Children's Church and for those of you who remain I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 9. If you have your pew Bibles it's on page 573 unless you have a large print edition in which case it's on page 680. We'll be looking at Isaiah chapter 9 verses 1 through 7 this morning. This is God's word. But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time, he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. But in the latter time, he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them a light has shined. You have multiplied the nation. You have increased its joy. They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. For the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. For every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end. On the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. Pray with me. Heavenly Father, we ask that you would make clear your word to us. that we might understand this glorious good news, that we too might see this light and joy and peace that we have in Christ, our wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. We ask this in his glorious name. Amen. So some of you who know me well know that I do enjoy smoking meats. It's a habit I picked up in COVID and have continued, and I splurged and got a Kamado Joe Classic III, and I've loved it. My only regret is I didn't get the bigger one so that I could do more, but it's been a great little ceramic cooker. It does everything pretty well. It's an all-around cooker, but there are a few things that it doesn't do so great. There are a few weaknesses it has, and one is this, that during the cold and wet and rainy season, it's no fun to use. And so you just kind of let it sit there, and all of the grease and all of the bits and all of the stuff in there, it just starts getting moldy and gross, so that when you do go out there and decide you want to use it, it's just disgusting. is that it's a ceramic cooker and so all you have to do is light a really hot fire and let it burn at 700 degrees and make some pizzas and you're done it's great it's easy to clean and it doesn't stick up the house because it's outside all you have to do is have that fire and it purifies everything burns all of it off all the grease all the mold it's all gone in a similar way God is looking to purify his people And it's His zeal that will do this, His fire and passion for His plans and His purposes and His people that will accomplish this purification. See, Israel has been corrupted by sin and idolatry such that as we saw at the end of chapter 8, they would be thrust into thick darkness. Isaiah has been constantly warning God's people of the consequences of their rebellion, of the coming onslaught of a conquering Assyria. And it will bring with it great hurt and sadness and grief as the northern kingdom of Israel is carted off into exile and as the southern kingdom suffers want and lack. But in the midst of those messages of warning, calling out the rebellion, calling out their wickedness, calling out their idolatry and sin, Isaiah is intent and purposeful and pausing to give messages of hope to God's people that they might not be so downtrodden as to give in to despair. And here, he reminds God's people in Isaiah 9 that the zeal of the Lord of hosts is still accomplishing the purposes of God and fulfilling His plans for His people. Because God is not zealous for Assyria. He is zealous for His people. He is on fire for His purposes. And He will purify His people from all their sin. Nothing can stand against the zeal of our God. Not the might of Assyria, not the idolatry of his people, not all the wickedness and frightening specters that this fallen world can conjure. Nothing can stand against our zealous God. The zeal of the Lord triumphs over everything the fallen world brings to bear. And we see that in at least four ways in this passage, and they're in the titles of the child promised in Isaiah 7, fulfilled in Luke 2, that child who is now king, that we worship forever and ever. These four titles, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, we see that the zeal of the Lord triumphs over a frightening world. And the first thing I want us to see in this title, Wonderful Counselor, is that the zeal of the Lord of hosts triumphs over darkness. The thing about darkness and the thick darkness that the people of God have been thrust into is that you can't find your way. I greased the hinges on the door in our bathroom, and it now closes without making any squeaking noises or screeches, but it also closes on its own unless you have a stopper there. And more than once in the middle of the night, it's closed behind me, and the light shining through the window goes away, and I'm left to find my way in the darkness to wherever it is I'm supposed to be, and hopefully not waking Tracy up in the process. That's just the thing about darkness. You can't find your way. But the wonderful counselor guides his people in the light of all truth. See, this title, wonderful, it's almost primarily used of God, his wonderful works, his wonderful might, his wonderful attributes, his wonderful name. And so for this child to be called wonderful counselor is not just like, oh yeah, he's really good. You should go see him. And he doesn't charge much per hour. No. This is a divine guide who gives people, once thrust into darkness, the light of His glory and truth that they might see the way in which they should go, that they might follow after Him in all truth and justice and righteousness and glory. God does not leave his people in darkness. He gives them the light by which they may walk. That light ultimately is the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the light of the world, who is the Word, which is the lamp to our feet, who is all truth, who is the way, who is the life. And if we would find our way out of this thick darkness, we must follow Him and Him alone. So where do you need guidance? Where have you found yourself confused or frustrated or lost or despairing? Where have the frightening specters of the world blinded you to the way in which you should walk, that you might be in fellowship with your God. Sometimes we get so lost in our own troubles, the bills, the needs at work, the problems with our families that we don't even have time to think about. Where would the Lord have me go? What would the Lord have me say? What would the Lord have me do? We get too busy with all of the things rising up. We don't even pause. Sometimes we find ourselves in circumstances where it just isn't clear. Like, it seems like I'm between a rock and a hard place. If I choose this, it will bring disaster and destruction. And if I choose this, it will bring disaster and despair. How are we to know how to navigate these things? The good news is that God has given us the Lord Jesus Christ. Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given. And he reigns on high even now, seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, guiding his people to be with him in his presence. And James tells us that if we need wisdom from him, all we have to do is ask. The light of the truth of our wonderful Counselor will come to bear. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts triumphs over darkness. The second thing I want you to see in this title, Mighty God, is that the zeal of the Lord of Hosts triumphs over the nations. Much of world history has been characterized by what people smarter than me call great power conflict. It's unusual for there to be one superpower to bring peace on earth. Usually it's a bunch of different nations all fighting, all trying to get their way, and it looks like that's where the world we live in now. And it unsettles me because I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know where the next conflict is going to rise up. In fact, I have no say. Nobody's called me to ask. I'm sitting by my phone. They've got my number, I'm sure. But all those decisions are out of my control. One rogue nation can transform the lives of millions of people. One great power can turn the next decade into darkness. And here we are, going about our day, trying to figure out how to get that one section of the Christmas lights to work, and we have no say, no power, no control. And in that were a lot like Zebulon, Naphtali, and Galilee. These were little powerless podunk territories. And Galilee was as backwater of a town as you could get. And in fact, these were the territories where if there was going to be a great power who decided to invade Israel, more likely than not, they were going to invade through Zebulon and Naphtali and Galilee to take over Jerusalem. These weak, powerless little territories. What were they going to do to stand up against Samaria or Ephraim or Assyria or Babylon or Rome? They, like us, in the face of some of these great powers, like a little league peewee football squad, set up to have a game with an NFL team. I mean, it's just, it's no contest. But the mighty God, when He shows up, everything changes. Because that word mighty conjures up the vision of a warrior. And we see here in verse 3 that he's multiplied the nation, he's increased its joy. They are glad as when they divide the spoil. This God shows up. with all of his might, with all of his heavenly armies, the heavenly host arrayed around him, and he brings these great powers to nothing, and he divides the spoil up amongst his poor, weak people. They might be filled with joy and gladness. See, there is no nation. There is no kingdom. There is no power, there is no weapon, there is no principality that can stand against our mighty God. He rules over all, and the kingdom that He is establishing will be second to none. It will bring every power to heel. and it will divide up their wealth and their glory, and it will spread to God's people that we might know the joy of victory. And sometimes when we are in this world that seems so full of conflict, so full of great powers from foreign nations, and from our own office, and from our own families, and from our own hearts, these great powers that seem to just rule and reign over us, The mighty God comes and says, no, I, I alone am king. And there is no power that has say over you for long. And He's proven this to us in the resurrection. Our Lord Jesus was not simply born of the Virgin Mary, did not simply walk amongst us and suffer every temptation, yet without sin. He didn't simply bear in His body the sins of His people. He rose again from the dead and defeated our greatest enemy, death. that we might, even in the midst of this darkness, even in the midst of all of these powers, know our God reigns, and we have a joy unshakable, that there is everlasting life with Him in His kingdom forever and ever, and no power in the universe can withhold the hand of God or stop His people from inheriting that joyous glory. God gives His people the joy of victory. Where do the powers seem to be reigning over you? Maybe you, like I, have children of draft age, and you're reading the headlines, and you're like, what's coming next? Maybe you're dealing with powers that seem to come out from within you. Addictions. Longings. Those besetting sins that we just can't seem to put in place and conquer. What are the powers? The mighty God says, they are nothing before me. And it does not mean that you will know the joy of victory in this moment. It does not mean that the Lord is going to hold back the disease, or he's going to solve the problem, or he's going to keep all the nations from warring in this moment in time. But what it does mean is that all that the world and all that the nations and all that the powers can bring to bear, are the dying gasps of defeated foes as God's people follow Him into everlasting life. For He will rule and reign and His kingdom shall never end because He is the mighty God. The zeal of the Lord of hosts triumphs over the nations. In this third title, Everlasting Father, I want you to see that the zeal of the Lord of hosts triumphs over oppression. There is no end of hardship in this world. Some of it we manufacture on our own. Some of it comes to us from others. And that's nothing new. You see in verse 4 that the people of Israel that felt the rod of the oppressor, the staff and the yoke and the burden of those who ruled and reigned over them, the threat of Assyria, Babylon. And they might wonder, and in fact many times did, has God forgotten us? Has he just left us here in this darkness? Has he just left us here to bear up under this oppression? Is this some kind of test? Is this something that we have to find our way out of? Is he even here? Does he even see? Does he even know? You ever been a kid? I mean, all of us have been kids, I guess, at one time or another. But my real question is, have you ever been a kid and lost in the grocery store or the Walmart? You turn around, and the legs that you grab hold of aren't your mom's. You look up, and it's somebody completely strange. To experience being lost, that's frightening. I can remember scurrying through the aisles, like looking this way and that, and like, what was she going to get? Was she going to get dinner? And then always going back to the toy aisle to check, because you know there are things to look at there. But also, maybe she'll come back and find me. Like, it's scary to just be forgotten, seemingly. Of course, as I've gotten older and now become a parent, I've experienced the flip side of that, where you turn around And your kids are gone. Where'd they go? And that's much more frantic. And I can tell you as a kid, more than once, I just, you know what? That's not my problem. I'm going to keep looking at the Legos. But as a parent, there's no rock I won't turn over. Like, I will go to the front and I will have them announce my children's names. I am not afraid to embarrass them. I will find them. I mean, they're old enough now, they can find their own way, but there was a time. What gives a parent that unquenchable zeal to find their lost children? It's love. And so in this title, Everlasting Father, we have a picture of what Christ's rule and reign is going to be characterized by. This mighty God, who could crush his opponents under his feet, is yet going to rule with the love of a father that is everlasting, unquenchable, unending. That forever parental, fatherly love. which communicates to us that He does see, He does know. And that yoke, that burden, the staff and the rod of the oppressor, He's going to break that as in the day of Midian, like when Gideon with 300 faithful soldiers conquered an entire invading army. God is going to break the yoke of the oppressor and give us a yoke that is easy, a burden that is a light. He is going to rule and reign as one who will not break a bruised reed. He is gentle and kind to the wayward and he calls back the lost and the whole reason he came and put on flesh and dwelt among us that he might seek and save them. who were lost in darkness, who were given over to idolatry, who were beset with sin and wickedness. And so he does pour out his love on those who don't deserve it, that they might know that they're not forgotten, even in the midst of the hardship and burdens and oppressive darkness of this world. Do you need to be reminded of God's fatherly care? It's easy to start seeing the problems pile up and the difficulties just flood into your life and buy into the thinking that God has forgotten me. God is crushing me. God is punishing me. And we lose sight of His patience, of His loving discipline, of His kind care and endurance to see through to the end the people that He called joining Him in glory. No one can snatch His people out of His hand. He finishes what He starts. because he is full of a love for his people. He is the everlasting Father. The last thing I want us to see is in this title, Prince of Peace. And it's that the zeal of the Lord of hosts triumphs over conflict. We should not minimize the fact that Isaiah is talking to a people who are witnessing external forces completely devastate everything that they had ever known. We should not minimize the fact that God is doing a work in this world that will see his kingdom reign forever and ever. But the reason there are so many forces in this world that are doing such destructive and devious and dark things is because we brought sin into this world. And when you throw a billion or more people together who are all sinful, you get a lot of darkness. And we find a way to corrupt everything good. I can't think of a single good thing that we haven't messed up somehow. We've unleashed the power of the atom so that we can provide electricity to an energy-starved world, but we also figured out how to make a bomb out of it. We have AI that can write all of our college papers for us. Don't do that. We have AI that can help us research new fields and uncover new truths, and we've figured out ways to make it into an algorithm for warfare and battles and strategy and tactics. Robotics, optics, whatever. There's not a thing that we can't turn to destroying the people around us, if you give us enough time. Even cheesecake. I mean, how many kings were poisoned by their favorite dessert? There's nothing that we can't corrupt. But notice what the Prince of Peace does. Every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. He does the opposite. Whereas we corrupt things to use them to destroy around us, the Lord puts it in reverse, and he takes everything that is corrupted, everything, even the garments that could be used to bring death and destruction, and he burns them as fuel for the fire to warm his people in the darkness of the cold, they might have life and light. And so, when the Prince of Peace brings His work to bear in this world to undo the corruption of wickedness and sin, we should not be surprised to find that He starts in your heart. That He begins that work. in the seat of corruption, where idolatry springs forth, where every wicked thought, where the Lord Jesus Christ says it's out of our hearts that all sorts of murder and vile thoughts come out. We should not be surprised that the Prince of Peace begins there. making peace between us and a righteous and holy God, atoning for our sins, giving us hearts of flesh where we once had hearts of stone, and making those who were once hostile to God now children of light that we might follow after Him in joy and in gladness with an easy yoke from a loving Father. that He might turn us who were once intense on being hostile to God and hostile to our neighbor into those who are growing in our love for God and love for neighbor who are named peacemakers by the Lord. That we might take the peace we've been given and see it spread until it rules over everything. Because God does not give His people a temporary peace. He doesn't give His people a peace that is dependent on some superpower that will last for a decade or a century. He gives His people a true, unshakable, unconquerable peace. A peace that begins in setting them right with Himself. A peace that passes all understanding. A peace that spreads as He turns us who once could corrupt anything for destruction, putting it in reverse and turning us into those when the power of the Spirit are able to make peace spread. What a gift. We see in verses 6 and 7 that this child who is born, this son who is given, shall be given the government. All the government. Whatever government there is, seen or unseen in all of history, it's his now. And of the increase of his government and of that peace, there will be no end. In the Chronicles of Narnia, in the last battle, when all the enemies of Aslan are defeated, he invites his people and animals and his nation to follow him further up and further in to see more and more of the glory of the Father. Where are we going now? Further up and further in. There's no end. You can't delve the depth of the glory, or of the righteousness, or of the holiness, or of the peace. And so we see this son, his government will always be on the increase. His peace, His righteousness, His justice from this time forth and forevermore will always be on the march. And He invites us, His people, to go with Him further up and further in into this glorious gift that we might know this wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, who shines upon his people with an unending light, who showers them with an unfading love, who takes them to be with him forever. And if you ever think for one moment because of the darkness in the world around us, or because of the powers of the nations, or the specters that the world conjures. If you ever think for one moment that maybe God has forgotten, or that He isn't able, or that He's lost track, remember the word of the prophet Isaiah. The Lord is on fire for His plans, and His purposes, and His people. And the zeal of the Lord will do this. Pray with me. Heavenly Father, we ask that you would give us eyes to see this great zeal that you have for your plans and your purposes and your people. That we might not give in to despair, that we might be re-energized with hope and joy even in the midst of a dark world. Lord, help us to know afresh and anew the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. He's given to us. He's a great and merciful King. Equip us in the power of the Holy Spirit to follow wherever He leads, that we might indeed share His zeal and spread the good news of His name. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.