The sermon, based on Isaiah 43:1-13, explores the profound and complex nature of God's love, emphasizing its preferential, personal, persevering, and perpetual aspects. Scott Brown discusses the doctrine of God's love, highlighting its distinctiveness and exclusivity towards His church. The sermon contrasts God's treatment of His chosen people with the wicked, illustrating His judgment and mercy. It emphasizes God's covenant love, not based on human merit but on His divine promise, and how He preserves and gathers His church from all corners of the earth. Brown also interprets the passage as a courtroom scene where God calls witnesses to testify to His love and protection for His people. The sermon concludes by encouraging believers to understand their role in the world as witnesses of God's love and to find comfort in the indestructibility of the church.

Morning. Today's sermon text is from Isaiah 43 verses 1 through 13 if you'd follow along please. But now thus says the Lord who created you oh Jacob and he formed you oh Israel. Fear not for I have redeemed you. I have called you by your name.

You are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire you shall not be burned, nor the flame scorch you. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I gave Egypt for your ransom, Ethiopia and Siva in your place.

Since you were precious in my sight, you have been honored and I have loved you. Therefore, I will give men for you and people for your life. Fear not, for I am with you. I will bring your descendants from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, give them up and to the south, do not keep them back.

Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth. Everyone who is called by my name whom I have created for my glory, I have formed him. Yes, I have made him. Bring out the blind people who have eyes and the deaf who have ears. Let all the nations be gathered together and let the people be assembled.

Who among them can declare this and show us former things? Let them bring out their witnesses that they may be justified or let them hear and say it is truth. You are my witnesses, says the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me there is no God formed, nor shall there be after me. I, even I, am the Lord, and besides me there is no Savior.

I have declared and saved, I have proclaimed, and there is no foreign God among you. Therefore, you are my witnesses, says the Lord, that I am God. Indeed, before the day was, I am he, and there is no one who can deliver out of my hand I work and who will reverse it let's pray father we are so grateful for this text that you have brought before us oh father I pray that we would all have open ears and open hearts to hear your truth today. Father we pray your blessing upon the word as it is spoken. Father we pray that it would bring judgment upon our hearts Lord where it is needed and it would bring joy Lord to our hearts knowing that it is your word and that it is your truth that you have preserved for this very time.

We thank you Father for this day. We thank you Father for this text that you have us in right now. In your mighty name we pray, Lord Jesus. Amen. In Isaiah 43, 1 through 13, we're under the instruction of the Lord on the doctrine of the love of God and we learn here in this passage as we have already been exposed to in the previous chapter of the preferential, the personal, the persevering, perpetual care of God for his church.

And he says that we are his. And Isaiah is continuing to make the contrast of two different kinds of servants. There is his servant, his son, and the servants of his son. And then there are others who are also looked upon as his servants, but they do not really serve him, but they are still his servants, if you can untangle that somehow. And Isaiah is making the contrast between these two servants and how he treats them differently.

All this began in the previous chapter. At the beginning of chapter 42, Isaiah is presenting a vision of Christ, the Elect One, and his servants. They sing to the ends of the earth, and he contrasts these with those in Judah, the insensible ones, who they have ears but they just don't hear. They're insensible. And so in the previous chapter, God has declared that the unrighteous of His people, who appear to be His people in Judah, They'll be plundered and they'll be burned.

But now he says that he will keep his protection up for his people and they won't be burned. So there's this contrast. Remember we saw the burning in the wick and all this kind of thing in the previous chapter. Now we find some of the same language, but contrasting God's treatment in such a clear way. And so Isaiah is speaking of two kinds of people.

They seem to exist together and contemporaneously. And these are critical matters for the church today. I think one of the critical matters that we find here in this passage is the doctrine of the love of God. Now people often so would rather hear about the love of God. They regard the doctrine of the love of God as so simple, as so comforting.

And they, but however, you know, the love of God as it is presented in the Bible and as it is presented in Isaiah 43 is a deep subject. It's actually mind-bending because if properly understood, it's a very disturbing doctrine. The love of God is extremely disturbing because in God, in His love, He makes a distinction and He actually treats different people differently. God's love is distinctive and we would like to think that God just loves everyone. Wouldn't that be such a sweet thought?

That's the sweet thought that you'll hear in many pulpits. God loves you, He always has, and He always will. But that isn't actually a correct or complete understanding of the doctrine of the love of God. Is God's love universally impartial and equally distributed to all people? Or is the love of God specifically focused?

Or if God is so loving, why does he destroy the wicked? If God is so loving, then why do the people of God suffer? You see, the love of God is not such a simple doctrine, it's a mind-bending doctrine. It stretches your ability to conceive of the breadth of it in the same way that you can't conceive of the sovereignty of God. You can't understand the doctrine of the Trinity.

It's beyond you. The love of God is the same way. It's one of those doctrines that's not so simple. It's not just so simple and syrupy that God just loves everybody, and he always has. It's not so.

And this passage of scripture makes it very, very clear. Isaiah is giving us both sides of the love of God here in this passage. He gives his care for his church and also his hatred toward the wicked. So not only do we have the doctrine of the love of God here, we have the whole idea of the perpetuity of the church, that God will preserve his people. God cares for his people in a very distinctive and special way, and he will preserve his people.

And that doctrine exists there. You remember, if you ever read Voltaire, you remember he predicted that the church would be wiped off the earth within 100 years of his death. Not so. It didn't happen. It didn't happen because the Bible tells us so.

That God will preserve his people. The church is indestructible. The Bible that the church loves will never be destroyed. We've already read in Isaiah 40, All flesh is grass and its loveliness is like the flower of the field. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God stands forever.

God's church, God's Word, God's kingdom will stand forever. It's absolutely indestructible. Heaven and earth will pass away, but Jesus Christ's words will not pass away. Daniel 2 says that his kingdom is forever, that all the kingdoms of the earth will crumble because they're of clay. But the kingdom of heaven is eternal and it's in the heavens.

And I think as we consider this passage, I think we should maybe try to recognize a sin of our own hearts, but we can also recognize a sin of the great cultures that are at large today, and that is this. People often miscalculate the hidden power of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. They think that they can legislate it out of existence. They think they can persecute the church into irrelevance. They think that they can marginalize the church out of its significance.

He who sits in the heavens laughs at this. And this passage of scripture makes it very clear. Also people miscalculate God's love for the church. The church is despised by the world but it's loved by God. The church is refuse to the world.

But here we learn that the church is precious. The church is his. And so the church can say I am his and he is mine. And this miscalculation of God's love for the church happens in our own hearts from time to time. We lose a sense of who we are and the significance of the church in the world and God's favor, God's absolute commitment to preserve His church until the very end.

And those who are in the true church know that they have they have joined an eternal family that will never be destroyed no matter what any government or what any controversy might bring forth. God will preserve his church. It's his love. It's his love that preserves it. And then we also, in this passage, see God's covenant love.

It's not based on the performance of his people. God's love is based on his covenant and Isaiah 43 is an example of this kind of love in the previous chapter. We we saw that Jesus Christ is the covenant and He has a covenant people and what we find interestingly enough in the Bible is that what God says about his son, he also says about his people. He raises his son from the dead. He raises his people from the dead.

He unites his people with his son, I in them and thou in me. We are in Christ and he is in us. And so you have this doctrine of the covenant love of God that is as a result of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. Let me show you the outline of this. You have it in front of you and I've broken it into two parts.

The first part is God's proving his preferential treatment toward his church. That's verses one through seven. And God shows that he has a very special relationship with his people. He prefers them above all others, and he calls them not to fear. And he says, they are mine.

And then in this you'll see five different proofs of his providential loving kindness toward his church. And then the second part is really a courtroom scene where God calls witnesses to testify to his preferring love toward his people. And God calls various witnesses. He calls the blind first, then he calls the nations, he calls his people, and then God himself stands up as if in the courtroom and testifies to his own devotion to his people. So that's it, that's the passage that's in front of us today.

Now there are two interpretive keys here in this passage to help you understand it. First in verses 1 and 2 he says I have called you by your name you are mine. That's the first matter and then secondly we'll get to this next week but in verses 16 through 21 is another aspect of this interpretive key to the passage to understand how it relates to what Isaiah has been saying before but what his core message is and he says in verse 16 thus says the Lord who makes a way in the sea and a path through the mighty waters who brings forth the chariot and horse, the army and the power, they shall lie down together, they shall not arise, they are extinguished, they are quenched like a wick." Oh, you remember the wick. You remember the wick. The smoking wick he will not put out, but he will put out the wick of the wicked.

And he's speaking here of Pharaoh and really the enemies of God, the abusers of the people of God. He will extinguish that wick, but he will not put out the wick of the servants of Jesus Christ. So there you have it. That's sort of an overview. Now let's jump into the details here.

And we see how God is proving his preferential treatment of his church. And the first proof is that he created the church. He says, but now thus says the Lord who created you, O Jacob, and he who formed you, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by your name. You are mine.

And here we are engaged in God's preferential personal care toward his remnant. Because in the doctrine of God's love, he does have favorites. And he introduces his favoritism with this word, but, but now. And this contrast with the wicked who will be burned. But now, in other words, it's not the end of the story.

The wicked, yes, they will be plundered and burned, but now, but now, thus says the Lord who created you. That God, there's a changed relationship with the people of God. And they show the contrast with the way that God treats His elect and those who are not. And God is a God of both judgment and of mercy. I was so grateful that Mike read Ephesians chapter 2 today when he cited this beautiful phrase, one of the most beautiful phrases in the Bible, but God, but God who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive in Jesus Christ.

This is the great hope of the world, but God. But yes, Jesus Christ stands and he calls his own by their name. The focus here is on what he has done. I have, I will, I gave. And who's this addressed to?

This is really important by the way, don't miss this or you'll miss the whole meaning of the sermon. Is he talking to you personally? Like is this a personal love letter to you individually? Well sort of but not really Because he's speaking to his church, he's speaking to his people as a whole, his people who are called by his name, whom he loves, like this group here. He's speaking to a collective group called his church.

And he proves his love by five things that he has done. First, he created. We learn that God created the church. And this word takes us back to Genesis chapter 1. The same word, Barat, created, is this whole thing.

He says, oh Jacob, and he who formed you, oh Israel. He creates the church And then he changes the names of those whom he loves. Jacob was a deceiver. You notice the order, Jacob and Israel. Jacob is who they were by nature, but Israel is who they are by his grace.

Jacob is the deceiver and the grabber. Israel is the converted son of God. Out of Egypt I have called my son." And so you have this distinction here. Second, he formed them. This has to do with the shaping of an object, squeezing them into shape like the potter in the clay.

Thirdly, he redeemed them. This is like buying them back out of slavery. That's the whole image of Egypt, where the children of God were enslaved by such an abuser. It's a picture of our salvation, how God buys us back off the slave block. He abolishes our slavery through the work of his son.

Fourth, he called. He says, he called us. And then fifth, he says, You are mine. You are mine. You know that phrase in Ecclesiastes, in the Song of Solomon, I am my beloveds and he is mine.

His banner over me is love. It's a very exclusive love. God has an exclusive love toward his church. He loves his church more than he loves the world. God doesn't love everyone the same way.

In his love, he does destroy the works of the devil, and he will destroy the wicked. That's an act of his love. So in one sense, God does love everyone, but he loves them differently. It's an exclusive kind of love. In Ephesians chapter 5, we learn about how this love, how exclusive this love is, and how exclusive love works.

In the relationship of the husband and the wife, the Apostle Paul says, husbands, love your wives as also Christ loved the church, and gave himself for her. And the Apostle Paul is drawing a parallel between Christ's love for his church, for his collective body, and how a husband is to love his wife exclusively, like no one else. You love your wife, you treat your wife, you talk to your wife, you touch your wife in a way that you do not do any of those things to anyone else. She is very special. And should a wife see her husband's love as universal or particular?

I don't think my wife wants me to love every woman like I love her. And that's what it is with God. God loves his church differently than he loves all the others. And should God's love be spread abroad and equally distributed? Should a husband's love be spread abroad and equally distributed, impartially Given?

No. That's not the Bible's picture of love. You're getting here an education about the doctrine of love. We want to have a little bit more clarity than God loves you and He loves everyone. He doesn't love everyone.

He loves everyone in a certain way, but he loves very particularly and distinctly. So in the same way that a wife would never want her husband to treat all women equally, neither should the church desire that either. Because God doesn't love everyone in the same way. He says, you are mine. I have called you.

It's such a beautiful picture here. This is God's covenant love. It means that your salvation is not based on what you have earned, but what he has done. Not what you deserve, but by his renaming you and identifying you as his people. So the fact that he has created his church is the first proof of his ownership that proves the preferential personal persevering perpetual care of God for his people.

The second proof, the second way that he proves his preferential treatment to his church is he abides with his church. That's verse 2. Look at verse 2. When you pass through the waters I will be with you, and through the rivers they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you." This has to do with different treatment.

God is speaking to you. Notice you, you, you. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. And through the rivers they shall not overflow you. He repeats this over and over in this second verse, and he's speaking of the plural people of God.

This is not a promise to you individually, necessarily. You are part of the people of God, so the promise does extend to you, but he's really speaking of his church. He is preserving his church through the fires and the waters and this is not a promise for all the people of the earth. So when you join the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, you have just joined the unsinkable ship. You have joined the ultimate fire barrier.

And he uses these terms fire and water and we should pay attention to the use of fire and water in the Bible. It's actually used two ways. Primarily fire and water are used for something that is comprehensively, irresistibly devastating. And fire reduces to ashes, and water is impossible to resist in its torrent. And they're figures of total destruction according to the righteous wrath of God.

And these very dramatic figures are used in particular ways, like in 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 5. Fire is used to depict the destruction of the wicked as well as is water. For this they willfully forget that by the word of God the heavens were of old and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which the world that men existed perished, being flooded with water. But the heavens and the earth, which are now preserved by the same word are reserved for fire Until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men the Church of Jesus Christ will survive the water and the fire that will destroy the wicked. That's the primary idea that's here.

Fire and water are also used for purification. In the book of Numbers, things gotten from war should be cleansed by fire and water. It's a cleansing agent. God brings his people through fire and water in order to cleanse them. We're being refined as by fire, being sanctified.

This whole imagery of Egypt is all throughout this passage. We'll encounter it in today and also next week. But God rescued his people through the waters. That was in Egypt. In Babylon, God rescued his servants through the fire, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

They had someone walking with them in the midst of the fire and they were not consumed. All this is to say that God preserves his church through the most dramatic threats of fire and water. Now, here's what he's not saying. God is not saying that there will be no floods or fires in your life. God is not saying that he is promising you some kind of earthly peace.

He is saying that when the floods come and when the fires come, he will glorify himself through you. In Isaiah's mind, it's not a question if you will go through the water, but rather when. When you connect the when in verse 2 and the for in verse 3, you see God's promise is really for his strength in the time of trial, not in the removing of trials. Don't look to God to remove your trials. This is a very immature view that people often have of Christianity.

They think that Christianity is somehow a promise of some perfect smoothness and all their financial problems are going to be fixed. All their relation problems are going to go away. All their bad emotions are going to somehow just evaporate instantaneously and it doesn't happen. That is not the promise of this passage. I like the way Calvin said it.

He says, the Lord has not redeemed you so that you might enjoy pleasures and luxuries, but that so you should be prepared for enduring all kinds of evils. This is what God is exerting his love for his church. I love the hymn, The Church is One Foundation. The church shall never perish, her dear Lord shall defend. To guide, sustain, and cherish is with her to the end.

Though there were those who hate her and false sons in her pale, against both foe and traitor she ever shall prevail. Mid toil and tribulation and tumult of her war. She waits the consummation of peace forevermore, till with the vision glorious her longing eyes are blessed, and the great church victorious shall be the church at rest. The church will never be overflowed. Individuals may be drowned and burned, as did the great martyrs of the church who were beheaded, who were crucified, who were stabbed to death, who were crucified upside down.

Some tradition says that Isaiah himself was the one who's sawn in two, referred to in Hebrews, the great martyrs of the faith. You know, 2 Chronicles 6 and 9 says, The eyes of the Lord run to and throughout the whole earth to show himself strong in behalf of those whose heart is loyal to him. This is the love of God toward his people. When they walk through the fires, God is with them. He cares for them in the midst of it.

They might actually get burned. They might get beheaded. They might get slandered. You know, one of the great things about the 21st century is the persecution of the church is all kind of on the internet pretty much. Not exclusively on the internet.

But most of the persecution is really just internet assassins. It's such a low-level persecution. But God walks with execution. But God walks with those that he loves. He abides with his church and this proves the preferential personal persevering perpetual care of his church.

This is how God proves his preferential treatment. Then thirdly, he proves it by his ransom of his church. In verse 3, look at verse 3. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I gave Egypt for your ransom, Ethiopia and Siba in your place.

This is another reason and a proof of his love. It's redemption from bondage in Egypt. This is an example and a proof of his love. This is perhaps the most often used image of salvation in the entire Bible. It's repeated everywhere.

I can't remember how many times, it's lots of times. But there is, in Egypt, there is favor toward God's people and there is disfavor toward the people of Egypt. And he's basing, he's basing his, the evidence of his love on what he did in Egypt as a result of his care. He says he is the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. And he demonstrated his holy care toward his people in Egypt.

He says, I gave Egypt for your ransom. Ethiopia and Siba in your place. You know, if you look back, go back to Exodus 14, you'll see what God did in Egypt. God preferred his people in Egypt, and he's using this example to explain his love for his people. This experience is an example of his preferential treatment toward his people and how he disfavors those who are autonomous and idolatrous.

Interesting, in the last plague, his blood, he warned his people to put blood on the doorposts of their house to save them from the death angel. Could not God have warned the people of Egypt? Didn't he have compassion on all those children of the sons of the pagans in Egypt? He could have told them, couldn't he? He could have told them how to have the death angel bypassed, But he didn't.

He was proving his love, his distinctive, particular love toward his people. He cares for his people more than he does for the pagans. This is the love of God. We have to adjust our doctrine of the love of God according to Scripture and to think about Him rightly or we can never Understand the world or what's happening in the world? The Exodus crossing is such a remarkable thing if you notice in Ezekiel 14 And I'm sorry in exodus 14 They you know you see these pictures of the crossing and there are these huge you know walls of water, you know, and the people are walking but But it happened at night They walked across in the dead of night.

And what did God do? He put a pillar of fire in front of them to lead them through the water in the dead of night. And behind them he put the cloud to place darkness between them and Egypt. Egypt was facing the darkness. His people face the light.

This is God's preferential love for his people. He does preserve and prefer his people. And he gives them as an exchange. He gives Egypt as an exchange. I think this is a figure of what we read in Romans 5 8 God demonstrates his love Toward us and that while we were still sinners Christ died for us he He we have exchanged our unrighteousness for his righteousness And God destroys the unrighteousness through the righteousness of his son.

In his ransom of his church He proves his preferential personal persevering perpetual care for his church. And then another way, the fourth way that he proves his preferential treatment is that he honors his church. This is in verse 4. Since you were precious in my sight, you have been honored, and I have loved you. Therefore I will give men for you, and people for your life.

Now he declares his valuation and his honor with three words, precious, honored, loved. You are precious in my sight. You have been honored. Now let's just stop on those words for just a moment. Do you know that?

Do you feel that? You know, we've gathered here today. I mean, are you just so overcome with your weaknesses and your inadequacies that you've forgotten this? This is how God regards His church. They are precious.

They are honored. They are loved. You know, when we gather together, we must remember this. You know, one of my great concerns for our time in the Lord's Supper is that I see so many heads hanging, And I wish you wouldn't hang your head so much. I wish it wouldn't be such a morbid, self-absorbed thing.

And often it is. Often You're so absorbed and obsessed with your stupidity and your sin that you forget the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you hang your head when you should lift it up in praise to God. It's the cup of blessing. You should examine yourself, but your examination should lead you to freedom and joy and recognizing that the blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed you from all of your unrighteousness.

And that's why it's called the cup of blessing. I want you to smile more when you take the Lord's Supper. I want you to hang your heads less. I want you to see the grace of God as greater. At the same time, I don't want you to despise the grace of God and think that you can just sin without any repentance, without any turning toward Him and lamenting your sin.

But that lamentation should turn to joy. I do know that we go through periods of time where we should hang our heads, but I want you to hang your heads less and smile more during the Lord's Supper. You know, I'm smiling most of the time during the Lord's Supper. I don't know if you've noticed that. It's hard for me not to smile.

His church is precious in His sight, is honored and loved. Therefore, I will give mint for you and people for your life. A sacrifice has been made for you. God honors his church. Do you see that?

Do you see his honor? In Exodus chapter 19, we read, If you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to me above all the people, above all the people. This is God's preferential love toward His people. His honor towards his church proves his preferential, personal, persevering, perpetual care of God for his church. Number five.

He also proves it by gathering his church verses five through seven. Fear not for I am with you. I will bring your descendants from the east and gather you from the West. So here God is assuring his people of his presence who are scattered throughout the earth. And you know, when is this referring to?

I think it's referring to a lot. It's referring to those who suffered in 721 or 722 under Sennacherib and were scattered. It refers to those who were deported in 586 under Nebuchadnezzar. I think it refers to The church that was scattered throughout the earth in the great dispersion, in the great commission as people are scattered throughout the earth and God calls them, he calls them from the east and from the west. Notice it's the east and the west and the north and from the south, you know, from everywhere to the ends of the earth.

He says, bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth. This is a picture of his in gathering. He proves his preferential treatment of his church by gathering his people from every tongue and tribe and nation. And that's where you get a righteous multiculturalism, right? Because God is going to save people from everywhere.

And he proves his love for his church by drawing people from every tongue and tribe and nation. This is missionary outreach. This is the spread of the gospel in every nation of the earth. Now again, just to remind you, you know, we're sending three men to Nigeria in just 15 days, or 17 days, something like that. And you know, we're sending them to bring the sons from afar, and the daughters from the ends of the earth, everyone who's been created for His glory.

But God proves His love by releasing from bondage those who are out in the outer reaches of the earth. This is really what God said to Pharaoh. He said, let my people go. The immediate context here is of this scene in Egypt. But for the past 2, 000 years God has been gathering his people from the four quarters of the earth and it's a proof of his love for his church.

He's gathering a worldwide body, a family. And he speaks of it like this, everyone who is called by my name, whom I've created for my glory, I have formed him. There's that word formed again, you encounter it in verse one. Yes, I have made Him. That's also back to the whole creation order.

And what qualifies them? Nothing. His love for them, His desire for his own glory is why they are brought in God God sees Adam sons is deserving his wrath But he desires to show his goodness to them and he made him who knew no sin to be sin on their behalf, to be the just and the justifier. God chooses to glory in His mercy. And you know, why salvation?

Why did you turn? You turned to Him because God wanted to glorify Himself in the salvation with somebody as poor and despicable and naked and blind as you were. He glorifies himself by associating himself with sinners. Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us that we should be called the sons of God. He's gathering, He's gathering His people from throughout the earth.

You know this is God's preferential treatment. God has always given preferential treatment to His people. You know, He took His children out of Egypt and they were not touched by the plagues of Egypt. In Genesis, God preserved His people in an ark through a flood while the pagans of the world perished in the water. In Leviticus, God comes near his people in the tabernacle.

He leads them by a cloud and a pillar of fire, but he doesn't lead the wicked that way. In Deuteronomy, God tells them that they're a special treasure and he gives them a law to live by. He gives them a law, he prefers them. You know, have you ever wondered why it is that when you find Christian people, they're not living in naked tribalism and they're not slashing themselves and drinking poison and abusing themselves. You ever wonder why that is?

Because God prefers His people. He gives them laws. He gives them great laws that are so good for them. They bless them whenever the law of God is obeyed. There's blessing.

Blessing I will bless you. Keeping I will keep you. In the book of Joshua, God gives them a land and he terrifies the inhabitants and he gives success to his people. In the book of Judges, he sends his people judges to rescue them. In the days of the kings, he sends prophets.

There's so many evidences of God's preferential treatment toward His people. He's always preferring His people. These are the ways that God proves his preferential treatment of his people. He created them, he abides with them, he ransoms them, he honors them, and he gathers them. Now, the discussion shifts And God has been declaring how it is that he prefers his church and how he treats them so much better than the world.

And then he calls witnesses to testify to it. And it's like he's got a courtroom scene going on here. Again, we're back to the beauty of the revelation of God to Isaiah as he brings these remarkable scenes before us. And now there's a courtroom scene and God is calling witnesses And then finally at the very end, God is the final witness to declare all these things. And so Isaiah continues with the theme of his love.

He's intending to prove it by these various testimonies, but he's using everyone. It's one commentator called this a lawsuit against the gods and where he calls the idols to come and present their case and he calls Judah to present their witness and then and then he command he just commands them to come out and so it's a trial scene This is not the only trial scene in Isaiah. In Isaiah 41, 21, in chapter 43, 22-28 is another one. Chapter 44, 8, and chapter 44, 22. We will find other examples of these trial scenes.

Here God's love is put on trial after God has already spoken about how he's loved his people. First of all the blind are called. Bring out the blind people who have eyes and the deaf who have ears. So this first call is for the insensible. They have eyes, they have ears, but they're unmoved.

They don't love God. They don't have an impulse toward God. They have no heart for holiness. They're hardened. They're resistant.

They're unfruitful. They're worldly. They're condemned. This week I was reading William Wilberforce, a seminal book called Practical View of Christianity and he speaks of the religious unconverted in his day. He says they have such unconcern with which they can amuse themselves on the borders of sin and the easy familiarity with which they can dally with it in its less offensive shapes.

That there is no love for holiness, No care for anything that would obstruct its entrance or dispute its sovereignty. This is a picture of a people who are just unconcerned. Holiness doesn't faze them. And they can just dally on the edges of sin so happily they can just get let's close enough to it this is this is these are the blind here and This this describes this the blind and then the nations are called verse 9 Let the nations let all the nations be gathered together, and let the people be assembled, who among them can declare this, and show the former things. Let them bring out their witnesses, that they may be justified, or let them hear and say, it is truth.

So he brings out the nations and he's saying you pagan nations speak tell us Tell us about my preferential treatment toward my people. Testify. This is in the third person. These are the unbelievers. These are the idol worshipers.

And he's saying to the idol worshipers, tell me what your idols have told you about the past and the future. They are stupid, dumb idols. They don't know anything about what they're talking about. Their testimony is rejected. Bring out your dumb idols, you nations.

And then his people are called in verse 10 You are my witnesses says the Lord and my servant whom I have chosen That you may know and believe me and understand that I am he before me there was no God formed, nor shall there be after me." So here God is calling his own, you in the second person, the believers. His chosen people are now called to testify. He calls them my witnesses. You notice he speaks of them differently. They believe.

They understand. They are his servants, his true servants. They are my witnesses. If you ask true Christians how Christ has treated them, like if you ask a person who's really been saved how Christ deals with them, And you ask them how the Lord has been. They will testify.

They'll bear witness. And that's the kind of witness that's right here. It's the real Christian who's been tenderly cared for, who's been forgiven, who's been led, who's been taught, who's been sanctified, who's been helped. This is the person now who's on the witness stand. And when you ask a person like that to testify, They'll tell you how good God is.

They'll tell you how sweet His laws are. They'll tell you how kind He is. They'll tell you what a good shepherd, what good bread, what good fruit of the vine, what light, what remarkable care. That's what they'll do. You know, I love that song that Jeff Pollard wrote a few years ago I wrote the music to the words that came out of a hymn Christ loved and chose and ransomed me from sin and Satan, set me free and washed me in His blood.

That's what happens when you bring a true Christian before the witness stand. He doesn't hesitate. He tells you about what a kind shepherd he has. He tells you about all the protections, all the mercies that have been given to him. He'll tell you about the fires and the waters that he's been carried through.

He doesn't, he's not bitter about the fire in the water. He doesn't care anything about his losses. He only cares about God's love. You know, they'll say the same thing that the disciples said to Jesus when everybody was leaving him. And they said, where would we go?

Where would we go? Are we going to go back to Pharaoh? We're going to go be abused by him? Oh, we're going to go back to the liar? We're going to go back to the deceiver?

We're going to go back to the enemy of our souls? Absolutely not. And the witnesses here are testifying. Perhaps this is connected to the great cloud of witnesses in Hebrews chapter 11 in Revelation 7, the multitudes who are singing a new song like that blind man who is cured by Jesus. He says, I was blind but now I see.

These are the witnesses. These are the witnesses of Jesus Christ. And These are the witnesses that are spoken of in Acts 1-8. Perhaps it's a direct prophecy of Acts 1-8. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be my witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.

You shall be my witnesses." Well his people are called as witnesses and then God himself testifies in verses 11 through 13 And God is declaring His saving grace. God is the final witness. His Word stands. And he says, I, even I am the Lord, and besides me there is no Savior. He's resting his protection and care, his preferential treatment toward his church on his own name.

I, even I, I am he. Verse 12, he says, I have declared and saved. I have proclaimed and there is no foreign God there was no foreign God among you therefore you are my witnesses, says the Lord, that I am God." And then in verse 13, He says, indeed, before the day was, I am He, and there is no one who can deliver out of my hand. I work, and who will reverse it? I am He.

God is placing the credit and the affirmation of His protection toward His church on His own name, I Am. I Am the name which caused the attackers to fall to their ground when Jesus Christ said that He was the one. I am He. When Moses was afraid of being God's witness, God told him, I am. Tell them, I am, said he.

So in calling of these witnesses into the courtroom, the preferential, personal, persevering, perpetual care of God for His church is proven. And He brings out the blind, He brings out the nations, He brings out His own people, and he himself declares he will protect his people because God's love is a very distinctive and particular love. He loves you like no other in the same way that your husbands speak to and walk with and live with and touch your wives like nobody else touches them. It's a very highly particular, distinctive love that no one receives in the world. You have to feel compassion for the people of the world who don't know this love, who haven't felt it in their hearts, who can't look back and see that they've had such a kind Father, such a good Shepherd, such a comforting Spirit to help them through.

They've not had it. You know how often we find ourselves maybe angry with the pagans of the world. It's something that we should consider. We should have compassion for them. And we witness.

We witness to His great love toward us. And we say, we want to say, come from afar, bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth, everyone who I've called by my name, whom I've created for my glory. God does everything for his own glory. Okay, I've got several applications. I have quite a list.

Number one, a passage like this should help us to consider the fires. Are you passing through the fire? Are you being sanctified in your heavenly journey? These fires are just precursors to your final trial with death. Prepare through these lesser trials.

Get ready to pass through the fire. God has promised when you pass through the waters, when you are in the fire. There is no easy road on the highway of holiness. There's fire and there's water, there's heat and there are floods. We should not forget that the martyrs were burned and blind and hacked, blinded and hacked.

It was Charles Spurgeon who said Christ's blood was shed meritoriously. Christians shed their blood gloriously, Christians shed their blood, testimonially. And it proves that they identify with the Church of Jesus Christ. It proves that you're on the same side of Jesus Christ. But the path of fire is also a path of progress and sanctification and a victory.

But we are in a refiner's fire. Malachi chapter 3 verse 6 says that we are not consumed even though we are in the fire. Now this leads to a question and this is what I wanted to get to in this application. Have you been preaching a gospel of success to yourself and because you've been preaching a gospel of earthly success to yourself, you're just so disappointed. It happens.

You know, many preachers preach a gospel of comfort and self-improvement. They give you the idea that the Christian life is where disturbances are removed. Unless you have faith, and then they're all removed. They don't want to talk that much about obedience. But they're leading their sheep astray, and they're saying that God will take away all your troubles financially and personally and professionally, but God has not promised that.

And that's why Isaiah says what he says here. God loves His people through the water and in the fire. He's promised to walk with you when you face trials and losses. And this, of course, is for the whole church. But it does overlap.

It does overflow to the individuals. And do you think that God is your talisman that's going to fix your problems and shield you from trials you know how many people have you known in Christianity who are in and out of disillusionment because Christianity is really not what it's all cracked up to be. It didn't fix all your problems. They thought God would fix everything and take every problem away but he didn't do that. Instead he took them through the Red Sea.

Instead, he took them into the fire. I read on a website this week, It was the Stand to Reason website. I don't know who wrote it. It said this, if suffering disproves your Christianity, you've missed Christianity. The Bible is filled with the suffering of those whom God loves.

The central event of the Bible is one of suffering. Love involves suffering. We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brethren. And that means suffering. So the first application is consider your fires.

Have you been preaching a gospel of earthly success to yourself and therefore you're disillusioned? Well here's the admonition. Get with true Christianity. This is true Christianity. Here's the second.

Rest in the knowledge of the perpetuity of the church. I found great comfort in this passage because it speaks of the incombustible and destructibility of the church. The church is often cut down but it always sprouts again. You can stomp on your Bible, you can you can have people flush it down the toilet, burn thousands of them, try to wipe them out, try to silence, try to silence the people who speak the Word of God, it will not happen. The Word of God and the Church of God is indestructible.

The Church never loses any of its members. It's unconquerable. The reed will not break. The light will not be put out. This is God's promise for His church.

When you join the church, you got on a ship that will never sink. When you join the church, you join the people that will never be incinerated to ashes. It won't happen. When you join the church, you join the people that can never be drowned. How about that?

I've just found so much comfort in this week, considering the attacks on the church that are here now and coming. But you can rest in the knowledge of the perpetuity of the church. And how about this, let's rejoice. Let's so rejoice that the church is gathered. When we gather together, we have gathered together as the indestructible people of God.

That's another reason not to hang your head in the Lord's Supper, wouldn't you think maybe? Number three. Consider the purpose of your life. Consider the purpose of your life. God says, bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth, everyone who is called by my name.

And this last phrase is so pivotal. Everyone who I created for my glory. God puts the church in the world, saving it for his own glory. This is about living for the glory of God. Often people get depressed because they've forgotten why they were born.

They thought they were born for their own glory. And so they get so disappointed when the shine is off their own glory for some reason. You know, they marry somebody and somehow the shine of their glory gets tarnished something happens to them they do something and They're not glorified. They've forgotten why they've been born But it But if you know that in whatever circumstance you find yourself, if you know your role and you're clear about it, that you've been created for God's glory, Then you can fulfill the will of God, no matter what. God created you for His glory.

He saved you for His own glory. He will glorify you, but not in the things of this earth particularly. He does bless his people and there is a way that he does glorify his people. But he created that lesser glory to point to his own greater glory. You know, when the people of God obey the word of God, he glorifies them.

But he glorifies them to glorify himself. That's what God is concerned about. And you can rest in happiness with the fact that God is wanting to glorify himself. Don't think it a bad thing that he just wants to glorify himself at your expense. He does.

That's what he's doing. But recognize what that means. It means that He's taking you up to His glory. He's raising you with Him in the heavens. His glory is your greatest hope.

It's your greatest defense. It's your greatest protection in the world. Don't think that God is somehow evil because he wants only to glorify himself. He wants to glorify himself and what does he do? He puts you in His family.

He is in you. Christ is in you, the hope of glory. It's a beautiful thing that God wants to glorify himself. But the world is full of people who they feel they need to be in a different spot to be happy. These people will never be happy because they've never learned the secret of the glory of God.

And here is the secret. The glory of God can be demonstrated anywhere, anytime, under any circumstances. The glory of God can be applied everywhere. So the second application, consider the purpose of your life, the glory of God. The things that depress us the most are the things that take the shine off of our own glory.

Can we just admit that? We want to be so special. We want to be so well-liked. We want to be so thought of as so brilliant and powerful and wealthy and wise. We want to be thought of as so beautiful and popular, God isn't concerned about any of that.

He's concerned for His own glory. And some of you are depressed today because you're so obsessed with your own glory. You only care about your own reputation and the way people treat you and the way you are feeling and how circumstances have treated you. You care only about yourself. You become so selfish and self-absorbed and because of it you're depressed.

And maybe you're seeking, maybe you want to call the elders for counsel. You need to call God and repent of trying to glorify yourself so much and being so depressed because you're obsessed with your own glory, which is the root of so many of our problems. I've learned in the years that I've been on this earth that when I am discouraged almost always, almost always, it's because I'm so concerned with myself and my own glory. Consider the glory of God as your greatest rescue. Put down that ridiculous book that's trying to teach you how to have a better life, to fix your problem that's bothering you now.

Behold the glory of God, behold your God. That's your rescue. The next application, number four. Consider your role in the world. You shall be my witnesses.

You are his witnesses, declaring the love of God. You know how much more we need to be his witnesses. I'm so convicted about my own life and your life, at how lacking we are in witnessing to the to the lost of this world and then finally consider the mercies of God that have been extended to you Isaiah is a is a proof of the mercy of God and that salvation is all of grace. That's what our teacher on Tuesday morning said was the summary of this passage. Salvation is all of grace.

That's true. Have your sins been blotted out? Has this happened to you? Has Christ delivered you? Have you been reconciled to God?

Do you see it? Do you see the love of God? Do you know the love of God? Do you cling to this preferential, personal, persevering, perpetual care of God for His church. Do you know it?

I pray you know it. I know some of you don't know it, only just because statistically that's the way it works. There are always unbelievers, there's always a mixed community, always. My appeal to you is see the love of God. Get on this ship that moves through the mighty waters and will carry you all the way to heaven.

Get on the highway of holiness that will get there. It will get you there. Be saved from this wicked and perverse generation. You know on the way to church I couldn't get out of my mind a hymn And I'll close with this as a final reminder of God's love as the final application. I am His and He is mine.

Loved with everlasting love, led by grace, that love to know. Spirit breathing from above, thou hast taught me it is so. Oh, this full and perfect peace, oh, this transport, all divine, in a love which cannot cease, I am his, and he is mine. In a love which cannot cease, I am his, and he is mine. In a love which cannot cease, I am his, and he is mine.

Things that once were wild alarms cannot now disturb my rest. Closed in everlasting arms, pillowed on the loving breast. Oh to lie forever here, doubt and care and self resign while he whispers in my ear, I am his and he is mine. Let's pray. Lord, we praise you for your loving kindness, praise you for your particular love, we praise you for your love being higher than the heavens, wiser than all of your creatures, better than anything in the world.

Amen.