Sermon Tone Analysis

Isaiah 9:8-11:16

I hope you guys remember from last week what is happening here in the context of our chapter, but God’s people, Israel is a mess at this point in their history, they have become divided as a people and a land.

With 10 tribes in the north known as Ephraim with Samaria as their capital, and Judah was in the south and maintained Jerusalem as their capital.

Their division wasn’t the good guys against the bad, it was the wrong brothers and sisters being divided against the other wrong brothers and sisters.

The Lord gives invitation to turn from their wicked ways, to repent and come back to Him, and they resist.

God uses other nations as we will see tonight, wicked nations, an evil nation even as a tool in His hand.

God didn’t make them wicked and evil, but when Adam chose sin, wickedness and evil entered the seed of man, and in their free will men choose darkness over the light.

Look at their reaction here as God allows judgement upon them in an attempt to save their souls and have them turn to Him…they don’t…but in their pride and arrogance of heart...

They say the bricks have fallen down....that’s no big deal, we’ll just build back better.

We will rebuild with hewn stone.

The sycamores are cut down, that’s no problem we still have the mighty cedars of Lebanon…rather than turn to God in repentance for salvation, they dig their heals in and say, we got this, we’re tougher than this.

This type of heart is the hardest for me to deal with as a pastor.

Not out of frustration or weariness, but for grieving and sadness on their behalf.

If I’m dealing with someone who the world has chewed up and spit out, there is nothing more refreshing than the good news of the gospel.

But for the one who thinks they know God, professes to know God, but out of pride and arrogance of heart remains the Lord of their own life, not just refusing to submit or surrender to God, but refusing to receive the rescue of God.

There are so many Christians that think that they are on some kind of maintenance plan.

They made a profession of faith and then somewhere along the line they quit.

Maybe they show up to church here and there, or remain in contact with some, but they are empty, and alone, and for the most part trying to make it on their own, trying to build back better, when their world is crumbling all around them.

I understand sometimes fellowship is hard…but, it is not typically the ones that I see faithfully attending and serving when the doors are open in the church, sitting in men’s study’s and women’s study’s those aren’t the ones that are struggling to hang on.

You might asks, yeah but are they in a good place because they are doing those things, or are they doing those things because they are in a good place, the answer is yes.

For all of us, all that we need is right here.

The Word of God, inspired by the Holy Spirit of God, fellowship with the family of God, communion, fellowship, prayer.

So God is beginning to deal with these guys and rather than being quick to repent, rather than calling out for His help and mercy, they dig their heals in, they don’t respond so God continues.

I was thinking about a story when I was a kid about a cow... Isa 9:11-14

God points out that this is not just a problem of rebellion in the hearts of the people, but puts the accountability for it on the leaders of the people and the false prophets.

Isa 9:17

His anger is not turned away because of their continued response of pride and wickedness.

Isa 9:18-21

His anger is not turned away why?

They don’t respond, they don’t repent, their pride continues.

Chapter 10 Isa 10:1-4

So this is a Woe to Israel for their sin, and this next section is where we see a Woe or a warning to Assyria, Isa 10:5

but we also see God using them as a tool of discipline against Israel.

Like they are the belt that Poppa is using to spank a rebellious child.

Now I said some things last week about the nation of Assyrians being wicked and evil in their warfare, remember I talked about them shaving the hair off the Israelites when taken captive as slaves, putting hooks through their faces, to chain the captives together?

Considering all of the saber rattling that is going on in our own country and in the world this week.

With carrying out an execution on AL-Qaeda’s top leader, China attempting and threatening the US on what we can and can’t do.

We sometimes think that we have some special protection because we used to be a Christian nation or were at least founded on Christian principles.

From 729-609 BC, there was only one super power in all of the world, the Assyrian Empire.

Listen to how Haley’s handbook of the Bible describes the Assyrians.

Understand, God never condoned the evil of the Assyrians, and He hated the idols that they worship, yet he still used them as His tool, as His rod of correction.

How could a loving God ever do such a thing?

Because, and our hearts might struggle with this, because He loved and still loves His people.

The most horrible things we can experience on this earth, don’t compare at all to Hell.

If you had a set of balances and put hell on this side of the scales, and put our worst hurt, our deepest pain, our most gruesome scar on this side of the scale, the scale would not budge, there is no comparison.

Far too often we blame God for allowing things to happen in our lives, when we fail to look back and see how many times our story says, and His hand is stretched out still, because I didn’t respond way back here, or you said in pride and arrogance, I don’t need you God, I won’t surrender....

If discipline, correction, even our worst nightmare will cause us to turn to God and repent and cry out for His help, rather than spend an eternity in Hell, what an act of love it is.

Most of the time we respond with, anger, hurt, pride, and a determination that NOW, I’ll never, ever turn to you God, and we remain in our pain, suffer in our misery, until it gets worse of all of eternity.

Although He uses Assyria, doesn’t mean that they escape justice for their own actions as we’ll see here.

I actually think there is an important lesson here for all of us, and in particular those who are in ministry.

Just because God may be using you, doesn’t mean that He is pleased with, or approves of your methods and motives.

Leaders need to understand the responsibility of their role.

When broken and hurting people come into the church, are you too busy, or too arrogant wash their feet, or to tend to their wounds?

We can be a tool in the hands of the Great Physician that is used powerfully, even in life saving measures, but can then be discarded with the medical waste.

If we’ve become contaminated.

Many times people are being used by God for a specific purpose, and they start to think, as the Assyrians did here, because they are so awesome, completely forgetting that God can speak through a donkey like He did to Balaam.

So few in number that a child just learning to count, learning their 1,2,3’s may write them.

Isa 10:20-23

Remnant first returned from Babylon in 538 bc by the decree of Cyrus, and then on May 14, 1948, Israel once again declared itself to be an independent state, and Jew began returning.

In 1967 we saw the reunification of Jerusalem, and now millions of Jews have returned and continue to return.

In 2021 there was a 31% increase in the number of Jews returning to Isreal, God has made promises that He will fulfill, specific to the nation of Israel.

Israel should be turning to God for help, not any other nation.

You are going through this now because you’ve rebelled against me, but it won’t last forever.

I will destroy them.

Just as God delived them from Egypt as Moses raised his arms and the red sea parted and then drowned the approaching Egyptian solders, He would deliver them from Assyria as well, that is what we read about last week this deliverer.

In a practice sense, we will read about it in chapter 37 of Isaiah, but the story is in 2 Kings 19 where an angle of the Lord wipes out 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in a single night.

This is the path from North to south that Assyria took as they were being used as the rod of God.

This area Michmash was only about 7.5 miles north of Jerusalem so the assault continues to approach and is more and more threatening.

Isa 10:29

Geba and Ramah about 6 miles away.

Gibeah 4 miles.

Isa 10:30-31

Gebim was the sight of a water reservoir that the citizens of Jerusalem were dependent upon.

Less than a mile from the walls of Jerusalem.

Isa 10:32-34

Antichrist will have this same animosity for Jerusalem in the future.

But Lebanon will fall by the Mighty One, already identified in our study last week as Immanuel.

2 Sam 7 Davidic covenant with God.

Forever be a remnant on the throne.

This is a Messianic verse of the promised Messiah, Jesus, but it is also an important verse for a couple of other reasons.

One, it explains a very difficult verse in the new testament.

The book of Revelation, or the Revelation of Jesus Christ, begins with this greeting from the Trinity.

Rev 1:4-5

Ok, I understand the Father and the Son, but what is the deal with the seven Spirits, in speaking of the Holy Spirit?

Lets look at verse two again…Isa 11:2

We also see seven candles in the Jewish menorah that is designed to represent the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit of the Lord, as His primary job is to testify of Jesus.

This is why there are two important ways to recognize the leading of the Holy Spirit.

He inspired the Bible, He won’t contradict Scripture.

Secondly, since He is the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit of Jesus, He will never violate the nature of Jesus that we see revealed to us in the Gospels.

So is this you Lord, is the Spirit leading me?

Does is contradict the Written Word of God?

If is does, it’s not the Holy Spirit.

Does it contradict the Living Word?

What we would see in Jesus?

Then it is not the Holy Spirit.

Check this out as Paul talks about the Antichrist in 2 Thes chapter 2, 2 Thessalonians 2:8

Paul gets this from the Prophet Isaiah.

Jesus will return to judge the earth and will rule and reign, and although He won’t win the popular vote, nor the electoral college, He will take power over all of the land.

And the government will be on His shoulders and listen what it will be like, for a 1,000 years.