If you have your Bibles with you, please take them out. Open them to the book of Isaiah and the ninth chapter. Isaiah chapter 9, beginning at verse 1. And if you would join me in standing for the reading of God's word. Isaiah chapter 9. beginning at verse 1. Nevertheless, the gloom will not be upon her who is distressed, as when at first he lightly esteemed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward more heavily oppressed her by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan. In Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who walked in the darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined. You have multiplied the nation and increased its joy. They rejoice before you according to the joy of the harvest as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. For you have broken the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder and the rod of the oppressor as in the day of Midian. For every warrior's sandal from the noisy battle and garments rolled in blood will be used for burning and for fuel of fire. For unto us a child is born. and unto us a son is given. And the government will be upon his shoulder and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would give us grace in this day. Grace to understand, grace to approach your word in a way that is faithful, that is reflective, that is obedient. And help us, God, in all that we do, to bring glory and honor to the risen Christ. Speak to us, teach us, change us according to your word and according to your purpose. In Jesus' name. I love the first word of this passage, nevertheless. No matter how dark the days, no matter how pressing the judgment, no matter how painful the chastisement or how overwhelming the circumstances, there is the whisper in the wind of the tempest, nevertheless. God is the source of all mercy and goodness and his mercy remains. He has promised that all who are his are being governed for their own good that he has the workings of his mercy and grace hidden in the wings going forth for all that he has intended and promised. And even when the darkness seems impenetrable, his light is breaking forth. The gloom is parting, the darkness is lifting, and night is breaking forth into dawn. The psalmist gives us hope to cling to in the midst of darkest despair. In Psalm 30, verses 4 and 5, he writes, sing praise to the Lord, you saints of his, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holy name. For his anger is but for a moment. His favor is for life. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning. Isaiah here gives us a host of reasons to remember that promise and to trust its fulfillment, regardless of where we may currently be in this cycle of God's patient warning, correcting chastisement, or gracious restoration. He is still doing all that He does with the same purpose that He always does, our good and His glory. The first thing we see is a promise of light. So again, in Isaiah 9, we see, nevertheless, the gloom will not be upon her who is distressed. even when at first he lightly esteemed the land of Zebulun, the land of Naphtali, and afterwards more heavily oppressed her by way of the sea beyond the Jordan. In Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light." Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined. So what we need to understand to kind of get some context for this is that Israel, the Northern Kingdom, the Northern Ten Tribes, is approaching the end of its existence as a nation. The judgment is about to fall upon them. Judah is a couple of hundred years behind that time scale. They also will be judged tremendously by God for their rebellion. But Israel has reached the end of their tether and judgment is approaching quickly. And God has been pouring out different things upon Israel. And Isaiah is reminding Israel that in the midst of all of these judgments, they are still to look to God for their hope. They are still to look to God for their promise. And he's telling them that, you know what, there's been these things going on in the northern kingdoms, Naphtali and Zebulun. These places, these tribes have been under great punishment and under great judgment from God. But then he turns the tide away from that thought and he says it's not always going to be like that. It's not always going to be like it has been since you were lightly esteemed. Because in Galilee, this place that is now going to be overrun by Gentiles, there has come a great light. Now we're seeing the promise of Christ and it's an interesting thing. that the judgment of God provides the context for the promise of His deliverance. That the judgment of God upon Israel provides the context wherein the light of Messiah shines more brightly, wherein the light of Messiah is more clearly displayed. And the people and the land have been under a cloak of darkness. They have been under a cloak of darkness of sin. They have been under a cloak of darkness of God's judgment. And, of course, we have to understand when he says that the people who dwelt in the shadow of death refers not only to Israel, but it also is broader. It refers to all of us, because that is where People are. That's where the land is. That's where, if you are not found in Christ, you are dwelling under the shadow of death. If you are not found in the presence of Christ, if you are not His, the only thing that lies over you is the shadow of death. But to those people, to those who are under the shadow of that death, is the promise of Messiah. And this reality gives us hope in the midst of whatever darkness is. Now, the second thing we see is that this judgment is far from over. In fact, It's really just beginning. Even though God is promising an end to it, in the timescale of man, it's just barely getting started. In the timescale of what's going to be happening, these things are just now starting to really accelerate and ramp up, and there's going to be a lot of problems in the northern kingdom of Israel, and there's going to be a lot of problems in the southern kingdom of Judah as well. But God's promise is not disturbed or dissuaded by its present circumstances. And that's something that we really need to cling to because we tend to be very myopic in our vision. We tend to look at things with a, here's what I see right now and this defines me. This defines how I think and who I am and how I see the world around me. I can only see my circumstances. That's human nature. That's just the failing of our frailty. That's the failing of our flesh. It's hard for us to see beyond this moment. It's hard for us to look at an empty building and say, what are we doing right? It's easier to say, what are we doing wrong? And yet God's promises remain exactly as they are. God's promises are always stable. They are always sure. And it's important for us to remember that no matter what the circumstances look like, the things that we cling to, the promise of God, his word, his testimony, the hope that is ours through him, these things are unwavering. They're unchanging. They are absolutely, absolutely without question, always to be trusted. And Isaiah is pressing this promise of light upon a people that even now are walking in darkness. And keep in mind, Isaiah lived around 600 years before Christ. Right? So 600 years from the giving of this prophecy, when the people who are now walking in darkness will experience the dawning of the great light, where Christ fulfilled the bulk of his ministry, right there in this place, which is going to be overrun by the Assyrians and filled back in with a people that are kind of Israelite, kind of not. It's a problem that they're going to have to dwell in. And yet at the end of it, promise of light, the promise of a restoration, the promise of hope that, frankly, even the people of Jerusalem, if they rightly understood, would have been jealous of, with all the scorn that they looked upon Galilee and its Gentile tendencies. Because the judgments that God has brought have a dual purpose. They are for breaking those opposed to God and for refining those that are His own. And that's always the truth. Whatever's going on in our world, when God brings judgment, there are two purposes in mind. And the first one is to break and to crush and to chastise those that are opposed to him. And the second is to refine those, to purify, to sanctify those who are his own. Now, the circumstances, whichever side of that coin you're on, are identical. Right? These things happen. This circumstance occurred. It's bad when we look at it. There's no other way to really say this thing is good. It's a bad circumstance. And yet, God promises that for His own children, its purpose is sanctifying. Its purpose is good. Its purpose is to restore and to refine and to make us more into the image of Christ. At the same time, that it's breaking those that are opposed. The Puritans had this saying to keep that thought in mind. They said, the same sun that melts the wax hardens the clay. Right? And so the idea is that the circumstances are unchanged. The difference in how it affects is a result of the nature of the object being affected. And as Christians, we need to bear in mind that our trials and our turmoils and our conflicts and our difficulties. They are designed by God to sanctify. And they will sanctify. The process is probably going to be painful. It's been my experience that when God brings judgment, it's always painful. It's going to be painful. It's going to hurt. It's going to be difficult. And yet, because of the nature of who we are as followers of Christ, because God has given us not just the new goal, not just the new set of, oh boy, I really think I want to do this now. It's not a mental game we play with ourselves as far as we're going to follow after Christ. It's a change in our nature. We've been transformed. We have been made into something new. And because of the change in our nature, the circumstances that will crush others will ultimately bring us to Christ. They will ultimately bring us closer and closer into conformity to his will. And this is the process that we're seeing at work here. And this is what's going on in Israel. The judgment set the stage for the coming of light so that God could call all to himself that he had chosen out of this place. And this circumstance is a necessary component of the coming promise. And that's the part that's really hard for us to get our heads around. We don't really understand what it is that God is doing. And yet the circumstances that he sets in place are lined up like dominoes. And in the end, when it's time... We'll see it displayed. We get to behold this. So the first thing we see is this promise of life. The second thing is the promise of peace. Again in Isaiah 9, it says, You have multiplied the nation and increased its joy. They rejoice before you according to the joy of harvest, and rejoice as men when they divide the spoil. For you have broken the yoke of his burden, and you have broken the staff on his shoulder. The rod of his oppressor is in the days of Midian. For every warrior's sandal from the noisy battle will be used... I'm sorry, and garments used in noisy battle will be rolled... Back up and try that again. For every warrior's sandal from the noisy battle and garments rolled in blood will be used for burning and fuel of fire. These glasses are not exactly right. So what we see is that God's judgment had brought war upon the land. Okay? The difficulty here is a very real one. There was a time of judgment, there was a time of war, there was a time of conflict, and God used pagan and Gentile kings to do his bidding because his people had refused to obey and had turned instead to false gods, to false magic, to necromancy, to talking to the dead, right? So think about our culture today. Think about some of the things that people go in for. They go in for seances, they go in for spirit guides, and spiritists, and people who will tell them the secrets of the stars, and all sorts of crazy things that people think are going to give them wisdom. We live in a day that is much like the days that had overrun Israel. We live in a day wherein all of the things that our culture turns to for wisdom, it's not safe to assume that because somebody says they're spiritual that they know who Christ is. And that's a really big buzzword in the culture today, is, I'm a very spiritual person. Typically, when I hear that from people, I tend to assume that they don't know Christ. That word, the way that it's used, I just typically kind of process that. So, okay, so let's talk about who Christ is. Let's talk about the reality of who he is. And this is how Israel had turned. The Northern Kingdom had given itself over to the worship of false gods, and they had given themselves over to so many things that were completely contrary to who God is. They had given themselves over, and as a result, God had brought judgment upon them that would ultimately result in war and conflict. The pagan kings were massing for an invasion of Israel. Assyria would come in, and Assyria would be the ones who ultimately took them over, and yet, At the same time that Assyria was coming in, Egypt would come up from the south, and Israel would become the battleground in this war between Egypt and Assyria. And so not only was it a war against them and a punishment upon them, but they themselves would become collateral damage in the other things that were going on. And all of this, God promises us, is a result of His purpose in refining a people. But here's the thing. In the midst of that war and in the midst of that conflict, we see that he's promising that on the backside of that comes the Messiah who brings peace. On the backside of that, we see these things where God says, that's gonna end. We see these things where God says, just pay attention to the words that he uses here. Broken the yoke of the burden, broken the staff of his shoulder, the rod of the oppressor, as in the day of Midian, every warrior's sandal and garments rolled in blood, used for burning and for fuel. And that promise of peace that is coming also is a promise of joy. He likens it to the joy of harvest. In agrarian society, there is no greater time of joy than the time of harvest, right? They're the ones that they work their whole year, and at the time of harvest, the payoff comes for all that labor and all that work. It's the time when the joy is abundant. Aside from that, it's just hard work. It's just drudgery. It's just head down, feet in the traces, and push on as hard as you can. It's that idea that there will come a promised payoff for the difficulties of the day. He also gives the analogy of those who rejoice at the time of the spoil, as men rejoice when they divide the spoil. So just as in an agrarian society, there is this joy at the time of harvest, if you're talking about a military-based society, the joy comes when they conquer and when they divide the spoil. So in the end, What we see, though, is that the promise that God gives is ultimately a blessing. So let's look at some of the things that he's giving us here. Ultimately, he's promising that there will be an increase of those who are his own by revival and by awakening. So we're going to see that the difficulties that are here will ultimately increase. He says in verse three, you have multiplied the nation. So even though Israel was going to be destroyed, even though Israel was going to be punished and chastised by God, what he says is that when Messiah comes there's going to be an increase, there's going to be more. The promise is for down the road and the good things will come. So even though it looks like they've been diminished, even though it looks like they've been struck and that God has basically cast them off, there will be an increase. He promises breaking the yoke of the burden. Whatever the trial, whatever the difficulty, whatever it is that you're laboring under, it is there for a season. And if you belong to God, it is there for a season at His bidding and for His purpose. So this difficult thing that you're dealing with, There's a reason for it. Now, don't ask me to give you what the reason is. I can't. It would be presumptuous of me to tell you what God is doing specifically in your life. But I can give you the general principles of Scripture. And the general principles of Scripture are easy for us to see, hard for us to believe sometimes, but easy for us to see. Romans 8.28 tells us that God orders all things together for the good of those who love him, for those who are the called according to his purpose. It goes on to tell us what that purpose is. It is to shape us into the likeness of Christ. So I can tell you at any time, whatever you're facing, that what God is doing in your life has the general purpose of fashioning Christ in you. It is for the good things that God is doing in your life. But ultimately, here's what I want you to hear. That burden will be broken. One day, God will break that off of your shoulders. One day, he will deliver you from it. One day, whatever it is that you're struggling with, beloved, he's going to break that burden free. He's going to destroy the yoke of the oppressor, the yoke, that piece that binds shoulders together that you carry the heavy load with. He's going to break that yoke. No longer will you be bound into that burden. No longer will you be bound into that difficulty. He's going to set you free. You see, war isn't just invading armies. Sometimes war is what goes on between our ears. Sometimes war is what goes on between our spirit and our flesh. Sometimes war is what goes on within our own hearts as we're trying to figure out what in the world is going on around us. It's not just people coming at you with guns and knives and axes and swords. War is really a state of mind in so many ways and God promises that one day that's going to cease and His peace is our reward and His peace is our promise and His peace will be ours because He's given it to us. The cessation of war and the advent of peace. He says, As well, in verse 5, from every warrior's sandal and from the noisy battle, garments rolled in blood will be used for burning and for fuel of fire. Now this is an interesting thing to me because what Isaiah does under the direction of the Lord is to take even the evidence of the difficulties and shows that there will one day be a good purpose put to it. Sandals used for conflict and garments rolled in blood. All of these things themselves will one day have a purpose. They're going to be used for fuel. You'll see good things come out, even though you look at the circumstances and you say, there's no way in the world that can be good. But ultimately, one day, these things will be brought out. There is good coming from it. Now, ultimately, all of this is pointing up to verses 6 and 7. He says, for unto us a child is born and unto us a son is given. And the government will be upon his shoulder and his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will fulfill this. It's important for us to note that although the Old Testament is littered with messianic promises, types, Christophanies, pictures, and prophecies, they have only now really begun to take shape. Isaiah was among the first prophets to give much in the way of detail. And here in chapter 9, we already have his third messianic prophecy. the first occurring in chapter 2, the second occurring in chapter 7. So here by chapter 9, Isaiah has begun to really flesh out what we would see as Messianic prophecies coming up to this point. It was vague. It was shadowed. It was more in types. We can look back, as we've been doing for the last several months, and we can see Christ typified in much of the Old Testament. But by Isaiah, God has begun to give very clear detail that the scholars of Israel began to look at and say, okay, this is who Messiah is going to be. This is what we're supposed to be looking for. This is the man we're expecting. But even with all of that clarity that Isaiah gives, they still missed it. For us as Christians, we can look back and we can see the present reality of who Christ is. We can begin to see the expectation that we can refine, that we can look back and we can say, how did they miss it? And I wanna tell you how they missed it because for us as Christians, it's something we have to also be careful of. They missed it by allowing their expectations to define scripture rather than allowing scripture to define their expectations. What Israel wanted was a Messiah that would restore a physical reality of David's kingdom. What they wanted was a Messiah that would put Israel back on the top of the heap as a world power. What they wanted was a Messiah that would deliver them from the physical issues that were going on around them, rather than understanding that what God was primarily delivering them from was sin itself. And you see, so often we allow our expectations to shape and define how we understand Scripture, rather than using Scripture to shape and define our expectations. That's the challenge for us. And, Beloved, that is always the challenge. It's going to be the challenge until we are in His presence. Because that's just how we're made. It's just our nature. It's just the flawed portion of the natural man remaining in us that so easily runs to what I can see, and taste, and feel, and touch. It so easily runs to the things that I can comprehend, and the things that I can quantify, and the things that I can explain, and the things that I can understand. And Israel did this, and so their understanding, even though, I mean, this phrasing is just astounding. His name, this Messiah who's coming, will be called Wonderful Counselor. He'll be called Mighty God. There's no reason in the world why Israel should not have understood that Jesus Christ was God in the flesh. There's no reason in the world that Israel should not have, that the Pharisees shouldn't have understood that when Jesus declared that He was God, and God didn't strike him dead, wait a minute, maybe this really is Messiah, instead of picking up stones and trying to kill him themselves. But you see, they had allowed their expectations to shape what they understood of Scripture. So, we must learn to allow the Scripture to speak to us, to say what it says and not allow our own perceptions, expectations, thoughts, hopes, or fears to color our understanding and thus cloud it. You see, Isaiah is startlingly specific about the person of Messiah. He is startlingly specific about who this Messiah is. And so the first thing we're going to see is that this coming one will be one of us, coming into the world in the usual way. For unto us a child is born. Right? What was one of the chief difficulties that the Jews had with Jesus? Isn't this Joseph's son? Isn't this the carpenter's boy? Isn't this that guy from Nazareth, the backwoods country that has nothing good? Has anything good ever come out of Nazareth? Has any prophet ever arisen from Galilee? Their understanding was colored by the fact that they had lost sight of the fact that Messiah was going to be born like one of us. Unto us a child is born. And they missed that. Now, we know theologically that that's a really important point, that God was of necessity by the design of salvation. Messiah had to be man, because Messiah had to be one of us to pay our debt. Since the price of our sin is death, Messiah had to be human, or his death would be meaningless. He had to be one of us. He had to belong to the race of Adam. But he also will be a king. Now the type of king that he is, government will be upon his shoulder is the statement, right? So there's the reality that he's a king. But skip down to verse seven. He's gonna be the king upon the throne of David. So he's David's heir. He is the promised Messiah. He is the one who is coming to fulfill God's promise to David. What was God's promise to David? I will establish your kingdom, I will establish your throne, and of your dominion there will be what? No end. So Isaiah references that promise, he references that so there's a resonance of God's words to David and he says, of his government and peace there will be no end, right? Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it. So this throne, this dominion is forever. Christ is the fulfillment of God's promise to David. There is a necessity for us to understand that sometimes the way that we first understand what God says is refined later as God gives more clarity. Israel wanted a physical king. They wanted a physical deliverance. They wanted a king that was going to establish Israel again as the dominant nation. I said that before. But what God intended was that there would be a king who would reign over the hearts of men. God intended a king who would reign over his kingdom. God intended a king who would display that Christ is everything and that the power of God knows no limits. And his throne will be eternal. This kingdom that he's establishing will be established with total and perfect balance. So the first thing we see is that his reign will increase. His reign will always be triumphant in whatever is going on around it. It's always going to be victorious. It's always going to be increasing. And this increase will always result in peace, and an increase of that peace. So again, in verse 7, of the increase of His government and peace, there will be no end. It'll be balanced with judgment and justice. So we see that God is willing to say that Christ is not just all fluffy and kind and sweet and good, even though that's the way the culture wants to paint him. Even though that's the way much of the church wants to paint him. Jesus is the nice guy who holds the little lamb. But there's a reality here. Judgment is a part of that picture. God says that sin will be judged. And God says that sin will be punished. Since Christ himself bears our punishment and stands in the place of judgment, when we will one day stand before his throne and know the judgment of God, it is Christ who will stand in our place. It is Christ who will say, my blood paid that price. My blood satisfied the judgment against that. But before that can be said, there has to be a judgment imposed, right? This is by the life of Christ. This is by the righteousness of Christ. We can't be delivered from a judgment that doesn't exist. We can only be delivered from a judgment that's real and that is there and it is present. This is part of His reign. This is part of His purpose. His righteousness requires judgment. His righteousness requires that God would absolutely judge sin. But because of His love for us, He took that punishment upon Himself. So we see judgment, we see justice, we see mercy, we see the resulting balanced kingdom, which will be ultimately unlike anyone before or anyone after. Now this is one of my favorite parts of probably the book of Isaiah is chapter 9 verse 6. Unto us this child is born and unto us a son is given. The government will be upon his shoulder. Now just listen to these descriptives. Wonderful. Right? Just stop for a moment and think about that. Jesus is wonderful. He is one who when we see him as he is, fills us with awe and wonder. He fills us with an awareness of his power and of his presence and of his person that nothing else should ever even come close to. He allows us to see him more and more clearly the longer we live and walk with him. He shows us his beauty. He shows us his magnificence. And the right response of a living heart is just to say, wow. It's a wonder. We gaze upon him and we marvel at him. We gaze upon Him and we are overcome by our awareness of His beauty and His perfections. And more and more, no matter how much more we learn, the more perfect He appears, the more beautiful He becomes, the more captivating is that vision of Him that we are permitted to see in Scripture. What God calls us to do is to embrace a reality which sees Christ as He is. And the very first descriptive is wonderful. The second descriptive is counselor. And what does that word mean? It means somebody who gives counsel. It means somebody who guides. It means somebody who leads. It means somebody who comforts. The counselor is one who comes alongside and gives to us what we need in our hour of need, whether it is insight or understanding or comfort or peace or just companionship. Whatever the need of that moment is, this counselor is the one who provides it. Christ is the one who supplies everything that we need emotionally and spiritually and physically. This giving of himself to us is an overwhelming reality. The next descriptive, he is mighty God. Now, how many of you have ever entered into a conversation with either a Jehovah's Witness or a Mormon who's told you that nowhere in scripture does, is God, is Christ declared to be God? If you've talked to these folks, you've had that conversation. Now, I want you to keep in mind that nobody argues that Isaiah 9.6 is not messianic. Everybody understands that Isaiah 9.6 points to Christ. So His name will be called what? Mighty God. This is a list. And the entirety of this list points back to His name will be called. Okay? His name will be called Wonderful. His name will be called Counselor. His name will be called Mighty God. Jesus is God in the flesh. He is God-made man, and He is absolutely 100% man, because He is the Son of Man, He came into the world in the natural way, mostly. But He is God in the flesh. He is God-made flesh. And no matter what you find, here's what you're gonna learn as you discuss the reality of these things with people. If they're wrong about who Christ is, they're wrong about everything else. Okay? You cannot be right about anything unless you are first right about who Christ is. So as soon as you remove the divinity of Christ, all of a sudden, salvation becomes works-driven. As soon as you remove the divinity of Christ, salvation becomes something which is all about us and all about our labor and all about our ability to fulfill a set of rules. As soon as you remove the divinity of Christ, the power of salvation is removed as well. Christ is fully God. And we need to keep that in mind. And immediately, I would encourage you, if you are engaged in a conversation with them or others who deny that, that is the place to go immediately. Just speak to the divinity of Christ. Affirm it. Confess it. Show them in Scripture this and a thousand other places where you could draw from it that Christ is God. And here's probably what's going to happen. The discussion is over. Typically, they're not going to stay engaged in the conversation at that point. And I don't tell you that so that you can end the conversation. I tell you that because truth is what's going to change people. And truth born from Scripture is what's going to do the work. So you need to be versed in the reality of what Scripture tells us about who Christ is. You need to be versed in the reality of the fact that Christ is God-made flesh, period, without exception. And do not surrender that ground under any circumstances. Don't surrender it in your discussions with anybody, and whatever you do, don't surrender it in your own mind. Christ is God-made flesh, period. He is also called, if that weren't strong enough, What? Everlasting Father. Okay, folks, we're not quite sure that it really means that Jesus is God when we say that he is mighty God, so let's just put a nail in that and call it Everlasting Father as well. Now, this not only speaks to the divinity of Christ, but it speaks to the nature of the Trinity. He is God. He is Father, He is Son, He is Holy Spirit. He is God. And this reality teaches us that for us as Christians, there is the wholeness of who God is that is ours through Christ. There's a lot of times we compartmentalize this and we tend to think a little too boxed in about the nature of the Trinity. We tend to to kind of focus our attention in one place or on one portion and neglect the others. And it's a failing that every aspect of the Church has. There are those who overemphasize the work of the Spirit. There are those who overemphasize God as exclusive of everything else, God the Father. There are those who even overemphasize Christ to the exclusion of everything else. The Trinity is God showing us His nature. It's all three, every part, has its place, and every part is important to the mix. And we need to understand who he is. And then he goes on to say he is the Prince of Peace. Now, as far as this is concerned, I just want to give you this, and I want you to think about it. For most of us, conflict is in one form or another always present with us. Whether it's conflict with people around us, conflict with the world at large, conflict with our circumstances, or just conflict with ourselves. That conflict is the perfect opportunity for Christ to reign as Prince of Peace. We don't appreciate the wonder of peace until conflict has been taken away. And what God tends to do in our lives is provide opportunities for us to see him. He provides opportunities for us to behold him in all of the various ways that he's at work in us. Beloved, here's what I know. I know that whatever it is that you're facing, whatever difficulty you may have, whatever problem you are currently wrestling with, the answer is Jesus. Right? It's sort of like the little kid who was in Sunday school, and the Sunday school teacher was teaching about creation, and she said, on the fifth day, God made all sorts of things, and she wanted them to understand what he made on the fifth day, and so she was trying to tell him, you know, there's these big tall things that have green on the ends, and they're kind of hard and woody, and she's trying to get him to think trees got made on the fifth day, and one little boy says, well, I'm in church, so it has to be Jesus, but it sounds a lot like a tree. Right? It's kind of like that. Whatever your problem, the answer is always Jesus. Whatever your difficulty, the answer is always Christ. Whatever you're struggling with, the answer is always Christ in me. And we need to learn to read the scripture with an eye to see Christ. We need to learn to look at our circumstances with an eye to see the opportunity for Christ to be manifested and magnified in that circumstance. We need to learn that no matter what it is that's going on, God wants us to see Jesus in it. Because Christ is, don't lose me here, Christ is the manifestation of God the Father. He is the way that we see God. Right? Turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 4. I just want you to see this in scripture. You know I'm not making it up. 2 Corinthians chapter 4. If you remember when we were going through 2 Corinthians, we spent several weeks in this passage, but I just want to bring it to your mind again and help you see it for just a second. 2 Corinthians chapter 4. Starting in verse 3, Paul writes, But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the God of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus' sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Do you see the way that Paul juxtaposes those two ideas, one against the other, plays them off one against the other? Christ is The image of God shining on them. The glory of Christ is the image of God. And then in verse 6, the glory of God is shining in the face of Jesus Christ. Right? We see that in the midst of one, to see one is to see the other. What did Jesus tell Philip when he said, just show us the Father and it will be enough? He said, Philip, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. Right? You see, we see God by seeing Jesus. We see God's working by seeing the hand of Christ. We see God's intention by seeing Christ being manifested in the midst of whatever's going on. And we need to learn to look at the world around us in such a way that Christ is being manifested. Because ultimately it is the zeal of the Lord of hosts that will accomplish this in us. Now that word zeal is a really awesome word. It means jealousy. It means God's passion for His people's good and for His people's providence. It means His determined intention to watch over them and care for them. It's likened in some ways to where God compares Himself to the husband watching over his bride, so in some places it's rendered jealous. The idea is that God is carefully guarding us, God is carefully protecting us, and that what He is doing in His work for His people is governed by His zeal to care for them. by his determination to make certain that all that is best is ours. Now, I want you to hear what I said, because I said it carefully. All that is best. And sometimes what we want is not necessarily what is best. And sometimes what is best requires a path that is painful to get to it. This is what the promise is about in Isaiah. They are about to endure the most difficult days of their life. And lest they lose hope, God gave them this wondrous gift, this prophecy, which was to remind them that after all of these days is done, the real glory is coming in the face of Christ. The real glory is coming in the promised Messiah. Because ultimately, while this is a promise of light, and this is a promise of peace, and this is a promise of Messiah, this is ultimately a promise of blessing. Ultimately, He restores God's people to a right relationship with God. And He brings into that right relationship all that are chosen in Christ. See, the Jews looked at the world like this. You are either a Jew or you are not. You are either us or you are them. And God said, no, you are either mine or you are not. And it has nothing to do with your ethnicity. It has nothing to do with what church you belong to, or what clothes you wear, or what political party you are affiliated with, or any of the other things that we want to use to determine the us and the thems of the world. What God says is either you belong to me or you do not. And what his promise is, is that when Christ comes, the fullness of those who are his will be brought in. There will be Jews and there will be Gentiles. There will be those who look like us and those who do not look like us. I love how Paul Washer defines his passion for missions. He says when he goes on a mission trip, when he's preaching Christ in another part of the world, he is looking for his family that he has not yet met, which is a beautiful way to see it. It's a beautiful way to understand it. We go and we proclaim Christ because we don't know who is his, but he does. And since God knows those who are his own, as we proclaim and preach and teach the truth of who Christ is, all of those who are his will be swept into the kingdom. You see, God does not exclude any from the proclamation of the gospel. And God does not exclude any from the kingdom based upon the things that we tend to think exclude people from the kingdom. We need to be careful about this. I'm not suggesting for one moment that God has unconcerned about sin. Right? Because the path to salvation is the same across the board. The path to salvation is repent and believe. Repentance must come. We have to forsake our sin. We have to turn away from that which is displeasing to the Father. And nobody gets into the kingdom apart from repentance. Can't happen. But we tend Because of our own prejudices and our own issues and our own failings, we tend to perhaps withhold the truth of the gospel from those that we don't agree with on the front end, losing sight of the fact that God didn't agree with any of us to begin with. Right? We all were ruined. We all were wretched. We all were destroyed by our own sin. And there is not a one of us that could stand on our own strength and say, God, okay, I'm righteous. Check me out. Not any of us. When you find yourself looking at somebody else's life and going, ugh, I can't imagine what it must be to be them, bear in mind the parable that Christ gave about the tax collector and the Pharisee in the temple. The Pharisee stood and he said, God, I thank you that I'm not like him. I thank you that I'm not a sinner. I thank you that I'm righteous. I thank you that I'm me. And the tax collector, Jesus said, wouldn't even lift his eyes towards heaven. But he lay on his face in the temple and he said, oh God, be merciful to me, a sinner. And Jesus said, I tell you the truth, one man left justified. Which one do you think it was? Since he said, I will not share my glory with another, and there is none righteous, no, not one, I don't think the guy that was very impressed with himself is the one who left justified. For us as Christians, we need to understand that the promise of Messiah is a promise for all. The offer of Christ is real. I haven't changed my theology. I believe in a sovereign God. I believe that God knows those who are his own, has chosen those from the foundations of eternity, has called them, will effectually call them, will save them, will secure their salvation. I am unyielding on that. But I also know that sometimes that understanding limits our evangelism because we don't think about it right. The exclusiveness that we tend to bring into things is dangerous. And more than anything else, this prophecy of Christ exploded that idea, which at the bottom of it may really be why Israel didn't remember it so much when Christ was on the earth. Because they didn't really want the light to be for the Gentiles. They didn't really want the light to be for those that weren't like them. They wanted the light to be their own. They wanted Messiah to make much of Israel. rather than understanding that God made Israel to make much of Messiah. And the same thing is true for us. God did not give us Christ to make much of us. That's a byproduct. He made us to make much of Christ. And we need to keep that in mind. And we need to be certain that in all that we do and in all that we're about, we are being generous with the gospel. I think that if I was going to be accused of something wrongly by God on the Day of Judgment, I personally would rather have Him say to me, I didn't really mean that you offer it to everybody, rather than have Him say, I meant that, and you withheld it selfishly. I don't think He's going to say that to me. I don't think He's going to say, I didn't mean that you offer it to everybody, because the Scripture's pretty clear that we should. And I pray He doesn't say, you shouldn't have held it back. Let's pray. Father, we ask that in this day you would teach us to love you as we ought, to see the glory of Christ as something that is transformative, and to embrace our obligation to share him relentlessly. God, teach us to share the Christ who is God made flesh. Teach us to share him with the people who are fallen, broken, ruined by sin. Teach us to share with a passion and a purpose that remembers who we were and who you have made us, ourselves fallen and broken, but redeemed by Christ, made whole by the blood of the Lamb. And teach us, God, in this day, to carry into the darkness of the world around us the hope of a risen Messiah, that our lives might be the light that draws others in. We ask it in Jesus' name.