Bible Talks - Sunday Night Church
Series: On Eagles Wings - Isaiah 1-39 · Talk No. 3
Do you want to see God?
Sunday, 18 July 2004
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1. 2 The vision of God
a Holy, holy, holy (1-4) What would you do if you saw God?
What would you expect if you came face to face with God? What would you expect God to be like? How would you expect to react?
Most of us would probably not spend a great deal of time pondering a question like that. But, a charismatic leader from the States, Roberts Liardon claims to have visited heaven, seen God, and had a water fight with Jesus in The River of Life. He claims that when eight years old, Jesus interrupted him watching TV one day. The description of this ‘visit’ gets weirder and weirder, and harder and harder to believe. Other people over the years have also claimed to have visited heaven and seen God. But the thing that stands out, is how all these descriptions are such a far cry from the Bible’s accounts of people meeting God.
Moses, Ezekiel, the Apostle John are all overwhelmed by the experience, and clearly, an encounter of this kind was not for the fainthearted.
It was commonly held in Isaiah’s day that a human could not ‘see’ God and live – that it was not possible for sinful people to enter God’s immediate presence and survive - such was his holiness.
But this was not strictly the case. Moses was permitted to ‘know’ the Lord face to face and lived to tell the tale.
But it is true that God established the tabernacle and then the temple with the ‘Most Holy Place’, and the system of priests and sacrifices to atone for their sin, all in order to act like a buffer between the presence of God and his people – vital for a holy God to interact with very un-holy humans.
But coming into the presence of God, or seeing God was never to be regarded lightly. In Isaiah 6:1 we read that King Uzziah died, but what it doesn’t mention here is that his death was brought about by his arrogance in coming into God’s presence. This is recorded in 2 Chronicles 26:16-19, and it underscores the extraordinary nature of Isaiah’s experience here as he has this experience of actually meeting God.
Just before we look more closely at that event, some might be wondering why this chapter isn’t the first chapter in the book. After all, it deals with Isaiah’s meeting with God and his commissioning to ministry.
The general feeling among scholars is that the preceding chapter are there to build up the case for Isaiah being commissioned. The case is made for Judah’s judgement at the hand of God, and now Isaiah is commissioned as the precursor to that judgement, proclaiming it to the people, but also the bringer of hope as well.
2. The vision of God
a) Holy, holy, holy (1-4)
Clearly, this is an absolutely remarkable experience for Isaiah! In contrast to King Uzziah, Isaiah sees the Lord God, high and mighty, the one, true king on his throne. This is the central focus of the chapter, and given the context, it is God’s judgement throne that he is sitting on... the time of reckoning has come!
All that is described of God’s appearance is the hem of his robe, and this fills the temple. This is an overwhelming, captivating experience. Isaiah’s whole experience is dominated by God.
The seraphs, or fiery ones, cover their eyes and feet, unable to look upon God. They praise the complete holiness of God. This is the God over all. His presence is not limited to the temple, but fills the earth!
This experience is obviously totally overwhelming to the senses, but I’m not sure we really comprehend that.
We live in a culture which is constantly in search of the next exciting, involving experience. It’s this that drives the Hollywood film industry, it’s this that is pushing DVD and home cinema setups in our homes, and is behind the huge peak in extreme sports – the desire to have an all-enveloping experience so different from our regular, mundane lives.
But the best, most exhilarating sport or entertainment experience cannot come close to this – a personal encounter with the almighty, creator of the universe... Nothing can compare with that...
b) Woe! (5)
So how would you respond to this event? It’s a pretty impossible question isn’t it? We have nothing to compare it with, and so we don’t really know how we would react...
Our efforts to produce the great experience are all based around pleasurable experiences, but clearly, for Isaiah, this is anything but. So what is Isaiah’s response?
The vision of God does not produce a state of ecstasy or bliss, but rather, sheer terror!
Using the language of chapter five when pronouncing God’s judgement on his people (the ‘woes’), Isaiah knows himself to be utterly ruined or lost, for two reasons:
a) He is ‘unclean’ and b) he has seen God, and feared that we would now die
He becomes acutely aware of his own unworthiness, uncleaness and sin . Face to face with God and Isaiah is totally overwhelmed by his sin and unworthiness. It’s also an extraordinary level of identification with his people. You know, we indulge in a great deal of quiet judgementalism, don’t we? We often find ourselves weighing ourselves up to other people in all sorts of circumstances... saying things to ourselves like “I may not be perfect, but at least I’m not like...so and so”. But as Isaiah found out, in the actual presence of God, degrees of sin become totally irrelevant! What can he in his state do? Absolutely nothing.... But what does God do?
c) Not guilty (6-7)
Actually, before we see what God does, there’s an interesting aspect to Isaiah’s response. In one sense, he does do something... His immediate confession of being unclean, like his fellow countrymen, actually sets him apart from them. At least he acknowledges his condition and the right of God to judge him and find him guilty.
Not because of this though, does God proceed with this somewhat strange ceremony of declaring Isaiah’s sin atoned for, or dealt with.
Rather, God has a task for Isaiah to do, and so he is cleansed, not by his own efforts, but by the grace of God.
People often ask me why the ‘approach’ to dealing with God is different in the O.T. compared with the new – meaning the Temple and sacrifices etc. But in reality, while all that has passed away, underneath, the way we ‘deal’ with God and he with us hasn’t changed.
Humans are only ever declared acceptable to God by his grace, and never by what we may or may not do, and in particular, not by any religious ceremony or practise.
What happened to Isaiah in receiving God’s forgiveness was available to all in Israel, as 1:18-19 points out. But as we saw last week, by their arrogance they have cut themselves off from it.
What happens to Isaiah is what must happen to Israel, and what must happen to us all if we are to enter into the presence of God.
3 Whose glory?
Let’s take a short sidetrack for a moment and consider how this vision of God’s glory impacts on us.
Isaiah certainly sees God’s glory in some detail, but who is this God?
Well, you may recall I said in the first week of this series how the book of Isaiah was a foundational book for the N.T... So consider now what the N.T. has to say on the matter:
a. Jesus (John 12:23-41)
John quotes Isaiah 6 (John 12:40-41), and in this context, we can now say that Isaiah saw Jesus’ glory!
I always find these wonderful connections in Scripture just incredible! How can it be? Go back to John 1:1 & 14
Jesus, the pre-incarnate Word, literally radiates God’s glory! Jump forward to Hebrew 1:3 where Jesus makes God known. There is also a link drawn between Isaiah 6 and 53 in John 6:38-40.
Where do we see Jesus’ glory that John speaks of in 12:23, 27-28, 32-33. Well, of course, if you want to see the glory of God, then look to the cross. In the death of Jesus, God’s glory is made plainly evident.
b. More privileged than Isaiah
After reading even just these small sections of the N.T., you wonder how could Isaiah have begun to grasp these things? You and I are so much more privileged. We may not be lifted up to heaven or see visions of the throne room of God, but we can see Jesus!
By faith in the full and final revelation of God – which is Jesus - we have clear access to the Lord of all.
If we come to Jesus, recognising our unworthiness, depending on his mercy, honouring him as King, then he will reach out and touch our lips and make us clean. Jesus, himself, is our sacrifice of atonement.
Don’t misunderstand here. There will come a time when each of us will find ourselves in the presence of God as did Isaiah. And we too will instantly know of our utter unworthiness and uncleaness and understand how deserving we are of God’s anger and judgement. His sheer holiness and perfection guarantees that.
And if you are not a in a living relationship with Jesus, that will be the most terrible day of your existence.
Which is why we must turn to Jesus as the only solution to that. If you have already done so, then ask yourself if your understanding of God lost some of its shine? If the answer is yes, then return to the Word of God.
4. Isaiah’s commissioning
So what impact does this incredible experience of God have on Isaiah? He instantly responds to God’s call to proclaim his message. And what a message it is!
a) Judgment – for a time (8-13a)
(8-10) He is to preach judgment, confirming his people in their rebellion, although it’s described in terms of it’s effects rather than it’s contents.
For how long? (11-13a) Until God has finished his work of judgment. This is no flash-in-the-pan message. Isaiah preaches this message until chapter 39. As a preacher, I can tell you that I’m glad I wasn’t called to preach this message!
b) A glimmer of hope (13b; cf. 8:16)
But... it’s not all totally doom and gloom.
Look more closely (13b). This verse likens the land and it’s people to a tree who’s stump remains after it has been felled. And while the verse as a whole is a little ambiguous, the word ‘seed’ or ‘offspring’ gives the strong suggestion of regrowth. It reminds me of the images you see after fierce bushfire tear through an area, leaving only the blackened, dead-looking skeletons of what were once mighty trees. And just a while later, the impossible seems to happen, and all these green shoots begin emerging from the blackened truck.
So the very end of this extraordinary chapter is positive. God will preserve a remnant. Some will listen to Isaiah’s message and repent (eg. 8:16). The seed will grow – and we’ll see in the next two chapters how central Isaiah himself is to that process.
c) The message that divides
You have to feel some sympathy for Isaiah. It’s an unenviable task he has. People are divided by message he brings from God. Many are confirmed in their sin and rebellion, and their judgment is sealed. But all is not totally lost: to those who repent, like Isaiah, they will receive forgiveness.
5. What message to us?
What do you and I make of this? If it was never mentioned again, then we could at least say that God’s Word came true in the history of Israel – God’s judgement was wreaked in a terrible way on both the northern and southern kingdoms, but the destruction was not total. A remnant did survive to rebuild the nation of Israel again.
But we can go a lot further with this. The New Testament picks up these words and applies them to the ministry of the gospel – something which impacts directly on us as God’s people here and now..
a) The words of Jesus (eg Mark 4:1-20)
Jesus’ teaching in parables like the parable of the sower in Mark 4 divides people on the basis of whether or not they follow him. Those who choose to ignore Jesus have to live with the consequences, and only those who follow Jesus are given the secret of the kingdom of God.
Elsewhere, Jesus speaks of sheep and goats, of people leaving their families and their living to follow him, and so on.
The gospel is divisive. It challenges people to take advantage of God’s grace in Jesus Christ, but warns them of the consequences if they fail to do so.
Sometimes the simplest acts can reveal this nature of the gospel. Just by plucking up the courage to invite someone to Lifeworks can be enough to signal very clearly to our friends or neighbours that we think they need it, that are lacking something in their lives. As some of you know, a refusal of the invitation can be hard to take.
b) The words of the apostles (Acts 28:23-31)
At SNC, we are heading towards the last few weeks of a 26 week series working to the book of Acts. As we have been working our way through that, we get constant reminders of the divisiveness of the gospel. Everywhere that Paul’s visits to preach, he ends up getting thrown out of the synagogue, sometime thrown into jail or even beaten and flogged.
Somewhere along the line in the last few hundred years in western cultures, going to church became respectable. With that, I suspect that the gospel work of the church suffered terribly and lost it’s divisive and cutting edge. The preaching of the gospel continues to divide people.
c) The words of Jesus and the apostles today
As people listen to the message of the gospel today, some will harden their hearts and reject the messenger along with the message. But don’t be discouraged! Consider what Isaiah faced in his day – a lone voice delivering a message that no one wanted to hear.
But this chapter – apart from giving us an awesome view of God – provides us with a picture of his servant Isaiah. He was a man with a big vision of God (v1), a deep awareness of his own sinfulness (v5), a profound experience of God’s saving grace (v7) and a willingness to give himself into the service of God – whatever the cost.
May God help us to be more like Isaiah, as we persevere sharing the good news and praying for God to open people’s eyes to the truth.
