today to Isaiah chapter 40. It's a passage that perhaps you'll know. It's one that's often thought about this time of year, and people thinking about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. If you're familiar with Handel's Messiah, it's these words that begin Handel's Messiah. Isaiah chapter 41 through 5, I believe that's on 762 of your Pew Bibles. God's word of comfort, God's word of comfort to his people, and of course, as we heard in the prayer, these words of comfort can only be fulfilled in our Lord Jesus Christ, as we will see. I'm going to be reading, as I said, the first five verses from Isaiah chapter 40. Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned. that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. A voice cries in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up and every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall become level and the rough places a plain. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for these beautiful words of comfort, for these beautiful words of return, your return to your people. But we thank you above all, Father, for the fulfillment of these words in our Lord Jesus Christ. And as we consider these words this morning, we pray that you would bless us, be with us, grant us everything we need, clarity of thought, open our hearts and minds, help us to receive what you have for us this morning. And most of all, Father, we pray that you would help us to embrace our Lord Jesus Christ more and more in our lives. And it's in his name we pray. Amen. Our family, it's a bit of a tradition that you wrestle. The boys, all the boys wrestle. And not just in our immediate family, but also in my more extended family. And I remember hearing a story once from my cousin, who was forced to wrestle. It wouldn't have been his choice, he was forced to. And of course, when you're forced to do something, you have the temptation not to do it very well. And he didn't do it very well. He wasn't very good at wrestling. And he lost, and then he lost, and he lost some more. And I remember his father, my uncle, went up to him once as he was dejected after another loss, went up to him and said, what's wrong? As if it weren't obvious. And my cousin said, I lost again. And then I remember my uncle gave these words of comfort to my cousin. Don't worry, you learn a lot when you lose. And he responded, then I must be learning a whole lot. You must be a genius by then. Words of comfort so often fall short. Oftentimes they come with their greatest will in the world. We want to help, but we just don't have the words to say. Or even more often, We want to help, but we just don't have the power to make it happen. Cold comfort is common among us human beings. In this passage, this very famous passage, God says, comfort, comfort my people. That's how he begins this beautiful passage from Isaiah chapter 40. And we know from the very beginning that God's kind of comfort It's actually quite different. It's not the comfort that we give ourselves or others. It comes from God, and therefore it is not cold comfort. It comes from God, and therefore it comes with the power to bring it about. This is true comfort from the hand of our Lord. This morning I want us to consider what this means. What this, especially this first verse here, but as we go on in verses two through five, we'll see that actually verses two through five kind of explain the meaning of that first verse. What is the comfort that God is giving to his people? What does it mean? What did it mean for them, the first hearers of this great prophecy? And what does it mean for us as we live in a world of cold comfort, as we live in a world where so many people around us give us comforting words, but we look around us and there's chaos. We look around us and there's difficulties everywhere. And we find it so difficult to be comforted. So I want us to consider that meaning basically on the basis of these first five verses. And I want us to... answer three questions in particular this morning. The first question is, what is our life like without God's comfort? We're going to consider basically what it means to be away from God's comfort. Only then can we really get what God's comfort means. Secondly, we're going to ask the opposite question. What is our life like with God's comfort? That's the second question. And finally, we're going to ask that very important question and answer it, I hope. How do we obtain God's comfort in our lives? So first is, what is a life like without God's comfort? Secondly, what is a life like with God's comfort? And finally, how do we obtain it? That's our path this morning as we consider Isaiah chapter 40 and the comfort that God gives us. So the first question, what is our life like without God's comfort? In order to answer this question, we need to know what this word comfort means, okay? Because sometimes it's used very strangely, or not strangely, but rather broadly as we think about it in our usage in the English language. Sometimes we use the word comfort simply as being comfortable, being in a good temperature. Obviously, it's cold outside, and we haven't had this cold, at least in our family, for a very long time, living in a place where it didn't even sniff freezing. So this is very different for us. We find ourselves very uncomfortable when we are outside. But that's not what is meant by this word comfort. Sometimes we think about the word comfort, the comforts of home, or kind of as the things that give us ease. That's just not what's in the purview at all of this passage. The word comfort here is used much more deeply. And we use it also in the English language in this way as well. But that's the meaning. The word comfort here is much more deep and it means joy after despair. The end of a time of mourning. We need to take out of our mind all the shallow meanings of the word comfort and go directly to this very powerful, deep meaning. The word comfort means joy after despair in the end of the time of mourning. We know this for two reasons. First of all, the word itself, both in Hebrew and Greek, have this meaning. Very rich words, both in Hebrew and Greek, that refer to joy after a time of mourning. As we will see a little later in the sermon, we'll see how that plays out. Secondly, though, and I think even more importantly here, it's the context in the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah chapter 40 here, what we have is a prophecy, a prophecy that occurs about 150 years before the exile. And it's as if Isaiah, through some sort of projection, is speaking to the exiles themselves, and he's saying, the time of comfort is coming. Your exile is ending. you will have joy after despair. So the context of Isaiah is really helpful here. It's not simply that we're looking at a word and its meaning. In context, it's very clearly referring to a time of joy after despair, the end of a time of intense mourning. That's what comfort means. So when the prophet says, comfort, comfort my people, says your God, that's how we should think of it. Think of a long period, 70 years in the case of the exile, A long period of despair, followed by joy, followed by a beautiful time of restoration. That is comfort. That's how we should think of it here. So on to our first question. What is our life like without God's comfort? The prophet here, especially in verses 2 and three, speaks of a life without God's comfort. Now he's talking about the comfort that will come, but by the words that he uses, we could tell what a life outside of God's comfort looks like. And the first characteristic, there are four characteristics, and the first characteristic of this life is simply a life without peace. A life in constant battle. We see this in verse 2. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare is ended. Her warfare. That implies that there was warfare. There was battles going on. Of course, in context, it's referring to what happened to the exiles. If you know the history in scripture, the armies of Babylon surrounded the people of God in Jerusalem. And after a terrible siege, they broke through. And not only did they destroy the city and take many people into exile, they also destroyed the temple. Battles. No peace. This is a life without God's comfort. And we see this throughout scripture, not just here at the time of the exile. From the very moment that sin entered into the world, we see, and the biblical word is enmity, hostility. We see it between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. We see it between Cain and Abel. We see it between husband and wife and the curses that fell upon them. And we see it throughout as scripture develops. Brother rising against brother. Husband and wife not being able to get along. Of course, we see it too in the Tower of Babel when nations are rising against nations. We see it in the conquest of Canaan, how evil the Canaanites were and they only could be destroyed through battle. But we ultimately see it not in our battles with ourselves, humans against humans. We see it ultimately in our battle against evil. Every day of our lives, we fight against evil. Life in the Christian world is not easy. It's not just going to sleep and cruising through the day sleepwalking. It is a constant battle. Enmity. That is a life outside of God's comfort. No peace. Secondly, the second characteristic of a life outside of God's comfort is condemnation. Condemnation for our sins. Again, you see this in verse two. It's implied that her iniquity is pardon, which again implies that she was under condemnation. The prophet here is referring to the exile, which was seen as retribution for the sins of God's people. We read that earlier from Ezekiel chapter 33, but it's everywhere in all of the Old Testament. You get it from the very beginning, from the first five books. When Moses is speaking to the people in Deuteronomy chapter 3, he tells them, after teaching them in Deuteronomy chapter 27 through 29, he's telling them, this is what's going to happen. If you continue to obey, blessings will come. But if you do not, Your sins will find you out, and you will be punished for your sins. And as we continue to read the narrative of scripture over and over again, we see God's people falling into sin. We see it in the desert, after God had just rescued them, imagine that. We see it in the land of Canaan. The terrible times, some of those narratives we read in Judges are quite awful. We see it during the monarchy. after David, and David himself, but also especially with Solomon and his sons. God sends his servants, the prophets, over and over again to warn the people that their sins will find them out, that God isn't going to be merciful forever, that he is slow to anger, but his anger will come on account of their sins. And God wasn't lying. After many years of putting up with it, God finally allowed the armies of Babylon to come in and to take his people from that place. What was the point of it? It was because they sinned. Their sin had brought condemnation. A life outside of God's comfort is a life of condemnation. A life where our sins are constantly condemning us. This was true for the people while they were in exile. It's true for us as well. If we are outside of God's comfort, we have no hope because our sins condemn us. All of us are sinners as we have read and as we say every week, and our sins condemn us because we are outside of the grace of God unless we accept it. A life outside of God's comfort is a life of condemnation. Third, so we have first, we have a life of battles, no peace. Secondly, we have a life of condemnation, no forgiveness. Thirdly, we have a life full of chaos. You see it hinted at here, especially in verse four, talking about every valley shall be lifted up, every mountain and hill be made low. The uneven ground shall be made level and the rough places a plain. It's speaking about the terrain and it's doing so in a way that's very disorderly, talking about the uneven ground, and the rough places, and how that will eventually be brought to order, which implies a good bit of chaos there. Chaos is what happens outside of the will of God. God is the God of order. We see this from the very beginning when God creates the world. First, the world is sort of a shadowy chaos. The great phrase in Hebrew is tohu vavohu, formless and void. That's what the earth is like. And God slowly brings order to his creation. And when God's people sin, they fall back into disorder and chaos. That very same Hebrew phrase, tohu vavohu, is used in Jeremiah chapter 4, verse 23, to describe God's people in exile. It's as if the world is spinning back into that chaos when God's people go into exile. And we see all the signs of it, darkness everywhere. We see people living not with an orderly rhythm of life, people living not in their land, terrible chaotic things. This is what happens when we do not have God's comfort. Our life turns into chaos. God wants us to live orderly lives and this is what he gives to us when he gives us comfort. But a life outside his comfort is a life of rough places and uneven ground. It's a life of chaos. We can't live in chaos. Eventually, we die. We can't live in darkness. We need light. But here we see outside of God's comfort, darkness, chaos, uneven ground, rough places. The fourth characteristic is probably the hardest one. A life without God's comfort is a life without God's presence, his blessing. Again, we see this in verse three. In the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. And that's a beautiful words of comfort, but that implies that the Lord had left them. And again, we see this throughout scripture that God leaves his people when they continue to sin against them. We see this first in the garden. God tells Adam and Eve, you can't eat from this tree from the garden. He tells it to Adam in particular. And they do. And then they are what? They are banished from his presence. And the great picture of that are the two cherubim that are there, the same two cherubim that are guarding the Holy of Holies, the glory of the Lord in the middle of the temple. They say, no, you cannot enter here anymore. You cannot be sinful and come into my holy presence. and they are banished from his presence. But then we see God slowly working to bring his people back to him. This is the point of the tabernacle. God tells his people to build this beautiful structure, and then he himself comes down. The glory of the Lord descends into that holy of holies, and he is with his people. He is their God, and they are his people. Beautiful, a beautiful indication of his coming back to his people. But then as we read, especially in 2 Kings chapter 24, we read it in, when God's people sin against him, what happens? The author says, in the end, he removed them from his presence. And you see it in Ezekiel as well. His glory leaves from Jerusalem. His presence goes away as judgment comes down. A life outside of God's comfort is a life outside of his gracious presence. And that's the worst bit of it all. Why do we say that? Because we can only have peace in his presence. Our life is a constant battle unless we are in his presence. We can only have forgiveness unless we are in his presence, unless he is gracious towards us. You only have order when he is with us. Otherwise, we spin back to tohu vavohu. We spin back to chaos. We need God's presence in order to have God's comfort. That is a life outside of God's comfort. Now, let's move on to more positive things that this text is telling us. What does a life in God's presence look like? Well, it's pretty much the opposite of what we saw. Those four characteristics flipped around, and this is the emphasis of the passage. The first characteristic of a life with God's comfort is a life of peace without that constant warfare. We see it here in verse two. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare is ended, is ceased, that her iniquity is pardoned. and that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins. Her warfare is ended, it's ceased. And you see this not only here in this passage, but you see it also in the prophets. Earlier in the book of Isaiah, there's that great passage about how people will basically make their swords into plowshares and their knives into pruning hooks. In other words, the weapons of war will become weapons of productivity, a beautiful world without war, a beautiful world with peace. Later in the book of Isaiah in chapter 11, the prophet talks about how in the new world, when the son of David comes, the wolf will lie down with the lamb. How the cattle and the lion will be together and a little child shall lead them. And worst of all, in our minds now, things are operating as they are now, a little child will put his or her hand right there into the snake hole and everything will be fine. I tremble at that thought. Not so long ago, I had little kids and reading that passage, having a child play in the den or in the hole of a snake, that makes me tremble. That's scary, but not in the new world. God is going to bring peace to that world. That is what comfort means. So much peace that the traditional predators will become friends. The wolf will lie down with the lamb, the cattle and the lion, and a little child, the most innocent and naive among us, will be able to lead these predators and their prey and no harm will come to them. There will be neither harm nor destruction in all my holy mountain, says the Lord, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." The beautiful promise of peace. Here in verse 2, her warfare has ended, but throughout the scriptures, That beautiful promise that the weapons of war will become weapons of productivity in order that God will bring his lasting peace to this world and to our hearts. That is life in God's comfort. Second characteristic, forgiveness instead of condemnation. Forgiveness instead of condemnation. You see this again in verse two, that her iniquity is pardoned. The iniquity is brought up, the fact of the exile remained, but it's going to be pardoned. It's going to be forgiven. That is what God does. And once again, you see this throughout scriptures. When humans sin against God, God offers his forgiveness, whether that's to David. It's interesting that David sins, and according to the Old Testament law, he should have been put to death. But God is speaking of a greater forgiveness that's coming, a greater, a full and a final forgiveness that will come. And not only that, we see in all of scripture the promise of God's forgiveness, especially in that great promise of a new covenant, when God will forgive their iniquities and remember their sins no more. Or we can think of the end of the book of Micah in chapter 7, where it says that God will throw our iniquities to the depths of the sea, where no one goes, where no one can find them. That's how full our forgiveness will be. and the comfort we will have because of that. And we know that we have this with our Lord Jesus Christ. We have forgiveness when there was condemnation. We read it earlier in Ezekiel chapter 36, when God removes the hearts of stone and puts in a heart of flesh, how he cleanses them from their iniquities. Once again, the context is exactly the same. Ezekiel's speaking to the exiles and he's saying, this is what's going to happen. He is going to restore God's people and bring them back in forgiveness. He's going to forgive them of their sins. Thirdly, a life with God's comfort is a life of order and peace. A life outside of that chaos. A chaos which we see again in Genesis 1 before God brings his order to the world. We see that the world is dark and again, formless and without shape. But in some of the greatest prophecies of the coming forgiveness, the coming comfort of God, we see God's light shining I can think of Isaiah chapter 60, arise and shine for your light has come. Or earlier in the book of Isaiah 49 when it talks about the Messiah being the light to the nations. Part of the point of that is they bring order to the nations when there wasn't order before, when there was only chaos. A life in God's presence is a life of order and peace. and a life of comfort. And finally, a life with God's comfort is a life in God's presence, his glory. You see it here again in verse 3. In the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord and make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Our God is coming back to us. I know you're in exile now. I know you feel far away from God. I know you're in a different land, and you're hearing a different language, and these are all signs of judgment to you. But God is coming back. Fear not. He is coming back. And it's important that's in the desert, because that is where God did his great miracles in the past. He brought the people through the desert. He's going to do it again. These words would have been of such comfort to the people, not simply because they would be saved, but also because they would be saved because God would coming back to them as he came to them in the desert with the pillar of cloud in the pillar of fire so he will come back to them in the desert in that place of chaos and ultimate not comfort away from God's presence he will come back to them but also in verse five, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together. The glory of the Lord, that's an important word. The glory, that word glory is the same word that's used to describe God's presence when it came to the holy of holies in the tabernacle and in the temple. The glory cloud descended into the holy of holies. The glory of the Lord shall be revealed. God's going to do that again. But this time, it's going to be even greater. All flesh shall see it together. Not just a few. Not just the millions that were there. All flesh will see it together. He's going to do it again. It's going to be greater. It's going to be more decisive. He is coming back to his people. And this time, he will not go. That is ultimately God's comfort. A life of peace, a life of forgiveness, life of order, a life in God's presence. Let's move now to the final part here. Perhaps the most important question. How do we obtain God's comfort in our lives? We've seen how beautiful it is. We see that life of peace and that life of order and forgiveness and in God's presence. How do we obtain this? The answer is only in Christ. Only in Christ. Because it's Christ that fulfills these words ultimately. And I'm not just saying that because it looks like it. All you need to do is turn to all four of the Gospels and all of them apply these words to Christ in their different ways. In Matthew and in Mark, it's very obvious. The verses one through three are actually quoted. John the Baptist says them. John the Baptist is the one who has come to prepare the way of the Lord in the wilderness. He is the one who announces the coming of Jesus. God coming back to his people. Not only that, though, in the other two Gospels, it's important, too, to see that these words are applied to Jesus. In Luke chapter 2, there's an old man by the name of Simeon, and God revealed to him that he would not die until he saw God's promise being fulfilled. But these are the words that describe here Simeon and what he is waiting for. This is Luke chapter 2 verse 25. Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon and this man was righteous and devout waiting for the consolation of Israel. Now that's a little bit muted because the translation is a little different here. That's the same word in the Greek text, the Old Testament, that's comfort. He's waiting for the comfort of Israel. He's waiting for God's return to his people. And when he sees God returning to his people, he says, oh, now I can depart in peace because God has visited us again. He's come back to us again. His comfort is with us once again. But also in John's gospel, in that beautiful prologue of John's gospel, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. As we continue to read there, we see in verse 14, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us. That word dwelt there literally means tabernacled among us. And we beheld his glory. and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. God has come back to his people, and he has come back to his people in our Lord Jesus Christ. How do we obtain comfort? We obtain comfort only through our Lord Jesus Christ. God's comfort only comes through our Lord Jesus Christ, who? faced the war on our behalf. He went through the battle, the ultimate battle, not against Rome, not against the powers that be in a human level. He went against the devil himself and beat him in the resurrection. Now is the time for the Prince of Darkness to be driven out. And therefore, he can give us peace because he has already fought our battle. Not only that, he can give us forgiveness because he took upon himself our condemnation. As Isaiah will say later in Isaiah chapter 53, he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace was laid upon him and by his wounds, we are healed. We can have forgiveness because he received condemnation on our behalf, or in the words of the Apostle Paul, God condemned sin in the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ. But not only that, Christ went through the chaos of this world. We see this as he walks on water. Water is a great symbol of chaos throughout the scriptures. This is why, by the way, there's no sea in Revelation chapter 21. But not only that, as Christ is dying, what happens? The whole world becomes dark. It's as if the world is spinning back to that formlessness and void. Christ experiences that so that he can give us order and peace, not as the world gives it, but the true peace that passes all understanding. Finally, Christ as he's dying on the cross, what does he cry out? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Christ can bring us in to God's presence because on our behalf he received not only the condemnation from sin, but he was forsaken so that we can live in the presence of our God. He faces abandonment to bring us in to God's presence. So as we think about comfort, the true comfort that only God can bring, the true comfort that means peace in our lives, the true comfort that means forgiveness from all of our sins, that means order in a world of chaos, that means being in God's presence fully and finally. Let us only seek it through Christ, who died on our behalf, who experienced all of the horrors of what we deserved in order to bring us into the presence of our God. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for our Lord Jesus Christ, who ultimately is the one who gives us comfort. We thank you for your returning in him to us. We thank you that the glory of the Lord was revealed All flesh saw it together. We thank you that as he was dying on the cross, he was bearing what we deserved. Pray that as we live in your presence, as we seek to live lives within your comfort, that you would give us peace, that you give us knowledge of our forgiveness and help us to live our lives in a way that is orderly. But most of all, Father, that we would live in your presence. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we pray all these things. Amen.