Next Level Isaiah (Part C)

She traveled the road without difficulty as far as what the scripture said about him. It was undelayed. Satan could not stop it. He tried, Herod, killing the baby boys of Bethlehem.

But the road was paved, and nothing was going to change that. And so this messenger, John the Baptist, again, was not as important as his message. His message was more important than him.

Jesus Christ was the message. 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. Now here's Pastor Rick with the conclusion of his study called Next Level Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 40. If you do anything, if you set out to work for the Lord, you're going to fail from time to time. But that's not the whole story. Satan wants it to be the whole story, but it's not.

He hates it when we get up. Anyway, cry out to her, as we do today. We preach our message. Her warfare is ended.

Again, that's future. Her iniquity is pardon, God's solution to man's plight. And man's plight is personal sin, which is a product of original sin.

Satan, a very real, invisible opponent who causes much harm. And then there's society that wants to paint crosswalks with perverted rainbow colors and hang it from buildings and yell out, how come the heterosexuals don't get to get a flag? You know, this is, well, you're not going to get any, it's always going to be a double standard with Satan, no matter what. But that just points out more of the folly that we're beyond that. We're beyond pointing out their folly. We're now just dealing with sheer evil, just evil in people that refuse reason and yet insist at the same time that they're scientific and they're rational. Nothing new about that.

Evolutionists have been pulling it off for years. Anyhow, coming back to this, for she has received from the Lord's hand, that is from the throne of God, double for her sins. That's punishment and penalty. The sin itself carries a punishment, but there's also a penalty. If you are, you know, robbing a bank and you get shot in the process, but you survive and you get caught, well, you go to jail, but you also suffer from the wound. It's a double penalty.

Well, that's just logic. The scriptural definition, the one that I think is the most accurate, is Exodus 22, 9. And according to that verse, a man had to pay double for a trespass against his neighbor. So if he, you know, accidentally killed his neighbor's dog, he'd have to pay for the dog plus pay for it twice. It would be a penalty. And dogs weren't so unclean that people just never had anything to do with them.

The people are people in every age. They may not have been as embraced as we may embrace them, but I just throw that on the side because I chose dog as opposed to lamb. Anyway, the appropriate punishment has a limit, and God knows that. He's telling his people that these things are going to get fixed, verse 3, for the nation, for the people, the Jewish people. If you were a Bible-believing Jew in Nazi Germany, you'd be taking comfort from this. Yeah, they may kill a lot of us, but we're still going to survive because I believe in the Scripture. And look, we look back at that and we say, look at that. Germany couldn't get rid of them.

They tried genocide, modern genocide, and it failed. Verse 3, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Interesting, prepare a way for Yahweh. And well, this is applied in the New Testament to Christ. Christ is Yahweh in the New Testament, Yahweh of the Old Testament. Verses 3 through 5 here concerning John the Baptist are all quoted in all of the Gospels, each of the four Gospels, quote this section.

Isaiah's section of grace, chapters 27 through 40, begin where the New Testament begins. The forerunner, the herald, John's Gospel chapter 1. John bore witness of him and cried out, saying, this was he of whom I said, he who comes after me is preferred before me for he was before me. Now John was older than Jesus by a few months.

Remember Elizabeth, you know, she became, you know, when Mary came to the house, the baby jumped in her womb, but she was, that child was older. So what's John talking about? Well, he's saying that the Messiah is self-existent.

He's always been, therefore he's older than him. John 1.20, he confessed and did not deny, but confessed, I am not the Christ, John the Baptist speaking. But he knew what his role was and he embraced it.

We'll get to that in a minute. He said, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, says Isaiah. This is, again, John the Baptist. With prophetic symbolism, John the Baptist used a literal wilderness for his work.

He's the voice of the one crying in the wilderness. Well, that's where his ministry was. People had to go out to see him, which was part of his ministry. If you want this, you got to come get it.

He didn't put it, you know, like I'll just come and meet you where you are. He put his ministry out in the wilderness and he ate nasty things like bugs and washed it down with honey, which is sensible. I don't know, you can't really wash down a bad piece of, you have a bite into a bad piece of fruit, you're done. You just got to suffer through it.

I know, because I just had a bad grape the other day. Anyway, you want to hear that. Coming back to this, John the Baptist, he claimed the fulfillment of this Isaiahan verse upon himself, that he is the voice. John's Gospel, chapter 1, John speaking, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

You can't be any more clear than that. And he continues, make straight the way of Yahweh, which is in the New Testament, it's translated Lord because it's Greek writing. As the prophet Isaiah said, just like that. So there's John saying that Isaiah wrote that second part that the liberal theologians protested, scoff at, or he couldn't have written with such accuracy, somebody else after the fact edited John. I'm going to go with John the Apostle, I'll go with John the Baptist before I go with any of those doomed souls in that state. Unless they repent, not likely they're going to make it. Prepare the way of the Lord.

And so quite powerful, got to kind of speed it up here. Who else had so much go into the announcing of their arrival on earth, their birth? No one. You would think that the Jews would have picked up the unbelieving Jews. We got to be careful, because they were Jews that did believe, and it's not, you know, a racial slur. But those of the Jewish people that resisted the testimony of Christ and John the Baptist were opposing their scripture, it was already laid out. The path was already paved, the obstacles were cleared. And that's part of John's ministry, as he says here, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.

Metaphorically, it was spiritually a desert. They had abandoned, that's why John's ministry was so powerful. That's why people were getting, when they were getting baptized by John, it wasn't into the Holy Spirit, it was to get, to redevote to God, the God of the Jews, to Yahweh, to admit that righteousness was paramount. And they wanted to line up with that.

And it was sort of this outward sign of an inward doing also that they wanted to be purged of disobedience. The baptism of Christ takes baptism to another level. Well, he says here, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Clear the way for Messiah. The Lord's road was to be straight, it was to be level, and it was to be obstruction-free.

And all of that happened, all of that was satisfied. When Christ came, that road was paved for him. And if you were paying attention, as was Philip, when, you know, Philip got it, and Nathanael, he was a little slow at getting it, but he got it because of Philip. And so he, Jesus, arrived without failure.

It was not random. He traveled a road without difficulty as far as what the Scriptures said about him. He was undelayed, Satan could not stop it, and he tried, Herod, killing the baby boys of Bethlehem, but the road was paved, and nothing was going to change that. And so this messenger, John the Baptist, again, was not as important as his message. His message was more important than him. Jesus Christ was the message. Yet no earthly king would die for their messenger.

Our Christ died even for it, for all of his messengers, for all of his people. Another contrast, verse 4, every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill brought low. The crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth. And so there you have, verse 3 says that the Lord's road will be straight, verse 4 says it will be flat level, and verse 4 also says it will be obstacle free. There will be an uncluttered path for Jesus when he came, and it was.

It was really nothing in the way but unbelief, the unbelief of the individuals. Coming back to verse 5 now, the glory of Yahweh shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of Yahweh has spoken. So some 700 years before Christ, that's where Isaiah is living, and he's saying God said it's going to happen. All flesh shall see it together. The first coming of Christ was not viewed by all flesh. The second coming of Christ will be viewed by everyone on earth, and the armies that are coming with him, us. Revelation 1, verse 7, behold, he is coming with clouds, and every eye will see him, even they who pierced him.

He's not going to be missed. How can this, just a mind working, what is just one natural way that, or miraculously natural way that could happen? We could have a slow descent, you know, like a satellite just, you know, taking his time and he's like, oh man, there's a lot of ways that could happen. Anyhow, the second coming of Christ, it's a phrase not found in the Bible, but the fact is taught and that's what counts. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, and then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of his coming. Paul's writing that after the first coming. So you have to learn that the Bible does not have to come out and say certain things, you know, word for word, verbatim.

The fact can be taught. The trinity, the word trinity is not in the Bible. The fact is in escapable, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Three personalities there and one God.

It's incredible. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken, in other words, this will be done. Both pathways, the first coming and the second coming, they are both prepared, they're not random, and they are unstoppable. Nobody's going to stop that. Chapter 6, the voice said, cry out. And he said, what shall I cry? All flesh is grass and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field. Just like back in chapter 6, when Isaiah was called to ministry, he said, what shall I, you know, he wants clarification for his message. And well, he's doing it here, what shall I cry out? And he's, preach is what it means, what shall I preach?

And the cry out part is without shame, and he's told, all flesh is grass and its loveliness like the flower of the field. You say, well, mankind knows that, that's why they've been searching for this non-existent fountain of youth. You can prolong, you can, you know, slow it down just a little bit, but there's no way you're going to stop the fate of life. Life is fragile, it's brief, it's temporary. And God is saying, if that is the case, what happens then? If your life, if you're going to fade like a flower, what happens to a flower when it fades and the petals fall? It's dead.

It ain't coming back, not that one. What happens then? And mankind is to think about that, and this is the prophet's message, to bring, as it is our message today, keep eyes on eternity, the perishable nature of man, and the imperishable nature of the word of God. Be ready for that. Romans 14, 10, for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. You know, I could be very nervous about that if I looked at me, but I ain't looking at me. I'm looking at Christ, and he presents us faultless with exceeding joy.

That's what I'm looking at, because he's taught me to do that. All of 2 Corinthians 5, back to the last few verses, talk about this reconciliation that Christ has achieved for us, so that we can enter his gates with thanksgiving in our hearts, and we can enter his courts in praise. And we won't have to say, boy, man, I sure hope, Lord, I sure messed that counsel session up, or I messed that witness up.

You know, present me faultless with exceeding joy. Verse 7, the grass withers, the flowers fade, because the breath of Yahweh blows upon it. Surely the people are grass. So he's asserting the sovereignty of God, his authority of the living God in contrast to the dead gods, that he'll bring up the fake gods in the latter part of this chapter.

We won't get to it this evening. But he's not forgotten for a moment that there are people walking around worshiping sticks that they've painted. He's even dumber. But anyway, he's going to hammer that, and I can't wait to get to it, because the breath of the Lord blows upon them, the sovereignty of God. Surely the people are grass. The people are not divine.

Everyone's strength, their physical strength is tent. It fails, it dims, it goes. But yet there's a path for us to glory that is, well, we'll come to some of that.

Verse 8 now, the grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of God stands forever. This is an emphasis going on here. But the God who wants to comfort his people is saying, let's just make sure we understand ourselves, who you are and who I am. Because if you, we don't get that right, we're going to have some problems. There are shallow churchgoers, and some of these shallow churchgoers only want to sing songs. They don't want the word. They cannot bear to be preached to.

They can tell themselves, well, I'd like to go home and read or turn on the radio. God has ordained this style of ministry. This is something God has put together. And it's worked through the centuries. Matthew 5.18, for surely I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. 1 Peter 1.25, but the word of the Lord endures forever. He's quoting this actually. His application is, now this is the word which by the gospel was preached to you.

And so, again, the emphasis on the word. Culture does not undo scripture. Oh, it does for some, to their own shame and guilt. Sin does not go out of style. Neither does God's word. There are some things in scripture that are cultural, but they're easy to identify because they're not given as imperatives or undone. The Sabbath day, the Christians don't have to honor a Sabbath day as the Jews did. The New Testament puts that aside. Christ is our Sabbath, but you still can't murder. That doesn't go out of style, although the culture can, the Nazis and Imperial Japan, and some would do it today if they could.

They would kill you for disagreeing with them. Nor does God's methods of truth go out. I think the Book of Acts is the way to go. If I want to learn how to be a church, if I want to learn how to serve in the body of Christ, the first place I'm going to go is the Book of Acts. When I need correction about that, I'll go to Corinthians. So beware of pastors and theologians because they can drink from poison mud holes like anybody else and flash their credentials or flash their office. I'm a pastor, you know, or I have a doctorate in theology. So what?

You still drink from poison mud holes. You can still be a Judas. Word stands forever, the integrity of God's word. I believe God can create the universe. I believe He can speak to man, and I believe He can protect the integrity of His word, but not with people who have no integrity because they're going to believe what they want to believe. His word is one with Himself. What He says is what He is.

Part of a thing is not greater than the thing itself. It belongs to Him. He is everlasting. So is His word.

Things that are fulfilled, of course, will be passed away. So since Christ is the word of God, this is true of Him also. Well, verse 9, O Zion, you who bring good tidings, get up into the high mountain. O Jerusalem, you who bring good tidings, lift up your voice with strength.

Lift it up and do not be afraid. Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. We might have to stop at this verse. Actually, this is the next section, and I should have stopped the verse ahead, but this one's too good. God always wanted His people to be a nation of believers.

Now catch this. Who loved their faith. Did I not challenge you and me? God wanted His people to be a nation of believers who loved their faith. He says, O Zion, you who bring good tidings, get up into the high mountain. O Jerusalem, you who bring good tidings, lift up your voice with strength.

Lift it up. Do not be afraid. Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. Man, it is unabashed Christianity.

The world's trying to get us to be ashamed of our message. So much did God want His people to become a beacon to even the Gentiles, to invite them to belong by serving the truth, by telling the truth, and nothing has changed. We serve the truth.

Jesus is the way, the truth, and life, and we tell the truth when we speak the gospel. Do we do it with our knuckles dragging, walking around like Eeyore, always ashamed of ourselves or something because we're not where we want to be? You know, I've noticed in me when I see others succeeding sometimes in ministry, I feel bad.

Not for them, but I feel like, man, I failed. Look at the picture. They're all happy in the picture. And I know it's not real, Satan doing that. I'm going to behold my God instead. O Jerusalem, so let's get back to this. That's what he's going to say. O Jerusalem, you who bring good tidings, lift up your voice with strength.

Well, instead of this, what happened? O Jerusalem, you killed the prophets who assent to you. No guarantee, because God calls His people to a task that they're going to fulfill it. That's true of the Jewish people. It's true of the Christian people.

Lift it up. Do not be afraid. Say to the cities of Judah, he's saying, preach without shame. Behold your God, reminding ourselves here when we read this, of God's greatness when we are fearful. He's saying, do not be afraid. Look at your God. John's gospel, chapter 1, John the Baptist pointing to Jesus, said, behold the Lamb of God. That was not supposed to fade. It was not supposed to be, oh, He's the Lamb.

He's the one. And then problems come the next day, and you just dismiss all that. We don't get to opt out.

We get to opt in. The prophet told them to get their eyes off themselves, to look by faith to the great God who loved them, wanted them to be excited about their faith, and promised to do great things for them. Do not be afraid. Behold your God.

I have a quote here, one old radio pastor from decades ago said someone sent him this in a letter. Look at others and be distressed. Look at yourself and be depressed.

Look to God and you'll be blessed. I should have said I wrote that. I should have just lied.

See, that's the whole thing with the integrity and, you know, our faith is on fact and the fact of righteousness. Look at others and be distressed. Yeah, you look at the other guys and you say, man, I'm not serving as much as that guy is serving. I'm such a failure. That's a lie. That's your flesh lying to you. Look at yourself and be depressed.

That's why I took all the mirrors out of my arm. But yeah, if you look at yourself, you know, you're not happy with, you're sad what you've not become, and you're disappointed with what you've become. That doesn't mean it's so.

It doesn't mean your estimate of yourself is right. What does God say? God says, look at me.

Old story of Jesus, Peter walking on the water. Look to God and be blessed. And so the eyes of the people had long been fixed on their apostate leaders who were supposed to save them from the Assyrians and they failed. Isaiah says, your foes proved too strong and your leaders too wrong. You need to look to God. So to address this, the prophet gave them hope.

Look at God, not everything else. Our Father in heaven, thank you for just the comfort of your word, strength that is in it. We Christians, we love when you speak. We love when you show up in a very noticeable way, but you love when we stand strong, even when we cannot notice your presence, even when we don't feel joy. You love when we overcome through the blood of the lamb, not loving our lives to death. We worship you and worship you alone. In Jesus' name.

Amen. 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 additions 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.