Sermon Tone Analysis

Copyright July 31, 2022 by Rev. Bruce Goettsche

Perhaps there have been times in your life when it seemed like God had fallen asleep, turned away, or had forgotten about you.

You cried out to Him and heard nothing.

Today we turn to Isaiah 52, and we find the people of Israel wondering if God was asleep.

They had been exiles in Babylon for 70 years!

They cried out to the Lord, and it appeared nothing was happening.

We saw this cry first last week in chapter 51:9,

Wake up, wake up, O Lord! Clothe yourself with strength!

Flex your mighty right arm!

Rouse yourself as in the days of old

when you slew Egypt, the dragon of the Nile.

(Isa.

51:9)

God’s answer in chapter 51 was they were not in exile because God was asleep; they were in exile because of their own choices.

They had deserted the Lord, and He let them face the consequences.

As we continue in chapter 52, God continues to answer their cry with one of His own.

1 Wake up, wake up, O Zion!

Clothe yourself with strength.

Put on your beautiful clothes, O holy city of Jerusalem,

for unclean and godless people will enter your gates no longer.

2 Rise from the dust, O Jerusalem.

Sit in a place of honor.

Remove the chains of slavery from your neck,

O captive daughter of Zion.

3 For this is what the Lordsays:

“When I sold you into exile,

I received no payment.

Now I can redeem you

without having to pay for you.”

4 This is what the Sovereign Lordsays: “Long ago my people chose to live in Egypt.

Now they are oppressed by Assyria. 5 What is this?” asks the Lord.

“Why are my people enslaved again?

Those who rule them shout in exultation.

My name is blasphemed all day long.

6 But I will reveal my name to my people, and they will come to know its power.

Then at last they will recognize that I am the one who speaks to them.”

Time for God to Act

The Lord uses the same words to tell the people of Jerusalem to wake up.

They should get ready because He is going to rescue them from captivity.

The Lord reasons that since He never SOLD them to Babylon, there never was a transaction.

The people still belonged to Him, and He was going to bring them home!

It was a time for celebration and renewal of hope.

Though God may have seemed silent, He never abandons His people.

I have wrestled with verses 4-6.

God takes them on a little history lesson.

In the past they were enslaved in Egypt and now they are again enslaved by the Assyrians.

God asks, “Why does this keep happening?”

The reason, it seems is because the people refuse to continue to trust Him!

When they refuse to trust Him, God lets them experience the consequence of their choices.

God not only held Israel accountable, He held the oppressing nations accountable and was going to bring judgment on them.

God was faithful as He had been throughout their history.

Like me apply this lesson to our life, sometimes we experience what seems to be the silence of God because step by step we have ignored the Lord and moved farther and farther away from Him. (Let me quickly add that sometimes we feel the silence of God for other reasons.

We may feel His silence because He is refining us, preparing us, or strengthening us).

However, Israel was oppressed because they drifted from the Lord.

It can easily happen.

It may not seem like they are big things.

We may say, “I was only having a little fun” or “it was only one time.”

But the result is the same, we move further away from Him.

A series of those things and we can no longer hear the call of the Lord.

We are like a little active child in a big store.

They don’t set out to get lost from their parents, they are just distracted by other things.

They drift away from their parents and soon they have no idea where they are.

For some of those kids, they don’t even realize they are lost until their parents frantically come to find them.

Here’s the takeaway: God didn’t give up on Israel and He will not give up on you.

He told Israel He was going to restore them to silence the critics, and to show His people that He loves and cares for them.

He has declared that “nothing can separate us from His love.”

God will pursue us and bring us home, but it may be a long and/or painful process.

It is certainly better to not drift away in the first place.

This is not a “Get out of jail free!” card.

It is painful to drift from the Lord and not know how to get back to Him.

To prevent drifting, the best thing is to keep checking back in with the Lord.

We need to confess and repent from sin as soon as possible.

We also need to keep consulting the Bible and measuring our life by what God tells us to do.

God does not want us to stay alienated from Him.

He wants to restore us, but He will wait until we are ready for Him to do so.

Our text continues with God holding out the picture of His restoration of His people.

Redemption is on the Way (7-12)

7 How beautiful on the mountains

are the feet of the messenger who brings good news,

the good news of peace and salvation,

the news that the God of Israel reigns!

8 The watchmen shout and sing with joy,

for before their very eyes

they see the Lord returning to Jerusalem.

9 Let the ruins of Jerusalem break into joyful song,

for the Lord has comforted his people.

He has redeemed Jerusalem.

10 The Lord has demonstrated his holy power

before the eyes of all the nations.

All the ends of the earth will see

the victory of our God.

This is an announcement of what was going to happen written as if it had already happened.

When the Bible does this it is to show that you can count on this promise.

It is so sure, you can speak of it in the past tense.

It is similar to the way we talk about having been saved.

(Salvation is a process, but, we are so sure it will continue, that we can speak of it as if it is already accomplished.)

The picture we are given is that of the people of the city looking out from the city wall on the horizon to see a runner coming their way with a message.

When at first you see the messenger, you don’t know whether they are bringing good news or bad news.

In this case, they arrive with the good news that God is going to redeem His people.

He will rescue them from their captivity and make it possible for them to go home.

The good news was that God was going to redeem His people from exile and this should lead to great rejoicing.