FBC Morning Light – June 7, 2022

A good Tuesday morning to you. I hope your week's got off to a good start so far. Looking forward to how the Lord will bless you in the course of your work and responsibilities as you carry them out day to day through this week.

Isaiah’s Warning to a Rebellious People

Today we're reading in the book of Isaiah. I've been struck several times as we've been reading through Isaiah how similar some things were in that time period that Isaiah wrote or prophesied and our time period as well.

Similarities between Israel in its time of apostasy and our own nation as a general rule. Now, first of all, lest I be misunderstood, I do not believe that the United States of America is God's holy land.

It is the modern equivalent of the promised land of ancient Israel. I don't believe that. I don't believe that the United States of America is a Christian nation in the sense that its religion is Christianity.

I think it was founded on Christian principles. I think a lot of the founding fathers understood and respected biblical principles. Biblical truth was sort of ingrained in the minds and hearts of people in that era, even if they never went to church, even if they didn't really care much for God, even if they didn't really understand the God of the Bible.

Some of them were deists and so forth. I don't want to be misunderstood about that. However, we must acknowledge our heritage as a country and as a nation. There has been historically at least a respect for God's Word, the Bible.

It used to be in a court of law that you had to swear that you'd tell the truth, so help you truth, and you'd have your hand on a Bible and you'd swear to God and all that. That isn't true anymore. There's still a tipping of the hat most of the times at the presidential inauguration where the president puts his hand on a Bible and so forth.

The point is that our nation historically has had a reverential attitude, at least in general, toward God, toward God's Word, and toward Christianity. That's pretty much changed now. There isn't that respect anymore.

In fact, there's more, if anything, hostility. Something I read in today's passage in Isaiah 30 seems to echo what the Lord said of his people in the Old Testament time. Listen to what he says. He tells Isaiah, go write this on a tablet and note it on a scroll that it may be for time to come forever and ever, that it may be noted, it may not be forgotten, that this is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear the law of the Lord, who say to the seers, do not see, and to the prophets, do not prophesy to us right things, speak to us smooth things, prophesy deceits, get out of the way, turn aside from the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us.

If that doesn't express a pretty common attitude toward God, God's Word, the biblical preaching of God's Word in our day, I don't know what does. Listen to it again. Say to the seers, that is those who preach God's Word, for the seers and the prophets, say to the seers, don't see.

We don't want to see what you see, and don't preach to us the right things. Don't open the Bible and preach to us what God's Word says in the Bible. When it comes to things like morality, and there's only two genders, and all that kind of stuff, and the plague of abortion, you don't tell us about all that stuff.

We don't want to hear all that stuff. We don't want to hear what your Bible has to say. We even heard that from one of the high-ranking officials in Congress. There's no place for the Bible in this room, the man said, something to that effect.

I myself was in a hearing one time and had to testify. I quoted a couple of passages of Scripture, and the comment of the judge after my testimony was, I really don't care what the Bible has to say. It's not a quotation, but that was the sentiment that he expressed, regardless of what Bible verses you quote or whatever.

There is that attitude. The corresponding thing that is attached to that is when they say, speak to us smooth things. We only want to hear things that make us comfortable. We only want to hear things that are nice, and that we like to hear, that are pleasant to hear.

We don't want to hear about things like judgment, and wrath, and sin. We don't want to hear about those kinds of things. Just speak to us smooth things, make us feel good, and prophesy deceits. It's not that the people were saying, tell us a lie, but they were asking for the prophet to prophesy something that wasn't true, simply to pacify them.

They were in essence saying, prophesy deceits. This is what the culture is demanding of preachers today. Don't preach to us that there are only two genders, that God made human beings male and female.

Don't preach to us that stuff. Preach to us that our feelings matter, and preach to us that God just wants us to be happy. Preach to us deceits. When a people as a whole come to that place, then what can we look forward to?

The prophet goes on to say, therefore thus saith the Holy One of Israel, because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perversity and rely on them, therefore this iniquity shall be to you.

The consequent sin that is going to encroach upon your land will be like this to you. It'll be like a breach ready to fall, a bulge on a high wall whose breaking comes suddenly in an instant. In other words, you're going to see the damn break of iniquity just spread all over the place.

I don't know about you, but this sounds very contemporary. People sometimes say, the Bible, it's not relevant. It's not relevant. Oh my goodness. If this isn't relevant, if this isn't our day, I don't know how much more relevant you can get.

I made a comment not long ago that I grew up in the 60s and the 70s in my pre-adolescent and adolescent years. I was just thinking the other day that that period of time, the mid to late 60s and on into the 70s, that was the period of the sexual revolution, the free love movement that dominated the landscape.

It got acceptable. It became acceptable. Then right after that time period, you saw the divorce rates start to skyrocket. Then you saw greater disintegration of the family. Then you saw homosexuality coming out of the closet and becoming more mainstream until it got to the point where same-sex marriage became the law of the land.

Now, something that used to be considered shameful, and rightly so, has a whole month dedicated to the pride of it all. This is an unleashing of the dam. The dam has broken. Why? Because as a culture, as a nation, as a people, we have said, speak to us smooth things, prophesy a lie to us, get out of the way with that preaching of righteousness stuff.

We don't want to hear that. Fortunately, God can bring about a revival. He can bring life to such times of death. This was his promise, ultimately, for the people of Israel. Because he says this in verse 15, in returning and rest you shall be saved, in quietness and confidence shall be your strength.

This is the offer that God holds out to us, even in a day like this. Oh, that many, many would receive it. Let's ask God to send forth that invitation, and that many would receive it today. Our Father and our God, we do grieve over the state of affairs in our nation, and how we, as a people, have turned our back on you.

Father, I pray that in this time of darkness, that you would send forth the light, that this invitation of returning to you, we would find rest and be saved. May that be true of a multitude in our nation today.

We ask that you would bring about some kind of a spiritual revival, even in our day. We pray this in Jesus' name and for his sake. All right. Well, I hope you have a good Tuesday. May the Lord bless you in it.