Let's hear God's word from Isaiah chapter six, beginning with verse one. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim. Each one had six wings. With two, he covered his face. With two, he covered his feet. And with two, he flew. And one cried to another. and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. So I said, woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the king, the Lord of hosts. Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it and said, behold, this has touched your lips. Your iniquity is taken away and your sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us? Then I said, here am I, send me. And he said, go and tell this people, keep on hearing but do not understand. Keep on seeing but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull and their ears heavy and shut their eyes lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and return and be healed. Then I said, Lord, how long? And he answered, until the cities are laid waste and without inhabitant. The houses are without a man. The land is utterly desolate. The Lord has removed men far away. and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land, but yet a tenth will be in it and will return and be for consuming as a terebinth tree or as an oak whose stump remains when it is cut down, so the holy seed shall be its stump. Amen. We'll end our reading there at the end of Isaiah chapter six. Let's once again ask for God's help in prayer. Our gracious God and heavenly Father, only the Holy Spirit who first showed Isaiah this vision can genuinely teach us what this passage contains. We can see a little bit of its glory, its majesty, but we cannot enter into it unless you help us, unless you speak to us from your word. And so we pray today for the living voice of our Savior to come to us through the printed and the preached word that it might reach our hearts, that it might persuade us of the great truth that is here. In Jesus' name, amen. You might wonder why Isaiah doesn't tell us what seems like his call to the ministry until six chapters in. Why isn't Isaiah chapter six, Isaiah chapter one, in other words? Well, of course, Isaiah is a long book with a great deal in it. And I think Isaiah wanted to set the template. He wanted to lay out the table, so to speak, in the first five chapters for the meal that he would be presenting later on. And so in those first five chapters, we find a great many things that are echoed, that are taken up again and explained more fully later on. One of the things that is important about Isaiah, and this is true to some degree of all the prophets, but we know a little bit more about some of them than about others, but one of the things that's true of Isaiah is that his own life is something of a seal on his teaching. His experience is confirmation or demonstration of the truth of his message. And I think that's why Isaiah Chapter 6 is Chapter 6 and not Chapter 1. Isaiah has laid down his great theme, God will bring salvation to his people, but not instead of judgment, God will bring salvation through judgment. Judgment is absolutely going to happen. It is inevitable, but that doesn't mean that God has forsaken his people whom he foreknew. That doesn't mean that grace has been defeated. And so, after words like these from chapter five, for all this, his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still, or when he said that people will look to the land, there's darkness and sorrow, light is darkened by the clouds, And if you look to the sea, you hear its angry roaring. Well, in spite of words like that, Isaiah can now hold himself forward as a trophy of grace. Has God forgotten to be gracious? You might ask yourself that after Isaiah chapter five. Isaiah chapter six is the answer, no. God hasn't forgotten to be gracious. Isaiah himself is a pattern, is a proof, is an example that God is still at work among his people to have mercy. And so this is the place where Isaiah tells the vision that really showed him who God was that really set the pattern for his ministry. You can notice that. I think I've already mentioned to you that the Holy One of Israel is a characteristic phrase that Isaiah uses for God. He uses that way more than anyone else does. How did he learn to call God that? What made him delight to call God that? I think it was this vision. where he heard the seraphim proclaiming, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. So now let's jump into the details of the vision a little bit. The first thing that Isaiah tells you is when it happened, the year that King Uzziah died. We don't know if it was before or after his death. We do know that Isaiah prophesied in the reign of Uzziah, so it's possible that this was shortly before his death, but however that may be, Uzziah had reigned for a long time, and by and large, he had been a pretty good king. He did make some mistakes, and the closing years of his reign were a little marred, but he had a son who was involved in a co-regency with him, So this had been an era of prosperity. Relatively speaking, a large amount of peace. Israel and Judah were both flourishing, and for a change, they were actually getting along. But this is the year of King Uzziah's death. Things are not going to last. That little window where really everything was pretty good overall was closing. In the political realm, in the historical realm, in the human realm, good things don't last forever. You have little windows, little seasons of peace and prosperity, a few years in between one war or one catastrophe and another, but all of that changes. King Uzziah dies and Put in there anybody you want, any king, any ruler, any president from any part of history. Did their reign last forever? No. Did the good times they created last forever? Also no. That's not how it works in this world. But there is something that doesn't change. King Uzziah dies, but Isaiah sees the Lord. Hi. and lifted up. His throne is not affected by the back and forth, the ebb and flow of history. His sovereignty remains unchallenged. That vision is going to be very important for Isaiah. He's going to live through a lot of turmoil. Coming up in the next chapter, there's going to be news that makes everybody's heart shake. like the trees of the forest are shaken with the wind, but not Isaiah. Why? Isaiah has a stability. Isaiah has a peace. Isaiah has a security that comes from having seen the Lord high and lifted up, sitting on a throne. Isaiah is not rattled and disturbed and troubled by the changes. Isaiah is able to remain steadfast and strong through them because He knows who God is because he knows that God is in charge. Now, Isaiah says he saw the Lord. Of course, we know this was not a vision of the essence of God. No one can see God's essence. It transcends human perceptions. But this is God accommodating himself. This is God revealing himself to the prophet. And you notice that even though that's true, there isn't actually a description of the Lord. We understand that this was probably a human shape because he says he saw the Lord sitting on a throne. But he doesn't describe a face. He doesn't describe an arm or a hand. He doesn't describe anything like that. He says, I saw the Lord. And then he goes on to tell you what is happening around the Lord. The Lord was sitting on a throne. The throne was high and exalted, so of course the Lord who's on it is also high and exalted. And then the train, presumably the train of his robe, is filling the temple. Isaiah moves on from there to talk about the attendance of this exalted Lord. Why doesn't he describe the Lord? Well, I think there are two reasons for that. One is we're not supposed to make images of God, so we really don't need a visual description. The other reason is related to it, underlies it, you can't. What words would describe God? What words would tell you what the invisible God who dwells in unapproachable light looks like? There are no words for that. So Isaiah has a vision, but he really doesn't tell you much about the vision. He emphasizes who the Lord is, he is sovereign, that's the meaning of the particular title that's used there. He emphasizes that the Lord is exalted, even his very throne is high. He mentions that the train of God's robe fills the temple. Now there's a lot to unpack there, but the way I think about it, is Isaiah sees a vision of the heavenly Lord, the exalted Lord, not enthroned in the temple in Jerusalem, enthroned high above that. But the train of his robe falls all the way down to the earth and fills. that earthly temple. You remember the Ark of the Covenant, that mercy seat there, that was supposed to act as a sort of a footstool or a throne for God. God says that heaven is his throne and earth is his footstool, and the temple was a sort of a scale model of that. So that's how exalted God is, that his robe fills the earth, as the seraphim will go on to say, the whole earth is full of his glory. What can be known of God fills the earth, that's what glory refers to is the attributes of God displayed, who God is made manifest to us in one way or another. So basically what I'm saying is that when it says the train of his robe filled the temple, that's saying the same things in different words when the seraphim say the whole earth is full of his glory. Well, the overwhelming impression that you get then from verse one is of majesty. There's no one like the Lord. There's no one with authority like him. There's no one with a character like him. And then you're introduced to his attendance to the seraphim. Now, depending on what sources you look at, you might find some people who try to suggest that these beings have some kind of connection with serpents. They're basing that on the etymology of the word, on the history of the word, and I don't think that case is very strong at all. For one thing, these would be serpents with six wings, but also with hands and feet. Okay, now you're talking about hands and feet. That is no longer a snake shape. I'm sorry, but that's just not how it works. So the only reason to have any reference to snakes here is that this word, this word for burning ones, which is what seraphim means, is applied to a kind of snake. But I think it's applied to that kind of snake in terms of how its bite feels. So you see how those are just completely different things. So what do we know about these beings? Well, from the name, you could call them Burning Ones. This is the only place where they're mentioned in scripture. Obviously, we can say that they have six wings. Two function as a veil. They cover the face. Because even for these pure Burning Ones, the glory of God is too much to look at unfiltered. They can't see God's essence. With two, they cover their feet. In other words, two are functioning in place of clothing. They're able to cover themselves because they have that extra set of wings. Well then, with the remaining two wings, they can fly so that they're swift in the service of God. And what Isaiah finds them doing is singing, calling one to another. There were at least two, maybe there were more than two, maybe there was a whole multitude, but presumably the ones on one side of the throne would call, and the ones on the other side of the throne would answer. So maybe one side would say, holy, holy, holy, and the other would say, is the Lord of hosts, and the other would say, the whole earth, and then they would answer, is full of his glory, something like that, an antiphonal chant is what that would be called. And as they call out, as Isaiah sees this, It's like there's an earthquake. The posts of the door were shaken at the loudness, at the thundering of these calling voices, and the house was filled with smoke. Smoke is often a sign of the divine presence. Of course, if you're thinking about burning ones, you wouldn't necessarily be surprised. And I think this is also a little bit of an anticipation of what happens. Smoke is something being consumed by fire. What a vision. If only we could enter into it. If only we could experience, not so much the vision itself. That's written down for us. But if we could experience the weight, the power, the majesty of this text, we can with the help of the Holy Spirit. It might take some, setting some time aside to read through this, to pray about it, just to bear it in mind and to ask the Lord to write it on your heart. The core of it, you've got the exaltation in the vision, but the core of it, is the cry of the seraphim, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. Now, that God is holy is a very big subject. Of course, it means that God is transcendent, that God is different, that God is separate from us in his exaltation. everything that has been made, and then there's God who made it, and they do not share the same nature at all. Of course, there's also a moral or an ethical component to holiness, that God is separate from impurity, God is separate from iniquity, God is separate from everything that is wrong, that is defiled, that is unjust or unrighteous or incomplete in any way. God is absolute perfection. That message struck Isaiah, as I hope that message strikes each one of us. And Isaiah's reaction comes in in verse five. So I said, woe is me. For I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." Isaiah recognizes he was not worthy to have this vision. In other words, this is not something he earned. This is not something he worked himself up to. This was not a reward for his faithful prophesying. This was God's initiative of grace to reveal himself to the prophet. And when Isaiah encounters that, he says, woe is me. He was overwhelmed with dismay because here is the holy king, the Lord of hosts, the one who is in charge of everything, and here is sinful Isaiah. We don't really know who God is until we have learned that coming into his presence is dangerous, until we know that we are unworthy to stand before him. You know, so often we're so familiar with the word, with the concept of God, we think we're, so to speak, gonna stroll into God's presence chewing gum with our hands in our pockets, like it's no big deal. But that's not the case at all. When people encounter God in his holiness, when people really know who God is, what happens? What are the reactions? Well, you can read other parts of scripture. I fell on my face as one dead is one reaction. Or you can think about Samson's father saying, we're gonna die, we're gonna die, which is kind of what Isaiah says here. Woe is me, I am undone. If you think it's a light or an easy thing to come into God's presence, that just means you don't know who God is. It's a staggering mystery that sinful human beings are able to have any knowledge of God, any contact with Him. You remember when the Lord Jesus performed a miracle. in a catch of fish that made Peter realize, this is not just a regular person. What did Peter do? He fell on his knees and said, depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man. Where there is no conviction of sin, where there is no sense of our deep unworthiness, there really is not the true knowledge of God. We see God. When God is revealed to us, we recognize that we are undone. How about you this morning? What are your thoughts of God? Do you think you've earned the right to be in his presence? Or does the awareness of his holiness remind you? that you are a sinner who richly deserves to be burned up by the fire of his judgment. We should take our stand with Isaiah. We should recognize that we are sinful. He chooses the sinfulness of his lips. We often don't put a lot of stock in that. It's just words. I was just talking. I was just blowing off steam. That was the point that Isaiah highlighted. that his lips were unclean and so were the lips of the people among whom he dwelt. If it were only the sins of our mouths, if you had no other sins to add to your list, if it were just the sins you've committed in speech, that's enough to render you utterly miserable forever, separated from a holy God. We expect God's holiness to destroy sin, don't we? And so we're not really much more prepared than Isaiah was for what actually happened. Hearing that cry of Isaiah, and isn't it amazing that the Lord heard Isaiah say that? One of the seraphim was sent. He took tongs that they had there, the instruments of the altar, He picked up a coal. Apparently, he dropped it into his hand. He's a seraphim. He's not gonna be burned. He's already a burning one. And he brought that burning stone, and he touched Isaiah's mouth with it. I don't know if that hurt or not. You would think it would, but Isaiah doesn't mention that. But he says, this has touched your lips. Your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged. What was the response of the messengers of God's holiness to Isaiah's crying out, almost as though there must have been some mistake? He wasn't supposed to see this vision. What a disaster for him. Now he's undone. It was an answer of grace. And this gets at the heart of the book of Isaiah. You can't read Isaiah and think that God in his holiness will not punish sin. Of course he does. Of course it's there. But it's interesting that Isaiah sees seraphim and not cherubim. Cherubim are seen. Cherubim are also the messengers of God's holiness. You remember, there was a cherub who guarded the approach to the Garden of Eden and wouldn't let Adam and Eve back in. But the cherubim seem to reflect God's holiness as it's reflected in anger against sin, destroying it and punishing it. But here you have the seraphim, a little bit different. And what happens with Isaiah's sin, it is taken away. It is purged. Now, what's the imagery here? Well, a coal or a hot stone is taken from the altar, from the altar of sacrifice, and applied to Isaiah's lips. How was sin taken away? Sin was taken away by means of sacrifice. Sin was taken away, in other words, by means of vicarious judgment. The judgment that Isaiah deserved fell on somebody else. Who that somebody else is is not really in view in this passage. He's going to get to that in chapter 53. But that it is taken away by sacrifice is very clear here. And what was sacrifice? Sacrifice was a symbol. Sacrifice was an anticipation of judgment. So what does the Lord in his holiness do with sin? Well, he destroys it, but he has more than one way of destroying it. He can destroy it in the person of the sinner, and you get the cherubim for that. He can also destroy it. by applying it to a substitute, by purifying the sinner from it. And for that, you have the seraphim. Isaiah acknowledged his sin and it was taken away. This is like a visual aid for 1 John. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The kids sang that in the program last week. Isaiah confessed his sin, and what happened? It was taken away. Do you hear the good news there? In God's holiness, consistent with his holiness, even an expression of his holiness, if you confess your sins, They are taken away by the sacrifice of Christ. You are purified from them by the application of that sacrifice to you. We are cleansed from our sins by the blood and spirit of Christ as surely as our bodies are washed with water. Amen.