Christ Through the Bible- Isaiah

Text: Isaiah 1:30- A garden that hath no water.

The book of Isaiah is impressive. Why? Well, it was written over 700 years before Jesus was born on that Bethlehem night over 2000 years ago, yet it contains clear and accurate prophecies concerning His birth, life, and death. Due to this precise revelation about the coming Messiah, it has often been called ‘the 5th gospel’. To back this up, the New Testament contains sixty-six direct quotes from the book of Isaiah and twenty of the twenty-seven books include a quote from Isaiah.

The Book of Isaiah is one of the most important books of the Old Testament. While little is known of the personal life of the prophet, he is one of the greatest of them all.

The book is a collection of oracles, prophecies, and reports; but the common theme is the message of salvation. There was, according to these writings, no hope in anything that was made by people. The northern kingdom of Israel had been carried into captivity (722 B.C.), and the kingdom of Judah was in the middle of idolatry and evil. The kingdom of Assyria had dominated the Middle East and posed a significant threat to both kingdoms, and the kingdom of Babylon was gaining power and would replace Assyria as the dominant threat. In view of the fast-changing international scene, the people of Israel would be concerned about their lot in life—what would become of the promises of God? How could the chosen people survive, let alone be a theocracy again? And must the remnant of the righteous also suffer with the nation that for all purposes was pagan?  These are questions that are being asked today about the conditions for Christians in the Middle East.

The messenger of the message of salvation is the prophet Isaiah, whose name means “salvation of Yahweh,” or “Yah saves.”

Here is something interesting about Isaiah, you may or may not know, the book of Isaiah is split into two main sections:

·         The first section encompasses chapters 1-39, and the general theme is the judgement of God.

·         The second section, from chapter 40-66 presents a different theme of God’s grace and comfort through the coming of the Messiah.

There are some more interesting facts about Isaiah:

·         First how many chapters are there in the book of Isaiah? Easy you say 66. That’s correct.

·         And how are those 66 chapters divided up? Well, I told you already that the first 39 chapters focus on judgement and the last 27 chapters focus on the coming Messiah and the grace of God.

·         So now comes the easy bit... How many books are there in the Bible and how is the Bible split up?

·         The Bible has 66 books. The first 39 books focus on the law and judgement whereas the last 27 books focus on Jesus and the grace of God.

Can you see how the book of Isaiah is a picture of the whole Bible?

This morning I would like to look at the greatness of Christ in our life.  I have often been in conversations with people who after I have made a statement about the judgment of God on sin or that God cannot accept sin in any form, have said to me, My God would never do that.  You must serve the Old Testament God.  They are not talking about the God of the Bible; rather they are talking about a god they have created for themselves.  God is the great I AM.  He is not the I am whosoever you want me to be. God is far greater than we can ever imagine.

This morning I want to look at the greatness of Christ in our life.

Isaiah 1:30- A garden that hath no water.

Have you ever looked at your garden after a long spell of hot, dry weather?  The ground is baked and parched with seams and cracks; the plants droop their weary heads.  You grab the garden hose and do your best to revive them, but if you happened to live in a place like Laverna and I lived in the early 70’s where the water supply is limited, and you have to carry your water from a hydrant three miles away, then you are wanting the rains to come.

One spring I decided to have a garden.  I had the garden plowed we bought the corn and beans, and I planted them.  I was sure that I could use the water from the canal that ran through the property since it was only about twenty feet away.  What I didn’t know was that you had to have a permit to get water from the canal.  We didn’t have the money to buy the permit.  So, the corn and beans either did not come up or they came up and struggled, and others just died. 

One morning we got up, and the entire garden was flooded from the canal.  What happened was someone downstream shut a gate and the water backed up.  I thought, what a blessing.  The problem was quickly resolved, and the dry, barren land was refreshed with water. I was going to have at least some beans.

I had one bean plant that survived, and it was growing.  Since we lived on open range cattle and horses were always coming on our property. I wasn’t too concerned when we had over one hundred cows invade our property.  Until I remembered the one lonely bean plant in the garden.  After all the cows were gone, I went to the garden to see what was left of my solitary bean plant. It was gone.

In the East where Isaiah lived, they were dependent on water for their gardens.  The sunshine is much hotter, and they have more extended periods of when the rain does not fall.  Can you imagine what a terribly dreary thing plants in the garden would be with no means of getting water?

There are types of gardens without water I want look at for a few minutes this morning.

The first is the garden of your soul.  God has given to us the garden in it we can have plants, flowers, herbs and yes even weeds.  Unless our garden is well watered everything will wilt, droop and die.  You know what is interesting about a garden, everything in it belong to us, but we cannot make it grow.  We cannot make the rain fall.  So, what can we do?

In Isaiah’s day sometimes, the rain only rained for a few hours each year.  Yet, they had gardens that flourished.  How?  Miles away there were mountains that were capped with snow.  They brought the water down from the mountains with canals and in some cases pipes.  They went to the source of everlasting water.  The mountains were so high and covered with snow all year round and the melting snow gave the needed water to grow their food.

The canal that ran through our property was from a reservoir at the foot of the Rocky Mountains.  The mountain that supplied the reservoir was over ten thousand feet high and covered with snow.  It was a constant source of water.

When we find the garden of our soul drying up, we need to go to the source of our water which we find in Jesus Christ.

It was about noon. A Samaritan woman came to the well to get some water, and Jesus asked her, “Please give me a drink.”  This happened while his disciples were in town buying some food.

 The woman says, “I am surprised that you ask me for a drink! You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman!” (Jews have nothing to do with Samaritans and men were permitted to talk with women in public.)

 Jesus says to her, “You don’t know what God can give you. And you don’t know who I am, the one who asked you for a drink. If you knew, you would have asked me, and I would have given you living water.”

The woman says, “Sir, where will you get that living water? The well is very deep, and you have nothing to get water with. Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob? He is the one who gave us this well. He drank from it himself, and his sons and all his animals drank from it too.”

Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.  But anyone who drinks the water I give will never be thirsty again. The water I give people will be like a spring flowing inside them. It will bring them eternal life.” John 4:5:14

That was over 2000 years ago, and you know what, He is still waiting at the well, ready to give you the water of everlasting life.  Those who the LORD has given this water He has marked as His own.

In the 66^th chapter the LORD said, I will put a mark on some of the people. I will send some of these saved people to the nations of Tarshish, Libya, Lud (the land of archers), Tubal, Greece, and all the faraway lands. Those people have never heard my teachings. They have never seen my Glory. So, the saved people will tell the nations about my glory.  And they will bring all your brothers and sisters from those other nations to my holy mountain Jerusalem as an offering to the Lord. I will also choose some of these people to be priests and Levites.” The Lord himself said this.

 The Lord says, “I will make a new world—new heavens and a new earth—that will last forever. In the same way, your names and your children will always be with me.  Everyone will come to worship me on every worship day; they will come every Sabbath and every first day of the month. This is what I, the Lord, have said.

There are those who have gone to the source of everlasting water and are sharing that water with others. Who have you shared the water of life with?

This brings us to the next type of garden.

The other kind of garden is dehydrated, it is the thirsty garden of other people’s lives. Some people have their gardens dried up from want of a kind word or the lack of somebody to love them; so, they become hard, and bitter and disagreeable.  There are no delicate flowers in their garden it is filled with bitter herbs and weeds.

The LORD wants us to lead them to the source of everlasting water, to water the parched garden of their life.  You may not like to work in a dry, dusty garden that is filled with bitter herbs and weeds.  It is so much more refreshing to work with a fresh, beautiful garden, but if you know where the source of everlasting water is to be found, you must show them the way.  It is their choice to accept the water; it is yours to show them where to find the source.  If the garden of your soul is dry and dusty and it looks like there is no hope, accept the water of everlasting life.

The final garden that is parched and dead.

This garden looks fresh, green, and everything perfect.  However, with a closer inspection, we find everything is artificial.  There is no real life.  There is a form of godliness but no power or life.   The LORD’s condemnation of this garden is strong:

·         Once you were like pure silver, but now you are like the impurities that people throw away when the silver is purified.

·         You are like good wine that has been weakened with water.  Your rulers are rebels and friends of thieves. They demand bribes and accept money for doing wrong. They take money to cheat people, and they don’t speak up for widows and orphans. They will not even listen to their cries for help.

 In the future, you will be ashamed of the oak trees and special gardens you chose to worship because you will be like an oak tree whose leaves are dying. You will be like a garden dying without water. Powerful people will be like small, dry pieces of wood, and what they did will be like the sparks that start a fire. These people and their works will both burn up, and no one will be able to put out that fire.

This is the judgment of the LORD on a people who have denied the everlasting source of water- JESUS CHRIST.

In Isaiah 65 we hear the words of the LORD,

“I helped people who had not come to me for advice. Those who found me were not looking for me. I spoke to a nation that does not use my name. I said, ‘Here I am! Here I am!’  “All day long I stood ready to accept those who turned against me. But they kept doing whatever they wanted to do, and all they did was wrong. They keep doing things, right in front of me, that makes me angry. They offer sacrifices and burn incense in their special gardens. They sit among the graves, waiting to get messages from the dead. They eat the meat of pigs, and their pots are full of soup made from unclean meat. But they tell others, ‘Don’t come near me! Don’t touch me because I am holy!’ They are like smoke in my eyes, and their fire burns all the time.”

These people have allowed their garden to fill with bitter herbs and poisonous weeds.  They have convinced themselves they do not need the Water of Everlasting Life- Jesus Christ.  They are burning noxious weeds that is sending the smoke of abomination into the eyes of the LORD.  The LORD has told us time and time again to repent and He would heal us, make us whole, give us the water of Life.

What type of garden are you tending, one watered from the everlasting source of life?  Or are you one who has been led to the source of everlasting water but has not made the decision to accept the water and change the bitter herbs and weeds to a beautiful garden? Or are you denying the everlasting source of water and burning the incense of noxious weeds from evil of an artificial garden into the eyes of the LORD.

Christ is ready to bring you the salvation needed to change the garden of your life if you only accept the source of everlasting water.  Don’t let your life be like a garden dying without water.  Accept the offer of Jesus Christ to give you a spring flowing inside that will bring you eternal life.