The sermon, 'The Latter End of Covenant Breakers' by Peter Allison, focuses on Isaiah chapter 2, emphasizing the theme of walking in the light of the Lord. The sermon contrasts the remnant, the faithful people of God, with those who have broken the covenant through four main transgressions: adopting eastern ways, relying on wealth and military might, and worshipping idols. Allison underscores the importance of understanding the broader narrative of Isaiah, highlighting the distinction between the first 39 chapters of judgment and the latter chapters of comfort. The remnant theme is significant, representing those who remain faithful after God's purifying judgment. The sermon exhorts believers to walk in the light, which involves acknowledging scriptures as the source of truth, maintaining fellowship with God and others, and obeying God's commandments. It warns against the folly of idol worship and putting trust in wealth or military power rather than God. The sermon concludes with a message of hope and comfort for the remnant, assuring them of God's ultimate justice and the fate of the wicked, urging believers to heed God's warnings and be strengthened in their faith.

Well our scripture reading is from Isaiah chapter 2 Beginning at verse 5 O house of Jacob, come and let us walk in the light of the Lord. For you have forsaken your people the house of Jacob, because they are filled with eastern ways. They are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they are pleased with the children of foreigners. Their land is also full of silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures. Their land is also full of horses, and there is no end to their chariots.

Their land is also full of horses, and there is no end to their chariots. Their land is also full of idols, they worship the work of their hands, that which their own fingers have made. People bow down and each man humbles himself, therefore do not forgive them. May His statutes be our songs in our pilgrimage. Heavenly Father, what sobering words Grant us ears to hear, to tremble at your warnings, to believe in your promises, to see with eyes of faith the city that you are building, And to persevere by your grace as pilgrims and sojourners here on earth.

Lord, strengthen us by your word And I ask that you would sanctify my sinful lips this morning, that they might faithfully proclaim your truth and your righteousness and your grace in Jesus Christ. Amen. In Jesus Christ. Amen. A few years ago, some colleagues were driving from the airport to the meeting location an hour or two away, and they were probably a good hour or more into their trip when they realized that they had been traveling in the wrong direction the whole time.

The driver had been following the road impeccably, right? They knew what road they were on, they knew what cities they had passed through, but they didn't have the big picture, right? They saw the individual trees but they lost sight of this of the forest in this case so in our walk through Isaiah we want to learn from that mistake and keep the forest in view as we go through this book of Isaiah. We want to keep the forest in view even as we and in mind even as we look at these individual verses and trees and we want to be continually aware of how this immediate passage that we are currently examining fits into the overall contour and context of Isaiah's entire prophecy. And so before we look at verses 5 to 9, Let's see just for a moment how they fit into the overall message of Isaiah.

So we saw that the first 39 chapters of the book of Isaiah are this book of judgments. They form the Old Testament-like part of Isaiah. And the last 27 chapters form the book of comfort or the New Testament-like part of Isaiah. We saw that chapter one was the covenant lawsuit against Judah and Jerusalem and it's analogous to the table of contents at the beginning of a book. It gives us all It gives us a preview of all the major themes that will be in the book of Isaiah's prophecy.

And so chapters 2 through 12 are a series of prophecies, messages, for the remnant. They're not always addressed to the remnant, and the remnant language is not always explicit, but these messages are for the benefit of the remnant. And we'll see why that's the case in a moment for this particular passage. But this remnant theme, it runs throughout the Book of Isaiah. But six of the 10 direct references to the remnant are in these first 12 chapters, over half of them.

It was first introduced in chapter one, the remnant, which would be fitting that it would be included in a chapter that summarizes all the themes of the book of Isaiah. The remnant we saw then was composed of those who are faithful to the Lord, those who do not bow the knee to Baal when everyone else does. It's those 10% who remain after God purifies his church of the dross and and it's those in whom all the covenant promises and blessing come to fruition this remnant Isaiah 1 9 said unless the Lord of hosts had left to us a very small remnant we would have become like Sodom We would have been made like Gomorrah. There was no one left in Sodom and Gomorrah, you remember, after God's terrible judgment fell upon them. And the next reference to the remnant is in direct references in Isaiah four.

Where it says, In that day the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and appealing for those of Israel who have escaped. That's the remnant. They've escaped the judgment. They will enjoy the fruit of the earth. And it shall come to pass that he who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem will be called holy.

Those who left and remain, that's the remnant. Everyone who is recorded among the living in Jerusalem and Isaiah chapter 6 which we haven't gotten to yet but there is the commissioning of Isaiah and there he asks as God's telling him sending him to these people he asks how long he's to preach to people that won't hear because God has told them they're not going to hear your message Isaiah and he says well how long do I have to preach to them? And the answer is until the cities are laid waste and without inhabitant. The houses are without man. The land is utterly desolate.

The Lord has removed men far away. And the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land. But then here's this remnant. But yet a tenth, that's the 10%, will be in it and will return and be for consuming as a stump remains when it is tree is cut down. So the Holy Seed shall be in its stump.

So when the image there is you cut down a tree, if it's a living tree, even if there's a lot of dead branches in it, then another tree will often grow up out of that stump. And that's the remnant that remains after God's purifying judgment. And then in Isaiah 7 in the next chapter the Lord says to Isaiah go meet this King Ahaz you and Shirjazab your son. Well Shirjazab the name of Isaiah's son means a remnant shall return. So Isaiah names his son after the remnant.

Now that's, that's pretty hardcore, right? We'd say, but that's what believers do, don't we? How we name our children says a lot about what we hold important. So We look to the graces of God for names. We look to faithful men to be an example to them.

And so there are three more references to the remnant in Isaiah 10 and 11. The first four verses though of this chapter that we looked at last week, we saw this message of hope that things would not always be the way they are now, that God's kingdom would be advanced progressively and gloriously, and it would triumph over all the other kingdoms of the earth. The heathen Gentile nations would be converted. The church would be progressively victorious. This was a message of hope.

It's a message of hope for the remnant. Because they'll be the ones that remain. Which brings us now to this fifth verse with its exhortation to walk in the light of the Lord. See the hope founded on God's promise of victory in the first four verses is the encouragement to the remnant now to walk in the light. But God gave them this message of hope, and then he calls them to walk in the light.

Verses six to nine go on the catalog, the sins of the culture, closing with a terrible judgment on the culture in verse nine they won't be forgiven and then in the remainder of this chapter that the terror of that judgment is described in some detail. But then in that chapter concludes, chapter 2 concludes in verse 22 with another solemn exhortation to separate ourselves from such covenant breakers. So these messages are to Judah and Jerusalem, but they are for the benefit of the remnant, to give them hope, to assure them that God's justice will fall in due time on covenant rebels. Because see Isaiah is told right from the beginning that only the remnant is going to listen to him. So verse 5 then.

It's an exhortation to the house of Jacob the house of Jacob is a reference to God's people it's used mainly by the prophets in the Old Testament and half the times they use it it's by Isaiah so this is a very there's a common name for the church in Isaiah. It's the Old Testament church. The people who have cut covenant with God. But obviously not all of those who have covenant and outwardly are children of Abraham spiritually. So this exhortation then is for God's people, his covenant people, his church to walk in his light.

Now light is a very, very, very significant concept in the Scriptures, both the Old and the New Testament. The very first words recorded in the scripture that God spoke, where let there be light. God created light. Light is energy. Broadly speaking, everything from radio waves that are received by our FM and AM radios to microwave ovens in our kitchens, to infrared lamps that are used to warm many things, to light bulbs that illuminate this room, to x-rays used at the doctor's office, to the gamma rays that come out of nuclear reactors.

They're all the same thing. And broadly speaking, they are all called light. Rightly so. They are properly called light. So what do all these things have in common?

What is this common feature of light? Well, light is the means by which information is transmitted, right? From radio and TV towers that in former days broadcast our news and our music and our entertainment, to the microwave towers that today transmit our cell phone calls and they transmit the websites that now provide our news and our music and our entertainment to the microwave ovens that cook our food and boil our water to the x-rays that can see inside of our bodies and tell doctors what's going on give them information about the state of our body to the lights that illuminate this room and enable us to see and to read. See light is a means of transmitting information and so God's Word is called light in the scriptures. Your Word is a lamp to my feet and what?

A light to my path. That's right. God's Word is the original and ultimate source of all knowledge. All that we know is revealed by God through His Word. God's Word is His message to us.

It's His communication. He's teaching us, giving us knowledge. God's Word can bring knowledge, brings wisdom and understanding. Psalm 119 also says, the entrance of your word gives light. It gives understanding to the simple.

The entrance of God's word gives light. God's word, which gives light, is the means the Holy Spirit uses to bring us into saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. So Paul explained to the Corinthians Church in 2 Corinthians 4 that the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. See this light is tied to knowledge, to the communication of that knowledge. On the other hand, those who are perishing are said to be blind.

Not able to see the light. Paul said, but even if our gospel it is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the God of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them." So God not only created light, the Bible says God is light. This, in 1 John 1, this is the message which we have heard from Him and declared to you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. So darkness is the absence of light. It's a lack of knowledge and understanding.

And of course there is no aspect of God that is not filled with light. In fact, Revelation 21 says that the heavenly Jerusalem won't need a son because the Lamb, Jesus Christ, is her light. David says in Psalm 27, the Lord is my light and my salvation. And Jesus told the Pharisees in John 8 and that encounter with the with the woman caught in adultery said I am the light of the world and He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life So light is is life that this light of the Lord is life-giving. And so to walk in the light then, as we're exhorted to do here, is to acknowledge the scriptures as the only source of truth.

To walk in the light is to have fellowship with the Lord and with one another as well. If we say that we have fellowship with him and we walk in darkness we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. Just walking in the light means that we come on Sunday morning together.

We have fellowship with one another. We have fellowship with the Lord. That's what it means to be praying without ceasing to be praying continually to be rejoicing in everything giving thanks. This is speaking of this fellowship that we have with the Lord. And that's what it is to walk in the light, to walk in the light is to follow his ways.

It's to do what he commands us to do. It's to go where he calls us to go. To walk in the light, of course, is to know where we are going, to see the bigger picture. To walk in darkness is to not know where you're going. And I'm sure you've all had that experience, as I have had, of trying to walk in a dark room with no light, right?

We think we can do it. But when We walk in darkness, what happens? We crash into things. We hurt ourselves, we fall. We end up going where we don't want to go.

We fall into things that we can't see. That's the very essence of walking in darkness. And so we quickly learn. It's not wise to walk in darkness. And we learn that with the physical world, but God is saying it's the same in the spiritual world.

When we walk in darkness, when we walk out of fellowship with the Lord, out of fellowship with His people, or contrary to His ways, we're like that person trying to walk in a room with no light. We hurt ourselves. It's not wise to walk contrary to the light of the scriptures. And we act very foolishly when we think that we can pick and choose the portions of God's word that we want to follow and those portions that we can safely ignore. You see, when we do that, we're like the person trying to walk across the pitch-black room filled with obstacles To walk contrary to the light of the scriptures would be like this Be like driving at high speed down an unfamiliar country road without headlights on a black and moonless night That would be a frightening terrifying experience that should terrify you But it should equally terrify you to think of walking in darkness, to walking without the fellowship of the Lord, without his precepts and his commandments.

And that picture is what you should have in mind when you think about walking away from the Lord and the fellowship of his people and ignoring the commandments of his word, Not studying them, not being interested in them, not delighting in them. So to walk in the light then is to know and to believe the truth. It's to obey the truth. And it's to be in fellowship and communion with the Lord and his people. And so, you know, the first sign of wandering in darkness is that we begin to absent ourselves from the worship of the Lord when we could be there.

But there's, I think there's another reason for this exhortation to walk in the light. Because see, God has ordained to bring the light of his word through the preaching of the gospel by people. He could have sent angels to bring the gospel, but he didn't. He might even say they could have done it better because they are without sin. And though they assist, God did not ordain the word to come by his angelic beings.

He ordained it to come by sinful people, weak and fallible people that the glory might belong to him. Vessels of clay. He works through his church. Matthew 5 says, Jesus said, you are the light of the world, speaking to the people in front of him. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a lampstand and it gives light to all that are in the house and they said so let your light shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven see our testimony to the truth our obedience to God's commandments is light.

It brings light to the world around us. We are the salt that changes the world around us for good just like salt enhances the flavor of food it touches and preserves the food in which it is put. When we do things without complaining and disputing, Do you hear that all you little ones? Do things without complaining and disputing. Paul told the Philippians that you shine as lights in the world.

Lights. So even you little children, when you do things without complaining and disputing, you shine as a light in the world, a light in a world that is in darkness. And you know light always dispels darkness, wherever it is. Darkness never dispels the light. Darkness cannot overpower the light because darkness is simply the absence of light.

So when you bring light, you drive away the darkness. And so the covenant blessings then that we looked at last week in verses one to four, they flow from the covenant obedience that is commanded here in verse five. Walk, O house of Jacob, come, and let us walk in the light of the Lord. So verse six then begins a second message for the benefit of the remnant. But it is a prayer that is spoken to the Lord.

You notice it changes. He's talking to the house of Jacob and now in verse 6 he's talking to the Lord. You there for you have forsaken your people. He's speaking of the Lord. God has forsaken his people, the house of Jacob, his covenant people.

This Old Testament Church has been forsaken by God God allowed them to fall prey to their own follies and consequently come under foreign pagan religious practices. And so Isaiah lists the reasons that they have been forsaken by God. There are four things. Four things that they are filled with. The first is they're filled with Eastern ways.

Instead of being filled with the Spirit, they are filled with these Eastern ways. Well, what are the eastern ways? Well, the East is the Orient. That's the land of Babylon and Persia, what today is Iraq and Iran. You know, a few years ago, Alice and I went to the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago.

And what do you suppose they had there? They had all sorts of artifacts from Iran and Iraq. This is the east. Babylon was the source of the occult practices that were incorporated into Israel. In fact, when the temple was destroyed in 70 A.D., they had apparently made this veil that couldn't be torn.

It was like four inches thick, but it was adorned with all sorts of Eastern symbol, occult symbolism. He says, they are soothsayers. Soothsayers are people who seek knowledge apart from the light of God's word. And we're forbidden from seeking light, from seeking knowledge outside of and apart from what God has revealed through his word. Deuteronomy 18 says, There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or daughter pass through fire, that's a demonic practice, human sacrifice, or one who practices witchcraft or a soothsayer or one who interprets omens or a sorcerer through demonic powers.

So tarot cards, the zodiac, the horoscope that's in so many newspapers, palm readings, seances such as King Saul used, these are all attempts to find light, to find knowledge apart from the Word of God, to seek to know what God has not revealed. So that's to reject the light that God provides and to seek light elsewhere. That is darkness. We're not to pry into the secrets of God. They belong to him.

Deuteronomy 29, 29, the secret things belong to the Lord your God. And it's, we shouldn't pry into them. But those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever. That we may do all the words of this law. So when we try to pry into God's secrets by all these means that He has forbidden.

This is what Sue is saying. That's far, far, far worse than prying into the secret diaries of other people. But that's what God says, don't pry into His secrets. They're his. These people are pleased with or literally they've clasped hands with, they've made common cause with foreigners.

They're filled with Eastern ways, they are soothsayers like the Philistines. So they've become just like the pagan nations that practice divination. And they are pleased with, or they've taken common cause with, they've shaken hands with, literally, foreigners. The concept of a foreigner is someone who is outside the covenant. So instead of walking in the light and being in fellowship with God's people, they are now in fellowship with those that are outside the covenant with the that's what a foreigner is It Proverbs uses this same this exact same word To describe the seductress the harlot Because it's the woman who is outside the marriage covenant The King James Version calls it her the strange woman So Proverbs 2 16 for example to deliver you speaking Speaking to the son to deliver you from the immoral woman from the seductress.

That's the exact same word here. That's used here, foreigner, who flatters with her words. Proverbs five, for why should you, my son, be enraptured by an immoral woman and be embraced in the arms of a seductress. That's the foreigner, same word. Proverbs six, to keep you from the evil woman from the flattering tongue of a seductress.

Again, a foreigner, somebody who is outside the covenant of marriage. Proverbs seven, that they may keep you from the immoral woman from the seductress who flatters you with her words See to be pleased With the children of foreigners is to reject our own family The heritage of our father Abraham and to make common cause with strangers, with foreigners who are not part of God's people. In other words, it's like rejecting your family that has loved you and cared for you and going and joining a gang of rebels. These foreigners, these strangers to the covenant are rebels against God. They're living in rebellion to his ways.

So instead of this fellowship with God and his people, Their circle of friends and those with whom they have common cause are God's enemies. And we can do that in a number of ways. The music we listen to, the entertainment, the movies, and all of these things are ways that we today take up common cause with God's enemies. Secondly, the second fault is that they are full of gold. Now, there's nothing wrong with gold.

But it's not what we are to put our trust in. That Kings specifically are not to multiply gold. But Isaiah says their land is also full of silver and gold and there is no end to their treasures." You see, they were putting their trust in their wealth and kings especially were told not to multiply gold. Deuteronomy 17, I'll read this lengthy passage because it relates both to this problem and the next problem, the third one, says Deuteronomy 17, you shall surely set a king over you whom the Lord your God chooses one from among your brethren you shall set as king over you you may not set a foreigner over you one who is not your brother and yes that's the same word that's used in Isaiah Foreigner you know they could not set a foreigner over them But But he shall not Multiply horses for himself nor cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses For the Lord has said you shall not return that way again Neither shall he multiply wise for himself. Let this heart turn away nor here thirdly It says shall he multiply greatly multiply silver and gold for it himself And it shall be when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of the law in a book.

And it shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life that he may learn to fear the Lord and be careful to observe all the words of this law and these statutes. So they were to put a king over them who was from their own family, not a stranger to the covenant. And he was not to multiply silver and gold, lest his heart be lifted up above his brethren. And he was not to turn aside from the commandment to the right hand or to the left that he may prolong his days in his kingdom and his children in the midst of Israel. You see a ruler has the power of the sword and they can use that to extract unjust wealth, to unjustly extract wealth through taxation and other unjust practices.

You know today our county commissioners give contracts to those who give them money. It's a form of multiplying money. And in doing this they're trusting in their silver and gold to get them power and control. But individuals can fall into the same problem trap of trusting the Lord instead of trusting the Lord to provide for our needs. They're trusting in gold to provide.

It's another way of rejecting God's laws. When people believe today that they have to have two incomes to be able to live. And in order to do that, they have to sacrifice having a family, being fruitful and multiplying. Essentially, they're trusting in money to give them what they want. And they're rejecting God's ways.

Now, there's certainly times when people need to work. Both people, both spouses might need to. So I'm not saying that's always wrong, but it's an example. It's one example of where the thinking in our culture has gone after money and gold and rejected God's ways. The love of money, Paul told Timothy, is a root, a root, not the, but a root of all kinds of evil, not every evil, but all kinds of evil.

For which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness and pierced themselves through with many sorrows, but you, God says, O man of God, you flee these things. Flee these things. And pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience and gentleness. Okay, the third fault of this culture is that they are full of horses. Now horses also, like gold, are good, there's nothing wrong with having horses, But this is a reference to military machinery.

What today we call the industrial military complex. And we know what a plague, what a scourge this complex is upon our nation. And it's arisen because of a desire to multiply horses. This is another means that people look to for security instead of looking to the Lord. Our help is in the name of the Lord.

Our security comes from him and yes there is a place for war. There were many mighty men of the Lord who were mighty warriors. But we don't trust in those things. The These horses and the chariots are instruments of power projection in empire building and so these people have become warmongers and much like we have today wanting to rule the world and wanting to project our power all over the world the things that have nothing to do with protecting our borders and Defending us from unjust aggression You see when God's law is rejected When we don't walk in His light, something else takes the place of that. And people look for truth outside of God's Word.

They trust in money to bring fulfillment. Instead of God as their Lord and Master, the state with its power often becomes the master. And so we see here in this that the sin becomes its own judgment. As Romans 1 illustrates, God judges sin with the removal of His grace, bringing about a fall in deviant more and greater sin. And the last the fourth complaint that Isaiah brings to the Lord in this prayer is that the land is full of idols.

People will always worship something. The question is who? Who do we worship? Because we will become like what we worship. Idols are dumb.

The word literally is futile, useless, ineffectual. They can't speak, idols are deaf, they can't hear, they can't see, they can't move, they only say what people make them say, they only go where people move them And someone 15 says These idols are the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but don't speak eyes, but they don't see ears But they don't hear noses, but they can't smell they have hands, but they can't handle they have feet but they can't walk, they don't mutter through their throat. But here's the clincher. Those who make them are like them.

And so is everyone who trusts in them. See the trust in idols is to become dumb and deaf and blind and stupid and unable to do anything. Isaiah describes this folly at some length. Those who make an image, all of them, he says in Isaiah 44, are useless. They don't see, they don't know, they should be ashamed, that they may be ashamed.

Who would make something that profits him nothing? Doesn't do him any good. This is how he describes it. The blacksmith works with the tongs, works one in the coals, he's taking metal, fashioning it together with hammers, works it with the strength of his arms. Even so he's hungry and his strength fails.

The craftsman reaches out his roll, he marks out one with chalk, he fashions it with a plane, he marks it out with a compass, He makes it like the figure of man according to the beauty of man. There's a craftsman taking a block of wood and fashioning it into something that looks like a person so that he can put it in his house. He cuts down cedar for himself. He takes the cypress and the oak and he uses these things to burn a fire to heat himself to heat his food and to warm himself he bakes his bread but he also takes some of it he makes a God out of it and he says ah I am warm and I have seen the fire from the wood that he burned. But then that same wood he takes and bows down to it and he prays to it and says, deliver me for you are my God.

And they don't know nor do they understand because Isaiah says God has shut their eyes so that they cannot see, and he's shut their hearts so they cannot understand. They've become like what they worshiped. And no one considers in his heart, nor is there any knowledge or understanding to think and say look I have burned half of it in the fire I have baked and warned myself with it. I baked bread on the coals I have roasted meat and eaten it and shall I make the rest of it an abomination shall I fall down before a block of wood. Isaiah says he feeds on ashes.

A deceived heart has turned him aside and he cannot deliver a soul nor, nor he can't even say nor. There is not a lie. Is there not a lie in my right hand. This guy is very foolish. It's a very foolish picture.

But that's what we are when we worship idols. And idols can come in many forms. Many, many things. As one reformer famously said, our hearts are idol factories. And when we make something that God has made and given to us for our good, When that becomes something that's more valuable to us than God's word, then we are like this person.

Just Isaiah describes, foolish. These rebels in verse 9, these people bow down to them, and each man humbles himself. There's two words for people here that Adam and the word Adam that we get Adam from and ish. It's speaking both of the common people and the rulers, everyone, everyone is gonna be humbled. The ruler as well as the common man.

And then Isaiah gives this very shocking statement that initially is shocking. Therefore, do not forgive them. Or therefore, they will not be forgiven. It could be a future sense to it. Therefore, they will not be forgiven.

God's salvation will come through his judgment. His justice will be vindicated as he brings his wrath on those who do evil. And so this is really a dreadful warning of the consequences for those who don't walk in the light. They aren't forgiven. But It also, I think, serves as an encouragement to the remnant.

That God will vindicate His people. That God will bring justice. It's the same way that Paul encourages the Thessalonian church in 2 Thessalonians 1. He talked about this church, this Thessalonian church that was struggling. They were being persecuted.

And he said, we boast of you among all the churches for your patience and your faith in the midst of all these persecutions that you are enduring and tribulations, which has manifest evidence of the righteous judgment of God that you may be counter-worthy of the kingdom of God for which you suffer. But then he gives them this encouragement, he says, Since it is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you, and to give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ these shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power when he comes in that day that is saying they won't be forgiven and Paul held this up as yes, you are suffering now. Yes, you look around and you see these wicked people They seem to prosper But he says It is a just thing for God to repay with tribulation those who are troubling you.

In flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not obey God. Everlasting destruction, they are not forgiven. And that is the comfort that Isaiah brings to the remnant here. There's this reminder that the wicked will not prosper, that they will not be forgiven. So let us be comforted.

With his promise of victory, comforted with his Lord's vindication of his of his justice, but also. Exhorted. To walk in his light and warned about the consequences of falling away. Heavenly Father we pray that we would heed your warnings in your word. You have given them to us that we might be warned of all of the consequences of falling away, that we might also be encouraged and comforted and built up and strengthened.

We pray, Lord, for your Holy Spirit to work through your word this morning. Where we have doubted its truth to fortify us, where we have wandered from its ways to restore us, where we have fallen to convict us and raise us up. We thank you for your servants of prophets that you have sent to us, for your messengers who have brought your word. We ask that you enable us to receive it with meekness, to lay it up in our hearts that we might not sin against you. Lord, this is our fervent prayer, this is our heart's desire that as many times as we fail we may look to your grace, to your work on the cross, and to your righteousness.

In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.