved to anyone.

How is it that you say you will become free?

What do you mean, Jesus? We're Jews by birth.

We are free by birth, even though we've been

enslaved

by everybody around us in judgment for our

sins. We've never been really enslaved,

but they were enslaved. They were enslaved to

sin, and they couldn't see it because they

thought that

they were justified by their birth as Hebrew

people. Well, today, we're under a similar

notion,

but it's slightly reversed. In the American

culture, in the American cultural religion,

we believe that we're justified by death, that

everyone who dies goes to a better place. Oh,

he's in a much better place than he would be

here. And so they're both incorrect. Both of

the

ideas are not true. And so these Jews, put

yourselves into their sandals. When they saw

the dust

coming from the Assyrian armies, the horses

picking up the dust in the desert far off,

God through Isaiah is letting them know that

they are not okay just because they have the

temple.

That was about to be destroyed. They're not

okay because they were given the word of God.

They

completely ignored that, and for the most part

, will be taken away. They're not okay just

because

the Abraham was their ancestor. They were

about to be taken into a foreign land as

slaves.

They would be okay because God was their God,

and his word can be trusted forever, that his

comfort

is forever, that he makes covenants, and he

keeps his covenants. And so they take comfort

even

in the midst of that foreign land under a

foreign leader because God would protect them,

and he would provide for them, and that he

would save them and rescue them with what he

calls

a mighty arm. So these news channels that we

have, these podcasts, the X, all these sources

that we

have for our immediate news, in their time,

they didn't have all those things. They had

heralds.

They had men who would run from city to city

and stand in the marketplace and cry out in

the

marketplace the news of the king. You want to

talk about propaganda. They had some

propaganda back

then too, but the herald that God uses never

speaks a word of propaganda. He only speaks of

truth,

and his message is a message of good news, of

tidings of great joy that we have in God's

word,

and the fact that God keeps his word, his

promises, and his covenants. He did back then

that we can look back and see in history, and

he will for us today and into the future.

Judgment is coming for us. We will all face

God on his judgment seat, but when we do face

him,

what will you say? Will we say that we were

our children of Abraham? Will we say, well,

we're going to go into a better place? No. We

're going to say that I have the promise

of the comfort of Jesus Christ, and therefore

I am justified because of him. Isaiah is

telling us

that everybody, every single person, must hear

the true call of comfort from God, this three-

fold

message of comfort. The first message of

comfort is that the Lord is coming in glory in

verses three

through five. A voice is calling. Clear the

way for the Lord in 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. This is the first part of

the news. The herald of God is to call out

that the King is coming. That the King will

come to his people, and when he does, he

brings his

comfort to his people with him because he

comes to rescue his people. The Old Testament

people

are waiting for God's first coming, and they

got it in Jesus Christ, the Messiah. We are

waiting

in the same way that they are with more

information, praise God, before his second

coming. When he

comes to make everything new again, when he

comes to rule and reign in the fullness of his

glory

and forever, that is what we are waiting for.

We're waiting for his mighty arm of justice

and peace to rule over all the world. Psalm 97

.1 said, "Well, the Lord reigns. Let the earth

rejoice.

Let the many islands be glad. Clouds and thick

darknesses surround him. Righteousness and

justice

are the foundation of his throne. Fire goes

before him and burns up his adversaries round

about.

His lightnings lit up the world. The earth saw

and trembled. The mountains melted like wax at

the

presence of the Lord, at the presence of the

Lord of the whole earth. The heavens declare

his

righteousness, and all the peoples have seen

his glory." And so the Herald is going before

God and

telling all the people to prepare the way for

the King of Glory to come, the King of Glory

to come

and to rescue us, to save us from all this

judgment. And there to clear the way for the

Lord. This is

such an interesting passage. It was accustomed

that the royal person's path, his way, his

journey,

would be cleared and made easier for them

before they came to visit a city. And

sometimes they would

do this physically and literally. And other

times they would do it spiritually. So

physically they

would literally, they would go and have men

clean up the city like the mayor of San

Francisco did

before the Chinese dictator came and visited

there. They cleaned all the garbage off the

streets to

make it look good for the royal person. And

sometimes they would go farther than that

depending

on the status of that royal person. In the

manners and customs of the Bible, it's a great

reference book that you should all have on

your shelves. He speaks of an Assyrian queen

named

Samu Ramat. I do pretty good with Hebrew names

. I never did Assyrian names before.

Not only did her subjects clean the litter

from the road and take the stones off her road

and

they made her road straight. They actually

leveled hills and filled in valleys so there

wouldn't be

any arduous path on her journey. That is what

they did. That is what the Isaiah is

referencing here.

Clear the way for the Lord. Make the ravines

level. Make the rough paths smooth. And this

would be

building the Chafalaya Basin Bridge for just a

visit from the president to go from Baton

Rouge

to Lafayette. It was done symbolically in

situations like Princess Ali Ababwa when he

came to be

introduced to Princess Jasmine. Everybody

remember that? The genie made up a big parade

for him to

come and they cleared the way. They cleared

all the riffraff out of the road so the big

parade could

come in with Princess Ali Ababwa. And this is

the same thing that Christ had on his triumph

al

entry. He rode on the foal of a donkey and

they put palm branches down. It was a triumph

al entry

of a king entering a city. Listen to how again

in verses three to four how they're commanded

to

clear the way. 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. Does this

sound familiar

to anyone? Does this sound like something that

we know about that we've heard before? Maybe

in the

book of John the Jewish leaders in Christ time

heard about a man in the wilderness that all

the

people were flocking to. And so they sent

priests to interrogate him because there was

many people

who claimed to be Messiah at that time. So

they wanted to see is this man claiming to be

another

Messiah that we're going to have to deal with

politically and everything? So John the

Baptist

said when they asked him about who he was in

John chapter one verse 20, he said, and he

confessed

and did not deny, but confessed, I am not the

Christ. Then after they asked him, well, look,

are you Elijah? Are you the prophet that is

coming? Or he frustratingly to them answered,

no. Then who

are you, John the Baptist? He said in verse 22

, or they said to him in verse 22, who are you?

So we

may give an answer to those who sent us. What

do you say about yourself? He said, I am the

voice

of one crying in the wilderness. Make straight

the way of the Lord. As Isaiah the prophet

said,

John the Baptist was the fulfillment of this

prophecy made by Isaiah all the way back in

his

time in chapter number 40. He was calling for

them to break up the hills and to fill the

valleys,

to make, to get the stones and the rocks out

of the way, to make the path clear because the

Messiah

is coming to rescue and to bring comfort, to

look to him for a rescue and comfort.

By verse five says, then the glory of the Lord

will be revealed and all flesh will see it

together

for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. In Jesus

, the Messiah, Jesus Christ, the glory of the

Lord

would be revealed. And that's who John the

Baptist was pointing to. Until that point,

God revealed his glory in awesome acts. He

performed miracles in their lives. He rescued

them from Egypt with twelve great plagues that

no one else could have performed. He did great

miracles in the wilderness, made the water to

come from the rock, and he brought fire down

from heaven

on Elijah's offering. But this revealing that

God is promising in chapter five is not just

about an

awesome act of deliverance that he's going to

do. He is going to manifest. He is going to

reveal the

full glory of himself in his Son, in invisible

, in touchable, in feelable, real presence in

Jesus

Christ. The fullness of who Christ is is the

fullness of who God is. God revealed himself

in complete fullness in Jesus Christ. So that

is the first call. The first herald is coming

that

to clear the way. God is coming. The King is

coming. And John the Baptist fulfilled that

prophecy

by pointing to the King that came in Jesus

Christ. And we also look forward to Jesus

coming again,

clear the way for the King. That is the first

coming that God will reveal himself to his

people

in power. Secondly, we can find comfort even

in the face of this life. Because the word of

God will stand forever. Verse number six for

verse number eight. So the voice says, "Call

out."

Then he answered, "What shall I call out?" "

All flesh is grass, and all its 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." Have you ever been in a situation

where a friend or a family member was really

sick

or had something really bad happen to them and

you wanted to be there for them? So the next

time

that happens, I want you to go up to them and

put your hand on their shoulder and look them

right

in the eye and say, "Don't worry. Your

troubles will soon be over." Life's really

short. We're like

grass that burns up anyway, right? That's not

exactly what you would want to put on a hall

mark

card because somebody would say, "Well, don't

worry. Life is short anyway. You're going to

die

soon and you won't be in pain." So why is God

telling the herald of his comfort, the herald

of his rescue, for him to say that, "Here ye

hear ye. Everyone's life is short like the

grass.

Everyone's life is short like the flower whose

bud falls off and doesn't last very long."

So put yourself into the sandals again of

these Old Testament believers and let's say

that you're

one of the remnant of them at the time that

didn't bow your knee to Baal, the false gods

that many

times they worship. You look around at the sin

of the people around you, the sin of your

nation,

and you completely understand why God is

bringing judgment on them. But you remember

the promises

to Abraham that God made in Genesis 13, 14,

and 15. He says, "The Lord said to Abram,

after a lot had separated from him, now lift

up your eyes and look from the place where you

are,

northward and southward and eastward and west

ward, for all the land which you see,

I will give it to you and to your descendants

forever." God made a promise to Abram who

would

be Abraham. And that was supposed to be our

land, the Hebrew's land forever. God promised

it, right?

And then he remembered that God made a promise

to David. And he told David in 2 Samuel 7, 12,

"When your days are complete, you lie down

with your fathers, I will raise up your

descendants

after you, who will come forth from you, and I

will establish his kingdom. He shall build a

house

for my name, and I will establish the throne

of his kingdom forever." So if we go into this

other

land, if we're taken in judgment into this

other land, well, this land won't be ours. And

we won't

have a king on the throne. We're going to be

slaves of a foreign king. And God answers back

here in

verse number seven of our passage. So that

question that you would ask as the Hebrew,

he said, "The grass withers, the flower fades,

when the breath of the Lord blows upon it,

surely the people are grass. But the word

doesn't just end with the shortness and fra

ilty of our

life." Look at verse number eight, "The grass

withers, the flower fades, but the word of our

God

stands forever." So now this makes more sense.

Alec Mottier calls this the marvelous contrast

.

He is using the shortness of our lives as a

great comparison to the eternity

that his promises, that his word stands firm.

So I can know, as that faithful Hebrew who's

getting

swung up or caught up in the judgment going

into Assyria, that if God promised to Abraham

that this was going to be our land forever, if

God promised to David that his son will sit on

a throne forever, I know I must be coming back

. God's going to rescue me. God's going to save

me

even though my life is a blip. Because I know

my life is short. I know that God's word is

eternal.

God makes promises. God speaks with his

almighty power. And when he speaks in his

power, the universe

is created. There is no accidental syllable

that comes out of his mouth. He makes promises

and

he keeps them. And that is our ultimate

comfort, especially to us when so many times

and so many

of our words are useless, are wasted, they're

frail, weak, and powerless. Many times are inc

onsequential,

but God's words aren't. We constantly break

our promises and our word. And sometimes it's

not even

on purpose. Sometimes simply, things are just

out of our control, but nothing is out of the

control

of God. If he speaks a promise, if he speaks a

covenant, if he speaks his word, worlds and

stars

and universes are created and every promise he

says will be kept. Now this is also good news

to us

in this time, because you have me up here and

I am a man. I am Simon Justus at Pecator. I'm

a

simultaneously saved and still a sinner. And

then there are many people in our lives. Many

of you

have been hurt by people in church. We look at

, in a very public case, Stephen Lawson and

what

happened with him and how much pain he caused

us and hundreds of believers around the world.

But because we know that God's word doesn't

fail, even when Stephen Lawson fails, even if

I would

were to fail, God's word is forever, even if I

mess up. You can believe the truth in spite of

the

sinful messenger. You should absolutely look

to God for comfort, because every word he says

,

every word he says, if he's promised to save

you to the uttermost, then he will eventually

save you to the uttermost. He's saved you in

justification. He's saving you in sanct

ification

as he's promised. He's changing you every day.

And then one day, finally and fully,

he will save us in complete glorification

before him. And what a comfort that is when

our lives

are so short. And finally, we can take comfort

by beholding your God. Verses 9 through 11.

Get

yourself up on a high mountain o' Zion. Bear

of good news. Lift up your voice mindily. 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 youth. What greater

announcement can be made when there is a

Savior, when there is a rescuer? The herald

that brings the comfort of God has the

greatest message, the greatest job that any

herald could

see. And you know, this isn't a secret. We

haven't been given a secret message. Like all

the other

churches have got the Bible wrong for hundreds

of years, and we just got the secret message

from

God. They've all been doing it wrong, and we

've got it right. No, this message of the

gospel is to

be to be standing on a mountain top and to be

screamed out so everyone in the valleys can

hear

this message of comfort. It's to be announced

in the most clearest way possible. Verse

number nine,

"Get yourself up on a high mountain, O Zion.

Bearer of good news. Lift up your voice might

ily,

O Jerusalem. Bearer of good news. Lift it up.

Do not fear. Say to the cities of Judah,

Here is your God." And there's quickly two

things that I wanted to bring out about this

one verse.

The first thing is for the grammar nerds.

Hebrew is a gendered language. In other words,

the grammar and spell are changed, depending

on if it's a masculine that they're talking

about,

or a feminine that they're talking about.

Spanish is the same way. There's a Latino pop

culture news,

like E, or whatever the news show, called El G

ordo y la Flaca. In English, you translate that

as the

fat and the skinny. But it's El Gordo, which

is masculine, and La Flaca, which is feminine.

So

you could say it's the fat men, man, and the

skinny woman. And the two hosts, that's what

that's

about. So the phrase here, the bearer of good

news is in the feminine. So he's referring to

women

bearers of good news. Much of the war, much of

the thing that they were looking at,

when they saw that dust of the Assyrians

coming over the clouds, who were the ones that

had to

worry the most, the women and the children in

these great wars that we have today that we

hear

about on the news, all the stuff that is

happening to the women that they're doing to

the women is

absolutely horrible and just grotesque. And it

's one thing to have a war and to fight a

soldier

to soldier. You both know what you're getting

into and you've both trained for this and

there's

rules and stuff that go with that. But the

women and the children bear the biggest brunt

of war.

So in the middle of wartime, the women go into

safe places. They hide in caves. They hide in

shelters in their cities and the men try to

take care of them as best they can because

they can't

fight the battles like the men can. So when

the battles were over, when the war was done,

it was the women who would finally be able to

come out of the safe places, come out from the

caves,

finally take a nice bath and dress nice and

they would celebrate and they would sing and

they would

dance at the the times. This is what happened

when David killed Goliath of the Philistine.

And in 1 Samuel 1860, it happened as they were

coming when David returned from killing the

Philistine

that the women came out of all the cities of

Israel singing and dancing to meet King Saul

with

tambourines with joy and with musical

instruments. David wrote a psalm that mentions

this fact as

well, Psalm 6811, "The Lord gives the command,

the women who proclaim the good tidings are a

great

host. Kings of armies flee." This is what they

're singing. "They flee, and she who remains at

home

will divide the spoil." When the women would

be most afraid facing them, now at the end of

it,

he is prophesying the end of the war that the

rescue of God would come and the women can

come

out of hiding and celebrate and bear the good

news that a rescuer has come. The second one

is much quicker. In the end of our verse, it

says, "Here is your God." We're more familiar

with the

King's James translation and the ESV used it

as well where it says, "Behold your God." This

is the

news that the women heralds are going up on

the mountaintops and singing and dancing. "Be

hold your

God who comes to rescue his people." This is

the song that they sing in verses 10 and 11.

Verse 10,

"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. To his

enemies, he comes with a strong arm. To his

enemies, he comes

with an almighty arm." There is no defeating

the Lord God Almighty, Almighty. Yahweh Saba

oth,

or the Lord of Hosts as it's translated, is

the Lord of Armies. He comes with the power to

destroy

all of his enemies and all the things that are

set up against them. All those who stand up

before

but shake their fists and say, "No, he will

wipe them out with a single word." Revelation

1911 says,

"And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white

horse, and he who sat on it is called faithful

and

true, and in righteousness he judges and wages

war. His eyes are a flaming of fire, and on

his head

are many diadems, and he has a name written on

it which no one knows except himself. He is

clothed

with a robe dipped in blood, and his name is

called the Word of God. And the armies which

are in heaven,

clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were

following him on white horses. From his mouth

comes a sharp sword so that with it he may

strike down the nations, and he will rule them

with a

rod of iron, and he treads the wine press of

the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on

his robe

and on his thigh he has a name written, King

of Kings and Lord of Lords. No enemy will

stand

against the Lord God Almighty." Verse 10, the

song that we sing of comfort is, "God is

strong

and none of our enemies can stand up against

him." But the second part is in verse 11 where

he talks

about how he is towards his own. Verse 11, "

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 youths.

To his

own he doesn't come with an arm of wrath and

an Almighty strong arm. He comes gentle and

lowly

as a shepherd who loves his flock. Christ the

shepherd has taken all of our pain and all of

our

sin on himself." And how often does the Bible

compare us to sheep? And it's such a fitting

comparison. And I know you've heard many

messages on this, but I just think it's

amazing that when

God was creating everything and he created the

sheep, he said, "I'm going to make an

illustration

and I'm going to use it a bunch when I write

my Bible." But this is going to be perfect,

right?

So in our day we don't shepherd sheep very

much. There's some people that kind of do it

for a hobby,

especially here it's kind of hot for them. But

the Hebrews did, they all knew, they all saw

these illustrations and were able to

immediately grasp what they were talking about

. My

brother's wife's mother or my sister, my

brother's mother-in-law, my mother-in-law-in-

law,

however you say that. Her name is Julie and

she's from Scotland and she is one of the

sweetest

people you ever meet. I just love, listen, she

could just read the back of a menu to a

Chinese

restaurant and I just love to hear her accent.

But she just got back from Scotland and we

were

talking yesterday, there's still a bunch of

wool production in Scotland. There's a bunch

of shepherds

and we were talking about sheep and how the

Bible uses them as an illustration and sheep

are not

bright, they're not smart at all and they are

absolutely incapable of taking care of

themselves

without a shepherd. And they're an animal so

they need to drink water but they will die to

third,

of thirst before they drink water from a

moving stream because they're scared of the

water.

Their reflection shakes and it just makes them

scared. So the shepherd has to bring them to

still

water like Psalm 232 says, "He makes me lie

down in green pastures. He leaves me beside

quiet waters because otherwise the sheep

wouldn't drink. They would die before they

drink."

And here this illustration is perfect and God

continues it into the New Testament

with Jesus Christ, John 10, 11, "I am the good

shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life

for the sheep." The sheep couldn't protect

themselves from their enemies but the shepherd

with a strong and mighty arm will for them and

he'll protect them and he'll guide them and do

everything for their benefit, for their

survival because he loves them. His arm g

athers the scared

lost lambs in our last verse here and brings

them back to the mother who will feed them.

Revelation

7, 16 says, "They will hunger no longer, no

thirst any more, nor will the sun beat down on

them nor

any heat. For lamb in the center of the throne

will be their shepherd and will guide them to

the

springs of the water of life and God will wipe

away every tear from their eyes." This is the

message of comfort of the great shepherd, that

message that is given to all of us who are in

Christ, that threefold message of comfort that

comes right after judgment. But you know what,

we can go through whatever happens in this

life and the next because of who God is and

what he's

done through his Son, Jesus Christ. We're to

take comfort in that almighty arm of God who

will defeat

all of his enemies in the end. We're to take

comfort in that God whose word is eternal and

lasts forever no matter how short our lives

are. The benefit to that is, the shorter our

life is,

the shorter the pain is. And then we're to

take comfort in that one day that God with the

almighty

arm who keeps every promise will come back in

glory. And if you're here today, he will hold

you in

his arms as a good shepherd no matter what you

're going through on this earth. And ultimately

,

at the end of this world, at the end of this

age, at the end of everything in his glorious

day, we'll

live before him in eternal glory because all

that Christ has done, all these promises that

we're

reading in Isaiah 40, and there's more down as

you read the rest of the chapter, have came

true

in Jesus Christ or will come true in Jesus

Christ one day. But if you don't know Christ

savingly,

if your family member doesn't know who Christ

is in a saving way, who hasn't come to Christ

in faith,

hasn't come to Christ in biblical repentance,

these are not words of comfort to you.

Isaiah later calls to those who haven't come

to God for his mercy in chapter 55-6. He says,

"Seek the Lord while he may be found, call

upon him while he is near, let the wicked fors

ake his

way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and

let him return to the Lord, and he will have

compassion on him, and to our God, for he will

abundantly pardon. Consider the power and the

holiness of our God, but also the amazing

grace and that amazing love that he's given us

in Jesus

Christ to comfort us, not just now,

temporarily, before ever in him." Let's pray.

Heavenly Father,

we love you and thank you for the words you've

given us in Isaiah and how often we need to be

reminded of this truth. As we go through life,

I pray that we would always look forward to

the

time of your coming when all of your promises

will most assuredly be made true in Christ.

And we

thank you for that. I pray you bless us as we

finish up here for your glory. In Christ's

name, amen.