Isaiah 55:10-13, Psalm 92:1-4, Psalm 92:12-15, 1 Corinthians 15:51-58, Luke 6:39-49.
A). THE WORD GOES FORTH.
Isaiah 55:10-13.
Isaiah 55:10-11 is about God’s words not returning to Him void. At first, we might imagine that God is talking about the weather, with all this talk of rain and snow. And what if there is no rain, nor any melting snows from the mountains of Lebanon? Famine!
Yet God is not just talking about the weather, He is talking about His Word. ‘The seed is the Word of God’ says Jesus in Luke 8:11. And there is, incidentally, such a thing as a famine of the Word of God (cf. Amos 8:11-13)!
The metaphor is this:
1. just as in the cycle of creation the rain and snow comes down, waters the earth causing it to spring forth and bud, giving seed to the Sower and bread to the eater (Isaiah 55:10);
2. “So shall my Word be” -
(i) it shall not return to me void,
(ii) it shall accomplish that which I please,
(iii) and prosper in the thing for which I sent it (Isaiah 55:11).
It is interesting to note that there is a part for man to play in the purposes of God. It rains/snows, the earth brings forth - what? Seed and food. Without the Sower, without the reaper, we starve. So it is with the Word of God. ‘How shall they hear without a preacher?’ asks Paul in Romans 10:14.
There follows God’s encouragement to His people in Isaiah 55:12,
“You shall go out with joy…”
And one of those wonderful word pictures in Isaiah 55:12-13, of the whole of Creation rejoicing with us in His covenant. The last verse, “it shall be a sign” refers to the covenant of David.
B). A SONG FOR THE SABBATH DAY.
Psalm 92:1-4, Psalm 92:12-15.
We open with the declaration, “It is good to give thanks to the LORD” (Psalm 92:1a). Perhaps our prayers are too often loaded down with petitions: but we should be thanking God for past benefits, even as we make our requests known to Him. Furthermore, if we are asking Him in faith believing, we can thank Him in anticipation of a favourable answer in accordance with His will.
“And to sing praises to thy name, O most high” (Psalm 92:1b). This is vocal, not silent. We can be vocal in the privacy of our own rooms, or as we go about manual labour. It is good, too, to be vocal with others (when we have opportunity).
Thus do we “show forth thy lovingkindness” EVERY morning, and “thy faithfulness” EVERY night (Psalm 92:2). Worship is not just for the sabbath day, after all. We may not have the benefit of the full Temple band (Psalm 92:3), but the sweetest praise of all comes from the contemplative heart of the believer, wherever and whenever we may lift our voice in praise to the LORD.
“For thou, LORD, hast made me glad through thy work” (Psalm 92:4a). As the popular chorus suggests, ‘He has made me glad! He has made me glad! I will rejoice for He has made me glad.’
It is a singular work of God in the believer that makes them appreciate the multifarious “works” of Creation, Providence, and Redemption. This is what it is to “triumph in the works of thy hands” (Psalm 92:4b).
“The righteous” are compared to a palm tree, and a cedar in Lebanon: both sturdy long-living evergreens (Psalm 92:12). Just as a palm tree flourishes in the courtyard of a palace in an oasis, and a cedar stands tall no matter what, so those who are “planted in the house of the LORD shall flourish in the courts of our God” (Psalm 92:13).
They shall be immovable, like a tree planted by a riverside (Psalm 1:3; cf. Jeremiah 17:8). “They shall bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing” (Psalm 92:14). Like Caleb, still as strong at the end of his course as he was at the beginning (Joshua 14:11).
Not that this righteousness is anything of our own ‘doing’: it is an imputed, imparted righteousness. It is the LORD who is “upright”: He is “my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him” (Psalm 92:15). Jesus is the rock of my salvation (1 Corinthians 10:4).
C). THE MYSTERY OF THE RESURRECTION.
1 Corinthians 15:51-58.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:51. When Paul speaks of a “mystery” he is not speaking of some secret to be kept, but rather of a hitherto hidden secret now being revealed (cf. Romans 16:25-27; Ephesians 3:3-5; Colossians 1:26).
The Bible uses ‘sleep’ as a euphemism for death. But Paul is saying here that “we SHALL NOT ALL sleep.” In other words, when Jesus returns for His own, some of us will still be living.
“But” he goes on “we shall all be changed.” We are told in the previous verse that ‘flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God’ (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:50) – but whether we are physically dead when he comes or not, we shall “all” be (literally) “transformed.”
1 CORINTHIANS 15:52. We have two indicators for a short space of time. First. “in a moment” speaks in the Greek of an indivisible point of time, an instant. Second, “in the twinkling of an eye” is as quick as a blink of an eye!
The point of time in question is also indicated: “at the last trump.” This trumpet heralds the moment when believers, both dead and living, will be resurrected and transformed.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:53. At this point, each Christian “puts on” an ‘imperishable’ body, and clothes their mortality with “immortality” (the Greek word here suggests ‘without death’).
1 CORINTHIANS 15:54. “Death is swallowed up in victory.” Death is the last enemy (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:26), and it is the Lord GOD who ‘swallows up death forever, and wipes away tears from off all faces’ (cf. Isaiah 25:8).
1 CORINTHIANS 15:55. “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” So certain is this triumph that Paul takes up the Lord’s taunt, ‘O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave I will be thy destruction’ (cf. Hosea 13:14).
1 CORINTHIANS 15:56. “The sting of death is sin.” Death only exists because of the entrance of sin (cf. Romans 5:12).
“The strength of sin is the law” (cf. Romans 7:5), but the law was meant rather to be our schoolmaster to lead us to Christ (cf. Galatians 3:24).
1 CORINTHIANS 15:57. “But thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The victory is ongoing, a present possession. It is a gift of the grace of God.
Jesus was delivered (to death) on account of our sins, and was raised again on account of our justification (cf. Romans 4:25). Our old man is crucified with Him (cf. Romans 6:6); our new man is raised with Him (cf. Romans 6:11).
1 CORINTHIANS 15:58. What lies before the Christian is ‘the hope of glory’ (cf. Colossians 1:27). So Paul encourages us, as “beloved brethren,” to be “steadfast” (unswerving) and “immovable” (rooted) in our Christian walk, life and service: “always abounding in the work of the Lord.”
Because of the resurrection of Jesus, our ‘faith’ is not in vain; neither is our ‘preaching’ in vain (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:14). Because we are “in the Lord,” we are partakers of His resurrection, and therefore “our labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
D). PICTURES FROM THE SERMON ON THE PLAIN.
Luke 6:39-49.
1. The Two Blind Men (Luke 6:39-42).
“Can the blind lead the blind?” asked Jesus. “Shall they not both fall into the ditch?” (LUKE 6:39). There is a certain arrogance about some would-be teachers of others. They boast that they can see, but are in fact blind (cf. John 9:41). They think of themselves as ‘a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness’ (cf. Romans 2:19); but ‘both shall fall into the ditch’ (cf. Matthew 15:14).
“The disciple is not above his ‘teacher:’ but everyone that “has been perfected” shall be as his “teacher” (LUKE 6:40). In practice, Jesus ‘judged not’ (cf. Luke 6:37; John 8:11; John 12:47; Luke 12:14). It was not time yet for Jesus to take on the office of a judge; neither is it time yet for His followers to take that role to themselves!
Jesus illustrates this with His almost humorous (were it not so serious!) picture of the man with a plank in His own eye trying to extract a speck from his brother’s eye (LUKE 6:41-42)! Why are we so busy “beholding” the minor faults of others without “considering” how great our own faults are? How dare we think to correct another when we are not right with God ourselves!
Again, it is evident that we should still be aware and help our erring brother, which is in some sense to exercise judgment or discernment. But if we try to operate on our brother’s eye while we are half blind ourselves then Jesus - according to His own judgment or discernment - has but one word for us: “hypocrite” or ‘play-actor’! First, we must operate on ourselves, seeking out the sin that hinders us and leaving it with the Lord; and then, and only then, are we in a fit state to help the other (LUKE 6:42).
2. The Two Trees (Luke 6:43-45).
Jesus warns us that there will be false prophets in the last days (cf. Matthew 24:11; Matthew 24:24). These are the days in which we live. These false teachers lurk around our doors, and the doors of our churches (cf. 2 John 1:10).
The false teachers are not always obvious: they may wear clerical collars - or not; or have strings of initials after their names - or pride themselves on the fact that they do not. They may seem to subscribe to the right creeds, carry their Bibles, be civil and polite and all. Jesus tells us that we will ‘know them by their fruits’ (LUKE 6:43-45; cf. Matthew 7:16; Matthew 7:20).
But what are these fruits? Elsewhere, Jesus equates fruitfulness with Christ-likeness (cf. John 15:5). The branch is attached to Jesus, the true Vine, and brings forth much fruit in the exercise of His grace and the performance of good works. A true minister must surely possess and demonstrate ‘the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance’ (cf. Galatians 5:22-23). A true minister, too, must be judged by his teaching. Jesus repeats the analogy in Matthew 12:33-34 and adds ‘by your words you shall be justified, and by your words you shall be condemned’ (cf. Matthew 12:37).
3. The Two Builders (Luke 6:46-49).
Mere profession of Jesus’ deity: “Lord, Lord” (LUKE 6:46) will not fit us for entry into ‘the kingdom of heaven’ (cf. Matthew 7:21). The person who will ‘enter into the kingdom of heaven,’ says Jesus, is the one who ‘does the will of my Father which in heaven;’ i.e. the one who, “HEARS these sayings of mine, and DOES THEM” (LUKE 6:47; cf. Matthew 7:24).
What we are looking at in the account of the wise builder who built his house upon a rock (LUKE 6:48; cf. Matthew 7:24-25) is one man’s relationship with Jesus. This man is not a hearer only, but a doer also (cf. James 1:25). That is what it is to build our house upon the Rock (cf. Joshua 24:15). We are not spared the rain, the floods, the winds: but when our lives are built upon Jesus, we are on solid ground (cf. Psalm 18:2).
Conversely, we have the man who was only a hearer of Jesus’ words, but not a doer of them (cf. James 1:22). Jesus likened this man to a foolish builder, who built his house upon the sand (LUKE 6:49; cf. Matthew 7:26-27). Faced with the same rain, floods and winds his work did not endure, but at last came tumbling to the ground: “and great was the fall of it,” Jesus punctuates!
