Isaiah 66 Verses 1 – 13

August 28, 2024 • Pastor Matt Korniotes • Isaiah 66:1–13

Isaiah Chapter 66 Verses 1 – 2 ·    I call this the perfecting of perspective because this is not so much the lens through which everything makes sense (God’s ways are higher than ours), but this is the lens of longevity. All that we deal with, situation, relationships, problems, even blessings and victories, in the end all that will remain is that which is of the Kingdom of God. To realize that now is wisdom…, (and you need to know this!) maybe not practically for today…, might cause you great inconvenience today, but it’s later…, it’s later to be revealed the true importance of really everything… ·    Guzik says it this way and I like this, “We can never understand much of anything until we understand that God is enthroned in heaven, and the earth is commanded by His sovereignty….” ·    God’s house, God’s place of rest… In the Hebrew, “where is God’s family, where is God’s place of still… Where does He stop and remain,” (in the Hebrew this word speaks even of matrimonial relationship). The answer is one who is poor and of a contrite spirit, and who trembles at His word. ·    Poor, the word doesn’t mean to be without. The word means to be humble, to accept and step into an existence of lowliness. Setting one’s importance less than another. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10:1, “Now I, Paul, myself and pleading with you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ, who in presence am lowly among you…” ·    But what if they’re rude? What if they don’t serve me? What if they don’t believe what I believe? What if they do wrong by me? Do you belong to Jesus or not? This is where God makes His name known. In this house. The heart of the poor. ·    And contrite. This word means straight up stricken! Those that are cut up by the world and by others and yet they don’t hide their backs (God help me with this)! Why? Because they have chosen to be lowly and that choice will always include abuse… Harm… Disregard… All of this so much looks like Jesus! (Still wanting to walk in Romans 12:1-2?) Tough stuff!! ·    And who trembles at My word! There are many reasons why one might tremble. Excitement, fear, temperature…, the person that just loves to be warmed in Spirit by the word of God… But what is more obvious and yet less plain here is that trembling is a physical response… ·    Jesus said in John 13:16-17, “Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.” God takes no pleasure and builds no relationship and works no mighty works in the lives of those who simply hear and believe and yet do not do. To tremble at the Word of God is to hear the Word and obey it… A physical response to what God has said. A manifestation, a bringing forth of a reality of a life in response AND alignment to God’s Word… ·    And perhaps the most impactful statement of all…, “For all these things My hand has made, and all those things exist, says the Lord.” Relationship with God and the blessings of God is far less what you do and far more what you surrender. My part is to surrender…, and it is God that works and builds and establishes! Isaiah Chapter 66 Verses 3 – 4 ·    Can I just say something about these verses…? Religion without commitment of heart is nothing more than narcissism. Narcissism is simply the service of self and the reason its called narcissism or perhaps why I’m calling this form of religion by that name and not pride is because the person doing it somehow is unaware of it… Well, not somehow. They’ve not cared for so long that it’s just not even close to an awareness presently. ·    The narcissist can be identified very very very very very simply. In the face of what is right, they chose to do what is right…, for them. Paul wrote of this condition in 2 Timothy 3:5 and 7, “Having a form of godliness but denying its power…, from such people turn away! Always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” ·    Hearing the Word, studying the ways and the will of God, learning even the heart of God and yet when the rubber meets the road, when it comes time to honor the Lord or honor themselves…, well, you know what I’m going to say. They honor themselves. ·    God says to us here that all of their works, all of their sacrifices, all of the service in the ministry…, it’s just simply not acceptable because although you do so much you refuse the change of heart power and authority of God in your life! ·    Jesus crushed this topic in Matthew 23:23-33, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel! “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also.” ·    “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’ Therefore, you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell?” ·    Simple answer, revelatory issue if you don’t defend, deflect or deafen…, do YOU choose that which God delights? This is the second time it has come up in this book. Last time was the previous chapter, verse 12. Sin is not the act of wickedness only. It is also the heart that does not seek to be challenged, altered and changed constantly by the strength of the relationship you say you have with Jesus. In fact, that sin is by far the worst because it is a condition of the heart from which all other sin flows… This is what God is trying to talk to us about here… Isaiah Chapter 66 Verses 5 – 6 ·    What’s interesting is that as I went through that last point of study in the previous verses, the folks that have and do bow their heart to Jesus and allow Him the right to call them to account and allow Him the right to lead them into a better heart, as I went through that last bit of scripture, you weren’t convicted as much as you were hurting…, like someone brought up something that was done against you in the past… ·    Why? Because nothing hurts a follower of Jesus more than followers of Jesus that deny His worthiness. Nothing hurts more. It’s just like the saints that come out of the Great Tribulation who are situated under the alter in Heaven calling out to God day and night, “How long Lord!?” God says, “Your brethren that hated you…” But all the brethren in the Body of Christ that do not strive forward to delight the Lord would all say, “I don’t hate them! I’ve never hated them!” But that’s just your narcissism talking… It hits like hate to those who are on the receiving end of you serving your own delight rather than God’s… ·    I know some can’t hear or receive or understand that…, Until your heart finds a knee in front of the throne of God in Jesus…, His will, His way, His words, until that moment, your ears just simply don’t work. Your understanding to this is darkened… You can understand and process a ton…, a form of godliness absolutely, but never able to see the harm caused to yourself, those you love and the heart of God…, and that is precisely why God gives us these verses… To comfort those who mourn in this present evil age with the promise of what WILL come! Isaiah Chapter 66 Verses 7 – 13 ·    This makes it entirely clear that the woman ready to give birth described to us in Revelation 12 was and is indeed Israel and the birth coming forth is the Messiah! ·    What does God do? He comforts those who groan in this present age by long-casting to what will come AND by reminding us NOW of the Messiah who HAS COME into this world. Giving us that not only as a present hope and encouragement but a reminder of His faithfulness! ·    Can a nation be born at once!? Absolutely! 2600 years later! At once, May 14, 1948 Israel was born again and all those today who live for today yes but live for today from a position of the coming Kingdom, all of y’all today can look to Israel and allow even the fact that they are on the map to comfort you as a parent would comfort their child!