Sermon #246 Series: Isaiah

Title: Zion’s Travail

Text: Isaiah 66:7-9

Readings: Office: Larry Criss Auditorium: Bob Poncer

Subject: The Church of god Travailing for Souls

Date: Sunday Evening - August 25, 1996

Tape # S-88

Introduction:

The title of my message tonight is Zion’s Travail. Our text will be Isaiah 66:7-9. Read along with me, beginning at verse seven.

"Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child. (8) Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children. (9) Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the LORD: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God."

In this passage of Scripture Zion, the church of God, is compared to a pregnant woman who gives birth to her children without going through the pain and travail of birth. Then we are told that the birth of her children comes only after she has travailed. It is a passage filled with spiritual instruction, teaching us something of God’s method of grace in saving his elect. It is also a passage in which we are given great encouragement, being assured that the work which God has begun he will complete. And this is a passage of Scripture which will greatly rebuke indifference and lethargy. May God the Holy Spirit be our Teacher as we consider the things revealed in these three verses for our learning and admonition.

Proposition: This is the primary thing I want to drive home to our hearts in this message - While we are assured that God almighty will save his elect, we are also assured that he will do so through the use of his own appointed means, the means we are responsible to use.

Be sure you get the picture that is presented to us in this text.

1. Zion is the Church and Kingdom of our God, the true, spiritual Israel, “the Israel of God.”

2. The man child and children brought forth are God’s elect, brought forth into spiritual, eternal life in Christ by God the Holy Spirit in the new birth.

3. The means by which this miracle is wrought is Zion’s travail.

Divisions: I want to expound these three verses under four heads. I will show you...

1. The Freeness of Grace.

2. The Wonder of Grace.

3. The Means of Grace. And

4. The Certainty of Grace.

I. The first thing I want you to see is THE FREENESS OF GRACE.

This is set before us in verse seven. "Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child."

The grace of God is free and sovereign. The Lord God declares, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on who I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy” (Rom. 9:15-16).

In this message, my primary emphasis will be upon our responsibility as God’s servants to seek the salvation of his people. But I do not want anyone to entertain the foolish notion for a moment that God’s work depends upon us. Our text is talking specifically about the spiritual birth of God’s elect. It is something that takes place by God’s sovereign power and irresistible grace. It is not caused by our travail. And it does not depend upon our travail. Do you see that in verse seven? "Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child." The Lord God will save his elect. There is no possibility of failure with him!

A. All who were elected unto salvation shall be saved.

B. All who were predestined to the adoption of children shall receive the fullness of adoption.

C. All who were redeemed by the blood of Christ shall be delivered from all the consequences of sin.

D. All who are called by the Holy Spirit shall be preserved by the Spirit unto eternal glory with Christ.

Every sinner loved of God and predestined to glory has been redeemed and justified by the Son. All who were redeemed by the Son shall be called by the Spirit. And all the called shall be glorified. This is the purpose of God (Rom. 8:28-30).

II. Now, look at verse eight and behold THE WONDER OF GRACE.

"Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once?”

The salvation of God’s elect is a supernatural, wondrous thing, astonishing in the eyes of all who behold it with the understanding of personal experience. It is here compared to a woman having a child without pain or labor. Though our salvation is the result of all God’s works from the foundation of the world, in the experience of it, it seems to be a sudden, climatic, instaneous thing. It is as astonishing as it would be for a farmer to sow his crops in the morning and reap them in the evening, or a nation to be born at once. Yet, in a sense, this is exactly the case with the salvation of God’s elect.

A. Our sins, the sins of all God’s elect, were removed by the blood of Christ in one day.

Zechariah 3:9 " I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day."

B. God’s Israel, his “holy nation,” the church of the redeemed was born in one day, when Christ was raised from the dead.

Ephesians 2:4-6 "But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, (5) Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) (6) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:"

C. This passage specifically refers to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and the marvelous conversion of three thousand souls, Jews and Gentiles in one day.

Acts 2:41 "Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls."

D. Indeed, every aspect of our redemption and salvation by Christ is an astonishing, amazing display of God’s grace.

Take a moment to consider...

· Who our Redeemer Is (2 Cor. 8:9),

· Why He Died for Us (Rom. 3:24-26),

· Who the Redeemed Are (1 Cor. 1:26-29), and

· What the Results of Redemption Are (1 John 3:1).

In the light of these things ransomed sinners stand amazed and sing...

“Amazing grace! How sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found;

`Twas blind, but now I see.

IV. Next we are told of THE MEANS OF GRACE.

Read the last sentence of verse eight. “For as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.” While salvation is, in its totality, the work of God’s free and sovereign grace in Christ, we are taught throughout the Scriptures that God has ordained the use of specific means to accomplish his work; and that it is our responsibility to employ those ordained means.

A. The imagery of birth is used with profound significance in the Word of God.

Ezekiel 16:6-8 "And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live; yea, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live. (7) I have caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou hast increased and waxen great, and thou art come to excellent ornaments: thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown, whereas thou wast naked and bare. (8) Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou becamest mine."

John 3:3 "Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

John 3:5 "Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God."

John 3:7-8 "Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. (8) The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit."

Salvation, as it is portrayed in our text and throughout the Bible, involves the birth of a child. Regeneration is a spiritual birth, a birth that is accomplished by God the Holy Spirit. “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit."

B. Wherever there is birth there is of necessity a travail that precedes it.

Our text declares that if Zion is to bring forth her children, she must first travail with the pains of birth.

1. This is God’s ordained means of grace.

Read your Bible. Study the history of God’s church. Whenever God has been pleased to accomplish great deliverances for his people, whenever he has been pleased to send revival to his church, it has always been precede by a time of travail. Read Psalm 107 once more and understand that God never sends deliverance until he first causes his people to cry unto him for deliverance.

a. The children of Israel cried by reason of their bondage in Egypt; and when their crying was heard by God, he sent Moses to deliver them.

Exodus 3:7 "And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;"

Exodus 2:23-24 "And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage. (24) And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob."

NOTE: The deliverance came as the direct result of Israel’s travail; but their travail did not cause God to send deliverance. He had promised to do it by a covenant with Abraham four hundred years earlier. Yet, he would not send his deliverance until he heard their cry, though he was already preparing the deliverer and had appointed the time when deliverance must come. The point I am making is this - The travail by which God brings deliverance is as much a work of his grace as the deliverance itself.

b. In the days of Ahab and Jezebel, when the seven thousand who refused to bow the knee to Baal cried out to God, Elijah suddenly appeared on Mount Carmel and led Israel out of its apostasy into a time of great revival (1 Kings 18:21-39).

c. You will remember that after Hilkiah the priest found the Book of God in the temple and Josiah travailed before God, the Lord sent a time of great revival. It was during that time that Daniel, Ezekiel, and Jeremiah all came to know the Lord (2 Chron. 33-35).

d. After seventy years of captivity in Babylon, the Jews began to agonize and cry out to God for his promised deliverance. Suddenly, Cyrus the Persian king appeared to bring them out, and Zerubbabel, Ezra, and Nehemiah restored the worship of God and rebuilt the wall and the temple in Jerusalem.

e. During the time of Roman bondage, when Rome occupied Jerusalem, the religion of the Jews had become nothing but ritualism and ceremony. In their utter apostasy, they crucified the Lord of Glory, killed the Prince of Life, slaughtered the Son of God. Then, as the chosen remnant waited and travailed in prayer in an upper room, suddenly the Holy Spirit came upon them like a mighty, rushing wind, and three thousand souls were added to the church!

f. During those dark days of popish tyranny and persecution, when pagan Roman superstition held the world in bondage, faithful men and women were burned at the stake, tortured upon the racks, beheaded, and bludgeoned to death under orders of his most unholiness, the pope! But all across Europe bands of men and women were meeting in secret, praying and travailing before God. Then, suddenly, Martin Luther, John Calvin, and John Knox were thrust into the world and the long arms of the papacy were broken!

2. Divine intervention always follows travail of soul before God.

God’s gracious operations by which he accomplishes the salvation of his people, by which he brings forth his children in Zion always follow travail. Therefore it is right for us to expect intervention from heaven to follow our travail before him. The great works of God recorded in Scripture apply to all time. They are recorded in the Book of God for our benefit. It is only reasonable for us to expect our Father to be as gracious to us as he has been to his children in ages past.

Travail is the forerunner of birth. A musician astonishes the world with his music, which he plays so effortlessly. But the secret to his effortless, spell-binding performance is long, long hours of travail.

Illustration: Mike Bartram

I remember when Dr. Debake performed the first heart transplant. The whole world was astonished by his knowledge and skill. Very few are yet aware of the countless hours of travail he endured in the study of medicine.

We have just watched the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. Everyone is amazed at the goldmetalists. Few pause to consider the years of travail required to attain such skills on the mat, the track, or the ice ring.

We enjoy great freedom as a nation. But in these day few even want to be reminded of the travail of blood by which our liberty was won and by which it has been maintained for two hundred years.

These facts must be applied to spiritual things. Zion brings forth her children as soon as she travails to bring forth her children.

C. The Scriptures specifically speak of a threefold travail by which God’s elect are brought forth in regeneration.

1. The Travail of Christ in Death

We are saved and born of God out of the travail, suffering, sorrow, and death of the Lord Jesus Christ. The church of the redeemed is the Bride of Christ, taken out of his side, when he was pierced for us. His sorrows, his sighs, his sufferings, his travail, his blood, his death is the source and cause of our life.

Isaiah 53:10-11 "Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. (11) He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities."

2. The Travail of Gospel Preachers in the Work of the Ministry

1 Corinthians 4:15 "For though ye have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers: for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel."

Galatians 5:19 "Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,"

Colossians 1:24 "Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the church:"

Paul certainly does not mean that there are some finishing touches to redemption that we are to complete. When Christ died our atonement was accomplished. When he cried, “It is finished,” he meant for us to understand that his great work of redemption was done. Paul’s meaning in Colossians 1:24 is simply this - His sufferings and travail of soul were the means God ordained for the completion of Christ’s body, for the conversion of his redeemed ones.

God’s servants labor in the Word and Doctrine of Christ, which is the Seed of the new birth (1 Pet. 1:23; James 1:18). They travail in prayer over the souls of men.

Romans 9:1-3 "I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, (2) That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. (3) For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh:"

Romans 10:1 "Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved."

C.H. Spurgeon wrote, “If any minister can be satisfied without conversions he shall have no conversions. God will not force usefulness on any man. It is only when our heart breaks to see men saved that we shall be likely to see sinners’ hearts broken.”

3. The Travail of God’s Saints in Prayer

Our text speaks of Zion’s travail, of the travail of God’s church in prayer. “As soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.” This speaks of “the earnest prayers of the church and its members, striving and wrestling with God, being importunate with him, that the word preached might be useful for the good of souls.” (John Gill) The Lord is telling us here that we will never be instruments of birth until we travail for children to be born, until we travail over the souls of men.

That is our responsibility. If we have no such burden, no such heart travail over the souls of men, that is no excuse. Let us be in travail with God for our own souls, that he may make us earnest for the souls of men.

D. There are many reasons why God has made the travail of his church a necessary forerunner to the birth of his children. He does it for our good.

If you could go to the store and buy a child, you might easily become indifferent to the child. But we do not get our sons and daughters from the department store. The child is conceived in its mother’s womb, nurtured beneath her heart, brought forth through great pain and travail, and nursed at her breasts. It is a rare thing for a mother to take a child born of her own travail and leave on a doorstep. Thus the Lord has arranged the spiritual birth of his children to make each of them dear to his church. As a rule, no one is more willing and more qualified to care for God’s chidren than those who have travailed inbirth for them. Those who are born of God through the prayers, intercessions, and travail of Zion are precious to the whole church.

1. This travail drives us to the mercy-seat, tries our faith, strengthens our patience, and casts us upon God, who alone can do the thing we seek.

2. This travail for souls cements the church and binds our hearts to one another. Two people kneeling, praying, and pleading with God for the souls of men and the revival of his church cannot be at odds with each other. (See Acts 2:1-2 and 41-47.)

3. Sharing the mutual burden of travail for souls unites our hearts in the worship of our God, in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit.

E. How does this travail manifest itself?

I want so much to stir up our hearts to the travail that is spoken of in our text. But the last thing I want is to produce an affected, pretense of travail. Oh, may God be pleased to pour out his Spirit upon us, drop his grace in our hearts, and move our souls with travail for the salvation of his elect! But how will we know it if and when it is given?

Usually, when God gives this travail to his church, when he is about to do a great work among and for his people, he burdens the hearts of a few with an insatiable passion for souls, a passion that cries out to him in importunate prayer.

This passion to see sinners converted, to see the idols of men destroyed, and to see the church revived rules them. They think of it when they are alone. They dream of it when they sleep. They talk about it in their homes, in the streets, and in the house of God. It is a passion that eats them up. They suffer great heaviness and continual sorrow of heart for perishing souls. They travail to give birth.

Little by little, by degrees, others catch the fire that burns in their hearts. Soon the church meetings are altogether different. Praying is no longer a formal repetition of words, but a wrestling of souls with God. The songs of Zion are no longer hum-drum words set to music, but songs of praise and prayer to God. The preaching of the Word is no longer a dry lecture of denominational rhetoric, but a message fetched fresh from God’s heart to the preacher’s heart, delivered as live coals from off the altar to the sinners’s heart. God give us a few people with such travail of heart! If he will, the gates of hell will soon fall before us.

Where is such travail today? Where is the pulpit today stained with tears for hell bound men and women? Where is the prophet today who stretches out his mantle like Elisha and cries, “Where is the God of Elijah?” Where is the church crying out to God that he would stretch forth his hand of mercy and snatch sinners as brands from the burning? Where in Zion are people found today in travail of birth?

God, give me a heart to preach as a man who may never preach again, as I a dying man to dying men! May God give you a heart to travail for birth! I ask you, my brothers and sisters to pray for God to give us this boon of mercy. Pray that he may yet again “in wrath remember mercy.” Pray that he may once more revive his work in these days of darkness. What he has done he can do again, and he will do again, if we believe him. Our Lord’s word is, “If thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God!”

I see some signs of hope. Hardly a week passes that I do not receive a letter or call from someone, who has heard one the messages we send around the world on tape, telling how God has blessed his Word to his heart. But I long to see the Lord working right here in our midst. Last week we had the first baptism we have had in a long, long time. How we rejoice in God’s goodness! But surely our quiver is not yet full. Oh, may God give us the pains of birth and cause us to travail! “For as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.”

IV. Now, look at verse nine, and let me briefly assure you of THE CERTAINTY OF GRACE.

"Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the LORD: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God."

With those words the Lord God assures us that he will, when he causes us to travail in birth, also cause us to bring forth! It is impossible for Zion’s travail to miscarry. Learn what our Lord is teaching us here.

A. All true prayer is God inspired prayer, found in the heart. God puts it in the heart where we find it and take it back to him (2 Sam. 7:27).

B. All God inspired prayer is according to the will of God and for the glory of God.

C. Every prayer that is poured out in importunity before the throne of grace according to the will of God shall obtain that which it seeks from God (1 John 5:14-15).

D. If our prayers fade, languish, and die without satisfaction, it is because our prayers have been but the expressions of our lusts, not the cries of God given travail. "Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts" (James 4:3).

Application:

I will finish my message by directing you to a few powerful passages of Scripture. I want you to turn to them and read them with me. May God speak to our hearts by them. We must never seek to find an excuse for our indifference to the souls of men in our strong belief in God’s sovereignty. You know me well enough to know that I take a back seat to no one in preaching the glorious doctrines of God’s free and sovereign grace in Christ. But it is our responsibility to labor and travail for the souls of men and to believe God for the building of his kingdom. Nothing but our own unbelief prevents God from using us for the salvation of his elect.

Of Nazareth it is written, in Matthew 13:58 "And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief." Then we read in Matthew 17:20 the reason why the disciples could not cast the devil out of the lunatic. "And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you."

Now read Isaiah 48:18-19. God is speaking. He says to us, "O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea: (19) Thy seed also had been as the sand, and the offspring of thy bowels like the gravel thereof; his name should not have been cut off nor destroyed from before me."

Isaiah 59:1-2 "Behold, the LORD'S hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: (2) But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear."

John 11:40 "Jesus saith,... Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?"