Isaiah 1:18-20
In Shakespeare’s famous play, Macbeth, there is a scene where Lady Macbeth is found sleepwalking at 2:00 in the morning. Those who find her observe her from a far, frantically wiping her hands. Lady Macbeth was imagining that her hands were stained with blood. She had taken part in the murder of King Duncan. In time her conscience became racked with guilt over her deeds. So stricken was she that in her dreams she imagines that her hands are permanently stained with the blood of that man. Nothing she could do could wipe away that crimson dye. Of course, it was only symbolic of the stain that was embedded upon her conscience.William Shakespeare was one of the greatest play writes of all time. One of the reasons that so many of his works have come to be regarded throughout history is because he understood something of man’s sinful condition. The characters are so captivating because they are people who must deal with the consequences of their actions.
And in portraying Lady Macbeth in such a crazed state, there with a stain so red and so immovable, Shakespeare illustrates each of us and the predicament we are in.
We might not have ever killed anyone like Lady Macbeth, but each of us has the scarlet stain of sin embedded in our souls. And yet, we have something in common with Lady Macbeth. For if we think about our sin correctly, we should think of every coveteous thought or every uncharitable action as attempted murder. Every one of our transgressions is a direct defiance of God. It is an attack on his authority over us. So every time we sin, it is as if we have risen up against God and sought to kill him!
Yet, no matter how wildly depraved we might be, God shows that he is willing to deal with us in a way we do not deserve. No matter how flagrant our defiance is or how deep the stain might go, God extends his loving arm to offer grace to scarlet sinners.
They say that to err is human, but forgiveness is divine. And while we say that to show how virtuous it is for each of us to forgive, it does remind us that God is one whose loving-kindness will never run dry. He extends his favor to all who would receive it.
And in this passage we see God extending that love towards people like us. We who’s sin is of the deepest hue. And God beckons us to turn from our wayward rebellion and receive the offer of his free grace.
If you look at verse 18-19 you will see him doing this. He lays out for us there the essence of his gracious offer.
I. Its essence
And if you examine it, you see just how great an offer it is. These two verses reveal that this is actually a two for one deal. God’s offers of grace is twofold in that He offers you both the grace of pardon and provision.
Verse 18 contains some of the most beautiful words of Scripture. It says, “Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” Now it is passages like these that I fear preaching. It is because they are so beautiful that I don’t want to mess them up. They are just so powerful that I feel that if I say anything I’m just going to destroy its beauty and power.
But what God is doing here is offering you the grace of pardon.
A. The grace of pardon
God is here saying that if you come to him He will forgive your sins.
One of the things that always haunted my youth was grass stains. I was your typical boy and when I went outside I was determined to play hard. Most of the time that involved some activity where I would fall on the ground repeatedly or some other activity that entailed digging my knees into the grass. After having three boys, my mother became an expert in laundry detergents. I remember coming home from one of my first football practices and proudly showing off my new football gear. You can imagine this little kid just as tickled as anything to get his first football outfit: complete with jersey, pads and helmet. My mother’s reaction was not so jolly. I remember her saying, “Of all things, why did they have to make the practice pants white!”
Now your sins are much worse than a little bit of grass stain. They are blood red. They stain that it has left is deeper than a permanent marker. A red Sharpie marker is nothing in comparison to the defilement of your sins. And no matter how hard you work at it, you will never to be able to get the stain out by the work of your own hands. Mom might have been able to do some miraculous things with my football pants, but we can’t do anything like that when it comes to our sin. We can’t make them disappear.
But there is someone who can cleanse the stain. God can wipe them all away, and he will if you look to him for his grace.
Looking out these windows today, doesn’t really give you the picture. The snow here has been around for a while so much of it has turned to various shades of grey. But some of you might remember the first big snow we got this year. You might have looked out the window and seen how beautiful everything was. How pure it was. That’s a picture of the purity you can receive through faith in Christ.
I’ve been reading through the book of Leviticus the last couple of days. And one thing I have come to understand is that there would have been a lot of blood in the temple. So many animals were to be sacrificed each day. The blood was to be thrown on the alter and sprinkled here and there. When the priests were ordained they blood was put on their ear, thumb, and toe. All of it was there to remind us that the stain of sin could only be removed by the crimson tide of Christ’s blood.
Now, because of he went to the cross, your sins may be purged. It does not matter how terrible they may be. The stain can be of the deepest hue or the widest breadth, but God can forgive it and wash you clean.
In Christ, God offers you the grace of pardon. And you should also notice that verse 19 adds to the grace of life to the grace of pardon.
B. The grace of life
It says, “If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land.” This is the language of prosperity and life. God was promising the Israelites much more than what they were currently experiencing. They were being deprived of things that made for a good life. They were coming under God’s curse. God was promising them the blessing of a restored life.
But what I want you to see is that God is ultimately promising more than just a good meal and a place to stay. What this really entails is God’s provision of eternal life! Food and land were just one portion of the full blessing that would overflow to them. God is promising to be the one who gives them life to the full. In essence, God’s saying, “I’m going to provide you with something much better than what you have right now or ever had before.
During the late 1800s English evangelist Henry Moorhouse made several trips to America to preach. On one of these occasions, he was taking a walk through a poor section of the city when he noticed a small boy coming out of a store with a pitcher of milk. Just then, the boy slipped and fell, breaking the pitcher and spilling the milk all over the sidewalk. Moorhouse rushed to the youngster’s side and found him unhurt but terrified. “My mamma’ll whip me!” he cried. The preacher suggested that they try to put the pitcher back together, but the pieces of glass would not stay together. The boy kept crying. Finally Moorhouse picked up the youngster and carried him to a nearby store where the preacher purchased a new pitcher. Then he returned to the dairy store and had the pitcher washed and filled with milk. With that done, he carried both the boy and the pitcher home. Putting the youngster down on his front porch, Moorhouse handed him the pitcher and asked, “Now will your mama whip you?”
A wide smile spread upon his tear-stained face, “Aw, no sir, ‘cause it’s lot better pitcher than we had before.”
That’s exactly what we see going on here. God is offering us something much better than what we deserve. He is promising that if we turn to him, he will give us something much better than we have presently. He is promising us pardon and he is promising us eternal life.
Certainly you can already see that it is an offer you can’t refuse. But this becomes especially apparent when we consider the alternative.
II. Its alternative
In verse 20 it tells us what will happen if we refuse the offer of grace. He says, “But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword.”
Hopefully you see the play on words. You can either eat the best of the land, or be eaten by the sword. This is a figurative way of saying that sinners will get what they deserve. Israel was promised that if they continued in their rebellion, their enemies would over run them and they would be completely destroyed.
Yet this dreadful threat is also applied to anyone who stubbornly resists God. If you continue in your rebellion, you will most certainly meet with death. The curses of God will be poured out on you. You will come to be stripped of all that you have, even life itself. Yet, the sword of Christ is not satisfied by blood alone. It only continues to devour after your breath has ceased. The sword of Christ’s wrath is insatiable in its appetite and its piercings will continue to go unquenched long into eternity.
This is the consequence of rebellion though. Resistance must meet with justice.
I hope you can see that God is holding this out so that you will see how much better the other deal is. God himself does not delight in the destruction of the wicked. It is not something that he takes pleasure in. Yet nevertheless, when push comes to shove, he must execute the due sentence. Sinners will receive their what is owed them.
It is for this reason that I speak to you and ask that you not reject this sweet offer. It would be folly to not take the Lord’s offer of grace.
It is like the story of the two soldiers who were talking about serving Christ. One of the msaid, “I can’t tell you all that the Lord Jesus is to me. I do wish that you would enlist in His army.” The other responded by saying, “I am thinking about it, but it means giving up several things; in fact, I am counting the cost.” An officer happened to be passing by at that moment and heard his remark. Laying his hand on his shoulder he said, “Young friend, you talk of counting the cost of following Christ, but have you ever counted the cost of not following him?” For days that question rang in his ears. He found no rest until he sought it at the foot of the Savior.
You too must count the cost. Sure following Christ will mean giving up certain things in your life. No one can be a friend of the world and a friend of Christ at the same time. You can only have one or the other. But think of the cost of not following Christ. If you reject this offer, you will come to find that you wish you never had. The sword of Christ’s anger will never depart from you. You will be run through with it again and again. Its teeth will only continue bite and to consume your life all through eternity.
If you have not yet received the grace of God, dear friends, do not let the offer pass you by! Some deals you miss and you can live without. But this one you cannot. To neglect the gracious gift of God is only to sign your life over to everlasting destruction.
You wonder though, is it possible to receive this offer? How can you be sure that it is true? How can you know that the terms will truly be applied to you and not be revoked?
III. Its affirmation
We are all wary of scams, are we not? I can’t tell you how many emails I get that have offers of this and that. And they all sound really good. But I know that they are scams. I’ve even been looking on Craigslist from time to time to see if they have any short term jobs available. When I log on to it, a screen comes up warning you to be on the look out for scams.
Charlatans are everywhere now a days. You turn on the TV and you see a commercial for a great blender. Only 19.95. And if you act now, you can get the set of steak knives too. But that blender won’t last but a couple of days.
We are given so many offers, almost every day. We have become wary of any deals that come our way. We even have a saying that goes, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
I would assume that this offer sounds too good to be true. Someone might say, “It sounds nice. Forgiveness is something that I would really like. Having the chance at eternal life sounds great. But I know that I could never have it.”
I know that you could be saying this, because I know many already have. It was interesting reading the commentaries this week. Some of the so called “scholars” couldn’t believe that Isaiah actually wrote this section of the chapter. They say that it simply doesn’t fit with the tenor of the rest of the chapter. They say that the offer of complete forgiveness and eternal life, given freely and unconditionally, in the face of all their offenses, just could not be possibly made by God. It just doesn’t fit with the context here. So they end up dismissing this passage outright. They find it so outrageous, so unbelievable, that they don’t even think this passage was really written by Isaiah.
If you are one of those people who are saying, “How could that ever be?” look at what it says in the last part of verse 20. The passage ends by saying, “for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” This is God’s way of assuring you that this is not a scam. It is not something that was inserted by another writer living some years after Isaiah. It was not made up by any man. This is the very word of God. It was inspired by the Holy Spirit. And God puts this seal on it as sort of a guarantee. You can be sure that you will not be disappointed. So that you won’t have to worry that this deal is going to fall through or not be applied rightly.
You know, we have the saying, “I got it straight from the horse’s mouth.” We say that when we want to get the true word on something. We’ll say something like, “I went over to Jerry’s house and got the scoop straight from the horse’s mouth.”
That phrase came from the world of gambling. When guys were betting on horses, they wanted to try and get the best information on which horse would win. The best sources were the stable boys who were with the horses day in and day out. These boys would know the horses and they would overhear the conversations of the jockeys and the owners. So if you wanted to know which horse was the best, you would go to the stable boys. And you would find your assurance for where you put your confidence in what they said.
Well right here you are getting your information outside the normal circle of communication. You are getting this word straight from the horse’s mouth. Right here, right now, just think that you are hearing God speak. You might be hearing my voice, but it is God’s word you are listening to. You can take God up on his offer because his word is solid. When you turn to him, he will wash your sins away.
Conclusion:
If there was any man who ever struggled with sin, it was Martin Luther. Luther was sometimes so vexed by the multitude of his sins that the concerns would carry over into his sleep. On such night Luther dreamed that he saw himself standing before the Judgment bar. Looking into the open books, he saw opposite his name a fearful list of sins. Some where sins of commission. Others were sins of omission. Some were deliberate sins, and others were sins of thoughtlessness. As he stared into the book, Satan stood beside him, accusing him. “Behold the record of your sins. There is no hope for you.”
But just then, to his inexpressible joy, Luther saw crimson letters being written across the page. The words, “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.” Thus, Satan was silenced and Luther received peace from God.
This is the grace that is afforded us in Christ. When we turn to Christ, we may rest assured that all our sins will be blotted out.
So may I encourage you, dear sinner, to run to the fountain of Christ. Know that its waters will never run dry. Christ extends his hand to you now; he promises that your guilt will be removed and your record wiped clean. Take Christ at his word, and receive him as he is. His blood can make the foulest clean, and though our sin may leave a crimson stain, He can wash it white as snow.
