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00:00:01 [Applause] [Music] good morning church today scripture reading is taken from the book of isaiah chapter 6 verse 1 to 6. isaiah's commission in the year that king mosaic died i saw the lord high and exalted seated on the throne and the train of his robe filled the temple above him were seraphim each with six wings with two wings they covered their faces with two they covered their feet and with two they were flying and they were calling to one another holy holy holy is the lord almighty the whole earth is full of his glory at
00:00:53 the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke woe to me i cried i am ruined for i am a man of unclean lips and i live among a people of unclean lips and my eyes have seen the king the lord almighty then one of the seraphim flew to me with a light cold in his hand which he had taken with tongs from the altar this is the word of god hello fbc and this is welcome to our first zoom service uh we're gonna do something a bit different from the first service uh
00:01:43 first service we had 284 participants i mean as in people coming in so it was a bit hard to do this right now we have about 49 participants so we're gonna do this you want to find out whether you're a robot or a real person what i'm gonna do is i'm gonna go box by box and mention name by name when i mention your name you either go or you say hi or you can do whatever you want but make sure we know you're alive let's start with the first box misha muy are you there are you a robot just wave wave michelle michelle way oh she's not
00:02:17 a robot yeah she's alive okay our elicito who's going to do our master's in body hi elisa young philum from alpha say hi uh legion walter said hi to us lydia lydia walter hi all right phyllis our our our deaconess say hi all right fantastic josephine saying hi josephine are you there all right esther say hi esther i said we say alright fantastic jamie say hi jamie jamie are you there all right you're not a robot christine say hi christine karen karen are you there karen ah she's not a robot either marcus i
00:03:10 don't know you i hope to get to know you better marcus say hi to us say hi to nbc chadwick say hi say hi to fbc we're going to go through every single one jessica lau say hi jessica are you there yeah ah fantastic oh who are these people oh they look familiar david susan adam say hi david susan all right oh my fellow architect why kyo say hi why can't wake up thumbs up all right peter david oh no peter disappeared he's got his better half his better half is going to wrap it all right there we are patrick
00:03:42 say hi mr mrs go they're here hey say hi say hi mr mrs go all right uh john go no need la jolly no needle all right next screen next screen next straight come let's spend the time to break the eyes next screen guy all right oh yeah are you alive yet are you a robot robot oh no united's alive brandon's here say hi brandon brandon say hi to everybody okay young laughs say hi hi you're there hi all right edward say hi oh anticipating say hi just wave to the screen all right see how curious people are there fantastic
00:04:15 joshua say hi joshua you're there josh oh fantastic alex wow look at that he's got light behind him he's an apostle look at that saying alexey hi and who's that guy called ang and pin are you new to church welcome to nbc ugg and pete we don't know who you are but uh we welcome you all right chu chiang welcome you to cheer say hi to chelsea listen hi lis laureen say hi laureen laureen lauren are you there okay uh clarina florien sorry florin can you say hi florine florina are you there ah fantastic
00:04:54 oh yes doctor operation okay doctor is there vivian we can't see you if you can't say hi nico hi now the rest are nico how you nicole joanne sally also went to become a robot my list are you there list the rest uh anybody else want to put on your faces we would love to say hi to you but if not we are not going to force it welcome to the first service all right now that we know all of you are not robots right we're going to pray all right and so would you put your hands up to the screen and we're going to pray to the lord lord
00:05:43 we just ask that you bless this second service it's a smaller crowd it's an intimate crowd and we're here to honor you uh well although we are separated lord by space and time but we're connected by the spirit and we ask today as we talk about the spirit about the presence of god you be with us and we say this in jesus name amen fantastic this is a way to start off and just a few announcements we are in a season of lent we don't want to be legalistic about it but it's something the protestant church is
00:06:17 rediscovering something the orthodox and the catholics have done for a long time uh it doesn't uh we are not saved by works but length is a period where we bring our heart before god and prepare it for easter i want to make you a challenge i want to challenge you from now to easter sunday would you consider giving up something anything perhaps some people on fridays they don't eat meat they eat fish some people give up their favorite netflix series some people certain days of the week uh abstain from certain things whatever you
00:06:51 can do that reminds you that the lord died for our sins and was resurrected in the same way the jews or the past were abstained from anything we live in living in the bridge coming up to the passover what they did was they reminded themselves even was equivalent to sin so these are little things you can do i'm just going to encourage you now pray about it prepare your hearts and minds for easter that honors god and what we're going to talk about this morning we're going to talk about the presence
00:07:21 of god in church and right now i want to ask you a question you don't have to answer it but do you feel connected do you feel connected to one another and more importantly seated at home now do you feel connected to the lord and here's something that we noticed right here is a prayer for god's presence may those in our community who are tired overwhelmed find you to be close comfort show them they're walking beside them carrying them through today and we all realize that right haven't uh you and i
00:07:53 gone through periods of darkness dark nights of the soul where we feel very alone and we just wish that god you are real to me during this time you are real and if you are real i send you i can just go through that dark days didn't you and i feel it we all struggled with this and so we have in christianity a whole range of people some people will tell you they seen visions some people will tell you they've been touched by god they had this sensation uh some people say god spoke to me in a certain way
00:08:24 the question we're going to ask ourselves this morning is how do you know that was god speaking to you how do you know there was not just your psychological state speaking to you how do you know that really god told you to do a b c d you see there's something about christians today christianity is in a whole range christian sometimes can think all sorts of strange things for example now going online uh this going around google chrome is from the devil you guys better shut up all your google okay
00:08:54 go and use uh whatever you know any other browser but you you're not trying to say right people think strange things so the question is just because someone says he had a vision from god and experience from god doesn't make it so but on the other hand we don't want to be cynical about it so we're going to look at scripture and what scripture teaches us about the presence of god and that is what uh we're going to take a break from the matthew series but we are going to go back to matthew a bit so
00:09:23 today we're going to look at zion isaiah 6 he's a very famous text what happened isaiah is in the temple very likely in the holy of holies and he's praying and as he's praying and you have the ark of the covenant that then and suddenly he has a presence of god and we're going to see what teaches that us about you know how we can enter into god's presence in our daily lives and this is a part of a monthly series i'm doing about church about innocence deconstructing church uh challenging our our perceptions of
00:10:01 church all of us come with a sense of what church here's an example how do you know what the baptist is doing is what god wants how do you know that the evangelical protestant reformed church is what god wants we assume it is how do you know that what you're being taught is what scripture says and not your church tradition and francis chan put it very well if god had his way what would our churches look like and we did that last month when we look at the first church of the 300 years and we discovered the church in the first 300
00:10:30 years the way they did church was very different from the way we did church and we're going to continue this every month next month i'm going to go through easter we're going to look at how the early church celebrated easter and we're going to look at you know how we do easter is that the way god wants us to do so we're just going to go through this monthly why are we doing that because many people come to church as consumers as consumers and you find it very often so doing these pandemic church
00:10:57 attendance drops what happens after a service people walk off people come in and to chill like they're tuning into a netflix series they want to receive things they put on the screen and give it to me but that's not true you come into the presence of god when you're here right now in this service you're in the presence of god and so we'll look at isaiah and this very famous text i've broken it into three ways what isaiah saw what isaiah tasted and what isaiah heard just to give you a way of framing the facts
00:11:33 you won't find this quite often out there but i'm trying to be as close to the text as possible let's go straight off to the first verse and the verse starts off with a sense of journaling which is quite interesting the author journals in the year that king uzziah died now why why even bother to do that because it's an important point in history you find the first five chapters isaiah talks about the disobedience of israel israel has forgotten god a donkey can remember his master but israel has forgotten yahweh you find
00:12:08 that in chapter one and the subsequent chapter after this a ziyad sun continues on in this disobedience is a time of difficulty for the kingdom uzi was a great king but he was a very proud man take that in mind something we look at later and he died of leprosy now there's a sense here it means the vision that isaiah has the experience he has is tied in a sense to this is tied politically is tight contextually is tied to a larger situation is like this if god gave you a vision today is probably tied to the situation of
00:12:48 malaysia it's probably tied to the situation of the world now that's interesting right because many people who come and tell you they have an encounter makes it very personal i was sitting at home and suddenly my tears fell down i had this bright light i had this warm feeling i'm not saying it's wrong but very often is to feel a personal vacuum but that's not the way isaiah saw it isaiah saw it larger than himself and here's one thing consistent with all encounters recorded in scripture very often they are not centered on a
00:13:24 personal need they're very much sending visions or very messy neurological that means they have a purpose and it's very missionary in its intention we're going to do that as we go through the text let's go straight into the vision first off he has this huge vision he's praying and probably you can imagine in front of him is the ark of the covenant and then suddenly as you know the ark covenant the lord is supposed to be in the middle of it with the two cereal beams and suddenly i saw the lord sitting on the throne
00:13:57 high and lofty and the hem of his rope filled the temple and kelvin in his institutes picked this up the three elements to the vision that's the lord the throne and the robe now does it mean this how god will look like we have no idea when you and i die we go before the lord we'll find out but there is first this uh a sense of what does the description mean so let's break it down number one notice here the hebrew word is adonai uh how do you know it because it's not capital normally when you use the word
00:14:29 lord it's always l capital o capital r capital d it's not when you see small form is adonai the hebrew word for adonai simply means he's the lord of all creation so the context here is isaiah is getting a sense of the lord not just in the sense of israel but of creation the lord of universe mighty high lofty and then there is the throne now jews understand this when you have anybody sitting on a throne what does it mean the throne means what the throne only two people sit on the throne the king
00:15:08 and the judge and the israel times is the same thing the king judges so what we see here is a vision of judgment israel has sinned and the lord comes to judge that's the context of the vision and it's such a terrifying vision it says the hem of his robe just the just the hem of the robe you know filled the temple it means the temple itself was only big enough for his rope that his majesty is so big the lord is above the temple the temple can't even feel him can only feel the hem of his robe what we are getting here we
00:15:49 are getting a vision of tremendous majesty this vision of glory glory to the sense the hebrew word for glory is khabar it simply means this kind of thing that takes us down to reverence and that again is a word quite lost among christians nowadays we have sort of like reconstructed jesus to be like buddy you know a lot of modern churches right now they they like to see jesus more like somebody i can connect with somebody friendly and that's all part of scripture but that's the other part of the godhead
00:16:26 that god is adonai he is the lord of the host and the earth and the heavens will shake and tremble in his presence and then the text continues and we are brought up to the first occurrence of the word seraphs okay seraphines and they are they are angels and it is a strange way of describing them the angels were in attendance above him and they had six wings why why six wings you find again there's an occurrence of this in the book of revelations by the way john has a similar experience when he meets jesus with white hair with
00:17:04 the lamb stand and you have the heavenly host with six wings but notice what it does with the six wings it's very specific the way the text describes it two covering the faces two covering the feet and to the floor why bother with such a description now a jew understands this you know the story of moses when moses has an encounter with god and god says you can't see me and so a burning bush is there you can't come near me your feet you know there is that ritual of trepidation and reverence you know my glory will pass by you
00:17:42 you cannot see my face you will die and so they covered their faces nobody sees the lord the lord's majesty is so much why their feet simple example again the jew understand this when you go before the king do you wear sandals do you go barefooted they will execute you for that in the olden days because feet are dirty so when the angels use your wings to cover their feet it's a sign of humility my feet lord these are dirty things i'm covering and two they flew what does that show us it means they're ready for service that's the
00:18:18 context of that so try to picture this drama it's a tremendous drama it's something of great majesty uh and let's compare that with uh now this is very old film unless you're old as me you wouldn't know it it came out in the late 90s it's called dogma it's a satire the catholic league was very unhappy with the movie it's not a very well-known movie but there was a particular image from the movie that has now become a meme quite a well-known meme and in a movie the catholic father complains that no
00:18:50 one's coming to church church attendance is dropping and he basically says you know what this image of jesus died on the cross is too brutal you know this either reverence to god is you know people don't get it you we need to rebrand the church so it sounds familiar isn't it it sounds very familiar and it basically says if you want people to come back to church we need to go to where they are and what he's trying to do is that we have to re-market jesus and this is what he proposed and the following image became
00:19:21 in a sense the hallmark of the movie and in this movie he says this is how jesus should be rebranded body jesus now not only is this uh blasphemous but the point is you look at that and you say hey you know they're they're making a blasphemous joke but let's let's let's pause with some humility haven't we all be guilty of that we want to see jesus like a like a friend like a buddy but what the text is telling you god the triune god is a terrifying god he is a shekinah glory his fire consumes israel sees him
00:20:02 and shudders that is the context of that verse so again let's take a deep breath back right there where you're sitting do you ever when did you feel reverence for god is that part of your sunday worship do you come like moses says no your feet you're on holy ground you know do we do we prepare our hearts and minds before we come in because we come into a presence of adonai the god of all creation or have we recreated god to be this because we are comfortable with this you know we come in sit down and we want body jesus but make
00:20:45 no mistake yes jesus is a friend but first and foremost part of the godhead he is the consuming fire he is the lord of hosts he sits on the throne and he will judge me and he will judge you and he will even judge us how we come before him on the sunday service what we're looking at right so far is to come the either reverence coming before god and let his glory shine and no one else takes his place and what we see now this in churches is that we are reconstructing the church in such a way because we want numbers to come in
00:21:25 and to appeal to that we do many things and what happened is that god no longer takes the glory man takes over have you noticed in many protestant churches is always about a great speaker a great worship team you say it's about god but really so let me tell you a story about martin lloyd jones he was a very famous preacher in the previous century he was called the doctor well loved by many people very famous like billy graham and one day he went to a church in wales this was part of the revival time
00:21:59 and as he came to the church the church was packed full of people and the pastor came to him he says see all these folk they have come to see the doctor here the team the name the doctor they come from the valleys they come from the veils they have come to see you preach isn't it right something for us we will tell hey so so coming to town you know we all have a list of the big names right oh better go in books ticket la or you're a church you say oh if i can only get this very famous speaker for america to come
00:22:31 to our church wow our numbers go up and i know some churches who are very into this they want to attach themselves to well-known big names you know so we all have our authors all these big names that we want to listen to and then and so martin lord jones looked to the pastor and he said this do you think i have power and he said did they come to listen to me and hear this did they come to listen to me or did they come to listen to the lord and he said basically if they had come to listen to me i will not preach wow
00:23:09 that has been really shifting to me as a preacher and it repeated again to the pastor if they came to listen to me i will not preach and you know what he told the pastor as he looked at the congregation all have come you know what he said tell them to go home can you imagine that tell them to go home and pray until they realize that it is god who comes in their midst and not man i will not return i can send you the link to the text it really humbled me why because god does not share his glory and if today after this end of service
00:23:49 you only remember arnold preaching judgment made judgment come on me truly at the end of this service it is my prayer i disappear and you hear only the voice of god and let's continue verse 3 and the angels started to call one another and this is their worship song in the presence of a god of glory they break out in worship and they say holy holy holy and notice the shift the shift now is capital l o rb that's intentional in the hebrew this is yahweh so right now the author is saying israel this is your god
00:24:31 adonai the god of creation is your personal god your god the lord of hosts and the whole earth is full of his glory besides that's probably the only sermon you will hear here from the angels they're the only spoken words that come out so let me just break it down a bit in such majesty what is the text telling us what gods was telling us you know some of us will say you know i never had the presence of god i never felt it if i'm honest myself i i may think i have it i i went somewhere someone laid hands on
00:25:10 me i was in a group people all started to break out in fangs i i'm not so sure now have you ever had that i had it i'm a cynic so a lot of people tell me they had all these things like i wonder i've been to meetings where they've touched me and i fell down i don't know whether why i fell down they put blankets over me i'm not so sure whether it's god but how do you know when god has spoken to you and he gives you a clue he gives you a clue the whole earth is full of his glory not just in the temple
00:25:44 when there's a vision the whole earth is full and the hebrew word here is khabar the same word used for the shekinah glory of god so here's the point what the text is saying god has spoken to every single one of you and to me it's not that he hasn't spoken it's not that we haven't seen his presence we have not acknowledged it you see unaware i haven't had this fire and brimstone and this thing in this when you and i sit on a quiet sunday afternoon or at night and you look up to the heavens the heavens
00:26:24 declares his glory that's why romans 1 says this very clearly why a man with an excuse and it's interesting you see if you pause and look only two things happen you will say like this person looking at that this is all an accident life has no meaning it's pure coincidence the mountains turn up and the composition is beautiful you are stardust and you will die or you can look at this and remember covenant you can look at this and look at the handiwork of he who done this and you can look at this
00:27:00 and then creation speaks back and you say i wonder could there be a god up there and you're new to us today you're a visitor you do not know jesus creation speaks and in the quietness you just slow ourselves down the lord speaks and so the psalmist says this in chapter 19 verses 1 to 2 the heavens declare the glory of god the skies proclaim the work of his hands day after day is interesting they pour fourth speech creation speaks night after night they reveal knowledge when you look up they're the knights
00:27:48 look at the galaxies the day time you look at the oceans you look out there they speak to you and god whispers i am god the lord of hosts i'm the lord of creation and then verse 4 the the image takes on a frightening shape and now the temple itself starts to cannot contain him the pivots of the treasure shook at the voices of those who call and a house filled with smoke and now from a vision of god isaiah has a vision of himself look at what verse 5 says and i said woe is me i am lost you know what's interesting here no
00:28:32 sermon no the only thing he had were two angels singing a short line no 45 minutes so many powerpoint and it comes with this conviction the great prophet isaiah the great prophet everyone says he's a godly man he'll be one of those mega pastors nowadays one of those who likes to lecture everybody and condemn the whole world what does he say this great prophet woe is me i am lost and then he gets personal with sin notice is very specific with sin because he reveals his personal sin and what is azire's
00:29:06 personal sin he's a man of unclean lips notice that is very specific he struggles with the mouth arnold has the same problem probably far worse and then he adds to it why you see a man one clip lips because the fact tells you he is influenced by the people is wrong and i live among the people of unclean leaves the moment the two are tied together he's basically saying lord i've sinned i've been keeping company of people who swear and curse and do stuff and so i've done the same thing it's a personal
00:29:40 admission of sin and then it shifts yet my eyes have seen the king the lord of hosts you can imagine him just on all fours in front by the way people who have visions always like to fall backwards you know ah i'm not saying that's wrong huh but you notice in the bible whenever they had a vision of god they fall forward you know what they fall forward they fall in meekness now let me just see whether you see where we're coming with this woe is me i'm lost blessed are those are the poor in spirit
00:30:17 i'm a man of unclean lips and i live among a people on clean lips blessed are those who mourn over their sins yet my eyes have seen the king the lord of hosts blessed are the meek and you parallel it up you find there is a very strong connection between the two that's my proposition it's not a perfect fit why because the beatitudes is about the kingdom of god it starts with the the first gratitude it's about the kingdom it ends with the same thing isaiah's encounter is about a king and you do not have a kingdom
00:30:59 without a king let's move on and here's take some note back and see why i struggle with evangelical church is it wrong to be this is it wrong to do that no let me stress it's not but you've got to be very careful when all eyes are upon this preacher whose glory is that his glory or god's glory when all lies upon this with so much wow like a rock concert is that glory to god a glory to man you're not careful this becomes a ted talk that becomes entertainment and i want to stress there's nothing wrong with a great worship team
00:31:38 nothing wrong with a great preaching but always remember the first fundamental sin is the sin of self glory and self-pride and the text tells us the lord will have none of it all glory is his he will not share it with anyone that's the lesson for us what has happened i'd like to propose to you in evangelical church there's a lot of self-actualization everybody wants to start their own church everybody wants to start their own worship team everybody wants to write their own book everybody wants to do their own charity
00:32:12 they all come and tell you the law told me to do it you know what's a consistent thing and all of that they're at the top of the heap they're the guy running the church they're the guy running the charity they're the guy writing the book they'll say all praises to god but where's the glory going to to them like this guy gave you a testimony how he had an encounter with god and the rest of the testimony by himself is all about self-glory this is something we all just want to challenge about uh i had a vision the lord told me to start
00:32:40 arnold ministries hallelujah do i hear hallelujah i don't hear a hallelujah oh not big enough arnold ministries is not being i had the law speak to me brothers and sisters not just arnold ministries arnold ministries international do i get a hallelujah and no hallelujah out there you know where i'm going with this right you know i'm going with this this is the plague on the protestant church it is a plague because you can say with your mouth glories to god but the glory is to the name now let's take this a serious tone two
00:33:16 months ago there was a man who had the same ministry here it wasn't on a limb it was another name i'm not gonna mention his name he died of cancer passed away cancer after he passed away they dug up all his hidden sins now the question is you know who i'm talking about you can look it up brother samuel brought him up and he has been one of those things that has stumbled the church the question is why didn't he come clean and i'll suggest this anybody who puts his name up there has self-glory you learn to live a double life because
00:33:52 everybody knows you you're going around preaching but privately you struggle with a sin but so much glory is given to you you just learn to hide it and that's a danger and so here i'm gonna speak to you if any one of you is struggling with guilt everyone is struggling with a sin you're sitting there you're feeling uncomfortable i will tell you this the lord is speaking to you his life is one where he wants to fill his glory into your space and remove all the clutter in your place uh let's go to the next part and this is
00:34:28 uh the probably the centerpiece of the text what isaiah tasted now what do you mean tested you know and and this is where the the text is interesting and we know from the vision that one of the series comes and takes a call to his lips now you got to ask yourself why that particular imagery is very deliberate let's read it it says this then one of the seraps flew to me holding a live code the word live code simply means is hot you know that means it's just been used they've been taken from the altar what
00:35:02 altered this with a pair of tongues so we know it's hot in a sense you can say that isaiah is being anointed with fire what it means is that when they had an altar and the pear talk is hot it means what a sacrifice will just put on it now if you know the tabernacle when you enter the tabernacle the outer court the first thing you see is the auto sacrifice is to remind the jews every time you cannot earn your salvation sin requires a sacrifice and that sacrifice requires the blood of a lamb or a bull or a ram and so what
00:35:42 has happened right now is there was a sacrifice at the altar that's why it's hot is life it means there was sacrificial blood on it you can probably see where i'm going with this because the text is foreshadowing something in the new testament and so the angel seraph touches his mouth why his mouth because isaiah is hungry not hungry for lunger he's hungry to taste something and what does it taste he tastes the blood of the sacrifice that's what the text is saying he's tasting the lamb that was
00:36:21 sacrificed for him you see where i'm going with this and when the blood of the lamb that was sacrificed for isaiah touched his lips what does he say your guilt has departed your sin is blotted out it's a symbolic gesture but we know where this is heading to isn't it and right after the chapter 7 it is a prophecy of emmanuel so let me go again the similarity between the beatitudes and isaiah's encounter with god hunger for righteousness this has touched your lips blessed are those who hunger for
00:36:58 righteousness and now from an image where he says woe is me i'm lost the angel hands out mercy instead of judgment and blessed are the merciful your sin is blotted out isaiah is merciful because he receives mercy and he will go on after this with that language of mercy to unrepentant israel what is this text telling us what can remove my guilt what can remove my sin with blood the text is leading us to the gospel to jesus christ who takes away my sin and again if you're struggling with sin this morning
00:37:47 you don't know jesus or you do know jesus you fall away this morning the lord is recalling you back and here's where any encounter of god has to be centered in if the encounter of god is telling you god asked me to go and start the charity movement god gave me a vision to go to india and do that but if it doesn't take you on your knees and says jesus died for my sins woe with me and my sins have taken away it doesn't come from god any encounter from the lord centers itself on the gospel if it's not it's probably your own mind
00:38:27 making it up i will tell you or even worse there are other spirits involved in the new testament paul said tests every spirit and when you test it when you declare jesus is king jesus is savior let me give you another way of looking at this at the center piece of this why this act of touching of tasting of the lord is so critical because isaiah has realized this blessed are the pure in heart so why because they shall see god so brother sister and ask you this morning is our heart pure before the lord
00:39:06 are we sincerely seeking him or do we seek a reconstructed body jesus to fill a need do you come before the lord to say woe is me i am broken i mourn over my sin i meek before a mighty shakina glory god and i seek his mercy only then would you see god only then will your heart be pure not because of our own works but by the cold that touched the lips of isaiah by the blood of the lamb and that's why in the early church holy communion was always centerpiece and we took it last week because that holy communion
00:39:50 is not the life coal that touches our lips but the bread and what is the bread it is the blood of the lamb is the body broken for us the wine the blood that was cleansed that was uh that was for us that washed away our sins every time you taste of jesus doing holy communion remember his presence is real his presence is around us his presence is in the ambulance and know that god walks in our midst that's when you have tasted the lord is good and his presence is with us and uh you know some people
00:40:25 say well that's all very nice and theological but doesn't help me i'm struggling with my sin i feel lost you know i i i went to this job because i thought god told me to take this job that screwed up the job i i thought i should date this girl and man she really stabbed me in the back i i feel like walking through a maze man i know you you talk all these religious god talks oh he's all oh oh it's all just religious talk to me how do i know i'm in walking life and i'm lost you ever felt that you most of us do we all have gone
00:40:56 through periods where we feel like we're just going through the motions right so something life is this uh years ago there was this movie that really triggered uh became very well it did very well all the seekers did very badly you know why because i think it's struck a chord in this movie it's a dystopian movie you probably have seen is based on a series of books they try to get out through life and life is amazed so they rather stay at the middle this is called the glades very safe meaning life just takes you around and
00:41:29 around and get nowhere and you just get lost now what is text telling us the text is telling us when you want to have the presence of god the presence of god takes us to the cross and so this is some wonderful news about christianity christianity is not about wisdom trying to get out the maze this is what the world teaches us buddha says this buddha says and i'm not here to run down buddhism but he says is to walk safely through the maze of human life to walk safely through the maze of human life
00:42:04 one needs the light the wisdom and the guidance of virtue and and that's what happened in the movie to get out of the maze you need to be smart enough to get out here either that you know you're never gonna get out but christians don't have that problem christians can go through life left right up down make wrong decisions in your career make wrong decisions in your relationship you start up a business i thought i'd do somewhere the business doesn't go through the pandemic is here i tried this i
00:42:35 i thought church strength would support me he didn't support me i went through this god i feel lost where are you lord and you know what the lord is telling you this morning you can go around in circles but you will always come back to the cross you will always come back to the cross that is where we taste the lord is good we taste salvation and we move from being spiritually bankrupt to seeing god and i'm going to challenge you that this morning you're going through a difficult time now you feel
00:43:09 aimless perhaps at the end of this service type something to us and let us pray for you but maybe the lord is saying you just need to come back to me and taste me no matter what decision you make you can go around in circles at the end of it i will be there waiting for you so let's finish with what isaiah heard and i think that's the response and um after that notice no 45 minute sermon just littered there isaiah shifts from feeling lost to now tasting the lord is good he is now gone from a sense of awe of fear of of sinfulness
00:43:49 to having his guilt removed his sins removed and this is interesting right then i heard the voice of the lord notice again he shifts back to lower capitals now you must understand all of this is deliberate in the hebrew you know why because this is ascending god this is adonai this is not the law of israel this is the lord of all countries all nations all peoples the is deliberate slain i heard the voice of adonai saying whom shall i send in interesting here's for all you live group leaders your next bible study who will go
00:44:24 for me ask why ask are you go study that in your bible study don't understand talk to me okay and without hesitation here am i send me lord i'm here here here send me whoa no hesitation he didn't say uh god what do you want me to do let me check first without hesitation what happened to the isaiah that said woe is me i'm lost what happened to the desire who had guilt and sin the moment he had tasted the lord is good he has changed now this verse here am i send me i think it's very much taken out of context you
00:45:07 know a lot of people use it to say you know i know i heard this verse and the lord is telling me start a church i had somebody tell me recently start the charity uh you know god wants me to start a charity i say how do you know god wants you to start a charity i felt it in me just because you felt it doesn't mean god asked you to do enough true enough can you donate to my charity so i struggle with this so how do you know that god is saying and you are responding to his specific voice so let's take that
00:45:39 through um in the 18th century what was known as the great awakening they were the first and second great awakening in america the methodist churches were leading in a lot of ten meetings and this young man in his twenties attended the ten meetings he was a regular attendee at the methodist church one day had a vision he walked in the forest and he heard the voice of god the voice of god and the glory was so specific he has written his testimony about it and he saw jesus he fell down and the voice told him the
00:46:12 voice told him to start the church and so he started the church and he was faithful to the church the church got persecuted eventually he got martyred for his church and he was such a well-known person in his movement they even had a statue of him his church even has a hall for him and has a building named after him his church movement at the moment has 14 million followers and an ex-president candidate who's part of the movement we have very famous uh economists uh uh uh people all sorts of well-known people
00:46:52 being part of the church and all of this started because a young man had a vision who is this person this person's name is joseph smith and the church is the mormon church to take a deep breath here what i'm trying to tell you just because you had a vision doesn't mean it has to come from god because if this vision came from god you and i should be mormons but we are not the mormon church cannot be right and the rest of christianity right because the mormons believe jesus came to america we do not this is the deadly thing
00:47:34 about visions because you can believe it and again i said when he had his vision either it was his own psychobabble state of mind which means he was mentally not stable it cannot come from god because it's contradicting scripture the more deadly thing is he saw something and it was spiritual and it was supernatural but it did not come from god it came from somewhere else and that's the thing we all got to test isn't it so how do you know when you say you know god spoke to me and god asked me to do this
00:48:12 you know something you hear that you want to you want to win an argument with somebody just say the holy spirit told me so ah show win one because can't argue how do you know now let's look at look at this the danger always goes back to this form of idolatry if the vision puts you at the top in joseph smith the mormon movement was very much him if you want to start a charity start at church start anything and you're at the top of it you're not a servant i i will worry a bit you say is god telling you
00:48:41 very likely is your own voice so how do we know is god's voice we look at verse nine isaiah said right god i'm ready to go what do you want me to do what do you want to do god tells it go and say to these people keep listening do not comprehend keep looking do not understand make the mind of these people dull stop the ears shut the eyes they may not load their eyes they listen and comprehend their minds and turn be healed it's a hardening message you can imagine azaya going what i thought you want me to do
00:49:13 something you know you're sending me out there to get mocked and god is saying yeah because god is doing what jesus did speaking in parables and what happened when he speaks in parables to the pharisees they throw stones at him so god is sending out to people who hated him that's the clue god is sending him out unleashing him to areas which are difficult and isaiah gets done so isaiah says how long oh lord and you can read the rest but here's the key word until the lord sends everyone far away and vast is the emptiness in the midst
00:49:52 of the land you know what that means judgment is coming is isaiah the assyrians are coming so you can imagine as i say whoa you want me to go to these people ask them to make peace with you knowing they will reject you and then they're going to mock me and and and and throw stones at me and my lines gonna be in danger and you can say god says yes that's what i mean when i say who will go for me and by the way isaiah you said here i am send me and i'm sending you so let's end with the kingdom of god
00:50:31 isaiah has asked to go why he is to be a peacemaker to reconcile israel with yahweh but they will not listen he says how long o lord how long because he is going to be persecuted how do you know if the lord is speaking to you how do you know if god's asking you do something well number one god's not going to ask you to do something where you're going to take away his glory and people going to make statues of you god going to ask you to do things which are difficult things that require you to go to
00:51:10 communities that do not know jesus and preach the good news and in malaysia we have a lot of that so you say you haven't heard the voice of god actually we have heard the real reality is that we have shut our ears and we are not careful what's happening is we are these people he has spoken but we are not comprehending he has been see he has shown us but we do not understand and our minds are dull the question is does this verse here speak to me or only to the israelites there are two ways to respond and i want
00:51:53 to make it simple let's not make it too complicated if you're sitting there you're feeling uncomfortable and maybe you're struggling with sin you have guilt and you don't like what i'm hearing i will tell you god is speaking to you because that's the way god speaks to me there are days where i hear a sermon and i want to i want to switch it off or i want i want to say stop speaking because it's about me and if you are dead god is speaking to you and god is saying he doesn't want to face christians do
00:52:24 not be like the israelites who show up on church but like a donkey a donkey knows his master the israelites have forgotten god and god is saying he wants to take away your guilt he wants to take away your sin he wants you to taste him the other one is this some of us have people we just cannot stand and god is asking you to go to them and be a peacemaker and maybe they will mock you but that's what is that's what isaiah's commandment wants isn't it to go to those who hate him and with the message
00:52:59 of the gospel to show them and taste that the lord is good and what is it for the rest of us the rest of us is to look at the nations out there nations who do not know the lord and to unleash the gospel to communities of jesus christ who came to die for our sins two ways to respond one to all of us today you hear his voice do not harden your heart and i challenge you some of you today god is speaking to you even right now and you feel it this later on we have an opportunity for you a qr code for you to pray i ask you to
00:53:39 do that pray because god is really speaking to you and if you don't do it you are hardening your heart and god will speak to you as he's speaking to me and what happens if you really hear and do that he only asks for one response for everyone here i am lord here i am here i am send me would that be your response today uh if it is i want to just ask us to quieten down our hearts quietly i do not speak to others as much as i speak to myself i'm a sinner woe is me i'm ruined if not for tasting of the lord of the
00:54:25 sacrifice my sin will not be taken away and i will ask you to reply pray on zoom just type in the word pray i'm gonna give you a moment now quietness is the lord this will not ask you in our midst here let's be gathered here would you do that just type in the word pray we'll give a time of silence as we just move into this and if you you want to talk to one of us the qr code is up again you do not know jesus you have made a commitment today let us know heaven rejoices the serbs will sing again you have a prayer request maybe you're
00:55:11 struggling with sin you can't let go something from the past some guilt you are not the only one brother and sisters many of us are used toward us are in the same boat and the lord is asking you today you know he's speaking to you would you say here i am lord here am i and perhaps you are confused in your faith we ask you to join alpha or perhaps you need to connect you know first service i was blessed to have this and two people i'm hoping to join my life group so the lord speaks even through us
00:55:46 online and so we end the service i just want to say this we are disconnected by space and time but we are not connected so much by technology as we are connected by the holy spirit i mean his presence be with you and me right now let us close our eyes have a word of prayer and then we'll do the closing song lord we asked right now that we can taste that a lot is good we come in taste of you a lot take away our sins remove our guilt take us from a place of spiritual bankruptcy to a place where our hearts are pure and we can see you
00:56:30 and once we have seen you lord we say here we are lord send us unleash the gospel may we be your missionaries to communities out there they do not know you may we reconcile ourselves with people whom we have difficulty work although their hearts are hardened o lord we will do the work for that is what the gospel calls for us and we say this in jesus name amen you
