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.