"Battle Royal - When World's Collide"
Session One: The Celestial Showdown
Isaiah 46 (Bibles open for readings throughout the message)
INTRO
(Showed movie clip "300" and the section before battle where the warriors were told by King Leonidas to "SEARCH YOUR OWN SOUL"
We are at war. Some are warriors who are willing to fight to the death and are exhausted in battle. Others are prisoners of war some of which seek escape from their imprisonment while others are trying to figure out a way to find solace in their prison surroundings. These feel escape is impossible and a way out is beyond reach, so let’s make the best of a bad situation. Still there are others who have no idea they are prisoners. Their current reality is so normal to them, so “the-way-it-has-always-been” that they have no idea there is something better on the horizon; that where they are is not the way God intended things to be. As we begin this weekend together, I believe God calls us to search our own soul. At the end of our search we will decide where we stand before Him and how we need to move.
We've been at war since before the beginning of time, when Lucifer, the bright and morning star, the exalted holy being of Holy God, desired equality with God and was cast out of the Majesty’s presence, cursed for all time. It might have been something like this mythological depiction of THOR. He intentionally violated his father’s will, King Odin, invading another world taking innocent lives through war and bloodshed. The result is facing the consequences of his choices so that he is cursed and cast out of his rightful place as a son of the king. (CLIP: CAST YOU OUT scene in the movie THOR)
And so since that day, Battle Royal continues. World’s colliding; not the minuscule concept of earth and space but what the apostle Paul speaks of in Ephesians 6:12, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” The problem, brothers-in-arms, is that sometimes we don’t understand the gravity of the situation we’re in or the forces we contend with. Too often we are completely unconscious of the fact that there are spiritual forces working against us and breathing down our necks. Frank Peretti is a well-known author for his fictional work on the spirit world. Much of it can be favourably argued as a way things work in the flesh and blood versus dark world battle that is around us every day. I remember one of his stories where believers are gathering for Sunday worship but the scene is captured from the spiritual forces dimension. Angels – holy and evil – are gathered for worship, all wondering how the day will fare. If believers gather with faith and use the weapons of prayer and the Word of God, evil will be routed and run for their lives. If not, the holy angels will have a battle on their hands to ward evil off and prevent it from disrupting worship any more than they already have. If they escape without losing souls it will be a good day.
We not only fail to understand the reality of the evil we contend with but we forget – or are completely oblivious to – the counter-punch power of God that resides in us, his men, to combat the evil that is prevalent around us. It is the power that inspired St. Paul to say to us with unapologetic confidence in Romans 8:32, “We are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” More than conquerors so we are not condemned by the flesh, bound by the law of sin and death; more than conquerors to set our minds on the Spirit’s desires; to experience his life in our mortal bodies because his Spirit lives in us. We can view our sufferings against the incomparable richness of the glory to come; more than conquerors to say with confidence, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Verse 31) Guys, we can live as warriors so at the end of the day and in all points in between, we can declare with Paul in verses 35-39, and know it! – “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?...Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
This weekend marks the beginning of a Celestial Showdown. If in fact you are not currently engaged in battle, you are going to engage in battle because your soul – your mind, emotions and will – longs for holiness and obedience. Your soul is tormented when it walks in unruliness (unholiness) and disobedience; you want this, as the battle for the mind and heart is a daily, reciprocating reality. The human spirit has been trying to get back to Eden (back to unbroken, tranquil relationship with God) from the day we left and we should not – we must not rest or give up the fight until the day when we “will finally be all that Christ Jesus saved me for.” (Philippians 3:12)
Our journey is a continuation of the fight and fire our forefathers knew so well. We pick up the story in Isaiah chapters 46-48. In each Session we’ll focus on a chapter and its lessons for our time together. Strap yourself in and if there are moments when a sudden outburst is residing in your gut and you need to get it out, here’s the “amen” for this weekend; are you ready? It’s “YEAH!” - Not this one from Russell Oliver: “Oh yeah” (Russell Oliver) but Macho Man Randy Savage’s “YEAH”!! (NB: Russell Oliver you tube videos is a jeweller waving cash with a soft "oh yeah". MMR SAVAGE is a World Wrestling Entertainment name - also can be found on you tube).
Our journey begins with Isaiah chapter 46. We’re going to jump around a little in the chapter, pulling verses into themes. If I go verse for verse, some of you will be asleep before verse 2! (If I don’t do it this way, I’LL BE ASLEEP BEFORE VERSE 2!!) The first lesson is an obvious but heart-breaking lesson. It is one of the things that means the difference between the stance as a warrior or a prisoner.
WE'VE BECOME ADDICTED TO IMPOTENT gods
The idea of this chapter is the lesson that we've reduced God to wood. Our wood is any attempt to shape God in our image, to make Him suit our thinking. Idolatry is the worship of other gods and we have become very good at shaping Yahweh (Hebrew name for God) to suit our preferences of what He should look like, how He should sound and what He should do. And once we've completed our idolatrous shaping, the pathetic, grotesque image we've constructed is itself, even ignored.
One dictionary defines impotent as, “lacking power or ability; utterly unable”. We've become addicted to gods – to stuff – and to the Yahweh God we've shaped to suit our appetites, which have no power to do anything for us. Yahweh does not possess the power to save us when our demand of Him is to feed our appetites or we use Him as a bargaining chip.
The chapter begins with a focus on Babylon’s idols. (46:1-2…)
There are two suggestions regarding these verses’ meaning:
1. It was not uncommon that a people would have a New Year’s procession and they would parade their gods on carts through the streets in celebration. Bel and Nebo are divinities known to the Babylonian people. One source (Interpreter’s) paints the picture that the carved gods are about to topple over because of the rutted streets and roads as they were pulled along in oxen or mule carts, something like a modern-day float in a parade that might be about to topple. The first thing we’d do is try to prevent it and hold it up. It is that picture here.
2. During the time of this writing, Cyrus, the king of Persia, was God’s instrument to bring Babylon down. It is suggested the Babylonians were possibly trying to cart their gods to safety before Persia invaded. This may be the more unlikely of the two suggestions because it seems more probable that Persia would worship the same gods.
Regardless of the message, the prophet is mocking them, almost suggesting that their gods are afraid, showing their fear by bowing down and toppling over. He mocks the ridiculous reality of what is happening – people carrying their gods! When they need their gods to deliver them, their gods are themselves being delivered.
Before we laugh too smugly we should ask if at times we are any better (46:5-7…)
In verse 5 we have a question that suggests we put God on the same level as the gods we are fascinated with, moving into verses 6-7 to learn that the things we are most interested in are shaped and formed by human hands and become the gods we carry. They are only dead imaginations feeding our addiction that they have value in the greater scheme of things. One writer notes how “they cannot move, answer or save and no matter how we shape them and overlay created things with other more valuable things, it is still a THING; as one writer reminds us “an idol remains an idol and the worship of it is as futile as the effort exerted for its creation.”
I want to come back for a moment to my earlier comments that the only thing as equally vile as shaping gods, are our attempts to shape Yahweh, the God of Israel, our God and fashion him down to our imaginations.
Example: Debate around The Shack because some cannot imagine the play that God could be a black woman called “mama”. Verse 5 becomes a haunting question. “To whom will you compare me or count me equal?” Do we understand the evil in this act, that we would give God an equal? When we put God in a place that he speaks of us doing this, where we allow the thought and behaviour that something can take his place and be equal to him, we’re in trouble. Think about this for a moment. How could we compare God so that he has an equal? That is the idolatry of bringing him down or exalting ourselves and it gives rise to evil in our hearts. We put ourselves in an extremely dangerous and destructive place. No matter how we imagine whom God to be, He is not that; He is always more than that. We struggle to imagine God coming in the form of a woman but have no trouble accepting the story that He came as a baby in a manger. Yahweh can present Himself however it suits Him! Like the Prophet Elijah in 1 Kings 19, we imagine God is the strong wing, or the earthquake, or the fire. But, God being God, He shows up as we least expect! To Elijah, he came as “a still small voice” or more accurately rendered, “a gentle blowing”. God, gentle? Who would have thought!
Authors Raymond Ortlund Jr. and R. Kent Hughes give us useful insight to the subject and fascination with idols in their book Isaiah: God Saves Sinners:
“The word Isaiah uses for “idols” in verse 1 echoes the Old Testament word for pain and hurt and strain. Idols promise everything, but they take everything from us and leave us fatally wounded in their trail of destruction. Why didn't Babylonian culture endure? Don’t take the rise and fall of civilizations for granted. Human achievement wasn't meant to fade away. God meant us to be significant and lasting. Why do human societies collapse, as they all do? Our idols fail us. Who even remembers Bel and Nebo today except as two props on the stage of the Biblical drama? If I have to explain to you who Bel and Nebo used to be, if I have to find an interesting way to describe them to keep your attention, even as the name of Jesus is adored more and more the world over, what does that imply about the pretences of our culture today? Idolatry, however impressive at the moment, is unsustainable. And all who cling to unreality are going into painful captivity.”
So how do we break this addiction? How do we vanquish or defeat this addiction? We change direction (sometimes we call it repentance) – we change direction in our interests. We being the journey to living victoriously, as warriors should live. We do this by that rather than continuing with addictions for impotent gods,
WE BECOME ATTRACTED TO THE OMNIPOTENT GOD
Where impotent means “lacking power or ability; utterly unable” OMNIPOTENT means just the opposite. It means “unlimited power and authority”! It’s just the opposite of impotent! Isaiah 46: 3-4…
There is no stronger image than the love of a parent for a child or a dad for his son or daughter. Couple that with the love of a father whose power is unlimited and you have an explosive combination that spells success and victory in every language and across the banner of the universe! I want to show you a triathlon clip of a father’s love for his son. It is a powerful image that in my use of it, attempts to show you how great God’s love is for you. This love, when captured and understood, will have the profound result of powerful attraction. The cerebral palsied son said to his dad, “Every time I run I feel my disability disappears”. They ran more than 900 races and marathons. As you watch you’ll hear Nicole C. Mullens sing the powerful words, “I know my Redeemer lives”. As you watch allow the words of Isaiah capture your heart – “I…will sustain you…made you…will carry you…will rescue you.” (CLIP: FATHER AND SON MARATHON - youtube)
For some reason, the reality of God carrying and rescuing us does not draw a loving response from us and positively impacting our interaction with the God who carries us and gets us through life’s learning curves as we run our marathons. He tells us in these verses that he carries us and he’s carried us from birth! Not only from birth in our physical timeline existence but as a people, as His chosen people, from before even the days when the prophet wrote about it in this chapter. God carried his people from the moment they were born and triumphantly brought them from Egyptian captivity. And even though there has been a fascination with other gods, and even though they are in captivity by Babylon, they will be delivered again! In times of catastrophe he protects what is valuable to him! Unlike the gods that we carry, the true God carries us! Yet we live with the mystery that no matter how loving and compassionate He is toward us, we are haunted with the question, “How can we not respond to love like that?”
The Interpreter’s Commentary says, “This superb passage contrasts religion as a load with religion as a lift”. To go a step further, Reverend James Hastings in his scholar work offers this, “The test [the prophet] suggests, by which a [person] can find out whether he is dealing with an idol or with the Lord of heaven and earth, is this: Do you feel yourself carrying your religion, or do you feel that it carries you: is it weight or is it wings?”
If we can barely crawl out of bed on Sunday and it is hard work to worship with God’s people, then it is a god we carry (or our bed is our god!). If tithing is a load, our money is a god we carry. If we can’t read our Bible regularly but can watch 10 hours of television or play endlessly on video games every day, our creature comforts and entertainment have become gods we carry. If our work trumps our wife and kids, our work is a god we carry. Enough examples, you get the message.
Did you notice the part where God speaks of carrying us in our old age and in our greying years? One writer suggests that this passage of promise and hope, of God carrying his people was written for a nation, being Israel. “But generations” he writes, “who live close to God seem not to grow old in spirit. Their physical…decays, their activities are severely [reduced], their mental [abilities] may weaken but their souls remain buoyant [resilient, cheerful].”
Chris Tomlin wrote it well in his song, “There is no one like our God”! And for good reason! The uniqueness and incomparability of Israel’s God over against all other gods is highlighted as another says, “The gods have to be made at great cost both of material and effort; they have to be carried about on men’s shoulders; they have to be set down so that they will not fall over. They make no response to men’s cries; they cannot save their worshippers in the time of their distress.” This should be reason enough to become attracted to Him! But sometimes we forget. Our forgetting then leads history to repeat itself and the fallout is similar to earlier times. The best way to avoid a third world war is to review and remember the things that resulted in Wars I and II. Remembering can be a wonderful thing because in remembering God reminds us of his faithfulness when we follow wholeheartedly and in obedience to Him. Yes, we must remember. So with a loud call to remember, Yahweh speaks in verses 8-11…
Yahweh reminds us who he is. He delivers, performs and proves there is none equal! Along with that he speaks into a few other details. Let’s break it down a little.
Verses 8-9, “Remember this… Remember former things”. The temptation to join the party of the pagan idolatry is strong. It seems harmless, until we find ourselves trapped and against the wall only to be faced with the dark night of no hope and our gods can’t help us. To avoid this venom bite, we are told to remember the past. One writer put it this way: “God is revealed in history, and we establish present fellowship by recalling what he has done.”
God rebukes any who reject Him or set something else in his place in our lives as our ruling Monarch. There have been recent suggestions that Canada should reject the Royal Family as Canada’s Monarchy. We suggest it is a waste of money and what’s the point – they have no power. We suggest change of loyalty, with no other symbol to replace her, other than our self-righteous arrogance and with little or no knowledge of the difficult Constitutional Reform required that makes that happen. Do we really want to play with our Constitution?
We treat God the same way. We want him, if not out of our lives, at least in the back room – out of sight, out of mind. We have other, more important things to capture our attention all the while ignorant to the tremendous negative impact his absence – or lack of rightful place – will have for us.
God rebuked the people for their desires and decisions to reject him and mentions in verse 11 of the “bird of prey”. God is speaking of the King of Persia, Cyrus, who is about to capture Babylon. To the gods earlier mentioned Yahweh suggests, “A lot of good they’ll do when their enemy comes and consumes them.”
But there’s always a silver lining, a light at the end of the tunnel or a ray of hope. God never introduces the difficult without the delight of the alternative! The delightful alternative is this and surely it must be one of the top attractions that draw us toward him. He promises righteousness or if you will justice, fairness or reliability. We could call it salvation! He speaks in verse 12 to the stubborn hearted, the people in their New Year’s celebration with their cart-pulled gods and he essentially says to them “my salvation will be close enough that you can reach out and touch it!” He promises in verse 13, “My salvation will not delay. And I will grant salvation in Zion.” God sets the stage for a showdown!
Worship music:
“There is no one like our God” (Tomlin)
“Holy is the Lord” (Tomlin)
“Revelation Song” (Phillips, Craig and Dean)
