A Sin Sick Nation Part 1

Pastor Mike will be speaking on A Sin Sick Nation Part 1. He will be reading out of Isaiah 1:1-10.

When you and I choose to be stagnant and apathetic in our relationship with God, we begin to live our lives in such a way that we don’t even reflect our godly core values. We begin to distance ourself from God. This is Pastor Mike Sanders.

We’re excited about you tuning in and being a part of Hope Worth Having. And today we’re gonna be in the book of Isaiah. We’re starting a brand new series in the book of Isaiah.

It’s gonna take a long time. It’s a big book, 66 chapters, but we know that God is gonna use it. And so right out of the gate, our first message is a sin-sick nation.

Isaiah chapter one, join me as we study. If you have your Bibles, I want you to join me in the book of Isaiah. We are beginning a new journey through another book in the Bible, and we are beginning the long journey of the book of Isaiah with over 66 chapters.

But I want you to know that I’ll do everything I can to get through the book of Isaiah before the rapture. If the Lord chooses to take us home before I finish, I’ll meet you up there on the hillside up in heaven, and we will finish together. But it’ll be better because I’ll have Isaiah the prophet giving me more clarification, which we could always use, right? Isaiah chapter one.

I want you to follow along with me as we read this great text, this great chapter. And I want you to note that we will cover verse one through 10 this morning. The vision of Isaiah, the son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth. For the Lord has spoken. I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.

The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib. But Israel does not know. My people do not consider.

Alas, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corruptors. They have forsaken the Lord. They have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel.

They have turned away backward. Why should you be stricken again? You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick.

And the whole heart faints. From the sole of the foot, even to the head, there is no soundness in it. But wounds and bruises and putrefying sores, they have not been closed or bound up or soothed with ointment.

Your country is desolate. Your cities are burned with fire. Strangers devour your land in your presence.

And it is desolate as overthrown by strangers. So the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a hut in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. Unless the Lord of hosts had left to us a very small remnant, we would have become like Sodom.

We would have been made like Gomorrah. Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the law of our God, you people of Gomorrah.

When we come to this passage in Isaiah chapter one, Isaiah is speaking to a nation that has left God. When you read verse one, you see the Bible says a vision of Isaiah. You might remember in the Old Testament, the book of Proverbs, that the Bible says that where there is no vision, the people will perish.

It’s not so much as saying that where there is no goals and ambition that the people will perish, as often might be interpreted, but what it is really saying is where there is no revelation from God, the people will perish. When the Bible says that Isaiah received this vision, it is a revelation from God. We see in verse two that it says, hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken.

You jump down to verse 20. Again, Isaiah reminds us that it is God who is speaking. He says, but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

Throughout his message, Isaiah reiterates to the people of God that it is God who has delivered this vision. It is God who is delivering this message, that Isaiah is just an instrument in the hand of God, being used by God to communicate the very words of God. When people visit Edinburgh, they’re often taken to Blackford Hill for a panoramic view of the city of Edinburgh.

It’s a different perspective from the street. It’s a higher viewpoint. And when we come to the book of Isaiah, we are seeing things from a different perspective because the vantage point is higher.

This book is telling us that a message from God who is helping the people to see the big picture. He is helping them to understand what is going on in their nation and what is going on in their own personal lives. As we walk through the book of Isaiah, there will be many striking parallels between this nation, the nation of Judah, or often referred to as Israel, but in this time, there’s a northern and a southern kingdom, and Judah is referred to as this nation of Israel, and it is defined the timeline based upon the kings that rule that you see in verse one.

But you’ll see that very much like Isaiah’s day, so is our day. And this message from the book of Isaiah will be very relevant to us, but we have to be careful that as we study the word of God, that it’s not for someone else, and it’s not for those people, and it’s not for that person just sitting in front of me, but rather it’s for my heart, it’s for my life. It’s what is God saying to me? What is he teaching me through his word? We jump down to Isaiah one, verse five, and again he says, why should you be stricken again? You will revolt more and more.

The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faints. He goes on to describe this sickness of the nation and the sickness of God’s people when he says in verse six, from the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores, that they have not been closed or bound up or soothed with ointment. And that’s why I wanna talk to you today about a sin-sick nation, because Isaiah the prophet is ministering in troubling, turbulent times in the days of Judah’s history and he is using figurative language, metaphorical language for us to help us understand and drive home the point of the great need of God’s work within our own hearts and even within our own nation.

And so I want you to see first of all, this morning is the degree of sin. I want you to go back to verse two and we are immediately ushered into a courtroom. And like a decorative of this hearing, Isaiah the prophet says, “‘Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, “‘for the Lord has spoken.'” The nation, the people of God are going to court and the universe is attending as witnesses.

The judge is the Lord and his people are on trial. Among the charges that are being declared are charges of rebellion against God and insincere faith, apathy by the people in their walk with God. We see this kind of scenario in the book of Deuteronomy.

In chapter 30, the scripture says, “‘I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, “‘that I have set before you life and death, “‘blessing and cursing. “‘Therefore, choose life that both you “‘and your descendants may live.'” Throughout the scriptures, we see this idea of where God is bringing his people into a courtroom and the heavens and the earth are witnesses to the judgments and the accusations that are coming upon his people. And so all of creation hears the evidence.

All of creation not only declares the glory of God, but all of creation witnesses the sick nation of Israel. All of heaven and earth sees the apathy that could even be manifesting in our hearts. Isaiah, like a skilled lawyer, is bringing forth every detail of the nation’s problems.

And I want you to know that, again, we will see that some of these problems are what we’re experiencing right here in America. But don’t forget that God is not just talking to our government and he’s not just talking to political leaders, he’s talking to you and he’s talking to Mike and he’s talking to all of us personally and he is talking to us about our own spiritual lives. And the question that we must consider this morning is have we become sick spiritually? Are there areas in our life where we have become apathetic and distant from God and are we finding ourselves walking through the motions of the activity of loving God and loving people and even celebrating God on a Sunday morning? Are we just kind of here but not really here? Are you with me? What are these accusations that are brought before the heavens and the earth? First is spiritual rebellion.

We look at the end of verse two and he says, I’ve nourished and brought up children and they have rebelled against me. Circle that word or underline the word rebelled. It means to break a contract or it means to sever a relationship.

Here is what God is saying. The children of Israel having been nourished and equipped and blessed and trained by a loving father, a heavenly father who has done nothing but pour out blessings upon blessings and protected and secured his people have severed their relationship with him. They have broken the covenant.

They have broken the relationship and on top of that, they’ve shown ingratitude for what God has done for them. And what is this sin? You see, sin is really rebellion against God. It’s this, sin is saying I wanna live my life the way I wanna live it.

I wanna live my life. Leave me alone, Mike. I wanna live my life how I want to live and don’t tell me what to do.

It is this kind of rebellion that breaks the heart of God. The question for us to think about this morning is have we severed that relationship? Have we allowed other things to come in between us and God? Have we allowed suffering to cause us to be distant with the Lord Jesus Christ? Have we found ourselves so adamant about the things of the world and so devoted to building our careers that we have forgotten our own relationship with God almighty? How many times as a pastor have I seen people with hardly two nickels to rub and yes, together and they can barely make it and they give their life to Christ and God opens one door after another and they begin to do well at their job and then all of a sudden, that becomes their consuming passion and they forget the Lord and he’s on the back burner and we’ll fit God in whenever we can but what’s most important is my job, is my career. Not realizing that it’s God who gives you the wisdom, it’s God who gives you the stamina, it’s God who gives you the strength to be able to achieve all that you might ever do as you walk into this world and as you work that job that you have been blessed with and so many times lacking gratitude, we sever the relationship and we’re very much like the children of God who have been nourished and brought up in Christ but have rebelled or severed the relationship against God.

He goes on to give us more metaphors in verse three. He says, the ox knows its owner and the donkey its master’s crib but Israel does not know. My people do not consider.

You remember that the scriptures teach us in Hosea that my people perish because of a lack of knowledge. We’re not talking about intelligence or we’re not talking about the knowledge of the world but we’re talking about the knowledge of God and the knowledge of Christ and the knowledge of his word and how that becomes a lid in our life and growing in our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. But here, Isaiah reminds us the ox knows, the ox knows where it is blessed from, knows its owner.

The donkey knows its master’s crib and comparing or contrasting, if you will, the ox and the donkey, not always the brightest of animals but yet they’re smart enough to know who feeds them. They’re smart enough to know who it is that has blessed them and strengthened them. They’re smart enough to know these minute details but what about us? What about us? God says in verse three, Israel doesn’t know and my people don’t consider.

The word consider has the idea of contemplating, thanking and looking at or kind of meditating upon. It’s used 84 different times in the entire Bible and it’s a reminder that God is calling us not to just know, not just a intellectual knowledge but to know God, to have a relationship, to walk in sweet fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ and to consider him and to think about him, to rejoice in him and to be able to meditate and contemplate about the greatness of our God. Isn’t God great, a church? Isn’t he, amen? Yes, go ahead and say it, it’s okay.

I know you’re still struggling with these things hanging down, don’t worry. You’re gonna make it, okay? You’re gonna be okay. But I want you to think about this.

Today, a sign of intelligence in our culture is to reject God or to not have any kind of a relation to God. And that’s actually less intelligent, amen? You know, somebody says I’m agnostic. I love to talk to those people.

I’d like to meet more of them because I love to break down the word agnostic which means not intelligent. Or I don’t know anything is how it could be translated. I don’t know anything.

And I think about you declaring you’re agnostic tells me how you really don’t know anything. They can see the beauty of this earth, the heavens declare his glory. They can see the majesty of a sunset and yet they’ll deny that there is a God in heaven.

They’ll see pictures from space and they’ll say there is no God. Only to be disproven by the beauty and the glory of God in all of creation. But I want you to consider this this morning is that you and I may say we’re certainly not agnostic pastor.

We’re not atheists but I wanna ask you this. Maybe you’re not in your what you believe and what you know but are you practically practicing? Agnosticism or atheism? How you live your life? Do you actually demonstrate in your life that you know God and that God knows you and that he lives in you in your conversations? Do you talk like an atheist or do you talk like someone who is filled with the spirit of God? Do you pray? Do you have enough humility in your heart to acknowledge that it’s the Lord who provides all things, everything that you have? He is the source of all that is wonderful and beautiful and good in your life? Or do you just go through your day in a busy hurry? Yes, I believe in God. Yes, I’ll go to church every once in a while.

Yes, I’ll worship the Lord and read my Bible every once in a while. But do you practically live your life as if there is no God? Because that’s what the nation of Israel was doing. They were outwardly religious and we learned from verse 11 all the way down to verse 16 that they went through the motions and buddy, they could put on the show and they could do the performance but their heart was far from God.

Yes, we see that the ox knows and the donkey knows but God’s people do not know and they do not consider. It is astonishing that the ox, the donkeys recognize the voice of God. They recognize the work of God.

They recognize this as creations of God but yet we find ourselves distancing ourselves from God. Look at verse 21 of chapter one, just giving us more insight to the charges against the nation, how the faithful cry has become a harlot, meaning unfaithful. It was full of justice, righteousness lodged in it but now murderers, your silver has become dross, your wine mixed with water.

Your princes are rebellious and companions of thieves. Everyone loves bribes and follows after rewards. They do not defend the fatherless nor does the cause of the widow come before them.

What is the result when you and I choose to not know God like we should, when we choose to be stagnant and apathetic in our relationship with God? We begin to live our lives in such a way that we don’t even reflect our godly core value, that we begin to distance ourself from God. As Christians, we must ask ourselves, are we living under the authority of Christ? Because every time we refuse to submit to his word and to submit to his truth and to follow his path, we are saying, God, I’m in charge, not you. I will run my life how I want to.

We not only see spiritual rebellion but I want you to see that moral declension that takes place. We jump down to verse four of chapter one. A last sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are corruptors.

They have forsaken the Lord. They have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel. They have turned away backwards.

Wow, a lot of different actions that the people have taken. And God is confronting their sin. And in every society, we can see that when sin abounds, that it becomes more and more reckless, uncontrollable.

And we see that it begins to grab a hold of the way people not only think but the way that they live our lives. We think about our nation. We think about a country that was founded on people who were searching to come to a land where they could worship God in freedom.

We think about how far our nation has come and how we have turned our hearts from God and that even now that in our political systems, on their platforms, they deny God and even, I’m gonna knock your socks off, but even in the Republican Party, they say they no longer wanna support traditional marriage and they no longer want to be pro-life because those things won’t win elections. Do you see what’s happening to our nation? Do you see what’s happening to our country? There are times I look at our political figures and I have to be honest and I say, is this the best we got? Out of all the people, 330 some million people that live in America, is this the best we got? And it’s only a reflection of the nation. It’s a reflection of our spiritual life as a nation that little by little, drip by drip, we have been ripping God out of every part of our life and we’ve said we don’t want God in the public square and we don’t want the 10 commandments in the courtroom because they remind us of our sin and they remind us of God’s expectation and they remind us of the calling of who we are in Christ and so let’s hide those things.

Let’s get rid of those things over and over again. And that’s why in verse five, he says, the whole head is sick, the heart is fainting and he reminds us in verse six that the body from the sole of the foot even to the head, we might say just the opposite, from head to toe, the body’s a mess, amen? But here he’s speaking metaphorically to us. From head to toe, yes, our nation’s a mess.

From head to toe, yes, we even as God’s people have gotten away from the truth and what we’ve seen is that even our churches are being afflicted by sin, that sin is infiltrating our churches, churches even here in Franklin County, platforming people who do not even believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, who embrace a lifestyle that is contrary to the word of God, confusion abounding as to what is a man and a woman and people are confused about what genders they are. You ask them, how do you define a woman and they’re offended that you asked the question. You talk about crazy, you say, what’s wrong? I mean, I grew up in a world where that was very clear but why is there so much confusion? Because that leads me to my second point is the damage of sin.

Verse five and six remind us of the damage of sin. There’s no soundness but wounds. There are bruises and sores and so like a battered human body, so it is that our nation and the church has become affected by sin.

Why? Because we want the world to like us. We’re more interested in pleasing the world than we are in pleasing God almighty. What if you woke up every day and said, I wanna please Christ today, I wanna please a holy God today, I wanna live my life for his glory and if other people don’t like it, that’s what they gotta work on.

But that’s what you have, people running around trying to please everybody, trying to please the world so they can grow their church, please the world so they don’t offend the culture, please the world so everybody will be happy when only finding out that the church has become corrupt and sin has invaded and taken over. What is it that are some of the damages of sin? First of all, we might say stupidity. Sin does not help the intellect, it just does not and we could go on and on but again, we find ourselves very much like Jesus said of the Pharisees, swallowing a camel and straining at a gnat.

The things that don’t matter, we’re not focused on and we’re all worked up about it and we really need to get focused on where is our heart and where are we with the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s hard not to read the Bible and see some of the consequences and characteristics in the nation of Israel compared to America. I’m not saying America has replaced Israel or is Israel, please don’t misunderstand me but the prophet made a strong message and he told the people of God that they were sin sick and I believe America is sin sick.

We think our answer is economics or affordability or some other cultural issue but our answer is Jesus. Jesus is the only answer for this nation and I am praying that God would send a revival, a spiritual awakening to this nation and if not the nation, at least perhaps the regions, the states, if nothing else, at least our churches and ourselves that we would be awakened, revived, renewed and committed in our following of Christ. We wanna remind you that we have a website, hopeworthhaving.com, there’s a lot of material there, opportunities for you to learn, to grow.

We encourage you to send us your prayer requests. We want to pray for you so there’s a way that you can contact us and if you’ll just hit that contact button up at the top of the website page then we’ll be glad to pray for you. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.