Isaiah 65

Isaiah 65:17, “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.”

Isaiah prophesies about a day in the future that God will let go of the universe and all things will burn up. You see right now God is the one holding all things together. Colossians 1:17, “And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” In science there is a mystery to what it is that holds atoms together. The nucleus of an atom is consisted of positive particles which by nature should repel away from each other, but scientists don’t understand what keeps these opposing forces together, they call it “The Strong Force”. You see God’s hand is what holds all things together just as we read in the scriptures. It’s God’s hand that holds Atoms together and the bible says in 2 Peter 3:10 that one day God will let go and all things will burn or dissolve away.

One day God will let go and He will create a new heaven and new earth just as we see Isaiah speak about. That’s where we will be together will God forever. We will have no memory of people or family members in hell because Isaiah says those things won’t even come into mind. We will be solely focused on the risen Lord Jesus Christ for all eternity.

Isn’t this scientific reality true with our lives today? Things seem to be dissolving and falling apart when we take God out of our lives. Things seem to be getting chaotic when God isn’t in the center of our lives holding all things together. When we feel like this, we need to refocus and put Christ in the center of our lives because God desires to hold things together for us, He desires to bear our burdens. How can we get back to God in the center of our lives? You do this by doing what you did when you first were a Christian, you read your bible, you pray, and you praise God for who He is and what He has done for us. The scriptures tell us that God inhabits the praises of His people. Start praising God and you will begin to realize that he never was far off from you, you will begin to realize that you have been far off from Him.

Isaiah 62

62:6b-7 “You who put the LORD in remembrance, take no rest, 7 and give Him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise in the earth.”

This passage is speaking about watchmen that will be placed over Jerusalem and their sole responsibility will be to remind God of His promises toward His people. We do not know much about these watchmen but we do know that they will be constantly praying to God for the people. They will be interceding. To intercede means to intervene on behalf of another. For example, if you knew your best friend was going to do something stupid, you would intervene or do something to stop them.

This is a great reminder to us about how we should constantly be praying for other Christians that we know and for all Christians around the world. The verse above tells them to not let God have any rest until He accomplishes His ultimate purpose. We should have the same attitude in prayer. Pray all the time. Who can you pray for? How can you pray for them? Start asking your family and friends how you can pray for them.

Not only should we be praying for our brothers and sisters in Christ, we should be praying for people that we know don’t have a relationship with Christ that they might come to repentance(1 John 5:16).

Here are a couple if tips to enhance your prayer life.

1. Take a few minutes and be quiet before you pray. Let God speak to you and make sure you are focused before you start.
2. Schedule a specific time during the day to pray. Try not to do it right before you go to sleep while you are in bed, you will just fall asleep. This is too important to give you last waking hours too.
3. Keep a prayer journal. A small notebook or take notes on your cell phone so that you remember who and what to pray for.
4. Pray somewhere you know you will not be distracted(Matthew 6:6).
5. Pray out loud. This will help you concentrate better and not get distracted by your own thoughts.
6. Kneel or lay down on the floor. It’s not like God won’t hear if you don’t do this but laying down our kneeling is a universal sign of submission and when we pray we are going before our Holy God and submitting to Him.
7. Lastly know who you are praying to. You are praying to our perfect and Holy God and the only way we have access to Him is through the Blood of Jesus. God is not our go-fer. Don’t just pray to God when you want something from Him. Tell Him how much you love Him and appreciate Him.

God bless you and keep praying!

Isaiah 61

Isaiah 61:1, “He has sent me to bandage those whose hearts are broken, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound.”

I am sure all of us have had a broken heart before but maybe not so many of us have been prisoners before. Isaiah is writing this chapter as a look at the hope in what God does despite our sin. Did you know, because of sin you and I have been brokenhearted? Because of sin, you and I have been taken captive and we have been in  the nasty prison that the chains of sin has held us too.

Now is the time to rejoice, family! Those chains have been broken, the prison doors have swung open and we are free in Christ. When I was a little child I remember singing a hymn titled, “I’ve Got a River of Life Flowing out of Me” by Donald L. Casebolt. In the hymn there is a line that talks about ”I’ve got a river of life flowing out of me! Makes the lame to walk, and the blind to see. Opens prison doors, sets the captives free! I’ve got a river of life flowing out of me!” This song I remember when I was younger because of the splish splash part that would follow after that line but when you really think about the work of Christ on the cross and our salvation it is amazing and should bring praise upon our hearts. Paul says in Romans 6:6, “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin.”

Isaiah writes in verse 10, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness.” I want to challenge you today to think about your salvation. Know that it was not anything you did but by God’s grace, the work of Christ on the cross that is how. Do you take your salvation for granted? I know I have in the past. Do you remind yourself that you have come from a prison cell of sin, to the safety and security of Christ? Take today and reflect about your sin and the price that Christ paid so you do not have to. After that take some time and praise God for that. Do you know that God really loves you? That he does heal our broken hearts and that we are free in Christ. Take a moment out of your day and praise God and rejoice in him.

Isaiah 60

Isaiah 60:1 “rise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.”

What an amazing verse. In the last chapter the people of Judah were confronted by their sin, wept over their sin, and realized how far away from salvation they were. By the end of the chapter the Lord promised them salvation and now here in chapter 60 we see it come to pass. This chapter deals with what it will be like when the Lord comes and rules on the Earth with His people. Chapter 21 of the book of Revelation says a lot of the same things that Isaiah talks about here. That will be an amazing day; when the Lord comes down and rules on the Earth and He will be the only source of light we need. But what can we learn from this passage today?

What if a reflection of that light of the Lord could be shone today? Do you think it would change people? I am talking here about the light of God’s goodness, grace, and righteousness. Do you think that would have an affect on society today? Ephesians 5:8 says “for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light.” We are a reflection of the light of God to the world around us. Before we knew Christ we were darkness. Sin was a part of everything we thought, did, and believed. We lived according to what our own thought and desires but now in Christ we are light. And Paul says “you are already children of light, now act like it!” How do we do that?

We live life according to what the Bible says. Here is one specific example. In Mark 12:30-31 Jesus tells us to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. In addition to that He added that we need to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Do you do that? Is there someone in your life that you don’t like or even hate? Walk as children of light.

Do you have a problem with cussing or telling dirty jokes? Walk as children of light. Do you lust or have a problem staying sexually pure? Walk as children of light. Do disrespect your parents, teachers, or any other authority figure in your life? YOU GET THE POINT! When we act like the rest of the world it’s as if we are covering up the light we are in Christ and we become like the darkness of the rest of the world(Matt 5:14-16) We are already light in Christ, let’s start acting like it!

One last thought: those 2 commandments Jesus gave are the best ways to get rid of any kind of sin(darkness) in your life. Follow those and you will be good to go. How? Read your Bible more. Pray that God would change you, memorize scripture, and don’t be afraid to share your faith. Walk as children of light!

Isaiah 59

A Desperate Situation

If you do a quick read through of the first couple of chapters of Romans you will very quickly realize how desperate our situation is. You will see how devastating the affects of our sin really is. We have been separated from God. Here in Isaiah 59, Isaiah is showing God’s people how desperate their situation is. He tells them that because of their sin God had to hide his face from them. They were guilty of murder, lies, violence, evil, and all kinds of wickedness. They were completely separated from God.

We are in the same situation that the people of Israel are in. Our sin has completely separated us from God. Because of our sin we have no access to God. The Bible tells that there is no one who is righteous, not even one person. So no one can stand before God and have access to Him. He can not even look at us because He is to holy and righteous. How does that make you feel?

Weeping Over Sin

Do you feel like the people of Israel did in Isaiah 59:9-15a? This section is a lament of the people. They came to the realization of their wickedness and they cried. Not only did they cry but they wept. They realized that they were walking in darkness. They were hoping for justice against their enemies but it did not come. They knew salvation was far away because of their sin and they knew they did not deserve it.

We need this attitude. We need to realize how wicked our sin really is. All sin is wickedness. All sin separates us from God. A lot of times we like to down play our sin and say that we are not as bad as other people. All that does is shows that you are living by a worldly standard and not God’s standard. Pray and ask God to give you His heart toward sin, to see it for what it really is; wickedness. When we see sin like God see’s it, the grace of God will be evident in every aspect of your life.

Salvation

In the last section we see God intervening for His people to bring salvation for them and judgment for their enemies. The people were repentant. They recognized their sin and turned from it and God honored that. This is speaking of a future time when Christ will return and bring call His people home and bring judgment to all His enemies.

Are you an enemy of God? I doubt that there are a ton of people that would call themselves an enemy of God(though I know there are some) but what does it mean? Do you actually have to call yourself an enemy of God? The Bible is very clear about what it means to be an enemy of God. Jesus said in Matthew 12:30 “Whoever is not with me is against me.” If you are not a friend of God, you are an enemy of God whether you view yourself as that or not.

James, in his epistle takes it a step further in James 4:4 “friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” Are you a friend of the world? Do you allow things in your life that are worldly and don’t do anything about it? Do things of the world appeal to you more than things of God? Do you have sin in your life that you just don’t care about? That is a dangerous place to be. Don’t be an enemy of God!

For a message given by Pastor Jon Lee on James 4 titled “The Test – How Much Has The World Marked You” click here

Isaiah 58

Jesus said in Matthew 15:8 that, “the people honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.” Same is true of the people in Isaiah’s day. They were going through the motions to look religious. They were fasting and praying yet they were still not loving the people around them. The first issue here is that they were not extending the love to the people around them and the second issue was their religiosity.

1 John 4:7-8 says, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” See God has loved His people so much, He redeemed them out of Egypt into the promised land. He showed Mercy by not whipping them out. He showed Grace by giving them what they didn’t deserve. Yet, God’s people still couldn’t extend that same love, mercy and grace to other people.

Aren’t we the same way? We love it that Jesus paid for our sins, even though He didn’t have to. Even though we did nothing to deserve it, and still we say we can’t forgive people because of something they did to us. See, the bible says that if you don’t love people with the same love that God showed to us by sending His son to die on a cross for our sins, then we really have no understanding of what Christ has really done. If we really did understand what Christ did on the cross then we can’t help but love people in the same way. Jesus paid for our sins once for all and yet we still say, “I just can’t forgive Johnny, you don’t know what he did to me.” GET OVER IT, because Jesus doesn’t come around and say, “I just can’t forgive Billy, He has hurt me too much.”

The bible says we were born as enemies to God! We were born as terrorists to the holiness of God, but God still decided to send His son to ultimately pay for all our sins. That is why we read John saying that if anyone does not love, then they don’t know God – because when we realize that all our sins are paid for by Christ we can’t help but extend that self sacrificing love to those around us.

Where are you today? Have you contemplated what Christ has done for you on the Cross? Are you looking religious but still hating your neighbor? If so you need to open your bible and read it because John says that you have no idea who God is, if you say your a Christian but still hold grudges and hate your neighbor.