What a testimony that is of the Lord's delivering of his saints in their time of need. The portion of scripture that God has appointed for us this morning is found in Isaiah chapter 25, the passage that I led us in the reading of earlier in the service, Isaiah chapter 25. And the Lord has laid on my heart, especially verse four, of Isaiah 25, and so God willing, that's where we will give our attention. Isaiah 25, let's reread the first four verses of the chapter, calling our attention especially to the fourth verse. This is the word of God. O Lord, Thou art my God. I will exalt Thee. I will praise thy name, for thou hast done wonderful things. Thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth. For thou hast made of a city an heap, of a defensed city a ruin, a palace of strangers to be no city, it shall never be built. Therefore shall the strong people glorify thee, The city of the terrible nations shall fear thee, for thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat. when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall. Amen. It's apparent to us, of course, that that passage begins with an expression of personal praise unto the Lord. O Lord, Thou art my God. I will exalt Thee. I will praise Thy name. And there the prophet affirms his personal relationship with God. He claims God as his own personal God, and he vows to exalt God, to lift up his name in the hearing of all who will hear it, to extol, to marvel, to speak wonderfully of the name of God. He will give thanks. He will express his delight in the name of God and in the character of God. And then he tells us why he's so desirous to do this. And there are three phrases in those first four verses that begin with the word for. Three reasons for praising God. The first one is in the first verse. Praise Him for He has done wonderful things. He has done divine things. The word wonderful there, speaking of acts of deity. Wonderful things he's done. The second reason for praising him, in that second verse, is that he has made of a city a heap, and you have it going on, speaking of the defeat of the nation's enemies. And then the third reason, that one will call our attention to in the fourth verse. Praise Him because He has been a strength to the poor. Now in the context of Isaiah's prophecy, this chapter comes directly after a unit that is often called the little apocalypse. From chapters 13 through 23, or 13 through 24, you have a series of woes on the surrounding nations, those nations that are congregating around poor little Judah. And if you turn back, you can see it, you can just flip through 13, 14, 15, 16, the burden of Babylon, the burden of Moab, the burden of Damascus, the burden of Egypt. And on and on, all those burdens go. In each of those chapters, you have about 12 chapters where the complete overthrow of the nations is foreseen. So in the immediate context then, The wonderful works of God that Isaiah is extolling are the Lord's unmistakable interventions on behalf of his people in the 7th and 6th centuries BC. The overthrow of the cities speaks of the destruction of Judah's enemies that carried Judah away into captivity. And the Lord's character as a stronghold and a refuge speaks of the way that he works on behalf of his beleaguered people during the days of their captivity and ensures that they will indeed flourish again even while things look so low in Isaiah's time. Oh, but Isaiah's words stretch much farther than that. When Isaiah is describing this national deliverance, we cannot help looking beyond that deliverance to another deliverance, a higher and a sublimer deliverance, the deliverance that will be brought in by the Messiah. the Savior, God's eternal Son. And what we have here in chapter 25 really and ultimately is a song of praise over the wonderful things that God has done in Jesus Christ. As wonderful as the overthrow of Babylon was, It was but an emblem of the utter destruction of all of the enemies of God and of his church. And as blessed as it is to consider God's faithfulness to Judah in the time of her weakness and distress, His loyalty to and His redemption of that nation signifies the way that He comes to the aid of all of His covenant people right down through the ages when they are at their weakest and when they deserve the least from Him. So this morning, The Lord has laid on my heart the soul-strengthening statements of the fourth verse of Isaiah 25. And I wanna apply them to Christ's relations to his believing people. Here in verse four, our Savior is described under three images. He's a strength, a strength to the poor and the needy and their distress. He's a refuge, a refuge from the storm. He's a shadow, a shade, a shade from the heat when it blasts upon his people. So my theme, God Helping Me, is Christ, our strength, our refuge, and our shade. Christ, our strength, our refuge, and our shade. First, the Lord Jesus Christ is our strength. For thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress. The word there can refer to a place of strength, a stronghold, a fortress. He's our protector. He's our defender. He is our strength. A strength to whom? To the poor. to the needy, to those who are in distress. The word poor in verse four. It's a rendering of a Hebrew word that literally means to be low. There are various words for poverty in the Hebrew language and each emphasizes some aspect of poverty. One of the words emphasizes the oppression of the poor, the way they're taken advantage of. One emphasizes the need and deprivation of the poor. This word is the word that Gideon used to describe himself and his family when he was initially resisting the call of God on his life. And he says, I am of a low family, a low family in Manasseh, and I am the lowest of the low family. He uses this word. He has no standing. He has no social strength. Nothing's expected of him. Nothing's expected of his family. He's low. And of course that low social standing that is associated with physical deprivation and weakness and vulnerability and oppression, all those things go along with it, but the emphasis is the low social standing. So if we think about it then, this word for poor emphasizes the helplessness of the individual even more than the other words for poor. Because a person who is this kind of poor can't improve their standing by merely coming into wealth. You know how it is in most of the world. and how it was especially in the culture of the scriptures, where folks are locked into a certain social strata, a caste system, if you will. And there's nothing you can do to escape it. No check is big enough. to raise you out of the lowest social standing. In fact, coming into money would only make the upper class resent you and be suspicious of where the money actually came from. This is a poor person who can do nothing about it. He is born into the low poverty and need of his situation. And then you have the word needy. He's not only poor, but he's needy. And that's one of those other words for poverty I was just referring to. This is the one that emphasizes the material deprivation, the material poverty. You've fallen on hard times. You're without basic necessities. You're badly off, requiring charity from someone else, needy. And then there's the word distress. You see that word. And that speaks of adversity, or tribulation, or persecution, or grief. It's actually the word trouble that we keep coming up against in our journey through the Psalms on Wednesday. That word that has to do with being squeezed, feeling tight and restricted, like you have a straitjacket on. Trouble, distress. So you put them all together and here you have someone described as helplessly in the grip of great need. I think of that man from John 5 who was called to our attention a couple Sunday evenings ago, the lame man by the pool of Bethesda, who for 38 years was just laying there in a helpless heap with no man to take him when the waters were stirred. He was poor, he was needy, he was distressed. And are not these descriptions true of God's people so very often? Are we not poor? Are we not needy? Are we not distressed? How weak you and I really are. Sometimes that weakness is revealed in bodily weakness. Sometimes it's spiritual weakness. We feel so vulnerable. We feel as if we do not have the wherewithal to face the challenges that are coming up against us. We don't think that we'll be able to endure the trial or the trouble that's before us. We feel we can't face a future with all of its unknown and uncertain difficulties out there on the horizon. Everything in us trembles at the thought of what life might bring, what we might have to face, because I'm weak, and we're so needy. You and I require so much help, and we feel it. We're so lacking in what we must have, either temporally or spiritually. I have needs as a husband, needs as a father, needs as a pastor. You have needs as a mother, as a wife, as a grandmother. You have needs in your place of work. You have needs in your service in this church. You have needs in your service as a steward. You have needs in your service as a Sunday school teacher. You have needs as a Christian school teacher. A lot of these needs are growing larger the longer you live. I feel like I need more faith now than I did 10 years ago. Do you feel that way? I need more faith now than I needed a decade ago. I need more love. I need more patience now. I need more yieldedness. I need more humility. I need more wisdom. I need more holiness. A lot of these needs that we have are of the sort that if they were met today, they'd be there tomorrow. Some of our necessities, they're just fresh every morning. The grace I had five minutes ago is not gonna serve me now, I need it now. Yesterday, I might have had great love, or great faith, or great courage, or great joy, I need it today, fresh again. You may have had great patience under some former trial, but old patience is stale stuff. You need fresh, fresh patience and endurance for what's currently in your life. I need wisdom from above. People bear their soul to me, and I need a word and season for those who are weary. I need physical strength. I need spiritual strength. Don't you need strength when you face criticism? Strength when you feel resistance? Don't you have needs when your patience is tried? When you feel a cold heart within? When you're weak in body due to illness and sleeplessness? Don't you need more of the fruit of the Spirit? Don't you need power because without Him you can do nothing? And it continually comes to you that the real things that I would like to accomplish with my life are completely outside of my control to accomplish. Like the real things, the real legacy that I want to leave, the real impact that I want to have, the real harvest that I want to see, none of that is within my control. None of that is within my power to achieve. And these are just the needs that we anticipate. How many do we not even anticipate? We have no idea what our needs will be. We're poor. We're weak. We're so often distressed. And there is none but God who is a strength to the poor and to the needy and to the distressed. To whom shall we go? Bow down thine ear, O God, hear me, for I am poor and needy. Against that backdrop, Isaiah paints this beautiful picture of God upon the canvas. Thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress. Whatever I may be confronted with, whatever I have to grapple with, He is my stronghold. He's bigger than I am. And he's bigger than the distress that I face. There is a rock that is higher than I when my heart is overwhelmed. Isaiah says, thou hast been a stronghold. Our Savior is an established stronghold. and therefore he is not a stronghold that is going to bend under pressure. He is the almighty God, who in our time of difficulty is mighty to save and just as mighty to keep us. like a stronghold with its walls surrounding it. That is God in relation to each and every one of his individual believing people. He's stronger than they are. He stands even amidst the worst that life can bring. He surrounds us like the walls of a fortress with his divine power and divine might. And so broad and so strong and so fixed are those walls that no enemy can assail or make a breach or overthrow our stronghold. God, even our God, is the almighty God. He has been a strength. to the poor, and to the needy, and to those who are in distress. And this stronghold, brothers and sisters, is always within reach. So when the battle rages, and you feel like your strength departs, and you fear for your very survival, He is there at hand, not far from any one of us. And there's access to Him. His love and His mercy mean that the gates of this stronghold are open and open continually, even to the vilest of sinners. He's ever ready to help those who put their trust in Him. God is a refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. And this is what the people of God have found over the years. When they have had to meet the same problems that you and I are called to meet. When they're vexed with the same sorrows, grieved with the same griefs, anxious over the same worries. having the same complaints that you and I have, they found Him to be their strength. They proved this God as their stronghold in the day of trouble, and so may we. Though we feel so feeble, so overwhelmed with fears, so uncertain about what may lie ahead. The people of God have proved God strong in the past, and we may prove Him our strength in our day as well. As I was with Moses, so I will be with thee, he says to Joshua, and the same is repeated all throughout scripture. As I was with Abraham, so I will be with Isaac. As I was with Jacob, so I will be unto thee. And what was he to them? He was a stronghold. Thou hast been a stronghold. So what must we do then? We must do as they did. And when our hearts are low and trembling, We flee to him who is our fortress, our help, our strength in our poverty and in our neediness and in our trouble. In the presence of God, there is security and peace and hope. We flee for refuge to the hope that is set before us and he receives us because he is never going to let one of his believing people come to shame. In whatever is against us, whatever is threatening us, whatever is alarming us, He stands as a stronghold in the day of trouble, and He vows by His own exalted name that we shall not perish. He will exert all of His deity, all of His Godhood to our preservation and for our safekeeping. And what a blessed truth it is, brothers and sisters, that our Savior is a strength unto the poor, a strength unto the needy in His distress. That's just what I need. Is it what you need? Thou hast been a strength to the poor. The second figure is the figure of a refuge. You see that in the middle of verse four. Not only a strength to the poor, but a refuge from the storm. A refuge, of course, is a shelter Covering, a covert would be the old word for it. Here, particularly one from a storm. The word for storm has a lot of water in it. Sometimes it's translated flood. It's a tremendous rain, an overflowing torrent of water. So the thought here is that when our lives seem to be in jeopardy, And it's doubtful whether we can continue. The storm breaks upon us and it appears so exceedingly dangerous to us. Our savior is our refuge. He will surround us with his keeping power. And he will ensure that when we pass through the waters, he will be with us. and through the rivers, they shall not overflow us. When we walk through the fire, we shall not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon us. So what this means, brothers and sisters, is that when we find ourselves in sore trials, when distress comes, When the flesh entices. When the devil accuses. When illness besets us. When bereavement breaks upon us. When health fails. When we're confronted with death itself. we may resort to our Savior and tell Him all about it. He is a refuge in the storm. And that means in the worst of time, our Savior is a place of calm retreat. The presence of God is able to defend us. He's resolved to look after us. And the one qualifying note is that you're in trouble, that you're being battered, that you're being broken, that the floods are coming in upon you. And if that's true, God is your refuge. A very present help in time of trouble. The refuge of God's people of old is the refuge of God's people still. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And he will see to it that you're not stricken to perish. He'll see to it that you're kept, kept at all times. He's your refuge in the storm. Oh, view it in Christ. What does a refuge do for a man? The refuge suffers the storm itself so that those that are inside the refuge are forever safe. And that's what God did in Christ. He came as a man, he subjected himself to the law of God, he put himself under the judgment of heaven, and he bore in his body the sins of his believing people, receiving the punishment for those sins, the curse for those sins, and in that he is a refuge. He bears the brunt of the storm, so that those who are hidden in Him are safe, safe in their refuge. And there is an ark. an ark for all of God's Noahs in a gloomy and stormy day. He suffered himself to deliver them for whom he stood as a substitute, a refuge in the time of storm. And having been that for us already, he will always be a refuge for us. Whatever surrounds us, Whatever overtakes us, whatever seems to lay us low, he's there, he's our refuge. As bad as life is, it will never destroy him. He is our refuge. He's able to keep what's been committed to him against that day. And he says, no man shall be able to pluck them out of my hand. Our refuge, and we hide in him. a sovereign protector I have, unseen yet forever at hand, unchangeably faithful to save, almighty to rule and command, and that protector is Jesus Christ. So you may be ready to give up, and ready to fall into abject despair, but he's not ready to do either. He will not give up on you, and he will not despair of you. He appears as your refuge today. And let hell do its worst, and let earth bring upon us all its troubles. If you will commit yourself to him, to the one who supplies superior power and guardian grace, it will be well with your soul. A refuge in the storm. And then the third figure is that he's our shade. Our shade, our shadow from the heat. That probably has its rise from Psalm 121. Remember that Psalm of the Lord's keeping? The Lord is thy keeper. The Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. our shade, whatever comes our way, the accusations of a fiery law, the fear. the fear of a flaming sword of justice, the heat of awful temptations, the blast of our enemies, fiery trials of suffering and loss, whatever comes, He is the shade from that heat, and He wonderfully offers His shadow to us. And as we come near to Him, and enter into the place of that shadow, there is a mysterious protection from all of the awful heat that we would otherwise be exposed to. And there's even refreshment there under his shadow. There's rest. We sit down. You think about the image of a traveler in the wilderness desert in southern Judah. the sun beating down on him relentlessly, hardly shade in sight for relief, and then up ahead, a big boulder. And he knows, if I can get to that boulder, there will be a side of that boulder that will be my shade. and I'll be able to lean against that boulder, and there'll be a coolness to that rock, maybe even some moisture on the backside of that rock to press my face against to get relief from this burning heat. If I will get under the shadow of that great rock in this weary land, I can no rest. I can know refreshment, I can know shade, and the Lord Jesus Christ is the shade from the blasting heat, brothers and sisters. He is the shadow of a great rock and a weary land. If you're going to enjoy the shadow though, you're gonna have to be near it. You can't be in someone's shadow when you're at a distance from them. You have to draw near. And he that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. And in that he gives us rest and he gives us relief. And He is a shade that will not leave us, the shade of a gourd that will never be eaten by a worm and fall over, an enduring shade for the people of God from all of the fiery blasts of the Wicked One. And so you and I can dwell in his presence and rest in his love and continue in his blessing. Even when the heat is intense, there is a shadow from the heat. And when we're ready to fall, he will appear over us and he'll be there as never before, a shadow from the heat. Others may trust in other things. We trust in the living God who shall not pass away and whose shade remains. So the believer can say, therefore, even though I'm weary and my strength is gone and I hardly know how to take the next step, It shall be well with my soul because my savior is my shadow from the blasting heat. And life may be rough, but he will keep me. And this may be hard to bear, but he will preserve me. And he will always and forever be my shade. He will sustain me. He will revive me. He is a shade from the heat, the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. So brothers and sisters, can we join in Isaiah's praise and exclaim together, O Lord, Thou art my God. I will exalt Thee. I will praise Thy name, for Thou hast done wonderful things. Thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth, for You have been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, and a shadow from the heat. Do you know him? Do you know him as your strength? Do you know him as your refuge? Do you know him as your shade? Do you know the things whereof I speak today? Or do you feel yourself as an outsider looking in, having none of these experiences? wondering what the prophet and the preacher is talking about. Do you know this God? Happy is the people whose God is the Lord. He is their strength. He is their refuge. He is their shade. So the thing to do is to do what the psalmist said in Psalm 62. Listen to his testimony. My soul wait thou only upon God, for my expectation is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory. The rock of my strength and my refuge is God. Trust in Him at all times. Ye people, pour out your heart before Him. God is a refuge for us. My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus, who is your strength, your refuge, and your everlasting shade. Praise be His name. Amen. Let's pray. Eternal God and our Father in heaven, we thank thee for thy living word and for the assurance to our troubled hearts that we have an unfailing savior who is our strength, who is our refuge, and who is our shade. Help us to take refuge under the shadow of his wing Lead us to the rock that is higher than us when our hearts are overwhelmed. Grant that we would draw near to such an all-sufficient Savior, that we would stop living at a distance from Him, that we would joyfully, gladly live in His presence. And we pray this in Jesus' name, amen.