Isaiah 40:21-28, What Do You Know?, Dr. John B. Carpenter

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Isaiah 40:21-28 What Do You Know?

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Isaiah 40 verses 21 to 28 hear the word of the Lord. Do you not know?
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Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
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It is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers
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Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them like a tent to dwell in?
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Who brings princes to nothing and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness? Scarcely are they planted scarcely sown
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Scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth when he blows on them and they wither and the tempest carries them off like stubble
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To whom then will you compare me that I should be like him says the Holy One Lift up your eyes on high and see who created these things
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Who brings out their hosts by number calling them all by name by the greatness of his might and because he is strong and mighty
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And power not one is missing why do you say Oh Jacob and Speak Oh Israel.
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My way is hidden from the Lord and my right is disregarded by my God Have you not known?
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Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God the creator of the ends of the earth
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He does not faint or grow weary. His understanding is unsearchable
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If the Lord had his blessings the reading of his holy word Well, you ever found that you've forgotten something that you already knew or You know something but didn't really understand it didn't really believe it
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I mean you you knew the facts but didn't really didn't really appreciate what they meant. You knew if you eat too many sweets
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You'd get overweight But you didn't really believe it. And so well enough about me
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Oh, we know facts, but we don't comprehend what they mean We know Jesus was born this time of year.
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We're constantly reminded of that the culture is likes to celebrate his birth Christians are saying
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Jesus is the reason for the season and importing a lot of time and attention and money and emotions decorations and stuff into celebrating and some of those same
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Christians will incredibly not have church next week because Why?
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Well, sure. Jesus is the reason for the season is the reason for every season But if you're going to make a big deal about keeping
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Christ and Christmas Surely you're gonna meet for church on the Lord's Day when it happens to coincide with Christmas.
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No then either it's not really about keeping Christ and Christmas or You don't understand what you know
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You know something that it's about Jesus But you've been distracted from it all the presents the gift -buying the decorations the charming music the parties the parades for some churches cantatas
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Christmas extravaganza enacted nativity scenes with real camels Mary went to a
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Christmas special at the Crystal Cathedral no less in California that had real camels and real cattle and men on wires dressed like angels.
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I guess they were men Maybe they're women. I don't know angels flying through the sky not real angels. Of course, they can get them for some reason all of that Comes around this time of year all that stuff and then if December 25th happens to fall on Sunday the
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Lord's Day You cancel church. What's this does that make you know that Jesus is the reason for the season yet?
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Despite all of that you've let the the background Noise that the clutter the distractions of the holiday make you forget obfuscate what you know
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What do you know? It was something I thought I knew about Isaiah 40 to 66 what's called of second
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Isaiah Scholars call it Deutero Isaiah for years, but but I was wrong
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I thought that it was addressed to the Jewish exiles after the Babylonian captivity in 586
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BC I was everyone's all the scholars say that almost every scholar now says that and I let the assumptions
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Confused me obfuscate up a plain reading of Isaiah If you read Isaiah, it is full of prophecies often of judgment in the first 35 chapters
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Then there's four chapters of history be telling the story of the Assyrian invasion in 701
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BC Their destruction in most Judean towns their siege of Jerusalem they're taunting of the
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Lord and of Hezekiah right outside Jerusalem and then the angel of the Lord delivers them and then
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We're back to poetry in chapter 40 back to prophecies in chapter 40 with comfort comfort my people now
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I knew for over 30 years that Isaiah had a history section in the middle and then the prophecies turned toward being comforting uplifting hopeful prophesying of the
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Lord's coming as in verse 2 in chapter 40 here and the famous Servant of the Lord all those passages occur and in this second part of Isaiah.
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I knew that for decades but I didn't realize what it meant until I put aside that the clutter of what
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I've been told all the obfuscation of people's opinions It should be obvious that Isaiah is telling us from chapter 40 that he's addressing the survivors of that Assyrian invasion
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But I didn't see it's really it's obvious now. How did I see that? But I didn't see it
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Until just really a few years ago during a family Bible reading when we were reading through Isaiah and it just struck me
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Of course all this history these three chapters four chapters of history in the middle of the book is
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Putting these prophecies that from chapter 40 on in the wake of the devastation that they suffered
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How do I see that? I've been distracted Really for once an obvious truth
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That I already knew I didn't understand What I knew
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What do you know? And have you been distracted from it have you let all the little clutter of life
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Obfuscate the big truths that you know, you don't deny them. You don't need me to teach them to you
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But you've been living like you don't know them Like the church that knows, you know, Jesus is the reason for the season and then cancels meeting together next week
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Okay, they probably don't need to be taught anything new They just need to understand what they already know
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That's what Isaiah is talking about here known but forgotten truths in verse 21, do you not know
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Well, of course the implications clear. Yes, we know they know but they've been living like they don't
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Isaiah is not telling them here new ideas. I'm gonna teach them a new doctrine that they haven't heard before It's not something that they would disagree with Do you not hear?
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He's signaling that he's about to remind them of something that they've been told before Has it not been told you from the beginning?
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Almost from the beginning. This is so elementary that they learned it It's the first thing that they learned about the
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Lord is little children elementary school Sunday school kind of things You know this already, but they've been acting like they don't have you not understood from the foundations of the earth
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These are the very first things That you should have been taught and you were taught about God about reality
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It's not new Well now if Christians naive Christians often
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Think the need for many people maybe for all people for many people like nominal Christians They're need cultural
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Christians who say Merry Christmas instead of happy holidays but then don't go to church if Christmas falls on a
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Sunday because they're too distracted by Christmas To spend time worshiping
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Jesus their main problem of those kind of people cultural Christians their main problem the naive think
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Is that they need to be taught? They need information Give them the facts about God if he's omnipotent.
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He's omniscient. He's all -knowing. He's infinite. He's sovereign Tell him about the incarnation son came is
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God in human flesh The Holy Spirit lives in every born -again believer. The church is the body of Christ Give them that information
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Then that will solve their problem The idea is that they just don't know the fundamental doctrines and if we can only teach those doctrines to them
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Well, then they'll change Then they'll see the absurdity of canceling church on Christmas.
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The problem is lack of knowledge They think my people are destroyed by a lack of knowledge Ironically taking a verse out of context from Hosea about personally knowing
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God and making it just about knowing facts We knew an elderly lady who had been going to a nearby
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Baptist Church all her life But her husband hadn't attended they're not even like I don't think even like once in 35 years
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Although he was a it was on the membership role Now when we resolved to clear the membership role of all non attending members
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Including her husband. She protested that if we do that When she dies and is buried in the church cemetery like all members and her husband can't be buried in the same cemetery
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That means that he won't be worth her in heaven Now the naive would say what she needs is education
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She needs information She needs to be taught that you don't you don't go to heaven by being buried in the church cemetery
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Because your name is on a membership role. You're not eternally married in heaven if you're buried side -by -side But but as an older woman who have been attending church all her life
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She had heard that many times in various forms If you ask her
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I bet if you ask her point -blank just an abstract gospel question about how do you go to heaven? She would probably be able to give the correct answer
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But then when it comes to her non attending and likely unconverted superficially religious husband
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She acts like she's forgotten it all She's been distracted from what she should know
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Here we see three truths about God That you already know you've heard him before But all of life's distractions may keep you from understanding them three truths first the majesty of God second the uniqueness of God and Finally the mystery of God.
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What do you know? Do you know about the majesty of God? Yeah, you probably do
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In verse 22 Isaiah tells them what they already know God sits above the circle of the earth
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Notice the implication of sits he sits like a king on his throne in Isaiah chapter 6 when
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Isaiah is called to be a prophet He said I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne
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High and lifted up he was majestic Surrounded by seraphim calling to one another.
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Holy. Holy. Holy is the Lord of hosts the whole earth is full of his glory
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He was so holy glorious that Isaiah says he felt in his bones his own simple as he cried out
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Whoa is me For I'm lost for I'm a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips
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For my eyes have seen the King the Lord of hosts Isaiah was overwhelmed by God's majesty
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Majesty has to do with the glory of Kings and God radiates that majesty perfectly
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So back here in Isaiah 40 this King Isaiah saw on his throne
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Is sitting above the globe in verse 22 the circle of the earth? Amazing by the way that Isaiah knew that the earth was circular like a sphere.
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How did he know that in these days? Because he's inspired Well here the
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Lord is elevated above the earth because of his majesty. He looks down and to him
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We mere inhabitants of the earth are like grasshoppers He stretches out the universe the heavens like you pull out a curtain or like you put up a tent a canopy
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Just as the universe is in fact now being Pulled out being stretched out. How did he know that?
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same reason He's ruling over the earth. He's expanding the universe now.
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We know that already though We know all that don't you we confess like in the Nicene Creed is the creator of heaven and earth
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Ho -hum tell me something. I don't know already We might have heard it but do we understand it
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Are you are we so awed by the Lord like Isaiah hearing holy? Holy holy that the presence of God weighs on us and pressing itself down on us so that we cry out
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Whoa is me. I've seen the King majestic in holiness When that's weighing on you worship comes out like breath
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All the clutter of life that used to distract you and obfuscate what you knew
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That just flooded your knowledge Like what to my city lights do and on to a night sky you can barely see you need stars
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Then suddenly what you know about the glory of God becomes comes bright Prominent comes overwhelming but the most important reality like the
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Sun Shining so brightly that it floods out all the stars. The only thing you can see is this one star the
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Sun It's not that canceling Lord's Day services on December 25th is against some rule is that now that you know
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What you said, you know About the majesty of God Well, you've heard
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Now that you know God is majestic You just wouldn't think of such a thing
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You know that God is majestic, but do you know what that means? Well for these people they had seen the officials of Sennacherib Taunt them as they stood on the walls of Jerusalem majestic looking men with an entourage a military detachment dressed
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Superbly all the accoutrements of all that kind of stuff Sennacherib Sennacherib's engravings of his
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Judah campaign Showed him being carried on a portable throne, you know
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Outside like quiche with the people prostrating to him he would have appeared majestic impressive
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To the people of Judah and so here Isaiah is reminding them that their King their true
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King Was far more majestic. His throne was over the world They knew that already.
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Of course, their problem is that they were too distracted by the seemingly impressive kings of the world
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Obfuscated by the petty little kings So they couldn't see the glory of the king who sits above the circle of the earth
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What they knew hadn't changed their life So they were impressed by Sennacherib and treated the
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Lord It's nothing You can cancel meeting to worship him of giving gifts get get to the way of that Why are we giving gifts on December 25th?
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I don't know forgot They have forgotten what the Lord's majesty means and so they were too impressed by its pale earthly imitations
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So Isaiah tells him in verse 23 the Lord brings princes to nothing
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There in verse 23 the word for princes and Hebrew doesn't just mean sons of the king I royal people but any weighty person with anyone with authority the kind of people can change your life
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Make decisions about you hold authority over you admit you or exclude you from universities from jobs
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Whatever impressive people the Lord brings them to nothing So that they're empty.
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He makes the rulers of the earth void at the end of verse 23 The rulers are judges there people who can imprison you or fine you or shut down your business issue masks our vaccine mandates
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That's impressive. Isn't it? Have that kind of power to be like Sennacherib carried on a throne and able to issue orders kill
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This one can live to have prostrating people prostrated on the ground before you the
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Lord says that all such majestic people Come to nothing verse 24 just as they start to rule
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Scarcely are they planted? Scarcely sewn scarcely as their stem taken root in the earth
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Then they're cut down And God blows on them just in verse 7 chapter 40 here the spirit of the breath of the
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Lord blows on them like that Hot dry desert wind wilts all the wildflowers.
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So they fade away These rulers fade away. They become like dead leaves blown away by the next storm
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They were over all these people of Judah by Sennacherib Like we're over odd by some president some powerful person, but God blows on them
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Uses time to take them away and soon the people we think are powerful now
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We're so impressed by now billionaires powerful political people those kind of people were impressed by now are like Sennacherib is to us
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Sennacherib, it's a meaningless name now. He's been blown away Time like an ever -rolling stream bears all its sons away.
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They fly forgotten as a dream dies at the opening day That's the majestic edict of God looking down on us even on powerful people seeing grasshoppers
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He's the king who makes all the other petty Kings seem like nothing Like a dried -up leaf blowing in the wind some churches expect the pastor to be constantly talking about politics either kind of politics
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Right or left doesn't matter as though the politics of the day the latest thing coming out of Washington the disgraceful disrespect for marriage act is so important that getting the right candidates elected is so critical a
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Political cause is so urgent that we have to take time from worship While we worship focusing on that Tell you how to vote write letters to your congressman protests, whatever
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Outrage is next the obsession about politics Now so dominates their vision.
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That's all they can see and next week. It'll be something else I was in a church that passed around a petition in support of the nomination of Robert Bork For the
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Supreme Court because if that didn't happen The world's gonna fall apart the suggestion was that this was so important.
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We have to do it here In worship, but when you see that God is majestic He's the king who reigns supreme over the circle of the earth
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And he makes presidents and Supreme Court justices wither away
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All that politics pales in comparison to his majesty
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You knew that already didn't you but did you understand it? What do you know, you know that God is unique the
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Holy One But do you understand it? The verse of 25 and 26
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God reminds them that he is the Holy One Who can't be compared to anyone else to whom will you compare me
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God says that I should be like him What are you comparing me to God is like?
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Hezekiah no much more powerful Sennacherib. No, even he's too tiny like who?
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No one. He's the Holy One at the end of verse 25 Holy one is
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Isaiah's unique title for the Lord He uses it at least 25 times in his book, but it rarely occurs elsewhere in the
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Old Testament Holy means set apart distinct in a separate class unique the
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Holy One means that God is so surpassingly awesome that his greatness and goodness is beyond Comprehension and so instead of being distracted by the the lesser goods of Earth the good
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Saints the good mother of Jesus the good politics The good holiday the good gifts the good family
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Instead of allowing your vision of God to be obfuscated by lesser goods Instead of that lift up your eyes
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He says in verse 26 lift up your eye look above this world and look on high and see
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Look up In verse 26 stop looking down All the little things that are distracting you
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They're obfuscating your vision. Look at the one who created all the stars all one
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Septillion of them. He has them all numbered All everyone has a number all the way up to one with 24 zeros behind it two and a half times longer than yours
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Social security number. He has them all named He calls them all because he created them by the greatness of his might oh
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You thought Sennacherib was great, you know in his palanquin. There's army behind him. It's your edicts some die live
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The Holy One makes one septillion stars live and die Because he is strong in power.
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Not one of those stars is missing not one Look at him instead lift up your eyes on high and see what you said
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You already know Twice in the Gospels Jesus is called the
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Holy One Once by a demon in Mark chapter 1 the demon cried out. I know who you are the
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Holy One of God second time by Peter at the end of John 6 when the superficial disciples left
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Jesus and Jesus asked his real disciples Do you want to go away as well and Peter replied?
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Go where? No one else has the words of eternal life We have believed
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Think of these words we have believed and come to know other words. We've come to understand what we've heard what we've known
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Now we understand it when we knew it before but now we understand it that you are
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The Holy One of God Jesus is utterly unique the
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Holy One The scoffers today try to argue that Jesus is a unique that he's just like a lot of other
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Mythological gods from ancient history of that time in place like Horus Atheistic skeptics have been saying that the story of Jesus was just borrowed from Horus There's a
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Egyptian God who they say like Jesus was born in December 25th of a virgin heralded by a star
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Attended by shepherds. That's her argument to say this is the mythology about Horus. It's born in December 25th He heralded by a star at his birth attended by shepherds.
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And so did Jesus birth story was just borrowed plagiarized from him and He's he's not really unique.
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He's just copied from Egyptian mythology of course that depends on a cultural Christianity understanding of Jesus because We know or at least you've heard haven't you that the
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Bible doesn't say that he was born in December 25th? So whoever put that comparison together didn't know his Bible very well
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It also turns out that they didn't know Horus very well and the Egyptian myth. He is not born of a virgin
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He is not heralded by a star or attended by shepherds. So all of that is just pure fiction Indeed, there is no other ancient myth of a god like Jesus and what makes
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Jesus particularly unique is that he isn't a myth He is placed in real history by the
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Gospels I'll be dated by Luke by a census in the Roman government He's derived from a genealogy like any other person right in the line of the
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Kings from Jewish ancestry. He's born a real Geographical location us come kind of mythological fictional place like Middle Earth the
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Shire Camelot anything like that, but in a real Historical geographical town
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Bethlehem He's the Holy One in human flesh the one Isaiah here tells us to lift up your eyes on high and see come
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Let us adore him. What do you know? third the mystery
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You know that God sees you right? That nothing you've done nothing. You've gone through nothing.
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You suffered has escaped his attention You know that already you've heard that But many of us don't really believe what we know
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Here in verse 27. The Lord asked his people why they don't believe what they know
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They know that because of the Lord's strong power not one star out of a septillion is missing
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Not one But somehow they think the Lord has forgotten about them
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They're Asking their verse 27. Why is he forgotten about me? Why have they been ravaged by this
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Assyrian invasion? So many of their critics destroyed and countrymen killed or hauled off as prisoners
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So they complain my way and there was my life me is hidden from the
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Lord You saw the same thing in Psalm 42, you know in verse 9 Has he forgotten me suffering this but I he doesn't seem to be paying me any attention.
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He's ignoring me He's overlooking me here back in Isaiah 40 verse 27, it's what the people of Judah were thinking
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Now sure, he doesn't overlook one out of a septillion stars But he's forgot about me
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My right he says in verse 27 So the people of Judah were thinking my right literally my justice the
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Hebrew word means in other words what I deserve What's justice for me? God's not paying any attention to it.
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He's not giving me justice It's disregarded by my God why? I was look at this disaster
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My house my barn is burned down. My animals are stolen. Some family members didn't make it
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This is a calamity and the Lord Hasn't even noticed Well, they knew that God sees all things
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That they didn't understand what it meant for them When they were picking up the pieces from their destroyed homes
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We know right the God is not merely aware of all things of all our life
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He sees everything going on in our life Was actually in control of them and some but when something hard hits
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We're tempted to forget what we know Why is this disaster come this death in the family this diagnosis this wreck?
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This layoff this bankruptcy this abandonment this betrayal
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Why is this tragedy happened to me we know that God sees and is in control but often
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We don't really believe it because things happen that we don't understand we forget what we know and act and feel and sigh and cry
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Like we don't know it We forget that God is mysterious
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God moves in a mysterious way as wonders to perform He plants his footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm you fearful
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Saints fresh courage take the clouds you so much dread are big with mercy and shall break in blessings on your head
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Judge, not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust him for his grace behind a frowning
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Providence he hides a smiling face You know that already, right
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You've probably sung the song God's a mystery. He asked again at the end at the beginning of verse 28
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Have you not known? You've heard it before. Yes, you've known We just so easy to forget.
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Have you not heard? Oh Yes, we've heard it so much. We don't even pay it any attention anymore, but here one more time
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Pay attention because even though you've heard it before you may not understand it for qualities of God That are mysterious to us past our ability to understand are laid out here in verse 28 first The Lord is the everlasting
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God Time doesn't bear him away like those rulers.
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He breeds on and wilts He's not changed or affected by time
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He is not confined by time. He is over it. He's outside it
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He sees all of history sees all of our lives laid out already before him
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This is why predestination isn't a surprise to us We should know it already Of course every decision we or anyone makes is already known and settled by him
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He's the everlasting God. He's over all time. He is right now in our future
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And we can't comprehend that But we should know it Second he's the creator of the ends of the earth
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What was the whole planet that the universe as creator of the universe? He is not merely in the universe
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Not just a part of it He's over it's beyond it he was before it existed and he'll be
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After it's gone That means he's not confined by space either He is everywhere and outside of creation at the same time
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Like we might be outside a little nativity scene we set up except that's not an adequate comparison because even if our fingers come from outside and Move a shepherd figurine around our fingers can only be in one place at a time
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While God is everywhere Simultaneously and beyond everywhere.
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We can't illustrate it with a good comparison Because he's mysterious
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Third He doesn't faint or grow weary He's inexhaustible
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He doesn't lose strength That's afternoon evening work all
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Into late at night. I was exhausted. I needed to go home and get something to eat and to drink and sleep
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God never does He's not like the phones that slowly lose power or our cars that run out of gas
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Have to be recharged or refueled God is always fully powered We know that theoretically
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But we forget Thinking God is gonna get tired of us. His love can't be that Steadfast not able to endure all our sins our forgetfulness
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He'll get weary of us after a while winning For finally his understanding is
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Unsearchable you can never get to the bottom of his wisdom if all you did with with your life
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Someone just gave you the money so you didn't have to work or anything All you did was was read and meditate and memorize and listen and pray at the end
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Well, you could make a lot of progress for yourself and you could be a source of great insight for others
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But you still wouldn't have come to the end or even close to the end of God's infinite understanding
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So, what do you know? Maybe you already knew Everything I've said this morning.
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Maybe you haven't learned a thing in This message you even knew that the Horace Smith doesn't have him born in December 25th
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And that Isaiah uses Holy One at least 25 times and that a demon and Peter called Jesus that You knew all that great
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But you understand what you know You understand that Jesus?
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God is Majestic and so overshadows all the petty things that distract you from him
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Especially this time of year Do you understand that the Lord is the Holy One?
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Utterly unique but he's not just one part of your life, but he is your life
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You understand that Jesus isn't just a sweet baby But he's also the Holy One who makes his enemies tremble like Sennacherib made his enemies tremble but for Jesus even the demons tremble and confess him
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You know it already But have you let all the the Christmas clutter?
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The focus on a baby get you to forget about that the demons say you are the
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Holy One Do you know what we say to him the one superficial disciples leave
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Who else has the words of eternal life Do you know that? Do you know it's you know, that's so deep in your bones
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That even when everything is destroyed When the funeral is scheduled when the money is gone
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When you're alone You're not moaning God doesn't see me no
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Because you understand what you know, you're still following Jesus still saying
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Where else can I go? I have believed and Come to know that you
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Jesus are The Holy One. Do you know that?