"Songs of the Savior - Given for Our Salvation" Isaiah 49 Sunday Morning Worship Service

Morning, why don't you open your Bibles now to Isaiah in chapter 49?

Let me echo Tom and wishing all of the women of our church a very happy Mother's Day.

It was four years ago that my wife and I moved here to be part of a manual Bible church.

Um we had a nine-month-old and we were practically newlyweds or so felt ourselves.

And in the last four years, we have found a body of people who have opened their lives to us, and we're so thankful.

We belong to a church in which men and women who love Christ have opened their lives to us and have served as examples to us in our faith.

So I want to express from my family to yours what a wonderful, what a wonderful gift belonging to this church is.

I hope that you have sunk roots here and you have likewise found people who are sharing their lives with you.

Well, this morning, our passage, Isaiah 49, is not a Mother's Day passage per se, but it is a passage about the infinite love of a God who, in fact, even in this text we'll see this morning, compares himself to a loving mother.

And I trust that this morning, as we read God's word, the Lord will encourage our hearts together.

So let's begin by doing that.

Let's begin by reading God's word.

Look down in your Bibles and follow with me as I read our passage for this morning, beginning in verse one of Isaiah 49.

Listen to me, O Koslins, and give attention, you peoples from afar.

Yahweh called me from the womb, from the body of my mother he named my name.

He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me, he made me a polished arrow, in his quiver he hid me away.

And he said to me, You are my servant Israel, in whom I will be glorified.

But I said, I've labored in vain, I've spent my strength for nothing and vanity, yet surely my right is with Yahweh, and my recompense with my God.

And now Yahweh says, He who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him, and that Israel might be gathered to him.

I am honored in the eyes of Yahweh, and my God has become my strength.

He says, It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel.

I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.

Thus says Yahweh, the Redeemer of Israel and his holy one, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers.

Kings shall see and arise, princes, and they shall prostrate themselves because of Yahweh, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.

Thus says Yahweh, in a time of favor I've answered you, in a day of salvation I've helped you, I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people, to establish the land, to apportion the desolate heritage, saying to the prisoners, Come out, and to those who are in darkness, appear.

They shall feed along the way, on all the bare heights will be their pasture, and they shall not hunger or thirst, neither scorching wind nor sun shall strike them, for he who has pity on them will lead them, and by springs of water will guide them.

And I will make all my mountains a road, and my highways shall be raised up.

Behold, these shall come from afar, and behold, these from the north and from the west, and these from the land of Syin.

Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth.

Break forth, O mountains, into singing, for Yahweh has comforted his people, and he will have compassion on his afflicted.

This is God's word.

For the month of May, we've been exploring a series of texts from the prophet Isaiah that are commonly called the servant songs.

It's a series of Old Testament poems that describe a mysterious servant figure, a figure whom the New Testament authors identify as the Lord Jesus Christ.

And so these Old Testament poems are songs that exalt and depict for us the Lord Jesus Christ and his glory.

And what we find in this particular psalm in Isaiah and 49 is a sweeping vision of the Lord Jesus and the way he accomplishes all of God's plans for salvation for his people and the whole of creation.

But I think really what we see in this text is a vision of the heights of the love of God.

And as we walk through this text this morning, I think that if we examine this text and probe it, we will learn not just what this text has to say about the heights of God's love, but also how to apply that love to the depths of our hearts.

I think this, as we walk through this text, we'll learn that we need to do that.

And we will do it if we learn to look forward to something and to look back to something.

What are those some things?

Well, we'll find that as we walk through this text, and we'll do that by just following the outline as this poem unfolds for us.

As we walk through this text, I'll give you some hooks to hang your thoughts on.

We're going to see in this, in this little poem, the servant's selection, struggle, and success.

We'll walk through those elements of this poem.

Let's begin with the first one.

Let's look at the servant's selection.

That begins in verse 1.

Look down in your Bibles with me.

Notice in verse 1, what we find in verses 1 through 6 is going to be a dialogue between the servant and the Lord God.

And the very first verse tells us who the audience is to be for this dialogue.

Look in verse 1 and here.

Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar.

Do you see who the audience is?

It's the whole world.

All peoples from afar, from all the coastlands, the far-flung parts of the globe, which, from the perspective of the Middle East author, Middle Eastern author of this poem, that would be us.

We are to listen to this dialogue.

And as we continue to read from verses one through six, the dialogue that unfolds for us is taking place in heaven, an eternity past between God, the Lord Yahweh, and his servant.

The first four verses are the servant's part in this dialogue, and then verses five and six are God the Father's part in this dialogue.

You notice what the servant says in verse one.

He says, The Lord called me from the womb, from the body of my mother.

You see what he's saying?

Is that the Lord has called me, that is, commissioned me for a particular task.

He's given me something to do, he's given me a mission.

And he's named my name.

And the reason that he has done this, sent the servant into the world to be born from a mother's womb, is because of verse 2.

He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me.

He made me a polished arrow, and in his quiver he hid me away.

And you notice what's happening in verse 2 is the servant is describing that the reason that God is giving me this mission, I'm going to be born in the world, I'm going to come through a mother's womb.

It's because of a particular relationship that I have with God.

So you notice, let's just make a couple observations about verse 2.

Notice the first line, he says, He made my mouth like a sharp sword, and then two lines later, in his he made me a polished arrow.

That is, he's made me strong, sharp, and capable of speaking and acting for God.

And then as I said, the reason that he's done this is because of this unique relationship that I have with the Father.

Notice in verse 2.

In the shadow of his hand, he hid me.

In his quiver, he hid me away.

What's happening there?

That's poetic language to describe the nearness and intimacy that this servant has had in his relationship with the Lord from even before being sent into the womb of his mother.

Do you see what's happening?

This is a dialogue that is taking place between the servant and the Lord God from even before the servant's time of entrance into this world.

For even before the servant's entrance into his mother's womb, he has had intimate relationship with God, hidden in his hand, in the very, in the very depths of his heart.

And because this servant is standing in this unique relationship to God, he's uniquely suited to accomplish a purpose, a task.

And we'll see what that task is as we walk through the rest of this poem.

But before we get there, we ought to ask this question: what is this servant's name?

Who is this?

Well, verse 3 tells us, look down at your Bibles at verse 3.

We read the servant recounting, He, the Lord, said to me, You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.

That ought to raise a question.

Describing a servant who, even before entering into the world, has had an intimate relationship with God the Father, where they're sharing unique communion even before time, and that's Israel?

This nation?

Is that who's being identified in verse 3?

And in fact, that if we read the rest of the poem, we'll find that that's not the best way to identify this servant Israel.

Notice in verse five.

He who formed me from the womb to be his servant to bring Jacob back to him, that Israel might be gathered to him.

This servant named Israel is being commissioned to bring Israel back to God.

Notice in verse 6, it's too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Israel and bring back the preserved of Israel.

And so in verse 6, we find a very explicit statement that this servant has a task to bring back the corporate nation of Israel.

In other words, this servant Israel is not a body or group of people.

And we saw this in the last servant songs, Isaiah 42, that there is a concept taking place in each of these songs in which this individual servant becomes so closely identified with a group of people that he can act on their behalf, in their place, and even bear their name and share their identity.

And so God addresses this person as Israel because he shares in their identity and acts for them.

I think this concept would be worth exploring a little bit more.

Just turn back in your Bibles to Isaiah 44 for a moment.

Just turn back a couple pages, Isaiah 44, and I want to read a few verses for you because if we zoom out just a bit, what we'll find is that these verses that we're reading in Isaiah 49 are really intended to begin to try to help us understand a tension that Isaiah has been building as he has written this book.

And you come across a text like Isaiah 44, and we'll read verses 21 to 23.

There's a significant tension being built.

Notice verse 21.

Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant.

I formed you, you are my servant, O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me.

Okay, so the corporate people, Israel, is God's servant, and they won't be forgotten.

Verse 22, the Lord says, I blotted out your transgressions like a cloud, and your sins like mist.

Return to me, for I've redeemed you.

So somehow God is going to forgive their sins and bring them back.

And the result of that is in verse 23.

Sing, O heavens, for Yahweh has done it.

Shadow depths of the earth, break forth into singing, O mountains, O forest, and every tree in it, for Yahweh has redeemed Jacob, and will be glorified in Israel.

So Israel is his servant, God's going to forgive their sins and bring them back, and the whole creation will celebrate it.

Alright, that's nice.

But how?

This text doesn't tell us how, it just asserts that it will happen and lets the tension hang.

And expects you to keep reading.

And you read a few chapters ahead and you come to chapter 49, and you discover that there is an individual so identified with Israel that he shares their name, and he will act in such a way so as to bring Israel back to God.

And in fact, he will act in such a way so that their sins will be blotted out like a mist, and they will return to God, and all of creation will shout.

You'll notice verse 13 is almost a verbatim quotation from chapter 44 and verse 23.

Sing for joy, O heavens, and exalt, O earth, break forth, O mountains, into singing.

That same language that's being picked up again is meant to connect us and say, look, the way that Israel is going to have their sins forgiven and be restored to God is through this individual who is going to identify with them, act on their behalf to save them.

That's what the servant has to tell us about his mission.

That he has forever been an intimate relationship with God, but at some mysterious time, the Lord and the servant agreed that the servant would be called to come into the world born of a woman to act to save God's people.

The conversation just keeps going on because it doesn't just tell us the servant's part in this dialogue, it also tells us the Lord's part in the dialogue.

And we find that in verses five and six.

So I want to notice the Lord's perspective on the servant's selection.

Notice verse five says, He who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him, and that Israel be gathered to him.

For I'm honored in the eyes of the Lord, and my God has become my strength.

He says, It's too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and bring back the preserved of Israel.

So yes, this servant is going to act to bring back the people of Israel.

But now verse 6 says, But that's not enough.

That's too light.

Not just one nation.

I will make you a light for all the nations that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.

That's the call that God has given to the servant, is not just to restore one people Israel, but to restore all the nations and bring them to God.

In other words, this servant is being commissioned to fulfill all of God's purposes for salvation.

And you know how this servant is able to do that?

Because he's a person unlike any other.

That's a provocative statement.

Because if you read through the Bible, and particularly in the book of Isaiah, over and over and over, you will see affirmations that the Lord is salvation, that God is the only Savior.

You read texts like Isaiah chapter 12, which is this resounding cry of what God's people will say in the new heavens and new earth, they'll say, The Lord has become my salvation.

Isaiah 12 · chapter mention

He alone is salvation.

And now this text says, But I will make the servant my salvation.

In other words, this servant is so bound up, so identified with God, that this servant can act for him.

The New Testament writers pick this up and say that this servant, the Lord Jesus, is the very exact representation of his nature, the radiance of his glory.

That's what God thinks of this servant, but he doesn't stop there.

He goes back, if you flip over in your Bibles, to verse 5, and he utters another incredible line that again is easily glossed over, but we ought to notice.

Look in your Bibles at the end of verse 5.

There's this little line tucked away wherein God says, or rather, the servant is recounting God's view of him and says, I am honored in the eyes of Yahweh.

I am honored in the eyes of Yahweh.

You know the significance of that?

Comes in tracing the way that this little phrase gets used throughout the Bible.

In the eyes of the Lord is a little expression that occurs over and over in the Bible.

So if you read through the book of Kings, you will notice that at the end of the life of every king of Israel or king of Judah, there's a summary that the narrator gives.

This king did good in the eyes of the Lord, or this king did wickedly in the eyes of the Lord.

And that's that refrain gets altered on rare occasions.

For example, in Genesis 6, you read through your Bible and you find that Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.

But there is only one figure in the entire Bible who is honored in the eyes of the Lord.

In fact, the word that's rendered here honored usually is rendered glory, glorified.

But there is only one person who by his very nature and essence and existence is glorious, honored in the eyes of Yahweh.

It is this servant.

Now let's just back up a little bit.

What we're being called to listen to in these verses is a conversation between the servant and the father before eternity, in which the father is expressing how this servant is glorious in his eyes.

He's so wrapped up in me, he is me.

He's so identified with me, he is me.

He's the radiance of my glory, the exact expression of my nature, he is my salvation.

But I want, the Lord says, to save a sinful people for myself.

And the way that I will do that is I will lose you, I will give you up.

And the servant chooses to pick up that task and accept it and say, I will enter into the world, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law so that they might become children of God.

What's happening is this servant, who is for eternity been so identified with God that he is God, is choosing to leave his home, come into the world, and become so identified with sinful people that he can represent them and make them partakers of his own nature.

The Savior that God has given for your salvation, the Savior that God selected to give for your salvation, is so identified with himself that he is himself.

And when God gave us his son Jesus Christ, he gave him so that when we come to him, we come to God.

There's one other little application that we ought to make from these verses, an application for how we appropriate these in daily life.

And that is in verse 6.

It's a line that we've made a couple observations about, but we ought to apply it in this way.

If you notice at the end of verse 6, look down at your Bibles, that last line in verse 6 reads, This is the Lord speaking to his servant.

Let me ask you a question.

Does that read to you like a command?

If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus, if you are Christian, when you read that, do you hear that as a command to you?

Because the apostles did.

In Acts chapter 13 and verse 47, when Paul was preaching in Antioch, he quoted this text and said, For the Lord has commanded us, saying, I've made you a light for the Gentiles that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.

Acts 13 · chapter mention

Paul interpreted this as a command to Christians.

What?

How is this a command?

And we answer that question by just asking a little bit of an indirect question.

Let me ask you this.

If you are a Christian according to the Bible, where are you?

In God's eyes, according to the Bible, if you are a Christian, where are you?

Read through the New Testament, what you find over and over and over is that the New Testament describes Christians as being in Christ, united with Christ.

When you become a Christian, you die to your old self, you rise to a new life, and this new life is united to Jesus Christ, so that you become a partaker of the divine nature, Peter says.

You are united with Jesus Christ, so that when God looks at you, he sees you in Christ, possessing his righteousness, and all of his favor and all of his love are on you.

God is 100% on your side because you are in Christ.

And because you are in Christ, not only does his life, his love belong to you, but so does his mission.

His mission belongs to you too.

And Christ's mission is to save a people from every tribe, tongue, and nation, is to save his people from every part of the globe.

That's Christ's mission.

And now because you're in him, it's yours too.

That ought to change the way we live.

That ought to affect the way that we interact with people in our family, in our neighborhood, in our workplace.

That ought to ought to affect the major life decisions that we make.

And the small day-to-day decisions that we make.

And perhaps maybe it's appropriate on a Mother's Day to remember, especially that this affects the very, very small things that we do.

Do you know that God is a God who in Scripture says he does not despise small things?

I'm reminded of a story that I heard when I first became a Christian about a missionary named John Patton, who went to a small island in the South Pacific.

It was then the New Hebrides Island, now part of the nation of Vanuatu.

I think that's how you pronounce it.

You can correct me later.

This small island was famous or perhaps infamous for a population that occasionally practiced cannibalism.

And he went there to share the news of the salvation of Jesus Christ, and he suffered much.

He lost his wife, and it was only after a very long period of time, after years, that he began to see fruit and people coming to love and worship Jesus Christ along with him.

And in the course of that very difficult period of ministry, this man exuded joy, confidence in the sovereign goodness of God.

And as a new believer, this rocked my world.

And I started to ask the question, where in the world does this come from?

And in fact, he begins to give little answers in his autobiography.

He says he first learned this.

The seeds of this kind of huge view of God were first planted in him by hearing his mother pray.

He says that I grew up in a home with a mother who talked to a sovereign and good God.

And before I ever had any profound theological categories in my mind, I knew God was sovereign and good because of the way my mom talked to him.

And he recounts little anecdotes of periods such as when uh Scotland experienced a potato famine, and he recounts his mother telling him and his siblings to pray.

Oh my children, love your heavenly father.

Tell him in faith and prayer all your needs, and he will supply your wants so far as it shall be for your good and his glory.

Those are little seeds.

God does not despise small things.

God will honor every seed that you plant.

This first section of Isaiah 49 wants to expand our view of the Savior we worship.

An infinite being forever identified with God, who chooses to humbly identify with you and now calls you to partner with him in his eternal and divine mission to make his salvation known.

That's the servant's selection.

But we should hurry on because the text also tells us not just about his selection, but also his struggle.

And that occurs in verse 4, the little verse that we skipped over, so go back to verse 4.

You remember those first three verses, the servants, he's on a roll.

He's recounting how he's forever had this relationship with God and God's called him for this mission in the world.

But then we get to verse 4, and all of a sudden there's an abrupt but verse 4, but I have labored in vain.

I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity.

The servant feels discouraged.

He's forever been an infinitely glorious community with God, and now he's in the world trying to fulfill God's mission, and it seems like it's going nowhere.

In fact, the words that he chooses are really colorful words.

The first, one of these words you'll read in your Bibles as vanity, might ring a bell from the opening verses of the book of Ecclesiastes, in which Solomon describes life under the sun apart from God as vanity.

Vanity of vanities, he says, all is vanity.

And this word literally means breath.

The idea is if you were to go outside on a cold day and blow and see the fog from your breath and try to grab hold of it, you come up empty.

And so the servant says, as God has sent me into the world to fulfill this mission for him, it feels like I'm groping after my breath on a cold day.

Vanity.

But his struggle goes even more when you come to verse 7.

Notice in the way that the Lord addresses the servant in verse 7, he says that he's speaking to one deeply despised and abhorred by the nation.

He feels like all of his work is in vain, and he's experiencing rejection.

He's even despised and abhorred.

So where does he turn?

How does he respond?

Notice that in verse 4.

Just as he says, I feel like I have spent my strength in vain for nothing in vanity.

He then resolves at the end of the verse.

He resolves to remember who God is and what he's promised.

He says, Yet surely my right is with Yahweh, and my recompense is with my God, so personal.

The God that he's forever shared communion with.

He knows who he is, and he knows what he has promised.

In the midst of this struggle, he remembers who his God is, and he remembers what he has promised, and he chooses to believe it.

What is he promised?

What is God's promise?

What is the servant's father promised?

Verse 7.

Notice at the end of verse 7.

Thus says Yahweh, the Redeemer of Israel and his holy one to one deeply despised and abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers, here's his promise.

Kings shall see and arise, princes and they shall prostrate themselves because of Yahweh, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel who has chosen you.

You know what the promise is?

You will succeed.

I will save my people through you.

Your work is not in vain, though it may seem so for a while, I will succeed.

Jesus, for the joy that was set before him, despised the shame and endured the cross and now seat is now seated at the right hand of God.

And that throne has become a throne of grace.

Where a Savior who has suffered in every way that you have, yet without sin, bids you come to me.

Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden.

I'll give you rest, I'll give you grace, I'll supply your need.

All my promises are true, are yes and amen, because you are in me.

You have the Savior who has left the heights of heaven, plummeted to the depths of hell, is back in heaven and is now saying, Come to me, I will help you.

I sympathize with you, and I have the strength to supply every need of yours.

That's the servant's struggle.

It's a struggle that he endured for you, and now he offers to endure your struggles with you.

This is an incredible servant, but this passage still isn't done revealing him to us.

We've seen his selection, his struggle, and finally the end of the poem reveals to us his ultimate success.

The third thing in this poem we'll find is the servant's success, and that runs from verses eight through thirteen.

And let me just begin by reading verse eight.

Look in your Bibles at verse eight and follow with me.

We read this: Thus says Yahweh, in a time of favor I've answered you, in a day of salvation I have helped you.

I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people to establish the land and to apportion the desolate heritages.

Yahweh is promising, I'm going to fulfill my purposes, and what exactly is my ultimate end here?

He uses this language that I'll answer you in a day of salvation.

That sounds a little generic, doesn't it?

The Bible talks a lot about salvation.

I'll answer you in a day of salvation, so nothing special.

But in fact, when you examine scripture, you'll find that this is a unique phrase that is used only one time in the entire Hebrew Bible.

The whole Old Testament, day of salvation occurs one time.

And what this term is used for is this idea that God is going to fulfill all of his ultimate plans for salvation, not just to forgive his people from their sins, but to restore the entire created world and bring them into an endemic paradise where they will enjoy fellowship with God and one another in a perfect world forever.

That's what the day of salvation is, and he's saying, I will finish it.

And so what we have here in the Servant's Success is that we have, through his struggle, comes the ultimate goal to redeem a people from their sins and bring them into an everlasting kingdom where they will reign with God forever and ever.

And what you find as you read through verses 8 to 13 are incredible images of the paradise God is preparing for us.

What I would love to do is I would love to show you how all of these images connect with texts that come before Isaiah and after Isaiah and the scripture, the Holy Spirit, who authored the scripture, weaves together an incredible tapestry that displays for us the beauty of the paradise where God will reign with his people forever.

That would be awesome.

But it's Mother's Day and you have lunch plans.

So let me just give you a snapshot of what this text is trying to convey to us.

You'll notice the end of verse 8 that he's going to establish the land and then in verse 13, sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth.

That little metonymy, heavens and earth, is speaking all-encompassing.

God's going to restore the creation.

He's going to fix everything that's broken in the world.

New heavens, new earth is where Isaiah 66 ends.

God says he'll make a new heavens, new earth.

And just as it'll last forever, so you will last forever before me.

And that's the key in this text, too, is that not only will God create a heavens and an earth, but he'll redeem a people who will enjoy it with him forever.

You see that kind of language at the end of it will really in verse 9, where the servant will say to prisoners, Come out, and to those who are in darkness, appear, and they'll feed along the ways on all bare heights, that'll be their pasture.

They'll not hunger or thirst, no scorching wind or sun will strike them.

All pain and misery will be removed.

For he who has compassion on them will lead them.

That's shepherding language.

God who has compassion on his people will be with them and tenderly care for them.

He'll bring them by springs of water and he'll guide them.

Let me just read one verse for you.

John, in his vision in Revelation chapter 7, where there's a people of every tribe, tongue, and nation worshiping before the throne, he says that there they will hunger no more, they'll thirst no more, the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat.

Revelation 7 · chapter mention

That sounds familiar.

For the lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

Do you know what this text is saying to you?

If you are in Jesus Christ, this is your future.

This is your hope.

As we've walked through this text, we have seen that the God who has given us his very self and giving his son for our salvation is a God of infinite love, of expansive love, that stretches the imagination, that's more than you could ever hope, think, or imagine.

And here at the end of this passage, what he's telling you is if you want that love to reside in the depths of your heart right now, then you need to look forward to this.

Your great hope, your great anticipation cannot be something in this life.

It must be what God is preparing for you.

It must be what Christ died for, which is more than this world.

And you know you must lift your eyes from this world, not only because this world has a gnawing effect on your soul, but also because if you hope in this world, you will lose it.

As a student pastor, every fall, I get a new batch of students, many of whom are athletes, and all of them eagerly anticipate their season because at the beginning of a season, no matter what happened last year, it's blank slate, and you feel like this could be our year, we could win.

And inevitably, about October, November comes around, and some of those kids have been shellacked by the conference powerhouse, and no longer can they win the conference or the championship.

But do you know what?

They all still say, but I'll just keep playing because it's sports and it's fun.

That makes good sense to me.

But do you know that life is not like sports?

When what you're hoping for is taken away, you won't just say, Well, I'll just keep living it because it's fun.

Life, love it.

Inevitably, if what you put your hope in, if what you're anticipating in this life is something in this world and it is taken away, you will find yourself desperate, despondent, and despairing.

Because you were not made for this world, and if you hope in it, you will lose it.

But do you know you must also not put your hope in this world but in the next, also because you could keep it.

It could be that God's will is for you to keep your stuff in this world, and do you know that might actually be even worse?

And C.S.

Lewis's classic little book, the screw tape letters, it's a series of little fictional letters between a couple demons trying to trip up a Christian in his walk.

One of those letters, the elderly experienced demon instructs his younger nephew to make sure that this person he's trying to trip experiences prosperity in the world.

He writes that if as the years advance he proves prosperous, our position is even stronger in his life.

Prosperity knits a man to the world.

He feels that he's finding his place in it while really it is finding its place in him.

As a reputation expands and our acquaintances and friends grow, we find work that we love and find meaning and purpose in, we begin to feel at home in this world.

Brothers and sisters, the Apostle John says, Beloved, do not love the world or the things in the world.

If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

This infinite love of God will not share space in your heart.

The love of Christ and the love of this world cannot reside in the same heart.

If you would know the infinite love of God in the depths of your hearts, you must pick your eyes up from this world and hope in what is coming.

But now I anticipate that if your heart is like mine, sooner or later, your heart will voice an objection.

That's cool.

You just described some nice stuff.

But what about now?

What about right now?

And in fact, God wants to answer that objection.

You'll notice that after 13 verses in Isaiah 49 of this exalted poetic language describing the depths and the heights of God's love and what he's planned for the future, he ends it with an objection to everything he's just said.

Look at verse 14.

But Zion said, Yahweh has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me.

Has your heart ever echoed that?

Sooner or later it will.

And God wants to deal with you just where you are.

And what we're going to find in the next two verses is that what God tells you is you need not only to look forward to something, but you also need to look back on something.

Notice verse 15.

Here's God how he begins to answer.

He says in verse 15, can a woman forget her nursing child that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb?

Can a woman forget her nursing child?

Elementary biology answer, no, not possible.

She can try, she won't be comfortable.

She can't physically, not possible to forget.

Emotionally, inconceivable.

A mother's love is powerful emotionally, psychologically, and it's an unconditional love.

Unlike a marriage in which there is a give and take necessary, a mother's love for a child is she gives and the child takes.

And this love that is unbreakable, God says there's something even higher still.

Look at verse 15.

Even these may forget, but I will never forget.

That's the first thing he wants to say to your heart when you think, but what about now?

He says, I haven't forgotten you.

There is a breadth and depth to my love that you can't yet imagine, and it is on you if you are in Christ.

But how do you know?

And what he does in the next verse is he not only asserts that his love is on you, but then he says, and I'll prove it to you.

Look at verse 16.

God closes his poem by saying, Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.

Your walls are continually before me.

I've engraved you on the palm of my hands.

That's language from the Near East.

In that culture, in that society, sometimes a slave would have the name of his master written on his hand.

It would indicate ownership.

But the language that is used in this verse is not the normal language that would be used for that kind of a process.

The verb that would be used for writing a master's name on a hand is writing.

It would be written or tattooed.

But here, what we have are two upturnings of the normal imagery.

First, the master is writing the servant's name on his hands, and then he's not just writing it, he's engraving it.

That verb speaks of taking a hammer and a chisel and engraving something, carving something, chiseling something into stone.

And the Lord here is saying, I will take up a hammer and a chisel, and I will carve your name into my hands, and I will never forget you.

I will love you and I will fulfill my word to you.

Do you know Isaiah looked forward to the day God would do that?

And you look back on it.

Two thousand years ago, a young man experiencing doubts asked, How can I know that the Lord really loves me?

How can I know he's alive and will fulfill his word?

And what the Lord did is spread his hands out and said, See, you are engraved in my hands.

I will never forget you.

And when doubts arise in your heart, where you go is forward to what God has provided and back where he proved it.

On the cross, the God who had forever dwelt in perfect relationship, separated from himself, humbled himself, and on the cross, God the Son endured all of the wrath that we deserve for our sins to forgive us, to wipe them out like a mist, and bring us to God, where we will dwell with him in a paradise forever.

And as you begin to hammer that into your heart, you'll find that you'll never be done.

Because the love of the God that is described in this verse, in these verses, in this gospel, in this book, is a love that surpasses height and depth and breadth and knowledge.

And you will never, ever, ever exhaust it.

So let's get to work.

Applying the heights of God's love to the depths of our hearts by putting our eyes forward to what he's prepared and backwards to what he's done.

This is a God of love.

Why don't you pray with me?

Father, we are thankful that you have given us your Son, and in giving us your Son, you gave us yourself.

God, our hearts will never fully comprehend this, and so we ask.

Open our eyes still more to behold Christ.

Open our hearts more.

To know the height and the depth and the breadth of the love of Christ that surpasses all understanding.

Let it reside in us.

Let it fill us, let it stir us to love and good works.

We ask this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You have been listening to Emmanuel.

You can find more resources like this at IBCva.com.

Here is a parting word from Pastor Justin.

If you have any questions about what you heard today, or if you want to learn more about what it means to follow Christ, please visit our church website, iBCVA.com.

If you're not a member of a local church and you live in the Washington, D.C.

area, we'd love to have you worship with us here at Emmanuel.

We're located in Northern Virginia.

And for more information about when and where we worship, check out our church website.

I hope to personally meet you this Sunday after our service.

But no matter where you live, it's our hope that everyone who uses this resource is involved in their own local church.

Now may God bless you this week.