The Heritage Of The Servants

THE HERITAGE OF THE SERVANTS

Introduction:

God loves you and knows everything about you. We also love God but we know very little about Him. I firmly believe that God wants to reveal Himself to you.

Some things we know, some things we don’t…some things are difficult to understand about God. And so, we stay clear of those issues. As an example, the ‘wrath of God’.

The ‘wrath of God’ is much too frightening or too negative for some of us to ever want to sit down and study. Let me see if I can be of help to you on this subject.

Text: Isaiah 54:7 thru 10; 17(b)

Let’s look at a few things that have been misinterpreted about God’s nature. For example:

What exactly does “wrath” mean?

There are two types of wrath.

1.The wrath of mankind:

This is the emotion that most of us have to deal with everyday. Typically, it is an emotional response to something that we have no control over. Something may happen to us that we did no want to happen.

More often than not, the wrath in our heart will cause us to overreact.

If we become upset enough, we may become jealous or envious over something. Wrath may cause us to seek revenge (to one degree or another) with someone else. (When we should be seeking the Lord.)

This is never a healthy, or good thing, for any of us to experience.

As a result of mankind’s wrath/anger, we may commit a wrongdoing (crime). This will complicates our life.

Perhaps you did not think you have wrath in your heart.

The Bible says you do…

Ephesians 4:26 says,

"Be angry, and do not sin": do not let the sun go down on your wrath, nor give place to the devil.

For mankind, anger is a normal emotion. Anger means we are exasperated and frustrated with something. But wrath means we have rage, and it is not something God has planned for our lives.

2. The wrath of God:

This is quite different. God’s wrath happens whenever things do not go His way. And we all know that God will always have His way. His way is always in our best interest both in the short term and in the long.

(God is very jealous for our attention. He created us to give Him lots of attention.)

What does the “wrath of God” mean to those who oppose Him? We will answer this, but first put a bookmark in our first text (Isa. 54)

Text: Nahum 1:2-6

Apparently, we do not want God to pour out His wrath/fury on us.

And He won’t as long as we are not His enemies.

Those who oppose God and His ways will face eternal judgment and wrath.

We must fear and dread the wrath of God’s judgment of sin.

Jesus spoke specifically in Matthew 3:7 & Luke 3:7 of the “wrath to come”.

And later, it was the Apostle Paul who declared to the Thessalonians in 1:10 that it would be Jesus who would “deliver us from the wrath to come.”

Many of the false teachers, of today, want us to believe two things –

1. God is not a god of anger and wrath.

2. After we die there will be a heaven awaiting for anybody and everybody.

That is simply not true.

Charles Spurgeon said it well,

“The wrath of God does not end with the death (of the sinner).”

If we read our Bible plainly we will see that the wrath of God’s Judgment is eternal and will never end.

God’s wrath is destined for the enemies of God and for those who reject His plan of salvation.

On the other hand, we find some Good News written to us in our text.

(Now go back to your bookmark). Isaiah 54 gives us a promise that we can shout about. For those who surrender their lives, the bottom line for Isaiah 54 is this -

As Servants of the Lord, God will never be angry with you, nor will He ever rebuke you.

As fierce as God’s wrath is we can easily see this is the “Goodness and Faithfulness of God”.

Question:

What does the “goodness and faithfulness of God” mean to the saint?

God has –

1. Verse 7 says - “Great Mercies (and) He will gather you (KJV) bring you back (NIV)

2. Verse 8 says - “Everlasting Kindness (and) He will have Mercy/Compassion on you

3. Verse 10 says - “His Kindness and Goodness will never depart you

4. Verse 10 says - “His Covenant of Peace will never be removed from you

If you belong to God, He truly has Goodness planned for you.

By this we know that God is also faithful to His people.

He is full of goodness and faithfulness.