Isaiah Lesson 49

The Concern for Self and the Burden for Future Generations

The study of the book of Isaiah. We are in, can you believe it, the 49th lesson. We are charging through, but we've only made it 39 chapters, so we may get to 100 in all. Praise God for the way it's going.

John, can you open us in prayer, please?

Lord God, we do again thank you for the opportunity to come together to open the instruction from your book of Isaiah. We pray, Lord, that we understand the question of matricodliness and having a concern for the things of you.

We ask, Lord, that you would speak through Jeff as he brings the word to us, and we pray, Lord, that beyond knowing the information, that it would change our hearts. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.

Amen. I saw a horrifying photo. It was the picture of a six-year-old boy sitting in a medical doctor's office with his mom next to him. The image had his face blacked out. You couldn't see him, but the caption underneath it said, we're so excited because our boy begins his hormone blocking therapy today.

And this six-year-old boy will begin the process of quote-unquote transitioning, which of course is impossible. And his entire life will be affected by what they're doing to him. Now this kind of madness, and it is absolute madness, is not only encouraged by a mother who is herself deranged, but sadly it is being taught in our schools.

It is being taught in our schools along with a number of other demonic ideologies. Students are being taught to identify by their race or their economic class or their nationality, and in those things to identify as a victim.

And that of course is the fundamental proposition of critical race theory. These things and many others are taking over our schools. Now imagine you are a retired military man, and after the military, you go to school and become a pastor and get licensed with your denomination.

At that point in your career, you could very easily say, what's happening in the schools doesn't affect me. I'm moving to Florida. I'm moving to Texas. I'm moving to a conservative state, and I'm going to enjoy my retirement.

Many people make that choice, don't they? But we have sitting here next to us, next to me, a man, a pastor of this church, who is running for the school board. And that spirit is the Christian spirit because it shows concern not just for self, but for the generations to come.

Let's turn, if you will, today to Isaiah chapter 39. As we come to the context of this book, we have been enjoying Hezekiah as a hero of the faith. He's among the faithful. When his people, and we know how God loves Jerusalem.

Tell us how God loves.

Zion, John, from today. There's Psalm 87. That's my psalm of the week, and I printed out of the ESV, and on top, it starts out from Psalm 87. And it sounds like it's going to be extolling the awesomeness of God, is the way the title starts out.

But the title is only part of the verse. Glorious things are spoken of you, it starts out in verse 2. The rest of it says, O city of God. This whole psalm is expressing the special place that Jerusalem holds in the heart of God.

That's.

Our sovereign God. Yes. Amen. And the whole Psalm 87 extols God's love for Zion, for his holy mountain, for his city. Well, his city, his holy mountain, his people in Jerusalem were under siege by the Assyrians.

And the wicked king, sending his spokesperson, was talking trash against the God of Israel. Hezekiah is the hero. He turns and takes that threat to the Lord in the temple, lays it out before him, prays and intercedes.

And before these episodes are over of invasion, 185 ,000 Assyrian soldiers have been wiped out. Not by Hezekiah's sword, but through prayer and God sending one of his angels to do the work. One of his angels.

One angel versus 185 ,000 men. So here you have Hezekiah the hero. Then he gets sick and it looks like this will result in death. But Hezekiah turns his face to the wall and he weeps bitterly and he calls upon the Lord in prayer.

And in answer to that faith, God grants him healing. 15 more years of life. So we come into chapter 39 and Hezekiah is the hero. But by the end of the chapter, sadly, we see a failure in his life and one that needs to be instructed to us.

So here's the idea. The natural concern for oneself. That actually is good. Was Hezekiah wrong to pray for himself? No. Was he commended for that? Yeah. Yeah. And rewarded for it. Given more years of life.

There's nothing in chapter 38 that indicates he was being selfish as we use the term, right? It was a good love of self. In fact, what's the great commandment about your neighbor? Love your neighbor as yourself.

So what does that imply? You have to love yourself. You ought to love yourself and you should be concerned for yourself. That's not a bad thing. Okay. However, Hezekiah's concern for self never matured into a concern for future generations.

So mature godliness sees beyond the here and now and takes concern for generations to come. Generations come. Let's do this today because we only have a few verses. John, would you read the chapter and then we'll chop it up?

So we're at Isaiah chapter 39.

At that time, Marduk, the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent envoys with letters and a present to Hezekiah for he had heard that he had been sick and had recovered. And Hezekiah welcomed them gladly and he showed them his treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the precious oils, his whole armory, all that was found in his storehouses.

There was nothing in his house or in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them. Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah and said to him, what did these men say and from where did they come to you?

Hezekiah said, they have come to me from a far country, from Babylon. He said, what have they seen in your house? Hezekiah answered, they have seen all that is in my house. There is nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.

Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, hear the word of the lord of hosts. Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house and that which is your fathers, which your fathers have stored up to this day, shall be carried to Babylon.

Nothing shall be left says the lord and some of your own sons who will come from you and from you will father shall be taken away. They shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon. Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, the lord of the word that you have spoken is good for he thought there will be peace.

And security in my days. It's a very sad chapter. It's a chapter about falling, immaturity, in a Christian leader and one that we respected. We liked Hezekiah, didn't we? And yet this is a major failing in his life.

So first of all, trust not in those who worship false gods, even if they are nice. Very often in our culture, niceness is the measure of things. Whoever can speak the most kindly and and come across as being nice is regarded as true and loving and to be trusted.

But understand from this passage that niceness is not the measure. Look at verse one. At that time, Meredith, the son of Babylon, king of Babylon, sent envoys with letters and a present to Hezekiah for he had heard that he had been sick and had recovered.

So very opposite the approach of the Assyrian. Remember the Assyrian approach? Completely opposite. Here you have a friendly enemy. A nice one. A nice one. Very nice. In fact, sending presents. Laurie, would you read for us Proverbs 29 5?

Oh sorry, it's in the notes. You don't have to turn it. I've got three verses we'll read here.

A man who flatters his neighbors spreads a net for his feet.

What's the image there in Proverbs 29 5? Remember the word flattery means you're not praising a person for their upbuilding. You're praising them for something you want from them. It's for your own benefit.

What's that? Manipulation. It's manipulation. Yeah. So flattery is that. So what is the flatterer up to in Proverbs 29 5? I kind of picture a snare or a net that's hidden under leaves. He's dug a pit for his neighbor.

He's laid a net. He's ready to capture him and drag him away and sell him into slavery or take his house or do something nefarious. But how does he speak to him? My neighbor, come over here. Come this way.

I have something to show you. I have a present for you. You're a wonderful neighbor. Next thing you know, you're a dead man because flattery is false. It is, it is a trap. And in the same way in chapter 39 verse one, the king of Babylon, what's Babylon's ambition?

Is it to worship Yahweh, the true God? Yeah. They have their own gods. They, who's it? Marduk. Marduk, I think was among them. Yeah. Marduk. That's not the same one as Yahweh. No, they don't worship. And in Leviticus 25 44, who would like to read that for me?

The point here is that Israel is not to regard their surrounding nations. Now quickly, when they're sent into the promised land, they're to conquer and take possession of the nations. Babylon is outside of that.

Okay. Now in the future millennial kingdom, all of this will belong to Israel. But at the time, Babylon is not their territory. They're a surrounding nation. So what of the surrounding nations? How was Israel to regard the surrounding nations?

Who'd like to read Leviticus 25 44? Carol. Please do. You can't.

Volunteer other people. As for your male and female slaves whom you may have, you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. Okay. Are they to buddy.

Up to the surrounding nations or are they to be the authoritative power over them? It's the second. Their king, Yahweh, is the king of the nations. And in fact, as politically incorrect as this is, they are even to take slaves.

As for your male and female slaves whom you may have, you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. Does that mean we can do that? No, we are not Israel. This is Old Testament Israel.

It is a theocracy where God is king and God has right over all of the nations because the earth and the fullness thereof belong to him. And because he is God, he has a right to rule and he has chosen in his sovereignty to appoint Jerusalem as the capital of his country, his theocracy of which he's the head.

And he has rights over the nations. They are to be in subjection to Israel. Israel is to hold them in subjection. Israel is the head. They are the tail. And that's God's arrangement because God rules the world.

He had that arrangement and it's okay for him to do that. Now, of course, there is a tearing down of the dividing wall of hostility between Jew and Gentile. Ephesians 3 in the New Testament, there is no longer an ethnic priority.

There is not a theocracy in Israel. We have instead a church made up of all the nations and it's an invisible church. And by this, we don't mean that you can't see it in local gatherings, but it's made up truly of all the believers in the world.

So we don't have the same dominionist mandate. So any of those who go down that road with dominionism are overstepping the bounds. But the case was that Israel was to be dominant in the Middle East. Instead, they're treating Babylon here as if they're the same, as if God is okay with Babylon.

He's accepting the present as like, okay, well, you're Babylon, we're Israel. There's no difference. So let's read James 4 .4 for a New Testament application, not of the theocratic rule of Israel, but of the disposition of the Christian towards the world.

God loves the world and yet the world is pictured as an enemy of God, the world, the flesh, and the devil. And so we can't just cozy up and be everything's all good with the world. So who's going to read James 4 .4 for me?

Carol, you volunteered yourself.

You adulterous people, do you not know that friendship with the world is enemy with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

There is a spirit in evangelicalism today that is friendly with the world in the sense of desiring the approval of the world. It's good to be friendly towards people. It's good to season your speech with salt, to be light to the world, to be a good friend and a good neighbor.

But what happens in the church is the church capitulates to what is not of God, the world in the sense of the enemy of God. The evangelical church will capitulate to the demands of the enemy. And that's the context of this.

Friendship with the world is enmity with God. You cannot serve two masters, compromise, wanting to be liked by the world. So let's make our worship services look more appealing to the world, to be friendly, to be light.

Here's a great example of it. When the world through wicked governors asserts jurisdiction over the church and demands that we not meet, Christ having lordship over his church must be at enmity with that spirit.

We must be willing to say no. In the name of Jesus, we resist that. But the spirit of friendship with the world doesn't want to look so bad to the world. They want to look more measured and nuanced than that.

We'll submit to this. We're here for the common good and surrendering the direct commands of God, right? Hebrews 10 25, do not neglect the assembling of yourselves together. Forsaking that, they instead make friends with the world and look good.

And the world applauds those pastors when they come out and oppose the John MacArthur's. You know, we didn't hear much. When John MacArthur made a stand against social justice and Votie Bauckham and James White, Tom Askell wrote the statement on social justice called the Dallas statement.

Many of our evangelical elite in Big Eva criticized them. Tim Keller recorded doing that. Many of the evangelical Big Eva leaders criticize them for standing up against social justice. It just doesn't seem very friendly to the world.

It takes such a harsh tone. When MacArthur stood up to the mandates, they criticized him. They were friendly to the world. But what was the vindication for MacArthur? I mentioned this on a Sunday morning.

Did you guys know what ended up happening? Yeah. Yeah. What happened? This is in L .A., your beloved state of California. The government had to pay all of MacArthur's legal fees for harassment of them by shutting them down.

Yeah. But see, he's not a friend of the world and everybody hates MacArthur in general, the world. And sadly, Big Eva. Why is that? Because there is this constant desire to be a friend of the world, to be esteemed, to be invited to the cocktail parties.

Go along to get along. Yeah. And maybe the motive for some is, you know, I just want to see the church grow and the more seeker-sensitive we can make it, you know, more welcoming. I say that a Christian cannot vote for Democrats knowingly of their platform.

If you know that the Democrats support the killing of babies and the transitioning of children and the silencing of churches through the Equality Act, which would make my preaching called hate speech.

If you support a wicked agenda like that, you're complicit in it. It's just as clear as debt, you know, that it's a connection. You can't support that. Now, there's people who get saved and they don't know the issues and they mature into understanding politics.

That's fine. But you cannot, as a pastor, say, you know what, I would like to see Democrats and Republicans all together in this church. No, if someone is advocating for the Democratic Party, if they're teaching abortion, if they're teaching transitioning children, that wickedness is an abomination to the Lord and it needs to be confronted.

And that pastor should not say, it is great for you to work and advocate for the Democratic Party while this person next to you works and advocates for another party. Now I don't say you need to be a Republican, but I say that kind of wickedness is out of bounds.

And David Platt says the exact opposite. Friendship with the world is enmity toward God. Yeah.

Yeah, Jeff, this sphere of compromise has been going on for decades now.

Yes.

Do you see it coming to a head at this point?

I really do. I think it is coming to a head. Obviously, things have heated up. And the question is, will Christians back down and surrender the future of America? Because the direction that it's on is not for the good of our children or our children's children or the generation after that.

If the trajectory continues the way it's going, it is absolute control. I mean, Russia outlawed proselytization just like five years ago. You can't preach the gospel in Russia. Missionaries kicked out of the country.

Putin.

China is the same way. Do you see what Australia is doing? They're progressively left of America. The lockdowns of people and the shutting out of Christianity.

It's happening on college campuses.

College campuses here in America. Anybody who doesn't see what's happening is just not aware or willingly blinding themselves to what's happening.

But we're just talking about that. We don't understand it. It's an elephant in the room.

It's the elephant in the room. Yes.

Now from a bigger picture, we were talking about this earlier this morning. Under the strength of Revelation 17, there will be at one time a one world government. And in the strength of Revelation 18, there will be at some time a one world religion.

That does not mean that we don't stand up as believers fighting the fight. But God is sovereign.

Amen.

God is sovereign and this stuff is going to happen sometime.

We're still on the side of the winner.

We are still on the side of the winner and we should still fight the fight.

Yes.

Absolutely.

Right.

Jeff, what do you do with the spores of Abby and Tim?

Let's not talk about that.

No.

So Isaiah 39 too. John, could you read that for me?

Sure. Isaiah 39. And Hezekiah welcomed them gladly. I put the emphasis on that one.

Yes.

And he showed them his treasure house. The silver, the gold, the spices, the precious oil, his whole armory. All that was found in his storehouse. There was nothing left in his house or in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.

All right.

Hezekiah is coming off of a great victory. He has just seen the most dramatic victory over the enemies of God, perhaps in the history of the world until this point. A hundred and eighty five. He just drove off the first great world empire.

By the power of God, by the power of prayer.

And now Israel is experiencing revival. Remember, it's three years until they're fruitful again. So now at this point in time, they're beginning to eat of the fruit of the land and people are prospering and happy and joyful.

Listen, great success from the Lord brings with it a new set of dangers. Many who start off well in ministry and experience church growth and all of the wonderful things that come from being faithful to the word of God eventually become complacent in those victories, and they are at great risk.

How many wonderful men and women of God who started strong ended with adulterous affairs?

Too many to name.

Over and over and over again. Proverbs 22 three. Who would like to read that for me?

The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it.

What was the danger when Hezekiah got this envoy from Babylon? These were wicked enemies of the king of kings. He treated them like friends and he showed them everything in the palace, the treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the precious oil.

What could possibly go wrong?

Remember the song that says their words are smooth as butter, but in their hearts there is war. There's war in their hearts.

He let the spirit of pride get to him.

Yeah, yeah, spirit of pride. He's showing this off. He's boasting and what's happened. There was nothing in his house or in his realm that Hezekiah did not show. This is folly, and it doesn't even seem to be intentional.

I think it's motivated by pride, but I think it's just the folly of not being as wise as a serpent and as innocent as a dove. We love the innocent as a dove part in evangelicalism. But anybody who's wise as a serpent, who trains the powers of their discernment by constant practice to recognize good and evil, who's a Berean, who tests daily to see if these things are so, those are the people that our culture demonizes.

And sadly, evangelicals do the same thing.

Yeah, a serpent slithers on the ground, so he knows what's on the ground.

Yes, nice. All right, so let's look at the discipline that will come as a result of this folly. John, would you read three to six?

Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah and said to him, what did these men say? And from where did they come to you? Hezekiah said, they have come to me from a far country, from Babylon. He said, what have they seen in your house?

Hezekiah answered, they have seen all that is in my house. There is nothing in my storehouse that I did not show them. I love the first person in that section there.

He's like so happy, like he did good.

In my house.

He's going to be shocked by what Isaiah says here.

Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, hear the word of the Lord of hosts. Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, that which your fathers have stored up until this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the Lord.

So we conclude, yes or no, God hates Hezekiah. No, is Hezekiah saved?

Yeah.

Yeah, there's a genuine faith in this man. God disciplines the ones he loves and chastises those he accepts as a child. Listen, Israel is still his promised people. But Israel is so rebellious, so foolish, that they need to be chastised.

And how will God chastise them? By sending these very Babylonians back to them in 605 and then 597, and then finally wiping them out in 586 BC to carry them off into captivity. And for 70 years, they will be under that harsh discipline.

But God loves them, and He will bring them back to the promised land, restore them, and then send them their Christ, who will walk those very streets in Zion. He's not done with them here. But the discipline will be very painful.

As Christians, we need to study Hebrews 12 and understand that that discipline is for us as well. Sometimes God will chastise us, and we need to be willing to accept it. But how much wiser is it to avoid the discipline in the first place?

You know, the man listening to this right now, who's been looking at pornography, how much wiser is it that you stop doing that and avoid the painful discipline that will come from your loving father if you don't stop?

Here, Hezekiah walks into folly, and his folly will be discipline. So let's finally read, well, let's read one more proverb first, then we'll read the last two verses. Who'd like to read Proverbs 3, 11, and 12, which is what Hebrews 12 quotes from in that great passage on discipline.

Ralph, please.

Amen.

Don't despise it. It's actually good. This is a form of God's love. He's not going to just utterly cast them out. There's no condemnation, but there is discipline. There's a difference between condemnation and discipline.

Okay, what is condemnation? If there's a building next to your house that had a fire and it's unsafe, and the city comes and puts a condemnation notice on it, what's going to happen to it? Totally destroyed.

The building is condemned. It can no longer be inhabited. It has to be rebuilt. But what is discipline over against condemnation? In Christ, there is no condemnation, Romans 8 .1.

What is discipline?

Discipline will build you up.

It's more like a father who does not spare the rod to his young child, right? To train the folly out of him. Hezekiah didn't have a good dad, evidently, because he never taught him wisdom. He never taught him Proverbs 1 .8, that wisdom literature for a father to teach his son.

And this man is a grown man, and yet he's foolish. He doesn't think.

He doesn't reason.

He doesn't understand who he's talking to and the implications of it. And he just blabbers out everything that shouldn't be said. And he walks around and shows what shouldn't be shown. And there will be discipline for that.

So Hezekiah didn't have an evil motive.

He was just foolish. By evil, I would say pride in his heart is evil. But I don't think that he's... I think the problem here is folly. Yeah, it's foolishness. It's not presenting him as malicious or evil in that sense that he's turned against God now.

He's still a believer, but he's foolish. Yeah, that's what's being taught. It's a spirit of folly, just not wise.

I think part of the issue...

But yeah, pride is at the root.

Yes, pride. And part of that issue can be found in the middle of verse 2 and then again in verse 6, where it says in verse 2, there was nothing in all his realm. The pronoun there is what's important.

Whose realm really is in state? God's realm. But in Hezekiah's heart, it was his realm. And then you go back into verse 6 and it says, all that is in your house. Well, whose house is it? It's God's house.

And eventually when they desecrate the temple and the Shekinah glory leaves, it's not God's house anymore. It's his house and it's ripe for the picking. So it all comes down to pride, which is what you said.

Yeah, yeah. So he's not innocent in the matter, but he's also not malicious here. The sin issue, is folly a sin? Is it sinful to be foolish?

Yeah.

I would say yes.

Right?

Isn't it contrasted with wisdom?

Yeah.

And wisdom, we just think, well, he's just foolish. Like doesn't know any better. Well, was he not responsible to be like a tree planted by streams of water, meditating on the word day and night? Was he not responsible to know Proverbs?

As the king, he was to have a copy of the book and to live by it. So yeah, it is sinful to be foolish.

Yeah.

And God treats it with a disciplining rod. So lastly, John, would you read verse seven and eight?

Some of your own sons who will come from you, whom you will father, shall be taken away. They shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon. Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, the word of the Lord that you have spoken is good.

For he thought there will be peace and security in all the days of the land. No, I mean, all my days.

In all my days.

Yeah.

This is a striking statement for what we saw earlier in chapter 38 verses two and three. Hezekiah is told about his own body. You're getting, you're sick and this will lead to death. Isaiah 38, two and three, then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed.

And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

Now consider the contrast at the end of verse eight. More like throwing up your hands, maybe even smiling a little.

Where are the tears? Where's the bitter weeping? Where's the turning your face to the wall?

When it was his body. As in the book of Job, when Satan says, but stretch out your hand and touch his bone and his flesh and he will curse you to your face. Job was sure you touch a man's body. That's the highest.

That's where he'll turn against you. He was wrong. Job was a mature man. And even in that, he did not curse his God. Naked I came, naked I will go. Blessed be the name of the Lord. And Satan was surprised by that.

Most men are more concerned over their own flesh than anything else. And so that's what's expected. But Hezekiah here was concerned for himself. But what was just said previously? Did you catch it? Look at verse seven.

You're going to take your sons. And what are they going to do to your sons? They're going to make them eunuchs. They will castrate them, castrate them, and they will be in the king's palace. So historically, what happens here?

We know that Hezekiah does have a son to be the king, Manasseh, and then Ammon, and then Josiah, a good king. So now we're generations down the line. But Jehoiakim and Jehoiachin, when Babylon has conquered Egypt, and then come up and conquered Jerusalem, they replace them with Zedekiah, who remains to govern until 586, and the whole group is wiped out.

But for 40 years, Jehoiakim and Jehoiachin serve in Babylon under the king. But they're castrated, so that these men who were kings would not be a threat to the kingdom of Babylon. He emasculates them, that they won't stand up to him.

And this is the issue to get.

And we know that Daniel and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed, were of royal heritage. They were royalty. It says that right in the beginning of Daniel, they were probably castrated too.