Let us look to God in prayer.
We thank thee for the reminder, dear Lord,
that thou, the great, the mighty creator, art
the God who is so faithful and who
has never broken one word of all his
promises.
Fulfill thy word this morning and speak to
our waiting heart so that we may be
blessable today, that there be no barriers of
thought, of outlook, of mind, of heart, of
attitude, so it would prove a block to
the Spirit of God.
We ask it in Jesus' name.
Amen.
We are continuing this morning, dear friends, the
series of messages from the prophecy of Isaiah,
and I invite you this morning to turn
to the 46th chapter of Isaiah.
Our general heading has been, faith for the
times, and we take for our text this
morning the closing verse of the chapter, I
bring near my righteousness, it shall not be
far off, and my salvation shall not tarry,
and I will place salvation in Zion, for
Israel my glory.
If you were to scan through this chapter,
you would see that its story, recorded about
170 years before the actual event, anticipates a
day when, in fulfillment of God's purpose which
can never be thwarted, Cyrus, king of Persia,
would invade Babylon, and in so doing would
be instrumental in releasing God's people Israel from
bondage.
You have in the opening verses of this
chapter, the graphic picture of the two great
Babylonian gods, Bel and Nebo, after whom the
two great kings of that empire were named,
Belshazzar and Nebuchadnezzar.
You have these two gods being carried off
in carts, as a trophy of the Persian
victory.
Not of course, that they would have any
place in their lives for the worship of
Babylon's idols, but the capture of them demonstrated
the completeness of their victory, and the folly
of the people, and the futility of the
gods, to rescue them from defeat.
The sixth verse suggests to us that they
had been made at great expense.
They had been lavishly decorated, and yet these
wretched idols, only emphasized in time of defeat,
their futility, and the absolute stupidity of the
people of ever having lowered their dignity to
worship them.
Now of course, my friend, these details are
past history, but the principles are up to
date.
And I would underline a lesson at this
very beginning of our message this morning, to
say that any nation which departs from her
former glory, in the worship of a living
God, to that of idols, whatever form those
idols may take, whether they be wooden images,
or mighty men, or weight of armaments, or
lust of power, whenever a nation does that,
and looks to these things for deliverance in
the time of crisis, they find them only
a burden.
And they prove the absolute folly and futility
of lowering our dignity, in departing from God,
to worship an idol.
In his State of the Union message this
week, President Kennedy said, world order will be
secured only when the whole world has laid
down those weapons which seem to offer present
security, but which in fact threaten our future
survival.
That Armistice Day seems very far away.
How true.
But if we are to put down those
things in which we have put our confidence
falsely, and forsake our confidence in false gods
of armaments and material strength, what are we
going to put in their place?
What's to be the ground of confidence if
that in which we've trusted proves to be
false?
No nation and no individual can live in
a vacuum.
Now to that question, this chapter has the
tremendous answer.
For it paints in a vivid contrast, in
a vivid picture, a three-fold contrast between
the idols of Babylon and Jehovah, the God
of Israel and our God.
And this contrast goes far deeper and far
further than ancient heathendom.
It comes right to where you and I
live this morning.
Whatever a nation or an individual may put
in the place in our heart which rightly
belongs to the God who made us and
bought us with his precious blood, he only
erects an idol before which he worships, and
in which he places his faith.
And by doing this he lowers the whole
dignity of his manhood, and reaps the inevitable
reward of the judgment of a holy God.
A judgment incidentally, which is not only reserved
for a dreadful future day, but one of
which God gives a man and a nation
ample warning in the course of life here
and now.
Look then with me dear friend, will you,
at this contrast between Jehovah and every other
idol, and let me ask you very earnestly
to put yourself, as I would seek to
put myself, into this vivid picture.
In the first place there is a contrast
here in burden bearing.
In the seventh verse of this chapter of
the idol it is said, they bear him
upon the shoulder, they carry him.
In other words, the idol is something that
has to be carried until it becomes a
crushing burden.
But Jehovah says in the fourth verse, even
to your old age I am he, even
to your poor hair will I carry you.
I have made, and I will bear, even
I will carry, and I will deliver you.
You see, a man makes and then carries
his idol, and many people spend a whole
lifetime at the job, making that in their
own imagination which is worthy of their worship.
And they make this thing and surround themselves
with it, and then they worship it, and
spend their whole lives in propping it up,
until it becomes a tremendous, crushing, overwhelming burden.
But God makes and offers to carry the
man.
If I turn from the worship of God,
as revealed in Jesus Christ our Lord, immediately
I make myself an idol, which though it
seems to offer present security, threatens my future
survival.
To some folk, even their religion is a
burden.
A burden of ritual, a burden of ceremony,
a burden of duty, a burden of service.
But to other people who yield themselves wholly
to God in Jesus Christ our Lord, they
find that religion, far from being something they
carry, in fact, carries them.
And of course that's exactly the intention of
the Christian faith.
It isn't something you're to carry as a
dreadful load, it is something that is designed
to put a lever under the weight of
your life, and to carry you.
And beloved, if your heart is right with
God this morning, if there's a living faith
in him, then your religion cannot be a
burden, because he is the great burden bearer.
He bears the burden of our sin, and
that's the root cause of all the trouble.
Isaiah 53, 4 says, Surely he hath borne
our griefs, and carried our sorrows.
He was wounded for our transgressions, and he
was bruised for our iniquities.
And though this world is dark with its
sin, and with its crime, he hath borne
it at the cross, and he will not
rest until one day he comes again, and
to put down all sin, and to rule
in righteousness, and to fill this earth with
his glory, he bears the burden of our
sin.
He hath borne it at Calvary, the crushing,
intolerable load of the idol that I have
worshipped, he bears it.
I have said from this pulpit, let me
repeat it, I don't believe there's any such
person in existence as an atheist.
People almost pride themselves on such a philosophy,
I'm an atheist, which simply means they worship
themselves, they have their own God.
Man, because of the kind of creature he
is, is incapable of living without worshipping something.
Perhaps the greatest form of conceit and idolatry
is to worship ourselves.
But God even bears the burden of this,
of my independence, of my sin, and he
took it to the cross, and bore the
guilt and the load of it, that he
might lift the burden.
And when he's done that, bless his holy
name, he bears the burden of my life
work, and my life responsibility.
The task which so often threatens to overwhelm
me, the responsibilities which sometimes seem too heavy
for us to bear, and seem such a
dead, crushing weight, why just there, when I
have had the burden of my sin lifted,
he comes and he places underneath the lever
of his everlasting arm, and he bears the
burden of our lives.
I think I told you the humorous story
of a man going along the road in
an automobile, and seeing a poor fellow standing
at the side of the road, carrying a
great heavy sack.
And he put him, offered him a lift,
and the man got in with his sack
on his shoulder, and he kept it there,
and the driver of the vehicle said, well
now, why don't you put your sack down?
Oh sir, he said, I was so grateful,
I was so grateful that you carried me,
I didn't think it was fair to ask
you to carry my sack as well.
Oh, says the Psalmist, cast thy burden on
the Lord, and he shall sustain thee.
Says the Apostle Peter, casting all thy care
upon him, for he careth for you, and
at that verse, on the 10th of August
1926, in a little tavern, near the boundary
of the Roman Empire in Northumberland, England, I
cast my guilt and my burden at the
feet of Jesus, and bless the Lord.
He's carried it for 35 years and more,
and he'll carry it right through till I
get to heaven.
And therefore he says, come unto me, all
ye that labour on a heavy laden, and
I will give you rest.
Oh, my dear listener this morning, is your
religious experience a burden that you're carrying?
Are you going through life crushed with it?
Or have you found that He, Christ, has
begun to carry you?
Is there a heart that is willing to
lay burdens on Jesus' breast?
He is so loving and gentle and true,
come unto Him and be blessed.
Contrast in burden bearing, and then the contrast
in activity.
Verse 7, speaking of the gardens of Babylon,
they set him in his place and he
standeth.
From his place shall he not remove, completely
immobile.
This is the helpless condition of inactivity of
the idol, as it stands by watching the
complete overthrow and the destruction of the nation
that's worshipped it.
It has no suggestion to offer, it has
no counsel to give, it has no remedy
to suggest, and desperately the worshipper seeks its
aid, but all in vain.
There it stands, immobile.
But notice the contrast.
Verse 13, I, says Jehovah, bring near my
righteousness.
Here is God on the move, here is
God taking the initiative.
What a contrast.
And in the constant battle of life between
men and God, we spend our time running
away from Him.
And He's continually in pursuit with a love
that will not let me go.
And even though I may be, in the
words of verse 12, far from righteousness, God
brings near His own.
Even though I may be clothed with all
the filthy rags of my own wretched failure,
at that point God brings right near His
own, in order that He might cover all
my filthiness with His spotlessness.
A righteousness that I receive by faith in
and by commitment to Jesus Christ as Lord
of my life.
Beloved, He follows every man to the very
gate of hell, and He bars the road
to a lost eternity with His cross.
Years ago, in London, there was a story
told of a certain nightclub which has a
very lurid reputation.
The story of its opening is quite extraordinary.
A young fellow, who'd been living a pretty
wild sort of life, came to the age
of discretion and maturity, an age when he
inherited from his father quite a fortune.
He demanded the whole fortune that his father
had, and he went off with it, and
he told his father, I'm going to open
the hottest nightclub in London.
I'm going to paint the place red.
His father was a godly man.
To hear his son talk like that just
broke his heart.
Plans were made, a site was purchased, the
nightclub was being built, and there came to
them a moment of the great opening day,
which was thoroughly well advertised in the press.
And as that young fellow went along to
open it that special night, that great night,
with all the swagger and pride of what
he'd accomplished, to his amazement, when he reached
the place, he found his father standing at
the door.
And already he'd driven away a whole crowd
of potential patrons.
And he was continuing to do this as
the people had lined up to enter.
There was this young man's father standing there,
sending them all home.
And this young fellow went up to his
father, put his arms upon him and said,
Here, you get out of the way.
This is my show, my club, not yours.
And his father looked at him straight between
the eyes and he said, My son, there
is nobody will ever enter this building tonight
except they do it over my dead body.
We talk about hell, we talk about judgment,
and we think it's severe.
Beloved, I declare to you in the name
of our wonderful Lord Jesus that there is
nobody will go out into a Christless eternity
except he tramples upon the blood of Jesus
Christ and turns his back upon God's offer
of salvation at Calvary.
God's whole purpose of redemption is to separate
us from the thing that he must judge.
And because he is holy, he is inevitably
bound to condemn and destroy that which is
sinful.
And his whole plea to every one of
us is that we might be separate from
our sin.
And if I refuse him, then isn't it
only logical that I must become involved in
the judgment of the thing which he must
condemn.
Oh, the activity of God today to bring
near his righteousness is the answer to our
deepest need.
And every false god stands silent in a
very silent mocking, mocking the stupidity and folly
that we've ever turned from the living God
to worship another.
But our God has taken the initiative, and
he's stepped out of heaven, and he's stepped
out of glory, and he's purchased our pardon
at Calvary, and he's offering to us a
righteousness that is complete, which we can receive
as a free gift, or else we'll never
receive it at all.
A contrast in activity.
But there's something else here, beloved.
It's not only a contrast in burden bearing
and a contrast in activity, it's a contrast
in power.
Verse seven, one shall cry unto him, yet
can he not answer, nor save him out
of his trouble.
Listen, worship that seemed sufficient in peaceful times
had proved absolutely inadequate when the crisis came.
That was the lesson Babylon learned.
Lip service to a God who wasn't real
was absolutely useless when the chips were down.
Are we not proving that today?
This world, involved as it is in a
global civil war, presents a terrifying picture.
And the gods in which we've placed our
trust are in fact threatening our destruction.
I wonder if we who profess to be
Christian are reaping the fruit of years of
lip service before a God who's never been
real to us, while the true worship of
our hearts is being given elsewhere.
President Kennedy said this week, if we cannot
fulfill our own ideals, we cannot expect other
people to accept them.
Of course not.
And we have set up an ideal of
a Christian society, but we don't attain to
it because our God is not real.
He's merely the patron of the society, instead
of the Lord of it.
And God is not here to be patronized,
he's here to be obeyed.
May I illustrate what I mean to you,
in a very personal sense?
If you were to turn with me for
a moment to the 8th chapter of the
Gospel of Luke, you would find in it
the parable of the sower.
You remember the story.
It's recorded in other Gospels, but I simply
refer to the Gospel of Luke here at
this point because the wording of it is,
I think, is so striking.
And we're told here that as the sower
sowed his seed, some fell on a rock.
Verse 6 of Luke chapter 8.
And as soon as it was sprung up,
it withered away because it lacked moisture.
And by way of interpretation, our Lord said
in verse 13, They on the rock, are
they which when they hear, receive the word
with joy, and thee having no root, for
a while believe, and in time of temptation
fall away.
May I put to you today, may I,
may I put to you and present to
you these three tremendous words.
I want them to sound like an alarm
bell in my own soul as I give
them to you.
Having no root.
Examine yourself and let me do the same
in His presence today in the light of
that text.
Have we received the word joyfully?
Have our feelings been stirred time and time
again?
Impressions have been made.
But beloved, to receive the word with our
ear is one thing, and to receive Christ
into the depth of our being is another.
And the strange paradox, and yet maybe your
experience will confirm what I say.
The strange paradox is simply this, that very
often, the man who superficially responds so eagerly
and quickly to the word, is the man
who has the hardest of hearts.
The seed fell on ground, says the Lord,
fell on ground with a rocky foundation.
And when it began to take root downward,
it found its downward growth was prevented by
hard stones.
And so that seed began to spend its
strength in pushing up green shoots as high
as it could.
But because it had no inward moisture derived
from root nourishment, it withered away.
Is this your case?
Is it mine?
Have you made quite a show of religion
in the flesh?
But with no corresponding inner life, have I
understood, have you, that true growth in the
things of God takes place upwards and downwards
at the same time.
And the word of God cannot take root
on a rocky, unbroken, unsanctified heart.
I would dread more than anything, I tell
you I would dread more than anything a
form of godliness which has a wonderful show,
but no root.
Oh beloved, if our heart remains unsoftened, the
seed of the word may germinate for a
little while, but ultimately because of lack of
moisture, because it has no root, because it
hasn't gone deep into the well of life
which Jesus plants into the heart of a
true believer, because the word has nothing upon
which it can grow inwardly, then that life
withers away.
If my mind remains stubborn and my heart
remains unbroken, then my religion will die and
my judgment is inevitable.
All because that in spite of outward show,
the fact is that God has never been
real.
In truth, we've worshipped a dumb idol and
we've refused to allow God to break our
heart.
Oh, my prayer is, my prayer is that
the word would plough deep into your soul
this morning, dear friend, and into mine, and
that he would cast the truth down deep
into us and he may meet no resistance
and the only thing the word may find
in me today is a heart that hungers
and thirsts for Jesus.
I wonder if what I've just been saying
has gone home to some folks listening to
me this morning, who perhaps for years, even
in this church, have put up the show,
but have had no root.
And your spiritual life today, beloved, is withering,
withering away, because the word, every time it
preached, every time it's spoken, it hits a
rock, an irresistible rock, of a mind that
rejects it and of a heart that rebels
against it.
And because there's no moisture, why you try
to build up your life and put up
the show of religion and pretend, but it
has no root.
I wonder what it'll take to break that
heart.
I know what it took to break mine,
just a revelation of Calvary, and what it
must have meant to him to bear away
my sin.
And of course, you see, this is the
final answer, the final contrast of this whole
chapter in Isaiah 46.
The powerlessness of the idol is contrasted with
the power of Jehovah.
Verse 13, I will place salvation in Zion,
for Israel my glory.
Think of those words, the idol couldn't save,
but Jehovah can.
In him there's power for anything, in his
will.
Of course, truly, our verse anticipates a day
when God shall set his king in Zion.
When Jesus shall reign, where'er the sun
of his successive journeys run, his kingdom stretch
from shore to shore, till moon shall wax
and wane no more.
Great day, but that's future.
Here's something for me now, today, in Chicago,
where I live, in my home, in my
job, something wonderful.
So near does he bring his righteousness, that
he places salvation in Zion, for Israel his
glory.
Or put it into the language of the
New Testament, listen.
I listened to our Lord, as he prayed,
just before the cross.
The glory thou hast given me, I have
given them.
I in them, thou in me.
John 17, 22.
Listen again.
As he spoke to a little group of
bereft disciples, who were going to lose his
presence.
I will pray the Father, and he shall
send you another comforter, that he may abide
with you forever.
At that day ye shall know, I am
in my Father, you in me, and I
in you.
Bless the Lord, it happened.
It happened at Pentecost.
Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy
Spirit is come upon you, and ye shall
be witnesses unto me.
And by that transforming power, he achieves in
us all his purpose, and he calls his
people.
Oh, what an amazing thing.
He calls his people, my glory.
Oh yes, the greatest revelation of the power
and the glory of God, in a world
today, indeed the only revelation, is the Christian.
And the only hope for your life, and
for the world, is that somehow that glory
should get in, and begin to shine through.
Let me conclude again by, well, going back
to where I began.
I'm quoting again from our President.
No, let me paraphrase, paraphrase President Kennedy a
moment.
Listen, heart rest will only be secured when
the whole man lays down the gods which
seem to offer him present security, but which
threaten his future survival.
And that armistice day can happen now.
How?
Oh, for a closer walk with God.
A calm and heavenly frame.
A light to shine along the road that
leads me to the land.
Where is the blessedness that once I knew
when first I saw the Lord?
Where's that so refreshing view of Jesus and
his word?
Here's the key, here's the key.
The dearest idol I have known, what e
'er that idol be, help me to tear
it from thy throne, and worship only thee.
Shall we bow in prayer?
Together with our radio audience we bow for
one moment of silent prayer.
Lord, as the truth dug deep, gone deep,
has the word broken through the rock of
your heart and fallen today on receptive, hungry
ground?
If so, glory to God.
He has brought near his righteousness and put
salvation in Zion for his people, his glory.
Oh, thou loving, living, lasting Lord.
We have erred and strayed from thy ways
like lost sheep.
We have followed too much the devices and
desires of our own hearts.
We have offended against thy Holy Lord.
There is no help in us.
But thou, O God, have mercy upon us,
miserable offense.
Spare thou them, O God, who confess their
faults.
Restore thou them that are penitent.
And each one of us, by grace, would
lift up our hearts to thee and say,
Lord Jesus, that means just me.
O Spirit of God, may thy word be
as the hammer that breaks the rock in
pieces.
We ask it for thy name's sake.
Amen.