Today we’re in one of the old testament’s greatest chapters. We, like Isaiah here, are called to speak for God in our culture; but we need to know: how does God equip someone for this?
A key part of the way God releases a prophet’s potential is by showing them His glory. That’s what He does with Moses at the burning bush, and that’s what He does here in Isaiah 6.
Isaiah knows that darkness is closing in on the nation, and horrific judgment is coming (5:24-30). And in this time he is called to speak for God. What can prepare you for that? There are several vital lessons here for all who are called to speak for God – as we all are…
The first is obvious: God equips Isaiah by a devastating vision of His colossal glory (v1). (Actually it’s Jesus’ glory, John 12:41. Look how God describes Himself as `us` in v8.) Maybe He will release our potential by revealing His glory to our physical sight; I would love that!- but it happens seldom in history. Most often, this transforming vision comes as the Spirit opens our eyes to His Word (cf 2 Cor 3:14-18). Lord, please help me feed on your Word (and perhaps the old testament is especially helpful for this?) so that I grasp Your glory – or it grasps me!
Then we read of the seraphs; `burning ones`, mighty beings at the sound of whose voices the very temple shakes – but what they do is cover their faces (v2), laying down their potential & power in worship at God’s overwhelming holiness and glory. This vision of God’s utter holiness (v3) is an essential equipping for the prophet. It surely shaped Isaiah: he repeatedly calls God `the Holy One`. It was essential because it enabled him to see his culture aright, that is, prophetically, and to see the consequent inevitability of judgment. But, its first result is personal: `”Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips; and I live among a people of unclean lips…”` As with Job (42:5-6) and Peter (Luke 5:8), really seeing the glory and holiness of God leads to self-knowledge, a seriously humbling awareness of our own uncleanness. So here are two vital equippings for us: first the sense of my own sinfulness – I’m unclean by God’s standards, even in my areas of strength (prophet Isaiah’s lips were his strongest suit). That comes first. And then, my culture also is foul before God; we can’t be used prophetically unless we see our culture as God does, in its uncleanness, materialism, selfishness. (It’s helped me to hear the shock of African Christians at their first exposure to the contemporary UK.) But our culture’s uncleanness is a problem for us too: `Without holiness no-one will see the Lord`, says Hebrews 12 – but holiness isn’t an easy thing to maintain in this culture….
We can’t rush this process of seeing these things as God does; it’s a vital stage in what God is doing in us. But once we’ve grasped them, we’re ready for the gospel’s glory. `One of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for”` (vv6-7). Our sin is atoned for because of the altar, and the new testament will explain: the altar is Jesus’ death for us. Here’s something deeply joyful: God’s destiny is open to us now, unclean though we are and unclean though our culture is, because of the cross… (Still, it’s a `live coal`, and the seraph takes it with tongs because it’s still burning; the cross will go on burning away impurity in people God is going to use, and sometimes that may be painful…)
But now we’re redeemed, we’re enabled, amazingly, to hear the very counsels of God. For He loves people, even in a culture that is so sick (Isa 1:6). Isaiah hears the thoughts of God, the `voice of the Lord`: “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And the response this draws from Isaiah – the essential response of anyone who truly sees the world with the passions God has – must be, “Here am I. Send me!”(v8). Have I said that to God? We are redeemed, but redeemed to (amazingly!) partner with God in His glorious saving mission (John 17:18)…
And there’s something else important here. The surrender that comes from the vision of God is active. It’s not just basking in the dreamy pleasure of our own surrender but where life goes on the same unless God does something drastic. True surrender means actively seeking out God’s purpose for us: `Lord what will you have me to do?` As I look to the next 25 years, might God want me to spend five where Jesus is hardly known? Have I asked Him? And He may well say, `No, I want you right where you are – but I’m so glad you asked!` Or — He may have something more colourful for us… God has a piece of His frontier set aside for each of us; and true surrender to Him is actively seeking it!
But there’s one thing more in this chapter – and preachers tend to stop before they reach it! Here is what God tells Isaiah to say: “Go and tell this people: ‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’ Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes…” (v10). The longer Isaiah preached the fewer people were going to listen; Isaiah is to preach until – until everything is destroyed (v11)! Situations can happen where we speak for God and yet it bears no fruit, because there is such deliberate unbelief; so God’s message is a warning: this culture is at the point of no return. This is what Jesus says to his hearers in Matthew 13, and Paul in Acts 28 – both citing this passage from Isaiah. But it’s hard! And Isaiah’s response is very understandable: ` `For how long, Lord?`- how long will I need to do that? God’s answer may not have been what he wanted!: `Until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the LORD has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken` (v12). Well, that’s motivational…….
Of course at the absolute end we will win, and win gloriously; but there are times meanwhile when the message God’s spokesperson has to give, if they’re to be faithful, is neither pleasant nor fruitful. That’s hard, and reading these verses shows me my weaknesses: throughout my own life it’s been important to me (too important?) that what I do should result in growth, conversions, success… But there are challenging times when God’s spokesperson has (like Jesus) to share a Word that is true but will only result in rejection (and numerical decline); and that doesn’t mean that (s)he has failed …
Times like that demand steel in our souls. Mercifully they are unusual. But how do we arm ourselves for them? The answer to this, at least, is clear: the prophet is readied for the challenge of v11 by the vision of the earlier verses. And us? We want to be used by God however He wishes, and He passionately wants to use us!
So — we need time in God’s Word, time to absorb the vision of this amazing chapter: You are this colossally holy God before whom even the seraphs hide their faces, before whom I am unclean and my culture is unclean… But, through Your cross You’ve made it possible for me to enter Your presence… I receive that with humility, and reverence, and JOY… Here am I then, Your servant, send me; I’m here for Your destiny, whatever that may mean, with my time, my money, my home, my stuff, my marriage. Show me as much as I can handle, let me be gripped by Your glory; knowing too that in the long run my labour will not be in vain (1 Cor 15), that You will indeed do more through me than I can ask or imagine (Eph 3); knowing that in the long run there will be unimaginable reward (Matt 25:23)…!
