"You Shall Know My Name" Sermon: Isaiah 52:1-6 (manuscript)

 

“You Shall Know My Name”

[Isaiah 52:1-6]

April 11, 2021 YouTube

            We continue our look at Isaiah this morning as we turn to chapter fifty-two. Previously, we saw this back and forth of “awake, awake!” Jerusalem calls for God to awake, awake – to see the dire state she is in as they ready to go into captivity, and God calls on Jerusalem to awake, awake to understand that she is being punished for her sin, yet God is strong to save His people.

            This morning we see, first, Jerusalem is to look like who she is and will be.

            Isaiah repeatedly tells Jerusalem that she is going to be taken into Babylon to be disciplined for her sin. And being taken into captivity is a horrible thing – a painful thing – being taken away from your family and your home and your land and your possessions.  Yet God tells her not to wither away like a shrinking violet.  God tells her to be courageous – to put on the strength that she has as children of God – His chosen people.

“Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion;”

Paul similarly writes to Christians suffering intense persecution and tells them not to give up or to quiver beneath their enemies, but to stand strong in the full armor of God:

“Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,” (Ephesians 6:13-18, ESV).

We are dressed for war by God Himself through Jesus.

And God tells Jerusalem not to merely be dressed in rags, but to put on her best clothes – to look like the person she is – a child of God.

“put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city;”

And Jerusalem could well ask, “How can we stand strong and put on our best clothes – we are sinners and God is disciplining us through the Babylonian exile.  All we can do is tear our clothes and mourn for our sin and the condition we now find ourselves.”

The answer is that God through the Servant Savior makes us able to look like – and be – who we are in Christ.

As Zechariah records:

“Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the LORD said to Satan, ‘The LORD rebuke you, O Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?’ Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. And the angel said to those who were standing before him, ‘Remove the filthy garments from him.’ And to him he said, ‘Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.’ And I said, ‘Let them put a clean turban on his head.’ So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the LORD was standing by” (Zechariah 3:1-5, ESV).

Peter describes believers in this way: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (I Peter 2:9-10, ESV).

Why does God tell Jerusalem to look like who she is?

“for there shall no more come into you the uncircumcised and the unclean.”

Yes, Jerusalem has been taken into captivity and God will discipline her there, but that is not a reason to live as though we are defeated and without hope.  We must remember that we are who we are and who we are to be because God is making us into the Image of His Son.

So, God tells Jerusalem to get up and throw off the rags and the chains – the dust and the bonds around their necks – because God has freed them from their humiliation and slavery – just as we and all believers have been freed.

“Shake yourself from the dust and arise; be seated, O Jerusalem; loose the bonds from your neck, O captive daughter of Zion.”

This is what God does for us after we have gone into a far country and sinned and befouled ourselves.  Do we remember the parable of the two brothers and what happens when the younger brother returns?

“I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.’ And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate” (Luke 15:18-24, ESV).

God tells Jerusalem to throw off their drunken stupor, their self-pity, their filthy rages, and show the world who she is becoming through the Servant Savior.

John writes, “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure” (I John 3:2-3, ESV).

It is not a lie to be as the person you will be.  We who believe are the children of God and no matter what our circumstance may be, we are called – with Jerusalem – to live as though we are now who God is making us to be.  As we live the life and beliefs and actions of who we will be, they become natural to us – we see God working is us – we begin to think and pray and be Christians – little Christs.

That’s not to say we should deny the truth.  No, if our spouse dies, we rightly mourn our spouse. Yet, we do not mourn as those who have no hope.  We mourn in hope that we will be rejoined with our spouse in the Kingdom of God that is coming. So, that even in the depths of our sorrow hope is strong.

So it is with Jerusalem’s discipline and exile.

Through discipline and persecution and hardship – Jerusalem and all believers are called to live – to be – the holy men and women that God is transforming us into as witnesses to the world and as witnesses against the evil one and his followers.

We are to be – and proclaim to the world – who we are in Christ.

Second, Jerusalem shall know God’s Name.

 God tells Jerusalem what is her past, present, and future.

“For thus says the LORD: ‘You were sold for nothing, and you shall be redeemed without money.’ For thus says the Lord GOD: ‘My people went down at the first into Egypt to sojourn there, and the Assyrian oppressed them for nothing.’”

God tells Jerusalem that sending her into exile in Egypt did not make God greater – it did not profit Him anything.  Sending her into Assyria did not make God greater – it did not profit Him anything.  Sending her into Babylon will not make God greater – it will not profit Him anything.  Rather, God sends them to these wicked nations to be disciplined – God sells them for nothing and redeems them back for nothing.  God is under no obligation to the wicked.  He uses them and their wickedness for His purposes.

As Jerusalem is readied to be freed from slavery in Egypt, God says, “Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians’” (Exodus 6:6-7, ESV).

God redeems His people whom He sold for nothing and gives no ransom to the wicked to redeem them.  God would sin to sell His people to the wicked for money, but God righteously uses the wicked to discipline His people. And discipline is always temporary.  God is the God of His people and He will not let them remain in the hands of the wicked forever.

God then turns His thoughts to the impending Babylonian exile.

“’Now therefore what have I here,’ declares the LORD, ‘seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Their rulers wail,’ declares the LORD, ‘and continually all the day my name is despised.’”

Given that God is neither made greater by selling His people into captivity, nor is He made less by redeeming His people, what is the response of the wicked?

When the wicked understand that they gain nothing and are conquered by God in the end, they wail against God and despise God’s Name.

That does not merely mean that they despise the name “God,” but that they despise everything about God – all His Attributes.  The wicked hate God for being good, omniscient, omnipotent, loving, faithful, and so forth.  Everything that can rightly be said about God they spit on and try to force down into the mud.

What is God’s response to the wicked doing this?

“You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain” (Exodus 20:7, ESV).

The Babylonians think they have a right to keep Jerusalem, but she has no right to keep her – God sent her there for a period of discipline for her good – not for the good or the profit of Babylon, so Babylon despises the Name of the Lord in vain.

In despising God’s Name – in taking God’s Name in vain – in despising everything that makes God God – His very Being – God holds them guilty of cosmic treason – a debt they will have to pay themselves, if they do not receive the Servant Savior as their God and Savior.

But the people of God Who believe in the Servant Savior and bow to His discipline will be redeemed in the future soon and in the future on the last day.

“’Therefore my people shall know my name. Therefore in that day they shall know that it is I who speak; here I am.’”

As Jerusalem sees God work in her life – and as all we believers do – we know the Name of God more fully – we understand God in all His Attributes more fully.  We understand more of what it means that God is Holy, Loving, Faithful, and so forth.  And as we know the Name better, we simultaneously know that He is God Who speaks His Word to us, and God is here with His people.

God calls all His people to be who they are and who they are becoming accord to the promises of God as the Holy Spirit works within us and we strive after Christ-likeness. And as the Holy Spirit works within us, we know God’s Name more fully.

As Paul writes:

“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained” (Philippians 3:12-16, ESV).

Let us pray:

Almighty God, we thank You for choosing us to be Your people.  As difficult as it may be, we bow before Your discipline of us and ask that You would help us to stand before the world as a witness to who we are in Christ and who we are becoming to Your Glory.  We thank You for the revelation of Your Name, and we ask that the Holy Spirit guide us to understand the Scripture and know Your Name even more fully.  For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.