Where is the heroism in discouragement?
It's not. You cannot be heroic for the causes of Christ if you have succumbed to discouragement. Now we all face discouragement on multiple levels.
The flesh cares nothing about what makes sense to God or righteousness, and we all have it, and we all spend our entire life fighting it because the flesh does not die from natural causes. This is Cross Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Isaiah.
Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. Isaiah chapter 29 is where Pastor Rick will be teaching from today on this edition of Cross Reference Radio. God is saying everything about talking spirits, talking to the spirits, talking to the dead, praying to Mary. This stuff is an abomination to God. It's clearly laid out in Scripture.
People do it anyway. Deuteronomy and Leviticus get right to the point with these things. The Old Testament prophets, they condemn these occult practices, and for Isaiah to say to the people of God, you're going to be behaving, and he uses these occultic practices to characterize them, rebuke all by itself. And so the city that had a proud past, Jerusalem did. You think of David, of course, and Solomon. What happened there as far as what the righteous achieved is now perverted, presently perverted in the days of Isaiah, and is facing this fearful future full of woe, terrified by the Assyrians, and again, demolished later by the Babylonians, because you say, well, Jerusalem survived.
Yeah, but think about it. Your country, the capital city survives, but all the other cities are wiped out. Well, that would be horrific. Family members, loved ones, your land, and that's what took place, and when the Rabshakeh shows up, some of the other cities were still smoldering, and they had good reason to be terrified, and that's why the way he talked, the foul language he used, the intimidation, terrorist tactics, when the Jews said, can you hold it down so no one heals us? We're talking here as diplomats. He got louder and more obnoxious.
Of course, it didn't work well for him. Anyway, what he is saying here is that the city will come to dust, and the people of the city, they're going to hide themselves in the dust and the rubble. They're going to pretend to be dead, to escape the enemy.
They're going to be so scared that if they communicate, they're going to be whispering so nobody hears them. Very detailed prophecy by the prophet. Verse 5, moreover, the multitude of your foes shall be like fine dust, and the multitude of the terrible ones like chaff that passes away. Yes, it shall be in an instant, suddenly.
This is an abrupt change now. He moves from the antagonist, from the Assyrians. He now comes to the protagonist, to the Jews, and as he moves through the verses, it's pretty easy to connect.
So the entire mood changes with this word, suddenly. The Lord saving Jerusalem from Assyria, and as you get that in verses 6 and 8, we get that again in the latter chapters of Isaiah, and then we have it also in Kings. So the foe, he is saying, the Assyrians I'm going to use to judge you, but they're not out of control. They're under my control, God has said, as sovereign. They are his instrument of judgment, but Jerusalem is the object of judgment also.
It's not going to annihilate the Jewish people, as it did some of the other people, such as the Edomites. Verse 6, you will be punished by Yahweh of hosts with thunder and earthquake and great noise, with storm and tempest and flame of devouring fire. Verse 7, the multitude of all nations who fight against Ariel, even all who fight against her and her fortress, and distress her shall be as a dream of a night vision.
So there you see, he's taught the abrupt changes about Ariel, Jerusalem. And he's saying, your enemies, the vanquish of the Assyrian army, or the vanquisher, will be vanquished. The Assyrian, with her foreign troops, and she had many of them.
When God wipes out the 185,000 of them, they all were not born in Nineveh. Many of them were from peoples that the Assyrians had conquered. You know, if you were a young man living in that ancient world, you didn't have any options. If you could get into the military, you could have a pretty good life if you were on the side of a juggernaut like Assyria was, until Babylonians came along, then you were on the wrong team. Otherwise, what were your options?
I mean, farming, if you could be a merchant, if you had family. So you had a lot of men from all over the region as a part of this army. And when they raised or demolished a city, the loot was theirs if they could get their hands on it, and that was the incentive. So that's why we pick up Isaiah 37, then the angel of Yahweh went out and killed in the camp of the Assyrians 185,000, and when the people arose early in the morning, there were the corpses, all dead. Reminds us of the Egyptian army that was swallowed up by the Yam Suph, the Sea of Reeds, as they chased Moses and the people, trying to re-enslave them, and the Jews woke up the next day and there were the corpses on the shore of Egypt's army. Anyway, verse 8, it shall even be as when a hungry man dreams, and look, he eats, but when he awakes and his soul is still empty, or as when a thirsty man dreams, and look, he drinks, but he awakes, and indeed he is faint, and his soul still craves, so the multitude of all the nations shall be who fight against Mount Zion. When he wrote this, it didn't say, you know, people many generations later, they don't need to hear all this stuff. But for his generation, they wanted to hear this, they would go home thinking about the graphic language that he used, such as here in verse 8, deliverance is assured. All the nations that rise up against Zion will suffer dissatisfaction, so he says it shall be as when a man is hungry and he dreams, and look, he eats, but he awakes and his soul is still empty. And so he's saying, these conquerors that come down, they're not going to be satisfied. That's not the reason why they're coming. They think that's the reason why. God is saying they're coming to execute judgment on you.
If I don't put these checks and balances in place, number one, I will end up perpetuating, enabling the Jewish people to be worse, and number two, I will be guilty of not dealing with the corruption when it reaches levels of intolerance. So their dreams will fail, the conquerors will come to Jerusalem, but they won't be satisfied, which was what happened to Reb Shaka when he comes, and I like saying Reb Shaka. There are just certain words you'd like to say. Who doesn't like to say Mozambique? Anyway, there's a bunch of them. Timbuktu, I mean just say it, not now.
Whisper it, but don't mutter it. Anyway, where am I? Here, back in verse 8. All of this has, again, end time overtones. All of it is looking in the direction of the future to a conclusion, not just an ongoing endless conclusion with the scoffers, you know, since our fathers we've been talking about the day of his coming, where is it? That's just unbelief at work.
No surprise there. Only by God's sovereign intervention was Jerusalem spared, of course. And this thing about Israel, this little piece of land about the size of New Jersey is just a stumbling block for the world. Zechariah 12 verse 9, speaking about the world tripping over Israel. It shall be in that day that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.
Well, Armageddon's going to do that. Micah writes about this. He's a contemporary of Isaiah. Zechariah came later, but Micah says, Now also many nations have gathered against you, who say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion.
But they do not know the thoughts of Yahweh, nor do they understand his counsel. For he will gather them like sheaves to the threshing floor. Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion, for I will make your horn iron.
I will make your hooves bronze, and you shall beat in pieces many peoples. I will consecrate their gain to Yahweh and their substance to the Lord of the whole earth. And so there's the Lord of the whole earth being Lord over the whole earth and protecting Israel. Again, another end time prophecy. And so the foes will rise, there will be struggles.
I'm not going to read, well maybe I will, just read a little bit. Most of you know this verse from Zechariah 14. For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem. The city shall be taken.
The houses rifled and the women ravished. Half of the city shall go into captivity, but the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations as he fights in the day of battle.
And it just continues, just brings in his Mount of Olives. Even though this is end times, even though it had elements of fulfillment. Previous to the final battle when almost all of Israel is wiped out. So the tiny nation of Israel is the tail wagging the earth.
And the earth doesn't believe it. And this because God has pledged his care for Israel. And Satan is obsessed with overthrowing whatever God cares for. And that's why Israel is such the center of spiritual and physical attention by those that are against God.
And it is the love of those who are with God to care for Jerusalem. Verse 9, pause and wonder, blind yourselves and be blind. They are drunk, but not with wine.
They stagger, but not with intoxicating drink. And now again to the Jews, he is reproving their folly of formality and hypocrisy. They're going down to the temple. Back up in verse 1, where you know, they're coming with their feast days. They enjoyed their feast days, their holidays. It's a, you know, Christless Christmas kind of a thing.
And I don't want to get into how Christmas started and was this and that. Just overall, we see that there are people that will say, marry Christ mass, but have no interest in Christ. And you say, well that's, there's some hypocrisy in there.
Coming back to this, well the remainder of the chapter deals with Judah's widespread sin and the coming judgments. God says here in verse 9, blind yourselves and be blind. He says, you're retreating from reality. Fine, you want to be blind, you don't want to see what's going on. You're going to reap what you sow.
There's a price attached to that. It's not free to make believe that the obvious does not exist. It's not going to work in your favor. You turn from God and from God you will be turned. There's a cause and an effect.
There's an action and a reaction. But it shouldn't happen and it did not happen to everyone. It didn't happen to Isaiah, but it happened to a lot of them. Why don't the Jewish people look at this today and just say, you know, let's just worship the Lord according to the scripture. Well, the rabbis are in the way, that's why. Same thing's happened with the Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Church. You can't call it a Catholic Church. You can't call it a Roman Church because Catholic means universal and they're not universal. They're limited with their Roman theology. Anyhow, they listen to the cardinals and the popes, the magisterium, not the scripture. That's the great difference between Bible believers and those who follow Romanism.
And it's not an insult, it's just a fact. Those who know anything about it on their side would be quick to admit it. Well, blind yourselves and be blind. Why were the people of Jerusalem so ignorant to what God was doing?
Why are people that way now? Why churchgoers? So many churchgoers hear the truth about things.
It just bounces off of them. This is the mystery of lawlessness and we cannot let it discourage us. The whole thing with the two thieves on the cross. They heard the same sermon from the same man at the same time. One went on to heaven, the other chose out. And don't let these things discourage us because where is the heroism in discouragement?
It's not. You cannot be heroic for the causes of Christ if you have succumbed to discouragement. Now we all face discouragement on multiple levels. The flesh cares nothing about what makes sense to God or righteousness. And we all have it and we all spend our entire life fighting it because the flesh does not die from natural causes. The flesh will not die until the Lord says, come on in. Well, anyway, why were the people of Jerusalem so ignorant? Well, verse 13 tells us because their hearts were far from God. God wants my heart and if I feel like, you know, I'm not giving it to him that I need to take it up with him.
What I must not do is ignore it or cave into it. They had trusted their outward forms of worship. They faithfully kept their feast as mentioned. And yet it wasn't true worship the whole time. The whole time God was not in their mind.
He was just an ornament on the tree. Going to the temple was a popular thing for their culture. Everybody did it. It was time for the Passover.
We all have to get rid of the leaven. It was just this fun, seasonal thing. But they didn't care what the Bible said. They didn't like what Isaiah was saying. Therefore, God sent spiritual blindness, put the people in a stupor. Instead of pouring into them the Holy Spirit, he said, fine, I'll pour into you sleep.
And that is exactly what we're going to come to in a moment. And this sleep kept them, this blindness kept them from understanding their own Bible as it is with many churchgoers. They can't stomach expositional teaching. They want you to get up in the pulpit and give them statistics, give them skyscraper sermons.
One story built atop of another story. Thrill them the whole time. But please, whatever you do, don't give me doctrine. Do not give me exposition and character studies.
And that's what Isaiah faced also. We talked about the people saying, what is he going to teach us like kids? The drunks were saying, you know, precept upon precept. It was a jingle. You know, precept upon precept, line upon line. They were mocking him and he mocked them back.
I love those problems. They didn't take any mess. They just, I mean, they had to take some.
But when the opportunity arose for them to straight out deal with what was happening, they dealt with it. And here he says, they are drunk, but not with wine. They stagger, but not with intoxicating drink. Here in verse 9, alcohol-free spiritual idiocy. That's what that is.
And that's what they would have understand him to be saying. You're walking around drunk with things about God and it's your fault. Staggering from one dumb idea to another idea. Paul said it, tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine.
Going to any church, loving any preacher, no matter what they're saying. Always learning and never really getting the point. This is not acceptable. And it shouldn't be. It's not like, well, you've got a handicap where, you know, you can understand God's word.
Well, that's not true. That's why Jesus said to Satan, man should not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And he couldn't say that if it was, you know, only for scholars. Well, anyone who studies is a scholar.
Of course, we use the word differently from time to time. Any student of scripture will learn. Not all of it, but enough of it. There will be things that you will say, hmm, that's perplexing, but there will be a lot of other things where you say, I got it.
And not only do I have it, I have it well enough to give it. And that is letting the Spirit flow through you. Verse 10, for Yahweh has poured out on you the spirit of deep sleep. And has closed your eyes, namely the prophets. He has covered your heads, namely the seers. But instead, again, of pouring the spirit into the people, welcoming them to be in communion with God, he's pouring sleep into them. God himself. Romans chapter 1, therefore God gave them up to uncleanness in the lust of their hearts to dishonor their bodies among themselves. It reaches a point where God says, fine, maybe you'll understand this.
This is what you insist on having, this is what you shall get. And then they blame him for that. And so, in this sleep, they missed everything. He cut the, no more prophets. There's a subtle difference between a prophet and a seer because, you know, some of the prophets were seers. But the office of a prophet had a lot more authority than just a person who could see something. The prophets wielded authority.
And that's my take on the distinction between the two. Romans chapter 1 again, and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to those things which are not fitting. But the sad thing is, as many Christians cave with them.
They just think it's just better to change teams than to stand. And having done all to stand, to stand. It does hurt, but you've got to take the pain. You're going to be in pain no matter what in life.
There's pain everywhere. You might as well try to make it count for the kingdom. I tell myself that and I believe it.
And it has worked well for me. And I'm afraid of thinking where I would be if I didn't take that approach. What would I do if I just got discouraged with ministry or just life? I don't want to, just change the subject. So, in no way is God to blame for their apostasy or his intolerance. Consider the miracles that Pharaoh refused to yield to. Stick that on God. It's his fault. No, it's Pharaoh's fault. God was reaching out to him. Moses appealed to him and he would have none of it. Consider Judas Iscariot. Saw more things than most people who were ever born saw.
And look what he did with it. Anyway, it's their fault that Yahweh hurt them for being harmful. Action and reaction. And why are rebellious sinners so upset with God when he behaves like God?
While they deny him at the same time. Well, this is what sin does to people and we need to be sensitive to that. You know, when you're dealing with somebody, say, Well, you know, I'm dealing with somebody who is in a deep sleep.
I'm dealing with someone who is staggering, but not because of some substance. It's sin that is doing this. And our response is always, I think the same largely.
We can do our part. Our part is always to follow the Spirit. Sometimes it's to be quiet. Sometimes it's to be encouraging.
Sometimes it is to rebuke. Verse 11, The whole vision has become to you like the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one who is literate, saying, Read this, please. And he says, I cannot, for it is sealed. Then the book is delivered to one who is illiterate, saying, Read this, please. And he says, I am not literate. Well, this blindness is the result of their infidelity to God, as we've been looking at.
And holding God's word is insignificant because they were frauds going down to the temple offering sacrifices, blind to the truth. And so here you have the educated and the uneducated. And to one he says, Can you read the scriptures? I can't. It's closed to me.
It is sealed. And he goes to the other one who can't read and says, Well, I would break the seal, but I couldn't read anyway. Isaiah is giving us this picture. Paul summed it up this way. And as you see this in the Old Testament, and you come across the New Testament cross-references, you've got to say to yourself, those New Testament apostles were reading those Old Testament prophets. And so he says, The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. They have foolishness to him, nor can he know them.
They are sealed because they are spiritually discerned. And these people were with the wrong spirit. The natural man is the unsaved man. The carnal man is the one that claims Christ, but is living like the unsaved.
So we all have an element of carnality that we've got to watch out for. So the spiritual man, of course, is in rhythm with scripture, which is the mind of God, because it is the Word of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
It's all tied in. Verse 13. Therefore, the Lord said, Inasmuch as these people draw near me with their mouths, and honor me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the commandment of men. Well, this is Christ, Matthew 15, saying that to the religious Pharisees, saying, Give me lip service, but you don't mean it. You are far from me. You make up laws, and you say God did this, but no, it's really you did this, and you did this to get something from people.
You're corrupt is the bottom line. And so they were flattering God, but they were false through and through. This goes back again to verse 1. Ritual alone does not impress God. Oh, look at the candles you lit. I never saw anybody light one with their left hand.
I never saw a righty light it with their left hand. It's very impressive. And there are a lot of people, they are very much into ritual. But they don't read their Bibles.
It's very sad. Man-centered religion, and it's routine. And so here Christ is repeating himself centuries later. What are we, 700 years later, Christ comes, and he inspired Isaiah to say this, and then he quotes it to the Pharisees, and we, of course, read and quote it ourselves. He repeated it in the New Testament in different ways. And so when he gets to the church at Ephesus in Revelation 2, he says the same thing, that you're drawing near to me, but you don't love me.
And I need you to fix that. Thanks for tuning in to Cross Reference Radio today. Cross Reference Radio is a ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel mechanicsville in Virginia. If you'd like to learn more about this ministry, we invite you to visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com.
You'll find a number of teachings from Pastor Rick available there. We also encourage you to subscribe to our podcast. When you subscribe, you'll be notified of new editions of Cross Reference Radio. Just search for Cross Reference Radio on your favorite podcast app. You can also follow the links at crossreferenceradio.com. We're glad we were able to spend time with you today. Tune in next time to continue learning from the book of Isaiah with Pastor Rick. Right here on Cross Reference Radio.
