They complain that God did not honor their fake offerings. It's like, hey, I've given you a counterfeit $100 bill. Why won't you cash it?
Because I know it's counterfeit. It's illegal. They complain that he ignored them for ignoring him. It's crazy how these people work. I mean, even into the New Testament, they will heap up for themselves teachers.
How do you do that? How do you say, you know, we're going to shop for a pastor who says what we want to hear, never mind what the Bible says. 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 in Isaiah chapter 53 as he continues teaching through this chapter on Cross-Reference Radio. There are reasons why you may not have the same pep in your step as you did as a new believer because over the years you've seen so much action, things have caked up on you. Well, you got to get those barnacles off.
You can't let them stay there. It takes hard work and that's part of examining yourself. It's checking what your motives are because they can become clouded if you're not careful. Well, this next verse exposes this delight to know the Lord. So if we look back again at verse 2 to keep the context, yet they seek me daily and delight to know my ways as a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God.
Yeah, they act like they're seeking me. They're acting as though they're righteous like they're people who haven't forsaken their God, but they have and that's where we come to verse 3. Why have we fasted, they say, and you have not seen?
Why have we afflicted our souls and you take no notice? I'm in verse 3, Isaiah 58. In fact, in the day of your fast, you find pleasure and exploit all your laborers. And so they're the prophet of saying, you're not kidding anybody. In your day of your fast, you find pleasure.
In other words, you're finding ways around the whole purpose, the purpose of the fast, which is to afflict the soul. They were offended that God did not fall for their pretended devotion. Why have we gone through all this religion? Why am I sacrificing for Christ and I'm not getting the job that I want?
I'm not getting this and all that. They obligated God to bless them for practicing the religion of the Jews. And so they are the Jews. And there are those who do it in all religions. If all the blessing, this is an old question, I think I ask it every now and then, it did not originate with me. It's a good question. If all the blessings in your life stopped, would you still serve the Lord Jesus? Job did.
All the blessings stopped in his life and he continued to be a man of integrity and he did not become a gamer. These people that Isaiah is addressing, many of them, his neighbors, those around the palace and the communities wherever he would find himself, those related in some way to his family members, his loved ones, they complained that God did not honor their fake offerings. It's like, hey, I've given you a counterfeit hundred dollar bill. Why won't you cash it?
Because I know it's counterfeit. It's illegal. And they complained that he ignored them for ignoring him. It's just crazy how these people work. I mean, even into the New Testament, they will heap up for themselves teachers.
How do you do that? How do you say, you know, we're going to shop for a pastor who says what we want to hear, never mind what the Bible says. There's nothing wrong with shopping for a pastor that preaches the word. There's something entirely wrong with shopping for one who doesn't preach the word.
And so why have we afflicted our souls and you take no notice? They expected a reward for pseudo piety. This complaint reveals that their quest for God lacked care for God. They did not delight in his person.
It was a scam. They wanted something from him. This using a religion as a vehicle for personal gain is ill-advised. They were troubled by supposed powerlessness of their religion. You know, a believer is going to come across seasons in life where their religion seems powerless in the face of opposition.
And blessed are those who are not offended because of me. If there wasn't so, then there would be no such thing as a martyr. And a martyr doesn't have to die to be a martyr. You can just suffer to be a martyr.
It qualifies. They were supposed by the powerlessness of their religion, not the error of their ways. Well, Isaiah wasn't the only one pointing it out. Psalm 78, they flatter him with their mouth and they lied to him with their tongue. That's two-faced. Speaking with a forked tongue.
Speaking with a forked tongue. Of course, Isaiah 29, which Jesus quoted and applied to his generation to let us all know these things, they go without interruption. Jesus quoting Isaiah 29, 13, here's Isaiah saying, and therefore the Lord has said, inasmuch as these people draw neighboring with their mouths, anonomy with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the commandment of men. Men make up other rules, counter rules. They bypass what God has said and they come up with an, I got another creative idea. Formulas criticizing God, calling him indifferent.
They're the frauds, but rather than examine themselves, let's just blame God. Well, he continues here, in fact, in the day of your fast, you find pleasure. Well, it wasn't a true fast. Finding ways around fasting to the Lord while proclaiming a fast. I'm sorry, I can't eat that right now.
It's fast. I don't like that anyway. I mean, I don't know how. It doesn't give us the details.
I'm filling in some of the blanks. Bottom line is they were cheating. They were scamming God and those around them into thinking they were honorable people, but they were doing real dirt in the community and in their culture. It says, and exploit all your laborers. There it is, corruption.
That made them scammers. Some churchgoers ignore un-Christ-like behavior in themselves and in those who they decide they don't want to see, you know, condemn because they're one of their buddies or something. Well, here they are in Isaiah's day. Un-Christ-like behavior, but still acting like they're in love with Christ. Now, I mean, we all goof and sometimes we don't reflect the glory of Christ, but we're upset by that.
That's not what we want. These folks didn't care. An intellectual delight in Bible knowledge. They delighted in hearing about my ways as the righteous do, but it wasn't genuine.
Intellectual delight and nothing more. You can't do anything with that, but Satan can do a lot with that. Satan can do a lot with somebody who has just enough Bible knowledge to be dangerous. That's what a cult is all about. That's where these cultic leaders, these Charles Russells and Joseph Smiths come from. They're not interested in the truth. They're motioning with their religion that they're moving toward God.
They have no intention of delighting God. They're going to write new things about Him. This is the case with King Saul. And Samuel had to, you know, live through that junk, but it was enlightening to Samuel.
And he, so enlightening, Samuel felt, you know what, I need to tell everybody about these things. It started off when God finally had it with Saul, and Samuel did too. And Saul, you know, goes ahead and lies about how he's serving God. It was all hypocrisy.
The evidence was glaring them in the face. It didn't matter to Saul, the quintessential narcissist. But now your kingdom shall not continue, Samuel said to Saul. Yahweh has sought for himself a man after his own heart.
And Yahweh has commanded him to be commander over his people because you have not kept what Yahweh commanded you. So he's saying it's the heart, Saul. It's what's inside the person. It's spiritual. It's not natural.
It's supernatural. And you chose to flunk. Later, when he finally gets in front of the one God, first, of course, David's older, elder brother Eliab comes out and Samuel, the great prophet, this has got to be the next king of Israel. And the Lord gently corrected him. I've enjoyed that from the pulpit at times. There's a bullet point I have, and I'm going to say it, and God comes along and says, don't say it this way. Or, no, that's not what I want. And it's pleasant.
It's not a harsh experience. Maybe you're sharing the gospel with somebody, and you're going to let them have it, and God comes along and says, give them some grace. Or maybe it's the other way. It's like, don't give them grace.
Give them the law. But you know, as you're thinking to say something, God comes in, and that's the case with Samuel. And the Lord said to Samuel, do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him, Eliab, for Yahweh does not see as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but Yahweh looks at the heart. Samuel says, get me a notepad, quick. I can't forget what just happened here.
And he gets it for us forever. And this is what, these people had this story. They were raised with this information about David, and yet they were perpetrators. They weren't alleged perpetrators.
They were criminals. And they had the story about God not looking at the outside, but looking at the inside, yet they were giving God the outside, and withholding the inside, and demanding that he receive them nonetheless. Form of spiritual extortion. And to this day, people demand that God, Cain demanded, you accept my fruit basket? And God says, why are you angry?
If you do right, if you do right, then things will go better for you. Well, again, remember they had household shrines, idols, and God saw their heart. Verse four, indeed you fast for strife and debate.
They think they were getting away with this. And you strike with the fist of wickedness. You will not fast as you do this day to make your voice heard on high.
I'm not receiving that kind of fast. They quarrel some churchgoers. Indeed, you fast for strife and debate. One of the glorious things about heaven you won't have to debate anybody.
You won't have to argue a point. Try to convince them or point out that they're wrong. Paul, you know, Peter said they twist the scriptures to their own hurt.
You can't fix them when they're that convoluted. It's just they're done because they don't want the truth. But the problem now is, are they gobbling up others?
Peter said they're going to make merchandise of you. They're going to exploit you because they're greedy and Christless. So the spiritual side had become external with these people, not internal, where it belonged. All of their religion was on the outside. There was nothing left. The carnal side was internal.
So it's flipped around. Their carnality was deep within their hearts. They did not want to give their lives to God. They wanted to give their lives to religion and a type of religion that made them feel good about themselves.
You know, look how articulate I am as I write creatively about heresy and call it truth. You know, again, God not accepting the sacrifice that is unaccompanied by love for him. And the Jews knew that. His psalms were already published, all of them, by this time because he's long dead, David.
So they knew about love for God, devotion for God, integrity and sincerity. Psalm 119, they had this material back in Deuteronomy, which they were supposed to review over and over again because that's what it takes. Anytime I've read the book of Deuteronomy, I've been blessed.
Seeing it through New Testament eyes, as it was intended, is just quite remarkable. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength. Jesus quoted this as the commandment. You shall love the Lord your God with everything you've got. And the flesh objects to that and that's where the war is.
This, the very thing that was missing from their formalism. Other people were taking sacrifices to the temple, but they loved God. Isaiah would take his sacrifices. He loved the Lord. So it wasn't like it was just, you know, them. Others were lined up to sacrifice, but God could see who was who.
He could sort them out, not even having to glance. These very things missing from their formalism is continued in the New Testament, and Paul warns about this. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. Okay, so this thing about love, what does that mean? Because the people who are giving to feed the poor, they think they have love.
They only want to help the poor. But God is saying there's a higher love than that. There is an agape love. And if I don't come first, all those things don't count. Because if that kind of attitude got into heaven, you'd have earth in heaven all over again. Then we'd be back to debating and all the other things that go along with this fallen world.
It's the flesh. Years ago on the greeting line, a lady came through and she evidently ran a food pantry at her church. Now I'm not opposed to food pantries unless it makes the majors minors, which is what I deduced was her issue. So she was shopping for a church because the church she went to again discontinued, they had all this equipment, and she's looking for a pastor to say, we would love to have you here. But there was no desire for the word. I could detect no desire for the word.
I had a little back and forth with the probing and she's not interested. She just wanted to give works, not worship. Well, what about the message? What about the preaching? What about the verse by verse? Well, where's that in the New Testament? Martha and Mary. Martha was in the kitchen.
Mary was sitting at the Lord's feet. Martha tried to steal her own sister from Christ so she could help in the food pantry where the works were. And Christ gently rebuked her. Now Martha receives the rebuke.
She doesn't fuss and later on we see her again, she's fine. That's the ideal, but it's not always that way. But that was a brilliant example of if I have not agape love for the Lord, then all that other stuff doesn't count. But if I have the love for the Lord, then I'm going to do these other things. I would love for us to have things like that if God did it, not us.
If God opened those doors. I'm not against helping the poor, not at all. I'll come back to that because again, leftists have muddied the waters and they always do and they've always been around. So we're not shocked by that.
We're just irritated. But coming back to this, God was well aware of their hypocrisy, their confrontation, their exploitation, their violent nature when they couldn't get their way. As you know, the case, you know, why do you have to have a policeman at a voting booth? Because there are people that will do violence to get their will done. Anyway, back to this, he says here in verse 4, and to strike with the fist of wickedness in the midst of their religious formalism, they were brutal.
Be it by tongue, be it by the evil eye, or be it by assault and battery, threatening you, then hitting you. And he continues here, to make your voice heard on high. You do all these things and you still think I'm supposed to hear you when you bring your sacrifices, when you play church with me. This brand of religion fails to reach God. That's what he is saying to them. If they wanted God to take notice as they complained he wasn't doing back in verse 3, and we're in verse 4, then they were going about it the wrong way. They'd have to have more than just this external approach to God. And hypocrisy's disingenuousness slams the doors of heaven shut.
And he's not interested after that. False religion, it tends to produce self-satisfaction, self-justification, self-righteousness, self-awareness. Before the iPhone and the iPad and all these other eye things came along, it was already there. This has got to be the most narcissistic age in the history of creation. It is just incredible what we're seeing. Thank God it's not everybody, but I know some of you may not be catching it, and good, good for you.
It's not like, you don't need a course in this. Well, this of course, false religion accounts for the other. Well, the legalist in Luke's gospel that Jesus pointed out in his parable is being judgmental and smug towards others, which they were.
That's why they were exploiting their laborers, this upper class or upper middle class, whoever they were. Luke's gospel, chapter 18, the Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself. It gets the language of that, because God's not listening. God, I thank you that I'm not like other men.
Extortion is unjust, adulterous, or even this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I possess.
Oh, let's just roll out a red carpet for you. There are people like that, and it's nothing cute or funny, but this is Isaiah's, this is his target audience. Of course, again, we always clear it's not everybody that was in Isaiah's day.
It's enough of them to merit the prophet going on the warpath against them. And verse 5, is it a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head like a bulrush and to spread out sackcloth and ashes? Would you call this a fast?
An acceptable day to Yahweh? So the prophet is appealing to them, and he's using a little satire, of course, and he's saying, what do you call this? Is this what God wants?
You really think this is what he does want, the things you're bringing to him, but he wants the heart. Well, so is this a fast that I've chosen? Where'd you get this from? It's a question that those who fall for heresy don't ask. You got to read this book. Well, you better consider the source.
Where does it come from? Well, it doesn't come from the throne of God. That's what the Lord is saying here.
He says God is saying to them, your brand of religion conveniently sidesteps the guilt of sinners, which God is always dealing with, because that's who we are. And the day that we're no longer sinners, the day God doesn't have to bring it up anymore. But your zip code will be different when that day comes. It won't be spelled out in numbers. It'd be spelled out in letters, and the letters will be heaven. So the only implied fast, because it doesn't come out and say you will fast on this day, but it is certainly implied with a strong enough hand that Isaiah links it to this day of atonement, that where God says, of all the feast days of the Jews, this is the one they were to afflict their souls.
And it's just one day. The rest of the feasts were more joyful. So God is saying, I don't want you somber all the time, but you still got to deal with sin. And it is Leviticus 16 and Leviticus 16 29 and 23 27 is what Isaiah is referring to here. The only binding Old Testament law concerning fasting.
And the fasting was supposed to stir them to repentance, to reflection, to consider their ways before the Lord, to examine themselves, as Paul mentioned to the Corinthians, concerning personal sin, not the other guy, not this tax collector, me, to afflict my soul, to face, face myself. It's not pleasant. I mean, it's very difficult to even listen to yourself on a recording. Do I sound like that?
I know you're worse. So anyway, from a remorseful heart before the Lord, they would be received. That was the intention of the Levitical law concerning the day of atonement, to get it right. In New Testament times, fasting had become so well established in the Jewish religion and society that in Mark chapter two, they challenged Jesus about it. How come John and the Pharisees, they fast, but your disciples don't fast?
To which he responded by reducing the fast and elevating himself, which I, this is just remarkable. Well, they've gotten me. I mean, who could say that? Who could say, can you imagine going to a church and why don't the people in this church ever fast? Well, they got me. I mean, that would be blasphemy, unless you're the son of God and therefore God the son.
And so I love that, that, you know, they went over their heads, but it goes over our heads sometimes too, but not now. Fasting without a contrite heart is useless and it is offensive to God. And this is what they were doing. It says here in verse five, is it to bow down his head like a bull rush? Where's the humility is the point in your fasting. Are you humble?
No, cause you're exploiting people. What is the humility in that? And to spread out sackcloth and ashes. Are you kidding me? These external observances you think, Ooh, look, he's wearing sackcloth.
Ooh, he's ashes. It's not sincere. Thanks for joining us for today's teaching on Cross Reference Radio. This is the radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia.
We trust that what you've heard today has been something to remember. If you'd like to listen to more teachings from this series, go to crossreferenceradio.com. Once more, that's crossreferenceradio.com. We encourage you to subscribe to our podcast too, so you'll never miss another edition. Just go to your favorite podcast app to subscribe. You can also connect with us through YouTube. We hope you'll tune in again next time as we continue spending time reading God's word and learning together. Make a note in your calendar to join Pastor Rick again right here on Cross Reference Radio.
