Isaiah 6: A Vision of a Holy God

"And one called to another and said: 'Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; 

the whole earth is full of his glory!'" Isaiah 6:3

For the last two weeks at WBC, we've been looking at Isaiah 6. In this chapter, Isaiah sees a vision of a holy God, he is blown over by his own sinfulness in the presence of this God, and he is cleansed at the initiative of God by the coals of a sacrificial atonement. Then Isaiah is called and commissioned to preach to God's people who would be stubborn and refuse to listen to his message. God tells Isaiah that he is to continue to preach this message until His destructive judgement is utterly poured out on the land. Yet even then, God gives hope that there would be salvation that would come through the Seed of the Woman--the Son of David.

Listen here and join us in the worship of this Holy God. 

Isaiah 9: God Saves Sinners

This post is written by guest blogger, Jake Cannon. Jake is a recent digital media graduate from Greenville College. He is actively involved at August Gate in St. Louis where he is taking a preaching lab. Jake will be supply preaching at WBC this Sunday, December 6, 2015.

“But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Gailiee of the nations.”

Isaiah 9:1

If there is anything that I have learned over my short time on earth it is this: your language matters. Your words and how you use them can either help or hinder others around you. One sentence can tell me a multitude about your worldview. For Christians, our language should be of the utmost importance. It is God Himself who spoke into existence the universe; it is Christ Himself who is “the Word”; it is the Spirit Himself who uses the preaching of the Bible to pierce into our hearts. Our words matter.

Never did words matter more than when the Israelites and Syrians made battle against the kingdom of Judah. It is recorded in Isaiah 7 that when King Ahaz heard that the armies of Israel and Syria were coming against him, “…his heart and the hearts of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake with the wind” (v. 2). Isaiah, the prophet to Judah, was sent to comfort King Ahaz with a word from the Lord. Isaiah’s words mattered. They mattered not only because of the historical context from which chapters 7-9 are written, they mattered because they were directly from the Lord.

We find recorded in Isaiah 7-9 a proclamation of hope, judgment, and peace. What the Lord gave Isaiah to speak mattered greatly to the people at that time. Though their wickedness brought contempt from God, He will make glorious their land. What is most powerful about verse one in chapter nine is that it is God who brings contempt and glory.

It is God, who in verse three, will multiply the nations and supply them with joy. Joy not in the harvests or in the spoils of battle, but in God Himself. Sinners cannot save themselves from the judgment of God. There is nothing good inside of Judah that can be considered worthy of escaping the contempt of God. What Isaiah ultimately tells us in just one sentence is that it is God Himself who brings judgment, and that it is God Himself who ultimately saves sinners.

Isaiah’s words mattered because Judah’s hope was gone. They knew their wickedness had brought contempt. But God’s glory is greater than Judah’s failures. Isaiah’s words mattered because he proclaims that it is God who will bring them out from their darkness and into the light. It is God who will turn their failure into a magnification of His glory. It is God who will turn their oppression into freedom, and their fear into hope. It is God who will bring a child to be born, a son that will be given, to forever seal His people.

“Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.”
Isaiah 9:7

Isaiah 7--Immanuel

"Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive a and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Isaiah 7:14

Preaching from prophecy is a tricky thing. We are often tempted to look at the passages quoted in the New Testament as being fulfilled in Christ as if they had no immediate context. However, while the prophets did predict the future with the aid of the Holy Spirit, and while they did write out of a conviction that was tied to a messianic hope, they were nonetheless writing to those who lived in their own day as well. This makes the task of interpreting the prophets difficult. 

Take, for instance, the prophecy of a virgin birth from Isaiah 7:14. This is particularly difficult. While Matthew clearly identifies this as being fulfilled in Christ, it is hard to see this from the passage itself. There are a few objections that the majority of scholars point out. First, the Hebrew term which our Bible's translate as "virgin" in this verse is more accurately rendered "a young woman of marriageable age." While the Greek Septuagint translates the word specifically as virgin, the Hebrew does not require it. So, to be precise, the prophecy did not require a virgin birth in the sense that we understand that it is fulfilled in Jesus. Second, the immediate context of the verse suggests that Isaiah is talking about a sign that will happen in his immediate context. It appears that the sign is to be given for king Ahaz of Judah as a sign that God would protect them from the imminent danger of an attack from Syria and Israel, the Northern Kingdom. Isaiah says to Ahaz that the two kings he fears will no longer be a threat by the time the child is old enough to tell right from wrong. Finally, chapter 8, within the immediate context of Isaiah, we see that there is a child born who is intended to be a sign. Isaiah has a son named Maher-shalal-ash-baz of which it is said, "before the boy knows how to cry 'My father' or 'My mother,' the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria." It seems as though Isiah's prophecy was fulfilled by the birth of his own son. Isaiah even says in 8:18 that his two children were given to him as signs from Yahweh for Israel. 

So how do we understand this in the light of what Matthew said? I believe he understood Isaiah 7 in the light of Isaiah 9. In Isaiah 9, we see another promise of a child to be born (9:6-7). In this promise it says that the child will be called "Mighty God" among other magnificent names. It also says that this child will sit on David's throne forever. In chapter 9, Isaiah is looking back to 2 Samuel 7:12-13. The LORD promised David, "When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring [seed] after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." This promised seed who would sit on David's throne forever is none other than the blessing that would come to all nations through Abraham. This son was also none other than the seed of the woman promised in Genesis 3:15. I suspect, that in Matthew's mind the Isaiah 7:14 was connected with 9:6-7 and that these were pointing to something that would find their ultimate fulfillment in someone much greater than the immediate context suggested--they were fulfilled in Christ. Jesus was born of a virgin, he was God with us, and he was David's son who would sit on his throne forever.

"For unto us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, and on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this." Isaiah 9:6-7