Good evening, everybody. Good to see everybody this evening. I would like you to turn your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 41. We'll be reading some verses from Isaiah chapter 41 this evening together. And as we read this together, I want us to be aware not only of the context for the people to whom this is written, but also how it relates to our own context. Here, Isaiah is prophetically addressing people who would be in exile. Now, for him, obviously, he dies many years before the exile, but he is prophetically addressing the exiles throughout Isaiah 40 to the rest of the book. And he actually calls Cyrus the great liberator of the people by name. So keep that in mind as I read this. This is addressed to people who are in the Babylonian Empire and in exile. Even though Isaiah is writing well before this, it's addressed to them prophetically. And try to imagine what kind of situation that would be. Terrible situation. You're living in a very far away place from your home with a different language, with the people over you enslaving you. It's to these people that these great and powerful words are written. Isaiah chapter 41, 8 through 20, the word of the Lord. But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham, my friend, you whom I took from the ends of the earth and called from its farthest corner, saying to you, You are my servant. I have chosen you and not cast you off. Fear not, for I am with you. Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you. I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Behold, all who are incensed against you shall be put to shame and confounded. Those who strive against you shall be as nothing and shall perish. You shall seek those who contend with you, but you shall not find them. Those who war against you shall be as nothing at all. For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand. It is I who say to you, fear not. I am the one who helps you. Fear not, you worm Jacob, you men of Israel. I am the one who helps you, declares the Lord. Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. Behold, I make of you a threshing sledge, new, sharp, and having teeth. You shall thresh the mountains and crush them, and you shall make the hills like chaff. You shall winnow them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the tempest shall scatter them. And you shall rejoice in the Lord, and the Holy One of Israel you shall glory. When the poor and needy seek water and there is none and their tongue is parched with thirst, I, the Lord, will answer them. I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will open rivers on the bare heights and fountains in the midst of the valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. I will set in the desert the cypress, the plain and the pine together, that they may see and know, may consider and understand together that the hand of the Lord has done this. The Holy One of Israel has created it. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for these beautiful words that give us encouragement. We thank you, Father, for the encouragement they gave to those who were listening to these words in exile. We thank you for the encouragement they give to us as we see a world around us that in many ways is far from you. And we see ourselves in places where are under control of powers that we cannot control. We thank you that you are above all of this. We pray that we would be encouraged this evening by these facts. And it's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. So when I was about 14 or 15, I hit my big growth spurt. I got to about the height I am now, 6 foot 2 or so, by the time I was 14 years old. So you could imagine in ninth grade, there weren't many people that were shorter than me. And I kind of liked that. I walked around. I kind of liked, I got used to the fact of looking down on people, quite literally, I hope not metaphorically, but looking down on people, seeing people below me. It was just something I, without even wanting to take it into account for myself, I just kind of liked that. But then one day all my dreams were completely shattered. I remember my My uncle, actually he's the husband of my father's sister, he used to play professional football. And he once took us to a practice or something like that, that the Steelers were doing. And we were really excited and I went and we got to meet all these players. And I realized then for the very first time, actually I'm not very big. I'm quite small really. For the first time in many years, I felt small. Surrounded by these men who were so much bigger and so much stronger than I was. We look around us and we feel small quite often. So many things around us we just can't control. We are at the power under the authority of people that we don't know. We feel small. And whether it's in our situations, whether it's our own emotions, whether it's because of those opposed to us, whether it's because of our needs, we feel small so often in our lives. The people who were hearing this in exile also felt small. They felt very small. They were under the thumb of the most powerful empire in all of the world, the Babylonian Empire. And they had no way of escaping, or at least no earthly way. They knew about the promises that God had made, but it didn't seem like it could be real. They were slaves to a powerful empire. They heard a language they did not understand. They felt small. In this chapter, God gives these people who feel so small, he gives his response to them. And he speaks to five different situations in their lives and in our lives where they felt small, and he gives his response. So we're going to go over these five situations in which they and we feel small, and we'll see what God says to those situations. The first situation is we often feel small because we simply just feel sorry for ourselves. It's easy to fall into self-pity. Second, we feel small because our issues are just so huge. We have so many things surrounding us that we cannot control. Thirdly, we feel small often because our enemies are so strong and we feel weak next to them. Fourthly, we often feel small because our needs are so great. We depend on others so much. This makes us feel small. And fifthly, we feel small because God is so majestic. God is above us. He's the great one. He's the creator, as we sang earlier from Psalm 19. And it's easy to compare ourselves, who have so little power comparatively, to see that we indeed are small. What is God's response to those situations? That's what we will explore together. The first situation, like I said, is we feel small because we feel sorry for ourselves. You could imagine being in exile, you would have the constant temptation to feel small. Every day you are surrounded by an enemy. You would have a temptation to fall or to wallow in self-pity. This is something that would be very tempting to all of us in that situation. And indeed, it's what some of them had done. We see this in verse 14, when the word worm is used here. It's very important to understand that this word worm, when Jacob is described as a worm, it's talking about their present situation, and especially as they conceived it themselves. Sometimes Christian theologians will say things like, oh, we're just worms. I actually don't think that is exactly what the scripture teaches. We are not worms. We are created in God's image. And the reason why sin is such a tragedy is precisely because we are not worms. Worms can't fall. Worms are already on the ground. We as humans were so great. We were created and given all this authority and we completely blew it. We sinned against God. And that's why sin is such a tragedy. It's because we were destined for such a great position that sin and the way it twists us in every way is such a tragedy. So this word worm here is not a description of who the people of God are in any ontological sense, nor is it even a description of the reality of their situation in exile. It's most likely a description of how they conceived themselves. They saw themselves as being surrounded by these powerful people, completely powerless. feeling really small, like a worm on the ground. We feel like this sometimes too, and it's so tempting to fall into self-pity. Self-pity is much more acceptable to us than pride, but really it's the same thing. Centered around ourselves, whether it's self-centeredness or self-pity, we are the center of it. I remember, this is something I fall into often. I remember when I was young, I used to say things to myself like this, my older brother, well, he's the oldest. The brother right under me, well, you know, he's really popular. The one, my sister, it's kind of hard to do this when there's six siblings, but I found a way. My sister below me, you know, she's the oldest girl. The next brother, oh, he's funny. Everyone loves him, he's funny. The next one, he's the youngest boy. Finally, the last one, well, she's the youngest. But me, I'm nobody. Nobody likes me. Nobody thinks of me. Of course, it was completely untrue. But oh, so tempting. And it's so tempting for us to fall into that self-pity as well, especially when our circumstances are difficult, especially when we feel small and we are surrounded by people much bigger and more powerful than we are. What is God's response to this? We see it in that same verse 14. He says, fear not. You worm, Jacob, you men of Israel. I am the one who helps you, declares the Lord. Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel, your Redeemer. He has redeemed you. You cannot be worthless. You cannot be a worm, because God has redeemed you. That means that you are valuable, not in yourself, not because you've done all these great things, not because you've somehow earned it, but because God has done it. You are valuable, first of all, because you were created in his image. And secondly, because you are being renewed in that image in our Lord Jesus Christ. Fear not, your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. That is God's message when we're wallowing in self-pity. It's sometimes nice to feel sorry for ourselves. It kind of gives us a nice feeling. It's addicting in some ways. We need to stop it with the lies. and accept this truth. Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. Remember it when you feel small. You are valuable because He values you and He has redeemed you. And he has redeemed you with the most precious blood, the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, who came and died and rose again to redeem you. So you are not this worm, Jacob. You are redeemed, redeemed by the power of God. Second situation. We feel small because our issues are just so huge. Think of the Israelites in exile here. Think of the issues that they had to deal with. We have a little taste of this in our own lives. Obviously, we were not exiles when we were living in a foreign country. But it's so hard to get up and move and go to a place that is completely different than what you are used to. The language is different. The way they operate, everything is different. It took us so long just to get a mobile cell phone because they do things completely differently there. And people are wondering, who is this foolish person who can't even operate a cell phone? It's unbelievable, but it's completely different. Everything is different. And that's in a good situation. Imagine their situation, going as captives in exiles. And you see some of this in the Psalms. I think it's Psalm 137. By the rivers we wept. The terrible situation in which these exiles found themselves. Our issues are huge, and they sometimes can overshadow us and make us feel really small. I remember feeling this way when I was doing my dissertation. I had heard, when I was in seminary, one of my professors, a great Hebrew professor, even though he likes Hebrew better than Greek, so I'll forgive him for that, but he was a great man, and he still is, and I remember he was doing his dissertation at that time, and he told me, it's like looking at a mountain, you can't see the peak, and I kind of filed that away, because I was planning on doing that, and when I got to that same situation, I realized he wasn't lying. completely huge mountain in front of me, step by step, so hard. Sometimes our issues are like that, looking up at a mountain, trying to climb it, utterly impossible. Or so it seems. What is God's response when we feel this way, when our issues are around us? What does he say? He says, I will equip you to face all the issues that are before you. Read this in verse 15. Behold, I will make of you a threshing sledge, new, sharp, and having teeth. In other words, he is equipping us to do the work he's calling us to do. You shall thresh the mountains and crush them. That is impossible to thresh a mountain. How can you thresh a mountain? It is impossible. It's like what he says in Zechariah 4. He's going to make the mountain into a plain. Humanly speaking, this is utterly impossible. But God can equip us to do what is, humanly speaking, impossible. So when our issues surround us, and we think they're just too big, remember these words here. You shall winnow them, and the wind shall carry them away, and the tempest shall scatter them. You shall rejoice in the Lord and the Holy One of Israel. You shall glory. He will equip you, and you will glory in Him. It isn't that we are so great, and therefore God is entrusting us with these great tasks. It's not like that at all. He equips us. He strengthens us. He gives us what we need in order to do what he has called us to do. This does not mean it's going to be easy. Part of what it means to follow Christ is to suffer. We read this over and over again in the New Testament, and we think it's easy to read it abstractly, but Paul is not lying, nor is he speaking generally when he says that we must suffer with him in order that we might be glorified with him. It is not an easy task. He doesn't say, I'm going to equip you So as to make it so easy for you, you're just gonna breeze right through it. No, that's not what he says, but he does say he's going to equip us. He's gonna make us fit to do the work to which he has called us. This is God's response when we feel small because our issues are huge. I will equip you to face the issues that are before you. Moving on to the third situation we find here. And that is, we feel small because our enemies are so strong. And now, the enemies here that are mentioned are quite literally enemies. They are the Babylonian Empire. And you remember, if you read in the scriptures about them, they're not very nice people. What happened is that the Babylonian Empire took over the Assyrian Empire basically sometime in the late 600s BC. And Nebuchadnezzar, the great king, the great emperor, set his sights on Jerusalem. And he wanted to take it over. And he started a siege. And that siege is with vivid detail described in the Book of Second Kings. And we see it written about in the Psalms and the Book of Jeremiah and Lamentations. And we see how the Babylonian armies broke through and destroyed the city. And worst of all, they destroyed the temple and took everything from it. These are villains. They are great, powerful, and wicked enemies. and they are surrounding the people of God. Their enemies are huge. We, too, have some pretty big enemies. What are the great enemies we face? Well, ultimately, spoken generally, they are sin, death, and Satan himself. These are the things that we face on a daily basis. The attacks of the evil one, the sin in our own heart, and the sin that is around us. Death and everything that leads to death. It has saturated this world and it is powerful. It has a grip on this world and it's so difficult to see any escape route from it. Our enemies are big and we feel small. What is God's response to this? Your enemies are big But I am bigger. With my help, you will defeat them. That is God's response. Your enemies are big, but I am bigger. With my help, you will defeat them. We read this in verses 11 through 13. Behold, all who are incensed against you shall be put to shame and confounded. Those who strive against you shall be as nothing and shall perish. You shall seek those who contend with you, but you shall not find them. That's how defeated they will be. You will seek for them and you will not find them because they are gone. Those who war against you shall be nothing at all. And here's the reason, here's the reason given in verse 13. For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand. It is I who say to you, fear not, I am the one who helps you. Our enemies are big, but our God is bigger. And not only do we have to take this only on God's word right here, although that would be enough, because God's word is sure, we have proof of it. Because our Lord Jesus Christ came to defeat the great enemies, sin, death, and Satan. And in his death and in his resurrection, he defeated them decisively, and he ascended to the right hand of God and sat at his right hand, the place of power, the place of majesty, the place where he holds all authority which has been given to him. Your enemies have been defeated. Fear not. It's easy to look around and get scared. It's natural, in fact. We don't know where we are going. There are many people opposed to the gospel explicitly around us. We don't know how to handle these things. They're beyond our wisdom and certainly beyond our power. We don't have the power to contend with these people around us who hate the gospel. And while it's true that our enemies are big, they are nothing before the Holy One of Israel who says to us, fear not, I am the one who helps you. He helps us. He strengthens us. so that in him we die and rise again and defeat the enemies. The last enemy, as the Apostle Paul says, to be destroyed is death itself. And on the day of resurrection, Christ will raise us from the dead, as he says over and over again, and I will raise him up at the last day, the one who believes in him. The enemies have already been defeated, and they await their final destruction when Christ returns. This is the truth. Fear not. Face them with courage. It's so easy to forget this. It's so easy for fear to grip our hearts because we're focused on what we can see. And if we're just focused on what we can see, we're in trouble. But this happened. God said these things. And not only that, he proved it by sending his son who died and rose again, defeating Satan, sin, and death for good. Our enemies are big. Our God is bigger. Fear not. Fourth situation, we feel small because our needs are so great. You see this in verses 17 and following. It talks about the poor and the needy. And obviously, it's referring to the people of God in exile. You see that they are in a destitute situation. You can understand why. Again, they are slaves. They have no status. They have no way of improving their situation. They are completely reliant on God and on the charity of others. They're in basically a refugee situation. I've seen people in this situation before, and it is very difficult. And actually, one of the most difficult things about it is you have to be constantly relying on the charity of other people. This is hard on the old pride, if you know what I mean. It's very difficult not to be able to improve your situation and therefore have to be constantly relying on others. This makes you feel small. And sometimes we feel powerless when our needs are so great. Perhaps these needs are financial, perhaps these needs are emotional, perhaps these needs are physical. And we constantly have to rely on other people. And it wounds our pride, and it makes us feel really small. How are we to deal with such a situation? What does God say when we are in this situation? Here is God's response. Your weakness is the context in which my strength is shown. Your weakness is the context in which my strength is shown. Or as Christ says to the Apostle Paul, my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness. You see this in verse 17. When the poor and needy seek water and there is none, and their tongue is parched with thirst, I, the Lord, will answer them. I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will open up rivers on bare heights and fountains in the midst of valleys. I will make the wilderness a pool of water and the dry land springs of water. I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. By the way, those are beautiful plants, all of them. They do not normally grow in the arid desert. God is doing it because our weakness, apart from everything that makes sense to the eyes of the world, our weakness is actually the context in which God's strength, God's power is shown forth. Once again, this does not make sense if we're thinking according to the ways of this age, but it makes complete sense when we understand that we are in Christ. Because what looked like weakness to the world when a man was suffering and dying on the cross, our God made that into the way in which he saved the world. The weakness, or the supposed weakness, was turned into the most powerful act in the history of humanity, the most salvific, that which saved the world, all people who trust in our Lord Jesus Christ. And so it is with us. When we feel weak, when we're surrounded by situations which make us feel small and weak, when our needs are so great, trust in Him and see the power of God at work. Because your weakness too, like the Apostle Paul, and before that, like our Lord, God's strength is made perfect within that. We have testimony after testimony after testimony of God meeting the needs of his people in Christ. Don't forget it. Trust in him. Finally, We feel small because our God is so majestic. And this, once again, is natural. And in a sense, it's good. We don't want to feel huge next to God, because he's God. And we won't. Anyone who sees God up close, so to speak, like Job did, Job had a whole lot to say to God. And he said as he was rehearsing it, as he goes through those middle chapters of the book of Job. And when God comes, what happens? His mouth is stopped. When he has an encounter with the living God, he cannot say a word because God is so much bigger than he imagined him to be. Psalm 8, we read something similarly, where David is thinking about the creation. He looks at the stars above and the moon and the sun and everything, and he says, it causes him to reflect and say, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man, that you think of him? It's a natural question. God is so great with his word. Just by speaking, he created everything that we see and the things that we don't see. Unbelievable power. It's easy to feel small next to God. And there's a sense in which this is correct. However, however, what is God's great response? His great response is, my majesty, my greatness is most powerfully shown in my love for you. That is what he says. And this is what we read here in verse eight. But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham, my friend, you whom I took from the ends of the earth and called from its farthest corners, saying to you, you are my servant. I have chosen you and not cast you off. And then he goes on to say, fear not. I am with you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. God's love for Israel is not opposed to his greatness. It's the way in which his greatness is shown. Once again, returning to Psalm 8. David says, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man, that you think of him? You crown him with glory and honor. All of a sudden, he starts speaking about the greatness of humanity in Christ, in God, created in his image. God's greatness is shown because he loves us. This is the truth that we see again and again in the Old Testament, but in particular, as we think of our Lord Jesus Christ. In Hebrews chapter two, the author quotes from Psalm eight, and he talks about, he quotes the lines, what is man that you are mindful of him? And he talks about how Jesus ultimately fulfills it. Jesus was made for a little while lower than the angels, but now he's crowned with glory and honor at the right hand of God. But that is not the end of the story. He goes on to say that he is going to bring many sons and daughters to glory. And that is where his majesty will be shown, in the glorification of his people. It is a terrible and desperate sin to seek glory for ourselves. But when we seek it in God, he will glorify us. Yes, we confess we serve a big God, huge. And we say, what is man that you are mindful of him? But he is mindful of us. Although he is most high, on the lowly ones he keeps his eye. The Lord saves his people. And precisely for that reason, he is great. Christ enter our world. Christ became small. And in the words of the psalm we're going to sing in just a minute here, Christ became a worm. But I am a worm and not a man. He became small and gave himself for us. Therefore, he was glorified and given the name above all names. So at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every tongue confess. And not only that, he offers us glory united to him. Yes, he is great. And in him, we are glorified. So when we feel small, remember the love of God and be encouraged. Let's pray.