And I'll be reading verses 1 through 6 of Isaiah 66. Thus says the Lord, Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. What is the house that you would build for me? And what is the place of my rest? All these things my hand has made. And so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. But this is the one to whom I will look, he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word. He who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a man. He who sacrifices a lamb, like one who breaks a dog's neck. He who presents a grain offering, like one who offers pig's blood. He who makes a memorial offering of frankincense, like one who blesses an idol. These have chosen their own way, and their soul delights in their abominations. I also will choose harsh treatment for them, and bring their fears upon them, because when I called, no one answered. When I spoke they did not listen, But they did what was evil in my eyes, And chose that in which I did not delight. Hear the word of the LORD, you who tremble at His word. Your brothers who hate you and cast you out for my name's sake have said, Let the LORD be glorified, that we may see your joy. But it is they who shall be put to shame. the sound of an uproar from the city, a sound from the temple, the sound of the Lord rendering recompense to his enemies. I think you will want to listen carefully to this sermon this morning because in the scripture, God tells us how to make sure we are among those who inherit the new heavens and new earth. Getting to live with God is represented here as a matter of getting God's attention. People in modern culture in which we live pay attention to and they hold in high regard the things such as who has the best social media posts, the best pictures, and the person who seems to be living the best life in the eyes of the world. People care about whether their image is getting likes or dislikes, even though many of us here, I think, have very little to do with social media, we do still care whether our friends are affirming our choices or activities. What does God look for when deciding what to regard? And who does he look to in deciding who will live with him in the new heavens and a new earth? Well, as Isaiah's ministry has progressed from his first prophecy in chapter one all the way to this one in his last chapter, his countrymen have become hardened to the ministry of God's word. Throughout most of the book, God has given overtures of grace to the people as a whole. These are calls to repent and invitations to come to seek the Lord while he may be found. But by now, Nearly everyone in Judah has been galvanized into his own position. Those who would believe God and join the faithful remnant have done so. Most others have stiffened against God, refusing to answer his call, refusing to heed his word. And so here, at the end of his prophecy, God's stance is even more decided. He is ready to comfort the troubled believers within Israel, and he's ready to judge the religious who have proven they are his enemies. This prophecy still answers why some well-churched people won't inherit the new heavens and earth, showing the future glory of recreation that is coming when Messiah, the Lord Jesus, comes a second time, God says many won't inherit glory because their hearts are not suitable temples, therefore they will not dwell with God. So what will God regard? To what does God pay attention? To even get an idea, we have to know something about what God is like, and then we must examine or re-examine His creative abilities, and finally We must see what the focus of his attention is. The first of those is related to God's chosen dwelling place. The Lord chooses a dwelling place, but where, after all, could someone like God dwell? I direct you to verse one, where God says, thus says the Lord, heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What is the house that you would build for me? And what is the place of my rest?" The Lord calls the temple a house. A temple was a kind of palace. It was the local dwelling place of God. He's talking about His temple house because of what He has said in the last chapter about creating new heavens and earth, in creating even a new Jerusalem, and of the whole earth becoming His holy mountains. The curse of sin in that future day is going to be revoked for His people. And when all that happens, they will be very joyful. So the question Israel faced was, could they expect God's approval simply because they had the Temple and its ceremonies? If Jehovah God was localized, if He was fixed to one place, the answer would probably be, well, if the Temple's here, we can expect lots of approval. But God says all who think of him must have a basic recognition of these two things, his transcendence and his immensity, because it is impossible to contain God locally. Long ago in the ancient world when there was a ruler or an emperor, he sat high up on a throne It was accessed by pyramiding steps and the first was usually a tall step requiring a footstool to step up onto. The elevation of the throne signified his dignity and grandeur and worth. And now think about what God says, heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. And if the whole earth now is comparatively nothing but a footstool, then not one place on earth, certainly not the temple on the mount in Jerusalem, could even possibly house Him. Hence the questions, what is the house that you would build for me? And what is the place of my rest? God's tone here is bemusement, as if the whole temple were, at this point when He looks at it, so insignificant that it could easily be overlooked. Have you ever known someone who just can't see something important? Maybe you have had an employee who you think ought to take the initiative and recognize that a job needs to be done, or maybe someone in your house can't see the dishes that need to be washed. You can even stage them, put them right there so that hopefully when they come face to face with the project, they'll just do it. but it never seems to register with them that this is the thing to pay attention to. Well, that's almost the sense in which God contemplates an earthly house as if he might misplace it or overlook it. It's not his focus. You get the same sense earlier in scripture from God's reply to David when David wanted to build a temple. This is in 2 Samuel 7, God said, Did I speak a word with any of the judges of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, why have you not built me a house of cedar? Would you build me a house to dwell in? My paraphrase is, I never said I needed a house. We might ask, well, how is it possible that God should dwell in a house anyway? if God is infinite. Space is not infinite. If you like science, if you like astronomy, if you like to understand the planets of our solar system, and you know that our solar system is just one of many solar systems in the galaxy, and that there are many galaxies in space, you know that space is huge. But space doesn't go on forever. It has bounds. But of the huge space that there is, God fills it at every point. That is His omnipresence. But God is also exalted above space. That is His immensity. He is the cause of space. So to think that He might occupy some tiny piece of real estate doesn't make sense. Lots of people wish they could own a large house. Recently I saw a house that measured, in area, 15,000 square feet. What is that to God? The temple real estate is dwarfed by God's own measure, by his immensity. He fills the universe, that's true, but he's also distinct from it. He is uncreated, immaterial. The best way to know that is just that he created all things out of nothing. He has the sufficiency in himself to create without being exhausted or depleted. He does not depend on what he has made for his existence, but its existence, like the stars, depend on him. He gives life, sorry, he gives to all life, breath, and all things, Acts 17.25. He is therefore transcendent, distinct from creation and outside it. So exalted above space, that's his immensity, transcendent, distinct from creation. And so that God would even talk to us, that he would even hear our prayers or care about us is astonishing indeed. What is man that you are mindful of him or the son of man that you should care for him, psalm 8? And yet God does. He knows each one of you. He knows you better than you know yourselves. And He cares for your life. He speaks to you in His word and He gives you all things. God's transcendence and His immensity mean that there would have to be something false about placing trust in an earthly temple. Solomon's temple was beautiful. It had taken many years to build. Solomon, though, recognized the fundamental problem of an earthly temple in his prayer at its dedication. He said, will God indeed dwell on the earth? Heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this house that I have built. First Kings 8. And yet God did come to dwell there, not because he needed it, but as a special grace, a condescending to his people of favoring them with his presence. Indeed, the Ark of the Covenant within the temple was said to be God's footstool, the mercy seat, the place where his feet rested. Over time, the temple began to occupy a superstitious place in people's minds. In Jeremiah's day, people would say, The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, as if God would not destroy it. People trusted it. Even the disciples who walked with Jesus thought too much of it, for they took Jesus to show it to him when he was in Jerusalem. And you know, the Pharisees overemphasized it, all for God, God's transcendence. They put God in a box, forgetting that God is not to be reduced to the temple and its ceremonies. They had come to think about the parts they were familiar with and not of the whole. And we should remember that God is transcendent and immense. And when we speak of His names or of His attributes, remember what we speak about and speak with reverence. We must never address God or command Him saying, Holy Spirit, do this or do that. We must never say goodness or gracious or holy in conversation without humility and respect or using them as minced oaths, because these are attributes of God. So this is God choosing a dwelling place, but where could he choose it? Where could he find? And next, God drew his people's attention to his creative abilities, to his creative abilities in verse two. He says, all these things my hand has made. And so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. Next time you're in science class, children, remind yourself and praise God that what you're observing in nature is an artifact of God's design. And then tell your friend. The light of nature shows every person that there is a God who is good, and who is sovereign and worthy of trust. And so you have this advantage in your favor to tell your classmates that this frog or this leaf or the stars were made by God, who made them because He's good to us, His creatures. Everything in the universe was made effortlessly by God, by the voice of His power. It's His workmanship. And though He allows people to approach Him in worship, there is nothing that we could give to Him that is not His already. I happen to live in a house that a father built for his son. The father must have drafted its architecture in his mind. He must have visualized and schemed based on some house that he had been in or some ingenious idea he had. And I've sometimes wondered what house I would build if the one I lived in was destroyed. And I've thought about replicating the one I have now, basically building the exact same house again because I like the design. Now, what if God designed the first creation not to be the best of all possible houses, but in the likeness of the best of all possible houses? What if God made the universe that we now live in to prefigure the consummate life that we'll enjoy, believers will enjoy, in God's presence to duplicate or replicate the future new heavens and new earth? Creation was like a prototype of the heavenly happiness for the probation passing Son of God. I'll explain that a little bit. You know I mean that test in the garden where Adam, should he obey God in this lesser house, might go on to the best house, to the heavenly house. You even get a sense of this from Revelation 22, in which we find the tree of life, which you remember appeared first in Genesis in Eden, but now at the end of God's book, overshadows the city of New Jerusalem, which has come down from God out of heaven. And so large is the tree that it overhangs both sides of the river. How do sinners get invited into this city? How do people like us who have offended God with our sin, who have been rebels, ever gain entry to heavenly glory? By God's grace, through his love for us, A probation passing Son of God obeyed His Father and merited life for His believing people. Not only creation, but the architecture of the Temple that was then in Jerusalem was projected from the heavenly blueprint. That Temple, Solomon's Temple and later Herod's Temple, they were wonderful for their time and purpose. But like creation, they were not intended to be final. Indeed, the Lord Jesus, when they had showed him the grandeur of the temple, said, you see all these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down. Matthew 24. And in Revelation 22, John even says, I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God. the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb." And what that tells you is that we are not going back to Eden. In this, Lutheran brothers are mistaken about the future. Nor are we going back to Canaan with its earthly temple. In this, dispensational brothers are mistaken about the future. We are going forward to the consummation, to the temple that Isaiah calls new heavens and new earth, where God will dwell with his people and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. At the time Isaiah wrote this, the temple and its sacrifices and its ceremonies were in place, that's right, because God ordained it. They were the means of grace for that day, but they were being abused. And if the earthly temple with all its splendor and all that was there did not get God's attention, on what place did his focus come to rest? And where did his favor lie? This is the focus of God's attention at the middle of verse two. But this is the one to whom I will look, he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word." There are three identifiers for God's object of favor here. These identifiers are marks of grace. They are signs that the person who has them has been regenerated. It is not that by cultivating one or the other of them, sinners can earn salvation from God, but that if a person is saved, God will cultivate these in that person's life so that they will be noticeable marks of grace. Furthermore, these three listed characteristics are there because we must make our calling and election sure. These are to be matters of spiritual focus and effort in your life and mine. We have to put forth spiritual effort in life. We do not want to have missed out on the new heavens and new earth by being sloppy in our spiritual character. So first, the humble. God says, I will look to the one who is humble. And the humble person is the one who has reached rock bottom spiritually. The army, the United States Army, used to have this motto, be all you can be. Well, the humble person is someone who can't be all he can be. It speaks of someone instead who is hindered from attainments that might make them proud. It's someone who might be under great physical affliction like a sickness or need like hunger. In the social arena, it's someone who has been disadvantaged by someone else's stronger interests, someone who has been oppressed. And so when it comes to spiritual matters, it's someone who's been laid low by their sin, and therefore is recognizing how dependent he or she is on God. So the humble person recognizes her helplessness. He or she does not stay quiet, but cries out to God for help. The humble are prepared to rely on God rather than self, and so they don't keep silent. To be humble is the best place that we can be. Not only the best place, it's where God wants us to be. God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. And what grace does he give? Well, the scriptures say he remembers them in their prayers. He acts as their protector and moves to save them. You save a humble people, 2 Samuel 22, 28, but your eyes are on the haughty to bring them down. The Lord Jesus was humble. It says so in Zechariah 9, 9, behold, your king is coming to you humble. and mounted on a donkey. Humility is often a result of the distress that moves you toward God. Have you ever gone through great difficulty? And maybe you're going through great difficulty now. But have you ever gone through it and come to a point where you realized, here I am, troubled inside and out. Things are bad for me. And my soul has made no movements toward God. I have not remembered Him, nor prayed to Him, nor acknowledged my pain before Him, have not told Him my woes. And if not, why not? Ultimately, because you were proud and self-reliant. Perhaps you reassured yourself that things will get better because they always do. Or maybe you thought, well, I can handle this because I've handled things before. Well, that is not humility. Lots of people are in trouble and distress, but the one who catches God's eye is the one who in humility cries out to him. And the second characteristic is contrition. In verse two, I will look to him who is contrite in spirit. You could translate this as broken in spirit. And the sense is of someone who's lame, who's disabled and unable to go where they would like to go. And it's speaking in spiritual terms. If you're contrite, or I should say you are contrite, if you understand your helplessness to please God. We began the sermon asking, how do you attract God's attention? The person whose spirit is contrite recognizes that there is nothing noteworthy about him that God should regard. In fact, he knows God ought to look away from him, and he's overjoyed when God does not. That's the heart, by the way, that we must bring to worship. It's the heart that we must bring to God. From contrition proceeds purity of heart and godliness. Thirdly, God looks on him who trembles at his word. In the mountains there grow entire forests of quaking aspen trees, taxonomic name Populus tremuloides. Why? Because even light breeze will make the leaves shake and quake or tremble. It makes a very pleasant forest sound. God regards those who tremble at his word. If the wind moves the leaves, well, the word moves his people. That means We experience fear at God's threatenings, reverence for his revelation, awe of God, and obedience to his command. At the most elementary level, God regards those who are afraid of hell, have a fear of dying, fear that they might perish without God, and who look to God for salvation. At another level, God regards the person who longs to please him. Do you remember as a child that there was someone in your life who you really respected and longed to please? Maybe your father or mother or someone else. And if you did, you were very careful of them. You were concerned about how they regarded you, how they thought of you, and how they would evaluate you. And it would actually hurt you inside if you knew you had made them angry or disappointed. Well, it's that kind of sensitivity that God sees when it comes to his word. Sensitivity to whatever gives God offense, sensitivity to avoid those things, and sensitivity to try to please. I think you know that someone who is always trying to please people has a kind of sickness and inordinate desire to be petted. but we should all desire to please God. That desire never fails to display a sensitivity to His Word, and it will show as a mark of grace in the life of the regenerate. It's going to show up as a mark, as sensitivity to what God has said. It's not sensitivity to inner feelings, to outer pressures, to people's likes or dislikes. It's not sensitivity to inner voices. but sensitivity to the plain and inscripturated word of the Bible. That's what makes the believer's heart tremble. Well, hearts that have these characteristics have been born again. The new birth, or the regeneration as we call it, recreates our emotional lives. We would be dead to God's word, were God not active in us, if he had not regenerated us. but because we have the new birth. We have joy where there was none. We have sorrow for sin. We have the emotions of humility and contrition and that newfound desire to obey where before there was just pride and self-seeking. Do you have these characteristics? Do you move at God's word? Are you sorrowful? understanding your helplessness and your sin, and your need for God, not just once in life, but day after day in life. Well, this is the astonishing thing that is contained here in these verses. It's not possible to build a structure to contain God, but it is possible that God will condescend to live in the hearts of His people. His people will be His chosen dwelling place. Isn't that what Paul referred to in Colossians when he spoke of the mystery? Christ in you, the hope of glory. So does your life catch the eye of God. If you can say that these marks are not really yours, then you should evaluate whether you have saving faith and whether you have repented of your sin. If they're missing, and if, for instance, you know what the law of God commands, But if you are omitting to obey it, you're not trembling at his word. You should hear the voice of God that is challenging you so that you will put your trust in him. Christ will dwell in your hearts by faith, but you must become a Christian. And if you are a Christian, you have these marks in you already. You must therefore devote all godly efforts to living the spiritual life God calls you to place the first area of sensitivity in your life as Him and Him alone. Your highest priority, the thing you care about, must be to walk worthy of Him and pleasing Him. I have an analogy for you to think about. You can tell what is most important in a church building by what is at the front and what is elevated. In Catholic churches, it's the altar, because the host, the sacrificial host, is central. In Reformed churches, it's the pulpit, because the Word of God is central. The Word should be central not only in church, but in all of our lives. It isn't enough just to have the right forms. God looks at the heart. So ask yourself, and I ask you, what is elevated? to the center of your life. Benjamin Franklin used to go to hear George Whitefield preach. Whitefield had a huge booming voice that could travel large distances, long distances, but Franklin wasn't interested in the gospel very much. So while Whitefield was preaching once in Philadelphia, Franklin walked a little bit further backward and then even more further backward until he could just barely hear him. And he marked the place and then went back and measured, figured that as a radius, and determined how large an area and how many people could hear the voice of Whitefield. Franklin discovered a fact, and as a fact that is interesting enough, but it was a worthless endeavor at obtaining the new heavens and earth. It was worthless for the purity and the godliness of heart that God notices and indeed requires for life in his new creation. How often, friends, when we hear the Word of God do our minds go for a walk? I urge you to new godliness, Church of God, because of the joy that it brings your Heavenly Father. Look to yourselves that you do not miss out on God. Look to yourselves that you do not miss out on life with Him. Many, even some in the visible Church, will not inherit eternal life. Hear, God, when he says this, this is the one to whom I will look, he who is humble and contrite in heart and who trembles at my word. How astonishing that God, transcendent in majesty, would look at you or at me, a sinner, that he might regard us, honor us, preserve us for heaven, sanctify us, adopt us, welcome us, glorify us, and make us the dwelling place for Him by the Spirit, even now. How is it possible that God would do this? In no other way than this, that all God's favor has proceeded to us from His Son, who laid down His life and died for us and took it up again. And if we have the Son, through faith in Him, we have life in His name. If we belong to the Son, we know God's eye is on us and we have His attention. Let's pray. Lord God, we are grateful for Your promises that stir us up to faith and new obedience. We're thankful for Your Word that speaks to us in a day that is much like Isaiah's, Almost the entirety of the culture of the nation is apostate and not interested in the things of God. We are thankful for Your Word that gives us hope and certainty for the future. And we're thankful that You're not grading us on our performance but on Christ's performance Him who is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near through Him, and so we do draw near to you through Him. Asking your help, asking forgiveness for our failures, our sinful shortcomings, and asking that you would help us as we live our lives to walk worthy of Christ and to make our calling and election sure. Keep your eye upon us for good. Favor us, we ask. And where there is pride yet in our hearts, humble us, bring us low, that you might lift our heads and raise us again in honor at the last day. We praise your name. It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen.