Nobody Is Like Our God!
Isaiah 46:1-13
Sermon by Rick Crandall
(Prepared September 15, 2024)
BACKGROUND:
Church: Nobody is like our God! One great way we can see this truth is by the over 300 Old Testament prophecies that have already been fulfilled by God, especially the prophecies about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
*The prophet Isaiah has been called the evangelistic or messianic prophet because his book focuses so much on the coming of Christ. God gave these prophecies to Isaiah about 700 years before Jesus was born in Bethlehem. That's why Isaiah 7:14 says, "Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel." That means "God With Us." "Isaiah's" name also refers to our Savior because it means "The LORD Is Salvation" or "The LORD Has Saved."
*But today we are going to focus on another amazing prophecy that God gave to Isaiah. It was about the Persian emperor Cyrus the Great who would conquer the Babylonian empire, and set the Children of Israel free to return home after 70 years of captivity. In Isaiah 44 and 45, the LORD called Cyrus by name about 200 years before the emperor was born!
*Then in Isaiah 45:5-6 God said this to the future emperor: "I am the LORD, and there is no other; there is no God besides Me. I will gird you, though you have not known Me, that they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting that there is none besides Me. I am the LORD, and there is no other." (1)
*Today in Isaiah 46, God's Word will show us how to respond to the only true and living God. Let's get started by reading the Scripture.
MESSAGE:
*Church: Nobody is like our God! The Lord makes this truth clear in Isaiah 46. In vs. 5 the Lord asks, "To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal and compare Me, that we should be alike?" Then down in vs. 9 the Lord tells us to "Remember the former things of old, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me."
*Nobody is like our God the Father, God the Son, Jesus Christ, and God the Holy Spirit! Think for example about the countless miracles Jesus worked during His earthly ministry. In John 20:30-31, God's Word tells us that, "truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name." John 21:25 tells us that "there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written."
*Jesus worked an astounding number of miracles while He was here on earth. But counting His birth, resurrection and return to Heaven, only 40 of these miracles are detailed in the four Gospels. (2)
*Nobody is like our God! But what does this mean for us in today's Scripture?
1. FIRST, IT MEANS WE SHOULD LET THE LORD CARRY US.
*Nobody can carry us like Almighty God! In vs. 1-2 God helped us understand this truth by comparing Himself to the false gods Bel and Nebo:
1. Bel bows down, Nebo stoops; their idols were on the beasts and on the cattle. Your carriages were heavily loaded, a burden to the weary beast.
2. They stoop, they bow down together; they could not deliver the burden, but have themselves gone into captivity.
*"Bel" was the false sun god of the Babylonians. And "Bel" was the first part of King Belshazzar's name. He was the king in Daniel 5 who saw God's judgment against him written on the wall in an unknown language by supernatural fingers sent from God. No one in the Kingdom could interpret the message until the prophet Daniel was summoned, and here is part of Daniel's explanation to King Belshazzar. From Daniel 5:23-30.
23. . . "You have lifted yourself up against the Lord of heaven. They have brought the vessels of His house before you, and you and your lords, your wives and your concubines, have drunk wine from them. And you have praised the gods of silver and gold, bronze and iron, wood and stone, which do not see or hear or know; and the God who holds your breath in His hand and owns all your ways, you have not glorified.
24. Then the fingers of the hand were sent from Him, and this writing was written.
25. And this is the inscription that was written: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.
26. This is the interpretation of each word. Mene: God has numbered your kingdom, and finished it;
27. Tekel: You have been weighed in the balances, and found wanting;
28. Peres: Your kingdom has been divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.''
29. Then Belshazzar gave the command, and they clothed Daniel with purple and put a chain of gold around his neck, and made a proclamation concerning him that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.
30. That very night Belshazzar, king of the Chaldeans, was slain.
*His name "Belshazzar" was actually a prayer to the false god, Bel: "Bel Protect the King." But the LORD is the Most High only true and living Almighty God!
*"Nebo" was another false god of the Babylonians, the god of knowledge and literature. And they may not call it Nebo, but there are a lot of arrogant atheists who basically worship knowledge today. I know this first hand, because I used to be one of them when I was a very foolish young man.
*"Nebo" was the first part of Nebuchadnezzar's name, and his name was a prayer to this false god: "May Nebo Protect the Crown." Nebuchadnezzar was the king who carried the Jews away captive, because many of them also worshiped false gods like Bel and Nebo.
*But the LORD is Almighty God! And in vs. 1-2, the LORD was basically laughing at those false gods. He was making the point that the false gods can't even carry themselves, much less carry you and me.
*Then in vs. 3 the LORD says, "Listen to Me, O house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, who have been upheld by Me from birth, who have been carried from the womb." In other words, "I am just the opposite of those false gods. I will carry you, if you will only put your trust in Me! In fact, I have already been carrying you."
*And in vs. 4 the LORD tells His people that He is not going to quit carrying us. "Even to your old age, I am He, and even to gray hairs I will carry you! I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you."
*Church: That is our Lord God Almighty, God the Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! So Isaiah 40:10-11 declares, "Behold, the Lord GOD shall come with a strong hand, and His arm shall rule for Him; behold, His reward is with Him, and His work before Him. He will feed His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom, and gently lead those who are with young."
*Christians: God will carry us as long as we live in this world, and when we die, Jesus will carry us all the way home to Heaven! And oh how we need to be carried by the Lord! Franklin Graham made this clear in a 2015 newsletter, and here is part of his testimony:
-"A few weeks ago I traveled to Myanmar, a nation once known as Burma. We'll be holding a Crusade there at the end of next year. This is a country that has been under military dictatorship for the last 50 years or so, and churches have been under severe restrictions. Myanmar is a Buddhist country, and it has one of the most famous Buddhist temples in the world: the Golden Pagoda. Thousands upon thousands of people go there to pray to the lifeless statues of Buddha.
*As I witnessed this in person, I thought of the story in the book of Daniel where King Belshazzar and the people 'praised the gods of silver and gold, bronze and iron, wood and stone.' Almighty God responded with handwriting on the wall, and Daniel was called to interpret the writing. He delivered God's judgment upon King Belshazzar for worshiping gods 'which do not see or hear or know,' and for failing to honor the God who gave them breath.
*Greta Van Susteren of Fox News was traveling with me, along with her husband, John. Standing at the temple, I remarked to her that 'these statues can't see, they can't hear, they can't know. The God we worship is alive. He sees, He hears, He knows. And He loves us!' That is good news, and it is a message people in Buddhist countries like Myanmar desperately need to hear.
*After the visit to Myanmar, we were in Vietnam. And our group was riding an elevator up to a meeting on the 35th floor in an office building in Hanoi. Somewhere above the 20th floor, there was a loud bang, and the elevator violently shuddered and began dropping, one jolt at a time.
*We all realized the grave danger if it kept falling. Someone in our group began praying out loud. Partway down, the elevator abruptly jerked to a stop between two floors. Greta, always the reporter, pulled out her camera and started interviewing me about what I was thinking. I simply told her, 'If we go down, -- I'm going up.'" (3)
*Hallelujah, Christians! Our God will carry us all the way home to Heaven! God will carry us, and He will never let us fall! As Jesus said in John 10:27-30,
27. "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.
28. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.
29. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand.
30. I and My Father are one.''
*No wonder in vs. 5, the LORD asks, "To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal and compare Me, that we should be alike?"
2. NOBODY IS LIKE OUR GOD! SO WE SHOULD LET THE LORD CARRY US. BUT WE SHOULD ALSO LET THE LORD CHASTEN US.
*Starting in vs. 6, the Lord began to chasten anyone who worshiped false gods. Of course, this included the pagan Babylonians. But the problem was that many of the Jews were also worshiping the same kind of false demonic gods. That's the main reason why God allowed the Babylonians to destroy Jerusalem and carry away the best of His people.
*That's one of the things Stephen the deacon declared before he was stoned to death by the corrupt Jewish supreme court. It started as soon as they were rescued from Egypt. And in Acts 7:41-43 Stephen said:
41. "And they made a calf in those days, offered sacrifices to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands.
42. Then God turned and gave them up to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the Prophets: 'Did you offer Me slaughtered animals and sacrifices during forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?
43. Yes, you took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, images which you made to worship; and I will carry you away beyond Babylon.'"
*God chastens His people. And one reason why is wasting our wealth. I say this because the LORD talked about wasted wealth in the first part of vs. 6. There the Lord said, "They lavish gold out of the bag, and weigh silver in the balance; they hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god." Well, we may not be buying statues to worship. But there are all kinds of other ways to waste the wealth God has given to us.
*Next in vs. 6, God talks about wasted worship. "He makes it a god; they prostrate themselves, yes, they worship." None of us would ever think about bowing down to worship a golden idol. But Eric Ritz said, "The shape and the size of the idol is not important, -- only that you substitute it for God. It turns out that people can and do make idols out of just about everything. Anything that comes between me and God is an idol in my life. (4)
*And let me ask you this: Your body may be here this morning, -- but what about your heart and mind? Have you ever come to church and just gone through the motions of worship? Have you ever come to church, and completely missed God? I'm sad to say that I have. Maybe you have too, and that's wasted worship.
*But here the Lord also chastened people for wasted work. They were wasting all of their time and energy on those worthless idols. In vs. 7 God said, "They bear it on the shoulder, they carry it and set it in its place, and it stands; from its place it shall not move. . ." That was wasted work.
*Next in vs. 7, God stressed wasted words. There the Lord said, "Though one cries out to it, (though someone cries out to that lifeless idol), yet it cannot answer nor save him out of his trouble." That's exactly what the Buddhists are doing today when they pray to those lifeless statues of Buddha. Their words are completely wasted. But there are many other ways to waste our words: Ungodly anger, gossip, cursing, lies, and more.
*Wasted wealth, worship, work, and words. When God sees these things in our lives, He chastens us. And rightly so. God wants to change our lives. And these changes are so important that our loving Heavenly Father is willing to chasten us. Our Heavenly Father is willing to chasten, and even "spank" us to help us be all we can be in Him.
*Hebrews 12 tells us that this is one of the surest signs of God's love. There God's Word says this to all Christians:
5. . . You have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: "My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
6. For whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives.''
7. If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten?
8. But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons.
9. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live?
10. For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.
11. Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but grievous; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
*God does chasten His children. -- But He ever so patient with us. My dad was a patient father. When I was really misbehaving, he would ask, "Do you want a spanking?" That was warning number 1, and of course the answer was no. But that warning wasn't always enough to get my attention. Then came warning number 2: He would slowly begin to take off his belt.
*At that point, you still had time to repent. But if that belt ever came off, it was going to get used. And it often did. My dad was a patient father. But we can't begin to know how patient our Heavenly Father has been with us!
*In Psalm 103:8-13, King David described God's patience this way:
8. The LORD is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy.
9. He will not always strive with us, Nor will He keep His anger forever.
10. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities.
11. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him;
12. As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.
13. As a father pities his children, So the LORD pities those who fear Him.
*Christians: Our loving Heavenly Father does discipline His children. And we are accountable to Him, so in vs. 8-9, He says:
8. "Remember this, and show yourselves men; recall to mind, O you transgressors.
9. Remember the former things of old, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me."
*God does chasten His children. But it's never to hurt us. It is always to help us. That's why down in vs. 12-13, the LORD says:
12. Listen to Me, you stubborn-hearted, who are far from righteousness:
13. I bring My righteousness near, it shall not be far off; My salvation shall not linger. And I will place salvation in Zion, for Israel My glory."
3. NOBODY IS LIKE OUR GOD! SO WE SHOULD LET THE LORD CHASTEN US. AND WE SHOULD LET THE LORD COUNSEL US.
*We can see why in vs. 9-10 where the Lord said, "Remember the former things of old, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure.'"
*Nobody can counsel us like the Lord God Almighty! He sees the end from the beginning. Nothing ever catches the Lord off-guard. He knows how it's going to turn out. If He says something is going to happen, it's going to happen. And He always knows what we should do next, so He is the best possible guide to our future.
*Verses 10-11 help us understand a key part of God's Old Testament plan. There God declares:
10. . . the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure,'
11. calling a bird of prey from the east, the man who executes My counsel, from a far country. Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it.
*Bible scholars tell us that the "ravenous bird" or "bird of prey from the east" was Cyrus the Great, King of Persia. In his day, he conquered most of the known world with an empire that stretched all the way from India to Turkey. By that time the Jews were under Babylonian Captivity.
*But Cyrus was going to be a righteous man, a good king. And God planned for Cyrus to be the man who allowed the Jews to return to their country. In Isaiah 44:24 and 28 God had already promised:
24. Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who makes all things, Who stretches out the heavens all alone, Who spreads abroad the earth by Myself;
28. who says of Cyrus, 'He is My shepherd, and he shall perform all My pleasure, even saying to Jerusalem, "You shall be built,'' and to the temple, "Your foundation shall be laid.'''"
*King Cyrus was part of God's plan and His promise to His people. But there was a greater promise, a greater plan, a greater Shepherd, a greater King! God the Father promised to send His only begotten Son, the King of Kings, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! God promised to send His Son to save us from our sins by dying on the cross for us, and rising again, forever victorious over sin and death!
CONCLUSION:
*There is an old legend about a great chief who lived on the border of Cyrus' empire. His name was Cagular. He was a mighty warrior who at first ripped Cyrus' forces to shreds. Finally, the Emperor Cyrus massed a whole army who marched down and captured Cagular. They brought him to the capitol for trial and execution.
*On the day of the trial, Cagular and his wife were brought to the judgment chamber. Cyrus was most impressed when he saw this warrior. And he began to reconsider his course of action. He asked Cagular, "What would you do should I spare your life?"
*Cagular answered, "Your majesty, if you spared my life, I would return to my home and remain an obedient servant as long as I live."
*Cyrus then asked, "What would you do if I spared the life of your wife?"
*"Your majesty," Cagular said, "If you spared the life of my wife, I would die for you (today)." The Emperor was so moved that he freed both Cagular and his wife, and allowed them to return home.
*During the trip home Cagular began to talk to his wife about the splendor of Persia. "Did you notice the beauty of the palace and its richness? Did you see the Emperor's chair? It must have been carved from one piece of pure gold."
*"I really did not notice any of that," replied his wife. Cagular was amazed and asked: "What did you see?" Cagular's wife looked deep into his eyes and said, "I only saw the face of the man who said he would die for me." (5)
*Church: Jesus Christ made the same promise for us. -- And He kept that promise when He died on the cross for our sins. The eternal Son of God was miraculously born as a man, lived a perfect life, died on the cross for our sins, and rose again from the dead.
*Now Jesus will save anyone who will truly believe in Him and receive Him as the Lord and Savior of their lives. Trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and He will safely carry you all the way home to Heaven. You can call on the Lord to save you right now, as we go back to God in prayer. Then keep God first in your life, and follow His plan for your life the best way you possibly can.
(1) Sources:
-HALLEY'S BIBLE HANDBOOK by Henry H. Halley - Copyright 1965 - Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids MI, p. 285
-MATTHEW HENRY'S CONCISE COMMENTARY ON THE BIBLE - 1708-1710 - ISAIAH
-GotQuestions.org - "Who was Isaiah in the Bible?" - https://www.gotquestions.org/life-Isaiah.html
-E-STUDY HOME BIBLE STUDY COMMENTARY - by James M. Gray - Chapter "Deliverance through Cyrus" - Isaiah Chapters 40-48 - Copyright 1985, by Kregel Publications
-BELIEVER'S BIBLE COMMENTARY by William MacDonald - Edited by Arthur Farstad - Thomas Nelson Publishers - Nashville - Copyright 1995 - Isaiah 44:1-28 - Downloaded to e-Sword by Rick Meyers - Copyright 2021
(2) Sources:
-http://blog.adw.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/37-Miracles-of-Jesus-in-Chronological-Order.pdf
-https://www.godisreal.today/miracles-of-jesus/
-http://www.aboutbibleprophecy.com/miracles.htm
(3) Franklin Graham Newsletter: "Whatever You Are Going Through -- God Knows" Franklin Graham - March 4, 2015
(4) Adapted from Sermons.com sermon "The Second Commandment: WHAT IS YOUR GOLDEN CALF?" by Eric S. Ritz - Exodus 20:1-21
(5) Sermons.com sermon "The Word and Words" by Maxie Dunnam - Luke 4:14-30 - 2006
