Lift Up Your Eyes - Part 1 | Beth Moore

living proof with beth moore is sponsored by the friends and partners of living proof ministries what is the big idea of the book of isaiah it is actually tucked in the name of isaiah the name isaiah means salvation of yahweh and i mean from 1-1 all the way to the very end of the book in 66 chapters over and over again god is making known the message of salvation wonderful people of the west i have to tell you something if you sense the power of god in the building you need to know in case you came from a distant enough place that you did not realize that early afternoon this whole entire area lost all power i mean it was like we came for soundcheck and there was not one light in the building except that which comes on when there's an emergency and let me tell you you talk about people praying this afternoon for this to take place there there was talk of having to cancel tonight and just meeting tomorrow we were just going you know every now and then when you just have to say no i mean you know just every now and then they're just going in jesus name no somebody say it tonight that's like in jesus name no every now and then we're just like no this will not do if we are going to be fierce in the day in which we have been called on planet earth it's going to take some kind of strength that only god could give us some kind of determination that we will not be quickly discouraged and called down anybody stepping in that with me tonight i got to tell you something before we get into our lesson and man do we have some lessons this weekend i uh flew from houston of course uh that's my hometown into san diego a three hour and one minute flight and the guy next to me um took off his shoes i i posted but i'm not going to put the picture up because i don't want this to end up on television and him to sue me for showing the bottom of his feet but he sat like this the whole time with his bare feet and i'm right here you know so it's like man i was reminded of souls you know what i'm saying but i felt a little defeated on the way over of course i want you to turn with me if you would please to isaiah chapter 40 isaiah chapter 40. now let me tell you a little bit about what's happened in the prophecy of isaiah from 1-1 all the way up to 39 and the final verse of it 39 verse 8. during that course of time god has been prophesying to a people who are once again being overpowered by a superpower that should have had no authority over them whatsoever let me kind of put this in a nutshell for you what god told the people of israel from the very beginning when he made covenant with them and in the mosaic covenant on mount sinai he said at that time if you will be faithful to me i will astonish you with blessing i will practically run you down with blessing but if you are unfaithful to me with the gods of the nations that are going to surround you i will warn you and i will warn you but if you do not turn away from that idolatry i am going to let you be held in captivity to gods to the gods of those nations who are not gods at all and you will be under their tyranny now i'm paraphrasing that but you would find that throughout very distinctly i mean no bones about it moses was very very clear the lord said and so they get to the promised land they settle in and after all of that sure enough over time just one temptation after another they begin instead of impacting the nations the nations begin to impact them and they begin taking on the gods the idols of the other nations around them which as god would tell us over and over when he says i am without peer i am the one and only god they begin to go into all manner of idolatry and what happens when we don't have god is our god the only thing that can possibly happen is godlessness and that's exactly what happened to them they fell into all sorts of sin they fell into every conceivable injustice their way of doing business for the most part was bribery the shepherds of the flocks in other words the religious leaders fleeced the flock everything you can imagine went awry everything turned upside down they went under complete defeat and sure enough sure enough that the uh superpower that was first uh over them in this rule after they had been settled in the promised land and then they began to go into this idolatry was the assyrians so the assyrians had them under their rule which god had said no no nation will have ownership over you no other authority will be over you but me as long as you are faithful to me never cease to love them never gave them up but he did allow them to go under the tyranny of the very thing they had begged to have and so what we're finding now is he begins the prophecies of isaiah by speaking to that to that uh rule over them that had come by way of their disobedience and their rebellion and so all of these firsts there are many many exceptions there are beautiful portions of it that uh speak um hope but they are truly sections of it for the most part 1 through 39 of the book of isaiah is i told you what what was going to happen and it will happen just exactly as i told you it would and so i want you to look before we look at 40 i want you to look at 39 with me for just a moment and let me give you a little bit of background here hezekiah is king at the time and so there there is a power that is emerging that as assyria began to disintegrate now they had already taken the northern kingdom of israel into captivity and at this time then they began to disintegrate and up comes mighty babylon and so we're told in verse 1 of 39 it's only it's only eight verses so go with me there at that time merida baladan the son of baladon king of babylon sent envoys with letters and a present to hezekiah for he heard that he had been sick and had recovered hezekiah welcomed them gladly and he showed them his treasure house the silver the gold the spices precious oil his whole armory all that was found in his storehouses there was nothing in his house in all of his realm that hezekiah did not show them then isaiah the prophet came to king hezekiah and said to him what did these men say and from where did they come to you hezekiah said they have come to me from a far country from babylon he said what have they seen in your house hezekiah answered they've seen all that is in my house there is nothing in my storehouses that i did not show them isaiah said to hezekiah hear the word of the lord of hosts behold the days are coming when all that is in your house and that which your fathers have stored up till this day shall be carried off to babylon nothing shall be left says the lord some of your own sons who will come from you whom you will father shall be taken away and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of babylon listen carefully to a people who were told your descendants will be more than the stars of the sky to hear that they will have no future sons those who were carried away and would become servants to the king because of this prophecy over their rebellion verse 8 then hezekiah said to isaiah i want this just to land with us tonight the word of the lord that you have spoken is good for he thought there'll be peace and security in my day god i believe is looking for a people who will understand lineage with the priority that scripture gives it that each generation does its thing in faithfulness to make sure that the next generation coming up is not in bondage to something that their own fathers and mothers spiritually speaking introduce them into the middle of we have to care about the body of christ long after we are gone what are we doing today that we may not even see a harvest from would we be willing to do what it takes do we have something in us that says i would do the work of the spirit now i will labor hard in my field now even if i do not see a single sprout come up i will do it for the next generation or i will do it for the next generation anybody know what i'm talking about but but instead if we just give way to our own idolatry and just saying you listen i'll be out of here soon i mean the church is in a mess but i'm going to be out of here soon anyway they can deal what generation will come along selfless enough in the things of the spirit to say we will do the work for those coming behind us we're going to clean up some of what got messed up we are willing to labor for somebody else's blessing he was unwilling to do that and so here's what i want you to do i want you to take 40 and go all the way through isaiah 55 and i just want you to hold those portions in your hand like this so you've got isaiah 40 and to isaiah 55 would you just hold this because i just want you to get that section in your hands let me tell you something about it this is the next section of the book of isaiah and it's extremely important because after 39 chapters with moments here and there speaking hope into it speaking a future and a ransom into it he is basically saying this is what's coming this is why it has come and this is how much it's going to cost and then all of a sudden 39 ends with this is what will happen babylon will carry you off you have flaunted your treasures to babylon and they are going to come for every last one of them and they did exactly that they did exactly that it would become a reality in 587 bc that city would be completely taken that temple would be stripped bare of all its riches they would go marching off with it and they would burn that thing just like he said then 40 to 55 begins this wild response of god right in the middle of their rebellion when he begins to speak peace and comfort and salvation we live in a world of so much clamor and chaos so much noise so many voices talking at the same time and often over one another we don't always know who to listen to we're becoming more and more conditioned to just look at short quick clips of scripture that may bless us but they cannot feed us and they don't transform us but for those of us in christ we know who we want to hear from we want to hear from god himself we want eternal words that are etched in holy concrete yet animated with the holy spirit of the living god come with my daughter melissa and me to these wonderful pages watch the words and the phrases and the verses come to life and cultivate fresh perspectives of what god has in mind for your calling pour over the fruit of the spirit right there in context and find out what it means to keep in step with the spirit be transformed by what it means to be free in christ learn the difference between obedience and legalism he has called all of us to the sacred pages for leadership for clarity for hope for love i didn't go looking for galatians galatians came looking for me i wonder if galatians is looking for you the online experience of now that faith has come is now available at bethmoore.org [Applause] it doesn't matter where you are from if you will give the time and space to this event this weekend if you will lend your heart to it and you'll really pay attention then it's going to come right back around because some of the things we're talking about simply could not be more practical we're going to be talking about divine power that god exerts on the behalf of people just like you and me and we're gonna see god do something that we could not have thought to ask him lord we want all that you have for us every little thing come join us i want you to hear it with me going back to 40 verse 1 it starts just like this comfort comfort my people says your god speak tenderly to jerusalem and cry to her that her warfare has ended that her iniquity is pardoned that she has received from the lord's hand double for all her sins a voice cries in the wilderness prepare the way of the lord make straight in the desert a highway for our god every valley shall be lifted up in every mountain and he'll be made low the uneven ground shall become level and the rough places are plain and the glory of the lord shall be revealed and all the flesh shall see it together for the mouth of the lord has spoken now let me pause here and say he is now looking very forward so now in the prophetic timeline of timeline of god now it's going quite forward past their captivity to babylon 70 years later when he would call those captives home and so what he's speaking to is comfort comfort because he knows they're going to get to babylon and they are going to open their eyes and go what on the ever-loving earth have we done i just wonder is there anyone in the house that has ever asked your own self that in your own mirror anybody besides me you are in the right house because this is our god it says in verse six a voice says cry and i said what shall i cry all flesh is grass and all of its beauty is like the flower of the field the grass withers and the flower fades when the breath of the lord blows on it surely the people are grass the grass withers the flower fades but the word of our god will stand forever go on up to high mountain o zion herald of good news lift up your voice with strength o jerusalem herald of good news lift it up fear not say to the cities of judah behold your god behold the lord god comes with might and his arm rules for him behold his reward is with him and his recompense before him and he will tend his flock like a shepherd he will gather the lambs in his arms and he will carry them in his bosom and gently lead those who are with young look what he says now after he's just talked about this shepherd who will come gathering his lambs in his arms he says who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and marked off the heavens with a span and closed the dust in the earth in a measure and weighed the mountains in a scale and the hills in a balance who has measured the spirit of the lord or what man shows him counsel whom did he consult and who made him understand who taught him the path of justice and taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding jump down to verse 28 have you not known have you not heard the lord is the everlasting god the creator of the ends of the earth he does not grow faint nor does he get weary his understanding is unsearchable he gives power to the faint and to him who has no might he increases strength even you shall faint and be weary young men shall fall exhausted but they who wait for the lord shall renew their strength they shall mount up with wings like eagles and they shall run and not be weary and they shall walk and not faint anybody got an amen in the house tonight because this this is the word of the lord now i got to tell you something one of the things that makes the book of isaiah so important to us as new testament believers is that it has got the most comprehensive prophetic picture of christ in one book in all of the old testament if you collect one scripture after another that is in great detail foretelling what messiah will be like you will not find a book in the old testament that can compete with isaiah's prophecy so it's important for you to know what it's important for me to know because it boosts confidence in us that to this point god is batting a thousand with prophecy i mean he's doing magnificently magnificently which is why the evil in this world and the powers and principalities of darkness and why satan we're told in revelation 12 12 is so furious because he knows his time is short because i'm going to tell you something the enemy knows god keeps his word he does not doubt for one moment that god will do what he said we may doubt what god says but let me assure you the enemy of our souls has absolutely no doubt he will do exactly what he said he would do because he has done it to the detail hundreds if not thousands of times till now one of the beautiful things about it is that the whole big idea if we were looking for what is the big idea of the book of isaiah i mean all of these chapters what is the big idea of the book of isaiah it is actually tucked in the name of isaiah the name isaiah means salvation of yahweh and i mean from 1-1 all the way to the very end of the book in 66 chapters over and over again god is making known the message of salvation i want to show you something that is so so powerful i want you to go back with me to verse 9 isaiah 40 verse 9 go on up to a high mountain of zion herald of good news lift up your voice with strength o jerusalem herald of good news lift it up fear not say to the cities of judah behold your god do you see those references to good news herald of good news this is the tap root of what we know as evangel or evangelism this is the good tidings this is the good news in the septuagint which is the greek version of the hebrew old testament it is the word that we would see in our mind if you'll think evangel if you see eva that's the word that's being transliterated there in the septuagint and it is giving us salvation what we know of as evangelism that we take the good news to the ends of the earth it starts coming it's been told it's been foretold all of this time and now it is being given a very specific name that becomes everything to us as new testament believers in fact you just sit tight where you are but i want to just read you the very beginning of the gospel of mark the beginning of the gospel of jesus christ the son of god as it is written in isaiah the prophet behold i send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way the voice of one crying in the wilderness prepare the way of the lord make his path straight the way the blessing is going to go all the way around the earth is through the message of jesus christ given on that mountain there is a god who saves behold your god the spectacular beauty that that individualizes that sets isaiah 40 apart from so many chapters what is it about it that particularly shines in the way that we're going to see it unfold and it's going to be through these two words so you're going to see first of all on the screen transcendent seating usual limits it's beyond comprehension you'll see in the third definition transcending the universe or material existence it says in short this is my part this is me putting it in a nutshell for you existing outside of time and space you'll understand it if you don't already you'll understand it better in just a moment when we contrast it with the other term did you notice at the end of it it says compare imminent that is our next term imminent is a word that means indwelling inherent being within the limits of possible experience or knowledge is anybody already tracking with me in this so this is going to be what seems to us the antithesis of transcendence being within the limits of possible experience or knowledge and it says compare what tell me again transcendent so it's comparing the two terms because they contrast if you want to understand what transcendent is that it's going to be what it seems antithetical to imminence eminence the antithetical term would be transcendence at the bottom of it you'll see that i've written you just a short little uh definition of it in short present within time and space present within time and space now there are two words that sound a whole lot like the same word and i want to make sure we've got those straight you don't have to write these down i just want you to understand it when you look at it so you know when you use the term which term you mean because there's imminent there's imminent and there's imminent and i want to make sure that we're real clear on which one it is and which one it's not so i'm going to bring that up on the screen so that you can see it now eminent e i e-m-i-n-e-n-t means of high rank that's a whole different term it would be it would be someone i'll say that a ruler or somebody of nobility especially in the ancient world would be called his or her imminence because of very high rank and nobility different word great word different word different word imminent you can see look how close they are together from the first one and the third one that means impending oh for instance i can remember after um the uh flooding began in houston i can remember that we were told when the point was going to come that landfall of hurricane harvey was imminent and it meant it is coming it is on us it is threatening or it is just happening very soon three great terms three great meanings but they're not the same all right you and i are gonna compile a list of points together that help us be able to wrap our minds around the beauty of isaiah chapter 40 and it begins right here number one number one is this god is both transcendent and imminent because god is something that nothing else and no one else can be he is both transcendent and he is imminent [Music] the online experience of now that faith has come is now available at bethmoore.org come join me for a study of galatians thank you so much for watching today it is our joy to serve you at living 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Channel: Living Proof Ministries with Beth Moore

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Length: 27min 26sec (1646 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 16 2020