Sermon #66 Series: Isaiah

Title: Communion With God

Text: Isaiah 26:7-9

Date: Tuesday Evening - January 8, 1991

Tape #

Introduction:

All men and women by nature are aware of God’s Being, his power and his justice. Without question, the natural man’s awareness of God is perverted. But all men have a natural consciousness (Rom. 1:18-20; 2:14-15). Professed atheism is but an attempt by men to suppress that which they cannot escape - The knowledge that God is, and one day they shall be judged by him.

Some people have more than awareness of God’s Being. Their awareness of God’s Being causes them to fear God. Their fear is slavish, legal fear. It is not the fear of faith that reverences God and seeks to honor him, but the fear of unbelief, that is afraid of God and dreads him (Jon. 1:16). Such men and women are restrained from the excesses of iniquity they would otherwise commit because they are afraid of God’s wrath. That fear of God, though it never produces faith, is beneficial to society. It would be a sad, sad day for this world if men and women ever escaped their fear of God!

But the believer is a person who has something far more than an awareness of God and a fear of God. The believer, the Christian, the saved person is one who knows God (John 17:3). How can a man know God? How can the finite know the infinite? How can the mortal know the immortal? How can we who are sinful know God who is holy? How can we who are flesh know God who is Spirit? You can be sure of this - It takes more than the work of a man to enable a man to know the eternal God.

· More than the Persuasion of a Preacher.

· More than a Religious Ceremony.

· More than a Decision on the Part of the Sinner.

1. Before man can know God he must be born again by the Spirit of God (John 3:3).

2. In order for man to know God, God must reveal himself (I Cor. 7:7-10).

Basically, the work of the Holy Spirit in revelation, illumination, conviction and conversion involves three things. When the Spirit of God comes to a person in saving power and grace he reveals to that person

· Who God is and what he requires.

· Who man is and what he deserves.

· Who Christ is and what he has done.

This knowledge of God in Christ, which is salvation, which our Savior calls “life eternal” manifests itself in communion with God. Tonight, I want to talk to you about Communion With God.

Proposition: There is in every believer a principle of communion with God.

When Isaiah spoke of the day of grace and salvation, he describes those who are saved by God’s almighty grace as people who walk with God in sweet communion - (Read Isa. 26:7-9).

1. The first motion of spiritual life is the return of a sinner to his God - (Heb. 7:25; Matt. 11:28).

Illus: The Prodigal - “I will arise and go to my

father.”

2. This spiritual life, the life of grace, grows as we continue coming to God through Christ Jesus (I Pet. 2:1-4).

Coming to Christ is not something we have done. It is something we are doing. We behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ that gives us hope, peace and rest. And in proportion as we know more of God, as he reveals himself in the Person of his dear Son, we grow in Christ and grow in grace. The knowledge of God is the meat and drink of faith. Faith ever seeks to know him (Phil. 3:10).

3. The most important, most beautiful, most useful, most practical aspects of the believer’s life is communion with God - (Lk. 10:38-42).

Communion with God is…

· The fruit and evidence of faith - One thing that will last forever!

· The essence of worship.

· The source of true, spiritual knowledge.

· The foundation of holiness, good works, and service to Christ and his people.

Illus: Who ever did greater service for Christ

and his church than Mary? Who knew

more than Mary? (Matt. 26:6-13).

Communion with God manifests itself in many, many ways. But in our text Isaiah shows us five specific aspects of communion with God which I want us to consider together tonight.

I. COMMUNION WITH GOD CAUSES THE BELIEVER, IN THE TENOR OF HIS LIFE, TO WALK IN THE PATH OF RIGHTEOUSNESS - (v. 7).

No man has reason to believe that he has been justified by Christ’s righteousness imputed to him, if he has not been sanctified by Christ’s righteousness imparted to him. Believers are new creatures in Christ. The believer, in the tenor of his life, walks in the way of uprightness - (Eph. 4:17-23).

Any doctrine that teaches or implies that a man’s character and conduct are unimportant, so long as he believes in Jesus, is not the doctrine of Christ.

The ungodly man seeks to please himself, or seeks to please his wife, or seeks to please his children, or seeks to please his neighbors. The believer seeks to please God! Like Enoch, in the tenor of his life, he walks with God (Heb. 11:5-6). That simply means…

A. We believe God.

B. We submit to God.

C. We obey God.

D. We endeavor to honor God.

II. COMMUNION WITH GOD MANIFESTS ITSELF IN WAITING FOR HIM.

David, the man after God’s own heart, the sweet singer of Israel, was a man of deep communion. And he, more than anyone else, spoke of waiting upon God. Our text says, “Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O LORD, have we waited for thee.”

This waiting does not imply idleness or indifference, but faith and diligence. As Israel, when standing before the Red Sea, was bidden to “stand still and see the salvation of the Lord,” so we are to wait upon our God.

A. Waiting upon God is believing him.

It is a blessed experience. Instead of complaining with God’s providence, faith waits on God. Unbelief hurries and worries. Faith waits. Unbelief is fearful and cowardly. Faith is confident and courageous.

B. This waiting is expectation.

To wait upon God is to stand upon the tiptoe of faith, looking for him to fulfill his promise (Ps. 62:1, 2, 5).

Mr. Spurgeon said, “It means, ‘I cannot see the way out of this difficulty; but I shall see it. I do not yet perceive God’s plan for my deliverance; but I shall be delivered. I do not know how bread shall be given me; but I shall have it even if God has to send ravens with it, or rend heaven itself in twain. I shall have his promise fulfilled, and I will wait his time’.”

Especially in times of trial, the believer, the soul in communion with God, waits on him. Notice the words of our text - “Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O LORD, have we waited for thee.”

Child of God, when you are in great trouble, expect great grace. When you have great need, expect great mercy. The big wave is washing up some precious, rare jewel from the bottom of the sea that you could never possess were it not for the storm that washed it to shore!

Hypocrites wait upon the Lord as long as his service pays them. Believers wait upon the Lord when his service costs them dear.

C. And this waiting upon God is service.

To wait upon the Lord is to serve him (Pro. 27:18). It is to do his bidding, to serve his household, to do his will.

III. COMMUNION WITH GOD CAUSES THE BELIEVER TO DESIRE HIS LORD - “The desire of our soul is to thy name, and to he remembrance of thee.”

A. Our desire is to God’s name.

His name represents three things in the Scriptures:

1. His Character - We desire to know God in all the attributes of

his holy character.

2. His Word - The Word of God is his name, his character

written out and revealed.

3. His Glory - “Hallowed be thy name!”

B. Our desire is to remember him.

I find it disgustingly easy to remember useless, frivolous things, and to remember evil things. But to remember God and the things of God is contrary to the flesh. How I wish I had a memory so narrow that it could hold nothing but the things of God. I want to remember God; don’t you?

· When I awake in the morning.

· As I go through the day.

· When I lie down in the evening.

Yet, our fellowship and communion with God is such that though we do not always remember him, we desire to remember him. “The desire of our soul is to the remembrance of thee” - The Remembrance of

· His Eternal Covenant.

· His Redemptive Work.

· His Daily Mercy.

· His Promised Grace.

· Him - Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

C. And our desire towards our God is intensely personal.

Did you notice, as we read the text, that the eighth verse is in the plural and the ninth is in the singular? This is not by accident. When Isaiah described the desire of the church toward God, he could not help stating his personal desire - “With my soul have I desired thee in the night.”

· In the night of trial.

· In the night of spiritual darkness.

· In the night of personal languishing.

IV. COMMUNION WITH GOD CAUSES MEN AND WOMEN TO SEEK HIM - “Yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early.” (See Lam. 3:25).

Let me tell you about those who seek the Lord.

A. We feel our need of him.

B. We seek him where he is to be found.

· In the Word.

· In his House.

C. We seek him early - now!

D. We seek him continually.

E. We shall find him!

V. COMMUNION WITH GOD ENABLES THE BELIEVER TO LEARN BY THE PROVIDENTIAL JUDGMENTS OF HIS HEAVENLY FATHER - “For when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.”

The wicked inhabitants of the world do not learn, either by God’s favor or by his judgments. But the believer, because he knows God, believes God and walks with God, learns by the works of God, even by his judgments.

A. He learns to look upon temporal things as temporal and eternal things as eternal.

B. He learns to value Christ, his gospel and his people aright.

C. He learns righteousness - (Heb. 12:11).

· God’s Righteousness.

· Where his Righteousness is to be found - In Christ.

· The Value of Righteousness.

Application: Let me show you one more thing about communion with God - The Lord our God delights in our communion with him - (v. 20).