Wednesday, July 10, 2024

and turn to the gospel of Isaiah we're going to be in chapter one and we're going to read a new section this evening we're going to be reading verses 10 through 20

Isaiah chapter 1 verses 10 through 20 hear the word of the

Lord you rulers of Sodom give ear to the law of our

God you people of Gomorrah to what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me says the

Lord I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed cattle

I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or goats when you come to appear before me who has required this from your hand to trample my courts bring no more futile sacrifices incense is an abomination to me the new moons the

Sabbath's and the calling of assemblies I cannot endure iniquity in the sacred meeting your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates they are a trouble to me

I am weary of burying them when you spread out your hands I will hide my eyes from you even though you make many prayers

I will not hear your hands are full of blood wash yourselves make yourselves clean put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes cease to do evil learn to do good seek justice rebuke the oppressor defend the fatherless plead and let us reason together says the

Lord eat as white as snow though they are red like crimson they shall be as wool eat the good of the land but if you refuse and rebel you shall be devoured by the sword for the mouth of the

Lord has spoken now the

Lord is not confused he is not forgotten that he has fire in brimstone

Sodom and out of existence they are no longer on the map so who's he talking to you and why is it that Sodom and Gomorrah are offering up sacrifices to the

Lord and celebrating feast days and observing a religious calendar focused on the phases of the moon well this is not

Sodom and Gomorrah of Genesis this is

Judah and Jerusalem and he is calling them Sodom and Gomorrah because they are that wicked they are offending him that much he's getting their attention and we've already heard in the previous passage that the people are undergoing and facing a destruction like unto

Sodom and Gomorrah but it is only the Lord who refrains from completely wiping them out unless the

Lord had left it's a very small remnant we would have been made like Sodom and Gomorrah verse 9 says so what is going on here well here in the first large section of Isaiah we have sermons for a difficult presence the difficulty of course is twofold there are the enemies from without and there is the apostasy from within and the

Lord is being showcased in the first 12 chapters as the true Redeemer they may look for one solution or another solution but there's only one

Savior for them and it is the very Lord whom they are forgetting the one who against whom they are rebelling in the first six chapters of Isaiah we are introduced to the children of woe they've got nothing but doom on the slate but is there any hope and yes there is but first of all they need to be addressed as what they are they are rebellious children they've been called rebellious and now the rebellion is being played out there being being shown first of all the first arena that their rebellion is shown is in their political arena not politics in terms of electioneering but politics in terms of them being a nation how their whole nation is like their whole nation is is has been beaten over and over again like the body of a of a drunken fool who won't stop committing crimes against the magistrate there they are beaten over and over again by the

Lord who's chastising them and he's saying why won't you stop why won't you repent and now the arena is that of the religious the religious arena verses 10 through 20 and the the amount of religious language in this section is very intense we went over those last time in a very short space of time in verses 10 through 15 you hear the following you hear sacrifices burnt offerings blood rams cattle bulls lambs goats courts incense new moon

Sabbaths assemblies sacred meetings feasts spreading hands prayers just just the whole list

God is walking through their religious activities he's taking inventory on all of it and he's giving them the report it's all rotten

I don't want any of it because they are in rebellion against him so we begin in verse 10 looking at the particulars the rebuke of the worshippers the rebuke of the worshippers verse 10 says hear the word of the

Lord you rulers of Sodom give ear to the law of our

God you people of Gomorrah so the rulers or the magistrates those who are the chiefs those who are sitting in the city gates and making decisions and ruling on particular cases those with power in the society and then just the regular run -of -the -mill people so the the mayor and the townsfolk the the chief and the tribe the judge and all the citizenry all of them are being addressed and it's not about their citizenship it's not about what they're doing in the city gates it's what they're doing at the temple it's what they're doing in their religious activities that God is drawing attention to and he is rebuking them for all of it these rulers of Sodom these people of Gomorrah the reason why they are being rebuked is because of all of their worship activities and so God is saying from the rulers to the people all of you need to pay attention and recognize that what you're doing is not what

I've asked for and all of you need to change your ways so worship is not simply for those of high status but it's for everyone worship is not just for the paid priests worship is not for a professional crew it worship is not something that you outsource and hire certain people to do it well worship is something that was all the people of God were accountable to God for the way that they worshipped

God inscribes into the covenant he made with Israel the manner in which everyone was to worship and the reason why he inscribed it into his covenant is because it's in the way of his creation he made us in his image to glorify him he made us in his image to worship him and he brings attention to that in this covenant that he made with Israel remember that it mattered it mattered to Jesus how people worshipped it wasn't simply the fact that he was getting on to the scribes and the chief priests the

Sadducees those who were controlling the temple and and all the rest of that it wasn't that he was simply getting on to that professional class he spoke about worship to everyone remember the

Samaritan woman it mattered to Jesus how the Samaritan woman understood worship and how to worship didn't it the dignitaries of Jerusalem and the

Dinsians of Judah are here called Sodom and Gomorrah now why is

God resorting to name -calling right this is essentially name -calling sometimes

God when he was very frustrated with his people he would call them Jeshurun which was the it's basically if if God were to draw a a political cartoon satirizing the follies of Israel he would draw them in the form of a stubborn foolish donkey

Jeshurun kicked he called them names to rebuke them sometimes he called them

Egypt well I thought Egypt was destroyed by the plagues of God because they were there because Pharaoh's heart was hardened against God and it kept on refusing

God's will yes you're following good because that's what his people are doing he calls them

Egypt when they're on the verge of judgment because they were refusing to follow him or he calls them Babylon because they're they're pagan and they're bloody here he's calling them

Sodom and Gomorrah this is not a cheap shot this isn't a clever insult

God is calling them something other than their name he's not calling them

Israel at just this point Israel which means God prevails he's not calling them

Judah which means praise Yahweh he's not saying Jerusalem city of peace

I mean those were their names but they were so named that way because of their special covenant history with the

Lord and their present covenant obligation and status but he doesn't call them that why notice in the previous passage they've forgotten

God they're acting like he's not their father they're they're living as if they're not his covenant people and so he names them something other than well see if you're not my covenant people if you're not really gonna be

Judah you're not gonna really be to Jerusalem then what's the difference between you and Sodom and Gomorrah apparently not a whole lot he identifies them as pagans deserving of cataclysmic judgment but also he's showing that they have despised and abandoned their special relationship with God he doesn't use their covenant names because they're not acting like it they forsake him verse four they forget him verse three so okay

I'm gonna call you Sodom and Gomorrah now they could protest say why are you calling a

Sodom and Gomorrah we've got the temple right well we offer sacrifices to your name we gather here on very special occasions throughout the religious calendar year we do all manner of things to praise the name of Yahweh why are you calling us

Sodom and Gomorrah well he's going to show them that all the things that they think that make them special their religious customs their sacrificial system all of it is an abhorrence to him in verses 11 through 15 consider further though that God could have called them something like he could have said just sure in here you could have said

Egypt he could have said Babylon but here he says Sodom and Gomorrah Sodom was known for its sin and Sodom is synonymous with those who parade their sin it's been that way for a long time

Sodom is known for making sin central to their culture

Sodom makes sin essential to their identity you couldn't put you couldn't put a page in between Sodom and their sin they were so identified by their sin still the same way today they are the same same class of people in Romans 1 those who have been turned over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are in rebellion to God contrary to nature and know that it's deserving of death but also approve of those who practice them and God is using that language

Sodom and Gomorrah to describe Judah and Jerusalem that he's already pointed out that no matter how often he chastises them they are like the fool being beaten again and again every single day by the magistrate and will refuse to change his ways and so he says

I'm just gonna call you Sodom and Gomorrah because there's no other name to call you at this time and yet the situation between Sodom and Gomorrah and Judah and Jerusalem it's not exactly the same is it it's not exactly the same it's both better and worse it's better because this

Sodom and Gomorrah this Judah and Jerusalem have been given God's Word they have been given

God's instruction his his his Torah you see the word law there hear the word of the

Lord you rulers of Sodom give ear to the law of our God very often when we see the word law in the

Old Testament perhaps we immediately think of the Ten Commandments well it's part of it right but law or Torah means instruction it has the idea of the loving fatherly authoritative instruction so there's a lot there it's not simply the

Ten Commandments so there's a there's all of his instruction has been given to Judah and Jerusalem this this particular

Sodom and Gomorrah unlike the one back in Genesis 19 this Sodom and Gomorrah are invited they are compelled they are commanded to hear and pay attention to God's gracious revelation and he's already promised that he's not going to wipe them completely out like he did with Sodom and Gomorrah so God is showing himself gracious situation is actually better than it was back in Genesis 19 but it's also worse it's also worse because God has been so gracious to them because he's given them so much revelation because he's been speaking to them because he's given him given them his word because he sent them his prophets and so on they are accountable for all of that they're responsible for all of that in Matthew chapter 11 is this past this passage has similar passages throughout the

Gospels but in Matthew chapter 11 in verse 20 Jesus begins to rebuke some cities

Matthew 11 verse 20 then he began to rebuke the cities in which most of his mighty works had been done because they did not repent consider the mighty works that God did for Judah and for Jerusalem the mighty works that he performed on their behalf well

Jesus did mighty works in these cities woe to you Chorazin woe to you Bethsaida for if the mighty works which were done in you have been done in Tyre and Sidon they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes but I say to you it'll be more more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you and you

Capernaum who were exalted to heaven will be brought down to Hades for if the mighty works which were done in you have been done in Sodom it would have remained until this day but I say to you that it will shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment and for you what makes the difference what makes the difference is that when

God shines his light and showcases his salvation and sends his word forth in amongst the people that they become accountable for that revelation and so it's better for Judah and Jerusalem but it's also worse they are accountable for more than Sodom and Gomorrah it is only

God who sustains them who has who has made them in the first place it is only

God who can save them from their their worst situation and when he calls them

Sodom and Gomorrah they may wonder at why he's saying that they may think that they have a special connection with God no matter what because hey the temple is there this is

Jerusalem and so on but he's going to show them how rotten their worship is and how they must repent and that's the point of verses 11 through 15 so a quick look at that we won't get through all the details but this this is rotten worship in verses 11 through 15 and we've talked about the the flow of all the different religious terms that we we find in these five verses but God does inventory he does inventory in two different areas in verse 11 he said let's take a look at the altar and what goes on at the altar and then in verses 12 through 14 he says let's take a look at the assembly and what happens when you all get together and then in verse 15 he kind of wraps it all up with a very structured resounding condemnation so in and when

God takes inventory at the altar and the assembly very similar structure he has a rhetorical rebuke a question that comes up it's a rhetorical question you know you're not supposed to answer it you're just supposed to bear it it's like oh man and then he follows up and shows that his righteous refusal of that sacrificial practice is justified so he does that with the altar and he does that with the assembly as well but when we look at the altar you find all these sacrifices being made you see the mode there the burnt offerings you see the multitude of them they're all being considered and weighed and found wanting verse 11 again says to what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me this term for sacrifice particularly references blood sacrifices the sacrifice the word for sacrifice down in verse 13 is oblation it's the it's the drink offering it's a different Hebrew word so up here in verse 11 it's the blood sacrifice where they're shedding the blood of the animals at the altar to what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me says the

Lord I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed cattle I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or goats now

God's question here this rhetorical question is especially cutting the sense of the text you have the

Lord simply kind of waving his hand towards all of the sacrificial activity that is happening around the altar this vigorous activities labor -intensive it's slaughtering and butchering animals and making fires and offering up sacrifices this is very very hard work and they obviously were doing a lot of it because there was a multitude of the sacrifices all the blood of these animals pooling around the base of the altar

Levites with sharp knives cutting slicing butchering sacrificing the smoke going up as the meat and wood are piled up on top and the waste is being removed by a bunch of other

Levites and the Lord gestures to all of that activity and with disdain asks what's that for that's kind of hit hard when the

Levites and the priest saying weird this is all for you and God is saying

I don't want any of that that hits deep but he is right to refuse he is right to refuse he says

I have had enough God has had enough it's like with Sodom about the stench of their sin rising all the way to heaven and he's he's had it up to here with all of this sacrificing going on in Jerusalem his frustration level with Judah and Jerusalem is at Sodom and Gomorrah levels the smell of the burnt offerings does not soothe him the sizzle of the melting fat does not please him the sight of all that sacrificial blood being shed before his face does not satisfy him why because the sacrifices at the altar had taken on a pagan approach all you have to do is look back at second

Kings chapter 16 and you see this Ahaz there in verse 1 of chapter 1 remember

Ahaz yeah Ahaz was the one who went shopping around in Syria and Damascus to find nice better quality pagan altars and rearranging all the sacrificial system in the temple because it was all about the sacrifices not about who you were worshipping the worshippers there in Jerusalem had begun to think of the

Lord as they would have bail as they would think of Chemosh as they would think of Molech or the Queen of Heaven or Asherah they would think of God that way they thought that God just wanted blood they thought

God just wanted food so just give him what he wants the sacrifices were not

God's desire what did he desire we talked about that last time

I desire mercy not sacrifice mercy chesed covenant faithfulness

I desire someone to be faithful to the Covenant not all the sacrifices that you offer up the sacrifices were not

God's desire he desired a covenantally faithful servant which was lost in Adam and re -envisioned in the

Covenant so next time we're going to study a little bit more on that and think about why is

God saying he doesn't want these sacrifices he doesn't want these blood sacrifices he doesn't want these burnt offerings he doesn't want them you know putting these parts of animal parts on the offering on the altar and burning them up we're going to look more at that from their various passages in the

Old Testament but I will point out one thing I will point out one thing he says that he does not delight in verse 11 he's had enough he does not delight in these sacrifices like I this is not where I am being satisfied

I'm not pleased with this at all and that must be a rather concerning to the worshipers there at the temple however in Isaiah 53 verse 10 whereas at the beginning of Isaiah he says

I am NOT pleased with these offerings I am NOT pleased with these sacrifices near the end of Isaiah Isaiah 53 10 of the faithful covenantally faithful servant who offered himself up as a sacrifice it says

Isaiah 53 10 yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him he has put him to grief when you make his soul an offering for sin

God is not pleased with this he is pleased with Christ all right we'll leave it there for now and let's close in prayer father we thank you for the time you've given us in your word

Lord we pray that you would help us to recognize that you are holy and that you are light and you are spirit and those who worship you must worship you in spirit and in truth and I pray that you would help us to do that I pray that you would help us to recognize it is not the form and the function of our practices that you are interested in but it is indeed our our worship our adoration our praise to you our love for you that you desire and I pray that you would stir those things up in us for the glory of your name we pray this by the name of your son