Restoring the People of God: A Passion for Restoration

Introduction

Revival and restoration are cousins to each other. I have so looked forward to being with you for nearly a year now. When Tony first dropped the idea of would you be willing to come for a summer series? I said yes. And then as we got closer, I thought, these people have heard me preach before, so I better bring my A game. I’m kidding. Can I just say, and there’ll be much more to say later in the series, we’re closer to the end, but I just want to say from the outset, it’s good to be homeless. And I mean that. We still pray for you guys on a regular basis, and even if it’s just for a few days, we think about you. We pray for you.

We love you. The hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make was leaving this group of people. And the only thing that made it possible was knowing that I was going to do the Lord’s work. And the way that you bid me God speed to do that. So I wanted to say thank you for that at the outset. We praise thee, O God, for the Son of thy love. For Jesus who died and has now gone above. Hallelujah, thine the glory. Hallelujah. Amen. Hallelujah, thine the glory. Revive us again. We praise thee, O God, for the Spirit of light, who has shown us our Savior and scattered our night. Hallelujah. Thine the glory. Hallelujah, all men. Hallelujah, thine the glory, revive us again. All glory and praise to the Lamb that was slain.

Who has borne all our sins and has cleansed every stain. Hallelujah. Thine the glory. There are two words out of this song that I hope by our time, the end of our time together this weekend we are intimately familiar with. That we know them, we understand them, and we appreciate them in ways that perhaps we never appreciated them before. The first is the word hallelujah, which comes from the Hebrew two separate words. One is Hillel, meaning to give praise, and the other Yah, which is a shortened version of God’s name. And so we say, praise God. Hallelujah is to say, praise God. In fact, when we sing hallelujah, praise Jehovah, we’re saying, praise Jehovah, praise Jehovah. And that is very much in keeping with the ways that the Jews would speak there in the time of David, that just to enunciate something twice was to proclaim how important that thing was.

And so no greater thought is there in the 148th Psalm than Jehovah is the center of our praise for all that he’s done for all the creation. For all the things that he has done for us, we will praise the name of Jehovah. Because you can’t talk about revival or restoration.

Without talking about a reawakening of the part of man that is cognizant of who God is. The Hebrew writer speaks this way in Hebrews chapter 12, beginning in verse 28. Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude by which we may offer to God an acceptable sacrifice with reverence and awe for our God is a consuming fire. If we want to work at restoring the person, if we want to get back to restoring God’s people, we need to focus our hearts and focus our minds and focus our attentions on just who God is. Because the second word that I want to bring out in that song that I hope we’re very familiar with by the end of our time together, is the word revival.

Because that’s the goal of restoration. And the word revival, revive us again, is not revival how we typically think of it within medical terminology, that someone is at a point of perhaps a comatose state or something like that, and they wake up. To them, revival, the keenest sense of that word, the most complete sense of that word, means to instill life in something that doesn’t have life. In fact, that is the essence of what God did when he created us out of inanimate matter and breathed into us the breath of life. He gave life to something that had no life. And so before we get too far into this lesson, I want to talk about three different types of revival, or restoration very quickly. We could talk about, and we are going to talk some about this on Sunday, about restoring works.

And oftentimes, when we talk about restoring, this is where our attention gets focused. And I worry sometimes that this is where we hang out. And it is not unworthy of consideration. I mean, absolutely, if you if you are reading through the books of the Kings or 2 Chronicles, and you get to Josiah at the end of 2 Kings or the end of 2 Chronicles, I got to tell you, that guy’s a breath of fresh air, isn’t he? After all the kings that Judah had. And God is already prophesying through Isaiah in the time of Josiah that this is going to happen. Then Josiah comes on the scene, and what happens? God says, I’m going to wait. Because I’m not going to do what I’m going to do while he’s sitting on the throne, because this guy really loves me.

But let me tell you something about restoring the works and tearing down the idols, and that’ll be the focus of one of the sermons on Sunday. It wasn’t just for the sake of works that Josiah was doing the things that he was doing. Because beneath that, undergirding that is restoration of doctrine. And when I think about restorating, restoring doctrine, I think about Ezra in the book of Nehemiah when the law is found. And they gather together there in the court, and he stands, and the people stand for six hours listening to him read from the law, and they’re weeping because they’re hearing things that they have never heard before. Oh, that were the case. When we read the word of God, move to tears over our sins, seeking repentance, seeking, because we are motivated, because it is Jehovah on high speaking to us that we would want to be revived when it comes to doctrine.

But I’m going to tell you don’t revive works without doctrine. You don’t revive doctrine or restore doctrine without heart. And this is the essence of our lesson tonight. We’re going to get into some of these passages in just a second. But I want to start with the one on the bottom of the screen, the 85th Psalm. Because it’s actually the psalm from which the song we just sang was taken. Let’s read together in verse 1. Oh Lord, you showed favor to your land. You restored the captivity of Jacob. You brought him back, basically. You forgave the iniquity of your people. You covered all their sin. You see God’s work of restoration here. You withdrew all of your fury, you turned away from your burning anger.

Restore us, O God of our salvation. And cause your indignation toward us to cease. Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger to all the generations? Now, the psalmist here is going back to some of the things that Moses had said about the law in Deuteronomy chapter 5. Where if they were faithful in those first three commandments, that they would have no other gods before him, that they that they would not make unto themselves any graven images, that they would not take upon themselves the name of the Lord in vain, that he would be faithful to that covenant upon generation after generation, but he would punish tens of thousands if they were to forsake these things. And what the psalmist seems to be saying here is, God, we get it.

We get that we are not where we should have been. Will you not yourself revive? Make us alive, if you will, again. That your people, why? Because we’re tired of being in captivity. So that your people may rejoice in you. Show us your loving kindness. The word loving kindness here is invoking the covenant of God. This is how God described Himself. The Hebrew word Hesed, meaning covenant faithfulness or faithful love. Show us your faithful love, O Lord. And give us or grant us your salvation. I will hear what God the Lord will say, or Jehovah God will say. For he will speak peace to his people, to his godly ones, but let them not turn back to folly. Don’t let them go back to silliness. We have to tell that to Will all the time.

Don’t be silly. You see what the psalmist just said there? Don’t be silly. Don’t be silly in your devotion to God. Let them not turn back to folly. Surely his salvation is near to those who fear him. That sounds like the Apostle Paul. The hour of our salvation is nearer than when we first believe. Surely his salvation is nearer to those who fear him. The glory may dwell in our land. Loving kindness and truth have met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Truth springs from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. Indeed, the Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its produce. Righteousness will go before him and will make his footsteps into a way.

This does not sound like the restoration of work for the sake of works. Nor does it sound like the restoration of doctrine for the sake of doctrine. But rather, this is the restoration of the heart that brings about faithfulness to those things that God has taught that produces the things that God commends and expects of his people. And so this great song that we just say is all about restoring us to what it is that God would have us to be. Notice what he said there in verse 6. Show us your loving kindness and grant us your salvation. He said in verse 1, you’ve restored us from captivity. You forgave our iniquity. You’ve restored us, O God of our salvation. You see, restoration is not simply getting the works right.

It’s not simply the right truth on baptism, although that’s important. It’s not simply attending the right church or listening to the right set of scriptures or putting theology together in the right sort of way. If we’re going to restore who we ought to be, we have to fix our attitudes when it comes to God and place him, as the song says, in the highest place.

You forgave the iniquity of your people. There is an acknowledgement on behalf of the psalmist here, in whatever condition, whatever time this psalm is written, there is an acknowledgement here that the people had transgressed God. And that to transgress God was not simply just to do the wrong thing. It was to invalidate the relationship that they had with God. Why had their punishment come upon them? Because there was iniquity. There was something separating them and God. And they are pleading for him for revival. Restore us, O God, verse 4. Bring us back to life, we would say. Salvation is mentioned. God is depicted as a redeemer or a rescuer. And all of these are an appeal to God because they know in invoking his loving kindness that God is faithful to the covenants that he makes with his people.

And he’s consistent in his character. If you want more evidence that restoration is not simply about works and patterns, I would ask you to turn over to Isaiah chapter 1. In Isaiah chapter 1, beginning in verse 10, the text says, Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom, and give ear to the instruction of our God, you people of Gomorrah. Now, we know this is written in Isaiah, so he’s not actually writing to who here. What are your multiplied sacrifices to me, says the Lord? I’ve had enough of the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of the fed cattle. And I take no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. When you come to appear before me, who requires you of you, this trampling of my cords?

Bring your worthless offerings no longer. Incense is an abomination to me, the new moon and Sabbath, the calling of your assemblies. I cannot endure the iniquity and the solemn assembly. I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts. They have become a burden to me. I am weary of bearing them. So when you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide my eyes from you. Yes, even though you multiply your prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are covered with blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean, remove the evil of your deeds from my sight. Cease to do evil and learn to do good. Seek justice, reprove the ruthless, defend the orphan, plead for the widow. And come now, let us reason together, says the Lord.

Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. And though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool. If you consent and obey, you will eat the best of the land. But if you refuse and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword. Truly the mouth of the Lord. I should have checked this, but I’m I’d be willing to bet you that word Lord there is Yahweh. Covenant name of God. Truly the mouth of Jehovah has spoken. So what are we saying here? Here you have in Isaiah these people that are wanting to correct their worship. They’re wanting to, if we’re going to fix this relationship with God, he’s prophesying through this crazy guy, Isaiah, and he’s talking about all these things God is going to do to us.

So here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to increase our assemblies. We’re going to get together more. We’re going to offer more sacrifices. We’re going to impress God with what we’re doing. We’re going to have more festivals. We’re going to bring the people together more. We’re going to pray more prayers. There’s going to be more blood running down the temple mount. God says, I’m sick of it all. Because what I want from you, what I need from you, what I desire from you is for you to desire to be clean. What I want from you is justice. What I want from you is righteousness. What I want from you is to stop doing evil. And so if we are going to restore the people of God, we have to have a passion for this kind of restoration and a passion for praising Jehovah.

Now, don’t misunderstand me. There are most certainly passages in Scripture that refer and clearly articulate the importance of proper worship. There are passages within all of Scripture, old and new, that clearly articulate the importance of observing proper doctrine. But that work and those observances in those passages, in particular the example we mentioned earlier about Josiah from 2 Chronicles 34 and 35, is flowing from a heart that’s seeking God. And that’s fundamentally the first thing that we have to correct. Because the work of restoration is not an outward one, but an inward one. Brothers and sisters, I don’t care. Nor does God care what our attendance record looks like if our heart is absent from him when we’re together. He doesn’t care about the number of sermons we share on Facebook if they’re not being applied to the heart diligently.

He doesn’t care about the hallmark like greeting card memes that we put out or the words of encouragement that we send to brothers and sisters in Christ that are struggling if the heart is absent from him. Because that’s where the people of God are born. You don’t believe me, we’re going to talk about that later in this series. But just go home tonight and read Romans 2, 3, and 4. And tell me how you identify the people of God who are really children of God. It’s worth noting that in that 85th Psalm, the idea of rival, revival and restoration is akin to taking away the reason for sorrow and replacing it with a reason for joy. And when restoration becomes simply about a change of behavior or pattern of worship, and this is really the danger of kind of second generation Christian mentality.

You notice we don’t talk about that much anymore? When I was growing up, everybody wanted to know what generation Christian are you? My dad told me to answer him, you’re the newest model.

Now I’m an old clunker. Tony’s a classic.

Can I say we don’t find that kind of joy in God until we know what it means to be absent from him? Until we really appreciate that. This is one of the dangers of the mentality of thinking, this is something I’ve tried to derive from the vocabulary of the folks at Centerville, whom I worship with. Growing up in the church. Nobody grows up in the church. We grow up around the church. We all get added to the church the same way. By the blood of Christ. When we obey the gospel with a believing heart. Every one of us has been added the same way. But this I grew up in the church mentality or second generation mentality, we begin to take this attitude if we’re not careful that because I’ve always been close to God and close to God’s people, that my own personal history with sin is not that bad.

That maybe, you know, those people out in the world that are that are really far out there, that they’re really into the into the kinds of sexual immorality or drinking or behaviors that we don’t contone. Whoa, they’re far away from God, but not me. I’ve never been that far away from him. Can I just say that every one of us has been so far away that we only were brought back by the blood of Christ?

The natural outcome of this is that what we see in the younger generations and young people, I’m not trying to put you on the spot, but I want to talk about some numbers very quickly. One study looking at millennials and younger, and I know everybody loves to beat up a millennials. That’s not what this is about. Some of my best friends are millennials. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to say? We ate dinner with some millennials tonight. It’s good. But 40% of that generation sees an attachment of God to God as only sort of necessary. In fact, religion, for what is approaching the majority of that generation, based on the studies I’ve seen is something seen as increasingly negative. And among those who do see it as important, most of them are affiliated with a church, notice the air quotes.

Because of this, not because of necessity or obligation or because they feel that it’s necessary or they’re compelled to do so by Scripture. But because of some communal experience or because it represents some perceived necessary social change. In the minds of many, religion and faith have become so commingled with politics and social justice that they’re inseparable. So the church becomes an institution serving man’s physical needs, which Jesus says is not something good in John 6. Rather than a body of believers who belong to Christ. And I’m not blaming them for this. This is on my generation, X and above. They keep trying to stick me into generation different. I’m X. That’s all I’ll ever be. Something happened, and it’s not hard to identify what? As a response to all kinds of false doctrines that were out there.

Rather than teaching people to praise Jehovah, we taught them basic doctrine without any real foundation underneath that. And when restoration is not about the heart. Even when we follow biblical patterns of belief, repentance, obedience, and baptism. Have we not just traded one idol for another? More than that, we’ve left a generation completely incapable of establishing this relationship because they don’t even know who God is. When’s the last time you pulled out? Used to be number two. I don’t know what it is in your book now, but when’s the last time you pulled out the song that’s based on the 148th Psalm? And just thought about hallelujah, praise Jehovah. The heavens praise his name. You know Paul appeals to that? Romans chapter 1. The heavens are praising the name of Jehovah.

How cool is that? How do you what’s our first lesson about God? Go out and look at the stars. What’s your first lesson about God? Go out and look at the miracle of birth. The miracle of life. Go look at I’ve been amazed at Barrett because I watched him grow up on Facebook. He’s just a little bit younger than Will. And gets just as many pictures out there. How do these little guys go from this squalling little thing that’s about that long? Some of them like Will are about that long when they’re born. To the size that they are now. And hopefully don’t look anything like me when they’re done. How does that happen? God is in that. He created it. He made it work like this.

Can you not see his handiwork? How many times can you accidentally create a universe? I can give you all the atoms that make water, and I can promise you can shake it up in a jar all you want to, and you’re not getting water out of it. There’s more to it than that. There’s more to it than that.

And yet, more often than not, we feel ourselves becoming like the people of Judges 2 in verse 6 when it says Joshua had dismissed the people. And the sons of Israel each went to his inheritance to possess the land. And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who survived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the Lord which he had done for Israel. And then Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110. They had a lot of time to get that right under him, didn’t they? And they buried him in the territory of his inheritance near Tim Natherez. In the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gash.

And all that generation also was gathered to their fathers, and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord, nor yet the work he had done for Israel. Then the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and served, and we say this in Texas, Baals. You know what the pronunciation of that actually is? Ball. Not baseball, football, soccer, ball, but I tell you what, in our generation, you could put that there, couldn’t you?

How much do those things intrude on the hearts of the people of God? When it’s time to teach the children a lesson about getting ready for church the next day. Well, I can’t do that. They can’t be ready for Bible class because we’ve got baseball. You realize there’s less than 500 people in this world that play baseball professionally, right? I graduated with a class of 800. If my entire graduating class went to play in the MLB, I still wouldn’t make the cut. There’s even fewer when you get down to football. Basketball. And I don’t know anything about soccer. Rugby’s fun. But they serve the balls. And I call it that every time I run into it now. And they forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt and followed other gods from among the gods of the peoples who were around them.

And bowed themselves down to them, and thus they provoked the Lord to anger. And so they forsook the Lord and served the ball and the asheroth. And the anger of the Lord burned against them, and he gave them into the hands of the plunderers who plundered them, and he sold them to the hands of their enemies around them, so that they could no longer stand before their enemies.

What you see in verse 17 is yet they did not listen despite all this to the judges. God raised up judges, they wouldn’t listen. For they played the harlot after the other gods and bowed themselves down to them. They turned aside quickly from that way in which their fathers had walked and obeying the commandments of the Lord. They did not do as their fathers. Why’d all that happen? Is it just because they got tired of sacrificing? No, they were still sacrificing to items. It’s because their relationship with God had been replaced with relationships that were more important to them with the people among whom they were dwelling. If we’re going to restore the people back to God, restore the heart of the people, we first have to restore praise for Jehovah.

1. God Sustains Us and Is Deserving of Our Trust

And so, in the time that I have remaining this evening, I want to introduce you to four reasons you can wake up tomorrow and say, Hallelujah. Praise Job. Reason number one, God sustains us, and he is deserving of our trust. Can I show you something in the book of Jeremiah, chapter 17? Jeremiah 17, beginning in verse 5. This is probably short of Jeremiah, short of a couple other passages in Jeremiah, let’s say I’m not going to speculate on which one’s more popular. But this is probably the top three passages that most people know out of the book. Jeremiah 17 and verse 5 says, Thus says the Lord, cursed is the man who trusts in mankind. Can I just say that verse needs to be double underlined starred and triple circled in your Bible?

Every time I say that, I say it differently. But if you see something with a bunch of circles and underlines and stars, just know Jared probably mentioned that might be important. Thus says the Lord, cursed is a man whose trust is in mankind and makes his flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from the Lord. For he will be like the bush in the desert, and he and will not see when prosperity comes, but will live in the stony waste of the wilderness in a land of salt without inhabitants. Blessed is the man whose trust is in Jehovah, whose trust is the Lord, for he will be like the tree planted by the water that extends its roots by a stream and will not fear when the heat comes.

But its leaves will be green. And it will not be anxious in a year of drought, nor cease to yield its fruit. I can’t read this passage and not think about John chapter 4. Can you? Where Jesus is talking with the Samaritan woman at the well. And she wants to know. She says, Look, my father’s told me these mountains are where you’re supposed to come to worship God. You Jews say he needs to get worshipped in Jerusalem. And he says, Woman, let me tell you. The time is coming and now is.

When those who worship God will worship in spirit and truth, and the Father is seeking such. He began that entire discussion by saying, Look, if you knew who it was who was talking to you would ask me for living water. This idea of God giving life to his people is in essence the major theme of the book of John. In fact, at home we’re studying the let us, or not rather, the let us, that’s a sermon I’m preaching later. The I am the statements from the book of John. Not the I am statements. You’d be all over the place in the book of John if you just looked at every time Jesus said, I am. But I am the, where he’s fundamentally focusing them on something that is changing their relationship to God.

And in almost every case that I can think of, it is a life-giving change. When you get to John 6. And he’s speaking to the people that followed him around the Sea of Galilee. And they ate the bread he’d fed 5,000 men the day before, night, including women and children. When you read that in some other gospels, he it says in verse 30 of chapter 6, he says, Look, you didn’t come to me because you saw the miracles. You came to me because you ate the bread. He says, You’re coming to me for the wrong reasons. What they don’t realize is that I am the bread of life. And he goes on to say, the one who eats my body will have eternal life. Get over to John 8.

And he says, I am the light of the world. He’s going to carry that all the way through John 9 with that great passage on the blind man who receives his sight. That’s how he starts that entire discourse. Why was this man born blind? Because I’m the light of the world, and I need to do the works of my Father while I’m here. He says, I am the light of the world in John chapter 8. And the one who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. In John chapter 10, he says, I am the door. He says, All who came before me were here to steal and kill and destroy, but I came to give life and abundantly. That’s a pretty cool thing when you stop and think about it.

I didn’t just come to give life. I came to give you more life than you can ever imagine, abundantly. In that same context, he says, I am the good shepherd. What does a good shepherd do? I lay down my life so that my sheep may live. He says, I am the resurrection in John 11 before he raises Lazarus. He who believes in me will never die. In John 14, he says, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except by me. And in John 15, I am the vine. And he who abides in me bears fruit, and he who does not, dries up and is burned. This says something not only about our relationship with Jesus and the Father, but they also confer things to us that Jesus is doing on behalf of the Father.

Namely, that he came on the Father’s behalf to give life to us. And yet each of these is marked with some sort of contention. The people in John 6, beginning in verse 59, it says, These things he said in the synagogue, and as he taught in Capernaum. Therefore, many of his disciples, when they heard this, said, This is a difficult statement. He’s talking to them about God deserving our trust. God sustaining us. This is too hard for us to understand. He just told you get eternal life. Don’t you think you’d want to work for that? Don’t you think maybe you might want to, before you dismiss this, maybe you might want to go sit down with a guy and have a conversation with him. What did you mean by this bread of life and body and eternal life?

But Jesus, conscious that his disciples had grumbled, said to them, Does this cause you to stumble? What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? He says, What if you’re around for the resurrection? What’s that really going to do? It is the spirit who gives life. The flesh profits nothing. This is what they missed. They didn’t realize he was talking about the Spirit. He says, The flesh is no prophet. I’m not worried about the flesh. I’m worried about the Spirit. These words I have spoken to you, and they are spirit and are life. But there are some of you who do not believe, for Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe and who it was who would betray him.

And he was saying, For this reason I have said to you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him from the Father. And as a result of this, many of his disciples withdrew. And they were no longer walking with him anymore. And so Jesus said to the twelve, You do not want to go away also, do you? And Simon Peter answered him. Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. He who has believed, we have believed and have come to know that you were the holy one of God. You know what I would do to that passage? I would write out beside that. Jeremiah 17. Verses 1 and 2. Cursed is the man whose trust is in mankind.

And makes his, I’m sorry, verses 5 and 6. And makes his flesh his strength. And whose heart turns away from the Lord. Their trust was in what the flesh was doing. They would never be able to be sustained by God because they didn’t trust him. When he says, I’m the light of the world, they tell him, You’re a demon-possessed Samaritan. When he says, I’m the good shepherd, they want to stone in the door, they want to stone him. When he says, I’m the resurrection, your brother is going to live. Martha says, I know you’ll raise him up in the last day, insinuating that Jesus couldn’t do anything about it now. Even the three of John 14, Thomas says, We don’t know where you’re going. Philip says, Can you show us the Father?

2. God Is the Source of Our Victory

These are people that heard and believed. They’re still trying to figure out how they connect fleshly things to God. And he says, Stop looking at those things. You know why? Because God is the source of our strength and our victory. This is something we can wake up tomorrow and say, and we used to call them these when I was young, thank you, God. Because that’s how we taught our kids, or how we were taught. We tried to teach Wilson this too. But the first thing we learn about prayer is to say thank you.

God is the source of our victory. And this is something that we can wake up every morning and say, Thank you, God for. Zephaniah chapter 3 says, But I will leave among you, verse 12, a humble and lowly people, and they will take refuge in the name of the Lord, and the remnant of Israel will do no wrong and tell no lies, nor will a deceitful tongue be found in their mouths, for they will feed and lie down with no one to make them tremble. Shout for joy, O daughter of Zion, shout for triumph, O Israel. Rejoice and exult with all your heart. That’s saying, Rejoice, O daughter of Jerusalem. The Lord has taken away his judgments against you. He has cleared away your enemies.

The king of Israel, the Lord is in your midst. You will fear disaster no longer. And in that day it will be said to Jerusalem, do not be afraid, O Zion, and do not let your hands fall down. The Lord your God is in your midst. A victorious, or the way the NIV renders this, a mighty warrior. Is God your mighty warrior? He will exult over you with joy. He will be quiet in his love. He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy. And I will gather those who grieve about the appointed feasts. They came from you, O Zion. The reproach of exile is a burden to them. And behold, I am going to deal at that time with all your oppressors. I will save the lame, and I will gather the outcast.

And I will turn their shame into praise and renown in all the earth. And at this time I will bring you in. Are you paying attention to this? Even at a time when I gather you together, indeed I will give you renown and praise among all the peoples of the earth. When I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says the Lord, what God was going to do through that people was going to be something that the whole earth would rejoice in. Because God is not just their mighty warrior, he’s our victorious warrior. Paul says as much in Romans chapter 3, when he says in verse 21, but now apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been manifested, being manifested by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ.

I want you to see something right there that he’s not saying that righteousness has no requirements. Right there’s a requirement to be part of the righteousness of God. There’s got to at least be a monicum of faith in Jesus. There’s a lot more to it that we’ll get to later. But I see people use Romans 3 all the time to say, there’s no requirement, there’s no nothing. Be careful about that. There’s a faith, there’s a belief that’s necessary. That word is all over the book of John. Every one of those I am thee statements is contingent upon their believing what he says about being the light and the bread and the good shepherd and the door. His sheep in the door are hearing his voice, they’re coming and following him.

They know that he’s the way to safety. They are believing something about him. Don’t let anybody misuse Romans 3. For there is no distinction for all who have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in his blood. This was to demonstrate his righteousness because in forbearance God has passed over our sins previously committed, for the demonstration, I say, of his righteousness at the present time, so that he would be, look at this, just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. He’s taking care of the problem that we can’t take care of ourselves. Now that doesn’t mean that nothing is required of me.

That doesn’t mean that there’s nothing that I’m not behooved to act that I am not motivated or obligated. But what it means is God won the victory that I can’t win on my own. This is the same kind of statement that you see the Apostle Paul making in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, where he’s assuring them of the resurrection of the dead. In fact, he’s telling them, look, these things have to be so. In verse 50, he says, Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery, we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised, imperishable, and will, and we will be changed.

For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when the perishable will have put on the imperishable, and the mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in what’s that next word? Victory. Oh death, where’s your victory? What happened to your victory, death? Oh death, where is your sting? Where’s the pain? Where’s the unimpeachable strength that you used to have? Used to be able to bind men in their sin, and they could do nothing about it. Jesus solved that problem. Oh death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. You don’t understand that statement unless you read all of 1 Corinthians.

But thanks be to God who gave us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord. God is always granting us the victory through his son. There is not a misfent moment that you will ever have. Trying to live more faithfully with your Savior and better glorify your Father.

3. God Gives Life

Because not only is God the source of our victory, God gives life. Ezekiel 37. Let’s just read this together. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley, and it was full of bones. And he caused me to pass among them and round about. And behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley. And lo, they were very dry. And he said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, you know. And again he said to me, Prophesy over these bones. And he said to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. And thus said the Lord God to these bones, behold, I will cause breath to enter that you may come to life.

Can I pause right here for just a second? I just want to say something. God isn’t doing anything in this passage as marvelous as this is that he did not do in the beginning. God gave life in the beginning. There is no life without God. Everything that moves and lives on this planet was created by him, and you and I were created especially to praise him. Into us he breathed the breath of life. Women fashioned from the rib of man, where we’re given, we’re given there as a as a helper suitable, created in the same manner, but suitable to his opposite, helping with his needs. A beautiful sentiment. Our God specializes in giving life. How wonderful is that? Our God He is alive. What a wonderful song.

Verse 6 I will put sinews on you, and make your flesh grow back on you, cover you with skin, and put breath in you that you may come alive. And you will know that I am the Lord. So I prophesied as I was commanded. And I prophesied, and there was a noise, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. And no, there’s not a great description of where the hip bone connected. And I looked, and behold, the sinews were on them, and the flesh grew, and the skin covered them, but there was no breath in them. So they looked alive, but there was no life in them. What’s he gonna do about that? Then he said to me, Prophesy to the breath.

Prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath. Thus says the Lord God, come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain that they may come to life. So I prophesied, and he commanded as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they came to life and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. Then he said, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, our bones are dried, and our hope is perished, and we are completely cut off. Does that not sound like the message that our society beats into our head on a daily basis? You have no hope. Your religion is in vain. You’re all dying off. Nobody’s interested in God anymore. Nobody wants to hear about Jesus anymore.

We know about science because we got it again. A guy that used to be on television back in the 1990s telling us how to figure all this stuff out. Never listen to a mechanical engineer about genetics, is all I can say. I gotta tell you, I got a lot more faith in what God said about his creation than Bill Nye says about God’s creation. Even if he has taken the pseudonym the science guy, God created the science that he claims to know. Prophesy to them and say to them, Thus says the Lord God, Behold, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of the graves in my people, and I will bring you into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord.

Again, God’s covenant name there. You’ll know I’m Jehovah. You’ll know I’m Yahweh. When I have opened your graves and caused you to come up out of your graves, my people. Look at what he says in verse 14. I will put my spirit within you, and you will come to life. And I will place you on your own land. And then you know that I, the Lord, have spoken and done it, declares the Lord. This is this is exactly the same kind of message that he’s giving in the previous chapter when he talks about to the prophet Ezekiel there taking the heart of stone and giving it a heart of flesh, and he’s going to put a clean spirit within him. It’s not talking about a literal indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit controlling us.

He says, You’re going to have a people who know they are made alive by God and they’re going to live that way. Because that’s consistent with what we see throughout Scripture. When people are moved by the Spirit of the Lord, they are moved to do the thing that God told them to do. And it is about desiring him and respecting the fact that God gives life. And is that not the covenant that he made with us through Jesus? Paul expresses as much in Romans chapter 6 when he asks the question does the abounding grace allow us to continue in sin? Certainly not. Why? Because he took the dead thing and he made it alive by Christ. So now we’re dead to the things that we were once dead in.

This is what our God does. We wake up every morning and we breathe the air he made into the lungs he created according to the design that he set forth in the garden when he made man. And if he says, I’m made alive by his spirit, I’m not going to question that. If he says the blood of his son and the death, burial, and resurrection of his son is the promise upon which I am made alive, according to Colossians chapter 2, I’m not going to argue with that. I’m going to believe that. I’m going to have faith in that. I’m going to be baptized into that for the forgiveness of my sins. Why? Because my God knows what it means to give life and knows how to make it happen.

And that so makes me appreciate the way that Paul worded the pivot of Romans before you get to Romans chapter 12, and he starts talking about being the living sacrifice. He says in Romans 11, and I know this is one of Tony’s favorite passages. Romans 11 and verse 33, O the debts of the riches. Both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgment judgments and unfathomable his ways. For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has become his counselor? Or who has first given to him that it might be paid back to him again? For from him. I bet you can quote this kinship. And through him. And to him are all things. To him be the glory forever.

Amen. Do you know what he just said there? God has made this salvation work just the way that he said it would, and it always works that way. It will never fail to work that way, because God’s the one that put it together. If he says, This gives me life eternally, if he says this makes my spirit alive, if he says this replaces the life of flesh with a living spirit, then I am not going to argue with that because God knows how to make something alive. I don’t. But I will wake up every morning and I will wake the dawn with praises, saying, My God, I thank you that you are the living God and you give life to your people, both at the beginning and at the end.

4. God Gives Hope Through Jesus Our Savior

Because our God is alive. One last one, and it would be unfitting not to end on this, although it will be the last sermon in our series. We ought to praise God because He’s a God that gives hope through Jesus our Savior. Hebrews chapter 6, beginning in verse 11, the text says, And we desire that each one of you should show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end. So that you will not be sluggish, but be imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. For when God made the promise to Abraham, since he could swear by no one greater, he swore by himself, saying, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply you.

And so, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise. For men swear by one greater than themselves. And with them an oath given as a confirmation is that is an end to every dispute. But in the same way, God desiring even more to show to his heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of his purpose. Look at what he says here. Interposed in earth, so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would find strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us. Can I tell you what these two unchangeable things are? I’ve heard people wrestle with this my entire life, and it’s actually really easy. He made a promise. And then he swore an oath.

Did God have to swear an oath to Abraham? No, because his promise was good enough. But because it gave Abraham hope, he made an oath.

But it is better in every way. It is superlative. It exceeds those things. Can I show you why? Because of his next statement. After saying this is the hope that we fled to take refuge, this is our strong fortified city. That’s the idea of refuge. This hope we have as an anchor to the soul. A hope both sure and steadfast, and one which enters within the veil. When Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. And I don’t want to step on Sunday night sermon, but can I tell you what he just said there? Jesus is a better anchor to the soul than the hope and the covenant that he gave to Abraham.

Do you know the thing that ought to cause us to wake up and praise God more than anything? He does not take away his salvation. We can distance ourselves from it, but God does not take it away. We’re going to talk about this Sunday night, but that’s the whole point of Romans 5. Hope doesn’t disappoint.

And then retract that promise callously. Brothers and sisters, we can get there. We can find that rest. We can maintain our hope in our great Redeemer because our living God tells us so.

Conclusion

I would add to that you could also praise him for being your creator. But I think that’s probably woven throughout this. But do we give him praise for these things? Let’s praise him together as we stand and say.