Sunday, July 14, 2024 PM

Rebellious Children and the Problem of Empty Religion

As we are thinking about what hope is there for rebellious children, this is the pressing question here early in Isaiah as God addresses the people of Israel left there in the southern kingdom of Judah as his children who do not know him, who have forgotten him as their father.

Oxen and donkeys know who they belong to, but these Israelites do not. And so he has rebuked them for their rebellion. And the rebellion is first surveyed in terms of their nation, their political rebellion.

He reminds them that they have been beaten by him. He has chastised them. He has scourged them as a magistrate would a fool. And like a fool, they keep coming back for more beatings. And the truth of the matter is, if God had not been merciful, their fate would be the same as Sodom and Gomorrah.

Now having made that point, he goes on to talk about the rebellion in a different arena, the religious arena, the manner in which they are approaching their worship of the Lord. And that's what verses 10 through 20 of Isaiah 1 are all about.

So let's read the word together. Verse 10. 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 Sabbaths, and the calling of assemblies. I cannot endure iniquity and 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 for the widow. Come now and let us reason together, says the Lord.

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool. If you are willing and obedient, you shall 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.". So as we think about verses 10 through 20, as God begins to address the rebellion of His children in connection to their religious practices, He's dealing with an issue that they may have relied upon for their standing with Him.

As it was in the days of Jeremiah, when Jeremiah would address the people about their wickedness, their idolatry and the assured judgment of God on the horizon, they would respond to Jeremiah by chanting, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.

And they would, in other words, say peace, peace, when there was no peace. We have the temple. We have the sacrifices. We have the high priest. We have Jerusalem, the city of peace. So what could happen to us?

Well, according to God's promises, according to the way He arranged His covenant with Israel, a whole lot could happen to them. And that's what He's bringing up here. The people are sacrificing. They certainly are arranging themselves and going to a lot of trouble to offer sacrifices at the altar and to gather together in their assemblies.

But it is not pleasing to the Lord. And He explains that. Now, we left off looking at, after looking at verse 10, where God calls them Sodom and Gomorrah, we began looking at the altar as God takes an inventory of the religious practices there in verse 11.

And the focus on all of the sacrifices, the burnt offerings, the blood sacrifices, all of the effort that the Levites and the priests were going to. And God says of it, what's the point? What's all this?

And communicating that apparently it is not really for Him. They're going through the motions, but they're treating God like they would the pagan gods that they worship, thinking that all God wanted was a little blood, right?

Or maybe a lot of blood. All He wanted was burnt offerings and blood sacrifices. And that's what He was all about. So we'll give it to Him. But He says in verse 11, He's had enough. And not only has He had enough, and He's weary and tired of all these sacrifices, He says, I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or goats.

Sacrifice, Covenant Faithfulness, and the Meaning of the Old Covenant

Now, we left off there and we began to think about this question. Wasn't it God who instructed Israel to do these very sacrifices? The particular requirements and instructions, the procedures that God gave to them, so specific and a variety of different offerings, different burnt offerings, different sacrifices in Leviticus, a lot of detail there.

And how often did God declare these instructions after saying to them, I am the Lord who brought you up out of Egypt, therefore worship in this way. But now He says to them, He does not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or goats.

Well, it turns out that it was never His delight. It was never His focus. It was not the joy that He would partake in these sacrifices. It was not His passion to see all these animals slain. He wasn't looking for blood.

He was looking for a faithful servant. He desired mercy, not sacrifice. He desired covenant faithfulness, not sacrifice. That which was lost in Adam, re-envisioned in the covenants and promised concerning the Messiah.

This is what He delighted in. This is why it's so significant that we find that when Jesus Christ is presented publicly, He's declared both the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world. And also God says, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.

He is fully satisfied and He delights in His son. Now, in this era of the old covenant, God has made it clear who He is and who His people are to be. And let's think of some, let's read some other passages that go along with this theme.

So let's look in Jeremiah chapter 7, Jeremiah 7 verse 22. Important to remember that Isaiah died during the reign of Manasseh. Manasseh's son smelt so much like Manasseh that he was assassinated fairly quickly.

And then good King Josiah came on the scene. And that was the beginning of Jeremiah's ministry. So there's a little bit of a gap between the end of Isaiah's prophetic ministry and the beginning of Jeremiah's.

But many of the same issues persisted in Jeremiah's day that were present in Isaiah's day. So in verse 21, thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat.

Verse 22, for I did not speak to your fathers or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices. When I brought your forefathers up out of Egypt and rescued them from the clutches of that serpent headdress wearing pharaoh that was trying to consume the promised sea, when I brought you up out of his clutches, out of bondage, and I brought you into the wilderness, what did he say to them?

He gave them manna in the wilderness, water from a rock, and he spoke to them his covenant, which was not primarily sacrifices. That wasn't the main focus. The very first thing he said to them when he said I'm going to make a covenant with you was the Ten Commandments.

Ten words. In other words, when God made a covenant with Israel, he says to them as he would say to one man, I want you to be faithful. Here's how you're supposed to live. And of course, we went through our long-term study of the Ten Commandments.

We see how every aspect of the Ten Commandments is a reflection of the image of God. So he's looking for a covenantly faithful servant. So in verse 23 he says, but this is what I commanded them saying, obey my voice and I will be your people and you shall be my people.

Walk in all the ways that I have commanded you that it may be well with you. That's what he that's what he commanded them. He wanted them to live in the pattern, in the form that he had established from the very beginning with Adam.

And he makes a covenant with them, says this is why I've made you. This is how you are to live. And when you live this way, I will bless you. And if you don't live this way, then I will bring curses upon you.

Very much a reflection of how it went with Adam, right? So when Adam and Eve were communing with the Lord and living in the way he designed them, it was all blessing, wasn't it? But when they rebelled against him, what happened?

Then the curse came. And so in the covenant that God made with Israel, he is forging something that is reflective of what it means to be made in the image of God and anticipating the one who is to come.

So what he's asking for is covenant faithfulness. That's what he talked to them about from the very beginning. He didn't take them out to the wilderness and then say, okay, here's the 10 sacrifices. He said, here's the 10 commandments.

Here's how you love God supremely. Here's how you love each other rightly. Here's how you steward the creation righteously. That's what he told them. And then when, what about when they failed? What about when they sinned against God?

What about if they didn't live up according to that standard? Then he said, okay, here are the sacrifices that I want you to offer in all of these various cases, reminding them of the need for atonement, showing them the need for the satisfaction of the justice of God, the offended wrath of God, and the promise of a substitutionary atonement at the blood of the innocent would cover the guilt of the sinner.

So God was not delighting in the sacrifices being offered because he was looking for faithfulness. Now let's look over in Psalm 50, and we'll begin in verse 10, in a bit of a famous verse that we often refer to, especially when we're praying for God to provide.

He says, For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the mountains and the wild beasts of the field are mine. Now, I think an excellent application of this passage is in fact that God owns all things and he can provide.

This is not why he's bringing it up in the text. He's bringing it up because he wants to inform his worshipers that they do him no favors. They give him nothing that he does not already own. And so he says in verse 12, If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world is mine in all its fullness.

Will I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats? They're not feeding God with their sacrifices. If they think they are, then they're pagan in their mindset, and they're thinking the way of idolaters think.

They would bring the food to Baal and to Asherah, to the queen of heaven, and to Molech and Chemosh, and they would bring their sacrifices to the false gods with a very distinct understanding that they were feeding these gods.

I'm saying, you're not feeding me. I own it all in the first place. Another passage in Micah, Micah chapter 6, verses 7 through 8. First, we remember that Micah is a very close parallel to Isaiah. Micah lived during the days of Isaiah, and so very often the things that he says are almost verbatim the things that Isaiah says.

The Lord Requires Justice, Mercy, and Humble Covenant Faithfulness

Micah chapter 6, verses 7 and 8. We'll begin in verse 6, so we have the question, With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before the high God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?

Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O man, what is good.

And what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? Now, let's think very carefully about the context of this passage. When Micah asks about thousands of offerings and ten thousand rivers of oil, this should remind us of when the temple was dedicated under Solomon.

There were thousands of sacrifices on that day. There were ten thousand rivers of oil, but none of it was enough to atone for the sin of a single man. And Micah is confessing that, acknowledging that.

What price could be paid that will be high enough, dear enough, effective enough for the sin of Micah's soul to be atoned for? What could possibly please the Lord so much that the sin of even one of his own prophets could be forgiven?

Not the firstborn son of Micah, but the only begotten of the Father. Correct? Not the fruit of Micah's body, but the one who was born of a virgin according to the seed of David. Now, that is fully affirmed.

The fact of the righteous Messiah, the righteous servant, the one who was yet to come, of whom Micah preached in more than one location in his prophecy, that is fully affirmed in the next verse. Verse 8.

He has shown you, O man, God has shown you, O man, what is good. The standard has been made clear. And what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God, to do righteousness, to love chesed, covenant faithfulness, and to walk humbly with your God?

That's what he requires. You see? He requires perfect covenant faithfulness. Who will do that? Who will ascend the hill of the Lord, he who has clean hands and a pure heart? Who will they lift the gates up for?

Who will they lift the gates up for except for the king, the one who stands in for his people? And by his righteousness, all the people who are in him will be blessed. So, remember when we read Micah 6 .8, this is something that is stated in the context of the covenant God made with Israel at Sinai, in the context of the covenant that God made with David, that his son, the king, would stand in for the sake of the whole people.

And is it right for us to think about what the Lord desires of us? Yes. Is it good for us to try to work righteousness? Yes. Is it right for us to be merciful? Yes. Is it good for us to be humble? Yes.

But that's not what this verse is about. This is about you achieve the standard that he's saying to Micah. He has shown you, oh man, what is good. He has shown you, oh Israel, what is good. Covenant faithfulness.

That's the standard. It's not offering a bunch of sacrifices. It's covenant faithfulness. That's the standard. Now, meet it. What are you supposed to do with that? You need a perfect Israel or at least a perfect king to stand in for Israel, for God to be pleased with.

So this is a, I bring this up because this is a verse that has been used in recent years. It's like everybody should be doing justice, which means social justice, love mercy, which means God's on the side of the poor.

You should be as well. If you're not involved in reconciliation work, then you don't know the gospel of Jesus Christ, so on and so forth. That's what this verse has been used for, for the last several years, without any consideration of the context of how it's stated.

It's very much Romans 2 and the first part of Romans 3, so that we may look to the second half of Romans 3 and Romans 4 and find in Christ our righteousness before God. That's why that's there. The sacrificial system presupposed the covenant unfaithfulness of Israel.

God knew they weren't going to hit the mark. He knew that the law was going to expose their transgressions and their need for a savior. And so the sacrificial system presupposed their uncovenant faithfulness while prefiguring the covenant faithfulness of Christ and the coming atoning work of Jesus Christ, faithful to the Father and obedient to the Father, even to the point of the cross.

So, as the covenantally faithful servant, fittingly replacing Adam, satisfyingly fulfilling Israel, Christ dies as the Lamb of God, bringing peace, pleasing the Father, satisfying God's justice, bearing God's wrath.

The problem is they thought the sacrifices were the point. They thought the sacrifices were the point of the whole shebang. So they pointed, but the sacrifices were pointing at their need for forgiveness and God's provision of a savior.

That's why they were there. Now, in verses 12 through 14, there's a focus on the assembly, not that we move from the altar, which is so vitally important. How often is it that we look at the Old Testament, we look at the altar and we see there the sacrificial system.

And I think we can connect with that very quickly, the Lamb of God. But also God wants to put his attention upon the assembly. God had made many arrangements in the life of Israel regarding their calendar and their congregating.

And that's brought to mind when we read verses 12 through 14. God says, when you come to appear before me, who has required this from your hand to trample my courts? Bring no more futile sacrifices. Again, that word for sacrifice is different than in verse 11.

That's the word for oblation, the drink offering being poured out before God. Incense is an abomination to me, the new moons, the Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies. I cannot endure iniquity in the sacred meeting.

Your new moons and appointed feasts, my soul hates. They are a trouble to me. I am weary of burying them. But God had made arrangements for them to gather at the tabernacle, or later on, meaning the temple where the tabernacle was brought into at Jerusalem, where God had put his name, where he wanted the people to gather.

And he wanted them to appear before his face. That's the way it's put. Appear before the face of God. Appear before him. And he says this in Exodus and Deuteronomy in several places, that they were to assemble before him.

That's a lot of effort for them to do so, to make arrangements three times a year, to gather together before the face of God and meet together as one great assembly. They were to stand before him as one man.

They were, in other words, to play the role of Adam. Remember God in the garden, walking with Adam in the cool of the day? Those made in his image, in fellowship with him. And so, where does he have all of Israel as one man gather, but at the tabernacle, which was designed in the very same shape, with the very same elements as the garden.

The entrance to the east, all of the various elements within the tabernacle, quoting and reflecting the elements in Genesis 1 and 2. So he brings them all together, and then he asks them this, he asks this biting question about their gatherings.

He says, who is required this when you appear before me? Who is required you to come trample my courts? You're supposed to appear before me, but you're just trampling my courts. In other words, they would show up for these very important assemblies and feasts and sacrifices, but they did so in such a routine way, with such a focus on getting the procedures done, that they weren't really worshiping God and rejoicing in his truth.

It was like a pre-COVID Black Friday in the temple courts with livestock, just running here and there and everywhere, just trying to get it all done so they can get on back with their business. God says, who's required that?

That's not what I asked for. In other words, this is to be a heads-up moment for Israel, but they were treating it like a heads-down moment. Put your head down, get the job done. God had arranged for a heads-up moment.

We're going to stop and revere and worship. So they were being task-oriented rather than relationally oriented. And God says he rejects those futile sacrifices. So we're going to leave it there for now, but as we look ahead to more of what God says about this congregation, the assembly, in verses 13 through 14, notice one of the things that's repeated, and that's rare in this list of religious terms.

We didn't see many repetitions at all, but there is one repetition that we should give some reflection to in anticipation of the next time we get to talk about Isaiah, and that is this list of the new moons.

Remember that Israel's religious calendar was oriented on night. How would you know what day it was? How would you know when the next sacrifice should be? How would you know when to have all these feasts and assemblies?

You had to watch the moon. It had to be night. I'm just going to leave it there. We're going to reflect on that. Next time we come back, we'll talk about why that's significant. Okay, let's close by singing the doxology together.