Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,
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sermon. God Bless. I love the vision of Isaiah,
the son of Amos. Isn't it a wonderful book to
read? I hope you enjoy reading that. In the year
that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated
upon his throne. Isn't that wonderful? So glorious.
Then that's chapter six, chapter seven. The virgin
shall conceive and bear a son and shall call
his name Emmanuel. And then chapter eight, Assyria
is going to invade, chapter nine, for unto us
a child is born, unto us a son is given. We have
a pattern here. We have a pattern of judgment
and salvation and judgment and salvation. And
it goes back and forth. Our text today is Isaiah
chapter 22, 1 through 14, is from a group of
four oracles of coming judgment. Chapter 21 tells
of the judgment of the wilderness of the sea,
Babylon. The judgment on Edom, which is called
Duma, deep, utter silence. One Hebrew scholar
translates Duma, the silence of death. Then the
judgment on Arabia and now the oracle concerning
Jerusalem the valley of vision I'm going to read
just a couple verses From this I'm not going
to read the whole section again But I hope that
you have your Bibles and can follow along Isaiah
chapter 22 I'm going to read from one and two
and then verse five from the English Standard
Version The oracle concerning the valley of vision.
What do you mean that you have gone up? All of
you to the housetops who are full of shoutings
tumultuous city exultant town and verse 5 For
the Lord of hosts has a day of tumult of trampling
and confusion in the valley of vision a battering
down of walls and a shouting to the mountains
Let's pray Blessed Father, thank you for your
word. Thank you for your prophets. Think of Isaiah
and Ezekiel and the words we've heard from them
this morning and the way that you have pointed
to Christ through them and the way you are revealing
him to us today, even through their words, we
pray now, Holy Spirit, that you will come and
be present here in this place among us in the
preaching of your word, that you will work through
my feeble words and work good things in our hearts
pertaining to life and salvation in Jesus name.
Amen. So I became a member of Susquehanna Valley
Presbytery in February. They had the meeting
February 21st at Proclamation down in Mount Joy.
And when I came into membership of Susquehanna
Valley Presbytery, I also was added to the session
of Valley Presbyterian Church, which is a church
plant of our Presbytery. up the river in Sealance
Grove and it's a very young church plant and
they have a borrowed session at this point and
they needed another teaching elder on their session
and so I'm able to serve in that role. Shelly
and I have only been able to attend services
up there a couple times. We're hoping to get
up there, continue to go up as we're able, but
last Sunday I was able to preach at up at Valley,
and I was thinking about preaching up there,
I thought of their name, and I asked Tom Hartman,
who has been here worshiping with us, he's one
of the founding elders. has anybody preached
about the name Valley?" And he said, no, nobody
says. So it's like, okay, great. And it's like,
all right, so we got the Valley of Dry Bones
in Ezekiel. We've got the Valley of the Shadow
of Death in Psalm 23. They're pretty much famous
Valley texts, but I wanted to bless them with
something. uplifting about their name and so
it's all the Valley of Vision. So that was the
text I used for them at that sermon. And then
Peter, while I was just about finishing up that
sermon, Peter said, can you preach on the 24th
at Second City? And I said, only if I can preach
the same sermon. because it takes me a long,
believe it or not, it takes me a long time to
prepare a sermon. And he said, well, it is Pentecost.
And I thought, well, this will be an unusual
Pentecost text. But I think it might tie in.
Let's see if it ties in by the time we're done
here. Why does the Lord call Jerusalem the valley
of vision? You know, it's like. Babylon's the
desert of the sea, and Jerusalem's the valley
of vision. Well, why is it called a valley? I
mean, you think Jerusalem's up on a mountain,
right? It's up on a hill. Well, the Mount of
Olives is 300 feet higher to the east of Jerusalem,
and Mount Zion is to the south. It's higher than
the city of Jerusalem proper. So Jerusalem can
appear to be a valley. And Isaiah's own home
is said, Josephus says that Isaiah's home was
in the valley between the two main hills of Jerusalem.
So the prophet's home was in the valley. So it's
like, well, this is the valley of vision because
the prophet sees the vision in Jerusalem, in
his home, in the valley. But I don't think the
Lord is mostly talking about geography when he's
Names Israel the valley of vision a valley is
a deep shut -in place a solitary place in the
depths of our valleys The Lord shows us the heights
of his glory in the valley We find a paradox
the way down is the way up the repentant soul
has the victory I Think we tend to undervalue
our valleys even to waste our valleys to miss
what the Lord is doing in our lives in this world.
In the Valley of Vision, we see first the judgment
of God, not in the order of verses, but I think
in the thrust of the passage. As Jason read it,
it's like, this is a passage about judgment.
It's like, yeah, it kind of is a passage about
judgment. God removed the defense of His people
and He brought their enemies to them. Elam and
Kerr are coming, verse 6. These are just two
of the many nations that composed the Assyrian
army. Jeremiah 49 tells us that the warriors
of Elam were greatly dreaded as bowmen. You know,
these are scary enemies coming against Israel.
People of God in Jerusalem attempted to escape,
but but destruction was coming and was assured.
They attempted to escape. How did they attempt
to escape? What do we see in our passage? They
attempted to escape by frantic self -salvation.
They were making every preparation. Verse eight
says that, in that day, you look to the weapons
of the house of the forest. What's the house
of the forest? We've heard of that before. Many
of us have read about that. The house of the
forest. Solomon built the house of the forest.
It was an armory of Jerusalem. He used cedars
from Lebanon and he made four rows of cedar columns
so that when you walked in, it looked like you're
walking into a forest. It gave the image of a
forest. You saw the breaches of the city of David
were many, and you counted the houses in Jerusalem.
Which of these houses can we spare? How many
can we spare? And you broke down the houses to
fortify the walls. You collected the waters of
the lower pool. You made a reservoir between
the walls for the water of the old pool. You
did all that you could to prepare. That isn't
bad in and of itself. That's a good thing. They
also attempted escape by mindless escapism by
partying. It's kind of like singing and dancing
while the ship was sinking, the Lord asked, why
have you gone up on the housetops? And I thought,
you know, gone on the housetops. Well, why did
they go on the housetops? You think, well, maybe
so they can see if the Assyrians are here yet.
But I think that would be on the wall. You go
to the wall and you see better. As I was reading
different commentaries, it's like, well, they
went up on the houses to celebrate. That's where
they had parties on their housetops. The Lord
of hosts of the armies of heaven called for weeping
over sin. He called for mourning and they responded
with killing oxen and slaughtering sheep, steak
and lamb chops for everybody. Let's eat, drink
and be merry for tomorrow we die. Eventually
they tried to escape by fleeing Verse 3 all your
leaders have fled together without the bow They
were captured all of you who were found were
captured though. They had fled far away Isaiah
saw this vision and he said in verse 4 therefore
look away from me that I may weep bitter tears.
Do not labor to comfort me concerning the destruction
of the daughter of my people." Such a terrible
thing to see the destruction coming because the
destruction was assured. The fate of Jerusalem
was fashioned long ago. Verse 14 the Lord of
hosts has revealed himself in my ears. Surely
this iniquity will not be atoned for until you
die Says the Lord of hosts Brothers and sisters
we live among a people who do not believe in
the coming judgment of God in General people
are not worried about that and they're not thinking
about that. I have a friend in Wilmington that
I go out to eat with once in a while or every
once a month or so. He's Jewish by ethnicity,
which he comments upon almost every time we're
together, but not by religion. And I've been
preparing this sermon for a long time. And as
I was thinking about it and talking with him,
I said, you don't believe in judgment coming,
do you? And he said, I don't believe in God.
You know, he said, but I'm still a moral person.
It doesn't mean I'm immoral. It's like, OK. And
they want morality, but they don't believe that
there's anyone ever going to judge whether this
morality was adequate or not or anything like
that. Which to me is so sad, because if you don't
have a view of God's judgment, how do you have
a view of Christ's salvation? Because the salvation
comes Judgment is the first word in the story
of salvation. There's an elephant in the room
here for you biblical scholars. The Assyrians
did not end up destroying Jerusalem, did they?
It's like Isaiah talks all about this and Assyria
was coming, but they didn't end up destroying
them. I believe the prophetic view captures the.
the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon centuries
later as well. In fact, I think it goes on to
even include the destruction of Jerusalem by
the Romans after the time of Christ. Jesus foretells
this in Matthew 23. chicks under her wings, and
you were not willing. See your houses left to
you desolate. Not one stone of the temple was
going to be left upon another." In our text,
we see a real irony, great attention given to
military readiness, but a complete disregard
to the sovereign God who controls the situation.
Begs the question, is there such a thing as taking
prudent measures without looking to God? Is that
even a thing? Valleys can be very difficult places
in our lives, and I know that there are many
valleys of just talking with a sister on the
way in about some of the struggles going on just
this week. I've been in a fairly dark valley
in my work situation since February, which to
me is a long time. I applied for a different
position at work. It would have been a promotion.
They gave the job to my coworker who was my partner.
We were both managers in one program and he got
that job and I was left doing both of our jobs
which was more than challenging for me. And then
As he entered into his new position, his second
day on the job, they brought in security. They
walked him out the door. He was fired. They changed
the locks. He could not come back in. It's like,
oh my goodness. It's like, what in the world?
So it's been a difficult time, which I am finally
recovering from. I felt a level of comfort, I
guess it was about two weeks ago, that I hadn't
had for a long time. And I was sitting there
thinking back and I thought, you know, it was
kind of like being dropped off for the first
day of kindergarten. Don't know if you remember
being dropped off for the first day of kindergarten.
I don't think I do but I can bet I have a feeling
from that I think I still remember the feeling
it's like this is terrible. This is never going
to work but Yeah, it ends up being okay I've
been working in Wilmington since my heart condition
came to light a little over three years ago three
years ago this month Shelly and I were walking
through my small apartment in Wilmington in one
of the oldest apartment buildings in Wilmington
and Shelly said this was going to be a good place
for me and I thought no This is not going to
be good But yeah, it has been it has turned out.
It is a good place. It's a good place for me
We tend to hate our valleys, don't we? We tend
to hate these valleys. Brothers and sisters,
let's not waste the valleys in our life that
the Lord is leading us through. In the Valley
of Vision, we see the judgment of God and we
see the Lord Himself. The Lord is a warrior.
The Lord has taken away the covering of Judah.
For the Lord God of hosts has a day of tumult
and trampling and confusion in the valley of
vision, a battering down of walls. Instead of
the tumultuous shouts of partying in verse two,
there's going to be the tumult of war coming.
Exodus 15 the song of Moses Moses says it very
clearly the Lord is a warrior the Lord is his
name Pharaoh's chariots and his host have been
cast into the sea and his chosen officers were
sunk in the Red Sea as a warrior the Lord is
fighting Against his people is he fighting against
is that what we're seeing in Isaiah 22 So we
think of the parable of the minas or the talents
going through at the end of that parable. He
says, ask for my enemy who didn't want me to
roll over him, bring him here and slaughter him.
The Lord is fighting against his enemies. and
against our enemies. And John 8, Jesus was talking
to the Jews who had believed in him. And they
said, we are offspring of Abraham. We have never
been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say
you will become free? We're free now. But Jesus
says, truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who
practices sin is a slave to sin. The slave does
not remain in the house forever. The son remains
forever. So if the son sets you free, you will
be free indeed. The Lord is fighting against
the sin in our lives. He's fighting against his
enemies and our enemies. We see the Lord Himself,
the warrior and the shepherd. Shelly and I were
blessed to attend the Quaker Town Conference
on Reformed Theology last November in Quaker
Town, Pennsylvania. And it's a wonderful conference
every year. Maybe we can get a, maybe we'll put
a flyer up this year and some more of you can
come. But Philip Rankin was there and... He was
talking about his trip to Africa. One of his
former students was a Maasai warrior. It's like,
well, how cool is that? You have a student that's,
I was just talking with Jed about his students
in the end of the year and doing the same thing.
One of your student is a Maasai warrior. So he
went to Africa with him, with this young man
and he was staying in a tent and it was dark.
and there were lions about. He could hear the
lions and he could not see the lions because
it was dark. And there was a certain, now I'm
doing this all from memory so details might not
be exactly right if you can find it written somewhere,
but I couldn't find it written anywhere. In any
event, he was in the tent and he had to get to
the main tent at night and he thought, I do not
want to leave my tent and he ended up of a necessity,
leaving his tent. When he got to the opening
of his tent, a messiah warrior met him and escorted
him the whole way to the main tent. That's what
we need. We need a warrior shepherd, a shepherd
who is strong, who is a warrior. The Lord shepherded
his people not to destruction, he shepherded
them to deliverance. At that time, with the Syrian
invasion, they didn't come. The Lord led good
King Hezekiah to repent. He tore his clothes,
he went to the house of the Lord, he humbled
himself and he prayed, and the Lord fought the
battle for his people. The Lord spoke through
Isaiah. In chapter 37, she despises you. She
scorns you, the virgin daughter of Zion. Whom
have you mocked and reviled? Against whom have
you raised your voice? Against the Holy One of
Israel. The Lord is shepherding his people through
the valley of the shadow of death. David wrote
in Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. He makes
me lie down. He leads me. He restores my soul.
He guides me in righteousness. Even though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil for who's with me? Is it
he is with me? No, it doesn't say, he does this,
he does that. It doesn't say, he is with me.
It says, you are with me. It turns to the personal,
the second person pronoun, not the third person,
not someone out there is with me. You are with
me. You are with me. My good shepherd, you prepare
a table for me. You anoint my head with oil.
In the valley of vision, we see the Lord. Whatever
we do in this world, brothers and sisters, we
have to do it with an eye to the Lord. In the
valley of vision, we see judgment, we see the
Lord, and we see a glimpse of the future. And
this is not the same thing that I preached up
in Valley Presbyterian, because we see a glimpse
of Pentecost. It's like I was thinking after
Peter talk to me. It's like, well, you know,
what's the Valley of Vision all about? The Valley
of Vision is the Lord spoke to his prophets in
the Valley of Vision, which he called Jerusalem.
And what happened at Pentecost? The first Christians
were told, remain in... the valley of vision
until you receive power from the Holy Spirit.
So they were gathered, they had remained in Jerusalem
until the Holy Spirit came. Brothers and sisters,
the new covenant is better in every way than
the old covenant. The new covenant in Christ's
blood is better. You know, the wages of sin is
death. We know this. People all over the world
know this. There are sacrifices in all kinds
of religions because they know that sin must
be atoned for. Judgment is coming and they need
to be separated from your sins somehow. The good
news starts with this. In the Old Testament,
there were bloody sacrifices made all the time.
Bloody sacraments, bloody sacraments were observed,
circumcision, and it's been replaced as a sign
of seal in the church. The bloody sacrament of
circumcision replaced with baptism and the bloody
sacrament of The Passover has been replaced with
the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. Think of
the sacrifices throughout history. You think
of the thousands and thousands of sheep and bulls
and rams that were sacrificed, tens of thousands,
millions, and the New Covenant has said no more.
We don't need any more of shedding of the blood
because, praise God, the blood of Jesus. The
blood of the sheep and the rams never satisfied
the wrath of God. It was just pointing forward,
just tutoring us, helping us to see we need a
covering for our sin. We need a substitute for
our sin. And praise God, in the new covenant,
Jesus Christ has come as the real sacrifice,
the one who takes away the sins of the world.
everyone who had faith in the Lord from the beginning
of time, from Adam and Eve on. In the Old Testament,
just a couple other ways, the New Covenant is
better than the Old. In the Old Covenant, it
talked about the meek inheriting the land. In
the New Covenant, it says the meek will inherit
the whole earth. Jerusalem was the center of
the earth and people came to Jerusalem to see
the laws and to see the worship and come to to
understand God. But now the Valley of Vision
is taken out everywhere because the Holy Spirit
is poured out on all of the people of God. And
the Valley of Vision, it was out into the whole
world. So I was thinking about Sears and Roebuck
this week. Sears and Roebuck really changed America
the Sears and Roebuck catalog you could be sitting
in your house in Nebraska and see something in
that catalog and you could order it and pay for
it and It would be delivered to they'd put it
on the train and bring it to your post office
What an amazing thing Don't even get me started
on the Amazon I Talk about that too much, but
God the Father loves the story of Jesus Christ.
God loves the character and the story of Jesus
Christ. He loves that Jesus humbled himself.
He left the throne. Isaiah saw him there on the
throne. He saw the Lord surrounded by the burning
ones, the seraphim crying, holy, holy, holy.
He loves the character of Jesus of Nazareth.
And Jesus left that and he came and he was born
of a poor virgin girl. He grew up in the valley
of this world. God the father made a plan for
salvation. to save the world through Jesus Christ,
God the Son. God the Son produced the salvation
by His perfect obedience, His perfect character
and His sacrificial death on our behalf. But
we can believe this. How does this get applied
to you and me? We're still sitting in our house
in Nebraska. We saw the thing in the catalog.
We ordered the thing. How does it get to me?
to us. It gets to us by the Holy Spirit. The
Holy Spirit is the delivery. It's the train bringing
it to the post office, bringing it towards the
Amazon driver coming to your front porch. That's
the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit comes to bring
us to life, to apply Jesus Christ and all of
His benefits to you and me. I love the quote
from Calvin in the bulletin about The fact that
they aren't private gifts for Jesus. They're
gifts that God gave Jesus for us. And they're
applied to us by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit
who is the giver and is himself the gift. We
receive the Holy Spirit himself, the Spirit of
Jesus. Friday morning, I was busily trying to
get everything done so that I could go home.
one of our schedulers came in and sat down in
my office and I think he was trying to figure
out if I'm really a Christian or not because
he is a believer and I'm glad he came in and
we were talking and he told me his story a little
bit. I believe he said it was 30 years that he
was an alcoholic and a drug addict and he came
to a crisis point in his life. And he said, I'm
done with this. And he said, I got to go to church
somewhere. And he ended up in an apostolic church,
an apostolic church. And he said, I want to be
baptized in Jesus' name. And they said, we'll
do it. And they baptized him in Jesus' name.
And he ended up, I don't understand, I didn't
understand all the details. He ended up in the
back seat of a car of people that he had just
met. taking him to Baltimore from Wilmington,
and they wanted him to be baptized in the Holy
Spirit. So they took him to Baltimore and the
matriarch there determined that he was ready
to receive the Holy Spirit. And so he was baptized
in the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues. And
he continues that way today. And I thought, you
know, I don't really want to go there, but the
Holy Spirit orchestrates all of our lives, believe
it or not. And it's like, this is the first time
anyone has walked into my office and told me
that they were baptized in the Holy Spirit and
were speaking in tongues. The first time anyone
has told me that. And it's like, the two days
before I'm preaching on Pentecost, how the Holy
Spirit wants me to tell you that. And I'm not
saying that you should go to Baltimore or anything
like that. I am going to say the Holy Spirit
moves as He will, and we do not control the Holy
Spirit. We, by the grace of God, Lord willing,
are controlled by the Holy Spirit. And the more
we're controlled by the Holy Spirit, the happier
we are and the better our lives are. The Holy
Spirit works as He will and praise God, miracles
still happen, especially when you go into third
world countries and you see where they are believing
in demon activity and demons are cast out regularly
and things like that. But the Holy Spirit does
what He will. As we, I was reading through, a
Jeremiah Burroughs sermon. It's like, how do
you get a Jeremiah? Well, we get the, what's
that called, Shelly, that booklet that we get?
Free Grace, the Free Grace Broadcast. booklet
and it has a lot of Puritan things in it. Jeremiah
Burroughs died in 1647 and I don't read a whole
lot of Puritans but I do read summaries of what
they said and this is from the Saints happiness.
The soul of man is capable of an immediate joining
with God. You will say God is infinite and I
am finite. His human soul was finite. Jesus'
human soul was a finite, created thing. I'm missing
up my reading here. Yet the infinite and finite
may be joined together. Who was the God man?
His human soul was finite, a created thing. Now
don't confuse finite with... Mortal we have immortal
souls. We have our souls that are immortal, but
they're not infinite and Jesus in his humanity
had an immortal soul that was finite a Created
thing and yet what a conjunction Christ's soul
had with his divine nature The fitness of the
soul the finiteness of the soul of man does not
hinder the immediate touch of the infinite God
Himself. We can be touched by the infinite God
Himself. Our souls can be changed by our union
with God Himself through the power of the Holy
Spirit. It's capable of more immediate revelation
of God, one that we will fully experience when
we are with Him in heaven. In the present, we
see it already. We see a union with Christ that
because of the Holy Spirit, we have union with
Christ. We can say, Jesus is in my heart. We
can call out to the Father, Abba Father, just
like Jesus called out Abba Father. But we have
hope for so much more. when we are in His presence
and see Him as He is, we will change to be as
He is and we will know a union with Him that
we can't even imagine right now. Praise God.
What a thing to hope for. What a thing to look
forward to. So judgment is coming on the world
for the believer in Christ. It has already been
born by Jesus Christ. The valley of vision is
the church. It is the Holy Spirit people. We're
in the valley of vision, as it were, because
of the Holy Spirit in us. In this life we're
living, we see Jesus made a little lower than
the angels, but now crowned with glory. We see
him coming again so that we might be where he
is. One thing I thought, I know there are I'm
going to end with this. There are souls that
struggle and say, I'm not sure. Do I have the
Holy Spirit myself? And I have three sisters
and one of my sisters had that struggle herself
when she was younger. How do I know if the Holy
Spirit's in me? Well, brothers and sisters, do
you love the character and story of Jesus Christ?
If you love the character and story of Jesus
Christ, that's a gift of the Holy Spirit, because
the world does not. They do not love the character
of Jesus Christ. They do not love the story of
Jesus Christ. Take heart, brothers and sisters.
Embrace the Holy Spirit and His work. Do the
things He leads you to do. Do the work that He
brings you to do. Let's pray. Blessed Lord, thank
you for these texts. Isaiah, the second chapter
of Acts. Psalm 23, so many texts that all tie
together and that your whole word fits together
and points us to Jesus Christ, our good shepherd,
our warrior that we need to fight our sins and
our enemies and your enemies. Thank you for bringing
this, bringing us together under your word today.
We pray that we will take it home with us and
that we will be people who do love the story
of Jesus Christ, love the of Jesus Christ and
are being changed by your Holy Spirit more and
more into the character of Christ. In whose name
we pray. Amen.