Receiving the Power of the Resurrection
Isaiah 6:1-8
There are certain days we remember where we were when we heard the news. Sept, 11, 2001. Or January 28, 1986 when the Challenger disaster happened. Or November 22, 1963 as word was sent out across the nation: “President John Kennedy is dead”. In each of these instances, a nation was plunged into grief and people flocked to churches. Seven hundred years before Christ was born, the sad announcement was made, “The King is Dead.” King Uzziah, the 11th King of Judah, who reigned for 52 years and brought stability to the nation, was dead. He accomplished more than any king since David. He defeated the Philistines and the Arabs. He rebuilt many cities. He created a great army and was able to fortify Jerusalem for its own defense. As a result, the people gained a great sense of security but that was lost now that he was gone. The prophet Isaiah was a statesman, who spoke for God to kings, including four who reigned during his life and ministry. Upon the news of Uzziah’s death, Isaiah’s heart was broken. Not only was his king dead but also his friend. This drove Isaiah to the Temple to worship and to seek comfort and hope in now uncertain circumstances.
While there, Isaiah had a vision and is taken into the Temple where only priests are allowed and then lifted up to the throne room of God. Isaiah is taken to one of the holiest places on earth. Jewish worship in the Temple was centered on the holiness and purity of God because God’s physical presence was thought to be there. The Temple wasn’t just a place for God’s people to gather and worship. Literally, you were going to the house of God to be in His presence. Thus, the holiness of those who came to the Temple was pre-eminent. Every person who came to the Temple would walk down into a mikvah, a ceremonial cleansing pool the size of a two person Jacuzzi, to be cleansed so they would not defile the Temple. The High Priest, the only person allowed to enter the Holy of Holies and offer sacrifices to Yahweh, had special purity and holiness expectations placed on him. The Levitical Priests had all types of holiness expectations placed on them covered in Lev. 21-22. As a result, the Jewish faith was built around the holiness of God and upon the spiritual cleanliness and holiness of God’s people because when you went to Temple, you were entering the presence of God. Isaiah goes to the Temple to be in the presence of God but little did he know that he would have an encounter with God.
We see the holiness of God. Isaiah looks up and sees God seated on a throne, high and exalted and the trail of God’s robe filling the Temple. He sees the seraphim, angels, flying around giving glory to the Lord singing, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord Almighty.” Repeating a word in Hebrew is a way to emphasize it. In the Hebrew language, if something is repeated twice, it was meant to be a comparative. But if something is repeated three times, it is a superlative, meaning it is beyond compare and there is nothing like it. Only God’s holiness gets this emphasis in Scripture, here and then again in Revelation 4:8. What do we really mean by holy? Literally, it means different or set apart. 1 Sam 2:2 declares, "There is no one holy like the Lord." In fact, there is nothing else like him in all the universe. We see two elements to God’s holiness here. First is His greatness. God is totally above and beyond us. He is great, grand, and majestic. We see this as just the train of his robe fills the Temple. In God’s presence, the Temple shook like an earthquake and filled with smoke, all pointing to the majesty of God. Second is the idea of purity. God has no blemishes and His nature, His love and His holiness is so pure and true. Now the seraphim are beings without sin yet they cover their face because they could not look upon the holiness of God and they cover their feet, because feet are considered to be unclean, so as not to defile God. His holiness is beyond compare.
Second, we see our sin. Being in the presence of God and seeing His majesty, power and holiness moves Isaiah beyond measure. Isaiah saw himself as he had never quite seen himself before. In the face of God’s holiness that fills the Temple and surrounds him, he sees his sin. Sin. Sin, it’s not a word we mention much in the church these days. We come up with different softer words for sin like he stumbled or she had a mistake. But this passage calls us to recover the biblical language of sin. Because sometimes, it’s the best language to describe the situation we find ourselves in. You made a decision you knew was wrong but you made it any way and now you find yourself living in the wake of all of the pain and suffering which comes with it. The problem with sin is that it usually starts with one small concession and then another and another before long, you find yourselves miles from God and who you thought you were. So Isaiah is confronted with His sin and cries out, “Woe is me!” as he comes to grip with the sin in his life. And when we find ourselves separated from God and from each other, because that’s the impact of sin in our lives, and we’re bearing the weight of remorse and pain and shame, Isaiah gives us perhaps the only language we need, “Woe is me,”
David Emory tells the story of baptizing a young father who had a 7 year old and 5 year old. They were close friends of his family and had never been a part of a church. But one Sunday, they came to worship, he gave his life to Christ and was baptized. At the end of the service, after everyone else had left, David walked back into the sanctuary to turn off the lights and lock the doors he found this man on the front row with his head in his hands. He sat down next to him only to see that this young father’s eyes were red and swollen with tears. “What’s wrong?” he asked. He answered, “I just feel this profound sense of the mistakes I have made in my life. I’ve done some things I’m really ashamed of and I just need to ask God for forgiveness. When I was a student in college, I played football. I was pretty popular and I used my situation to take advantage of lots and lots of women and I hurt them again and again and again. Now that I have two little girls, I just pray they don't meet someone like me. I now realize the young women I hurt and the selfish decisions I had for myself, they were somebody’s little girl and I am ashamed.” For this young man, the only appropriate words were “Woe is me.”
Some of you have been there. When you realize the holiness of God and the life to which we have been called and how far short you have fallen of the glory of God and His holiness. And yet, there is good news: it’s that dark, burden filled, guilt laden and shameful place where God can begin to work in your life. Because it’s in this place where you begin to reach out to God with your whole being. It’s in this place where God can reach down into your life, touch you with his grace and forgiveness as he did with Isaiah and then offer you a new beginning. That’s who God is. God is not just holy and far removed. Our God is a god of second chances. If you are at the point of “Woe” hear this: God is ready to meet you where you are.
For the rest of you here this morning, I have some bad news: you and I are not as good as we think we are. Isaiah was God’s chosen prophet and voice. He may have been the most faithful man in the land. He was a sold-out servant of God. Yet despite all of this, when he sees the holiness of God, the only thing he can do is recognize his sin: “Woe is me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips…” The statement "I am ruined" literally means “to be devastated” by what you have done. This realization of his sin is almost overwhelming. Isaiah calls himself a man of unclean lips, a profound statement because the most important instrument of a prophet was his mouth, for he was called to speak for God. The lips express what is in the heart and mind indicating their uncleanness also. He realizes that His lips do not belong to God or else like the seraphim, they would be pouring forth praise. The Word he has been proclaiming has been limited by the sin in His life. Isaiah, standing in the presence of God, saw who God really was and at the same time, maybe for the first time, he really understood who he really was, a sinful man. He saw the huge chasm between the faith he professed and the life he lived.
You and I are not as good as we think we are. The problem when we look at ourselves is that we often compare ourselves to others. And we can always find someone who is worse than us and has made a bigger mess of their lives than we have. But when we compare ourselves to others, we’re comparing ourselves against the wrong standard. There is only one standard that counts and that’s God’s. Like Isaiah, when we are confronted by the holiness of God or when we are confronted by the cross and the fact that Jesus died for us, we come to an acute awareness of our own personal sin. Sin is a good word because it helps us understand who we are and who we are not and how much we really need God and His grace.
Third, we name our sin. The key to receiving the power of the resurrection in your life is first you have to lay claim to and name your sin. Easter is not just recognizing that Jesus died for the sins of the world and was resurrected. It’s not just recognizing that Jesus died because of sin. It’s not just recognizing that Jesus died for my sin. It’s laying claim to the fact that Jesus died because of my sin. I want you to feel the weight of that for a moment. I want you stand before God and look at your life and decide what is sin in your life: what attitudes, what habits, what behaviors or what actions need to die in you because they are sin. Because you cannot have a resurrection unless first there is a death. Let me say that again, you cannot have a resurrection unless first there is a death. We can name what needs to die in us because we know that God loves us, does not want to harm us and wants the best for us. It’s only then that we can receive forgiveness and experience the power of the resurrection in our lives.
Jeremy Myers writes, “Why don’t we see resurrection today?...“Why don’t we see lives of Christ-followers being radically transformed and changed into new creations?” Why don’t we see the “resurrection life”? It seems almost expected today that when a person believes in Jesus, not much will change. Oh, they might start going to church, and maybe reading their Bible and praying, and if they are really zealous, they will talk about Jesus to their friends. But typically, within a few months, old habits creep back in, old ways of living continue. Not much changes.
So whatever happened to the resurrection? Whatever happened to being raised to new life in Christ? Whatever happened to being a new creation? People talk about living the “resurrected life,” and sing about it, read about it, preach about it, and even pray for it, but it rarely seems to happen. Why is the resurrection life so rare? I believe it is because we have forgotten a vital element in the truth of the resurrection, and it is this: There can be no resurrection without death. Death always precedes resurrection…if you want to experience resurrection in your own life, you must die. Yet very few of us like to think much about dying, and fewer still like to hear pastors and preachers call for us to die…You must die to your old self before being raised to new life. We are buried with Christ before we are raised with Him. We must crucify the old man and the lusts of the flesh, before the new man rises from the grave….So you want to experience resurrection? Die. Not literally, of course. Die to your dreams, your ambitions, your goals, your old habits and patterns. Die to yourself. Because resurrection reigns only where there is death.”
Fourth, we receive forgiveness. After coming to grips with his our depravity and sin and repenting of it, Isaiah is forgiven. God sends the seraph to touch his lips with a coal from the altar. “And with it, he touched Isaiah’s mouth and said, ‘See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.’" The heat of that coal removes any impurity within Isaiah and cauterizers it so that it may not occur again. God does not leave Isaiah devastated wallowing in His sin. He meets Isaiah where he is and gives the cleansing power of forgiveness. And that’s God’s desire for us, to cleanse us of our sin and to make us right before God. Because God loves us, we can stand before Him as we are sinful creatures but we can also say, change me, mold me, shape me.
The key is that you have to stay there long enough for God to speak to you about the sin that’s in your life which needs to die. There, God assures us that our sins are forgiven by touching our lips with his Son’s body and blood. That live coal is taken from was the Altar of Burnt Offerings - it was the altar where the body was broken and blood was shed. It was the place where the priests would kill those animals to pay for the sins of the people, because without the shedding of blood there is no remission (no cleansing) from sin. So you have a coal that has been touched by two things: BLOOD and FIRE. The blood speaks of cleansing from sin and the fire speaks of refining, purifying power. Doesn’t that remind you of Holy Communion?
Fifth, we respond to God’s call. Only now is Isaiah willing to serve, not out of obligation but out of gratitude and a desire to exalt God's glory. For God makes it plain that while spiritual experience is never merely a means to an end, neither is it an end in itself. God never just delivers us from something. He always delivers us to or for something. For Isaiah, he wants the world to know the greatness and the goodness of God. And because of the confession he has made, what has died in him and God’s ensuing forgiveness, Isaiah can call out to God, “Here I Am, Send Me.” Amanda Conquers writes, “Death precedes resurrection. I don’t know what God will make of the brokenness you hand over and surrender to Him, (or) how He will raise it back to life, but I do know He will.” Amen and Amen.
