“Listen to Me, you who pursue righteousness, you who seek the Lord: Look to the rock from which you were cut, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who gave birth to you in pain. When I called him, he was only one; I blessed him and made him many. For the Lord will comfort Zion; He will comfort all her waste places, and He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and melodious song. Pay attention to Me, My people, and listen to Me, My nation; for instruction will come from Me, and My justice for a light to the nations. I will bring it about quickly. My righteousness is near, My salvation appears, and My arms will bring justice to the nations. The coastlands will put their hope in Me, and they will look to My strength. Look up to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens will vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and its inhabitants will die like gnats. But My salvation will last forever, and My righteousness will never be shattered. Listen to Me, you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is My instruction: do not fear disgrace by men, and do not be shattered by their taunts. For the moth will devour them like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool. But My righteousness will last forever, and My salvation for all generations.” (Isaiah 51:1-8 HCSB)
Growing up is hard. Once we reach a certain stage of maturity, we adults seem to forget just how hard it was. I doubt that we really forget, I think we just don’t want to admit how hard it was. We take those memories and push them down into a sturdy box, close the lid and try really hard to keep them inside. Out of sight, out of mind. But they’re really never very far away. We do everything we can to keep them inside with the lid tightly sealed, but sometimes they surprise us at the least opportune time.
Based on those words, you might think I had a traumatic childhood. But that is just not true. My parents were kind and I was never abused by them or by anyone else. I loved the life I shared with my three brothers and our neighborhood friends. Afternoons filled with bicycles, makeshift ramps to jump any obstacle, daredevil races down dangerous paths, baseball practice and evenings filled with “kick the can” and catching lightning bugs.
But children are not always kind to other children and some adults can be just as cruel. I’ve encountered my share of bullies, children and adults, and I have a few emotional scars from them but nothing debilitating. I just know that most of us look back on our past and we don’t always like what we see. As a parent, I have always wanted my children to have a better life than I did – but I don’t entirely know why. Now the mantra repeated by many young adults is that “adulting” is hard and they’d like to return to their childhood of play and carefree living. But it’s too late for that…
In a similar vein, God calls for His people – those who pursue righteousness, who seek the LORD – to look back on the past to inspire their hope for tomorrow. Listen to Me, remember what I’ve done so that you will trust what I promise to do. My past relationship with you is the basis for the promises I make to you, today. “Look to the rock from which you were cut, the quarry from which you were dug.” But you need to catch and hold onto that conditional phrasing that is so easily overlooked – you who pursue righteousness, who seek the LORD.
This is not a promise to every Israelite ever born in the lineage of Abraham and Sarah. This promise is specifically directed at those who “pursue righteousness, who seek the LORD.” This is a promise to the true children of Abraham, children by faith not by DNA. There were many living in exile who had lost faith and no longer trusted God to keep His promises. They looked at the rubble of Mount Zion, the barren wilderness of a destroyed Jerusalem, and they saw no hope in God’s promises. It seemed that God had let them down. How could He be trusted for their tomorrows?
Our understanding of what God did yesterday and our expectation of what God will do tomorrow determines how we live today.
The problem is that our understanding of yesterday and our expectations for tomorrow are often wrong. It is easy to take the promises of God and to misunderstand how He was fulfilling those promises in our past and how He will bring them to fruition and completion in our future. This is clearly demonstrated in this passage when God qualifies His promise of salvation for those “who pursue righteousness, who seek the LORD.” Not all of Abraham’s natural children are spiritual children by faith – not all pursue righteousness and seek the LORD like their fathers did. Not all who are Israel by birth are Israel by faith.
This is where many modern believers stumble, too. We want to apply God’s promises incorrectly. We try and apply the promises of salvation to people who aren’t pursuing righteousness and seeking the LORD. For example, many well-meaning Christians take the promise of 2 Chronicles 7:14 and try to apply it to America. They often quote it this way, “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, pray and seek My face, and turn from their evil ways, then I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land.” Then they want to apply it to the nation. But just like the promise in Isaiah 51, this passage has a conditional clause: My people, those who are called by My name and are willing to humble themselves before Me, pray, seek My face, and turn from their evil ways, they are the ones whose prayers I will hear, whose sins I will forgive and whose land I will heal.
What is overlooked in that promise is the judgment in the preceding verse: “If I close the sky so there is no rain, or if I command the grasshopper to consume the land, or if I send pestilence on My people…” (2 Chronicles 7:13 HCSB) As I’ve stated before, God’s acts of judgment are always, ALWAYS intended to drive the recipients to repentance and faith in Him. So, the promise in these verses is not unconditional it is covenantal. What does that even mean? God’s covenant is not an unconditional promise to a nation that turns away from Him and goes their own way. It is a promise to a people who pursue Him and His righteousness, and who seek Him above all other desires in life.
So, God’s promise in Isaiah 51 continues as He reminds this righteous remnant not only of the rock from which they were cut, but of the barren wasteland that IS the promise of God. He will “comfort Zion” and “He will make her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the LORD.” It’s hard to look at a pile of rubble and see the shining City of God. It’s hard to look at miles and miles of barrenness and see the garden of God’s delight. God’s promises are always bigger than our wildest dreams and beyond our highest hopes.
If the dreams you’re pursuing and the hope you treasure can be achieved through your own efforts, they aren’t big enough because they aren’t of God. I know, that sounds a bit far fetched, a bit out of bounds. But scripture clearly indicates that the promises of God can only be achieved by God. He doesn’t share His glory with anyone. What you can achieve through your own knowledge, your own skill, your own efforts will be attributed to your own glory. What God does is for His glory and His alone. Abraham and Sarah could NOT have fulfilled the promises of God on their own. It was impossible. They will be instruments in His hand, but the fulfillment of His promise can only be attributed to Him!
What God was going to do in Zion could not be achieved by man, either. If you listen to the description of God’s promise regarding Zion in these verses, you will recognize that what the nation, under the leadership of Ezra and Nehemiah, did was NOT its fulfillment. Jerusalem was marvelously rebuilt, but she was not Eden. Sin still plagued her existence and those walls would fall, once again. No matter how much men marveled at what was achieved, it was not the fulfillment of God’s promise.
Can we look at the barren wasteland, the wilderness of our lives and see the fulfillment of God’s promises? Not in the brokenness and sin that still exists, but in the hope of what is promised for the future.
“This is important, so pay attention… (see v. 4)” That’s precisely what God says to His people, so pay attention. He wants them to pay attention to His word, to listen to Him “for instruction will come from Me, and My justice for a light to the nations.” But why should we pay attention? Because our achievements are fleeting and His are eternal. He tells them to look up at the heavens, to look around at the earth, for all of those things and even its inhabitants will wear out like a garment and die like gnats. But God’s salvation is eternal, His righteousness will never be shattered.
I’m not sure we recognize the sheer magnitude of what God is saying. This physical world is temporal, but He and His word and works are eternal. Everything that you and I say, do and build will fade into the lost memories of a people long dead, but what God says and what He does lasts forever. Because of these facts, “do not fear disgrace by men, and do not be shattered by their taunts.” You and I and everything we achieve will come to nothing just like a garment devoured by moths. That’s a sobering thought given how much we take pride in our personal achievements. That’s truly humbling when you apply it to a lifetime of effort and professional recognition. It’s especially sobering when you seek to write words like these to proclaim God’s truth.
That doesn’t mean God discards our obedience, it means that only through faith are we able to achieve His work. It is only in obedience to Him and in the power of His Spirit that my writing and preaching are able to have an eternal impact. In other words, people are not drawn to faith or found obedient because of me, my words, or my preaching. It is only and ever because of what God’s Spirit does in them. Is God able to use my words? Only as they are His words and not mine. That is both empowering and humbling.
Just for a moment, go back to the child we talked about at the start of this lesson. Whether that child is you or me, it is incapable of being righteous, truly unselfish and good, and understanding the truths of life on its own. As he matures, that doesn’t change much. In fact, those failures may only be exacerbated by age. Remember, adulting is hard. It is! Precisely because of the expectations we place on ourselves and those our culture presses upon us. Some of them are legitimate, some are not. But how do we know which are which?
That’s precisely what God is saying to us: “Pay attention to Me, listen to Me… for instruction will come from Me, and My justice (My judgment, word and laws) will be a light to the nations.” You and I can’t do this effectively on our own. We need help and God is offering it to us. It is only when we begin to realize this and then pursue His righteousness and seek Him above every other desire and need in our lives that we will begin to see hope in tomorrow. When we look back at what God has done and how He has kept His word and fulfilled His promises to those who walk in faith, then we begin to have hope for tomorrow.
I stated above that our understanding of what God did yesterday and our expectation of what God will do tomorrow determines how we live today. If we properly understand God’s past actions and His promises regarding the future, then we will live as God commands. We will not fear disgrace by men, we will not be shattered by their taunts because they are fading away like a garment being eaten by a moth. But what God does in us and through us as we pursue righteousness and seek Him above everything else in life will last for eternity.
“According to God’s grace that was given to me, I have laid a foundation as a skilled master builder, and another builds on it. But each one must be careful how he builds on it. For no one can lay any other foundation than what has been laid down. That foundation is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on that foundation with gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, or straw, each one’s work will become obvious, for the day [of judgment] will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire; the fire will test the quality of each one’s work. If anyone’s work that he has built survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, it will be lost, but he will be saved; yet it will be like an escape through fire.” (1 Corinthians 3:10-15 HCSB)
I recently faced my own mortality during a health crisis. The doctors were quite clear with me that my life was at risk. Fortunately, God was not finished with me just yet. Those kinds of events cause you to question choices you’ve made and the goals you’ve set for your life. I don’t want my children to remember the things I achieved in my professional career, those things are unimportant and fleeting. I don’t even want them to say, “he was a good man.” I want them to remember the things God achieved through my obedience to His purpose. I can honestly say, my life goal is to hear Him say: “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
Let me end with a question or two… When you look at your life, do you see a pile of rubble that’s in desperate need of a master builder? Do you see the potential of what God could do if you were just obedient to His word and honestly desired Him above every other desire in your life?
What you and I do will turn to dust, what He does will last for eternity. Build wisely.
Hilltop Baptist Church - Shawnee, OK 
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