Sermon #49 Series: Isaiah

Title: Three Facts About the Purpose Of God

Text: Isaiah 14:24-27

Subject: The Purpose Of God

Date: Sunday Evening - July 22, 1990

Tape #

Introduction:

In Isaiah 13 and 14 the Lord God Almighty promised his people, Israel, that he would both deliver them from their Babylonian captivity and thoroughly destroy their enemies who would hold them captive for so long. But the promise would not be accomplished for 200 years. In that length of time his people, being as us nothing but sinful flesh, would begin to question the Lord’s faithfulness, his power and his Word. So, in order to strengthen their faith in him and keep his elect remnant looking to him with hope, God promised his people a somewhat lesser and more immediate deliverance. He promised them that he would destroy the Assyrian army, cause his people to tread them under foot, and break the yoke of their oppression. And the prophet of God gave his people absolute assurance that God would do what he promised. The basis of that assurance was the sure, eternal purpose of God - (Read the text).

1. Throughout the scriptures, we are assured that God has a purpose of grace according to which he rules the world.

Turn to Acts 15 - Here Luke records the history of the first Bible conference ever held by the church of God. It was held at Jerusalem about 14 years after God has saved Saul of Tarsus. In this conference three issues were dealt with and set forth with clarity by the apostles.

a. The believer’s freedom from the law (vv. 5-6, 23-24).

b. The method of God’s saving operations (vv. 8-11).

· Faith alone!

· Grace alone!

· Christ alone!

c. The purpose of God (v. 18).

James here declares, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.” If all his works were known to him, then all were certain to be accomplished. If they were certain, it must be because God had purposed and ordained them. And if he ordained them, then he ordained them to be before the world began.

This purpose of God is God’s sovereign, eternal work of predestination - (Rom. 8:28-31; Eph. 1:3-6, 9, 11, 12). In predestination God acted in total sovereignty. His work of predestination was according to his own sovereign will, for the praise of the glory of his own grace, according to his own eternal counsels. All who are finally saved and obtain an inheritance in heavenly glory are said to have been “predestined according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will: that we should be to the praise of his glory.” In other words, the purpose of God in predestination is twofold: ¬ The salvation of his elect and the glory of God in salvation.

2. The purpose, object and design of God in predestination is the glory of His own great name in the salvation of His elect.

When the Jews were in Babylon, in captivity, their plight was hopeless. Deliverance seemed impossible. But God had promised it. He promised them that he would deliver them from the hand of their enemies, set them in the land of their promised inheritance, and cause them to rule over their oppressors. This God had declared to be irreversibly decreed.

And the same thing is true regarding the deliverance and salvation of God’s elect in every age out of every part of the world. As the Jews were his elect among the nations, so there is now “a remnant according to the election of grace” (Rom. 11:6) - a people whom he has given to his Son from eternity (John 17:2, 6, 9) - a multitude to whom God has promised eternal life before the world began (Tit. 1:2).

This elect remnant God will search out from the four corners of the earth and save (Isa. 43:5-7; John 10:16). In due time, he will call them by his irresistible grace (Ez. 34:11-13) and bring them into a saving knowledge of Christ (Isa. 65:1; II Pet. 3:9). And them he will also keep unto everlasting; so that not one of them can be lost (John 17:12).

For the salvation of this elect multitude God has made full and complete provision in his eternal purpose of grace and bound himself with the oath of his promise (II Tim. 1:9; Heb. 6:17-20). If ever one of God’s elect should perish it must be by their departure from him, or through their being wrested out of his hand, or by him casting them off. But none of these things can be, because God has purposed, predestinated and promised that…

· They shall not depart from him (Jer. 32:40).

· None can pluck them from his hands (John 10:29), or separate them from his love (Rom. 8:39).

· He will never abandon them, or cast them off (Isa. 54:7-10).

This is what I am saying - Before the world was made, from eternity, God predestinated…

a. Who He would save (II Thess. 2:13-14; I Pet. 1:2).

b. The death of Christ as the grounds of our salvation (Acts 2:23; I Pet. 1:18-20).

c. The means by which he would seek out and effectually call his elect to life and faith in Christ - The preaching of the gospel (I Cor. 1:21).

d. And all that was necessary to accomplish his glorious purpose of grace (Rom. 11:36; 8:28).

God, from eternity, predestinated our redemption by the blood of Christ, our regeneration by the irresistible call of his Spirit, and our resurrection glory in conformity to Christ.

3. What about the ungodly, the wicked, the reprobate, who are lost in the end and suffer the wrath of God in hell? Did God irreversibly predestinate some men and women to hell?

While I have no interest in answering the foolish questions of godless and ignorant men, who wrest the scriptures to their own destruction; and though I will not honor those who oppose the gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace in Christ by answering their objections to it, I do want us to be perfectly clear in our understanding of God’s purpose.

We assert boldly and emphatically that God chose a people from eternity whom he would save; and that his elective purpose can never be altered. And we assert, just as boldly and emphatically that no one was predestinated or ordained to eternal damnation, except as that eternal damnation is the just and righteous consequence of their unbelief - (I Pet. 2:7-9).

a. God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 33:11).

b. Any sinner in all the world who calls upon Christ in faith shall be saved (John 3:14-16).

c. If you are lost forever in hell, the cause of your eternal damnation will be your willful, obstinate unbelief (John 3:17-19, 36; Pro. 1:23-33).

d. And you can mark this down, as surely as God has purposed the salvation of all his elect, it is the purpose of God to destroy every obstinate, unbelieving rebel who refuses to trust his Son - and God will not be deterred from, or rescind his purpose.

The vessels of wrath are fitted for destruction by their own sin and unbelief (Rom. 9:22). Whereas, the vessels of mercy God “has afore prepared unto glory” by his blessed purpose of grace (Rom. 9:23) - If you, by unbelief, fit yourself for destruction, God will destroy you!

Illus: Randy Adair - “Don’t you believe that everybody will be saved in the end?”

Now I want you to turn back to my text in Isaiah 14:24-27. Let me show you Three Facts About the Purpose Of God, and I will send you home.

I. THE PURPOSE OF GOD IS IMMUTABLE (v. 24).

I do not pretend to understand everything the Bible teaches about the purpose of God. But I do know this - whatever the purpose of God is, it is unchangeable. His counsel shall stand. He will do all that he has purposed - (Num. 23:19; Job 23:13; Ps. 33:11; Pro. 21:30; Dan. 4:35; Mal. 3:6; James 1:17).

II. THE PURPOSE OF GOD INCLUDES ALL THINGS (v. 26).

God rules all the nations of the earth by the omnipetent hand of his providence, according to the purpose of his grace toward his elect - (Ps. 76:10; II Cor. 5:18).

· Nothing in the world happens by chance.

· Nothing in the world is determined by the will of man.

· Nothing in the world is under the control of satan.

· God rules the universe! And he rules it according to his own purpose of grace.

III. THE PURPOSE OF GOD IS EFFECTUAL AND MUST BE ACCOMPLISHED (v. 27).

I am trying to tell you who God is - He is one whose purpose cannot be thwarted, whose will cannot be resisted, whose power cannot be defeated. He is God. And he is God alone (Ps. 115:3; 135:6).

Application: “Behold your God!” “He is able to perform what he has promised.”

1. We are nothing, but withering grass.

2. But the Lord our God is God indeed - Because his purpose is immutable, universal and effectual.

· His Word is Sure.

· His People are Secure.

· His Covenant will Endure.