Let's Make Some Noise Series

“The Charge of the Light Brigade: Let’s Make Some Noise!”

Is. 62:1-7; Ezek 33:1-20

As I begin today I want to be perfectly clear. America is not God’s chosen nation. There is only one of those and it is Israel. But America has been richly blessed because of her underpinnings which were planted during her founding. Make no mistake about it – America was created as a religious nation. In fact, as a study of her early documents reveals, America was unapologetically rooted in the particular religious tradition of the Christian faith and in Judeo-Christian principles. The blessings she has experienced have been the direct result of these roots. As the Psalmist wrote (144:15) “Blessed are the people whose God is the Lord.”

With that backdrop, let’s examine THE MESSAGE FROM THE PROPHETS. God spoke to Isaiah (62:6-7), “I have posted watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem; they will never be silent day or night. You who call on the LORD, give yourselves no rest, and give him no rest till he establishes Jerusalem and makes her the praise of the earth.” God appoints watchmen for the benefit of His people. According to Isaiah, the task of this watchman is to PREACH AND PRAY. As he stood on the wall he would turn his face towards the people and deliver God’s messages to them, and he would turn towards God and pray for them. The prophet was to make some noise – to the people and to God. He, and in turn the people, were not to rest praying, from bending God’s ears with the noise of prayer, until Jerusalem was re-established.

God spoke to Ezekiel about the watchmen as well. (33:7) “Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me.” The watchman is not only to preach and pray but also to WATCH AND WARN. He would stand on the wall so he could spot any advancing enemy; upon seeing one he would make some noise by blowing the warning horn to alert the people to get ready for battle. God says, in fact, that if the watchman sees the enemy advancing and fails to warn the people, and any of the people are killed by the enemy, God will hold the watchman accountable. But if the watchman blows the warning horn and any of the people fail to respond correctly, they will be held accountable.

I stand before you each week as your watchman. Part of my task is to preach God’s Word to you and lift you up to God’s throne of grace as I pray for you. Together we are ‘not to rest’ from praying, from bombarding the throne with prayers, until God’s kingdom has fully come on earth. It is also part of my task to identify the enemies that confront and attack us. Together we must enter the noise of battle.

This morning I am compelled to share what I see as I stand on the wall and look out into the world that surrounds us. May it inform and inspire our prayers and equip and motivate us for battle. To begin with, I see a PROBLEM OF SPIRITUALITY. We lost a sense of a “Christian America” because WE HAVE LOST OUR JUDEO CHRISTIAN FOUNDATION. Patrick Henry, in May of 1765, stated, “It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that his nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity and freedom of worship here.” Another one of the founders, Benjamin Rush, said “I lament that we waste so much time and money in punishing crimes and take so little pains to prevent them…we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government; that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by means of the Bible…”

Having lost that foundation we have lost our cherished moral compass. AMERICA HAS LOST HER MORAL DIRECTION. Paulina was a Polish high school student who came to study in the United States. She said that when she first came here, she was amazed by the way teens spent their time. “In Warsaw, we would talk to our friends after school; go home and eat with our parents and then do four or five hours of homework. When I first came here, it was like going into a crazy world, but now I am getting used to it. I’m going to Pizza Hut and watching TV and doing less work in school. I can tell it is not a good thing to get used to.” That really fits our current moral climate, doesn’t it? It is not a good thing to get used to!