Welcome to Delight in Grace, the teaching ministry of Rich Powell, pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. In Ephesians 1, Paul prays that the eyes of God's people would be opened to the immeasurable greatness of God's power toward us who believe. Today, let us consider from Isaiah 50 the power and omnipotence of our great God. He has the authority and power over all creation, and He has chosen to use that power for our benefit through His Son Jesus.
Let's listen in. This is part two of a message first preached on June 9, 2013 at Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. With me in Isaiah chapter 52 in verse 10.
He uses hand and arm synonymously about His power and His ability. Isaiah 52, 10, the Lord has made bare His holy arm in the eyes of all the nations and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God. 53, 1, who has believed our report and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? The omnipotent God is speaking.
And all we need to do is look in history. Look what He says in the middle of verse 2. Indeed with my rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a wilderness, their fish stink because there is no water and die of thirst.
I clothe the heavens with blackness and I make sackcloth their covering. What is God saying? He is speaking of the authority of His word. God is saying, let me remind you of my power.
Let's look in history a little bit. And what He's doing is He's taking their attention back to the Exodus, the plagues upon Egypt and the Red Sea, crossing the Red Sea where God delivered His people from the most powerful army on the face of the earth at the time, the Egyptians. And Israel just got up and walked away from them. And God is, it's like He's saying, have you forgotten that? How many times in scriptures does it say, and God said? What does it say in Genesis? And God said, let there be, and guess what?
There was and it started with light. And all the universe that you see, the earth and all of creation and all of the universe, God spoke and it was done. Psalm 33, 9, He spoke and it was done. And the same is attributed to the Lord Jesus Christ as we find in Hebrews chapter 1 verse 3, speaking of Him who is upholding all things by the word of His power. That is the authority of God's word, the power, the authority of an omnipotent God. And what is the power of His hand? Again, once He says here, I clothe, verse 3, I clothe the heavens with blackness and I make sackcloth their covering. God in His powerful hand is in command of the universe.
Look, look with me at chapter 48 verse 13. This is the power of His hand. He laid the foundation of the earth. He stretched out the heavens. Indeed, my hand is laid the foundation of the earth. My right hand has stretched out the heavens. When I call to them, they stand up together. Just His right hand.
He didn't even use both hands to stretch out the heavens. You have to pay attention to those details. Think about that. It's staggering.
Let me help you. Our solar system is a part of the Milky Way galaxy. You know that.
You learned that in fourth grade, right? If the Milky Way galaxy were the size of the entire continent of North America, our solar system would fit in a coffee cup. Two Voyager spacecraft are hurtling at the edge of the solar system at the rate of 100,000 miles per hour. More than three decades now.
This was launched in the 70s. Speeding away from earth, they're approaching a distance of 9 billion miles. When engineers beam a command to the spacecraft at the speed of light, it takes 13 hours to arrive. The Milky Way is one of perhaps 100 billion galaxies in the universe.
Your brains fried yet? To send a light speed message to the edge of that universe, it would take 15 billion years. With my right hand, I stretched out the heavens. And God is looking you in the eye and He is saying, explain to me your lack of trust. Behold, you're God. And yet, I think there is a sense in which we need to look at the omnipotence of God today that we don't normally do that. Because when we look at the omnipotence of God, we look at the huge massive things that He does like the universe.
I like what John Oswald says. He says, but what will His arm look like when He bears His arm and all the world will see His salvation? What will His arm look like?
His appearance will be surprising. Instead of power to smash the enemy, and it can and will, it will be the power to absorb the worst that the enemy can do and yet give back love. Well, wait a minute. I thought God was omnipotent.
He is. But you remember last time, God is a compassionate God. He is touched, He is moved by the plight of our sinfulness and He cares deeply about us. The chosen servant is the one who is in focus here. And we know who that chosen servant is. That chosen servant is Jesus Christ.
And this prophecy written somewhere around 700 B.C. was fulfilled in the person, the historic person of Jesus Christ. Here's another way to look at the omnipotence of God, the touch of that chosen servant. The touch of the chosen servant's hand demonstrated His sovereign power and authority over nature and all of creation. The touch of His hand, the authority of His word. It is no accident, it is no mistake that in the Gospels, four of them, we have recorded the miracles of Jesus Christ. God in the flesh, the one who upholds all things by the word of His power. The touch of His hand in the miracles that He performed demonstrated His sovereign power and authority over nature and all of creation. Let me read to you an example of that this morning. Here is a miracle that is recorded in the three synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke. I am going to read this morning from the novel entitled Iscariot by Tosca Lee.
Listen to this and consider the omnipotence of your God. The leper staggered forward on a foot that was the wrong color for flesh. His face obscured with warty growths so that it looked like the lichen covered anchors we had passed on the dock. I felt more than saw Simon draw back at my side, heard the strangled sound of his revulsion. The man was so covered in the disease as to be deformed as to hardly look like a man at all. He had uncovered his face, the rest of him was wrapped in the rags mandated by law. His skin had peeled away so that it was hard to distinguish flesh from dirty cloth. Please, the leper cried, his voice cracking as though he had not spoken or cried out in a very long time. Now I could see the way his eyes darted this way and that, the way his hands with the stumps of fingers trembled like the flutter of a leaf.
Please. The leper lurched forward, closing the distance between him and the one man who had not moved since his appearance. He pitched to the ground onto his knees, onto his face. Please, he wailed in a hoarse voice that carried with terrible clarity.
Please, if you are willing, you can make me clean. When the Nazarene sank to one knee and laid his hand upon the leper's shoulder, I staggered back as though struck. I stood fixed, acutely aware of that taut gaze of every person there all fixed on one point like the gathering threads of a spider's web, that hand on that shoulder. The man on the ground lifted his head, his face contorted, his mouth gaped open in a low keen as though having gone so long without the touch of another human that it pained him to feel it at all. He lifted one star-like hand as though wanting to touch the clean hand upon his shoulder except that he didn't dare. He began to shake and his head dipped back down with a soundless moan of one who has suffered so long he cannot remember how to cry. I am willing.
I could not mistake the way his voice broke as he cupped the leper's face and he again said, I am willing. 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.
