Welcome to Delight in Grace, the teaching ministry of Rich Powell, pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. Today we begin a new series titled Behold Our God. It's a study on the character of God from Isaiah 40-55. In this first message, we see the beautiful picture of our Creator from the vantage point of Isaiah 40. Seeing the Lord as He is will equip us against the temptation to seek our satisfaction from things other than our Creator, things that will leave us empty and unsatisfied.
Let's listen in. Once again, if you would have your copy of the scriptures open to the 40th chapter of Isaiah for our exposition today, Behold Your God, the title of this series. We're looking today at Isaiah chapter 40. In honor of the Lord and His word, would you please stand with me as we seek His help to hear and heed His word. O God, we can but stand in awe of You. For You are a great God. You are a good God.
You are a holy God. And we thank You, Father, this morning that You have made Yourself known to us in such a way that we can know You and walk with You and serve You. And so, Father, as we open the scriptures and the prophecy of Isaiah in which You reveal Yourself, Father, I pray that You would open our hearts and our minds and that You would manifest Yourself to us, Father. Through Your word, by Your Spirit, may we know You in the way that You have revealed Yourself to us, Father, and rescue us from thinking of You as small or unnecessary. For there are many ways that we can do that when we look to something else for our strength, when we look to something else for our security, when we look to something else for our satisfaction. Rescue us from such idolatry, O God. Open Your word to us by Your Spirit, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
Please be seated. It is no accident that a man by the name of Isaiah penned this prophecy by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. For Isaiah's name means the salvation of the Lord, and that is, in essence, the message of the prophecy of Isaiah. Part of the name Isaiah is the word Jehovah, and the word Jehovah, Israel knew him as the absolute I, the self-existent one, as living and revealing himself in history. It was the personal name of God.
It wasn't a general name like the word God, it was Jehovah God, the self-existent one, who has revealed himself and lived among us in history. Now, you might be saying this morning, why are we beginning in the middle of the book? Isaiah chapter 40, well, what about the context of chapters 1 to 39? Well, let's talk about that for a moment, but there is clearly a turn in direction when it comes to Isaiah chapter 40.
And chapters 1 to 39 provide us the context for what is going to be presented in chapter 40 and beyond. What is happening then in this time, in the time of Isaiah, is that the people of Israel, God's people, God's chosen people, because of their outward prosperity, were distracted. And they were distracted to forget God.
Here's the problem. God had blessed them. He had lavished blessing and goodness upon them.
But here's the problem, and here's what can very easily be our problem as well. They loved God's stuff, but they didn't love God. Folks, that is a very real temptation for you and me every day. And so let us, as we seek God, as we seek to know God in the way that He has revealed Himself, let's let God work in our hearts so that we don't become guilty of enjoying God's stuff and not enjoying God Himself.
There's a difference between the two. This is what Israel had done, and this was the warning 700 years prior to this time. Moses had warned the people of Israel, don't forget God.
In Deuteronomy chapter 6, Moses was speaking to the people of Israel before they were going to cross the Jordan and take God's land that he had promised them. He says, do not beware lest you forget the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt. He is their redeemer, their rescuer. He is their God. They are His people. And he says beware lest you forget the Lord your God. At this point of Isaiah's prophecy, this is exactly what was going on.
Their prosperity had led them to forget God. And so what is happening? What is outlined for us in the first 39 chapters of Isaiah's prophecy? Well, for the most part, it's a prophecy of judgment in the first 39 chapters.
Why the judgment? Well, consider the branch that severs itself from a tree. What happens to a branch when it severs itself from the tree? It dies. It becomes thirsty. It cannot be productive.
It cannot do what it was designed to do. And that's what Israel was experiencing, the judgment of walking away from God, the judgment of forgetting God, the thirst and the oppression that follows when one ignores God, when a people ignores God and walk away from him. And this is what Israel was experiencing at the time. But there's also a second part of the judgment that is in this, and that is when God removes His hand of protection and blessing from His people who have walked away from Him, then the neighboring pagan nations, godless nations that surround will invade and they will oppress God's people. God has a message for those surrounding nations that oppress His people. He says, you touch My people, it's like poking your finger in My eye. That's part of the prophecy of Isaiah. We would find that, for example, in Zechariah 2, verse 8, where He speaks of the nations that plunder you. He says, He who touches you touches the apple of My eye. And so there is a message in there of judgment, a prophecy of judgment for those nations that would oppress God's people. Even though God's people have withdrawn themselves from God's blessing and protection, those nations that touch His people are poking God in the eye.
And He says, I'm not going to stand by and let them get away with that. Those are the messages of judgment in the first 39 chapters. What are the manifestations of that? What's going on? What does it look like?
What do things look like? Well, first of all, things are not as they ought to be. Things are not as they should be.
And you're probably sitting here this morning and for one reason or another, you are acutely aware of the fact that things are not as they ought to be. It might be a physical illness. It might be impending death in the family. It might be a spiritual oppression.
It might be an emotional depression. It might be looking at the world around us and thinking, look what's happening to our culture, to our society. Things are not as they ought to be. Yes, we know that. God knows that.
It's not taking Him by surprise. But why are things not as they ought to be? Because people have walked away from God.
That's why. The earth is cursed. In a sense, God says, if that's the way you want it, have it your way.
See what life is like without me. And that's why we sense the oppression and the frustrations and the disappointment that we do today. But though things are not as they ought to be. And the prophecy of Isaiah paints a portrait, even though it was over a century ahead of time, it paints a portrait as if the Babylonian captivity were already happening and the people were in exile. But here's the second part of the manifestation. Though things are not now as they should be, one day God will make it so.
One day God will make it so. He is the God who sets things as they ought to be. He is the one who makes things right. The message of Isaiah is the Lord's restoration of His creation. And you see, that is the perspective of verse 9 of chapter 40.
Look at verse 9 with me. 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 lifted up.
Be not afraid. Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. The one who is leading history. The one who will make things right. The one who will overrule all the oppressions and the frustrations of man.
He will make things right. Behold your God. So if we could encapsulate the prophecy of Isaiah in a nutshell, it would look something like this. Here is a big picture. And the one who is in charge of that big picture is a great God. Here is the big picture. Look at the big picture, understand, grasp the big picture.
And the one who offers that big picture is a great God. Have you ever put a puzzle together that has 500, 1000 pieces? There's a lot of pieces and you take one piece of the puzzle. If you were to walk around the house, you hadn't seen this puzzle before, you walk around the house, you find a random piece to a 500 piece puzzle. And you look at that one little piece of the puzzle. Can you tell what that whole picture is?
You can't. You are a piece of the puzzle. You, by yourself, you cannot determine the big picture of your life.
You need revelation for that. You see with a puzzle, with a 500 piece puzzle comes what? A box.
And on that box top is what? The big picture. That's the prophecy of Isaiah. There is a big picture and the one who orchestrates that big picture is a great God. And that's why in this prophecy from 40 on, he presents a portrait of who God is. This great God who is orchestrating the big picture of it all. So whatever you're sensing this morning, whatever frustrations in life that you have, remember, you are just a piece of the puzzle. And you cannot determine purpose, meaning, whatever by just yourself as one piece of the puzzle. You need the big picture.
You need the one who created that picture. And that one is a great God. Now let's understand this God. We're going to understand him in two main senses this morning that we get from Isaiah chapter 41. One is that he is person and second is that he is infinite. He is the infinite person. The great God behind the big picture who orchestrates the big picture. Thanks for joining us here at Delight in Grace. You've been listening to Rich Powell, the lead pastor at Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. The Delight in Grace mission is to help you know that God designed you to realize your highest good and your deepest satisfaction in him, the one who is infinitely good. We hope you'll join us again on weekdays at 10 a.m.
