Blessings friends, Pastor Nick here today. We are in our nesting with Jesus reading in the book of Isaiah. We're going to attempt to finish up chapter nine and move into chapter number 10 in this particular lesson today. We are just so excited. I'm just excited about what God is revealing and showing and doing. the prophetic picture that we find in this vision that was given to the prophet to proclaim to Judah as well as Israel and what we'll see in the coming days how he is making that message known and prophesying to the surrounding nations and the rest of the entire world that God whispered, He spoke to the prophet. and His witnesses that He called together, heaven and earth, and the disciples of Isaiah, and Isaiah and himself, we see the warnings that God has been given. We hear of His wrath that has fallen upon them, and they couldn't even see that God's wrath was upon them, but we find God's wisdom continually reaching out His hand and inviting them to come and follow the ways of God, His willingness to change the course or the direction of individuals who had been caught up and ensnared with the error of this nation and its leadership, and we find the woes, the woes that come to the people in their rebellion toward God. We find Isaiah say, woe is me, I am Undone. I am nothing, God. I'm depleted of myself. I'm depleted of all things. I'm unclean. And God graciously and gently burned something into that man when He purged him and He gave him a zealousness, a passion. And that's what we see in Isaiah 9 in verse number 7 at the very close of that last, verse number 7, the last phrase in there for the zeal, the zealousness, the passion of the Lord, the burning fire. The Lord will see this through. He will perform this. And it is impossible for anything that happens in the kingdom of God today, that you can strip away this principle. You can't take it away from anything that God is doing in the hearts of His people. This zealousness, this burning passion, this pleasure of the Lord to establish this kingdom to set this kingdom up to sustain his kingdom to do this work through his son when he took upon flesh and became our our substitute an example of all living when he became that for us he became he was God's sacrifice to himself because we couldn't offer a sacrifice we were unacceptable there was nothing acceptable to God and what we find here is that this zeal this zeal of increasing of establishing of sustaining the work of God in righteousness and justice. I'll think about a passage, if you would. Turn to Luke chapter 1. Luke chapter 1. The Gospel of Luke chapter 1. And let's get a glimpse of how Jesus made reference to Him being the fulfillment of these promises where these promises begin, we know, in the very beginning in Adam and Eve with the fall of man, but was promised to Abraham this mercy that would come. He says in Luke chapter 1 beginning in verse number 67, this is Zacharias. He's filled up with the Spirit of God. It says, Now his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit, and he prophesied, saying, Blessed is the Lord God of Israel. And all God's people said, Amen. Yes, blessed be the Lord God, for he has visited, he has invaded his people. this interruption of this invasion of the grace of God. And Jesus is the personification of grace for He has visited and redeemed His people and has raised up a horn, a strength of salvation for us in the house of His servant David. as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets, which we're reading about right now, as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets who were ministering to us, as the scripture says in 1 Peter 1, these prophets, Isaiah, he was ministering to us in the last days that this grace would come, that spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets who have been since the world began, that we, should be saved, delivered, rescued, snatched out of the hand or saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us to perform, to accomplish, to finish to fulfill the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember, to bring to mind His holy covenant, the oath which He swore to our father Abraham, to do what? What did He rescue us for? What did He save us for? What did He perform this for? To grant us, that is the believer, that we being delivered from the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life. Oh, my friend, this is the heartbeat of the work of Jesus. This is the heartbeat of the reigning government, the keys that were placed in His hand upon His shoulder that when he opens, no one can close. When he closes, no one can open. This is the mighty God, the Prince of Peace, the Everlasting Father. This is the Counselor. This is Him who shall be known as Wonderful, that He might deliver us from the hand of our enemies and all that hate us. Listen now, He might deliver us from, but what He delivers us from, then He delivers us to. God never takes us from something without placing us in something. God never reveals where we are in life, God never grants us grace to remove that out of our life without replacing that with His goodness. So He delivers us from something, but He always delivers us to something. So it's not enough for me, and it's not enough for me to accept the testimony of those who claim that they are no longer doing what they used to do. That's wonderful. Praise God you're not living in open rebellion. Living for yourself. Living for ways that you wasn't living before. That you're not living like you did when you was in your youthful lust. Well a lot of people do that. You don't need Jesus not to live that away. I mean, people mature and they grow up with wisdom and insight, and they realize that, hey, that stuff caused me harm. That'll cause my children harm. I don't want my kids to do what I did. I didn't need Jesus in my life to recognize that. I was a fool. Foolishness was bound up in me as a child, but as I grew in wisdom and not God's wisdom, but just the atmosphere around me. I recognize those things only create trouble for people in their lives. And I didn't want my girls to go through what I went through. So I had enough sense not to mislead them into those things that I walked in as a younger person. That is common to men. But you see, we have an enemy, and that enemy is our flesh. That enemy is Satan, this devil. That enemy is the world. That enemy is a system of thinking that doesn't factor God into the equation of everyday life. Well, Jesus came to deliver. a promise that was made to grant us liberty, freedom, deliverance from the hand of those things. which were adversaries to our God, and therefore adversaries to the people of God, things that kept his people trapped in darkness, as Colossians would say, and we'll read that in a moment, but notice that, he delivered them from those things, but he always delivers us to, and he delivered them to service, to serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life. So we're looking at an unadulterated, unashamed service for the rest of our life. Why? He's wonderful. He's precious. He's a treasure to us. Why wouldn't you want to know Him and learn more about Him and serve Him and place your hand in His hands, submit your heart to His heart, your mind to be renewed and transformed day in and day out. Does that mean you're not going to battle with the flesh? Does that mean that you're not going to still be tempted with things of this old world? See, our flesh is still corrupt, but God's done something to grant us liberty and freedom from that grip and that That authority of our flesh, the authority of darkness, the authority of Satan, the authority of a world system that doesn't factor God into the equation who is governed by the prince of the air and the spiritual host of wickedness in heavenly places. Those principalities who are manipulating the world that we live in. have been delivered from that authority and their power and we have been placed in the kingdom of God's love in his son that we might that we might serve him serve him wait upon him work for him that we may long for him serve him unashamedly unadulteratedly in righteousness and holiness all the days of our life. Wow, what a words. Always remember that. I pray that God will help us that you burn that in our spirit is that, hey, he delivers us from something to deliver us to something. That is the agenda of God's grace. Colossians, look in Colossians. Colossians chapter number one. Colossians chapter number one, the scripture says, all these rich, life-transforming words. Colossians 1, verse number 3, we find where the Apostle Paul writes to the church at Colossians. He says, We give thanks to God and our Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, praying for you always. Why do we give thanks? Since we heard of your faith, We give thanks to God. We're not thanking men for their faith because you don't thank men for something that is a gift from God. We thank God for your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all the saints. We appreciate the acts of faith and the works of faith and the labors of love, but thanks is always given. I don't know if you've ever really paid much attention to that, but any time, any New Testament writer, Old Testament, whatever it may be, led of the Spirit, which we know God's word is God breathed, so therefore he took these men, used their personalities and the way that they thought their traits about their life and used them to pin His message to us. And we never find in any case where men are ever thanked for their faith, for their love and for their hope. Why? Because they're all gifts of the grace of God. They're gifts of God. Faith can't be without a report from God. It came from Him. It's Him. It's always Him. He's the one teaches us how to love. He's the one that compels us to love. He's the one that teaches us to love the brethren. We don't have to teach one another to love the brother. And God Himself teaches that love comes from Him. It's part of His DNA. It's the gifts that come from above. That from Him who is there is no waiver and a shadow of turning. Who's consistent. Every good gift comes from Him. And faith, love, and hope are gifts from Him. So we never see, never, Fine, you will not find in the scriptures, and if you do, let me know, please, because I've searched, I just haven't come across it, but I personally do not believe you're ever gonna see where men are personally thanked for their faith, for their love, and for hope. So he thanks God for them, and that's what he says. Since we heard of your faith in Christ and your love for all the saints, because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel. All this came to them in the gospel. So that's the gift of God, and that's why he's thanking God. Verse six, which has come to you as it has also in all the world, and it, the gospel, the word of truth, is bringing forth fruit as it is also among you since the very day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth. Oh, that little phrase, in truth, that you heard and knew the grace of God in truth. What was the product of hearing and knowing the grace of God in truth. Well, that's that deliverance. That's that salvation from something and delivered to something. And that's that work of God's work in their heart that we see faith in Christ, love for the brethren and hope for what is to come, which transforms how we live each and every day. Hope that continues to remind me that I'm living in this life in the light of the promised return of him who delivered me from the hand of my enemy, from myself, and also delivered me from the wrath of God. So he delivered me from God himself, but he delivered me from God, delivered me to God. That is that I could be a servant of his. So when there is no fruit of faith, love and hope, no fruit of being persuaded of Christ Jesus to put no confidence in the flesh. When there is no love for the brethren, when people just don't love and are fond of the brethren and want to be with the brethren, to grow with the brethren, to learn with the brethren, to help the brethren, to learn more about the love and the depth of Christ that can't be learned by ourselves. And there is no living beyond the world we live in that we're not just short-sighted and blind to where we are. That was the problem that Isaiah was dealing with. Look, if there is not that fruit of the gospel being manifested, it's because they have not heard nor known of the grace of God in truth because that is when the gospel blossoms out of the heart of people's lives, when they hear and know of the grace of God in truth. What took place? Paul says it here. He says in verse number 12, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. It was the Father who qualified us, in the Beloved, in Christ, who accepted us in Him, who made us His children. He, the Father, He has delivered us, delivered us from the power of darkness, and He delivered us into the kingdom of the Son of His love in whom that Son we have redemption through His blood the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God the firstborn over the creation for by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth visible and invisible whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers all things were created through Him, and all things were created for Him. And He is before all things, He is the preeminence, and in Him all things are held together, they consist. And He is the head of the body, that is the church, who is the beginning, the very firstborn from the dead, that in all things He might have the preeminence, first place. That's delivering us from darkness, and delivering us into the light. From delivering us from hate to delivering us into love. It is God's work. This is what He does. And Paul goes on to say in the rest of the chapter that God has reconciled us into Him. And what is the unwavering validation of this reconciliation? Verse number 23. He says, if indeed, or basically let's say in seeing that you continue in the faith grounded and steadfast and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard and knew in truth. which we preach to every creature unto heaven of which I, Paul, became a minister. There is a difference. There is a difference than having the gospel preached to me and the gospel being established in me. We have way too many people who have settled on having the evidence of Christ preached to them, but not that evidence of Christ being established in them. If you take a bit and just look in 1 Corinthians 1, you will see that Paul said that the evidence was established in in us, not just to us, but in us. We wasn't just preached to. we were delivered when we knew the gospel of the grace of God in truth, and we were delivered from something to something. Now, this is all the product of the zeal of the Lord of hosts. That's why we thank Him. That's why when we hear truth proclaimed, we thank Him. That's why when the gospel is sung, we thank Him. When the messages are preached and filled with the Spirit and anointed of the power and the authority of God, we thank Him. Why? It's the zeal of the Lord of Hosts. Every Jesus-sent missionary, every Jesus-sent message, every Jesus-sent ministry, that is the passion and the zealousness of the Lord of Hosts, fulfilling what He promised through the prophets that He would bring to each of us in the grace of God and that we through the power of God heard and known the grace of God in truth and to him be the glory. Look in Titus chapter number two, Titus, Titus chapter number two. Titus 2, this is some of my favorite passages of Scripture. They just bless my heart of seeing this purpose and this agenda, this aim of God and His grace, this redeeming grace, not a common grace that all men get to participate in. We're talking about God's redeeming grace. eternal work of saving grace that delivers a man from darkness and delivers them into the light. And this is this agenda. Verse 11 of Titus chapter 2 says, that brings or ushers in salvation has appeared to all men. There's no men, no people groups, there's no men. Obviously at that time it had not appeared to every single person on the planet. This was all a beginning work. There were people around the world who still had not heard nor known of the grace of God in Christ Jesus. but there are no people excluded from that. It's not one group of people. It's not one particular nation. It's not one particular nationality. That the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared, has been made manifest before all peoples, all tribes, all tongues, all people groups, teaching us. And that word teaching means to instruct. That is the idea of parental instruction, parental teaching. That it's a personal thing. That God's grace only teaches those that are in the family. that belong to Him. We're talking about a redeeming grace here. This is a parental, fatherly role in teaching. So we're not talking about the grace of God teaches the lost world to deny themselves and to say yes to Jesus. We're saying those that have been delivered from the hand of their enemy, delivered from the kingdom of darkness, delivered from a system that never asks God for help, nor advice, nor seeks Him for a way of living. But we're talking about people that have been birthed into the kingdom, that have heard, and known the grace of God in truth. It's that people that the fruit of that word, that gospel, that grace is bringing forth a product that is of God. So this grace is teaching those that are in the family to deny ungodliness and worldly lust and that we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age. You see that. Teaching us to deny what we've been delivered from and to say yes to what we've been delivered to. and it teaches us how to listen live grace teaches us how to love and grace teaches us how to look how to look to look for the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great god and savior jesus christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us deliver us rescue us Save us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special or procure your people who are zealous for good work. See, the zeal of God gets in the people of God and the people of God become zealous in the things of God because it's God fulfilling the zeal of his will in our life. So we have zeal, we have God's will, and it will be fulfilled. And it's gonna be fulfilled by God through His grace in Christ Jesus in His body for His glory. Grace reaches us in our sin, grace teaches us, and then grace guides us on how to live in this life. Let's read this passage in Titus 2.11-14 again. The grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present times, the present age. looking for the blessed hope and the glorious appearance of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people who are zealous for good works. YOU SEE, GRACE REACHES US IN OUR SIN. IT IMPEACHES US FROM THE THRONE OF SELF-CENTERED LIVING. AND GRACE TEACHES US HOW TO LIVE FOR JESUS, HOW TO LOVE WITH JESUS, AND HOW TO LOOK FOR THE APPEARING OR THE COMING OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. IT TEACHES US HOW TO LIVE and to zealously live for Him. This is all the work of the zeal of the Lord of hosts getting in His people. Why? He delivered us from something and delivered us to something. I don't think there's any clearer or better passage of Scripture that explains the agenda, the aim, the heart of grace. If grace is at work in the life of an individual, If grace is actively at work, this agenda will be the agenda of those people. That is, to reach people in their sin through the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ by God's grace. to teach those people to say no, that is that the grace of God will impeach them from governing and living for themselves and by their own authority. It impeaches, grace impeaches us from reigning upon the throne of our own heart. Jesus takes over that life And then that grace teaches us how to live in the life of Christ, how to love Christ in his people, in his ways, in his word, and it teaches us how to look for Jesus in his coming. He is the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior. Grace teaches us how to live in the light of that return, how to live, love, and look in the light of the return of Jesus Christ. God's agenda in His grace makes all the difference in the world. So we're looking for this agenda. We're looking for this to be manifested in the lives of His people. And when none of these things are evident, there is no blossoming of the fruit of the grace of God at work. We don't see somebody that's been delivered from something and delivered into something for the glory of God. We don't see them saying no to themselves and yes to Jesus. We don't see them taking the message of grace and that reconciliation to go reach people in their sins, see God impeach them from the throne of their life and then teach them how to live and love and look for Jesus. We have somebody that is still anathema. They still condemned in their sins and they still have a need of this grace to rescue and redeem them from their despair and from the darkness that they're in and the depravity that they're trusting in in this life and we need to be a tool that God would use to be able to help them see their need for Jesus. Now that is something that only God can do. You see, grace is what reaches us in that place. We're just a tool in the hand of the Lord Jesus to do what he's asked us to do. So back if you would in Isaiah chapter number nine. Verse number eight reads like this. And the Lord sent a word against Jacob and it has fallen on Israel. All the people will know Ephraim and the inhabitants of Samaria, remember Ephraim is spoken of, it's meaning the northern 10 tribes, Israel, who say in pride and arrogance of heart, That though God do a work that he said he's gonna do, that he's gonna use the Assyrians, he's gonna use all these other people, he's gonna bring them in and ain't gonna overthrow them. He's already said what he was gonna do. He's already going to bring in judgment upon them. It's inevitable. As he told Ahaz within 65 years, these things are going to come to pass. The northern 10 tribes of Israel are going to be dispersed. They're going to be overthrown. That is coming, and it's coming very shortly. It will happen very soon. And what they gonna say that when that word comes, this destruction comes, in their arrogance and in their pride, they are gonna say that this, oh, the bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with hewn stones. We gonna make it better and bigger. The sycamores are all cut down, but we will replace them with cedars. Therefore the Lord shall set up the adversaries of Rezin, or Reason, how you pronounced him, and against him, and spur, God will set it up, God will spur his enemies on, the Syrians before and the Philistines behind, and they shall devour Israel with an open mouth. For all this, his anger is yet not turned away, he's not finished. But see, you can finish fighting with Him. Some people will teach that this is not giving an invitation as much as for them to respond back to God, but more in the light of that God's judgment is not done, there's more to come. And I think that is true in the sense that there is more judgment coming. There is more severe judgment he's not done, regardless of how bad it is and how bad it looks. It's only going to get worse, but I believe it also has within it this word of mercy of saying that look, He's not finished. There is more things coming, worse judgments coming, but you can be finished fighting against Him. You can be finished fighting with Him and take His hand and even though there's more trouble coming that you can rest assured that you can be right with God and do things His way even when that judgment falls upon the land and of course upon you as well. you'll be better off getting right with God and having to go through the judgment with your people for whom you've walked with all these years in your rebellion than have to suffer your rebellion and not receive the mercy of God. So I see that as he extending his hand to say there's still an opportunity and we're gonna see that several times in this particular chapter. But you see in pride, pride, swelled up in the heart of the people because they didn't live for the glory of God. They had already began living where we would take matters in our own hands. We would do it our way. We'll get this thing done. They had learned the ways of the world around them. Remember those Eastern ways, the ways of the soothsayers who observed the times and who are go-getters, and they just do what they want without any regard to what God would have for them. It's not living like Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 teaches us to trust in the Lord, lean not upon our own understanding, acknowledge God in all our ways, and He'll direct our paths. They were not living that way. That was not their way of living. Their way of living was, is that when it gets bad, we'll just get tougher. When hard things come, we'll just get grittier. We'll do whatever it takes. And if the bricks fall down, we'll just continue to rebuild. But the thing is, we're going to make it bigger and better. It doesn't matter what they do, we're going to bounce back. And you see, that's the spirit that we find globally That without looking at, man, we've been wayward. God brought this into our lives. What do we need to do to get right with Him? It's not that. It's that they don't even look at it that way. They look at it as, okay, things happen. Things happen every day. Things happen to everybody. So what does God have to do with that? What does God have to do with us rebuilding? Well, it had everything to do with that. They were under His wrath and His judgment for their rebellion, and out of their pride, they said that they would rebuild. Well, there's a glimpse of this in the book of Malachi. Malachi chapter number one is highlighted in the New Testament as well in reference to the difference between Jacob and Esau. The scripture says in verse number two of Malachi 1, I have loved you, says the Lord, yet you, Jacob, says, in what way have you loved us? He says, was not Esau Jacob's brother, says the Lord? Yes, he was. Yet Jacob I have loved, but Esau I've hated. I laid waste his mountains. I laid waste his heritage. for the jackals of the wilderness. And even though Edom, which is Esau, the descendants of Esau, has said, we have been impoverished, no doubt, but we will return and rebuild the desolate places. And thus says the Lord of hosts, they may build, but I will throw it down. Yes, they shall be called the territory of wickedness and the people against whom the Lord will have a perpetual indignation that I have indignation to award forever." Why is that? What did Esau represent? What was Esau a picture of? Esau is a representation of the flesh. Jacob, though a deceiver, was representation of grace, of the promise of God, what God can do in the life of a person. A man with God in his life, Esau's a man without God in his life. Esau's a picture of a man living by the flesh, operating within the flesh, living according to the ways of the world in his own pride, who says in his own heart that though we may be broken down, though we may be impoverished, we are going to continue to build and we're going to keep getting up and doing it our way and it's pride. Pride is not picky. Remember that pride is not picky. Pride shows no partiality. Pride couldn't care less about your humble beginnings, your honored past, or your lifelong service to God or men. You can be ignorant or you can be brilliant. You can be as dumb as a box of rocks. Pride doesn't care and it cares not how you got to it. It pays no attention. Pride pays no attention to how dirty someone may be, how poor someone may be, or how wise someone may be, or how famous they may be, or how wealthy someone may be. Pride just don't care at all because it doesn't care about you. Pride doesn't care about me. It just wants a little of you, just a little. Because you give pride an inch, it's going to demand a mile from you. And before you even know it, yesterday's humility, like with the northern ten tribes of Israel and Judah, we see them being filled up with pride. They have gotten so far from their humble beginnings. Yesterday's humility turns into pride's disability when you turn it on. Pride is very similar to what I would call like an emergency kill switch. You turn that switch on, you hit that button, and it kills the power source that's brought you up to this point. And that's what was going on with these people. They were operating in pride. Pride disables the God factor in your everyday life. Pride disabled the faith factor and then God disabled the grace factor because we turned on the pride factor. And that's what they did. In Isaiah 9 we see it. God said, this is what I'm going to do. And the people says, do it. We're just going to build and get bigger and better and smarter and wiser. You can tear us down. We're going to build it up again. So instead of God releasing His needed grace for more of His grace upon grace, what we find God is no longer helping them, but fighting against them. Why? You see, when the faith factor in our life has been disabled, we're not listening, we're not paying attention to God. Now the God factor, that is God invading and being with us is disabled because God disabled the grace factor and resist those who turned on pride in their life. Pride is no respect of persons. Who you are, where you've been, who you know, how much or how little you know, that has absolutely no effect on pride's efforts to serve you its best. You can read about this throughout the Word of God. Yesterday just doesn't matter to pride. What matters with pride is what's happening at the moment And pride is always in it to win it and to win you. So remember, God has given us plenty examples of pride in its destruction. And pride, as I've already said, shows no partiality. I see pride. Pride's like an old nasty, flesh-eaten buzzard. It doesn't matter how you died. It just loves death and feeding on rotten flesh. Don't let pride pick you apart, one irritating piece at a time until all you have is one wrecked relationship after another. and you just keep bouncing up in your own strength, doing it your own way. Need to pay attention to what's happening in their life and seek and ask God, God, why are these things coming my way? Why are we in this position? Why are things looking like, I want to hear from you. Don't let the pride buzzards consume you before there is nothing left. Always remember, Jesus raises the dead, and He always lifts those who are humble and contrite in spirit. Isaiah reminds us that His hands are extended. They are extended to us still. So grab His merciful and gentle hand while you still can. God's given us plenty of rich and beautiful examples of those who walked humbly, with him. And that's what we see in these passages here, that God was going to do a work that was going to be extremely hard to deal with. Verse 13 says, that for the people, do not turn to him who strikes them. He's already said, why do I do this? Your head is sick. Your heart is in bad shape. You're weak. You're feeble. Why do you continue to go through punishment? It's not making any difference in your journey. But the Lord in His justice and judgment is saying that, hey, I'm going to cut off the head and the tail from Israel, the palm branch and the bulrush in one day. I'm a cut down the elder and the honorable which he said is the head who's been misleading you taking you down the wrong path which the tale has followed the prophets have followed the tale instead of the prophets speaking for God to direct the head the prophets are just following the leaders and living off of their their abundance and being fattened by what they've given him to tell the people the lies. Verse 16, for the leaders of these people have caused them to err. Both are responsible and those who are led by them are destroyed. Therefore the Lord will have no joy in their young men. He will have no joy in their young men because he keeps saying, like their fathers, Like their fathers, they have gone astray. They have been misled and misguided. God will have no joy in their young men, nor have mercy on their fatherless and widows. For everyone is a hypocrite, and everyone an evildoer, and every mouth speaks folly." Now, in spite of all this, He says, for his anger is not turned away. There's still more to come, but his hand is still stretched out. It reminds me of several passages in the history books of 2 Chronicles, like 2 Chronicles 15. How do you get to a place like this? Well, 2 Chronicles 15 tells us. Let's just go look at it for a moment. 2 Chronicles 15. 2nd Chronicles 15, God says in verse number 1, Now the Spirit of God came upon Azariah the son of Obed, and he went out to meet Asa, Asa being a king, and he said to him, Hear me, Asa, and all Judah, and Benjamin. The Lord is with you, the Lord is with you, now notice the next phrase, the Lord is with you while you are with him. While You are with Him. When we are with the Lord, the Lord is with us. And when God is with us and for us, who can be against us? The Lord is with you while you are with Him. If you seek Him, He will be found by you. But if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. If you release Him, He's gonna release you. Verse 3, for a long time Israel has been without the true God and as a result that resulted in because of they've been without a true teaching priest and without the Word of God. They've had no guidance. They've had no way. They've been without the presence of God because there's been without the knowledge of God. And when you're not, when you don't have the knowledge or the truth of God to walk in, you're not walking with God and God's not with you. The only way to walk with him, you got to abide in him. That's why Jesus said, you can do nothing unless you remain connected in me. unless you're with me, unless you abide in me. If you're not abiding and connected with me, you can do nothing of eternal value or significance. It reminds me of Judges. Look in Judges chapter number 2. Judges chapter number 2, we'll see that once Joshua passed, The leaders in his generation passed, and it only took one generation for them to lose their identity. Identity. You see, the only way to walk into the identity of God is with God's presence, with God's promises, by God's principles, for God's purpose, so that you are identified as the people of God. In verse number 10 of chapter number 2 it says that, Now when all that previous generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the Lord, nor the work for which he had done for Israel. One generation. And we know the result of that. Judges tells us during that time every man was doing what was right in his own eyes. Why? Because they didn't know the Lord. When you don't know the Lord you can't be dangerously strong for the truth upon the earth. And there is no identity. Identity is fundamental to everything godly. The fear of the Lord allows the identity of God to be manifested through our life, but when I don't have the fear of the Lord, I don't know the fear of the Lord, I don't know how to walk in the fear of the Lord, because I don't know the Lord, haven't been being taught by the people of God, you can see why God would have no joy in their young men, no joy in their widows, in their offerings, no mercy to them, because what happened is that there was not an invasion of God's presence upon them. They had no influence of godly leadership and the instruction of God's ways were missing and the end result is the lack of identity of the presence of God in their life. That's exactly what happened as you journey through Judges and look at them They'll get to a place where it got super bad. They cried out for a leader. God come in, delivered, brought them a leader. That leader guided them. And as long as he guided them and the identity of God was re-established in the land, things went well. But when that leader, that strong leader would die, the people would revert back to their old ways. And when they did, that identity was lost. And when that identity was lost, You see wrath. You see judgment. You see the enemy coming in and taking over. It always goes back to an identity of the presence of God upon His people. And when that is missing, for which it was missing in Israel, it was missing in Judah, we find that God keeps warning them to turn to Him because impending judgment is coming when there is a loss of identity. You think about Samson for an example. Samson is one of those guys that had these markers in his life. And everything that he had validated about his life, these markers validated on him that he was identified as a servant of God. And the last identifiable marker was his hair. that he was this Nazarite for whom it had been told that a razor should not be put on his head. He had forfeited all the other identifiable marks, but when that last identifiable mark was off of his life, what do we see? He lost his strength, he lost his way, and it cost him dearly. Identity, the identity of God is identity. far more important than our serenity in this life. Don't ever miss that. Identity is fundamental to everything that God does and we can't walk in His identity without His INSTRUCTIONS. WE CAN'T WALK IN HIS IDENTITY WITHOUT HIS INVASION OF HIS GRACE. WHEN WE LOSE THAT IDENTITY, AND THAT'S REALLY WHAT WE NEED RIGHT NOW IN OUR LAND, IT IS A REVIVAL OF THE IDENTITY OF THE PRESENCE OF GOD UPON THE PEOPLE OF GOD. When His identity is present, and that means that He is present, He is at work, His ways are at work, there are things that God does that He doesn't do when that identity is lost. And people can't distinguish between God's people and the people of the world. We need His identifiable marks upon us, and that's what grace does in our everyday life. VERSE 18 OF ISAIAH CHAPTER NUMBER NINE SAYS, FOR WICKEDNESS BURNS AS THE FIRE. IT SHALL DEVOUR THE BRIARS AND THORNS AND KINDLE THE THICKETS OF THE FOREST. THEY SHALL MOUNT UP LIKE A RISING SMOKE He says, though the wrath of the Lord of hosts, through the wrath of the Lord of hosts, the land is burned up and the people shall be as fuel for the fire. No man shall spare his brother and he shall snatch on the right hand and be hungry and he shall devour on the left hand and not be satisfied. Every man shall eat the flesh of his own arm. Manasseh shall devour Ephraim and Ephraim, Manasseh, together they shall be against Judah. For all this, his anger is still not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still." I encourage you. I encourage you. We need to hear and have a word from Him to walk in. God is telling us that, look, He resists the proud. It gives grace and more grace to the humble. We want the zeal of the Lord of Hosts at work. It is not looking good for the nation of Israel simply because they had been living in error for so long. Their leaders had manipulated and misled them and the people just followed right along suit with them and the consequences are grave and the identity of God had been lost. We want God's identity to be in our lives, in our family. Let's just look at a couple passages where he says, look back up in verse number 13 of Isaiah 9. For the people do not turn to Him who strikes them, nor do they seek the Lord of hosts. Therefore the Lord will cut off the head and the tail. They don't seek Him. They don't turn to Him. They've forsaken Him. They've rejected Him. All those things. But if you look over in Jeremiah, Jeremiah chapter 3. Even after this, before God's judgment of Judah, before the Babylonians come in, we see God pleading with His people. And just like with Isaiah, in chapter number 6, when Isaiah saw the glory of God, he simply confessed his condition God cleansed him, God commissioned him, and God sent him to go do a work for him simply because the man AGREED WITH GOD THAT HE WAS UNDONE AND THAT HE WAS UNCLEAN. AND JEREMIAH CHAPTER NUMBER 3 BEGINNING IN VERSE NUMBER 11 HE SAYS, THEN THE LORD SAID TO ME, BACKSLIDING ISRAEL HAS SHOWN HERSELF MORE RIGHTEOUS THAN TREACHEROUS JUDAH. NOW ALL THAT WE'VE BEEN LOOKING AT, GOT TO KEEP IN MIND ISRAEL'S ALREADY BEEN OVERTHROWN BY THE ASSYRIANS AT THIS POINT. Babylon is projected to come in and overthrow the Assyrians as well as Judah and conquer all the land. And God is saying that Judah has become worse, worse than Israel, the northern ten tribes, Ephraim that He's been referring to in Isaiah. because of God's continual manifested presence among them and it didn't do anything for them. He said go to proclaim these words toward the north and say return backsliding Israel says the Lord. I will not cause my anger to fall on you, for I am merciful, says the Lord. I will not remain angry forever. Only acknowledge, confess, come in agreement that your iniquity is what it is, that you have transgressed against the Lord your God and have scattered your charms, your ways to the aliens, the deities under every green tree, everything that seemed to be promising, you gave yourself to, and you have not obeyed, you have not heeded my voice, says the Lord. That was the problem. They had not heeded the voice of the Lord. Instead, they forsaken Him and gave themselves to everything else. God's word, verse 14, return O backsliding children says the Lord for I am married to you I will take you one from a city and two from a family and I'll bring you to Zion I will and I will give you shepherds leaders that are according to mine heart who will feed you with knowledge and understanding what was God re-establishing among the people when the people turned to him turned from their ways because they trusted the message that God sent to them. God says, when my people get right with me and they're with me, I will ensure they have leaders over them who will feed them with knowledge and understanding of who I am and my ways. And what does God reestablish among His people? His identity among the people. That's what we see. It is simply God is saying in these words that we're turning to Him in trust, turning from the ways of our previous days of how we were living and how we were thinking and how we gave ourselves to everything but Him Just acknowledging the transgression of our iniquity, that it is what it is, seeing it the way he sees it. God says, when you do that, you place your trust back in me. I will give you exactly what you need to continue to walk with me, and I will reestablish my identity and presence in your journey. And that's the message that is to us today when God says, for his anger is still not turned away, but his hand is still stretched out. That's what he's saying. Trust me. Turn to me. Turn from your way. Acknowledge the depths of your iniquity. Just acknowledge it. Confess it. See it the way I see it. I will heal you. I will lift you. and I will give you what you need to walk in my way. Notice it's there again. I'll deliver you from that way of living and I'll deliver you to a way of living that is filled with the knowledge of me so that you can walk with me. That's that Luke 1 passage that he says that I'll deliver you from the hand of your enemies that you might serve me. and holiness and righteousness all the days of your life. From something to something. That's how he works. God bless y'all.