The god-makers Club (Part A)

You are stiff-necked people. So, typical of God. True all the time. It doesn't mean that you're worse than everybody else. It just means don't go thinking you're better than everybody else. You have an assignment. You have been chosen. Well, this is true of the Christian.

You have assignments. You have a role to play in creation as a Christian. Whether you opt out or not is up to you. Many of the Jews opted out.

Many others did not. 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. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the book of Isaiah chapter 44 with today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. Isaiah 44. Easy chapters to love because of how Isaiah gives us these truths. Kind of reversed from Jeremiah. Jeremiah in the first chapters, man, it's just amazing. And then you get to those deeper chapters and it gets to heavy duty.

Isaiah is the other way around. The God-Makers Club, that's the title for this message. And hopefully, you know, when I used to buy books on sermons, almost all of the guys, they were long dead, but I really enjoyed the titles of the sermons. It was just so educational and so much doctrine, just in the titles.

So, I hope you don't dismiss that as just filler. Hopefully, a pastor puts some work into understanding which direction it's going to go in his time in the pulpit, because it can go in a lot of directions. I could do Isaiah 44 again, I'm not, and just go in a different direction. So, the God-Makers Club, and you younger Christians, I hope this, these things are not being wasted on you. Don't be distracted by things you don't understand.

Lock on to the things you do get and build on those things. Well, man did not create God. God created man, and there are people that will say, well, man, God is created in the minds of people. It's the opposite, but it's an old move of Satan that always works on those who like it, like the idea that there is no God or that they can make up things about God. It's odd that men will deny God, but they can't deny evil, and you think they would work through that a little bit more.

Well, before I was a believer, I didn't work through it, and I want to remember that as I, my heart longs for so many souls to be saved. God names the source of evil. We know the person of Satan, God's enemy and our enemy. He's God's enemy in the sense that he goes against everything God wants, and he is a deceiver, and men scoff at that. Men scoff at the source of evil.

Satan's lies about God, they show up in idolatry. They show up in atheism, so-called atheism, and I hope that whenever the subject of atheism comes up for us, that we point out to the unbeliever, perhaps a believer, who needs to understand there really is no such thing as an atheist. I don't believe in atheists. I think they're lying. I think they're not honest with themselves. The Bible says the fool has said in his heart that there is no God.

I happen to agree with that. You can't escape it, though you can play dress-up and pretend that God is not there, but you're still stuck with having to account for everything, and a person's reason, it just defies, just absolutely dismissing these things. So I don't believe in atheists, and I know God does not either, but Satan, of course, he plays that card.

They're part of the God-makers club also. So let's look at verse 1. Yet hear me now, O Jacob, my servant, and Israel, whom I have chosen. Behind these words, a great amount of love of God, but he is restricted by free will, the free will of sinners. They do not have to accept him, nor the nation has this calling. No nation has ever had so many prophecies and promises about their present and their future history.

It is unprecedented. How many prophecies deal with Israel's past history in the scriptures? And then how many more? And how many are being fulfilled right in front of our eyes? Amos, the prophet, wrote, you only, God speaking to the prophet, to the Jewish people, you only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities. Well, we're going to keep that in mind because no other people have been dealt with by God, good and bad, like the Jewish people as a nation.

The church is really made up of the righteous, independent of ethnicity. None have sustained undeserved attention like Israel. And so you can scoff at the Bible all you want. You still have to account for Israel. And then you have to account for all the prophecies concerning Israel.

And you can, it's impossible to dismiss any logical approach to it will be cornered if it can persist in trying to refute these things from scripture. No other nation has suffered for their stiff necked behavior as Israel. The ones that other nations have suffered before their stiff neckedness, but they're gone, many of them.

Egypt has suffered. For example, they're not gone, they're here, but the Canaanites are gone. The Philistines are gone. And those who try to say that the Arabs in Israel are descendants of the Philistines are lying. They most certainly are not.

They're Arabs from Jordan, the same type of Arabs there. Anyway, God made it clear to the Jews that they did not deserve this status, but it was linked to the faith of their fathers. Deuteronomy 9, it is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you go in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations, Yahweh your God drives them out before you, and that he may fulfill the word which Yahweh swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Therefore, understand that Yahweh your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are stiff necked people. So, typical of God, true all the time. It doesn't mean that, oh, you're worse than everybody else. It just means don't go thinking you're better than everybody else. You have an assignment. You have been chosen. Well, this is true of the Christian.

You have assignments. You have a role to play in creation as a Christian. Whether you opt out or not is up to you. Many of the Jews opted out. Many others did not.

Thank God for the ones that did not. Men like Isaiah and the prophets, for example. So, to whomsoever much is given, much is required. It is a principle given to us by God. It is applicable to a nation.

It is applicable to an individual. So, now the second verse, the prophet says, thus says Yahweh, who made you and formed you from the womb, who will help you. Fear not, oh Jacob, my servant, and you, Jehoshuram, whom I have chosen. Now, the Jews reading this, they're following it. There's no need for so many explanations as we might, but here's one.

For those, most of you know this, but maybe there's someone who doesn't. When we come to the word in the Old Testament, particularly Lord, if it is in all caps, some publishers opt to italicize the word. It is the covenant name of God between the Jew and the Jewish people, and it is believed to be pronounced Yahweh. There's an outside chance it's pronounced Jehovah or Yahovah. The pronunciation is secondary. The understanding is that when we come to that name in the scripture, Lord, in all caps, that is signaling to the reader that it is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and he has been dealing with the Jewish people, and he has all people in mind. Thus, the Jews were to be a light to the Gentiles, and Jesus will bring that, we'll get to a verse from Jesus about that too. So it's not a little thing, and that's why I prefer to use the presumed proper pronunciation that it is Yahweh.

We've lost the pronunciation because of the scribes thinking the name was too sacred to spell out completely. Well, as we covered last session, with leadership comes rights of lordship, and with lordship or rights of ownership, and then with ownership comes lordship, and God is exercising these things. Israel, the nation, is not a natural occurrence. Is that lost on some of your youth? Do you miss that?

Let me help you with that a little bit. The nation of Israel, there's no way to explain her existence except it is supernatural. There's nothing like Israel. No nation has been knocked out of their homeland for 2,000 years, retained their culture as a nation without a land, and then been put back into their land. It is, and so hated by everybody.

For what? There are other nations that have done far worse. Israel has not invaded anyone's territory. Other nations have. It is a big deal.

It is not a natural occurrence. If it were, Israel would have been gone with the Philistines, especially with all the hatred she's had from all her neighbors. And so, Isaiah, he's reminding the Jews of their origins when he brings up the name Jacob, who became the name changed to Israel. But when he says Jeshurim, I have chosen, it's a descript term, and it is also a term of endearment. It is sort of a pet name. It means the righteous, the righteous one, or the upright one.

And this is what God wanted Israel to be. It's too bad we don't give nicknames anymore. Not benevolent nicknames. I don't mean insulting names. Here comes Loghead.

That's not a good one. But, you know, it's just nice when you have people, you know, something in their character stands out, and they sort of pick up a nickname, and you can't force it. But anyway, Jeshurim, in contrast to Jacob. Jacob means heel catcher, or basically the cheater, the little rascal.

And innocent enough at birth in life, as he matured, he became quite the opportunist, if you would. And so you have this, Jacob was his name. God changed his name from heel catcher, because when he was born, and they had the two, he was a twin to Esau, and they had the two boys there, and he reaches out, and he grabs his brother's heel, and they give him that name.

Well, you're a little heel catcher, you. And it had other meanings with the word. Anyway, Jeshurim means the upright one, and that is what God wanted them to be, to aspire to be righteous. Verse 3, For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and floods on dry ground. I will pour my spirit on your descendants, and my blessings on your offspring.

That must be painful, and must have been painful to many of a Jewish person over, you know, in recent history. Even when Thomas Takamata was persecuting the Jews for being Jewish and torturing them, and the Jews knew these verses, and how they must have longed for these things. The source of spiritual life is the Holy Spirit. We used to say the Holy Ghost, but in time the language sort of, you know, changed to people miss the meaning of it, but it is the Holy Spirit of God. God operating amongst people. Revelation 21 6, I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. Now, thirst means desire, an intense desire, or a more intense desire.

If you've ever been very thirsty, you'll not forget it. Joel, of course, rings in on this, and Joel probably probably penned his prophecy before Isaiah. We're not sure, but that's how it looks like. Anyway, Joel writes, and it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. That necessarily does not mean they're telling the future in prophecy.

They're speaking God's Word. Continuing, he says, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions, and also on my men servants and on my maid servants I will pour out my spirit in those days. Now, Peter took this verse having so much greater knowledge of Scripture than he had before he met Jesus, and Peter says this begins at Pentecost, the birth of the church, the giving of the Holy Spirit, and the significance of having the Holy Spirit and the Pentecost experience is to understand Messiah, the Christ, and to be able to articulate his gospel. That is because you had the Spirit to come upon the prophets long before Pentecost, so it couldn't be just that.

What is the difference? What is the distinction between the Spirit coming upon us at Pentecost versus before Pentecost? It is the gospel of Jesus Christ.

You shall be witness. You shall receive power and be my witnesses, and that is the main thing, and so when you are preaching Christ to somebody, there's a partial fulfillment to Joel. It is a complete fulfillment to the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, and we see after Pentecost the disciples, those apostles of Jesus Christ, they're stronger men coming to the faith. They're taking beatings for Christ, and they're preaching saving souls. The church was, Christ was magnified.

The church was multiplied. Well, Romans chapter 11, so all Israel will be saved. Yeah, not today, but it's going to happen, and it's going to be, but, but individual Jewish people, they come to Christ anytime.

There's no distinction between Jew nor Gentile, Greek or barbarian, slave nor free. Anybody who thirsts has the desire to come to God. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

They shall be filled. These are basics. The basics are the foundation of all our faith. Don't let folks who think they've gotten very sophisticated move you away from the basics. They may impart very insightful things, are very helpful, but there also is a tendency for them to overdo it to the point where the basics get clouded.

That's our strength. You don't have to be a theologian to preach Christ, and theologian in the sense that you've had this formal education, and you now have arrived. God said, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

That's what we need, and that is for everyone to be able to, to be used. It is the devil or your flesh that will tell you you're not qualified yet to share your faith. All you have to do is you be a witness.

That's where it begins. Here's why I believe in Jesus Christ. I met him, and I'm learning his word. Even as a young or brand-new convert, you can share why you love the Lord.

Anyway, verse 4, they will spring up among the grass like willows by the watercourses. He's talking about Israel. This is a big deal, especially because the world has watched this happen even before 1948. They watched Israel retain authority influencing kings and heads of state. It's incredible how many Nobel Peace Prizes have been won by Jewish people in comparison to Gentiles. It is quite significant, and is the hand of God on them as a people. Anyway, not approving their rejection of him, but guarding them for the day when all Israel will be saved. Again, I've already covered the only nation to be without a nation or without a land, a homeland, for 2,000 years and then get their land and continue on as though it never stopped.

It's just they just picked up, and it's astounding. This is extended to the church, such a teaching as verse 4, they will spring up among the grass like willows by the watercourses, and reminds us of Psalm 1. Blessed is the man whose leaf will not fade.

He talks about the tree planted by the rivers of water. John 10, why this extends to the church. Jesus speaking, and other sheep I have which are not of this fold.

Them also I must bring, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock and one shepherd. You know, again, the church wasn't born in the days of Christ. He was laying the foundation for it, and they didn't have the same understanding of many things that Christ said that we get because we have the fuller picture, and that's one of the verses. They weren't thinking Gentile when he said that.

We know it's Gentiles. God even said to Paul, I'm sending you to the Gentiles. Well, verse 5, one will say I am Yahweh's. Another will call himself by the name of Jacob or Jacob.

Another will write with his hand Yahweh, Yahweh the name, and name himself by the name of Israel. So there's going to be this revival, spiritual revival. Revival is something that's brought back to life, and the Jewish people, there's a day coming where they will see their Messiah, they will love him, they will love their faith, and they will be very outspoken about it. You remember when the great tribulation period comes, after that period ends, Christ comes back, and he sets up rule on earth, and there will be millions of people who have not died, who will be alive and spared, they will survive the great tribulation period, and life will go on for them for a very long time. Anyway, they will love Jesus Christ.

They don't love him right now. He's an opponent of their truth, and it's unfortunate because the scriptures have so much to say about their Messiah, whose life is matched by Christ, and he is either the Christ, or there's not going to be one, because the door is closed. Being able to identify, you know, who's from Judah, and who's from, I mean, you just can't now. Who's from the line of David? It has to be Christ, but at this point, by process of elimination, with all the things we know about him, Zechariah 12 10, I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and supplication, and they will look to me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for him as one grieves for firstborn, and we look at the life of Christ, and we say, man, that's a perfect match.

Nobody else. I mean, he was said to be born in Bethlehem. You can't self-fulfill that prophecy. You can't say, you know what, I'm going to be born in Bethlehem unless you're God, Son of God, as Jesus is, and the Jews will embrace their heritage as God's people, free from idolatry, free from rejection of Christ, but in the meantime, meanwhile, back at the church, we're supposed to be doing the work, bringing the light to the world, and it takes a lot to do that. It can't get done if you don't love the Lord, but if you love the Lord, then you've got what, you have what you need. You have what God needs to work through you, but it's not enough to just say you love the Lord. We have all, if you've been around Christianity long enough, you've had your full of people who boast about how much they love the Lord and they live like, you just, when they come, the room goes dark. When they come in a room, oh man, there are. I don't know if they're imposters or just weak, whatever the case is.

There's no excuse to be like that, and yet, there's no excuse to be too mean towards them either. It says here in verse 6, thus says Yahweh, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, Yahweh of hosts, I am the first and the last. Beside me there is no God. Redeemer is here as a dominant Isaiah theme throughout these last 27 chapters. He brings up the Redeemer. Titus in the New Testament, Paul writing to Titus, he talks about these things. Paul knew this verse very well.

He says, writing to Titus, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. You see, this is what makes the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormon's teachings so sinister. They say they have the same Bible and then some other stuff too. Well, that other stuff too gets them to contradict what is plain speak scripture. They are without excuse, and their judgment is self-inflicted. It doesn't matter that they're passionate. People are passionate about a lot of things. It doesn't automatically make it acceptable to God.

People are passionate about stealing from other people, and they get elected. Anyway, verse 14 of Titus chapter 2, keep it in context, glorious appearing of our great God and Savior who gave himself for us. There's no way to disconnect this, that he might redeem us from every lawless deed. You see the redemption? Isaiah says there's only one Redeemer, and that is Yahweh. Paul comes along, a Jewish believer, and he says that Redeemer in Isaiah 44 is the one who died for us. That's how he redeemed us.

That's how he pulled it off. It's one thing to tell mankind I love you, I'm God. It's another thing to die for them, to become sin for us, because the Bible says, cursed is he who is hung on a tree, in judgment that is, of course, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people, zealous for good works. 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.