“Pervasive Darkness”
[Isaiah 21:1-17]
February 3, 2019, Second Reformed Church
Come to the wilderness of the sea and hear the Word of God:
The whirlwinds that sweep on from the Negeb – from the desert – are stronger and wilder and darker than the ones that come up from the inhabited lands. They have more time to gain strength and darkness. They fill the land as they move across it and then all is pervasive darkness – nothing can be seen. Yet, somehow, it comes up from the terrible land – darkness has overcome all its obstacles.
God gives Isaiah a stern vision – the traitor is traitorous and the destroyer destroys – the darkness darkens. Who can see?
And God calls the Persians and the Medes to come up to have her sighing relieved
Isaiah is filled with anguish at this news – why – the darkness is pervasive. His legs give way, his stomach is filled with the ache of a woman in the midst of hard labor. He is bowed down in pain and he cannot hear. He is dismayed by God’s Word and he cannot see. He had been looking forward to twilight, but his heart is now erratic, he is filled with horror, darkness has completely enveloped everything.
And the Medes and the Persians – they are preparing dinner – they are laying out rugs to sit on – they eat and drink. The princes oil their shields. They have no concept of the darkness they are in and how pervasive it is.
God sets Isaiah to be a watchman – God tells Isaiah to climb to the watchman’s tower and to watch for what he sees. And, when he sees the riders coming across the horizon – when he sees the first horsemen in pairs – when he sees the riders on donkeys and the riders on camels – then he is to listen diligently – very diligently. As the whirlwind continues to swirl from the terrible land across the desert of the sea, with darkness, heavy darkness, pervasive darkness cutting off all light – he is to listen through the darkness.
And Isaiah stays in the watchtower as the Lord commands. He stands there by day and he stays there through the night. And then, through the darkness – he sees the riders – horsemen in pairs!
And the rider cries out, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon; and all the carved images of her gods he has shattered to the ground.”
And Isaiah says, “O my threshed and winnowed one, what I have heard from the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, I announce to you.”
Babylon is the discipline for our sin – first amongst the sins in the darkness being our idolatry. Any time we put anything in God’s place, we commit idolatry. Any time we make a decision and God has said, but we say, “Nah, I’d rather do this,” we turn deeper into the darkness.
Think about your favorite sin – maybe you don’t like to call it your favorite sin – what sin do you sin the most? Greed? Lust? Lying? Pride? What god do you go to in the darkness?
The idols will be smashed – shattered – and you can walk away and leave them behind, or gather up the pieces and take them with you into Hell.
Isaiah is still in the watchtower when one man from Edom – the nation to the southeast of Judah – sometimes enemies of Judah – arrives and asks when these things will happen.
“What time of the night will it happen? When in the pitch of the darkness will it be?”
And Isaiah tells him, “There will be morning and night again and morning and night again. If you want to know, ask. If you want to know, ask again. If you want to know, come back and ask again. But the time is not yet.”
God tells Isaiah that in the darkness of that darkness the Arabs will be slaughtered – and as they make camps in the wilderness – as they live under the scraggy bushes, Judah is to bring the survivors water and bread – bring the fugitives water and bread. They have survivied the sword and the bow and the men of war.
“For thus the Lord said to me, ‘Within a year, according to the years of a hired worker, all the glory of Kedar will come to an end. And the remainder of the archers of the mighty men of the sons of Kedar will be few, for the LORD, the God of Israel, has spoken.’”
Within a year, the Arabs would be slaughtered to a remnant as the darkness moved over them.
Darkness can symbolize evil and sin, and we see this most profoundly in the death of Jesus:
“Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour” (Matthew 27:45, ESV).
As Jesus hung on the cross, the darkness was allowed to descend on Him – as He bore the sins of all we who believe, and He suffered God’s Wrath for the sin and the darkness we delighted in.
Jesus explains what He came to do to Nichodemus:
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God” (John 3:16-21, ESV).
We are delivered from our bondage to sin and darkness – our Babylon, but we are still drawn towards the darkness – the old man in us still longs for the darkness – it is seductive – it is pervasive – it is a liar.
Paul explains:
“For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
“So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin” (Romans 7:15 -25, ESV).
“The phrase ‘post tenebras lux’ (after darkness, light), a rallying cry of Protestant Reformers, refers to the rediscovery of biblical truth in a time of spiritual darkness. Because the darkness of heresy and immorality constantly creeps in, the church must always be seeking to rediscover the light” (https://www.ligonier.org/learn/conferences/pillars-of-christian-orthodoxy-2011-ligonier-academy-conference/post-tenebras-lux/).
In this life, we are continually drawn towards the darkness, but as believers, we must constantly fight by the power of God the Holy Spirit to turn away from the darkness, to come out of the darkness, to repent of the darkness and sin and evil we desire to pursue – to seek holiness – to seek to be thoroughly cleansed by the Blood of Jesus.
John writes:
“This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us” (1 John 1:5-10, ESV).
Beloved, the darkness – sin and evil – will make itself look like whatever will entice you to follow it into pervasive darkness. It is comfortable and exciting and deadly. And God is Sovereign, even if you and I can’t see through the whirlwind in the dark. Walk in the light as Jesus is in the light.
Let us pray:
Almighty God, You sent Your Son into the darkness we created by turning away from You. Thank You for sending Him to live and die for us, and cause us to turn from the darkness, walk in the light, and seek after holiness. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
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