Wake Yourself Up! - Isaiah 51&52

I assume all of you enjoyed your extra hour of restful sleep last night?  Hopefully, your clocks all fell back one hour and you got that hour back that you lost in the Spring and you’re wide awake and ready to listen to God’s word to us today.  But if not, you have permission to stand up in the back of the room to keep from falling asleep.

One of the more obnoxious experiences that many of us have in common is the occasional bout of insomnia.  If I am anticipating a very busy day or a very important appointment, sometimes I just can’t shut my brain down long enough to fall asleep.  Or I’ll sleep until 2 AM, and then stare at the ceiling in the dark for another hour or two, deceiving myself with the lie that I’ll fall asleep again in a few minutes.  Then finally, at about 4:30, it occurs to me, “If I have to be awake, I might as well get out of bed and do something.”

But the opposite condition is even worse.  We might think there is no such thing as too much sleep.  However, there are some very unfortunate people who are regularly incapable of staying awake.  They suffer from a condition called narcolepsy.  This is not simple fatigue from exertion or lack of sleep and the person can’t hold their eyes open (You know, like what happens in church every Sunday).  “Narcolepsy is a chronic sleep disorder . . . characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness in which a person experiences extreme fatigue and possibly falls asleep at inappropriate times, such as while at work or at school.  Narcoleptics usually experience disturbed nocturnal sleep and an abnormal daytime sleep pattern, which is often confused with insomnia.  When a narcoleptic falls asleep they generally experience the REM stage of sleep within 10 minutes; whereas most people do not experience REM sleep until after 90 minutes.”1

The term “narcolepsy” was invented by a French physician using two Greek terms: narke’ which means “numbness” or “stupor”, and lepsis which can be translated “attack” or “seizure”.  So if you suffer from narcolepsy, you literally have “stupor attacks”.2 

There were people in the Bible who apparently suffered from a type of narcolepsy.  I want to read you some excerpts from Isaiah 51.

“Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness, you who seek the LORD . . . .”  (Isaiah 51:1a ESV)
“Give attention to me, my people, and give ear to me, my nation; (Isaiah 51:4a ESV)
“Listen to me, you who know righteousness . . . .” (Isaiah 51:7a ESV)
“Wake yourself, wake yourself, stand up, O Jerusalem . . . .” (Isaiah 51:17 ESV)
“Therefore hear this, you who are afflicted,who are drunk, but not with wine.” (Isaiah 51:21 ESV)
“Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion.” (Isaiah 52:1a ESV)

This call from God to His people to wake up and pay attention is a repeated theme throughout Isaiah’s book.  The people of Judah were suffering from spiritual narcolepsy.  They were having a national stupor attack.  They were in a constant state of REM sleep when it came to hearing God’s word.  But once again in this passage, God is saying it is time to wake up, smell the proverbial coffee and see what God was doing, and what He was going to do in the future. 

As always, we need to ask of this text, What is the context here?  To whom is this being written, and what time period does it pertain to?  Is Isaiah talking to the people of Judah in his own day, or to the people of God in a future day?  I believe the answer to that question is “Yes” and “Yes”.  Often in the Old Testament prophetic books a word is spoken that has both a near fulfillment and a future fulfillment.  There are many passages that pertain not only to Old Testament Israel, but also to the New Testament church.  For example, turn to Isaiah chapter 6.

    [8] And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.” [9] And he said, “Go, and say to this people:  “‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’ [10] Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”  (Isaiah 6:8-10 ESV)

Isaiah then asks the question of the Lord, “How long should I speak this word?”  And the Lord says to him, “Until Judah is destroyed and the people who remain are taken captive to Babylon.”  So this passage had an immediate application in the life of Isaiah and the people of Judah.

But, in Matthew 13, the disciples ask Jesus why He speaks to the people in parables, and He says to them, “This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.  Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “‘You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.”  (Matthew 13:13-14 ESV)

What Isaiah wrote in chapter 6 pertained not only to the Jews in his own day, but to the Jews in the days of Jesus. 

In 2 Samuel 7, God made a covenant with David:
[12] When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. [13] He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.  [15] but my steadfast love will not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. [16] And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever.’”

That prophecy was fulfilled in part by David’s son Solomon.  It was fulfilled yet again 2000 years ago when the Lord Jesus, the Son of David, the King of the Jews was born.  And there will be yet another future fulfillment when the King returns in His glory to sit upon His eternal throne and judge the nations. 

There are many such prophecies that have dual or even triple stages of fulfillment.  Messianic prophecies were relevant to those to whom the prophets spoke directly, and they were more specifically designed to point to the specific person of Jesus as the promised Savior when He arrived. 

In our passage today, Isaiah 51, we have several verses that talk about a future day for God’s people, a new world filled with joy in which their enemies will be no more.  The Jews of Isaiah’s day would see this fulfilled in part when they are set free from Babylon after 70 years in exile to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the city and the Temple.  But there is also a more far reaching fulfillment of these verses which we today look forward to as God’s redeemed people.

Let’s read Isaiah 51, beginning in verse 1 down through chapter 52, verse 12.

    [51:1] “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness, you who seek the LORD:
    look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug.
     [2] Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you;
    for he was but one when I called him, that I might bless him and multiply him.
     [3] For the LORD comforts Zion; he comforts all her waste places
    and makes her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the LORD;
    joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song.
 
    [4] “Give attention to me, my people, and give ear to me, my nation;
    for a law will go out from me, and I will set my justice for a light to the peoples.
     [5] My righteousness draws near, my salvation has gone out,
    and my arms will judge the peoples;
    the coastlands hope for me, and for my arm they wait.
     [6] Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath;
    for the heavens vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment,
    and they who dwell in it will die in like manner;
    but my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never be dismayed.
 
    [7] “Listen to me, you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law;
    fear not the reproach of man, nor be dismayed at their revilings.
     [8] For the moth will eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool;
    but my righteousness will be forever, and my salvation to all generations.”
 
    [9] Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the LORD;
    awake, as in days of old, the generations of long ago.
    Was it not you who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon?
     [10] Was it not you who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep,
    who made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over?
     [11] And the ransomed of the LORD shall return and come to Zion with singing;
    everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
    they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
 
    [12] “I, I am he who comforts you;
    who are you that you are afraid of man who dies, of the son of man who is made like grass,
     [13] and have forgotten the LORD, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens
    and laid the foundations of the earth, and you fear continually all the day
    because of the wrath of the oppressor, when he sets himself to destroy?
    And where is the wrath of the oppressor?
     [14] He who is bowed down shall speedily be released;
    he shall not die and go down to the pit, neither shall his bread be lacking.
     [15] I am the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar—
    the LORD of hosts is his name.
     [16] And I have put my words in your mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand,
    establishing the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and saying to Zion, ‘You are         my people.’”
 
    [17] Wake yourself, wake yourself, stand up, O Jerusalem,
    you who have drunk from the hand of the LORD the cup of his wrath,
    who have drunk to the dregs the bowl, the cup of staggering.
     [18] There is none to guide her among all the sons she has borne;
    there is none to take her by the hand among all the sons she has brought up.
     [19] These two things have happened to you—who will console you?—
    devastation and destruction, famine and sword; who will comfort you?
     [20] Your sons have fainted;
    they lie at the head of every street like an antelope in a net;
    they are full of the wrath of the LORD, the rebuke of your God.
 
    [21] Therefore hear this, you who are afflicted, who are drunk, but not with wine:
     [22] Thus says your Lord, the LORD, your God who pleads the cause of his people:
    “Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering;
    the bowl of my wrath you shall drink no more;
     [23] and I will put it into the hand of your tormentors, who have said to you,
    ‘Bow down, that we may pass over’;
    and you have made your back like the ground and like the street for them to pass over.”
 
    [52:1] Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion;
    put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city;
    for there shall no more come into you the uncircumcised and the unclean.
     [2] Shake yourself from the dust and arise; be seated, O Jerusalem;
    loose the bonds from your neck, O captive daughter of Zion.

[3] For thus says the LORD: “You were sold for nothing, and you shall be redeemed without money.” [4] For thus says the Lord GOD: “My people went down at the first into Egypt to sojourn there, and the Assyrian oppressed them for nothing. [5] Now therefore what have I here,” declares the LORD, “seeing that my people are taken away for nothing? Their rulers wail,” declares the LORD, “and continually all the day my name is despised. [6] Therefore my people shall know my name.  Therefore in that day they shall know that it is I who speak; here am I.”
 
    [7] How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news,
    who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation,
    who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
     [8] The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voice;
    together they sing for joy; for eye to eye they see the return of the LORD to Zion.
     [9] Break forth together into singing, you waste places of Jerusalem,
    for the LORD has comforted his people; he has redeemed Jerusalem.
     [10] The LORD has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations,
    and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.
 
    [11] Depart, depart, go out from there; touch no unclean thing;
    go out from the midst of her; purify yourselves, you who bear the vessels of the LORD.
     [12] For you shall not go out in haste, and you shall not go in flight,
    for the LORD will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard.  (Isaiah 51:1 - 52:12 ESV)

The people of Judah are referred to in these verses as being oppressed by their enemies and they are utterly defeated and completely hopeless.  God has brought this calamity upon them because of their sinful rejection of Him.  Isaiah is referring to them and their future deliverance out of Babylon and God is calling His people out of their spiritual slumber, their narcoleptic state of spiritual stupor.  Repeatedly He tells them to wake up and pay attention to His words.  Their day of redemption from their enemies is coming.  An entirely new world is coming.

Is there EVER a time when such a call isn’t needed?  Do we ever feel confident that we’re listening closely and hearing well God’s word to us?  It seems many of us are always wondering if maybe God is trying to tell us something and we’re missing it.  I believe that is a sign of spiritual sensitivity, not spiritual stupor.  If that is how you feel, that is an indication you’re awake spiritually, not asleep.  You want to know what God is saying, and you want Him to lead you clearly through this life, and you desire to be obedient to His word. 

You may not know all the specifics or the particulars of what God is doing in your life, but you are cognizant, you’re conscious, you’re awake.  You pray for wisdom.  You ask for the Lord to reveal your own sin to you.  You pray for His forgiveness when you do sin.  You read the Scriptures regularly and conscientiously and meditatively.  You’re awake, you’re paying attention, you’re not distracted by the world. 

This is what God is calling Judah to.  “Wake up from your narcoleptic dullness and pay attention to what I am saying!  Listen to this good news!”  And little do they know just how good it is.  God has for them a good word regarding their eternal destiny as well as the destiny of their enemies. 

[3] For the LORD comforts Zion; he comforts all her waste places
    and makes her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the LORD;
    joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song.
[6] Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath;
    for the heavens vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment,
    and they who dwell in it will die in like manner;
    but my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never be dismayed.

Comfort, joy, gladness, thanksgiving and song!  The wilderness will be like Eden!  The heavens and the earth will vanish and wear out.  But My salvation will be forever!  Eternal salvation for you who know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law. 

This is a good word for the helpless and the hopeless, and that would soon be the situation for Judah.  But this is reason to keep living, to keep persevering, to keep trusting in God in spite of the present circumstances.  Every heartfelt burden will be lifted forever.  Singing will consume our days.  There will no longer be the need to be thankful in spite of our circumstances because the circumstances are about to change. 

This is a word from God that gave the people of Judah, and it also gives us, reason to look at this world and live in this world and hold this world loosely in our hands.  Judah represents all the people of God, Babylon represents the oppressiveness and the captivity of this world.  Not only would God deliver the people of Judah from Babylon, but He is going to deliver all of His people from a fallen world!  He will deliver us from the very presence of evil, from the all the enemies of both body and soul.  God has promised to do away with this old, corrupt and dying world in order to create for His children a world like Eden.  He makes her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the LORD.  If the deserts will look like the Garden of Eden, what will the vacation spots look like?

Are you awake?  Are you listening to this?  Are you paying attention?

Not only is God going to bless His people with spiritual and physical blessings that are beyond imagination, but He is also going to deal with His enemies with vengeance and justice.  Part of God’s comfort for His people is His just punishment of their enemies:

[7b] Fear not the reproach of man, nor be dismayed at their revilings. [8] For the moth will eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool;

The reproach of evil men against the godly is real.  The godly always have suffered at the hands of the ungodly.  But it is not true that the godly always WILL be the objects of reviling and reproach.  Is that not a comfort?  One day, there will be no one to oppress or repress God’s people.  The righteous will live forever.  The wicked will not.  They will not live forever where we’ll be living forever. 

[11] The ransomed of the LORD shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away!!

God’s people will enter into the Heavenly Jerusalem with singing and joy and gladness and happiness, and all that former sorrow and sighing and sadness and discouragement and weeping and tears and hopelessness - will slowly meander away from us and we’ll kiss it all goodbye.  NO!  Hardly!  All that junk, all the vestiges of living in a world characterized by sin and suffering will FLEE AWAY!  Finally!  Gone!  And good riddance to you!!

BUT,  [22] Thus says your Lord, the LORD, your God who pleads the cause of his people: “Behold, I have taken from your hand the cup of staggering; the bowl of my wrath you shall drink no more; [23] and I will put it into the hand of your tormentors.

The punishment that God meted out against his own redeemed people for their sin will be poured out upon their enemies without mercy.  This was true for the people of Judah, and it will ultimately be true for all the entire Church of God gathered from all the nations of the earth.  All of you have probably heard of Foxe’s Book of Martyrs.  It is a brief history of the persecution of God’s faithful people from the first century until the time of the writing of the book in 1563.  Innumerable Christians have been fed to lions, burned at the stake, dipped in pitch and used as human torches, pulled apart by horses, shot, hanged, drowned, beheaded, beaten, tortured and maimed in every conceivable manner by those who hate God and the truth of God’s word.

But John Foxe is not the only person who has written a book of martyrs.  God has His own record.  He has not been asleep.  These things have not escaped His notice:

    [35:1] The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; [2] it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing.  The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon.  They shall see the glory of the LORD, the majesty of our God.  [3] Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. [4] Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not!  Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God.  He will come and save you.”  (Isaiah 35:1-4 ESV)

God’s redeemed people will be ushered into an eternity where righteousness dwells and there is fulness of joy.  God’s enemies will wish they had never been born.

Finally, look again at 52:7-12.  These words would have been easily understood by the Jews.  If you lived in Jerusalem, and you were a watchman upon the walls of the city, and you lived in constant fear of powerful enemies that longed to destroy you, and you always anticipated the worst and never heard anything that gave you hope, then the feet and everything else that belonged to the guy who brings good news would be beautiful!

[7] How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news,
    who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation,
    who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
     [8] The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voice;
    together they sing for joy; for eye to eye they see the return of the LORD to Zion.
     [9] Break forth together into singing, you waste places of Jerusalem,
    for the LORD has comforted his people; he has redeemed Jerusalem.
     [10] The LORD has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations,
    and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.

Their gods do not reign.  Beloved, YOUR God reigns.  The kingdom of this world will become the kingdom of our God and of His Christ (Rev. 11:15).  The joy that the people of God will experience when Jesus comes again will be in direct proportion to their desire to leave these waste places behind.  For the faithful, there will be peace, happiness, and salvation from an all-sovereign God.  There will be a global, spontaneous outbreak of shouts of praise and joy among God’s people when they are finally face to face and eye to eye with the King of Israel, the Lord Jesus.  There will be comfort and redemption and a new world order.  Not like the United Nations’ new world order.

The King of Glory, the Lord God Almighty, the Redeemer of Israel, the Son of David, the Savior of the World will have something to say about the order of the world:

    [17] “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.  (Isaiah 65:17 ESV)
    [22] “For as the new heavens and the new earth that I make shall remain before me, says the LORD, so shall your offspring and your name remain.  (Isaiah 66:22 ESV)

The New World Order will be a New World with Jesus Christ seated upon it’s throne. Turn with me quickly to 2 Peter 3.
    [7] But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.
    [8] But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. [9] The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. [10] But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
    [11] Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, [12] waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!
[13] But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.  (2 Peter 3:7-13 ESV)

Are you listening?  Are you hearing all of this?  There are only two appropriate responses to the things we’ve just read: unbridled joy, and sheer terror.  If I were sitting in this room today and I had any doubt about my relationship with the Person who will one day bring this world to an end by fire, and melt heaven and earth and His enemies with it, I think I’d be looking for a way to avoid that sort of thing. 

    [11] . . . [Y]ou know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. [12] The night is far gone; the day is at hand.  So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. [13] Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. [14] But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.  (Romans 13:11-14 ESV)

Jesus Christ is returning someday.  I don’t know when and neither does anyone else.  But He is coming.  It will be a day of horror for His enemies, and a day of endless joy and rejoicing and singing and gladness and comfort and peace and life and righteousness for His friends.  A very, very good day for the one, and the most awful and terrifying day for the other when Christ speaks to the goats and commands, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’  (Matthew 25:41 ESV). 

Are you listening?  Do you hear this?  Are you suffering from some kind of spiritual narcolepsy?  Listen to me!  Pay attention!  Come out of your stupor!  The hour has come for you to wake from sleep!  WAKE YOURSELF UP! 

Are you going to sleep through the greatest news this world has ever known, and slumber your way into Hell?
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1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcolepsy
2. Ibid.