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00:02 Before I look at the text, I do want to say a personal word of thanks to this congregation. This is the first time I
00:08 have addressed you since our daughter, our youngest daughter had surgery. And I
00:13 know this church prayed for our daughter in corporate worship. Many of you also
00:19 prayed for her in your personal prayer time. and my wife and I want to say thank you for your prayers and also just
00:25 report that our daughter is doing very well, much better than when she had a
00:31 similar surgery last year. So, we're grateful to God for the way that he is moving in her life. And so, thank you
00:38 for including her in your prayers. In looking at the title of the sermon
00:44 today, worship as the heart of missions, we're going to see that although there
00:51 are many good reasons for being involved in missions,
00:56 worship is at the heart of everything we do in missions, true worship is crucial
01:04 for missions. Worship is indeed the heart of missions.
01:11 because it is the beginning point of missions. Everything begins there. Not
01:17 only is it the beginning point, but it will be the center of everything in our mission efforts. And worship is also the
01:25 final goal of our mission endeavors. We'll come back to that later in the
01:30 sermon and look at those points again. But worship and worship experiences have
01:35 played an important decisive role in the lives of many people who are involved in
01:42 missions today. Probably in the lives of all people who are involved in missions.
01:48 Remember one missionary that I heard speak talked about the role of scripture. And when he was in worship
01:53 service, it just seems like every time scripture was read on closer examination
01:59 of the text, he saw God's heart for the world, God's call to mission. For
02:04 example, scriptures from the Psalms that we usually think of as praising God.
02:10 Many of them will have a missions context. If you look at them, sing to the Lord a new song, all the earth.
02:19 Bless his name. Tell of his salvation from day to day. Declare his na his
02:25 glory among the nations. His marvelous works among all peoples.
02:34 All peoples. All nations. All ethnic groups. All groups of people are to hear
02:39 the word of the Lord. We're to declare his salvation so that they too can join
02:45 in praise and worship. Another missionary I heard speak spoke of the
02:51 role of music. Some of the old hymns, for example, this old missions hymn, O
02:57 Zion haste. The whole thing is a mission hymn, but these verses proclaim to every
03:02 people, tongue, and nation, that God in whom they live and move is love.
03:08 or the final verse showing the many ways we can be involved in missions. As we give of our sons or we give of ourselves
03:16 to bear the message glorious as we give of our wealth as we pour out our soul
03:22 and intercessory prayer worship through songs like this has led
03:27 people to respond to God's call. Others that I've heard talked about for times
03:33 of prayer, they heard God speak to them, showing them God's will for their life or showing them the need in the world
03:40 and impressing upon them their responsibility, their need to go and share with others.
03:47 But it's not only people that are involved in full-time Christian work or full-time missions
03:53 who are influenced greatly by worship to be involved in missions with God.
03:60 Worship's the heart of missions for everybody that's involved sharing the
04:05 message of God to be the heart of everything that we do as believers.
04:11 I heard an Australian man report about the fact that when he was younger, he had lived a very wild life, but through
04:19 the consistent witness of a Christian friend, he had accepted Christ as his Lord and Savior. And then he began
04:25 meeting regularly with his friend for worship and disciplehip training. And as
04:31 they worshiped together in just a small group, just two people, he said God spoke to him and impressed upon him. Go
04:38 tell your story to other people who are also living a wild life just like you used to. And he was a little bit
04:46 hesitant, but he obeyed. And he said he was amazed. People
04:51 listened to him. Another person, this time in America, talked about because of
04:57 times in worship, now they're involved voluntarily doing volunteer work in
05:02 ghetto in the inner city in the inner city of a city in the US, helping with social ministry, but also helping with
05:09 the spiritual needs of the people. So, if we're going to say, as the title of the sermon suggests, that worship is
05:16 the heart of missions, it will help us to get a grasp of what worship is.
05:23 Now, if somebody were to ask you to define worship, what would you say?
05:31 Many different definitions you might hear running around. Many different ideas. Some are better than others.
05:38 Unfortunately, in recent years, sometimes worship has been restricted to only anything that involves music. Now,
05:47 music can and should be an integral part of worship. can be used for many different elements in a worship service.
05:54 But to restrict worship to only when music is on is a total misunderstanding.
06:01 I was appalled but also somewhat amused recently when I heard a worship leader
06:09 in front of a group of people. And by the way, this is not a member of this church, so don't try to figure out who
06:14 it was of our worship leaders. But there had been some music and praise
06:20 to God. And then this person gets up on stage and he says, "Now I'm going to
06:25 pray with you and then we'll get back to worship." Do you see a problem here?
06:33 Is prayer not also worship? Now I know a lot of times people in
06:38 front of a group will say things without really thinking through what they said or there'll be a slip of the tongue
06:44 because that happens also to me. So I don't want to be too critical, but I was just kind of amazed and appalled. I'm
06:51 going to pray and then we'll worship. No, prayer is also an integral part of
06:56 worship. I'll give a couple of definitions that I've seen for worship. This is from Dr.
07:03 Bruce Leafblad. For a few years, he was the minister of music at the church in the US where John Piper is the pastor.
07:10 And then he went from there to teach at a Baptist seminary. has a doctorate in music but also then teaches on worship.
07:18 He says worship is communion with God in which believers by grace
07:26 center their mind's attention and their hearts affection on the Lord
07:32 humbly glorifying God in response to his greatness and his word.
07:40 I can't go into a lot of detail with that definition, but the communion, the fellowship with God, believers in God
07:46 are able to do that because of God's grace in their life. And it happens when
07:52 we center our mind's attention, our thoughts, also our heart's affections, our emotion, our will,
07:59 and then we glorify God. And it's in response to what God has
08:05 revealed to us through his word. and in response to when we see God's greatness.
08:12 A little simpler definition by the same man but going beyond just a service of worship or a time of private worship. He
08:20 said worship is really the process in which we make God or we allow God to be first in our lives. And this shows that
08:29 worship goes beyond just a formal time of worship like Sunday morning or a
08:34 private time of worship, just you and God in a quiet time. But everything we do in life is to bring glory to God. As
08:42 it says in Romans 12:1, we present our bodies a living sacrifice
08:47 and this is your reasonable worship. A similar definition by Don Wartson, a
08:54 prolific songwriter, but also a teacher on worship. Worship means putting the
08:59 Lord first in your values. Putting the Lord first in your affections and in
09:04 your commitments. And he goes ahead to explain the values have to do with the objective truth that
09:11 you believe. Affections deal with our emotions and commitments have to do with
09:16 our priorities and our convictions. So we worship when we put the Lord first in
09:22 all of these. Now these are all good definitions. There's many more that are also good.
09:30 But best of all is when we look at scripture and see worship in the scripture. And probably the best known,
09:38 most comprehensive, most instructive, most helpful passage on worship in the Bible is this passage in Isaiah chapter
09:45 6 that we're going to look at today. Because in this text we see an actual
09:50 worship experience as it's taking place. And in this we see the various elements
09:57 of worship, the elements that would comprise a meaningful worship service. And we see how these all then logically
10:04 fit together into a meaningful flow to bring us closer to God.
10:10 So we're going to look at this text today in detail and first of all just see what it says about worship and
10:16 that's where we'll be looking most of our time. Then we want to make some application see how that applies to our
10:22 life for our personal worship but then also for the mission as we're also
10:28 called to be involved with God. And we'll see how then worship and missions
10:33 really are so integrally related. Well, to our text in Isaiah chapter 6,
10:40 verse one begins with in the year that King Uzziah died.
10:46 Frequently, we just skip right past that. We have no clue who Uzziah is. We
10:52 don't really care who Uzziah is, and we go on to the next part. But it is an
10:57 interesting detail here. The king of Judah has just died. And when a nation
11:04 loses its leader who is an absolute unquestioned ruler,
11:11 there's going to be changes in the nation. And you don't know if the changes are going to be good or bad. And it's a traumatic time for a nation to go
11:18 through. And so, as Isaiah has this vision, the nation is in a time of
11:25 uncertainty. Uzziah is the only king that Isaiah has ever known. He was born during Uzziah's
11:32 reign. And this time of Uzziah's reign has been very prosperous for the people of Israel. Trade and commerce had
11:39 flourished. Agriculture was strengthened. There was peace. And anytime there had been a conflict with
11:45 enemies from the outside, the Israelite people had won the battle. So the king's
11:51 presence had inspired the people with strength and hope and security.
11:57 King Uzziah was probably the best king since the time of Solomon. And the nation had enjoyed its most prosperity
12:05 ever since back to the days of Solomon. But unfortunately, the last few years of
12:12 Uzziah's life had not been quite so good. It seems like sometimes when people are
12:17 enjoying prosperity and security and peace that they forget the God who gave that
12:25 to them. And the people in Judah were turning their backs on God. And some were
12:31 beginning to worship idols, were involved in immorality, were involved in
12:36 dishonest business practices. Oh, they were wealthy, but what they had was not enough. They needed more. And even King
12:43 Uzziah had set a bad example in his arrogant, rebellious, prideful spirit
12:48 against God. And he suffered leprosy as a result. God punished him with leprosy. So the last
12:56 few years of Uzziah's life, he had not been in public because of this disease.
13:02 But now he was dead. His son was a weak person and the country was not in a good
13:08 situation. And God called Isaiah at this time when the people in Judah were
13:14 turning their backs on God when there was a growing foreign men
13:19 menace the country of Assyria, current day Iraq and the Assyrians were cruel,
13:26 ruthless, bent on world conquest, and they would soon come and conquer their northern neighbor, the kingdom of
13:32 Israel. So at this time of loss and grief for the country and a time of insecurity,
13:38 it was also probably a time of personal loss for Isaiah because it appears that
13:45 Isaiah might have been related somehow to the royal family and he definitely
13:50 had ease of access into the palace. So, the king is dead,
13:58 but then Isaiah sees the Lord sitting on a throne high and lifted up. Now, look
14:06 at the sharp contrast here. The king of Judah is dead,
14:12 but the king over all kings is alive and well.
14:17 The throne of Judah is vacant, but the throne of heaven is occupied with the
14:24 Lord over heaven and earth. The temporal mortal king's reign is over, but the
14:31 eternal king is going to reign forever. The insecurity and the uncertainty
14:38 faced in Judah by the loss of the king is now contrasted with the presence of
14:45 an all- knowing, all powerful, omnipresent God.
14:50 And it's at this point when God showed himself to Isaiah as the king reigning on the throne that
14:58 this worship experience began. We don't know if Isaiah was in the
15:04 temple at the time or if he was alone. He could have been at the temple, but
15:09 remember going to the temple back then was not like coming to church today. You did not go inside the temple building,
15:15 be seated, and then have a worship service like we have. Only the priests were allowed in the temple building. The
15:23 others could be in the outer courts and there the people would sometimes hear
15:28 scripture read or participate in the singing of psalms. But the main thing
15:33 that happened out in the temple courtyard was the sacrifices as people brought animals or other
15:39 offerings and there they were offered to God.
15:45 It could be that Isaiah was at the temple and he had this mighty encounter with
15:52 God. Not sure what happened to the others that might have been there. The others might have just been going
15:58 through their religious rituals doing their duty. Might have been there just for the fellowship.
16:05 But Isaiah actually encountered God. Or Isaiah could have been alone, just a
16:13 personal quiet time as he's praying and meditating. And in the stillness,
16:18 this vision from God appears to him. So Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on a throne
16:25 high and lifted up and the train of his robe filled the temple. Here Isaiah sees
16:33 the majesty, the glory of God as God reveals himself to Isaiah.
16:42 Isaiah sees God as being bigger than he had ever imagined.
16:48 Undoubtedly, before this vision, Isaiah had a much smaller view of God.
16:54 You see, many of the Jewish people considered the temple to be the dwelling place of God.
17:01 So logically you would think God can fit inside the temple. Well, here in this
17:07 vision we see that just the seam of the robe on God more than fills the temple.
17:15 God is so great. He's so big. A temple cannot hold him.
17:22 Later in the book of Isaiah, we see this truth expressed in even greater terms than just the seam of the robe filling
17:30 the temple. But when we get to chapter 66, we see God speaking and he said,
17:35 "Heaven is my throne. Think of the heavens from our modern
17:40 scientific perspective. Not just the solar system, not just the Milky Way galaxy, but all the heavens. That's
17:48 God's throne. He fills it all." and the small little earth that's just
17:53 his foottool. How can almighty
17:59 allpresent God live in just a small house?
18:05 So undoubtedly Isaiah's view of God was greatly expanded here as he sees just
18:13 the hymn of the robe filling the entire temple.
18:19 Excuse me. So when Isaiah sees this great
18:28 vision of the greatness of God, what's the response that happens?
18:36 Well, in the throne room of heaven at the greatness of God, we see that
18:41 saraphim are praising God. Now, the seraraphim,
18:48 we don't have a lot of information about them in the scripture, but they're some kind of angelic beings. And the word
18:55 saraphim comes from a root word that means fiery. So, evidently, these are
19:01 fiery beings, beings out of fire. Fire symbolizing holiness and purity.
19:09 Fire is what refineses gold so that gold will be pure. So this fiery being is
19:17 just emphasizing the holiness and the purity of God and the fact that nothing
19:23 unclean will come into his presence. And it said that each of them had six wings.
19:29 Two of the wings to cover their face, showing their reverence, realizing
19:34 they're not even worthy of looking on God. two of them covering their feet,
19:40 probably a euphemism, meaning just covering their entire body out of
19:46 modesty, reverence, and awe before God. And then with two, they fly, showing that they
19:53 are always ready to do God's beckon call. When God speaks, they respond in
19:60 service to him. So these saraphim are then constantly
20:05 giving praise to God. And I'm having trouble. There we go. And
20:12 one seraraphim called to the other and he said, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord
20:20 of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory."
20:26 Isaiah here sees the holiness of God. He sees the power of God. He is the Lord
20:33 of hosts as it were the commander and chief of all of the multitudes of the
20:39 heavenly hosts. He sees the glory of God in all its spectacular gland grandeur
20:45 and majesty. And he sees the immensity of God, the omniresence of God as the entire earth
20:53 is filled with the glory of God. Not only is the temple filled with just
20:59 the seam of God's robe, but the whole earth is filled with the awe, the
21:06 wonder, the glory of God. Everything in the created order is testifying to God's
21:13 greatness and his glory. And the seraraphim are crying out antiply, one will speak these words of
21:20 praise and then the other and then back to the first one, then back to the other in unceasing praise. and they're singing
21:27 what is sometimes called the song of heaven because we see a very similar
21:32 song again when we look into the throne room of heaven in the book of revelation. In Revelation we see again
21:39 living creatures with six wings like the saraphim. And what are they crying?
21:44 Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty
21:50 who was and is and is to come. always crying out, "Praise unceasing."
22:00 So Isaiah sees this vision of the glorious
22:05 majesty and holiness of God. He sees and hears this praise going on
22:12 by these fiery beings symbolizing holiness, purity, and showing that no
22:17 sin can come into the presence of God. And what do we see next?
22:25 The foundations of the thresholds shake at the voice of him who cried. And the
22:31 whole house is filled with smoke. The praise just intensifies even greater.
22:38 No, there's no fog machine to fill the place with smoke. There's no amplifiers
22:43 or loudspeakers to make the room reverberate, but just the presence of God. And the
22:50 unceasing praise of God, God's gloriousness makes the room shake. And it's filled
22:58 with smoke again symbolizing God's presence.
23:04 When Isaiah sees this in the worship service,
23:11 he has just experienced what we too want to experience in worship. Because you
23:18 see in worship, first of all, God is going to act. God reveals himself and
23:25 then we respond. And in this worship service so far, God has taken the
23:32 initiative. He has revealed his greatness to Isaiah.
23:38 And then in response to the greatness of God, there's a response on the part of
23:43 the cherubam saraphim in praise. God reveals his majesty, his glory, his
23:50 power, his greatness, and the appropriate response is praise and adoration. So in a worship service, we
23:58 want to make sure that we have time to recognize God. let God reveal himself to
24:04 us through scripture, through song, through prayer, but we look for God to
24:09 reveal himself to us. And then a fitting response is that of adoration as we
24:17 praise God. Well, when Isaiah
24:22 saw what was going on, he realized that he was out of place in that heavenly
24:29 throne room. And this is his response to a holy God. He said, "Woe is me, for
24:38 I am lost, for I'm a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a
24:43 people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts.
24:54 Woe is me. How terrible it's going to be for me.
24:60 Woe is me. Now, it's interesting if you read the context where this comes in
25:06 Isaiah chapter 5, just preceding this, Isaiah is giving a message from God to
25:14 all the people around him. And his message is woe to you.
25:21 Woe to all of you people. And then he lists several reasons. Woe to you who are involved in social injustice.
25:29 Woe to you who are wasting your lives in frivolous pursuits. Woe to you who are
25:34 ignoring the deeds of God. Woe to you whose lives are filled with lies and
25:39 evil and you're purposely rebelling against God. Woe to the proud, the
25:45 hotty, the arrogant. But it was always woe to you. Now the
25:50 spotlight is on Isaiah. and he realizes he cannot stand in the
25:57 presence of a holy God because of his unholiness.
26:04 He says, "Woe is me. Woe is me for I am undone. I am lost. I
26:12 am ruined. I am doomed. I'm going to die." No doubt is what he
26:18 thought. But then he confesses his sin and he his sinfulness
26:24 and he's honest and he says,"Woe is me for I am a man of unclean lips and I
26:30 dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips." When he came face to face with God's
26:36 holiness, then he became very much aware of his own sense of defilement with his
26:42 own sin. Maybe he had never before recognized the extent of his depravity.
26:51 Yes, if he compared himself with these other people that he had said woe to earlier, he might have looked like a pretty good guy.
26:59 But in the presence of God, he recognizes how deep his depravity is.
27:08 Now, why Isaiah focused on his lips? My lips are unclean. That's not real clear
27:15 in the text. Some people would think that this was Isaiah's main problem. He
27:20 was a man who misused his lips, who misused his tongue, who had misused his mouth. He had committed sins of speech.
27:30 And in the Psalms, there is a prayer where the psalmist is asking God to protect my lips from speaking guile,
27:38 speaking evil, speaking deceit, speaking lies, speaking evil of others.
27:46 This might have been Isaiah's problem. It does seem to be a fairly common problem among some religious people, not
27:54 just in Isaiah's day. And so if this was Isaiah's sin, at least he recognized it. He confessed it.
28:01 He repented of it. He wanted to turn from it. He did not want to use his lips like that anymore.
28:08 But it's possibly when Isaiah said, "I'm a man of unclean lips." He was using this phrase just as a symbol to say, "I
28:16 my entire being is unclean." Jesus. Now, I know Jesus came a few
28:23 hundred years after Isaiah, but the truth that he expresses was also true in Isaiah's time. Jesus was talking about
28:30 what makes a man defiled. And he said, "What comes into your mouth does not make you defiled.
28:37 What comes out of your mouth, what comes out of your lips, that's what defiles you." Because what comes out of your
28:43 mouth, what comes out of your lips, that's coming from the heart.
28:48 And then Jesus gives a few specific examples like evil thoughts, murder,
28:54 theft, sexual immorality, false witness, slander, among other things. So possibly
29:01 Isaiah was just confessing his total depravity, his total sinfulness.
29:07 God, I need your mercy. And we do know for sure that God is
29:14 going to be using Isaiah's lips. God wants Isaiah to be his spokesman. And
29:21 it's necessary for Isaiah's lips to be cleansed. It's essential that Isaiah
29:29 confess the sin of his lips and allow God to purge them so that they will be a
29:35 clean vessel to be used by God. Confession of sin is absolutely
29:41 essential. Isaiah realized his great need for
29:48 forgiveness. Why? Because he had seen the King,
29:55 the Lord of Hosts. When you see God as he truly is, then you'll see yourself as
30:02 you truly are. And you'll realize God is king. I'm not.
30:09 God is the rightful Lord, master, ruler of my life. Not me, not somebody else,
30:16 not something else. God is worthy of my devotion.
30:22 Nothing else is. God is high and exalted. I'm not. God is holy. I am
30:30 unholy. Now in the scripture, holiness can have two meanings. One meaning is that God is
30:37 holy. other. He is totally different from people. He is the creator.
30:43 Everything else is creation. He's totally different from man. He's not
30:49 distant, but he is different. And this is summed up very clearly in the book of Hosea where God speaks and says, "I am
30:56 God and not man. I am the holy one in your midst."
31:03 But here in the book of Isaiah, we see holiness has another dimension in
31:08 addition to the holy otherness of God. But here we see a moral dimension. When
31:16 we see holiness, here we see purity, moral purity, something that is
31:22 unblenmished, untouched, unstained by sin. So in the presence of holy
31:27 perfection where there is no sin, where there's only absolute purity,
31:33 then there's no way for Isaiah to cover his sin. He was exposed and he needed to
31:41 confess the truth that we will also need to confess that we see in Romans 3:23.
31:48 I have sinned, God. I have fallen short of your glory.
31:54 compared to these other people, maybe I'm okay. But God, in your presence, I fall so far short. Woe is me. I am
32:04 doomed because I have seen the king.
32:11 And Isaiah possibly thought that this was his end. But at this point, God reveals himself
32:20 even further to Isaiah. And God reveals himself as being a God of mercy, a God
32:26 of love. Yes, God is a great, almighty, exalted Lord,
32:33 holy and pure, but he is also a God of mercy, a God of love. And we see that in
32:41 the next verses of our text. One of the seraraphim flew to me, having
32:46 in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. and he touched my mouth and said, "Behold, this
32:53 has touched your lips. Your guilt is taken away and your sin is atoned for."
33:00 One of the seraraphim, one of those fiery beings whose job is to make sure there's no
33:07 defilement coming into the presence of God. They take a burning coal from the
33:12 altar. Now, what's he talking about here? First of all, let's think about the
33:18 altar. Now, sometimes in our churches today, we talk about the front part of the church here as being an altar. And
33:25 so, we think, well, there's a table, there's the offering bags, there's some flowers.
33:30 That's not what it's talking about here in this text. If you remember the story from the tabernacle or from the temple,
33:37 the altar was a bronze altar where when
33:42 sacrifices were made, blood was sprinkled on that altar. And then there
33:48 was constantly a fire within that altar and they placed the sacrifice on the
33:53 altar and the sacrifice was burned as a burned offering to God. So it's a coal
34:00 from this altar that is brought and put on Isaiah's lip. This coal
34:07 has had contact with blood from the sacrifice. This coal has had contact with the fire
34:13 and is itself a flaming burning coal. And that is what is then put on Isaiah's
34:21 mouth. So have in this have in your mind this picture of the coal coming from
34:28 this altar. And when that type of a coal touches your mouth, it's going to be painful.
34:37 But the sarapath says, "Behold now, this has touched your lips. Your guilt
34:44 is taken away and your sin is atoned for.
34:50 Undoubtedly a painful experience for Isaiah, but he didn't die. Instead, he
34:57 was cleansed. He was purified. His sins were atoned for. The same picture that
35:04 we see in Leviticus when God told the people,
35:09 "Bring sacrifices. The high priest is to make a sacrifice
35:14 for the sins of himself. Then make a sacrifice for the sins of all the people. The blood is to be sprinkled on
35:21 the altar. And then take a goat, confess the sins of your of the people, placing
35:27 your hands on that goat. Send the goat into the wilderness. And this will
35:33 symbolize that God has taken the sins off you, placed them on the goat and sent them away. And here we have this
35:40 picture. The sin, the guilt has taken away and our sin has been atoned for.
35:48 Isaiah has seen a holy God and now he is
35:53 experiencing a merciful God. And as he God reveals
35:59 his mercy and forgives Isaiah. Then Isaiah gratefully in faith receives that
36:06 forgiveness. So a recap of what we have seen in this worship service. Remember worship begins
36:13 because God takes the initiative and then the worshipper responds. God
36:18 reveals his greatness. The response is praise. And now we've seen God reveals
36:23 his holiness. No confession of sin is appropriate. And when we confess our
36:30 sin, God is faithful and just to forgive our sins and he grants us mercy and we
36:36 receive this forgiveness in faith and in gratitude.
36:42 The elements of worship would be the revelation as God shows himself to us and we recognize who he is. adoration,
36:50 the praise of God, the confession, the repentance of the believer, the
36:56 expeation of the forgiveness of God. And now we're ready for the proclamation
37:02 of the word. And Isaiah heard the voice of the Lord
37:09 saying, "Whom shall I send and who will go for us?"
37:15 That was God's word for the day. Pretty short sermon, wasn't it? Isaiah got out
37:20 of church early that day. But even though the sermon was short,
37:27 Isaiah heard it. And the reason he heard it because he was ready to hear it.
37:33 He had seen God as God truly is.
37:38 And he had confessed his sin and received God's forgiveness.
37:45 And that's what put him in a position to be able to hear and then also to respond
37:53 to God's word. I know there are many passages in the
37:58 Bible that are not easy to understand. But I think sometimes
38:04 our difficulty in understanding God's word is because we have not yet gone through what Isaiah went through in this
38:12 worship experience that he had. Maybe we've not truly seen who God really is.
38:18 Our God is too small. Our God is like a man. He's not holy.
38:25 Or in our pride, we think, "I'm pretty good." And we haven't seen our utter
38:30 depravity, our need for God's forgiveness. And so without the recognition of God
38:37 and the adoration of him for who he is, not just for what he can do, but for who he is.
38:43 And then in confession of sin and gratefulness for his forgiveness, then
38:48 we're in a position where we can hear God speak.
38:54 And so God spoke to a man who had already been changed,
38:60 to a man who had already been renewed. And when God asked, "Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?" Isaiah was ready to
39:07 respond, "Here am I. Send me."
39:14 Now, I don't think this was an overconfident Isaiah volunteering God. You can use me. No problem. I'm your
39:20 man. I can handle it. But more of a humble Isaiah
39:27 understanding God's greatness and his own smallness. but realizing that if he goes as an
39:34 ambassador for God, God's greatness, God's presence will give him the power
39:39 he needs. Not going as a perfect better than other people type messenger, but
39:45 going as a messenger who has experienced God's grace and forgiveness and wants other people to also be able to
39:52 experience God's grace and forgiveness. So Isaiah volunteers to do God's bidding
40:01 even when he doesn't know what it is. Now that can be quite dangerous, isn't it? Somebody comes up in front of the
40:07 church and says, "I'd like some volunteers." How many of you going to volunteer if you don't know what it is?
40:13 Not too often will that happen. God's asking for a volunteer. And hadn't even said what's going to happen. just that
40:19 you're going to be going in God's service, going somehow as an ambassador
40:24 for God. So Isaiah says, "Here am I. Send me."
40:32 And then God commisss him and says, "Go and say to this people,"
40:39 and we're not going to read the rest of the chapter, but that does make interesting reading to see God does now
40:44 further fill out the message to Isaiah. He tells him what Isaiah is to do in
40:51 this specific historical situation. And it's not going to be easy.
40:58 Isaiah is told by God to go and bring a message of judgment to a people who has
41:06 already turned their back on me. They have gone so far from God that there is
41:12 no turning back. They have hardened hearts and they will not listen to your
41:17 message Isaiah. But you go and proclaim to them anyway.
41:22 A difficult task, judgment is coming. But Isaiah was
41:30 willing to go. But if we do read the next part of the chapter, we'll see that in this section, Isaiah also then offers
41:36 a prayer, a prayer of supplication. And God answers the prayer and he says,
41:42 "The judgment will be severe, but there will be a holy remnant that remains."
41:50 Judgment, yes, but also hope. So, here in this text from Isaiah, we've
41:56 been privileged to be able to see a worship scene that took place in the throne room of heaven that Isaiah was
42:04 able to participate in. And we've seen that God is always the one that takes
42:09 the initiative. We respond to his initiative. As God reveals his
42:15 greatness, we adore him. When God reveals his holiness, we see our
42:21 sinfulness and we confess our sin and repent.
42:26 God forgiveness. We receive his forgiveness in faith and gratefulness.
42:32 God reveals himself to us through his word. He shows us his will. He speaks to
42:39 us and then we respond in commitment or dedication.
42:45 And then God commisss us to go. And as Isaiah did, we go in faith and
42:53 obedience. This is what's involved in a service of
42:58 worship. Whether it's corporate worship, whether it's private worship,
43:04 but let's think about our lives and our worship of God.
43:10 Do we see God for who he truly is? Do we recognize his greatness, his majesty,
43:16 his splendor? We sang earlier today, the earth will shake and tremble before him. Do we just
43:24 sing those words or have we really seen the God who is that great and powerful?
43:31 Do we adore and praise the almighty God for his greatness?
43:38 When we see God's holiness, are we willing to confess our sins?
43:46 And I think this is possibly one of the biggest problems our modern churches face today.
43:53 Very seldom in our worship times do we really have a good opportunity
43:59 to be confronted and then to confess our sin. Yeah, it's difficult. You can't have
44:04 just everybody stand up and say, "Well, I did this last week and I did this last week." But somehow we've got to have
44:11 this time whether it's in corporate worship or in your private worship where
44:16 we're honest with God. Are you honest with God? Do you admit
44:22 your sin to God and ask his forgiveness?
44:27 And then once you confessed it, receive God's forgiveness in faith. Another
44:33 problem we have in our churches today is people go around feeling guilty all the time. Well, guilt serves a purpose. It
44:41 brings us to repentance and confession. But once you have confessed your sin,
44:46 there's no reason for guilt anymore. As it says in Romans, therefore, there is now no condemnation in those who are in
44:55 Christ. No condemnation. Receive God's forgiveness with
45:02 gratefulness. No need to feel guilty. But you can't receive his forgiveness
45:08 without the confession, the repentance. Are we willing to listen to God's word?
45:15 Do we really want God to speak to us?
45:21 Some of us hear God's word like, "Who will I send and who will go forth?" And our response is, "Here I am, but send
45:28 him. Don't send me, send him." Because we're not really listening to God and what God wants us to do. But listen as
45:36 God proclaims his word. And then our response will be dedication, commitment
45:42 of our life. Knowing we cannot go in God's service in
45:49 our own strength. So we entreat him with prayer and supplication
45:55 asking for God's direction for his guidance for his strength as we go in
46:00 his name. And then we go realizing that worship is not only what happens within
46:06 these four walls but worship happens as we live our lives in obedience to God's
46:12 command. We started off this morning talking
46:18 about the fact that worship is at the heart of missions. Well, look at these
46:23 elements and you can see how it all will lead us to being on mission as we serve
46:29 God. As we respond, here am I, God. Send me. I will go with your message as a
46:37 cleansed servant of yours who has seen your greatness.
46:43 We said at the beginning that worship is the beginning point of our mission.
46:49 When we see God as he really is and we see that God has a heart for the nations. Let all the peoples praise you,
46:57 oh God. When we see God's heart is revealed in John 3:16, for God so loved the world
47:05 that he gave his son. when we then in response to God's word
47:11 commit and dedicate ourselves to him. Worship is the beginning point of missions. But it's also the center of
47:19 all of our mission endeavors because we realize I can't just go in God's name
47:26 and then forget about God. God's got to be at the center of my life. The worship
47:32 of God has to be at the center of my being as I go from here. And worship is also the goal of all
47:39 mission endeavors. Now, what do we mean by it's the goal?
47:46 If we look in Revelation chapter 7, once again, a glimpse into the throne room of heaven, we can see the goal of worship,
47:56 the goal of missions being worship. Because there he says, "I looked and
48:02 beheld a great multitude that no one could number from every nation, from all
48:08 tribes, all peoples, all languages." And what were they doing? They were standing
48:14 before the throne of God worshiping God.
48:20 And the way that people from all nations, all tribes, all peoples, all languages are going to be in heaven
48:25 worshiping God is because there are people like Isaiah and people like you and people like me who when we hear God
48:32 speak, we say, "Here am I. Send me." And we go and we share God's message.
48:42 About a year ago, I met a Chinese man. not a Chinese man from China, but a
48:48 nevertheless an ethnic Chinese man. You all can identify with that. I think many of you. He was born in a non-Christian
48:55 family. Now, I don't know, I didn't ask him what kind of family, if it was Buddhist, Dowist, traditional Chinese
49:02 religion, or if he was maybe from a freethinker background, which basically is agnostic or even atheistic, just
49:09 things of this world. He said as an adult, he accepted Christ,
49:14 but he didn't know much about God. And so at the beginning of his Christian walk, his God was very, very small. God
49:23 was there to help him and to help his friends, help his family. Of course, he
49:28 was a new Christian. He hadn't really seen the greatness of God yet. But all of his prayers, he said, had been
49:34 centered on himself. But then he said as he grew in his faith, he came to realize that God was
49:40 so much bigger than he had imagined. That God was the God of the entire world and that God's heart was for all peoples
49:48 of the earth to come in saving faith to him. God's heart is that none would
49:53 perish but all would come to repentance. And the man told God, much like Isaiah
50:01 did, here am I. God send me. Use me. I want to be used by you to share my faith
50:09 with other people including with those who are from other ethnic groups. Well,
50:14 this man said that he this just happened recently in the last couple of months.
50:20 He went on vacation of all places to India. Imagine that. But nevertheless,
50:25 in India there are some very nice hill stations where the climate is nice and cool. and he'd gone up to this hill
50:31 station wanting to be out of the hot air. And while they were there, there was just a chance meeting with somebody
50:39 else. This Chinese man's wife was out one day and she heard somebody talking
50:44 on the phone, not in the native language to there, but in a common language that they both
50:50 knew. Not the mother tongue of the Chinese people, but nevertheless, a common language they knew. And so this
50:56 Chinese man's wife started talking with this lady after the phone conversation was over, communicated in their common
51:02 language, and they shared information with each other, shared phone numbers with each
51:07 other. And it turns out this other couple was also on vacation. And both of
51:13 these couples lived in the same city. So after vacation was over and both couples
51:18 return to their home city, telephone contact is made between this Chinese man and then the husband of the
51:25 lady that had been talking on the phone. And as they met together,
51:30 the Chinese man said, "This man told me, I'm from another religious group, from
51:36 another one of the world's great religions. I'm not a Christian,
51:42 but I have a high opinion of Christians." And the other man said, "A lot of the
51:48 people from my background, a lot of people that I know, they speak bad about Christians. They say Christians are
51:54 horrible people. But when they say that I always correct them. And the reason I
51:60 correct them is because one time several years ago, I had a boss who was a
52:05 Christian. And that boss treated me and all the employee employees with
52:11 fairness, honesty, respect, and dignity. So I tell my friends that are speaking
52:17 bad about Christians, that's just not true. Christians are good people. The Chinese man sensing an open door
52:25 from God says, "Hey, well, I'm a follower of Jesus. would you like to know more about
52:33 the God who caused your boss to act the way that he did? And the man was
52:38 interested and they continued to meet over several weeks and over a period of time then this other man from this other
52:45 ethnic group from this other religion came to faith in Christ. This happened just recently.
52:53 But what really struck me about what this Chinese man said was
52:60 he said, "When I looked at everything that had happened, I just marveled at God."
53:06 Here we were on vacation in India. A chance encounter with somebody else who
53:12 happened to be in the same spot on vacation in India.
53:18 chance overhearing of a phone conversation to realize that we had a common language between us, a former
53:25 boss who happened to be a Christian, the fact that both of these couple just
53:30 happened to live in the same hometown, and how God put all of that somehow
53:36 together so that this other couple could come to faith in Christ.
53:43 And the Chinese friend said, 'I just marvel when I see how God orchestrated all of this. And then he said, my
53:50 worship of him only grows bigger.
53:57 My worship of God only grows bigger. It's an upward spiral.
54:04 We don't want the downward spirals, but an upward spiral. Worship God. See who he is. go out on
54:12 mission with him and then you get to know God even better as you see God at work. So you worship God, go out on
54:19 mission with him, you see God even better as you see him move. And our
54:24 praise grows, our worship gets even bigger as we get to know God through his
54:31 word, but also experientially in his service.
54:36 Does your worship of God continue to grow? Wouldn't you like to be able to say with
54:42 this ch other Chinese man, my worship of God is growing bigger?
54:51 Let's pray together by praying this psalm. Let's read it together. But as we read
54:57 it, read it as a psalm asking for God's blessing, but realizing
55:04 that God's blessing is in order that all peoples
55:09 may hear and come to faith and praise God. Let's read together.
55:15 May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us that
55:22 your way may be known on earth. your saving power among all nations.
55:29 Let the peoples praise you, oh God. Let all the peoples praise you.
55:36 Let's pray. Father God, as we see in that psalm, we
55:42 realize that yes indeed we are blessed. But help us to realize our blessing is
55:48 for a purpose to share with other people. proclaim your salvation so that they too can
55:54 receive your blessing so that they too can praise you. Lord God, I realize there might be some people here this
56:00 morning who have never experienced the forgiveness of their sin that is made possible not by the blood of a lamb like
56:08 in the Old Testament days, but through the blood of the lamb, Jesus, the lamb of God, as he died paying the penalty
56:13 for our sins. So, Father God, I pray if someone here has never experienced your
56:19 forgiveness, that they would recognize their sin and their need for you, but
56:24 also see your mercy and respond to that mercy in faith, accepting your forgiveness as they acknowledge you as
56:32 the rightful Lord of their lives. And Father, for the many of us who have responded in repentance and faith to
56:38 you, Father, I pray that we truly would see you as you are, that we would adore you,
56:48 that we would be willing and humble enough to confess, repent of sin.
56:55 And Father, as renewed people, I pray that we would be willing to say, "Here
57:01 am I. Use me. Here am I. Send me
57:07 in Jesus name we pray. Amen.
