How Beautiful on the Mountains are the feet of Those who Bring Good News
Part 3
27th December 2019
This wonderful prophecy has many applications, and we've looked at several of them:
Isaiah 52:7-12
How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news,
who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation,
who say to Zion, "Your God reigns!"
Listen! Your watchmen lift up their voices; together they shout for joy.
When the Lord returns to Zion, they will see it with their own eyes.
Burst into songs of joy together, you ruins of Jerusalem, for the Lord has
comforted his people, he has redeemed Jerusalem.
The Lord will lay bare his holy arm in the sight of all the nations,
and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God.
Depart, depart, go out from there! Touch no unclean thing!
Come out from it and be pure, you who carry the vessels of the Lord.
But you will not leave in haste or go in flight;
for the Lord will go before you, the God of Israel will be your rear guard.
We've studied the first fulfilment of this prophecy, when the Jewish people returned from exile in Babylon in 538 or 539 BC and God, too, returned to the holy city of Jerusalem. We considered its second fulfillment, that incredibly exciting moment, the turning point of all history, when the second Person of the Holy Trinity was born to a virgin, in a stable, in poverty, for us. We looked at the third fulfilment when, after more than three years of preaching the Good News and healing the sick, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey. Again, God was returning to His temple. And we thought about the very personal fulfilment of the prophecy, God coming to us as individuals by His Holy Spirit when we put our faith in Him.
This week, let's look at the way this prophecy is fulfilled every time a Christian or a church repents.
Isaiah 52:8b
When the Lord returns to Zion, they will see it with their own eyes.
Individual Christians can find themselves in a place where they feel desolate, like God isn't with them anymore, as ancient Jerusalem did. But if we will turn back to God, then God will turn back to us (James 4v8). Also, local, and even national, churches can become desolate, as Jerusalem during the exile.
The church in our own country is attended by fewer people than used to come, and it's been fewer people every year, almost without exception (there have been a couple of years where this isn't true) and this trend has been going on for about a hundred years. The church in England is getting smaller, at least if you measure it by attendance.
We don't know how many of the people who attended church a hundred years ago were truly Christians, so it may be that the church is the same size, or even bigger, but in terms of attendance, it's a great deal smaller. Church buildings, which used to be full, standing room only, can now be three-quarters empty. Some of them are now carpet warehouses or even nightclubs.
Some local churches have been planted and some have grown but, on the whole, churches are getting smaller. Nationally, the church is getting smaller all the time.
And you have to wonder if there some idolatry in the church. Has the church taken its eyes off God and looked at something else? Perhaps the British church is more interested in being acceptable to the society around us than we are in Holy Scripture. And if that's true - well, at least we won't go to jail - but on the other hand, if we don't honour God's holy word, why should we expect God to honour us?
If we don't preach the truth, why do we imagine people are going to come and hear what we've got to say? If we're just going to echo whatever we see on the BBC or read in The Guardian, why bother coming to church to listen to us? If we can't offer a distinctive, godly, holy, pure voice, what can we offer? Why would our church grow if we water down God's word? How will the church grow if we preach God's word but don't live it? The average non-Christian can spot a hypocrite a mile off.
So it's not surprising that the national church is getting smaller, because there are many churches that don't preach the Bible, all the Bible, and nothing but the Bible. And there are many Christians - perhaps all of us - who obey it rather less than we read it.
But revival can come. It's come to this country several times in the past. It will probably come several times in the future. It can certainly come once more, can't it? If God finds in the church a holy remnant, who will take the scriptures seriously - so seriously that they will preach it, and so seriously that they will live it, and pray it, and seek His face - will not God come back in revival power? Surely He will. And we will say together, "How lovely on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news!"
Isaiah 52:8-9
Listen! Your watchmen lift up their voices; together they shout for joy.
When the Lord returns to Zion, they will see it with their own eyes.
Burst into songs of joy together, you ruins of Jerusalem, for the Lord has
comforted his people, he has redeemed Jerusalem.
You ruins of the English church, burst into songs of joy! The Lord will lay bare his holy arm again in England. In the sight of all the nations and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God. Revival will come!
But there is a word of caution and correction in this wonderful promise of scripture:
Isaiah 52:11
Depart, depart, go out from there! Touch no unclean thing!
Come out from it and be pure, you who carry the vessels of the Lord.
When God returned to Jerusalem, some of the people returned from exile, and some didn't. God is calling to his holy people in England today, "Come back to church, come back to God, come back to holiness, come back to prayer, come back to joy. Touch no unclean thing."
If you're excited, as I am, about the possibility, or rather the certainty, of revival, can we agree to touch no unclean thing? To abhor all idols - major idols like those in the Old Testament, and minor idols, like those in our own lives? Will we put Jesus first, and seek his face? Just as Jerusalem went from being a handful of peasants scratching a living from the rubble, to the vibrant holy city of God once again, cannot English churches like yours and mine be filled with praise and worship, and with people?
I pray for those Christians who have fallen out of church - for whatever reason - their sin or the church's sin - and actually it's usually the church's sin that causes it. Whatever caused them to stop going to church regularly, to stop being part of a local body of Christ, I pray for them to find a safe church.
How lovely on the mountains are the feet of him who says "The people are coming home to God. The people are coming home to church” Let us pray for them, let us welcome them, and let us go and out there and find some more, and preach the gospel to them, and see the kingdom of God re-established in the United Kingdom. In Jesus' name.