Have you ever had a time in your life where you felt like you were in a pit? A dungeon? Perhaps like David in Psalm 40 when he said God had rescued him from a horrible pit. He was in the miry clay. We don't know what the pit was. It wasn't a literal pit, but he described it as a dungeon of that day. The pits of that day were... water was in them, so it was an experience of being overwhelmed, water to your neck. There was mud in the bottom, so you were stuck. Like you couldn't move. You couldn't go forward or backwards or side to side. And it was a place of darkness. They didn't put a nice chair and a light down in a pit to make the prisoner feel well. It was a place of darkness, a place of being in a dungeon. Have you ever felt stuck like that? Felt like you were in a pit? Felt like you had no light? Felt like you were in darkness? Felt the stress and pressure of some circumstance, some situation, or maybe just melancholy? You just felt sorrow? As you look with the human eye, there was nothing there to put your finger on, nothing you could look at and say, well, that's why it's happening. It's inexplicable, cannot be explained. Perhaps like the businessman is overwhelmed with the pressure of work and every time he gets out of one pressure, there's another to meet him. It just lingers and stays and hovers. He's in a pit, or like the mother who's so overwhelmed with little children, it's just one stops crying and another starts. It's like 24-7, whining, crying, whining, crying. She feels overwhelmed, in the mud, stuck. Takes a step forward, two steps back. Tries to move ahead and actually moving backwards. Or maybe like the student who thinks the next year classes will be a little easier, a little less depressing, a little less difficult, and yet they find themselves again, like in a pit. Can't find their way out, semester after semester. Subject after subject, it's hard. We thought it would get easier, but it just gets worse and worse, and it seems like it never lifts. Or the child who thinks or feels like they're in such oppression, just suffocating oppression at home. Or the parents who have a child or children that are very challenging. Seems like there's always resistance. Seems like nothing ever improves. You take one step forward, it's two steps backwards. Or the oppression of an enemy. There's an enemy that's just oppressing you, Just remains. Whatever you do, however you talk, whatever you try to do in this situation, it doesn't lift. Or the debilitating illness where 99 out of 100 people get cured. You are the hundredth. You are the statistic. that doesn't get the relief. There's no explanation. The medical community, anywhere, the books, you search and everybody gets healed except the one out of 1,000 and you are the 1,000th person or perhaps the person that just doesn't fit in. You just don't feel like you fit in at work or in the community or with friends or in the church or wherever you are. You just don't seem to fit. Well, in our text today, in verse 10 that we read aloud, we find a person in darkness. Such may be the darkness that we described as we'll read again verse 10 of Isaiah 50. Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of His servant, that walketh in darkness and has no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay, lean, rest upon his God. My subject this morning is walking in darkness. Now darkness in the Bible is often a metaphor of the demonic realm, perhaps that's the first one you thought of with the word darkness, the rulers of the darkness of this world. We know that there are demonic forces that rule there but that's not the darkness here. There's also the darkness of the unsaved world, the Gentiles of Ephesians 4.17 where Paul says, we are not to walk as other Gentiles walk, the unsaved among the nations. in the vanity of their mind, having their understanding darkened. being alienated from the life of God through the blindness that is in them because of their heart. Blindness, darkness, Satan, satanic realm, demonic realm, unsaved realm. But that's not the realm here. Here is a person who fears God and the fear of the Lord here is described as listening. The word obey means to pay attention. You fear God, you're paying attention to the voice of the servant of Isaiah 50 and you're in darkness. It just won't lift. You don't have any light. You can't explain it. You look with the human eye and there's nowhere to look to explain it on the human level. It seems like everything is just kind of working against you. It's pushing back, pushing back. And there's nothing in your life you can point to and say, yeah, I can see why this is happening. It's the kind of... Providence described in Psalm 44 rather, when they sing the song of God's deliverance and then with a great contrast says, but you have cast us off and we don't get it. You're selling us and you're not getting anything out of the sale price. We're crushed, we're oppressed and God, we know you're doing this and we look at ourselves, we are not serving any foreign deities or false gods, if we were, Would you not know this? We've searched, we've looked, and on the human level, we don't get it, God." And then they say, "'Awake, God, why are you sleeping? Will you cast us off forever? Our bellies are in the dust, we're bowed down, we're in a pit.'" You ever felt like God was sleeping? That was their experience. He's just asleep. It's like, I'm just such darkness, he doesn't know. And the only thing they can put their finger on, which is really not an answer of sorts, it is, but it's not, it's just for your own sake, you're killing us, you're slaughtering us. And they call out and cry out to God. So the person that walks in darkness here is the person fearing God, the person that is listening to the voice of the servant. What is the voice saying? Trust in the name of God as your refuge, your strong and mighty tower, and lean, stay upon your God. So to understand what it means to walk in darkness and to be this kind of person of verse 10 and not to be the person of verse 11 where you decide, you know, I'm just going to light my own fire here. I've had enough. I'm getting out of this pit and I'll do whatever it takes to get out. I'm going to light my own fire, I'm going to get my own sparks, I'm going to surround myself with my campfire. And God says, if you do, this is what you'll have for me, sorrow. You're going to lie down in sorrow. So we don't want to be that person. We want to be the person of verse 10. That means we have to understand something about the servant who's speaking for which voice we listen to in the darkness. Can't see him. You can't feel him. You can't touch him. but He speaks. And that's the servant of verse 4 through 9 that leads us to verse 10. So we look at this servant. This is the third servant song or poem we see. Isaiah 42, Isaiah 49, and Isaiah 50. Now we see something about His obedience, His listening to His Father, His preparation, and His sorrow, His darkness. Not the darkness of the sinful kind. He's perfect. but the hour and the power of darkness. The literal darkness on the cross when His Father turned His back on it. We'll see His obedience in the face of that kind of darkness and how the Lord in relationship with that servant says to us, be in relation to this servant, hear His voice, depend on Him, trust Him in the darkness and stay upon Him. And we'll find even in the darkness we can just walk. in the darkness. I love the word walk. It's not running, it's walking. And sometimes there's running in the Bible, but you just walk. You just put one step out, take another step. How are we going to do that? Let's look at verse 4, first of all. The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned that I should know how. Now we see again the humanity of Jesus and His ministry. This servant learned how. to do something. We're going to see the Lord prepares His servant for the coming suffering. He's going to prepare His servant. So He's the one that is of the learned, the disciple. What is the aim of having the tongue of the learned? We saw in Isaiah chapter 49, God has made His mouth like a sharp sword. Now the same God hath given, He's given Him the tongue of the learned, of a disciple. Why? That I should know how to speak a word in season to Him that is weary. Do you realize that Jesus had to learn that? He didn't learn it by being disobedient and then being obedient. He learned it by relation to His Father. He's a human being. That's why we find Him in Luke 2 increasing in wisdom. The Son of God is growing, He's learning, He's reading the law, and He's increasing in wisdom and in favor with God and man. That's not some kind of phantasm where you go to that and say, well, he really wasn't, and he really didn't have a body, which some people think, and it looked that way, and it looked like he was learning. No, he really was. He really, really was. His fulfillment of the law had to be like a man that learned it and kept it, and struggled against everything that we would struggle against, yet we know gloriously without sin. And so Jesus was prepared for the mission of speaking a word and season to the person who is in darkness, which is a place of great weariness, is it not? Has Jesus ever spoken a word through this word, his servant's word to you in weariness of soul? His whole ministry in part is for that very reason. Do you qualify for the ministry of Jesus? but you've got to be weary to qualify. Now, I recognize all men at some point in time in their life are going to be weary of something. This is a weariness of soul. Not just an exhaustion of the body as the word weary means, exhausted, faint, toil. It's the same word in Isaiah chapter 40 in about the 29th verse. He giveth power to the weary, the faint, and then that have no might, he increases strength. Who does that? The shepherd of Isaiah 40 carries his lambs, carries them in his book, feeds them. How did Jesus learn how to speak that way? He was prepared by His Father. Have you ever heard the words of Matthew 11, 28 where He says, I will give you rest." Do you qualify for that text? Do you feel that kind of weirdness? Now, the Pharisees were not a weary people, yet they might have gotten exhausted. But they were the people that bind heavy burdens, heavy to be born, just loaded people up and they wouldn't lift a finger to carry them. But Jesus carried your burden to the cross and Jesus was prepared in His ministry His whole life from birth to death so that He would know how to speak a word to you in a season of darkness and weariness, when you feel like it won't lift, I go forward and I go backwards. Or as Job says, he's not on the right, he's not on the left, left, right, front, back. I don't know where he is. I can't find him. So Jesus speaks to us in our seasons of weariness. This is His mission, this is His aim. That's how He began His ministry in Luke 4.16, as He quoted, 18 rather, as He quoted Isaiah 61.1. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor." Do we qualify for that? Not just poor financially, spiritually poor, weary. Do you ever get weary with the load of sin, weary of carrying it, weary of bearing it? The Lord came to speak those words to the weary, to preach the gospel to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted. He has sent me to preach deliverance to the captives and the recovering of sight to the blind and to set at liberty them that are bruised, the bruised, the captive, the brokenhearted, the poor, the weary, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. all his life up to that very moment. He was being prepared, he was being taught, he was being discipled by his father so he could speak. And what was the testimony of everybody in that room, the synagogue, as he rolled back the scroll and gave it to the minister and sat down and said, this day are these words fulfilled in your ears. And they all were witness that he spake wondrous Words of grace, gracious words. They wondered at it, they marveled. They were admiring his words. Now what's interesting, these people were not weary because they later tried to kill him. Even his critics had to admit his words were so gracious and they wondered and they were amazed and they said, is this not Joseph's son? How does he speak that way? You remember the temple officers when the Pharisees on that last or during the feast in Jerusalem, Jesus was teaching and it was really upsetting them. So the chief priests and the Pharisees sent the temple officers, the big guys, the muscle, to get Jesus. And on the last day when they come back, they say, where is He? Where have you put Him? You can see their dumbfounded look as you read the text of John chapter 7. Never, never man spake like this man. We just got distracted like the boy that's sitting on an errand to go get something. He comes back and says, I saw something. It was so amazing and appealing. I'm sorry, mom. That's how these temple officers were mesmerized. And the Pharisees and chief priests, are you deceived also? Are you being brought in to the wonder and amazement of gracious words of Christ? for the weary pilgrim." So the mission, the aim of him being given the tongue of the learned is so that today to you in your darkness, in your pit, in your clay, in your mire, when the water's overwhelming you and maybe you can't put your finger on it, you can go to the servant who was trained as it were to be able to speak in his gospels all there for you. His whole word is His, but the gospels speak of His gracious, wondrous words. How He spoke to Martha, different from Mary, on the same occasion. How He challenged the faith of some, but comforted the faith of others and of the same people. This is the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ. But how then was He trained? How did He come to know how to do this? Two ways. He was prepared by instruction. He was prepared by suffering. That's what the word disciple means, one as taught or the learned. So if the Lord has given him the tongue of the learned, the tongue of the taught, the tongue of the disciple, that means God was the master, Jesus was pupil. God was the master craftsman, Jesus apprentice. God is scholar, Jesus is student. And the students in that day didn't just go to the class and go home, they were with the master. moment by moment. He learned, he was taught by the Father. So he was instructed as a disciple. The Lord prepares us by instruction. The imperfect servants that we are, the sinful ones, we're at times in darkness, we're gonna be prepared by that darkness for something that God is aiming at as well. Look at the wording in verse four of this disciple-like training or learning, the word being taught, a disciple. It says, he wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hears the learned, the Lord God hath opened mine ear and I was not disobedient or rebellious, neither turned away back. So the servant that hears the voice of his father is not disobedient, why? He listened. He heard. He was taught. He was trained. Jesus said this in John 8, 28 about Himself. As the Father hath taught me, even so I speak. He's been teaching me. He's been training me. And everything He's taught me, that's exactly what I'm going to tell you. That's what I speak. Now the first expression, morning by morning, speaks of reputation and priority. Morning by morning. How many mornings do you do this? Morning by morning by morning. Every morning. Repetition. Priority. When do you do it? Oh, you know, I get kind of blood pumping about 3 p.m. That's when I start communicating with the Father, the Master. Morning. Priority. The priority of the servant, the perfect servant is repetition, every morning, every morning. When? Morning, priority. It's the priority we see of Psalm 5 when David speaks of his own priority to call upon the Lord and cry out to Him, hear David the imperfect servant. I'm looking at the perfect servant of Jesus in Isaiah 50. It says in verse 1 of Psalm 5, give ear to My words, O Lord, consider My meditation, hearken unto the voice of My cry, My King and My God, for unto Thee will I pray, My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord, in the morning. Morning by morning. I will direct My prayer unto Thee and will look up. Repetition morning after morning, priority, in the morning, in the morning. How long does it take us to cry out to God each day? Beloved, I understand the challenges and the distractions and the things that get in the way, but is it month by month or year by year or day by day, morning by morning? We're imperfect servants. We can get distracted. So God brings us back to the priority of hearing the voice of this servant, seeing him as Redeemer first, then seeing him as our example. David needed God. It's an expression of need. Verse 4, for thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with thee. What is the wickedness that God doesn't have pleasure in, in verse 4, for which we get the word for or because? It's prayerlessness. Is it not? You will hear my prayer morning by morning because you don't have pleasure in wickedness. Isn't that the ultimate end of the wicked is that they never ever call, trust, express anything to the name of God? That's their wickedness. They do not call upon the Lord. They do not know Lord. They do not need God. So David says, I'm calling morning by morning because God you're not pleased with wickedness. What are you pleased with? You're pleased with the prayer of the upright. the ones who are right by the blood of the servant Jesus Christ. And so Jesus, we see Him in Mark 1, getting up early in the morning. It's a great day before dawn or a great while. It's still dark. He goes out of the city, as you know, in Mark 1. He's been healing all night. He gets up early. Morning by morning, it's priority, it's repetition. Oh, may God get us back to priority or keep us on the priority. When? In darkness. hearing the voice of the servant, He's redeemed us, He's the example, calling upon that voice, calling upon that name that we're trusting, calling upon, staying upon the God in the darkness that at the moment we can't seem to experience or see because there's no light, there's inexplicable darkness, it doesn't fit with our experience and yet The command is stay, trust, call, make it a priority. If you get distracted, things get in the way, emergency crisis, then call during it. Call as you go, but call on the name of the Lord. Beloved, we'll find that the word for the weary in the seasons of prayer will come through prayer and the word of God. But then look at the next expression of this instruction that prepared him to speak a word in season. He wakeneth mine ear to hear as to learn. These are synonymous but expressed differently, different expressions of really the same idea, a pupil that's hearing and learning from the master. He wakens the ear to hear as to learn. This speaks of his eagerness, his eagerness. Now for you and I, it could be that we are awakened often, our ear to hear as those that are part of compulsory education. You're familiar with that term. That's when this is the rule, this is the law, this is the requirement. You will get up and do math, you will do your algebra, and you will study history. For which when your ear is awakened to the task for the day, you roll over and take the pillow and put it over your head. Not so eager, but not this disciple. Perhaps we could illustrate it this way with another sense, not the sense of hearing, because we struggle with that, with the sense of smell. How would this apply to you concerning eagerness? I think it works for this illustration. He wakeneth my nose to smell as the hungry. You know that one, don't you, in the morning. The fresh ground coffee, the aroma makes its way through the house. Nobody even called your name, you just... Now, some of you don't like coffee, we've got to pick a few different things here. You hear and smell the sizzling of eggs, if that's your thing in the morning. Butter melted, bacon, sausage, right? Sausage. pancakes, melted butter, maple syrup. And if you're healthy and you think that's not, pick your own breakfast item that when you smell it in the kitchen, you're aroused, you're eager because you're hungry. That's what this means here. Jesus was not hard to wake up. literally or figuratively, the language here, his ear was like the hearing of the learned, the eager, the one that was hungry to hear and to know everything from the Father as a man hears from an instructor or a dad or some other person that is training them. So he's eager for it. Then the next expression, the Lord God hath opened mine ear. You can see the hearing, the repetition, the priority, the eagerness, the opening of the ear was the cause or the root of his not being rebellious but being what? Obedient. Now what's our text say? Let him hear the voice of the Lord. See? You're walking in darkness, keep walking with God. We're imperfect, He is not. He's the Savior that redeemed us to supply the grace, the Holy Spirit, so that we can walk even in darkness. Now, the only time we find this exact expression, the Lord has opened His ears, is in Psalm 40. We looked at that last Sunday, so let's look at the counterpart or where the writer of Hebrews 10 uses Psalm 40. And we'll see this expression being explained in Isaiah 40 verse 5 or Isaiah 50. So turn to Hebrews chapter 10 where the writer quotes from Psalm 40 verse 6 where it says, Mine ears thou hast opened. Just like Isaiah 50 verse 5. What does that mean? So we see priority, repetition, eagerness, And now we see, of course, if you remember, we see now delight. Delight. Verse 4 in chapter 10 of Hebrews, For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Wherefore, this is why He said this in Psalm 40, because that's not possible. All the blood, all the sacrifice, not possible. Wherefore, when He cometh into the world, He saith, That's the servant of Isaiah 50. He said, the Lord hath opened my ears. It's the servant of the Messianic psalm or passage in Psalm 40 verse 6. What did He say? What did the servant say? He's talking to the Master, sacrificing, offering. You would not. You don't want that. But a body You have prepared me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin, thus had no pleasure." Now, in verse 5 of Hebrews 10, the writer now puts in a different statement in the place of, mine ear is thou, have you opened? So if you were to go back and read Psalm 46, it would say, sacrifice and offering, you don't want, you have no pleasure, mine ear, have you opened? Burnt offering and sin offering, you have not required. Okay? But here, He substitutes an open ear with a prepared body, prepared. The response of the servant to the body for which what the father said opened his ear, it perked it, it peaked it. Here's his response in verse 7. Then said I, lo, I come in the volume of the book it is written to me. I'm coming to do your will, O God. He's eager. Now why does he... Substitute, you prepared a body for you, you've opened my ears." Because what God required, what He wanted was a body of a man, not the body of an animal. And when the servant heard that, He also heard that the sacrifice and offering that was seen with the animal sacrifices would happen to His body. You will be sacrificed. That's why you need a body, because the pre-incarnate Christ cannot die. He's eternal, so He must be a man with a body in order that He may suffer, in order that He may die, in order that He might please God with His own sacrifice, for which the animals could never please God. So when He says, I've come to do thy will, in Psalm 40 verse 7 He says, I delight to do your will. That means when in that eternal covenant, when God spoke His purpose to the pre-incarnate son, He says, you need a body to please me because what's going to please me is the sacrifice for sin on behalf of these people and the body is going to be smitten, Isaiah 50. Verse 6, 5 and 6, you're going to have to give that body to the smiters who are going to whip it unmercifully. That's what you're going to have to do. You're going to have to give your cheek to them that are going to pluck out the hairs because you don't have a cheek, eternal Son of God. You don't even have a back. So I prepared a body. What's your response? You've opened my ears. You piqued my interest. What? How could Jesus have His ears open to His hair being plucked off? He hid not His face from shame and spitting. He took acceptance of the full derision of all that happened in the three hours of darkness and the power in the hour of darkness and all as He was facing Jerusalem and went into that darkness, the darkness of the demonic world and the unsaved world. So an open ear A prepared body means Jesus gladly took on the body. He was delighted to do the will of the Father because the Father's will was the glory of His name. It wasn't a delight to be beaten, shamed, spit upon, hair plucked out, and back given to the smiters, but that was part of the reason He needed a body. And so He says, I come. I'm eager, I delight your laws within my heart. This is not compulsory education on this disciple, just pressing me, just making me do that. It's inward delight. He wants to glorify and magnify the Father, even though it will cost him such a great sacrifice. How did he prepare? How did he get prepared for such a sacrifice? My ear, you've opened. You've taught me as one that's awakened morning by morning. I take that to mean from early life all the way up to the time of his public ministry, even through it, he's having constant fellowship with his father so that he would know through this instruction from a father, because he said, as the father that taught me, so I speak. He would then know how to speak a word and season to him that is weary and he would not be disobedient. His obedience would flow from listening. You see, the reason Jesus could speak so well is because He listened so well. That's a lesson for us, isn't it? The reason He could speak so well a word to the weary in due season is because He listened so perfectly to His Father. We're imperfect, beloved, but yet what does the text say? Who is He that feareth the Lord and listens to the voice of His servant? What's the key? We have to listen. to the Father. And we listened to the Father and the Servant, we hear some wonderful, glorious things, don't we? But we hear some very hard things just like Jesus heard. Beloved, we're living in a time in Christianity where the hard things are kind of overlooked when it comes to discipleship. Turn to Luke chapter 14 and let me just share one of the hard things that Jesus said. He said a lot of them. He said glorious things about His love for His sheep and what His death would do, but He said some hard things to His disciples and those that wanted to be His disciples. Luke chapter 14, as He gives the parable of the tower builder and the king. He finishes the parable in verse 33 where he says, so likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, you cannot be my disciple. Oh, that's a hard thing, but it's a true thing. See? See, I just want easy listening. Now years ago, children, easily listening was in the dentist's office and the doctor's office. There were no words, it was just like, you want to go to sleep, just easy listening. I think it was there because they didn't want you to get all anxious about what was about to happen when you got in the dentist's chair. But easily listening, it's just so comforting, it's soothing, it's like the love of God, it's like God not leaving nor forsaking me, all wonderful and true. But here's some hard listening. And Jesus had to embrace some things that were hard. They're going to spit in your face. They're going to torture you. How did he face it? He was prepared by delighting in the Father and not the darkness and the suffering. So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. Salt is good, but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be seasoned? Salt without savor is bland, it's uninteresting. You dump it on the food and it just supplies no spark, no zest, nothing. When the Christian is no longer salty, like Matthew chapter 5 tells us, we're the salt of the earth, we become uninteresting and bland to the world. Do you know why? because our interest, our affections are the same as theirs. So what? You do not compel me. You do not interest me. I have what you have and I enjoy the same things. We've lost our salt. But if you renounce what you have to be a disciple, oh, they don't have that because they don't know the superior delight of the Savior, which is the power of forsaking. You can't forsake what you love. You cannot forsake what you love unless you love something better. You cannot. You cannot. That's why Romans 8, 7 says, the carnal mind is enmity against God, it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. You cannot subject yourself, you cannot subject yourself, submit yourself to a law whose first command is, love God. You cannot. because you love darkness as a carnal man. And you cannot love God, so therefore you cannot, it's impossible to be subject to the law of God. You cannot forsake that which you love supremely above everything, you cannot, because you have nothing to delight in that's better than what you're forsaking. So when Jesus says, follow me, he means I am better than father and mother, I am better than family, I am better than everything. So if you cannot forsake and renounce all that you have to follow me, of course we know Jesus didn't mean divest yourself of all that you have that moment. He says being a Christian will mean you will have some plundering and some spoiling and some losing. You'll have to sacrifice. How are you going to do that? because Jesus is enough, He's better. And then the world sees there's something interesting about that person who just has things stripped out of his head, just in darkness, just things happening, but he's still a salty Christian. Because in Matthew 5, He rejoices and is exceeding glad." When? When you're persecuted and all manner of evil is set against you falsely for my name's sake. That's a pit. That's a darkness. Serving God, you're obeying the voice of the Lord, you're imperfect, but you're listening and you want to be a disciple and you want to hear from Jesus, and just everybody hates you. And you just keep walking. That's salt. That's interest. And beloved, if Christianity just means we're just inviting people into experience that they already have, happens all over our country. Just come on in here and experience what you already have. You're nothing that I don't have. I mean, I just do it here, do it there. Doesn't matter. Be salt. Listen to the servant, the perfect servant who obeyed because he heard the voice of his father and he delighted in that voice, not in the suffering. So when he went into the darkness, what did he do? He gave his back. Here it is. Now you're thinking, well now, Jesus doesn't really want us to give our backs, right? You're right. He wants you to give your cheek. If someone smites one side of your cheek, you turn and let him smite the other. Wow. I'm just not even going to explain that. You know, sometimes God's Word is just sufficient. If somebody smites one side of you, you turn and let him smite the other. If he sends you to court and gets one coat, you give him another coat. That's salt. Why are you doing that? I don't delight in coats. I don't delight in my defenses and civil rights. I delight in Jesus." How can we ever do that? We have a servant who helps you, who speaks a word to you, who is your Savior, your Redeemer and your example. Next, we see the Lord is not only prepared for the mission through instruction and through His suffering, we see that too. He suffered, He learned obedience by the things He suffered, Hebrews chapter 5. Now we see in chapter 50, the Lord will help His servant. Now for Jesus, He had to obey, He had to face the hour and the power of darkness with the help of His Father. He was one that knew how to trust, in Hebrews 2 it says, He put his trust in God. So as a human being, he was relying upon God as he moved to Calvary. And so he says it this word, this way, beginning in verse 6, I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting, because this is why, this is how in the darkness for the Lord God will help me. Therefore shall I not be confounded. Therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed." Now there's two fruits to the help of God. You see that by the two words, therefore. In other words, when the Lord not only trained this servant, He helped him. The result, the therefore was, I won't be confounded. He states it again, I won't be ashamed. Just means I won't be disgraced or disappointed. And then secondly, he said, therefore, because the Lord will help me, I'm moving forward, the Lord will help me, therefore, I have set my face like a flint. Flint's a rock. To set your face is to be resolved. It's determined to do something, even though The smiters would be waiting, the pluckers and those that would spit, shame and mock. He's set. He's set, He's determined. Let's take the first fruit of God's help to be the second one which is His face set. You find this in Luke 9.51 when He comes to Jerusalem, it says, He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem. I think that Luke is alluding to this. This is the servant. He's coming not to be served, but to serve and give his life a ransom for many. And so to do that, he's got to go to Jerusalem because that's where it's all going to happen. That's where the darkness will descend and hover over him and the darkness will snuff out his life. He says, I'm resolved. Why are you so set? The word means to be established, to be firm, to be settled. He settled. Now notice this, the fruit of God's help for this servant and for us is that we keep moving forward. Oh beloved, how many times in your darkness do you justify your disobedience? By saying, I'm just in a season of darkness, therefore, not therefore, God's going to help me. I can keep walking. No, it's therefore, You just got to excuse me for some undefined period of time. I'm not into doing God's will right now. The expression of God's help is the fruit of verse 10. Who is he that feareth the Lord and obeys the servant, listens to him? The person who has help. Help. So the help of God's grace is designed to keep us walking. listening, obeying. The obedience may shift and change, particularly if there's something debilitating physically, it may take all kinds of forms, but the servant kept moving toward Jerusalem in the face of the smiters and the pluckers and those that would shame him and spit on him because of the help of God. Let us not justify disobedience with the grace of God. Here it is the fruit of his help. If you say to yourself, why would God help me in such darkness now? Verse 10, He wants me to keep walking and keep listening and keep obeying by the power of His help. You are giving testimony in your darkness. He is my helper. Therefore, I will boldly say, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Your testimony of God's help is not checking out of the kingdom and saying, I'm just in a season of darkness and so everybody's got to understand. Yeah, we understand the darkness and we experience it, but God says, I'm your helper. So what did Jesus do perfectly? God is my helper, I'm set. Your pain and darkness will never measure what He was facing as a human being, as the Son of God. the depth of the anguish of soul and trouble. So He faces it. He looks into it. He knows what's coming. And He's set. Why? Because God would sustain. He would help. He would be gracious. He would uphold the servant. Now because of His death, beloved, God has promised to uphold you. And the fruit of that upholding is in your pressure, in your melancholy. You just can't explain the darkness. Here's what God wants you to do. Take the next step. Just take the next step. Get out of bed. Do you ever just feel like, I cannot get out of bed? Get out of bed. Why? That's God's will. He wants you to face the day in the morning. Get out of bed. Do you know that first step? You're listening to the voice of the Lord. The Holy Spirit's going to help you get out of bed. It's just that practical. Now what's the next thing that God wants you to do? Do the next step. See, this is not conquering the world. It's taking the next step in your darkness because you know what? That's the very thing you don't want to do. Ravi Zacharias recently said, maybe it was in some pastime, it was written, how do you reach a generation of people who hear with their eyes and see with their feelings? That's where we are, isn't it? In a media-saturated society. We're developing the habit of listening with our eyes and seeing with our feelings. Now, what do you do when you're like that and you get in darkness? Everything is based on how you feel and what you see. Interestingly, the word stay in the Hebrew is the same word for lean in Proverbs 3.5 which says this, Trust in the Lord with all your heart and don't stay, don't lean on your own understanding. Because in the darkness, that's what you don't have. It doesn't mean you don't understand who God is. It means, I don't get this. You cast me off. I don't understand why I'm following you, and it's like you're pressing against me. The old writers called it dark providence. It's where you're moving ahead with obedience. You're walking in the pathway imperfectly, and it seems God's pushing back. He's pushing you back. How do you explain that? Psalm 44. God's going to be pushing back on His Son. It's His plan. but his help is going to sustain him. And so Jesus is moving forward. He's on the pathway of obedience. He perfectly, us imperfectly. So beloved in darkness, stay on the path. Don't stop doing what you know it's God's will. I'm not talking about trying to find God's will in something. Just stay in the pathway and keep doing it. Keep doing it. That's what Jesus did. Secondly, the second fruit is, He said, I shall not be confounded. He said, I shall not be ashamed. This relates to the help of God, because God is going to help me, I won't be disappointed, I won't be disgraced. How would you be disgraced if this doesn't work out? If God's help is disappointing, if His help is not what He says it is, if God tells me all this and I trust Him and get there and say, what a letdown, what a disgrace, what shame, God let me down. Not going to happen. Didn't happen for that servant. Not going to happen for you. What is it that Jesus...what do we find here that was the expression of that help where He would not be confounded or ashamed? It's the word, no, the last part. I know that I shall not be ashamed. I know. the name of God, I know the help of God, I know the presence of God, I know the promise of God. So Jesus says, I know I won't be ashamed. If you go back to Luke 9.51 again, I left part of the verse out, it says, and when it was time for Jesus to be received up, he steadfastly set his face toward Jerusalem. What does he know? If he's left to rot in that grave, disgrace, disappointment. Everybody's looking, see, we told you he was an imposter. But his face is set precisely because the Lord will help him to the end and the Lord is gonna receive him up into glory. I know that, he said, I know it. See, beloved, in your darkness, you can't know from what you see and you can't know from what you feel. You'll be like Job again. I don't know where he is. I can't see him. I can't feel him. But Job says, I know that my Redeemer liveth. I know that when I am tested with the fire, I'll come forth like gold. He had to rely on some things he knew in order to keep moving in the pathway of obedience, which was just sitting at the moment because he was incapacitated with what he had. He just kept moving with God, asking tough questions, and so it will be with us, beloved. In our weaknesses and our imperfections, God wants us to rest in His help in the darkness, which He says by trusting in His name and staying upon the God who loves us and has redeemed us and says through this servant, I will help you. Isn't that why the writer of Hebrews chapter 12 says, wherefore, lift up the hands that hang down and strengthen the feeble knees. Make straight paths for your feet to walk in, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way, but rather let it be healed, looking diligently, lest any man fail the grace of God. What's he saying? You're in darkness. You're in pain. You're in suffering. You're being scourged. Here's the message of God. Lift up your hands. Strengthen the feeble knees, keep walking." Where would you have us walk, Lord? Follow peace with all men, holiness without which no man shall see the Lord, looking participle. How do you fell the grace of God? How do you check on the grace of God? You check out on holiness. Or verse 10, you check out on obeying the servant. I'm not going to do this to him. I'm not going to obey him. I'm not doing this holiness thing. What's the help of God in Hebrews 12? The help of God is your training for holiness, your chastening. What's your response to God's help? I'm quitting. I'm fainting. I'm weary. I'm tired. Not doing it anymore. Are we rejecting the help and the grace of God? What form is His grace taking for which He says, Don't fail, meaning don't set it aside. Stay with the grace of God. Stay with the help of God. Pursue holiness and know that your father's chastening is for your holiness. Take another step. Oh, it's dark and painful at times. It just seems like it won't lift. Take another step. Take another step. Don't leave the God who is your help. Why? Why? Because you will lie down in sorrow. Sometimes the wicked look like it's so much better. So much better. I mean, if I just were there with them, they're going to lie down in sorrow. So we want to stay with this servant. This servant stayed, he obeyed, he's perfect, but he had help from God, and now this servant says, I will help you. Yes, I know you're imperfect. I know you're dust. I know you're not like I am in that sense. But I am like you in that I'm a man. I've been prepared for this mission. I've redeemed. I've saved. I'll help. Keep walking in the darkness. And thirdly, verse 9, Behold, the Lord God will help me. Who is He that shall condemn me? Lo, they shall all wax old as a garment. The moth shall eat them up. Who is among you that feareth the Lord? And then verse 8, He is near that justifies me. The Lord will be near and justify His servant. Let's take justify first. It means to vindicate, to declare right. What was the justification of Jesus? It's not like our justification meaning He had to be declared right because He was ungodly. That's not what it means. The justification of Jesus was His resurrection. God vindicated, declared that My servant was right and everybody's wrong. How do you prove that? He's at His own right hand right now, far above all principality and power. He's seated at the right hand of majesty. That's His justification, His indication. The Lord will vindicate your darkness when you have to do tough things and it looks like You're just spinning your wheels, and people may be mocking and reproaching you. You Christians, you're just in darkness. You could be out here with us, and you're to be so pitied. You're so pitiful, Christians. Such pain, and all you have to do is jump out and get over here with our campfire, and it's all gone. You will be vindicated by God. He'll write it in the sky, but He's gonna tell everybody. My servants, plural, who are leaning on My servant, were right. They're sinful, but they're right by the blood of Christ, and they're right because they trusted Me. Everybody else will be declared wrong. That's the first thing. Secondly, what does it mean to be near? And how can Jesus say He was near when in Psalm 22, He says, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me? Well, that seems contradictory to everything we just saw. He's near that justifies Me. He will help Me, but the Messianic Psalm says He's very far from helping Me. Well, the word near means to be allied or to be at hand. And we know God, in whatever way this took place, He forsook His Son because Jesus said He did because He's holy. Turned His back on Him. So, in what way was God near and yet far? My take is, meaning this is what I think this is saying, He was near and at hand with His purpose. Beloved, that may be all you have to hang on to in the darkness, because He's not... If you felt like He was near, the darkness is gone, you know? When Jesus is near, you know, everything's going well, but when He's not near, and I'm in the darkness, I don't feel the presence, I don't feel the light of His countenance, what do I do? He's at hand. with His purpose. He's allied, which means combination working together with, or it means all things work together for good to them that are called according to His purpose. He's always near with His purpose. His dark providence is always coming in keeping with the purpose of God, always, always. For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. For whom He did predestinate, then He also called. For whom He called, He also justified. For whom He did justify, He also glorified. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? For us in presence? Some, not always. Sometimes He lifts the light of His presence. For us in purpose? Always, always at hand. His providence is always serving the purpose of your conformity to Christ in everything He lets touch your life, and in everything He does in your life, and in everything He providently orders in your life. Always allied to you, always at hand and purpose, even when like Job we say, I just don't see His presence, I don't feel it. What are you going to stand on when you're in the darkness? He's near, He's at hand, He's my ally, and therefore the darkness can't be against me, no purpose can be against me, no human being can be effectually against me, even though in reality they are. I mean, they are. This means they can't be successful ultimately. Why? is God for us. Now that's how He's for us in His providence, everything works together for good, He's near with His purpose even though He may not near with the experience of His presence, His Holy Spirit is still there. Why is He for me. He that spared not his own son, he didn't spare the servant who gave his back to the smiters, his cheek to him that plucked off the hair, he did not hide his face from shame and spitting, he did not spare him but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with him also freely, graciously give us everything? Everything His providence orders, everything He works for good, everything for which His providence serves the purpose to make you like Jesus. He will. He'll always be at hand in purpose. So what do you do in darkness? You stand upon the name of God and what that name means. You stay upon God and His purpose until the darkness lifts. It will lift, beloved, but we cannot put God on a deadline. You can't dictate to God how long it's going to last. It may be a short season, it may be years. What are you going to do in years of darkness like that? You're going to trust, keep walking, keep staying. And like David, we wait patiently on the Lord. He delivered me out of a horrible pit. We don't know how long, we don't know what the pit was, but He got the deliverance. And so we see that nothing can separate us, nothing can sever us, nothing can thwart the purpose of God. He was near in purpose and ultimately that purpose brought Him out of the grave. God is near to us in presence, yes, but sometimes It may only feel like His purpose. And so we must hang on the purpose of God, hang on the Word of God and listen to the servant who gives us a word in our weary seasons of darkness that we will not be forsaken, we will not be left. God will keep His purpose firmly under us, sustaining us so that we can walk, we can listen, we can keep hearing and taking one step at a time. Let's pray.