Isaiah: OUR URGENT NEED Isaiah 1; August 16, 2015

Transcription

1 1 Isaiah: OUR URGENT NEED Isaiah 1; August 16, 2015 The land around the Dead Sea is one of the most desolate areas on earth. I ve taken groups there on a number of occasions. We would visit the imposing fortress Masada where the Jews took their heroic last stand against the Romans during the revolt of AD 70 that Jesus had sadly predicted. We would then take a swim in the Dead Sea, called so because the salt content is so high literally no life is possible in it. You cannot sink into the water, rather you bob like a cork on its surface. But beware, don t get any water in your eyes because that will hurt like crazy. According to tradition the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were either along the shoreline or are now submerged under the water. Looking at the blasted and twisted volcanic landscape, it is not hard to imagine the wrath of God falling upon this place as the Patriarch Abraham looked on in shocked wonderment. Then we would visit En Gedi, where David hid out from Saul during his years on the run. And finally we would stop at Qumran, the site of a Jewish monastic community called the Essenes. Scholars think John the Baptist might have been an Essene. One day in 1948 a Bedouin shepherd boy was idly throwing rocks into caves high up on the cliff sides of Qumran when he heard the sound of breaking pottery. He ran back to his camp and brought his uncle to the site. They climbed into the cave and discovered one of the most important finds in biblical archeology the Dead Sea Scrolls. Written before and during the time of Jesus, the scrolls were probably placed in the caves to keep them out of Roman hands during the revolt. Now they are one of the greatest treasures of Israel and have their own museum in Jerusalem. The jewel in the crown is a totally intact copy of the Book of Isaiah written in 300 B.C. which makes it 300 years older than the previous oldest manuscript we have of the book. At one time many critics of the Bible said it is impossible to have accurate copies of the books of the Bible as they were originally written. Long before the invention of the printing press all books had to be copied by hand and surely many errors and changes would have crept in over the centuries. Now this theory could be put to the test. But when scholars compared the Dead Sea copy of Isaiah to much latter editions of this book, they were astounded. Scarcely any

2 2 changes had been made over vast stretches of time. There are only a few differences in word phrasing and punctuation, nothing that would alter the meaning of the text. The scribes who made these copies took their jobs seriously and they were very good at it. Isaiah is the longest books of the Bible and deals with almost all the major themes found in the Bible. Jesus quoted from it more often than any other book of the Old Testament. How can we fail to profit as well if we take this magnificent but complex book to heart and learn to know its contents like our Lord did? The book starts by stating, The vision of Isaiah which he saw (1:1). this is a vision (singular), not visions (plural). Isaiah is met to be understood as a whole, not as collection of unrelated teachings. Some scholars think that Isaiah was written by three separate authors because the writing style and content change abruptly three times. But authors often change their style of writing when their emphasis changes. Near the end of his life Isaiah gathered up all his papers and notes and produced a coherent anthology of his life s calling as a prophet. First, what exactly is a prophet and what is the value of studying their writings? We all see the world through our own senses, based on our biases, experiences, and perceptions. But the prophets of the Bible claim to see the world in a different way, the way God sees it. For example, the prophet Elisha was surrounded one night in the settlement of Dothan by an army of hostile Syrians. His young apprendice was scared to death when at dawn he saw the enemy soldiers advancing. But Elisha didn t panic and calmed his disciple by saying, Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them. His apprendice must have thought, This old man is nuts. But then what did the prophet do? He prayed, O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see. God did. And the young man suddenly saw the surrounding mountains were filled with horses and chariots of fire, the very army of God which far outnumbered and outclassed the Syrians. Paul says that the way most of us see reality is like looking at the reflection in a dim mirror, we see so little of how things really are. But Isaiah, like all true prophets of God, can help us see the world as it really is. If you are reading through the Bible, you have come to the last major section of the Old

3 3 Testament the books of the prophets. They are categorized as the four major and twelve Minor Prophets, designated as such by the length of their writings, not the importance of their content. Who was Isaiah? The Bible says he was the son of Amoz. According to rabbinic tradition Amoz was brother to Amaziah, King of Judah, putting Isaiah into the royal family. Much more importantly, the name Isaiah literally means The Lord saves. Isaiah s very identity announces grace from beyond us. You would think people would really appreciate have a prophet present in their generation to show them God. Not really. Isaiah and his fellow prophets got beat up a lot, especially by the religious folks. When it comes right down to it, we don t like God interfering with us and challenging our preconceptions which we have grown comfortable with. We want to retain control, preferring the God who is a reflection of our own wants and desires over the God who is liable to call into question everything we hold dear, our idols of choice that define what is important to our lives. We tend to be pretty good at grace avoidance. Yet we all crave reassurances that our lives are not zeroes. But unless we see our lives in God s terms and order our priorities by God s priorities our uncertainty generates a desperate grasping that burns us up until we become old, tired, disillusioned, and worn out. No idol can honestly say, My yoke is easy, my burden light (Mat. 11:30). But by his very name Isaiah says God is indeed in our midst and his desire is to saves sinners. In the film Amazing Grace there is a poignant scene where the discouraged parliamentarian William Wilberforce has been beaten down by the opposition to his crusade to outlaw slavery in the British Empire. He seeks out John Newton, the ex-slave ship captain who had written the hymn Amazing Grace. He finds Newton mopping floors as a humble church janitor as a way of doing penance for all the suffering he inflicted on others. Newton observes: Though my memory fails, there are two things I still remember: I m a great sinner, God is a great Savior. This was not a popular message in Wilberforce s day, nor is it in our day, or in Isaiah s day for that matter. We much more admire and want to emulate people like Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, who was considered one of the most successful business men of

4 4 our generation. Those who worked for him said he was a bully with a towering ego. Still, though, we perhaps harbor the notion that Steve Jobs was right when he frequently said his favorite quote was Leo Durocher s, Nice guys finish last. We also see in the poisoned and toxic swamp of politics of our current time the desire to assign blame to the other party for all the things that we cannot either understand or control. Donald Trump is so representative of the current state of affairs as he lashes out in vitriol and contempt toward all who disagree with him but then comes up short when asked what he would do differently. When Isaiah began his ministry about 740 B.C. Judah was in the last days of her long prosperity. Peace and plenty were about to slip away and the people sensed it. The mighty Assyrian Empire was expanding in Judah s direction. One nation after another was falling into virtual slavery as the unstoppable Assyrian juggernaut swept over them. The people had a choice, they could either turn to God for their deliverance or they could try to cobble together some kind of political or military solution. The vast majority of people plainly preferred the later and didn t like Isaiah constantly pointing out the folly of their choices. They finally killed him by sawing him in two. If Isaiah had wanted to be popular and pleasing like Jobs or Trump he would have started his book by proclaiming God s judgment against all the nations that were threatening Judah. But no, he cuts right to the chase, saying if there is to be judgment it starts with that person you look at in the mirror first thing in the morning. Before you go assigning blame to others, you need to be more concerned about how you may have things all turned around, especially if you think of yourself as spiritual and thus subtly might be tempted to consider yourself to be better than others. Beware of the religious person who thinks he or she has a lock on absolute truth. They are the ones who end up throwing the bombs. Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; listen to the law of our God, you people of Gomorrah! The multitude of your sacrifices, what are they to me? says the Lord. (1:10, 11). We all need to learn to see our world in the same way God sees it. The starting place is to see ourselves in terms of lost sinners. This is not as depressing a thought as we might think it is. Considered one of the greatest

5 5 psychiatrists of his generation, Paul Tourier observed, A diffuse and vague guilt feeling kills the personality, whereas the highly focused conviction of sin gives life to it. Isaiah would agree, he says such a conviction is our first step back to God. What the world says is that we need more self-esteem and children should be told from birth how special and wonderful they are. But what we really need is more humility and more Christesteem. William Kilpatrick relates that a colleague at Boston College once asked members of his philosophy class to write an anonymous essay about a personal struggle over right and wrong, good and evil. Most of the students were unable to complete the assignment. When the professor asked why they said, apparently without a trace of irony we haven t done anything wrong. Apparently we have lots of self-esteem but not too much self-awareness. On the other hand, what is conviction of sin? It is not an oppressive spirit of condemnation or paralyzing guilt feelings. Conviction of sin is the lance of the divine Surgeon piercing our infected soul, releasing the pressure, letting the infection drain out. Conviction of sin is the severe love of God overruling our compulsive dishonesty, our willful blindness, our lame excuses. The Book of Isaiah is God telling us the truth about ourselves. Our apparent bottomless capacity for self-deception manifests itself in two ways according to our new friend Isaiah: national turmoil and vain worship. Your country is desolate; your cities are burned with fire to what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me? I have had enough of burnt offering I cannot endure the iniquity and the sacred meeting (1:7, 11, 13). Repentance is needful work for all of us to engage in from time to time. I volunteered at a Billy Graham crusade when I was in university. At the end of his message, Graham would ask that people get up out of their seats and come to the platform that had been set up in the stadium. There, he said, someone will meet you, pray with you and give you some literature. I was one of those some ones. It was a powerful moment as hundreds and perhaps even thousands of people advanced toward us and the prayer we used was a prayer of repentance. According to Mark, the first thing Jesus said when he started his ministry is, The time has come,

6 6 the Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news (Mark 1:15). Repentance simply means that we agree with God about the true state of our lives and the need for God s grace to do its marvelous restoration in us. Repentance is the crucial first step in opening ourselves to God s presence and God s love. We don t just need to repent at the beginning of our Christian lives, but every time we sense that God wants to take us further along the road of discipleship, ever time God wants to do a new work in us or through us. So often we live outside of God s blessings of love, joy, and peace because we are in rebellion against God without being aware of it. Isaiah awakens us to God s broken heart, our broken ability, and his unbroken grace. God is saying See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god beside me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and there is none that can deliver out of my hand (Deut 32:39). that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed (Is. 53:5). Lastly, true repentance is not just confession of our sins, it is a willingness to make things right again. We not only have the course of our daily lives corrected, we learn to live wisely and well. God is saying, If you want your worship to please me, do this: Become actively involved in works of compassion and justice for the people you have hurt, especially the people who are so easily ignored and dismissed, people who can t pay you back, and people who might not thank you. Set right again the wrongs you ve been tolerating. Then your worship will be a thing of beauty to me, and you will know firsthand my presence and grace. Here is good news for wounded people. Jesus was wounded with our wounds. Isaiah saw clearly what Jesus would accomplish 700 years in the future, He was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement