Opening illustration: Story of a passionate British underground evangelist in Salalah, Oman.
Introduction: In this figurative vision, the temple is thrown open to view, even to the most holy place. The prophet, standing outside the temple, sees the Divine Presence seated on the mercy-seat, raised over the Ark of the Covenant, between the cherubim and seraphim, and the Divine glory filled the whole temple. See God upon his throne. This vision is explained, John 12: 41, that Isaiah now saw Christ’s glory, and spoke of Him, which is a full proof that our Savior is God. In Christ Jesus, God is seated on a throne of grace; and through him the way into the holiest is laid open. See God’s temple, his church on earth, filled with his glory. His train, the skirts of his robes, filled the temple, the whole world, for it is all God’s temple. And yet he dwells in every contrite heart. See the blessed attendants by whom his government is served. Above the throne stood the holy angels, called seraphim, which means “burners;” they burn in love to God, and zeal for his glory against sin. The seraphim showing their faces veiled, declares that they are ready to yield obedience to all God’s commands, though they do not understand the secret reasons of his counsels, government, or promises. All vain-glory, ambition, ignorance, and pride, would be done away by one view of Christ in his glory. This awful vision of the Divine Majesty overwhelmed the prophet with a sense of his own vileness. We are undone if there is not a Mediator between us and this holy God. A glimpse of heavenly glory is enough to convince us that all our righteousness is as filthy rags. Nor is there a man that would dare to speak to the Lord, if he saw the justice, holiness, and majesty of God, without discerning his glorious mercy and grace in Jesus Christ. The live coal may denote the assurance given to the prophet, of pardon, and acceptance in his work, through the atonement of Christ. Nothing is powerful to cleanse and comfort the soul, but what is taken from Christ’s satisfaction and intercession. The taking away sin is necessary to our speaking with confidence and comfort, either to God in prayer, or from God in preaching; and those shall have their sin taken away who complain of it as a burden, and see themselves in danger of being undone by it. It is great comfort to those whom God sends, that they go for God, and may therefore speak in his name, assured that he will bear them out.
How to burn for God?
1. What is their character? (v. 2)
• Here it is applied to Yahweh; see also Psa_114:7, where it is also so applied; and see Isa_8:7, and Job_28:28, where Yahweh calls himself “Adonai.” The word does not itself denote essential divinity; but it is often applied to God.
• That Isaiah evidently meant to say that it was Yahweh who appeared to him. He is expressly so called in Isa_6:5-8, Isa_6:11.
• It is equally clear, from the New Testament, that Isaiah saw the messiah. John quotes the words in this chapter, Isa_6:10, as applicable to Jesus Christ, and then adds Joh_12:41, ‘these things said Esaias when he saw his glory, and spoke of him.’
• The most holy place only is intended. The large, full, magnificent robe seemed to fill up the entire holy of holies. Apparently we are the temple today and God desires it to be holy as He is.
• The Lord - The Divine Majesty as he subsisted in three persons. His train - His royal and judicial robe; for he is represented as a judge.
• The Seraphim are, in many respects, in contrast with the Cherubim, though both are expressive of the divine holiness, which demands that the sinner shall have access to divine presence only through a sacrifice which really vindicates the righteousness of God.
• Ezekiel’s vision of the living creatures and wheels; and this appears by their name "seraphim", which signifies "burning", and so Ezekiel’s living creatures are said to be "like burning coals of fire", Eze_1:13 and the ministers of the Gospel are so called, because of their ministerial gifts, compared to fire, as the gifts of the spirit of God.
• The saint shall be cleansed before serving. (Gen_3:22-24) illustrates the first; (Isa_6:1-8) the second. The Cherubim may be said to have to do with the altar, the Seraphim with the laver.
• This is designed, doubtless, to denote the “reverence and awe” inspired by the immediate presence of God. And if the pure and holy seraphim evinced such reverence in the presence of Yahweh, with what profound awe and veneration should we, polluted and sinful creatures, presume to draw near to him!
• In a similar description of the cherubim in Eze_1:11, it is said that they covered “their bodies.” In Isaiah, the expression clearly denotes not the feet only, but the lower extremities. This was also an expression of reverence drawn from our conceptions of propriety. The seraphim stood covered, or as if “concealing themselves” as much as possible, in token of their nothingness and unworthiness in the presence of the Holy One.
• Refer to John’s vision in Revelation 4: 8
• Expressive of their modesty and humility, looking, upon themselves as less than the least of all the saints, and the chief of sinners, and as ashamed of themselves before the Lord; or that they might not look upon the divine Majesty.
2. What do they articulate? (v. 3)
• The “repetition” of a name, or of an expression, three times, was quite common among the Jews.
• Jesus Christ is meant as speaking in Isa_6:10, according to Joh_12:41. Isaiah could only have “seen” the Son, not the divine essence (Joh_1:18). The words in Isa_6:10 are attributed by Paul (Act_28:25, Act_28:26) to the Holy Ghost. Thus the Trinity in unity is implied; as also by the thrice “Holy” (Isa_6:3).
• The fact that three is the number of developed and yet self-contained unity, has its ultimate ground in the circumstance that it is the number of the Trinitarian process; and consequently the trilogy (trisagion) of the seraphim (like that of the cherubim in Rev_4:8), whether Isaiah was aware of it or no, really pointed in the distinct consciousness of the spirits themselves to the triune God.
• This often repetition signifies that the angels cannot satisfy themselves in praising God, to teach us that in all our lives we should give ourselves to the continual praise of God.
• His glory not only appears in the heavens but through all the world, and therefore all creatures are bound to praise him.
• Just as when Christ dwelt in it, wrought his miracles, and manifested forth his glory, and when his Gospel was preached everywhere by his apostles; and as it will be, more especially in the latter day, when it will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord; when the kingdoms of this world will become his, and his kingdom will be everywhere, even from sea to sea, and from the rivers to the ends of the earth; and this is what Gospel ministers declare will be: or "the fullness of the whole earth is his glory," the earth is his, and all that is in it, and all declare his glory.
3. How are they empowered? (v. 4)
• Which was to confirm the prophet, that it was not the voice of man: and by the smoke was signified the blindness that would come on the Jews.
• That is, the posts of the door of the temple, as the Targum adds, where this vision was seen, as represented to the prophet. Some think this respects the earthquake in Uzziah’s time, mentioned in Zec_14:5.
• This shaking therefore may denote either the shaking and removing of the temple service and worship, at the death of Christ (earthquake), and through the preaching of the Gospel; or rather the shaking of the consciences of men by the word, which made them cry out, what shall we do to be saved?
• They are empowered with the Spirit of God after a powerful time of worshiping God. Let us not forget that God inhabits the praises of His people.
• Apparently we see the power or impact of worship in a profound way. When we worship God in this manner, He will shake and move every hard, difficult, heavy or the biggest mountain for you.
4. How can we be refined? (Vs. 5 – 7)
• He speaks this for two reasons, the one because he who was a mortal creature and therefore had more need to glorify God than the angels, did not do it, and the other because the nearer that man approaches to God, the more he knows his own sin and corruption.
• It was not because of his sight of Christ he reckoned himself undone; but because of the impurity of himself, and those among whom he dwelt, which he had a view of through his sight of Christ: his sight of Christ is given as a reason of his view of his impurity, and his impurity as the reason of his being undone in his apprehension of things.
• The prophet, in these his circumstances, represents a sensible sinner, under a sight and sense of his sinfulness and vileness; as the seraph in the following verses represents a Gospel minister bringing the good news of pardon, by the blood and sacrifice of Christ.
• The unholiness of his own person was doubled, in consequence of the closeness of the natural connection, by the unholiness of the nation to which he belonged.
• This does not mean, that the fire from the altar had any physical effect to purify him from sin, but that it was “emblematic” of such a purifying; and probably, also, the fact that it was taken from the altar of sacrifice, was to him an indication that he was pardoned through the “atonement,” or expiation there made.
• This declares that man cannot render due obedience to God, till he has purged us.
• The prophet Isaiah had to be cleansed before serving God.
• The seraph, therefore, did here what his name denotes: he burned up or burned away. He did this, however, not by virtue of his own fiery nature, but by means of the divine fire which he had taken from the heavenly altar.
• For just as, in the case before us, a seraph takes the fire of love from the altar; so there, in Eze_10: 6-7, a cherub takes the fire of wrath from the throne-chariot. Consequently the cherubim appear as the vehicles and media of the wrath which destroys sinners, or rather of the divine, with its fiery side turned towards the world.
• As the smoke which filled the house came from the altar, and arose in consequence of the adoration offered to the Lord by the seraphim, not only must the incense-offering upon the altar and this adoration be closely connected; but the fire, which revealed itself in the smoke and consumed the incense-offering, and which must necessarily have been divine because of its expiatory power, was an effect of the love of God with which He reciprocated the offerings of the seraphim.
Application: For each one of us to be a God burner, some things are just mandatory (God desires that from us) ~
a) Revere Him
b) Draw near to Him
c) Continue to be modest and humble at all times
d) Be worshipers in Spirit and in truth, not lip servers
e) The genuine worship that goes forth unto God, will allow the impossible things to happen in your life
f) Be cleansed and purified before serving God
g) The closer we draw to God, the more if sin we see in ourselves and therefore prompting us to be purified by the blood of Christ and refined for His Glory.
Note: Cherubs are described as winged beings. The biblical prophet Ezekiel describes the cherubim as a tetrad of living creatures, each having four faces: of a lion, an ox, an eagle, and a man. They are said to have the stature and hands of a man, the feet of a calf, and four wings. Two of the wings extended upward, meeting above and sustaining the throne of God; while the other two stretched downward and covered the creatures themselves. Apparently they were carved on the Mercy Seat that is on the lid of the ‘Ark of the Covenant.’ The cherubim serve the purpose of magnifying the holiness and power of God.
The Seraphim belong to the highest order, or angelic choir, of the hierarchy of angels. They are said to be the caretakers of God’s throne, continuously singing Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, i. e. "holy, holy, holy"—cf. "Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts, the whole earth is full of His Glory" (Isaiah 6:3).
