Isaiah 35:4 Say to those with fearful hearts, "Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution
he will come to save you.

What is it that you fear? I think that's a good question to ask
ourselves now and again. Let me share with you some of my fears and see
if they perhaps fit what you are thinking too.
On a general level, I have some fears concerning our society, being good
old Americans. Over the past years I have watched and the thing that
bothers me most is how inadvertently we seem to be teaching our children
to disobey and ignore the rules. Let me give you an example. I recently
spoke with a young man who said, "I missed school today. Mom said I
could. I wanted to make cookies and get my room clean. I have all A's
in school so we figured it would be all right."
I asked that young man, "Because you have all A's in school, can you
steal?" He said, "No!" If you have all A's then can you commit murder
or adultery or lie or cheat?" He said, "No." Then what makes you think
that because you have A's you can skip school because you feel like it?
He didn't have an answer.
I went on to explain to him that what he had done was determined that he
was above the law, above the rules that society establishes for the good
of the whole. It is this idea that leads people to make decisions that
they can sell drugs because people will take them or they can shoot
people because they are upset and feel like it or...I think you get the
idea. I fear we as a society are teaching our children to disobey the
rules if they feel like it and then we defend our "freedom" to do so. In
the end it is dangerous.
Other fears? I could probably list quite a few. That is the dumbing
down our kids. Instead of setting high goals and helping them to achieve
that we are lowering our standards and then act thrilled if they get
close. The materialism of the world bothers me. Take the case of the
money found in the wall recently. It seems to me that splitting the
money is fine, I mean, a $91,000 dollar windfall for two is awesome. But
the two involved want to fight for it all and leave the other out.
That's basic greed. It bothers me that we have lots of people out there
who believe they should have what everyone else has and we should just
give it to them. I fear the loss of dignity, politeness, courtesy and
respect for others. Each group is so intent in fighting for their rights
that they willingly trample the rights of others. My list could go on
and on.
The biggest fear that I have though is related to what I do. I am a
pastor. I fear for the souls of people. I fear that people don't take
the Lord Jesus and his marvel as important. I see Jesus and His Word get
trampled by so many. I see, yes, even in our very own congregation, a
trend to believe the world and its idea of "It doesn't matter what you
believe just so you believe something!" We as a whole proclaim, "Jesus
is my Lord!" The problem is that we act and live like Jesus is some sort
of demanding despot and since he isn't right in front of me I'll just
ignore Him. Yes, I fear that people don't get the awesome grace of the
Lord! I fear for eternal souls!
That's one of the reasons that I treasure the season of Advent. Advent
reminds of the Lord and the way things really are. Advent does that as
it prepares us to celebrate that Jesus came to be our Savior. Advent
does that as it leads us to think about God our judge. They are one and
the same God. Nothing in the standard of God has changed. Jesus is our
Savior and Jesus is our judge. We need to grasp how! Let's then
consider our text for today under the theme: GOD'S COMING. 1st. God the
Savior. 2nd. God the Judge. 3rd. God our strength.
I think everyone here grasps that these words are a prophecy of Isaiah
concerning the Christ of God and God's eternal plan. That plan of God
was completely fulfilled in Jesus, yes, these words came completely true
in Jesus. The problem for most people is that they want to hear about
the one side of Jesus (the Savior side) and ignore the other. That is
perhaps not the wisest thing to do.
What do these words say? First we want to contemplate that simple fact
that "Your God will come." This simply reminds us of the promise of God
to be a force and a factor in the history of this world. For the Old
Testament people these words were the basis of faith. They were to
believe that God was coming, believe that what God has said is and would
be true. For the people of the New Testament these words still serve as
the basis for faith. We are to believe that these words have been
fulfilled and will be fulfilled in Jesus. That means we will want to
continue looking closely at what these words say.
Let's first consider the end of this verse. It says, "He will come to
save you." There is no doubt that these words are about Jesus. Jesus
came to put an end to fear, especially the fear of eternal death and
hell. He did that by serving as our Savior. From the moment of his
conception Jesus perfectly and wonderfully fulfilled this role of Savior.
He did it in a way that we are still bowled over by.
The Son of God came humbly and lowly. Born in a stable and laid in a
manger we find Jesus. He deserved riches and thrones but that wasn't the
purpose of Jesus. Even Jesus told us, "The Son of man came not to be
served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Jesus
came to be our Savior.
What an awesome plan! What human could have ever thought of such a
thing? God sent his Son to perfectly fulfill the law and then to serve
as our atoning sacrifice. Even today it stuns people to hear that Jesus
went to the cross to suffer the pangs of hell for sin, yes, your sin and
mine. Today people scoff at this truth. They say that such a thing
makes God cruel and hateful. They don't understand God's perfect love
for us. God's justice, his perfect justice, demands that sin be paid
for. God the Father sent Jesus who willingly and lovingly determined
that He would pay for sin. That's what they did. God punished Jesus for
us. Jesus took our sins willingly that we might have the gift of eternal
life and salvation. Yes, God has come and he has come to save!
That, dear people, is called the Gospel. The gospel is the message that
Jesus paid for our sins, that Jesus has made it possible for souls to
once again be accounted as heirs of heaven and partakers of the feast of
eternal life. If you don't hear in your church about Jesus dying for and
paying for sin you are not hearing the gospel. If you don'' hear about
the resurrection of Jesus, the actual physical resurrection as the key to
this knowledge, the reality to the hope of God's deliverance you have not
heard the gospel. The gospel is the message of God coming to save.
Please note though that the Gospel does not make void and nullify the
Law of God. Go back and look at two other lines found in this verse.
They say, "He will come with vengeance; with divine retribution." We
wrestle with understanding this but that's only because our sinful nature
wants to ignore the facts. There is the gospel and there is the Law. If
you don't have the gospel, you are under the law and you will then face
and be condemned for your sins.
In Romans, after a rousing presentation of the gospel message and its
gracious salvation this question is asked, "Do we, then, nullify the law
by this faith?" The answer is given right away, "Not at all! Rather, we
uphold the law." Here is the balance we need to grasp. Yes, Jesus has
paid for our sins, that's the message of the cross. But if you think
that it is okay to ignore Jesus, to have the attitude that a few more
nails won't hurt him, then Jesus really isn't in your heart. Without
Jesus you stand before God on your own and God makes it clear that the
unbeliever will completely and eternally face his judgment. That's the
vengeance of God, the divine payment that God has in store for rejecting
the sacrifice of Jesus.
I'll share with you one section of God's Word that we need to
contemplate in this regard. It is perhaps the strongest section of the
Word that addresses exactly what is presented in this verse and what we
are wrestling with. Hebrews 10:26-31 says, "If we deliberately keep on
sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice
for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of
raging fire that will consume the enemies of God...How much more severely
do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of
God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the
covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?
For we know him who said, 'It is mine to avenge; I will repay,' and
again, 'The Lord will judge his people.' It is a dreadful thing to fall
into the hands of the living God."
In a nutshell, it is one thing to say, "I believe in Jesus," but if you
are not living "I believe" you have a problem with God. The key to this
truth is that word "deliberately." If you think you can bend the rules,
change what God has declared, that your excuses for sin are flawless,
that God had just better accept you on your terms...then you had better
study carefully what has just been said. You have a faith problem.
The whole key to this marvel of our verse is found in the opening words:
"say to those with fearful hearts, "Be strong, do not fear." Here is our
human condition. I know that some of you are just waiting for the
service to be over so you can say to me, "Pastor, we shouldn't have any
fears or worries." I know that! The problem is that I am not perfect.
I am both saint and sinner and there are times when my human side gets
the better of me. That's when I have a fearful heart. Even this text
acknowledges those fearful hearts. We struggle with the issues of God
and faith. We fall short of the glory of God. That's not an excuse:
that is a fact. Sometimes I have a fearful heart.
I take great comfort in what the Lord says here. "Be strong, do not
fear." These words remind us to trust in him! He will give the courage.
He will strengthen our weak knees, our failing spirits, our trembling
hearts. God does that through his Son Jesus. To realize that Jesus is
our strength, our fortress, our Rock, our Shepherd, our hope, confidence,
light and life. In Jesus and his promises we find our comfort and joy,
that peace of God that can never be shaken. It can never be shaken
because that peace rests in Jesus and his victory not in me and my
perfection. That's what faith is. Trusting in Jesus. Trusting in the
salvation he has won. Having his strength and righteousness. Knowing
that He gets me through, He calms my fears and makes me realize
everything will be okay because of Jesus. That doesn't mean I don't
think about things and work to make a change. It means that I am a
servant of the Lord, a child of God, a person who strives to be a good
steward of all that God has put us in charge of. My attitude of faith is
that Jesus is my Savior, my Lord and I will out of love strive to follow
him. If our strength is not in the Lord and his Word, we have missed the
point of faith.
Thank you Lord, for this advent reminder. Take away our fears.
Strengthen us in your promises and in the hope of our salvation. Bring
us the sweet comfort of Jesus. Amen.