We're back in Isaiah chapter 42 this morning. If you'd like to use the pew Bible, that should be on page 900 or I'm sorry, 602. Isaiah 42, we're going to read verses 10 through 17, if you're able to stand for this reading of God's word. Beginning at verse 10, the word of the Lord. Sing to the Lord a new song. His praise from the end of the earth. You who go down to the sea and all that fills it, the coastlands and their inhabitants. Let the desert and its cities lift up their voice. The villages of Keter, excuse me, the villages that Keter inhabits. Let the habitants of Sila sing for joy. Let them shout from the top of the mountains. Let them give glory to the Lord and declare his praise in the coastlands. The Lord goes out like a mighty man, like a man of war, he stirs up his zeal. He cries out, he shouts aloud. He shows himself mighty against his foes. For a long time, I have held my peace. I have kept still and restrained myself. Now I will cry out like a woman in labor. I will gasp and pant. I will lay waste mountains and hills and dry up all their vegetation. I will turn the rivers into islands and dry up the pools. And I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know. In paths that they have not known, I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These are the things I do, and I do not forsake them. They are turned back and utterly put to shame, who trust in carved idols, who say to metal images, you are our gods. As for the reading of God's holy word, you can be seated. I wonder if you are the type who likes the new and shiny object. You see that thing that attracts you and you think I can't live without it. Or maybe you're the exact opposite. Maybe you would better be described as the old soul who values tradition, things that have been proven over time. instead of the Keurig coffee maker, maybe like Ray, you like the percolators of yesterday. I have noticed in recent, the last several years, despite our seemingly making progress at breakneck speed with our smart devices, with AI, and all that we're developing and that we've come to really in the last little more than a decade, just things that we can't live without. I have noticed a desire to return to older things. And this is not altogether anything new. You can hear tales of people riding on trains and beginning to long romanticize, the romantic period, being romanticized for things that were before the industrial age and before trains were a thing. And so as they're riding in the train, they're looking out at the countryside and now they're just longing to just be in the countryside and sit there and enjoy nature as things progress rapidly. I've noticed even among my own circles and especially with my own sons a desire to return to things of yesterday, things that are not all that old at all, just a few decades. the days of the 80s and the 90s, the days that I grew up in. And I have to remind my kids at times, oh yes, the 80s and the 90s were really cool. I have to show them every once in a while things to ensure them that not everything was good about those days. And so they like things like square body pickup trucks, things that are analog over that which is digital. I've even seen clothing and hairstyles come back from the 80s and 90s. People are desiring to return to the soft yellow glow of incandescent light bulbs, as opposed to those bright white halogens that we've become accustomed to. Real wood over synthetic materials, and all of these things are sort of nostalgic for me. You even have men, silly men, who wear mustaches again, if you can believe that. And of course, some of this, no doubt, has to do with a nostalgia for simpler times. Again, with the rise of AI and smart devices and the like, people want to return to things that are a bit older, a bit more simple, things that maybe were trusted back in the day or proven true. But of course, things that are older, just because something is older doesn't necessarily mean that it's better. Just because something is new doesn't necessarily mean that it's better. There certainly are new things that we have come to think we can't live without. There are new things that help us with our creature comforts that make our lives easier. And something shouldn't be embraced just because it's new or just because it's old, both old and new. have their place. And when it comes to scripture, both old and new has its place. They have their place. We have exhortations, for instance, from, say, the prophet Jeremiah, who exhorts us to seek out the old paths. But then scripture also speaks of things that are new in a very positive way. The new covenant. The new creation in Christ, that Christ has come to open the new and living way for us. We're expecting, as Peter says, a new heavens and a new earth where righteousness dwells. And we've seen this dynamic of old and new recently in Isaiah and these passages as we've been plotting our way through them. Most recently in these chapters, chapter 41 specifically, God has challenged, remember, the gods of the nations. as to whether they had any knowledge or power to show, to demonstrate whether they were true gods or not. And so the Lord asked them, can you tell us former things? We can elaborate on that a bit. Can you tell us of how those former things came to be? Can you tell us what they meant? And then we had the Lord challenge the gods of the nations by saying, Can you tell us new things, old or new? Do anything. Can you tell us new things, things that are to come? If you can tell us the things that are to come, if you can accurately predict them, then we will know that you, the idols of the nations, that you are gods. But of course, as we've seen, the idols have failed the test, as we sang in Psalm 135 earlier. The gods of the nations, they have mouths, but they can't speak. They have eyes, but they can't see. They're merely carvings. Or as verse 17 says, they're metal images. They are the creations of men. We've seen that it's though the idols of the nations have failed the test, the Lord alone has passed the test. He tells them, I do know about the things that have come to be. And I'm going to tell you about the things that have not yet come to be. I am the one who has the wisdom and the power to declare those things. And so we left off last week with verse 9. Behold, the former things have come to pass and new things I now declare. Before they spring forth, I tell you of them. And what are these new things that are coming? Well, for one, the Lord has told us in chapter 41 of this conquering king named Cyrus, the Medo-Persian king who would conquer the Babylonians and thus he would set Israel free from their exile. But more notably, he has told us at the beginning of chapter 42 of another king who is coming, but he hasn't called him a king in this passage, though he's called him a king before. He is simply called a servant. Behold, my servant, the servant of the Lord. This is the one through whom God is going to save the world. And the arrival of this servant that we saw in verses one to nine, the arrival of this servant on the scene of redemptive history, God telling you these things that are coming to pass. Is so significant. That as we come to verse 10, we find. That a new song is in order. A new song is in order after hearing the news of this new revelation of the servant who is to come. And so what we're going to see now in verses 10 to 17, that is in light of this new revelation concerning the servant. All that God has been telling us here, we're going to see this idea that the arrival of the Lord's servant is reason to break forth into song. Sing to the Lord a new song. The arrival of the Lord's servant is reason to break forth into song. We're going to look at that idea under two headings. First of all, in verses 10 to 12, we'll see that the Lord calls on the earth to sing. The Lord calls on the earth to sing. And then in verses 13 to 17, the Lord gives reason for the earth to sing. The Lord calls on the earth to sing and the Lord gives reason for the earth to sing. Let's look back first then to verses 10 to 12 and see here that the Lord calls on the earth to sing. We've already mentioned it a couple of times, but again, verse 10 begins with these words, sing to the Lord a new song. I wonder if that sounds familiar to you. It should because it is an oft repeated refrain, especially in the Psalms. We find it in Psalm 33 and verse 3. We read of it again in Psalm 96 verse 1, Psalm 98 verse 1, and then at the end of the Psalter in Psalm 149 and verse 1. Sing to the Lord a new song. Now, this does not necessarily mean that the composition of a new poem set to music is in order, although it could be. For instance, as we gathered this morning, we have sung a very new song in terms of church history. We sung a song a moment ago that was written just 30 years ago. And so it could be appropriate to compose a new song in light of this new revelation to the Lord. We certainly have our songs that include the name of Jesus Christ in the hymns of the church that we sing. But it could be that an old song may do. We have sung very old songs again today, as well as new songs. We sang the very words of Scripture in Psalm 135. And though we might sing new hymns that include the name of Jesus, new songs, yet we know that in the new revelation concerning God's Son, as it is revealed throughout Scripture, this servant who was to come, we can also sing the old songs that, though they may not mention his name, they certainly do speak of him. as we sing of the Messiah who was to come, as He is revealed to us in the Scriptures, especially in the Psalms. So new compositions of new poetry may do, but also we might sing old songs. I've come to love this combination of new and old, especially in the Psalms, and most particularly in Psalm 103. Psalm 103, very ancient words, And yet the tune and the meter that we typically sing it to here at Ortega that we have in the last few years as we've gotten the new Trinity Psalter hymnal is my absolute favorite. I would, if it weren't for all of you, we would sing it every Lord's Day to open the service. Come my soul and bless the Lord. And I love it so much that we have even adopted it in our family as a way to give thanks to God upon certain special occasions. It is an old song and yet it is a new way of singing it to this tune. So whether the song is old or whether the song is new, what seems to be in common though when it comes to this idea of singing to the Lord a new song is a fresh realization of the experience of God's grace, or as it is here, it is it is singing of singing, exclaiming, just breaking forth into praise because of what God has done and what he has revealed. And certainly this is a fresh realization of God's grace as we have it revealed to us in the servant. It's this, it's God's grace and coming to a realization of this that causes us to break forth into singing. That is the reason to break forth into new song. And so God is calling upon. The inhabitants of the world to sing. And here in particular, as we we find that the revelation of the servant through whom the Lord would save the world as it comes to be known, as God makes it known, that certainly is an occasion to sing, is it not? The things that we find in verse 9 that God says he will declare merits a new song to be sung to God in verse 10 as we break forth into praise. Something worth singing about. We have a reason to sing and when the church gathers we should sing. Colossians and Ephesians tell us to sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, making melody in our hearts to the Lord. And so we should sing as we gather, we should sing a new song to God concerning these very old things, especially concerning this one that God has revealed, the servant. The one that verse one tells us of the passage that God delights in. The one through whom the Lord has made known His compassion, who doesn't break the bruised reed or quench the smoldering wick. The one who has delivered us and opened our eyes from blindness, who has brought us out of the dungeon. Should we not sing the praises of this one? Should we not sing and declare the mighty works of God in the servant? Our Lord Jesus Christ. Notice who it is who is singing here. Verse 10 tells us that this praise resounds from the ends of the earth. The Lord is calling upon those who go down to the sea and those who fill it. He is calling upon the coastlands here and those who inhabit it, those who inhabit the cities of the desert. He calls upon particular villages here, Keter and Sila. He calls upon general places, again, like mountaintops and the inhabitants by the seas and the coastlands. And then you have this These extremities of the earth that are being described here, the oceans, depths, the mountain heights, you have near, you have far, you have general, you have specific. It's like totality is in view here. Yes, indeed. His praise, verse 9, verse 10, rather, from the ends of the earth. The extremities of the earth and the mountains and the seas and the coastlands convey, as one commentator puts it, convey the idea of the entire earth. All of creation, all of the earth and those who inhabit it are being called upon to sing. You see, the song here to be sung to the Lord is not just the earth rejoicing with Israel because God has sent Cyrus to deliver them from their Babylonian exile. But he has sent his servant, the redeemer, his very own son, our savior, so that the work of the servant extends beyond Israel and to the ends of the earth. All of the world finds salvation in this God through his servant. And so therefore, the appropriate response with these new things concerning the servant being revealed. is that the world would break forth into joyous song that gives praise and honor and glory to the one true and living God. The Lord calls upon the earth to sing. But then in the remaining verses, verses 13 to 17, the Lord gives reason for the earth to sing. Now, we've already spoken a bit about that. We've seen reason in the revelation of the servant who is coming. But now, as we look at these next several verses, we're given further reason to sing. We're given more detail in what the Lord is declaring here. And really, if we've been given reason to sing so far, this should give us more reason to sing. It's like we have this call to sing, but now that the Lord gives us more reason in verses 13 to 17, it should raise our singing another octave higher. Because of all that God is declaring here. And the reason is, I want you to note the subject of these verses here. Who is being spoken about? Verse 13, it's the Lord. Who goes out like a mighty warrior. Again, it's the Lord in verse 13 who is going out and stirring up his zeal, who is crying out, shouting aloud, showing himself mighty against his foes. And then we get to verse 14. Though he has apparently been silent for a lengthy period of time, it's the Lord who says he will cry out like a woman in labor. In verse 15, it's the Lord who says he will bring down the mountains and dry up the waters. In verse 16, it's the Lord who says he will lead the blind. Who will guide them out of their darkness. Again, it's the Lord in verse 16 who says he will make those places that are difficult to traverse, he will he will make it all level ground so that his people can travel easily. And also in verse 16, it's the Lord. Who will not forsake his people. You see, if our singing is being raised another octave here, it's because of the subject of these verses. God is saying, I am going to do all of these things and you have reason to rejoice because of this. Now, if Israel were to look at themselves. If the nation is to look at itself, both the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom as we've been considering all through chapters 1-39, they wouldn't really find a reason to sing, would they? Maybe they would, but if they were to sing, it would be the blues. It would be a song of lament for all that they had done, for the lack of righteousness and justice, for the oppression, for their worship that was only external conformity. For their unrighteousness. For them being a wicked vine that bore no fruit. It would be a song of lament. For all they've done and all they deserved. But now when Israel and by extension, as we've seen, as all the earth is being called upon to praise God and to sing this song. As they look to the Lord. As they consider Him, there is reason to sing a song of praise so that the joyful sound and note is resounding. Because it's God who does these things. God is telling us here that our salvation is entirely owing to Him. Entirely owing to all that he has accomplished as he is the subject of these verses that we have contributed nothing to it. As some have been prone to say, the only thing we contributed to our salvation was the sin that made it necessary. God is the one who delivers. God is the one who does all these things. And so what is left for us to do? Having heard the news of the servant that is coming, having turned away from the path that leads to destruction and having embraced the promise through faith that God is declaring here. What is left to do now but to sing? Knowing that God accomplishes it all. As we continue to consider the Lord as he describes himself here, I want you to note in these illustrations that we have mixed metaphors. It gives us a multifaceted view of all that God is and what he's doing for his people. He describes himself in three ways. The first is as a mighty warrior in verse 13, who conquers his and his people's enemies. He shows himself mighty against his foes. Then in verse 14, the second metaphor here is that the Lord describes himself as a woman in labor. He says there's been a long period of silence here. For a long time, I've held my peace. I've kept still, restrained myself. And surely during the days of exile, it must have seemed like a lengthy period of silence. They must have been asking the question, will the Lord ever fulfill his promise? And then when God finally did fulfill his promise, when he delivered his people from Babylon, when Cyrus issued the decree that they could go back to Jerusalem, When they returned to the land, when Nehemiah rebuilt the wall and the temple was rebuilt, yet still. Still, there was something lacking because those promises that God had made, although they had been fulfilled, it was only partially. There still remained this anticipation, this expectation of what was to come. And then you have from the days of the post-exilic period and those post-exilic prophets, the days of Malachi when the Old Testament canon closes. And all the way to the days of the first century and the days of the Gospels, you have some 400 years of silence. The expectation of the Messiah was growing, it had reached a fever pitch. Still wondering with that expectancy, would the deliverer win and will the deliverer finally come, the servant of the Lord? And then all of a sudden. Though he had held his peace, though he had kept silent and restrained himself, all of a sudden, like a woman going into labor. The fullness of time had come. It's the servant of the Lord, the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ arrives on the scene of history. And though it was long, it came suddenly like labor does upon a woman. The third way the Lord describes himself here is what we find in verses 15 and 16. We've seen the mighty warrior. We've seen this woman in labor. Now it is this leader who is a great pioneer. who paves the way for those whom he is rescuing. Barry Webb puts it this way. Redemption is accomplished with tremendous effort and at great cost. And it is the glory of the Lord that he spares himself neither. It was indeed at great personal cost. As we sang in that hymn, how great the pain of searing loss, the father turns his face away as he gave up his only begotten son. And it also was that with a tremendous effort as this warrior in verse 13 is this man of war who stirs up his zeal. And as this leader, this pioneer before whom no obstacle can stand. We've seen this imagery before, but we find it yet again in Isaiah, that the Lord lays waste mountains and hills. He dries up vegetation and places that are wet, like pools and rivers. He dries them up. We're reading here that no mountain is too high. No valley is too low, no river is too wet or too wide. It's sounding like that old song, you know, I can't remember, The Temptations or something. But this imagery, once again, we find it. This is what the Lord is saying. These obstacles, none of them is insurmountable. The Lord levels out the ground so that he can lead his people safely. On the path that he's prepared for them, and it's not just the geography, it's not just the topography like mountains and rivers and valleys. That aren't too much for the Lord, but it's also that his people's own weakness is not too much for him. In verse 16, though they are blind, he will lead the way. Though they don't know the way. God is going to guide them in these paths and lead them back to himself. When we look at these things, just as we said earlier with Israel and Judah, if they were to look to themselves, it would only be a song of lament. When you look to yourself, friend, you may find doubts. You may find a song of lament. You may find nothing to rejoice in. And this is true. Truly, when it comes to these matters, there is nothing we can do. There's nothing we can do to save ourselves. We cannot release ourselves from the dungeon of our bondage. We cannot give to ourself sight because we are blind. We don't know the way. The obstacles are too great. There is nothing within us that can redeem ourselves because we are in a further and deeper exile than just being away from our homeland. We are estranged and enemies of God in our natural state, in our sin. And so we should doubt ourselves, we should sing songs of lament when it comes to ourselves, there is nothing that we could do for those in verse 13 who are the foes of God, who are trampled underneath the feet of this mighty warrior as he conquers and brings justice into the earth and sets things as the way they should be. But there is not lament here, is there? Yes, there is lament for the enemies of God, but there is hope. That is the major, the dominant note here. Sing to the Lord all the ends of the earth. There is the message of hope here. And that hope is that though you despair of yourself, that you hope in this God. That you find hope, you find rescue, you find salvation in him, that those, as we said, in the assurance of pardon, those who cast themselves upon the mercies of God in Christ, what do they find? They find that God is merciful. The one who trusts in other ways of salvation find that they are beneath the boot of this mighty warrior as he tramples down his foes, because they are those who, in verse 17, who are put to shame because they've trusted in other methods, they've trusted in idols, they've trusted in carved images, they've trusted in things that are formed from metal. They are, again, as we sang in Psalm 135, they trust in those gods who cannot deliver and they become like them. They are put to shame along with those gods who were asked but failed the test as they were put to the test. Can you tell us those former things? Can you tell us the things to come? And they could not. They were put to shame. And so those who trust in those gods are likewise put to shame because in them there is no message of hope. There is no deliverance. There is no salvation. This section has been framed. or bookended with references to the vanity of trusting in idols. You look back in verse 8, before this section began, the Lord says, I am the Lord, that is my name, my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols. God says, I don't share my glory with the gods of the nations. It's I alone who do these things. And then we come to verse 17, the conclusion of our passage, and we find, again, the vanity of trusting in them, because those who trust in them will be put to shame. There is no hope there. All of this is intended, once again, as we've been seeing in recent weeks for Isaiah's audience. Yes, his original audience, but the audience who would read and hear of Isaiah down through the ages, including us who are hearing the message from Isaiah today. It's intended to tell us. That there is only one in whom we may put our trust, in whom we must put our trust. Because in him alone, salvation is found. You see, the arrival of the Lord's servant. We considered last week in verses one to eight, the one through whom the Lord will accomplish these things and the one that the Lord identifies himself with as the servant was the one delivering. But now God is saying, I am the one delivering. Jesus would put it, I and the Father are one. God is through his son redeeming the world. The arrival of the Lord's servant. His reason to break forth into Saul. Do you remember as we were making our way through chapter 41 when the news concerning Cyrus reached the nations? The Lord said, I stir this one up. He's coming from the east or from the north in those two passages. And what did the nations do? What was the response? Remember, it provoked them to fear. They were so afraid that what did they do? They went to their gods and they fortify them. They made sure they were strong and secure so that they could stand like a hurricane was coming. You're boarding up your windows, you're getting the sandbags and you're making everything ready. They were trying to get their gods ready. God said there'll be no match. They vainly trusted in them. But now, note the difference. Whereas the arrival of Cyrus provoked the nations to fear, the arrival of the servant provokes the nations to sing. Because this is not a message of destruction, but rescue and hope and deliverance that he's bringing. It is a reason to sing. Isn't it a fascinating thing that we sing? That's what human beings do. You go to your favorite artists, you go to watch a concert and you hear those songs that you're familiar with and though you've heard them on the radio or you've bought the albums, you've heard them a million times, there's something different about singing those songs live with all of those people and seeing that artist perform the songs on stage. Or you've got the radio playing or the playlist in the background if you're driving down the road or at the gym or wherever you might be or we just whistle and hum, don't we, while we're peeling away at mundane tasks. You're sitting around the campfire and some annoying guy has to take his guitar out or something, right, to show you all his new songs. This is what we do. We sing. No offense to those who might do that. I'm sure it's enjoyable. And it's what we do when we gather as God's people, isn't it? We sing when times are good. We even sing when times are bad. We do have a genre called the blues. We do have songs of lament. It was said by survivors who were aboard the Titanic that as the ship sank, the band continued to play, even as they were going to perish themselves. That's what trusting in idols is like. Whether it's the old gods here, carved in metal images, metal and wood and stone, the old gods of the primitive age, Whether it's the new gods of the modern world, whatever it is, it's promising you hope. It's writing checks that it can't cash. If you're trusting in them, you might even be singing their songs. You're on a ship that is sinking. It's going down. There is no hope. God says you'll be put to shame. But singing this song, however, that we find in verse 10, the new song. In light of the arrival of God's servant is to sing the song of victory because we have abandoned the ship that is sinking. And we have come aboard a new ship, a ship that, yes, it may encounter storms, it may be tossed about in the wind and the waves, but it is a ship that will safely arrive at last at its harbor because the Lord himself is the captain of this vessel. He is the one who is guiding the way as we have seen and leading us even though we don't know the path. And this is why we sing. We are among those of the many coastlands. We are among those of the extremities of the earth who have heard the joyful news of the Lord's faithful servant. And we have despaired of all other hopes. And we have fled to him for rescue. We above all, as God's people, have reason to sing. The call to Isaiah to sing a new song, it begins there. But it ends in the book of Revelation. When we read there in Revelation chapter 5, the saints of God sang a new song. And they said, worthy are you, worthy are you to take the scroll to open its seals for you were slain and by your blood you ransom people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. As they sing, the saints of God sing.