The Warrior God

Silicon Valley Reformed Baptist Church

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Please turn in your Bible to Isaiah chapter 42. That can be found on page 847 if you're using the

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Pew Bible in front of you. Isaiah 42, be looking at verses 13 through 17.

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One thing that I've noticed pretty consistently throughout Isaiah 40 and onward so far is that my preaching pericopes, pericope is like a segment of scripture, tend to rarely follow the paragraph breaks that the

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ESV has. Notice that was not the case in the earlier portions, but it frequently is the case here. I do believe this passage about the

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Lord going out like a mighty man relates to those verses that immediately follow it.

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Please stand when you have that for the reading of God's word. Isaiah 42, beginning in verse 13.

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The Lord goes out like a mighty man, like a man of war, he stirs up his zeal.

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He cries out, he shouts aloud. He shows himself mighty against his foes.

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For a long time, I have held my peace. I've kept still and restrained myself. Now I will cry out like a woman in labor.

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I will gasp and pant. I will lay waste mountains and hills and dry up all their vegetation.

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I will turn the rivers into islands and dry up the pools. And I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know and paths that they have not known,

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I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground.

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These are the things I do, I do not forsake them. They are turned back and utterly put to shame who trust in carved idols, who say to metal images, you are our gods, amen.

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You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, those who trust in idols will be ashamed, but we know that those who trust in the gospel of Jesus Christ will not be ashamed.

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We ask that you would point our eyes to Jesus Christ, that we would trust in his good word to us, his good news, that we would not be ashamed.

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We pray that we would look forward to this time of judgment of which you have spoken, that we would look to the salvation of which you have spoken with eagerness and anticipation.

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And likewise, with an understanding of how it has already been brought to pass as well. In Jesus' name, amen.

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If you remember in the preceding passage of Isaiah 42 in verse 10, it said, sing to the

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Lord a new song and his praise from the end of the earth. Because the Lord has done a new thing, we are to sing a new song.

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And now we transition to the judgment that accompanies that salvation.

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Frequently throughout Isaiah, we've seen statements of judgment and statements of salvation. Sometimes there are statements of judgment on God's own people, and they must be understood as statements of discipline.

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Other times, they must be understood as statements regarding that people being a mixed people full of those who do not truly know the

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Lord and will not know the Lord. And other times, these statements of judgment are against the enemies of God's people so that God would save his people.

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Here we have one of those statements, statement against the enemies of God's people, that the

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Lord will save his people. You are to sing to the Lord a new song because of his salvation, and salvation, as always, comes by means of judgment.

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In order to be saved from an enemy, that enemy must be judged. Lord saves through his judgment.

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Now, of course, we have seen this many times throughout Isaiah. There are two particular truths I would like for you to take away from this, since these repeated statements about judgment have their own character and flavor and particular aspects you may draw from them.

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That is that God's judgment will be great. I want you to understand the greatness of that, particularly from this analogy that is made, this metaphor of a woman in labor.

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His judgment is great, and his judgment accompanies salvation. His judgment is great, and his judgment accompanies salvation.

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But simply looking at this passage here, it says the Lord goes out like a mighty man. This is a term that's used of a warrior.

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He goes out like a warrior. Like a man of war, he stirs up his zeal.

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So how does a warrior go out? He recognizes the task in front of him. You see people who go about even just sporting events, rile themselves up, beating their chest, things like that, getting into a mood where they are ready to go out and do battle.

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It says he cries, he shouts aloud, he shows himself mighty against his foes. So he's stirring himself up for this activity.

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He is yelling, he is going against his foes. It says in verse 14, for a long time

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I have held my peace. Now, as I'm reflecting on this in the moment, perhaps the reason that there would be a paragraph break here would be because it sounds like Isaiah is speaking.

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Of course, it's very evident when it says, I will lay waste mountains and hills, et cetera, that these are not

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Isaiah's words as the prophet, but they are Isaiah's words speaking on behalf of God.

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When it says in the previous verse, he cries out, he shouts aloud, this is telling us what he is crying out, what he is shouting aloud.

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For a long time I have held my peace. I have kept still and restrained myself. Now I will cry out like a woman in labor.

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I will gasp and pant. What is the idea of a woman in labor? The idea is not that he would be in pain.

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That is not the point of this. The idea is that judgment has been coming and growing, and now he is about to give birth to that judgment.

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There is a, if I could get someone to deliver me a tissue, please, one of my kids.

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Thank you. Now he is going to go out in war against his enemies at a time that has come to full fruition.

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It has been building up. It has not been a matter that is just sudden without any sort of buildup or any sort of anticipation or any sort of reasoning.

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Rather, it is something that has been growing. Judgment is something that is growing. Thank you. I will lay waste mountains and hills and dry up all their vegetation.

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Turn the rivers into islands and dry up the pools. This reversal of creation. This is exactly the opposite of what we had seen in the previous chapter.

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In Isaiah 41, verses 17 through 20, it said, when the poor and needy seek water and there is none, and the tongue is parched with thirst,

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I, the Lord, will answer. I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will open rivers on the bare heights and fountains in the midst of the valleys.

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I'll make the wilderness a pool of water and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive.

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I will set in the desert the cypress, the plain, and the pine together. So here, he's saying that he's going to dry up any sort of plants that exist.

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But before, in the previous chapter describing salvation, he talks about placing plants where they do not exist.

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Where it's dry, he's going to make it vibrant and lush. But now, in describing judgment, he takes all those places that are lush and makes them dry.

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He takes the mountains and levels them. Everything that is humble will be exalted.

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Everything that is proud will be humbled. I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know and paths that they have not known.

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I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These things

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I do and I do not forsake them. Of course, Isaiah has been a book about blind people.

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Isaiah's prophecies, usually when you think of prophecies, you think of things given to open the eyes of people.

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Isaiah's prophecies, Isaiah's commissioning statement in chapter six was in order that the people's eyes be shut.

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Jesus appeals to that passage when he explains why he speaks in parables. It was so that people would not understand him.

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And then, of course, we just heard the very ending of Acts, that same passage spoken of.

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The people of Israel do not understand it and so the gospel goes out to the nations.

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God will open the eyes of the blind and he does it in the most unexpected way.

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Yes, by opening some of the eyes of those who are of the physical nation of Israel, but he opens the eyes of many.

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His people are all across the earth and he opens their eyes, leading them though they were blind.

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If you are someone who does not know Jesus Christ, your eyes are closed, you cannot see, you cannot understand.

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If you are someone who has trust in Jesus Christ, your eyes were closed, you were blind, but they have been opened in order that you would understand the truth.

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Romans 8, seven says that the mind that is set on the flesh does not obey the law of God.

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Indeed, it cannot. We are unable to see, we are unable to follow after God's ways apart from the work of the

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Spirit within us, it is only through the work of the Spirit that our eyes can be opened so we can truly know what is right and wrong, so we can truly know the goodness of God.

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It is impossible to know him otherwise. Even the demons know that God is good, but you can only experience the goodness of God through the work of the

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Holy Spirit in your heart. The kind of opening of eyes that is needed here is not merely intellectual, it is experiential.

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You must experience the goodness of God, and this is what is describing this kind of salvation.

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He leads the blind. Of course, there will be a more immediate fulfillment of this when

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Cyrus comes and leads the people out of Babylon. Part of what is being prophesied here is that people will go into Babylon, the

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Lord will save them, bring them out of Babylon by the hand of Cyrus, the king of Persia, but ultimately, this refers to Jesus Christ, and that is most evident from the numerous references we have in the

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New Testament to these very passages that speak of the blind men of Isaiah's day, including the one that you just heard read in Acts, verse 17, they are turned back and utterly put to shame, those who trust in carved idols, who say to metal images, you are our gods.

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These go hand in hand. The salvation of God's people goes hand in hand with the shame of those who trust in idols.

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How are they ashamed? In the vindication of God's people. That is part of their judgment. Part of their judgment is the salvation of those who they mocked, the salvation of those whom they oppressed.

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So just taking a step back and considering those two primary aspects of this passage, the greatness of God's salvation, and then, or excuse me, the greatness of God's judgment, and how judgment comes through salvation, and salvation through judgment, both of those are true.

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Just the greatness. There is a growing, a buildup of God's judgment that is described with this woman, with this metaphor of the woman in labor.

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This is not the only time this analogy is used. This metaphor is used several times throughout

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Scripture. Psalm 7 says that their judgment descends upon their own head, on their own skull.

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Their wickedness descends after having described them giving birth to their own sin.

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Their sin grows and grows inside them. It gestates, and then they give birth to it.

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It falls on them. Here is God. God is, his judgment is gestating, and it comes to full birth, full fruition.

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This is why God, this is part of why the Lord tarries. This is part of why he does not save all of his people immediately, and in Christ's return.

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In Romans 9 .22, it says, what if God, although wanting to demonstrate his power, makes known, what if God, although wanting to demonstrate his power, let me go ahead and quote it exactly for you.

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What if God, deciding to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom he has called, not from the

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Jews only, but also from the Gentiles? So why is it that he has permitted injustice to continue, and why is it that he has not immediately whisked us away out of the situation that we are in?

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It is because his judgment is growing to make a greater demonstration of it to his people.

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He will make a greater demonstration of his judgment because of this delay. There is a full nine months that must happen in order for a woman to give birth at the proper time, so there is a full time in which the

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Lord's judgment waits until it will be complete and full.

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Genesis 15, 16 describes this also. God says to Abraham, and they will come back here in the fourth generation for the iniquity of the

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Amorite is not yet complete. What he's describing there is the fact that the people are going to go off into Egypt, they are gonna stay there for 400 years, and they will come back after the people of the land of Canaan have committed enough sin, enough abominations against the

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Lord that it will be most glorious when Joshua comes through and destroys all the inhabitants of Canaan.

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This judgment is growing, and this judgment is great, and that shame that is coming will be especially great because of that.

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Those who have trusted in idols have had ample time to repent, and during that ample time, they have continued in their abomination of trusting in things that are not the

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Lord. Scripture tells us that even covetousness is idolatry. This is not just talking about literal idolaters.

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If you have trusted in something other than the Lord Jesus Christ, if you have trusted in your own wealth and you despise the providence of God and what he has given you, you have trusted in something else.

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And if you do not turn to the Lord in repentance, if you have not trusted in him as your Savior, this describes the shame that you will face on that last day, not just a small shame for one time having trusted in things rather than the

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Lord. It describes a lifetime of building up things that there will be shame for.

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If you turn to the Lord Jesus Christ, then it describes the shame that all those who would oppose you for having trusted in him will face.

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This is why Scripture speaks of shame this way, because it is not just talking about a negative feeling that you would have upon bad circumstances.

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It is very often when it describes shame, talking about the results of a false trust. In Romans 1, when it says,

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I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation, the point of that is not just that Paul is proud of it, now that's true, but the reason he is proud of it, he explains, is because it will not prove false.

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He is not ashamed of the gospel because on that last day, there will be nothing to ashamed of.

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Rather, those who have trusted in something else on that last day, they will be ashamed. They will see all the days that they trusted in something that is false, and their foolishness will be revealed.

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It is especially shameful to see someone who has trusted in something that is not trustworthy, and then see the outcome of their ways.

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If someone were to repeatedly, or to continue building a house out of insufficient material, let's say you were to build a house out of straw, just like the fairy tale, and everyone was saying, don't build a house out of straw, you should build it out of brick, and they just kept doing it and kept doing it, on that day when the house blows away, they would be ashamed, because everyone else is shown to be right, they are shown to be wrong.

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Well, this is what's happening, except it is the many who will be ashamed, because the many think that they can build their house upon the sand, rather than the rock, the foundation of God's word.

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Now, this judgment not only will be great on that last day, because it is permitted to grow and grow and grow, but in addition, it will happen through salvation.

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These are things that happen together. First, there is the fact that it is simply necessarily the case that judgment will happen through salvation, because salvation happens through judgment.

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How will God save his people? He will save his people by destroying the enemy. On that last day, there will be a judgment that will wipe out all those who have not bent the knee to Jesus Christ.

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But then on top of that, salvation is the means that God uses to distinguish his people from others and to heap up judgment against them.

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Hebrews 11, seven says that by faith, Noah built an ark and condemned the world.

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Noah, in following after God's ways, was revealing the folly of the people.

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So we, at this time, are condemning the world by our own following after God's ways, our own trusting in Jesus Christ.

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That condemnation is happening now through our faithfulness, through our salvation.

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If I can use the word salvation to refer not just to our justification, but likewise to our sanctification, to our growing in holiness, he uses it to distinguish his people.

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And this is not something that just will happen at that last coming. It's not just on that final day when

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Noah had finished the ark that the people are ashamed. That judgment was happening throughout.

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That judgment, though the people did not realize it, though it is not fully manifest, is being made known to those who see with eyes of faith.

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It's being made known to Noah who the enemies of the Lord are and what their end is as he is building the ark.

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So it is with us. Now, we do not know who all the last people that God will save are, yet we see more and more that he is heaping up a list of condemnation against the world that will be read aloud to it on the day of judgment.

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This is something that happens not just at the second coming, but it's something that has happened at the first coming.

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Even at the first coming, you hear the words of Simeon, how it will make a sword that divides the people.

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So it has come to pass that Jesus Christ, even in his first coming, has divided the people, that he has distinguished them, some for judgment, some for salvation.

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Consider the words of this, and I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know. How does that go hand in hand with laying waste mountains and hills?

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Does God only lead the blind later when he's destroying all the rest of creation that's been created and has not followed after him?

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Or is it not the case that that laying waste is, in a sense, happening now?

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Christ has already accomplished the victory. Every last enemy is being placed under his feet. These are realities that we are supposed to affirm as happening now, even as Christ is leading the blind.

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These are not just things that will happen. These are things that are happening, that are happening, and they are happening through salvation, that as he is leading the blind, he is heaping condemnation on those who are showing a much greater manifest blindness that is a hardness of heart that will not be healed.

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The fact that even the blind have followed after Jesus Christ demonstrates the wretched state of those who would not turn to him.

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Here are the words of Peter. Peter in 1 Peter 2 .12

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says, Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify

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God on the day of visitation. This is not talking about salvation.

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There are some passages that talk about unbelievers seeing good works and giving glory to God in the sense of saving faith.

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This is talking about them realizing on the day of visitation. This is on the day of judgment this will come about.

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Why should we keep our conduct among the Gentiles honorable? Gentiles, this is speaking of the world.

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Why should we keep our conduct among the Gentiles honorable? So that when they speak against you as evildoers, on that day of judgment, they may see your good deeds and glorify

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God. That judgment is happening now that the record is being built and is being built not just through their sin, but being built even through our own righteousness.

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That our own righteousness, as with Noah, heaping up condemnation on them, our own righteousness, our conduct being honorable, they one day seeing all those good deeds and that giving more glory to God, his hand of judgment being greater because our righteousness was substantial and they rejected it.

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They called it evil. These things are happening even now.

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First Peter 4, 17 says, for it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God.

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And if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?

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This is talking about us needing to suffer for the name of Christ. Now it is not talking about us being judged in the sense of being punished, but that discernment happening, that this separating, there's a way that the wheat and tares will not be separated until the final day, yet the record is being established now by which the wheat and the tares will be separated.

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It is time for judgment to begin at the household of God. What does the

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Bible refer to this? Creating of a record so that on the day of judgment, it will be known who the wheat and the tares are.

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What does it call it? It refers to it as judgment. Judgment is happening even now. Yes, it will be manifest later, but it is even happening now.

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Consider the words of John the Baptist, where he said that the one who is coming would baptize with fire.

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It is talking about Jesus bringing judgment even upon his first coming. How did

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Jesus bring judgment upon his first coming? Isn't that something that only happens at his second coming? No, that is something that has already happened.

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And you see that here in Isaiah. When it puts hand -in -hand to him leading the blind and him laying waste the mountains, these are happening hand -in -hand.

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And we are supposed to have a hand in that judgment. As it says in 1 Corinthians 6, we will sit with him on the judgment on that last day.

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Even now, we are participating in that judgment. Even now, we are seated with him in the heavenly places.

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Even now, he has us working for his purposes to judge the world.

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This is not a position that should be taken lightly. Instead, we should do as Peter tells us to, and keep our conduct among the

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Gentiles honorable for the sake of that last day. Most people are only focused on the glory of God in salvation itself, not considered how that salvation happens through judgment.

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They are concerned that God be glorified in the salvation of sinners directly apart from judgment, so they are eager to, maybe they often aren't eager to evangelize, but they have a much greater sense of the goodness of evangelism for the sake of saving souls.

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But then they are discouraged when they don't see souls being saved through it.

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This is not the only way God is glorified in your evangelism. He is glorifying himself in judgment at the same time that he is glorifying himself in salvation, and maybe that salvation is only your own salvation.

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And so you should give the gospel to others, not thinking of salvation as being the only end, not the salvation of the individual you speak to as being the only end in which

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God is glorified. He is glorified even when they reject. Now, admittedly,

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I have not read the book yet. I want to read the book, but there's a book out in our tract rack there by Ryan Denton called

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Even If None, and that's the idea behind it, that the gospel should be given even if none repent, and that's a play on the phrase that often people say.

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Even if just one sinner repents, it'll be worth evangelizing. It'll be worth proclaiming the gospel even if just one repents.

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His response to that in that book is, even if none repents, it is still worth it. Here we have the statement here in Isaiah that laying waste mountains and hills goes side by side with him leading the blind.

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These are happening together, and these are happening at the first coming. It is already something that is happening even now.

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So what should you do? What is the response to this? First, of course, you should repent.

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If you have not trusted in the Lord, but you have trust in idols, turn from them. You are, at the moment, there is the reason why the

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Lord is letting you continue is either so that you will be saved because it says that he is patient towards the beloved, and he does not wish for any to perish.

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It is either for your salvation, or it is for you to keep up more and more condemnation against yourself.

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Turn to him today. Join the ranks of those who would trust in Jesus Christ. But then, you should likewise rejoice in judgment.

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You should recognize that much of what is happening in the world, being for the glory of God, is worth your rejoicing.

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You can sing your new song that it describes in verse 10, not just because of what will happen one day, not just because of what has happened in those instances of salvation that you see, but even in the way that God is judging the earth currently through that baptism of fire brought by Jesus Christ.

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There's a reason for rejoicing in all those things. You have many reasons for joy, not just a few small reasons for joy, where the new

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Christian gets excited that they're gonna see many people saved in a way that is unreasonable, given what

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God has spoken about the way being narrow. You do not have to have the wrong expectations about what joy is.

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You can have the right expectations that many will face judgment and rejoice in what

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God is doing, making his glory known, that he is high above all things. And you should, just to make this more alliterative than really needed, repent, rejoice, and restore.

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You should restore others. Those who would be discouraged by the situation they find themselves in, by the surroundings of wickedness, et cetera, you should encourage your brothers and sisters.

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You should restore them. It says in 2 Peter, 2 Peter 2 .12, but, excuse me,

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I've lost the passage, but the passage is the one that says that their condemnation is not asleep, their judgment is not asleep.

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You should encourage one another with this idea that the judgment of those who are opposed to the people of God is not asleep.

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Maybe you act as though it is asleep. It's something that's going to wake up one day. It is not asleep.

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It is gestating, it is growing, but it is not asleep. And these are words that we are given to encourage us.

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Peter does not say that their condemnation is not idle, just to give us some random fact.

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He tells us that in order that we be encouraged even in the situation that we find ourselves in.

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Now, how do you do that? How do you encourage one another in that? It is right to point out the foolishness of the wicked.

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It is right to identify what this passage says about the nature of those who trust in idols, that it is something shameful.

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Now, we should desire the salvation of others, but given that many continue in unrepentance, it is not wrong to point out that foolishness.

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And one of the most encouraging things you can do, especially for those who are men, especially engaged in the front lines of battle in the kingdom of Jesus Christ, is to point out the foolishness of the world, to point out that their judgment is not asleep.

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You know, one of the most encouraging things, because there have been a number of evangelism encounters

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I've had with other men at this church recently. Just a number,

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I won't list them. But one of the most encouraging things, when you're getting discouraged by hearing the, hearing the foolishness of others and all these other voices that are telling you you should be ashamed, when you're trying to point them to the gospel of Jesus Christ, is to remind yourself and others that they are the ones that will be ashamed.

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It is right to point out the foolishness of that and mock it. Now, I'm not saying the way you go about evangelizing is to just mock and deride others, but there is a place for that.

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There is a place for doing what, for being Elisha and the prophets of Baal.

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There is a place for that kind of thing. And one of the best ways that you can encourage others is by reminding of this truth that they will be put to shame.

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It is not you who will be put to shame, who trusted in the gospel of Jesus Christ. We should not be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ because we will not be ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ on that last day.

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But they will be ashamed, and so they should be ashamed. Therefore, let us encourage one another with these words.

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God's judgment is great because it is growing, and it is also something that is taking place even now, even through our salvation.

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It is not just the case that salvation happens through judgment, it is also the case that judgment is happening through salvation, amen.

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Dear Heavenly Father, these are good truths. They are heavy truths. They are truths that you have given to encourage us.

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We are people who don't always think rightly about these things. We ask that you would help us to understand the words of Isaiah, the words of Peter, that we would make our conduct among the

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Gentiles honorable so that on that final day of visitation, they would glorify you most supremely.