Kerwin Baptist Church Daily Broadcast

Welcome to the Kerwin Baptist Church broadcast today. Our desire is for the Word of God to be spread throughout the world so that all may know Christ.

Join us now for a portion of one of our services here at Kerwin Baptist Church located in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today, Isaiah is a prophetic book. We've spent time in Isaiah the past few weeks in different areas. We're talking about Israel under the Babylonian captivity. Now, things were a little bit dark for Israel at this point.

And by the way, in many ways, they deserved exactly what happened. As many times as God tried to bestow His goodness and blessing and mercy upon them, they rebelled in their heart and hardened their heart and didn't want God to be their king and all these things. And so now they're in captivity in Babylon, and they're having dark days.

And by the way, that would be dark days. And as Israel is prophesying, God comes in to remind them of a few things. First, He reminds them of things that He has done and is doing. And then He makes a promise to them, a reminder of a promise that He had made to them of what their future would be. So I want to pick it up. Look at verse one just to show you a little bit of tidbits if you don't mind following.

I just want to show you some highlights. It says, The Lord hath come to me, hearken ye people from far. The Lord hath called me from the womb. From the bowels of my mother hath He made mention of my name. That means this, that obviously we know God knew us before we were ever even conceived. But this does make it clear that you and I are called by God for a purpose even before we ever come out of our mother's womb.

Just follow Him. How often do we fight against that, though? We've got our own plans. He had a plan for us when we were in the womb. We come out of the womb, and now we know it all.

That's just what we do. Notice if you would, down in verse seven. And a lot of good things, I just don't have time this morning. But in verse seven it says, Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel. Remember, He'd already redeemed Israel and had promised to do so. Look in the middle of verse seven. He said, Kings shall see and arise.

Remember, they were under captivity by kings. But He said kings shall see and arise. Princes also shall worship because of the Lord that is faithful and the Holy One of Israel. And He shall choose thee. Look at verse eight. Thus saith the Lord in an acceptable time. Have I heard thee? And in a day of salvation, have I helped thee?

And I will preserve thee. Look at verse nine. Being captives here.

Being prisoners. God says this, That thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth. He says, I'm going to free you from this prison. Verse 10 in the middle. It says, For he that hath mercy on them shall leave them, even by the springs of water shall he guide them.

Doesn't that sound familiar? Maybe a little bit of a Psalm 23 verse in there. As he says this, that, where am I at? Even by the springs of water shall he guide them. Look at verse 11. And I will make all my mountains away and my highways shall be exalted. God says, I'm going to make a way for you. I'm going to provide for you. I'm going to conquer thee.

I'm going to do all this for you. Now, verses one through 12 and even on down, it talks about all the things that God has done. But I want to begin in verse 13 because it gets real specific here. Excuse me, look at verse 13. Sing, O heavens, and be joyful, O earth.

Why? Well, look at everything that's just been written. Look at all these things that God has done. I know you're in captivity, but don't forget because of the situation you're in right now. Don't forget all that God has done, all that God has provided, and all that God has promised. Have a little faith. You've got a lot to sing about. You've got a lot to be joyful about. Look at verse 13.

And break forth into singing. O mountains, for the Lord hath comforted his people and will have mercy upon his afflicted. But Zion said... See, it didn't really matter what the Lord did.

What matters now is what they said. The Lord hath forsaken me and my Lord hath forgotten me. Verse 15, God replies. Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?

Yea, they may forget. Yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands. Thy walls are continually before me. All God's people said. Interesting passage. There's a lot of back and forth.

It's God making claim to all the things he's done, reminding of all the promises he's made, and right in the middle of that, when God's people actually speak, when they finally say something, what is it that they say? The Lord hath forsaken me and my Lord hath forgotten me. And remember our title this morning.

They may. I will not. Let's pray. Lord, I love you. Thank you for all that you've done. Lord, this is so very applicable to our lives right now. I thank you, Lord, how this has helped me this week. Lord, we all go through seasons of our life.

I'm in one right now that you are certainly well aware of. And Lord, there can come up confusion, frustration, hurt. And Lord, I pray that you would use your word as you used it in my heart and are continuing to do so. Lord, I don't even know that I've grasped it all, but Lord, help me as I rightfully divide your word today.

I pray that it would be a blessing to those who are here. Lord, we are flesh, we fail, but you don't. May we remember that. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. As we look at this passage, and I know, I think you understand a little bit of the context now.

I want you to notice number one. Look at verse 13. I want you to see first he gives us the reason to praise, a reason to praise. Look at verse 13. Sing, O heavens, be joyful, O earth, and break forth into singing, O mountains.

Wow. That means sing, be joyful. In fact, you ought to be so grateful and praise so much that there's this spontaneous bursting into singing. Now, I have had that happen in my life on different occasions. And I'm sad to say that it has happened to me a lot during sporting events. Somebody will hit a last-second shot on your team.

And what do we do? It's this spontaneous bursting forth into praise. And isn't it sad how often maybe we've done that to a sporting event or whatever the case might be and how little we do that in gratitude to God. He said a reason to praise. For the Lord hath comforted his people.

And will have mercy upon his afflicted. Now, listen to me. Now, I'm going to preach fast this morning.

I hope that you can listen fast. They were in captivity, so what was there to praise God for? I mean, all these things are great, and it sounds really a good hoorah. In church, we can get up, we know the lingo, and well, praise God anyhow. Well, God in control of everything. We know the words to say, and we know the phrases to say, but deep down, we struggle. And we don't want people to understand that or know that.

But I'm going to be very transparent with you. Your pastor struggles with things. I mean, sometimes we end up in situations, and you think, you know, what is there to really praise God for right now?

And what is there to really sing about right now? And these folks were in captivity. And all the wonderful things said that God did, what was their response? Hey, you've forsaken us.

You've forgotten us. So they were in captivity. They were in a bad situation.

They were basically prisoners by an entirely different nation. So what was there to praise God for? Well, can I show you just very quickly in some of the passages we've read? Look at verse seven, if you would. Notice in the middle of verse seven, because of the Lord that is faithful.

Can I tell you something that they had reason to sing about? Was the fact that God had been faithful. One of the things we might be in is the fact that God's been faithful even though you haven't. And God has been faithful to me even though there have been many times where I wasn't faithful to him.

There's always something to sing about. Notice verse eight, the Bible says, Thus saith the Lord, In an acceptable time have I heard thee. There's something to be joyful about, the fact that God would even take the time and care enough to listen to a bunch of sinners when we pray. We don't have the right to enter into the presence of God. All through this Old Testament, people didn't even have the right to go to God on their own.

Literally a priest had to go into the Holy of Holies and offer sacrifice to go to God on behalf of them. But now you and I can go straight to the throne of God. You say, yeah, but I'm still in captivity. Notice the middle of verse eight, he said, In a day of salvation have I helped thee. Hey, there's something maybe to be joyful about.

You're saved. If you've been saved by the grace of God, there's something to be happy about even when you're in captivity. I don't know about here, but the Bible says here that he helped them.

Hey, there's something to praise about. God's helped you. And whether you know it or not, admit it or not, whether I even acknowledge it or not, there are things in our life we couldn't do without God's help, we couldn't accomplish without his grace.

He's helped us this morning. And you might say, Preacher, but I'm in this situation. Even though you are, don't forget, he's helped you.

I notice here in verse eight that he says, I will preserve thee. God's preserved you. All the stuff that's happened to you in your life and yet guess what? You're still here. Guess what? You've still got most of your brain left.

Your nerves are frazzled. But bless God, God's word still stands. God's still on the throne.

And he still loves you. He's preserved. You. All of us could stand and talk about things that many people wouldn't have made it through, and yet we have.

Why? Because God preserved us. Notice if you would in verse 10, the Bible says they shall not hunger or thirst.

How about praising God for this? The Lord fed them. In fact, he fed them for 40 years in a wilderness, and they didn't even need to be in that wilderness. It was their fault, their choice, their decision, and yet God fed them faithfully every day. And even in this captivity, yeah, they were in captivity, but guess what? They weren't missing.

They weren't missing meals. Look at verse 10. They shall not hunger nor thirst.

Look at the middle there. Even by the springs of water shall he guide them. The Lord guided them. May I say this? There is always something to praise God for. Let me say that again.

I don't think many of you heard me. There is always something to praise God for. Some of you might be in what we call the captivity of something. Maybe you're in the captivity of a disease.

We have folks watching our service probably right now that are in the prison of sickness. And you say, preacher, it's easy to stand up there at the pulpit and say there's always something to praise God for, but what about my captivity? Has God still been faithful? Has God still fed you? Does God still love you?

There's always something to be grateful for. Some of you are in the captivity of circumstance. There's some things that have happened. Maybe a person disowned you, rejected you, left you, whatever the case might be.

And you know what? You're in a circumstance that you didn't necessarily create, you didn't want, you did everything to avoid. And you say, but, preacher, here I am, and I don't understand it, and I feel like maybe God has forgotten me, and maybe God has forsaken me.

And please do not look at me with those kind of condescending eyes this morning as if you've never had a time in your life where you thought maybe God had overlooked you, forsaken you, or forgotten you. We all end up there sometimes. There's always something to be joyful about.

There's always something to break forth into singing about. And some people have problems. Their response to problems. Look at verse 14. But, this is a contrasting statement. This is a conjunction that feeds into. In other words, this statement has been made leading in one direction that they had a lot to be thankful for. But this conjunction comes in here in this verse but which means we're getting ready to change directions. Although everything that has been said thus far should point a person to this direction, that word but changes direction.

It means but they're, although they should be seeing it this way, although they should be going this way, they're now going a different way. But Zion said, notice this, the Lord hath forsaken me. The Lord hath forgotten me. You see, in verses one through 13, God did. But in verse 14, they said, do you know our attitudes are often bound by our limited perceptions?

Now that's a statement, so I'm gonna say it again. I want you to allow your mind to wrap around it. Our attitudes are often bound by our limited perceptions. We often feel and act based on what we perceive.

And oftentimes, you and I do not perceive the entire story. You see, as I read this passage, they did not see God's provision, they solved their problems. They did not see God's protection, they solved their prison. They did not see God's faithfulness, they were only consumed with their own fear. Instead of claiming faith, they felt forsaken. Instead of trusting their father, they felt that he had forgotten them.

May I make a loving statement this morning to me first, and maybe it'll trickle down to you. You and I must understand that just because we have a problem, does not mean that God has not provided. Just because we have a problem, does not mean that God has not provided. In fact, never in God's word did God ever say that we wouldn't have problems. But God did promise that he would provide for us. Just because we end up in circumstantial prisons does not mean that God has not protected. Just because we fear does not mean that God has not been faithful. Just because we go through some bad, it does not mean that God has not been good.

Y'all act like you're not totally convinced this morning. Now may I say this before we become a little bit too judgmental, let's remember that we're not in their situation here in Isaiah 49. We don't really know all that they went through. We don't really know all that they felt.

Here is a generation maybe of people that heard about the promises that have been made to their parents and their grandparents, but all they knew was captivity. I must be honest, as a pastor over the years, there's been times that I've had to sit across from some people, and I struggled to find, looking at their life and their situation at this present moment, I have struggled to find what they could possibly be joyful about right now. You know, during times like this, you can almost hear Satan say, what are you gonna sing about now, big boy? How's your joy now, preacher?

Yeah, yeah. Response to problems. You know, I wonder if sometimes that's basically our response to problems. We just kinda say, God, you've forsaken, you've forgotten. God, you didn't do what you were supposed to do.

Now, none of us would probably say that out loud. Some of us might be honest enough to do that, but that attitude and that feeling, what it shows itself is we just get out of church, we don't read God's word anymore, we don't really care about spiritual things, we got other things we'd rather do, and basically what that is, that's an outflow of an inward attitude that says, God, I'm mad at you. Number three, he brings up the role of a parent. So God gives reasons to praise, and they give their response to their problems. So God has to kinda start from scratch. Okay, look at verse 15.

God asks a question. Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? God brings up the role of a parent, and he kinda uses this as an illustration, because remember in verse one, God said literally that this nation was birthed from the womb. God was not just their God, he was their father.

And by the way, God is not just your God, he's your father. He asks a question, can a woman forget her sucking child? Obviously speaking of an infant that is still nursing. And as he describes this scenario, I want you to see two things that God gives them as the role of a parent.

First, we see extensive provision. You see, when a child is that age, it means that that child is totally dependent upon his mother for sustenance, for protection, for warmth, for a dwelling place, for transportation, for cleanliness. An infant can't get somewhere and walk somewhere or drive somewhere. An infant can't feed himself, can't clean himself. An infant can't provide a place to live, can't buy a house, can't even afford rent.

Neither can mom and dad after they have that baby. Amen. May I remind you today that you and I are totally dependent upon God. Oh, okay, Israel, I know you're in captivity, but can I remind you that even while you've been in captivity and all the years of your history and despite all the decisions you've made, God says you are still totally dependent upon me. You're getting mad at the very source that feeds you.

You're getting bent out of shape with the very person that provides for you. Extensive provision, notice secondly as a parent, God says, he brings up the subject of enduring compassion. He said, can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?

Isn't it interesting here that God never talks about dad? Talks about mom. I mean, when you're talking about enduring compassion, that no matter what, it's mom.

Okay, thank you, there's two of us. Nobody loves a child like mom. My mom in heaven, bless her heart, if she was here on earth, she would tell you, and I've told you this before, she would tell you that I was a very good child, that I rarely caused any issues at all, that I was very well behaved, and my dad would, he would tell you this.

Because us men, we think black and white. Hey, show me the numbers on paper, and if you can't show me the numbers on paper, then I'm gonna feel this way, but a mother doesn't look at the numbers on paper, it's not facts, it's feeling. And even though dad says, hey, he did this, he did this, he did this, I know exactly what's going on, he's this, but mom says, oh, he's my baby.

Oh, I just love him. Oh, he wouldn't do that. Not my baby. Oh yeah, mom, not yours. God, as he brings up the role of a parent, he says a mom wouldn't forget her child that is totally dependent upon her, and a mom is gonna have compassion way beyond, and a mom's gonna take care and still love way beyond any other person in your life will.

Which brings us to number four, rejection, that is possible. As God gives this scenario, he says this in verse 15. Can a woman forget her second child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget.

Did you hear that? It means this, that the most unlikely person to forget another person would be a mother and her child. That would be the most unlikely scenario that a mother would abandon her child when the child needs everything from that mother. And the most unlikely scenario of a person that's gonna have compassion on somebody else would surely be a mother that's gonna have love and compassion on a child way beyond everyone else. Even when everyone else has given up and has turned off and said, forget you, mom still has compassion.

And yet this is what God said, even that is possible. They may forget. They may forget, as unlikely as that would seem, it happens. And may I say something to you today, if it is even possible for a mother to do that to a child, imagine how possible it is for us as individuals to do that to each other.

You see, listen to me, please get this. People can and may fail you. People can and may forsake you. And people can and may forget you.

That's what you and I can come to expect from people. They may forget. As much as you would say, surely they wouldn't. How many of you sitting in this building have been absolutely stabbed in the back by somebody that you thought would never do that to you?

They would never do that. Man, I've given years to this company. Yeah, but when they're looking at paying out retirement, they're gonna get rid of you before that retirement comes. Preacher, I've had family. I've been over backwards, done stuff, bought and stuff, provided stuff, let them live free in homes and all that stuff.

And the very person I've done all this for has just absolutely stabbed me in the back. Yay, they may forget. You say, well, I didn't really come for some bad news this morning, but I'm getting it, preacher. Listen to me, I am gonna tell you, you and I are flesh, we fail. God looks to them and says, hey, a woman is earthly. And they may forget. But I want you to notice, fifthly, a reminder of a promise. In verse 15, God says this, yet will I not forget thee. You see, God was not making the point that you will never be forsaken, that you will never be forgotten.

God was making the point that that would never happen with him. The one person that they were mad at is the only person that had never forsaken them. The one person that they thought had forgotten them is the one person that never will. Yet will I not forget thee.

Can I give you a little bit of encouragement? You say, preacher, yeah, but this is written to a different group of people at a different period of time absolutely right, you're right. But you gotta understand in the scenario that the nation of Israel has always been a picture all through the Old Testament of the saved people of God.

You see, Israel was chosen by God, we've been called by God, we've been redeemed by God, just like the nation of Israel was. And all that they did through the wilderness and all the accounts of how they've acted with God and the ups and downs and all that is literally an illustration of our life as saved children of God. The way that even though we're up and down and even though we rebel and even though at times we feel guilty and even though at times we're apologetic and we're humble, there also comes pride at times in our life. The whole point is despite all that, that God still loves us, he has not forgotten us and he has not forsaken us. Amen.

Amen. It's a reminder of a promise. Thank you, Lord. Just in case you thought, well, I'm not really sure about that, God tells us two things that he's done to make sure you never doubt and that you will always know. That despite the captivity you may be in, he has not forgotten you and he will not forsake you. I want you to notice in verse 15 and beginning in verse 16, he says this, I will not forget thee, behold, in verse 16. In other words, let me explain what I've done, what I'm going to do to make sure you know you've never been forgotten. He said, behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands. Thy walls are continually before me.

First, engraving in the palms. Thank you for listening today. We hope you received a blessing from our broadcast. The Kerwin Baptist Church is located at 4520 Old Hollow Road in Kernersville, North Carolina. You may also contact us by phone at 336-993-5192 or via the web at kerwinbaptistchurch.com. Enjoy our services live and all our media on our website and church app. Thank you for listening to the Kerwin broadcast today. God bless you. We'll see you next time.