The Sovereign Goodness of God
Isaiah 45:1-19
Why do you believe in the God of the Bible? Richard Dawkin, who wrote the best-selling book The God Delusion, says the only reason Christians believe is because we were raised that way – that there’s no more reason to believe in the God of the Bible than in what he calls the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Watch this YouTube clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urZXB6ct_cc
Richard Dawkins says the only reason Christians are Christians is because we were raised that way; that we have no more reason to believe in the God of the Bible than we have to believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
So is he right? To answer that, let’s turn to Isaiah 45. If you need a Bible, go ahead and raise your hand and we will bring a Bible to you. Isaiah 45 is on page 605 in the Bibles we are passing out. Throughout the Bible God says that He wants everyone to know about Him – so He works in history – in verifiable history – in such supernatural ways that everyone can know that He is God.
And one of those places he says that is here in Isaiah 45. Here God explains how everyone can know that the God of the Bible is God. You can see that in vv.5-6 –
5 I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me,
6 that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other.
So here God says He is going to do something so that everyone from the rising of the sun (the east) all the way to the west will know that there is a God, that it is the God of Abraham, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that He alone is God.
So what does He do? To understand what God did, you need to know what’s going on when God speaks these words through Isaiah. Isaiah writes these words at around 700 BC. At that time Israel is living in Palestine. Assyria was the dominant power. Babylon was small, Persia was small, and there was no Cyrus on the scene.
So look at what God says He will do in the future – starting in ch.44 v.24 --
24 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself,
25 who frustrates the signs of liars and makes fools of diviners, who turns wise men back and makes their knowledge foolish,
26 who confirms the word of his servant and fulfills the counsel of his messengers, who says of Jerusalem, 'She shall be inhabited,' and of the cities of Judah, 'They shall be built, and I will raise up their ruins';
27 who says to the deep, 'Be dry; I will dry up your rivers';
28 who says of Cyrus, 'He is my shepherd, and he shall fulfill all my purpose'; saying of Jerusalem, 'She shall be built,' and of the temple, 'Your foundation shall be laid.'"
1 Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have grasped, to subdue nations before him and to loose the belts of kings, to open doors before him that gates may not be closed:
2 "I will go before you and level the exalted places, I will break in pieces the doors of bronze and cut through the bars of iron,
And then skip down to v.13 –
I have stirred him [Cyrus] up in righteousness, and I will make all his ways level; he shall build my city and set my exiles free, not for price or reward," says the LORD of hosts.
So here’s what God says He would do, mostly from this passage but also from some other passages in Isaiah. God said Babylon would become the dominant power. Israel would be exiled in Babylon. Then Cyrus would become the Persian emperor, who would conquer Babylon. And then Cyrus would send Israel back to Palestine and would help rebuild her temple.
So that’s what God prophesied would happen. So what actually happened? In 626 BC Babylon become the dominant power. Then in 606 BC Israel was exiled in Babylon. In 600 BC Cyrus became ruler of the Persian empire. In 538 BC Cyrus conquered Babylon. And in 536 BC Cyrus sends Israel back to Palestine and rebuilds her temple.
To see this last point look at Ezra 1:1-3 (p.389) –
1 In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled [Jeremiah prophesied this as well], the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing:
2 "Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah.
3 Whoever is among you of all his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and rebuild the house of the LORD, the God of Israel--he is the God who is in Jerusalem.
So everything happened exactly as God had prophesied 150 years before.
Some people think maybe Isaiah 45 was written after all this happened. But that’s not possible. How do we know? Josephus was a Jewish historian living at around 100 AD who wrote a history of Israel. In his book Jewish Antiquities he writes about Cyrus. He says that Cyrus read these verses from Isaiah – he read that God named him and worked through him to conquer the known world. This blew him away – and this is how God changed his heart so he decided to free God’s people. So if Cyrus read these words of Isaiah, then they were not written after Cyrus. They were written before Cyrus.
So think about this. To prophesy all of this and have it all happen would require perfectly knowing the future and perfectly controlling the future. But no human being perfectly knows and controls the future. So who prophesied all this and had it happen? The being who spoke these words – God Himself.
And why did God do this? Turn back to Isaiah 44 and read vv.5-6 again –
5 I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me,
6 that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other.
God did something only God can do – so everyone would know that there is a God, that the God of Abraham and the Father of Jesus is God, and that there is no other God. That’s what God has done.
So – what has the flying spaghetti monster done? Case closed.
So why do you believe in the God of the Bible? The most important reason is because of what you have personally experienced through trusting Jesus Christ. But there’s other reasons – reasons that you can share with others so they can see for themselves that the God of the Bible is God.
But not only does God want everyone to understand that He is God and that He alone is God. He also wants Israel to learn from this two crucial truths about God which will encourage them as they go through the trial of the exile in Babylon.
One is in v.7 – that God is sovereign –
I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.
God is God, and as God He is sovereign over everything. God ultimately does everything. God raised up Babylon to be the dominant power. God had Babylon conquer Israel and take her into exile. God caused Cyrus to become the Persian emperor. God caused Persia to conquer Babylon. And God caused Cyrus to return Israel to Palestine and rebuild her temple. God ultimately does everything.
And He not only does everything, this is His right as God. As Creator, he has rightful sovereignty over everything. He created you, and me, and He can rightfully do with us whatever He wants, because He is God.
But there’s another crucial truth about God -- in v.8 – that God is good. Everything that God prophesied about Israel brought her great good. And in His sovereignty God does great good for all who bend the knee before Him – which today would mean bending the knee before His Messiah Jesus. That’s the point of v.8 --
"Shower, O heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain down righteousness; let the earth open, that salvation and righteousness may bear fruit; let the earth cause them both to sprout; I the LORD have created it.
So not only does God have the sovereign right to do whatever He chooses to do, for those who trust Jesus Christ everything God chooses to do is ultimately good. And what Isaiah wants to do is use these two truths to help Israel deal with her trials. And I want to use them this morning to help us deal with our trials.
Many of you are going through difficult trials. It’s like now that we have embarked on planting a church downtown the spiritual attack has increased. The number of crises at Mercy Hill church has quintupled in the past few weeks.
And there’s two temptations we face when dealing with trials. One is to complain, and the other is to despair. So in vv.9-12 Isaiah says: don’t complain; submit to God’s sovereignty. Look at v.9 --
Woe to him who strives with him who formed him, a pot among earthen pots! Does the clay say to him who forms it, 'What are you making?' or 'Your work has no handles'?
The potter has the right to make whatever he chooses from the clay. You are clay, created by God; so He has the right to do with you whatever He chooses to do. Which shows that complaining involves a terrible reversal of roles. It shows that we think we have the right to question what God is doing.
Now there is a place for humbly asking God to show you what He is doing – that’s not complaining. There is a place for humbly saying – “Father, this is hard; help me.” That’s not complaining.
Complaining is when I angrily say – “why is that driver going so slow?” “This trial should not be happening to me!” “Why is God letting this happen!” When we talk that way, Isaiah says “woe” – because we creatures are putting ourselves over the Creator. This is not right, because the Creator has the right to do with us whatever He wishes. Now it’s also true that for those who trust Christ everything He does is ultimately good. We’ll talk about that in a moment. But it’s also true that it is not our place to question what God is doing.
So instead of complaining, we need to humbly submit to God’s sovereignty. Come to God in the name of Jesus. Understand that Jesus died to pay for the sin of complaining. Ask Him to forgive you and help you. He will. Recognize that God is sovereign creator, and that you are His creature, and that He has the right to do with you whatever He chooses. Humble yourself before His sovereignty. Now you can and should also pray for God to remove that trial; nothing wrong with that. But the foundation of everything is that God is God who has the right to do with me as He chooses.
I guarantee: if you will humbly submit yourself to God’s sovereignty, and see that God has the right to do with you whatever He chooses, your heart will be transformed.
Here’s the story of Mara. Mara had struggled with depression for 15 years. She was a believer, but constantly felt sadness, hopelessness, and loneliness. She was angry with God that she struggled in this way, and she just could not see how God was good.
But then something happened which enabled her to see God’s goodness, and this was the beginning of profound change. Now this isn’t how God always works. There’s not necessarily quick fixes for depression. But Mara’s story illustrates a crucial point for all of us in our trials. She said everything started to change when she submitted to God’s sovereign will. Here’s how she described it:
Once I got to the place where I said, “Okay, God, if this is your will for my life, I bow to your will,” then my focus and orientation changed. Most of my adult life I had focused on getting out of the depression. But now I said: “Okay, if you’re calling me to live with this, then I will.”
Shortly after I made that decision to bow to God’s will for my life, regardless of whether or not that meant depression, I became more convinced of God’s goodness … I had the strongest sense of God’s presence than I had since I first became a Christian. (paraphrased from Journal of Biblical Counseling 18:2 pp.35f)
Everything started to change when she submitted to God’s sovereign will. That will be true for all of us.
Then in vv.13-19 Isaiah says: don’t despair; trust God’s goodness. When you are in the thick of a trial, it’s easy to despair. Israel could have easily despaired when she was in exile, because she could have thought her exile would never end. And we can easily despair when we are in a trial, because we think our trial will never end.
But the reason we need not despair is because God is not only sovereign, God is also good. You can see that in v.17 --
But Israel is saved by the LORD with everlasting salvation; you shall not be put to shame or confounded to all eternity.
Yes, Israel was in exile in Babylon. But great good was going to come out of it. God was going to move on Cyrus’ heart to send her back to the Promised Land with all the money she needed to rebuild her temple. Great good was coming.
And if you are trusting Jesus Christ, the same is true for you. Great good is coming to you from your trial. We don’t know all the good that God will bring. But we do know one for sure: every trial will bring you the great good of more of God’s nearness.
So if you are in the thick of a trial, don’t despair; trust God’s goodness. The day is coming when you will thank God for every second of that trial – because of the closeness to God you experienced, and the many other goods that came out of it.
Jonathan Edwards was one of the most powerful preachers and writers in Church history. When he was 55 years old smallpox vaccinations had just come on the scene, and were proving very helpful, so he was vaccinated. But the doctor gave him too much, and he developed a fever and ended up dying of smallpox.
This brought a severe trial to his wife, Sarah. But she did not complain; she submitted to God’s sovereignty. And she did not despair; she trusted God’s goodness. We know this because of a letter she wrote to her daughter about her husband’s passing. Here’s what she wrote:
My very dear child,
What shall I say? A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud. The Lord has done it. He has made me adore his goodness, that we had him so long. But my God lives; and he has my heart. O what a legacy my husband, and your father, has left us! We are all given to God; and there I am, and love to be.
Your ever affectionate mother,
Sarah Edwards
Don’t complain; humble yourself before God’s sovereignty.
And don’t despair; trust God’s goodness.