The New Liberalism in Christianity (Man-Centered "Evangelism")

In an article entitled, "Is the Megachurch the new Liberalism", Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Seminary, writes:

Theological liberalism did not set out to destroy Christianity, but to save it from itself. Is the same temptation now evident? The Great Commission, we must remind ourselves, is not a command merely to reach people, but to make disciples. And disciples are only made when the church teaches all that Christ has commanded, as the Great Commission makes clear.

In a nutshell, Mohler states that the church's infatuation with numbers is a great threat to orthodoxy.  The primary example he gives is from a recent sermon delivered by Andy Stanley, Pastor of Northwood Community Church in Atlanta, which is the 3rd biggest church in America, wherein he implicitly stamped his - and by implication his church's - hearty approval of same-sex marriages, including them in his definition of "the modern family."

Being a pastor myself, I feel the pressure that "evangelicalism" places on churches to be "successful."  Of course, being completely ignorant of any time in history but our own, we as North Americans assume that successful has always been defined in terms of numbers and public approval.

I think this is the dangerous mentality that has permeated most (note: not all) megachurches.  When their god becomes numbers and not faithfulness to God's Word, this is inevitable.  However, as Mohler notes, this is not peculiar to megachurches.  Many small churches, that haven't reached that status, are trying to.  And how do we fill our pews, er, cool movie theater seats? By cheapening the gospel.  Whether or not they are "in" the Kingdom of God is besides the point.  They are in our church, and therefore we must be doing something right.

Let's face it. Jesus didn't suffer for preaching a soft-sell gospel.  He died because He preached a message that confronted sin, and only offered forgiveness to those willing to part with their sin.  As Leonard Ravenhill once said, if all Jesus preached was our American gospel, He would still be alive today.

Like adultery, stealing, gossip, blasphemy, lust, and covetousness, homosexuality is a sin.  If this message keeps homosexuals from attending our church, we must be faithful to the Scriptures, and trust that the Holy Spirit will bring them to repentance through regeneration.  If our message keeps people who are living in adultery from attending our church, we must preach the gospel & likewise trust that God will bring true conviction and repentance.  (By the way, I truly believe that the church has compromised on what the Bible teaches on divorce & remarriage for this reason alone, namely, that our churches are filled with people who treat marriage with such indifferent contempt. God forbid they go across the street to another church! So we let all kinds of people divorce for unbiblical reasons, so they and their families can stay in our church....and keep tithing, of course).

If we "tweek" the gospel, we take away the only tool the Spirit has to bring about the new birth.  It's that simple.  We can fill our churches with people who pray prayers that are not found in the Bible, but we may be inadvertently filling Hell with people who have been given a false bill of sale.

Satan is no fool.  The word "liberalism" is scary, and most 'evangelical' pastors would denounce those who have denied the authority & sufficiency of Scripture in the past.  So Satan gives us something noble, namely "soul-winning via a goat's gospel" to destroy the witness of the church, filling it with unregenerate 'members' who have never truly known what "Jesus is Lord" really means.  Such professors show up to church on Sunday, sing some songs, laugh at some jokes, give some money, are entertained for 25 minutes, then leave so they can return to 'reality'. One little addition to the gospel can completely change it, just as one molecule can radically change the outcome of a chemical reaction.  Since we pander after unbelievers who love their sin, we preach a feel-good gospel that tells them Jesus is OK with our sinfulness.  After all, He came to save sinners, right?  However, Jesus came to save His people "from" their sin (Matt. 1:21), not "for" their sin. One letter makes all the difference!

I close with a quote from Mohler, who is implying that many of the 'pastors' filling pulpits today are the successors of well-known liberals from the past.  This is scary stuff.

The current cultural context creates barriers to the Gospel even as it offers temptations. One of those temptations is to use to use the argument that our message has to change in order to reach people. This was the impetus of theological liberalism’s origin. Liberals such as Harry Emerson Fosdick claimed that the Christian message would have to change or the church would lose all intellectual credibility in the modern world. Fosdick ended up denying the Gospel and transforming the message of the Cross into psychology. Norman Vincent Peale came along and made this transformation even more appealing to a mass audience. Fosdick and Peale have no shortage of modern heirs.

 Gulp.  I would challenge you to check out the 10 Biggest Churches in America. Listen to their "messages" and tell me if the words "sin" or "repentance" are used in their "gospel" appeals.  God have mercy on us!

How different from Paul's final letter, written to Timothy.  We just finished working through it in our family devotions. It's filled with suffering for the gospel.  Sometimes I wonder how we in North America have missed one of the main themes in the New Testament: suffering for preaching & living the (true) gospel. In 2 Tim. 4, Paul reminds Timothy of what needs to be done "in these last days" which are characterized by religious wickedness (ch. 3):

"I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, Who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the Word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."

 May God give us His Spirit in full measure to suffer for the gospel (2 Tim. 1:6-8).

Recommended books:

James Gresham Machen, "Christianity & Liberalism"

Michael Horton, "Christless Christianity"

Dever on Monologue Preaching

The following is taken from Mark Dever's latest book entitled, Preach.  It is extremely pertinent to a 'christian' generation that has by and large forgotten that it is through "the foolishness of preaching" that people are saved (1 Cor. 1:21, NET). Not entertainment. Not slick presentations. Not emotional appeal. Not hip youth pastors or tight worship teams. The first two chapters of Paul's letter to the immature Corinthian church are a rebuke to our insipid, post-modern, latte drinking, entertainment seeking

The empty pulpit in many of our church buildings well displays the spiritual reality. We run around seeking life for our churches and life for ourselves through a million different methods, and the one means God has given for bringing people into a relationship with Himself stands neglected and disdained. In the act of preaching—a congregation hearing the voice of one man who stands behind the Scriptures—God has given us an important symbol of the fact that we come into relationship with Him by His Word. Just as surely as Abram was called to God by the word of promise addressing him, so we as Christians are made God’s people by believing God and trusting His promises. In a word, we come into relationship with God through faith, and “faith comes,” Paul tells us in Romans 10, “from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”

There is only one God, and He is a relational and communicating, personal being who speaks to us and initiates relationship with us. Those powerful, life-giving truths are not only proclaimed but also powerfully symbolized by the preaching of God’s Word. He speaks, and therefore we preach.

As Mark Dever says in an endorsement of Al Mohler's book, He is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World, "Where are the Spurgeons of this generation?"

May our Lord Jesus, in His great love for His church, send this generation many such monologue preachers who speak as God's mouthpieces to a dying, Hell-bound world.

In Christ, and for His glory to the ends of the earth,
Pastor Ryan

The Resurrection Changes Everything

I'm currently reading a book entitled, "Raised With Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything" by Adrian Warnock. His preface is just too good to not share with others.

For Christians all over the world, every Sunday is Resurrection Sunday. We meet each week, among other things, in order to celebrate the glorious, wondrous fact that Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus' resurrection really did change everything. It changed the cross from a tragedy into a triumph...This was the most powerful divine event in the history of creation, and it ushered in a new age of the Holy Spirit's activity and power in saving and transforming lives.

When considering if Christianity is true, it all boils down to the whether Jesus rose from the dead. The lives of Christians today demonstrate that the resurrection is still changing people. It changes fear into love, despair into joy. The resurrection changes people from being spiritually dead to being alive to God. It changes guilty condemnation into a celebration of forgiveness and freedom. It changes anxiety into a hope that goes beyond the grave. It can change our sinful hearts so they want to follow the Lord Jesus, and the power of the resurrection is relentlessly killing the sin in every true Christian. Because we neglect to emphasize this truth, many Christians have a meager expectation of the extent to which we can today experience resurrection life and victory over sin. The resurrection is far from being something we only benefit from in the future!

As John MacArthur says,

The resurrection is the ground of our assurance, it is the basis for all our future hopes, and it is the source of power in our daily lives here and now. It gives us courage in the midst of persecution, comfort in the midst of trials, and hope in the midst of the world's darkness.

Warnock continues,

Christians have therefore already been changed by Jesus' resurrection. Jesus really is alive today. Because of this Christians are also alive in a whole new way. The same power that raised Christ from the dead is living in every true Christian. God wants us not just to believe in Jesus' resurrection but to be transformed by it and to receive the power we need to live the way we know we ought. For all of us, the questions, did Jesus rise from the dead? and what are the implications of His resurrection? are the most important ones we will ever answer.

 If Warnock is right, we would do well to understand more deeply, and reflect more seriously, and apply more realistically the glorious truth and subsequent implications of the immeasurable greatness of God's power at work in us (Eph. 1:19ff.).

Is Jesus Yahweh?

One of the younger ladies in our church asked for some resources to help her dialogue with a friend of hers who left the church and has since become a jehovah's witness (I have intentionally not capitalized their title out of reverence for the true & living Yahweh).

I sent her some good stuff from the ESV Study Bible, which I thought was excellent.

Then I went to Robert Reyburn's Systematic Theology and basically sent her his section on how the NT writers ascribe the divine Name of Yahweh used in the OT to Jesus in the NT.

Here, with a couple of additions, is what I sent her.  I hope it will help us as we contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.  Jesus is God.  Let us remain confident and unashamed of what the Scriptures make so abundantly and gloriously clear.

1. Moses' description of Yahweh as "King of kings" (Deut. 10:17) is applied by John to Christ (Rev. 17:14; 19:16).

2. The author of Hebrews applies the entirety of Psalm 102:25-27 to Jesus (1:10-12).

3. Proverbs 18:10 provides the background for Peter's assertion in Acts 4:12

4. Joel's summons to trust in Yahweh (2:32) is employed by Paul to summon men to faith in Christ (Rom. 10:13).

5. When Isaiah looked upon Yahweh (Isa. 6:1-3), according to John he was beholding the glory of the preincarnate Son of God (John 12:40-41).

6. Isaiah's call to sanctify Yahweh in the heart (8:12-13) is applied by Peter to Christ - He is the One who is to be sanctified as "Lord" in the heart (1 Pet. 3:14-15).

7. Isaiah's representation of Yahweh as a stone that causes men to stumble & a rock that makes them fall (8:14) is applied by Paul to Christ (Rom. 9:32-33).

8. Yahweh, whose coming would be preceded by Yahweh's forerunner (Isa. 40:3; Mal. 3:1; 4:5), is equated w/ Christ (Matt. 3:3; 11:10; Mark 1:2-3; Luke 1:16-17; 3:4; John 1:23).

9. Jesus Himself employs Yahweh's words in Isaiah 43:10 & 45:22 to summon men to be His witnesses & to rest in Him (Acts 1:8; Matt. 11:28).

10. Isaiah's description of Yahweh as the "first & last" (44:6) is employed by John to describe the glorified Christ (Rev. 2:8; 22:12-13).

11. Yahweh, "before whom every kneww shall bow & by whom every mouth shall swear (Isa. 45:23) is identified by Paul as Jesus (Rom. 14:10; Phil. 2:10).

12. Yahweh, the pierced One upon whom men would look & mourn (Zech. 12:10), John tells us is the Christ (John 19:37).

13. Jesus is given the divine Name, "Lord" (NT) by the Father in Phil. 2:9).

14. That Yahweh is called "the only Savior" in the OT (Isa. 43:11; 45:15, 21) and applied by multiple NT writers to Jesus shows that Jesus is no mere angel, but divine (see Tit. 1:3 & compare w/ 1:4; 2:10 w/ 2:13; 3:4 w/ 3:6). That Paul does this 3 times in the same context is more than mere coincidence.

There are plenty more examples.  If they deny this much, there is no use giving any more, as their hearts are closed to the truth & hardened to what the Scriptures plainly & repetitively teach.


In Christ, and for His divine glory to the ends of the earth,
Pastor Ryan

Loving Our Enemies

In God's great providence, He saw fit to give me one of those minds that has a hard time 'stopping'.  Hours after reading a book, my mind is often found digesting and analyzing and contrasting and comparing and dissecting.  Needless to say, more often than not, sleep can become more of a chore than anything.  One of the ways I have learned to combat this 'gift' is to read "non-theological" books (especially biographies) at night time as I'm 'settling down' to go to bed, as doing so often has the effect of putting my brain into more of a screensaver mode.

Last night, I began reading A Heart for Freedom, the story of Chai Ling and her courageous determination to seek the freedom of her fellow countrymen (and women) in China.  Though best known for her leading role in one of the greatest uprisings in world history (Tiananmen Square), what she is not known is for the amazing journey that God had predetermined for her before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:3-14).

But before she gets to her freedom in Christ, she recounts for us in the beginning of the book the slavery associated with her upbringing in Communist (read: Atheist) China, along with the massive effects and implications that this had upon her life.  In these introductory chapters, she paints the landscape of her upbringing in a small town in China, highlighting especially the pain of growing up without her parents, who were somewhat renown doctors and loyalists to the People's Liberation Army (PLA). So loyal were they to this 'cause', that they were never home for their children; often they were away from home for up to a year at a time.  Though well fed physically, they were starving spiritually.

By the time she gets to the sixth chapter, which chronicles her University life in Beijing, we begin to see the ramifications of a godless [read: God-hating] upbringing.  For example: having never had a godly male figure in the home - she literally was raised by her grandmother, and then by the age of ten, was raising the rest of her family - she never was taught what true love from a man looked like.  And so we should not be surprised when she recounts how in her time at University she began dating a guy whom she didn't love.  The reason she dated him: he would be a stable husband, much the way her dad was to her mother.

Then, one day, before Chai Ling knew what had been happening, one thing led to another, and, while visiting her parents during a University break, was found to be with child (Chai had no idea, though her mom of course did).  Being brought up in a culture that is completely foreign to us, namely a culture of respect and shame, Chai Ling's father was furious, as the very mention of this would destroy the generations of hard work he and his ancestors had exerted to build the family a respectable name in the their town (not to mention the Army they so loyally served).  Without even discussing the options, her father dragged her to an abortion clinic two hours away (no one would know them in the remote village they went to), where an abortion was administered without any questions whatsoever (again, we need to remember that at that time, China was under the one-child policy).

The details were gory.  As wicked and gruesome as abortion is in "modern and sanitized" America, how this abortion was administered was far more disturbing.  Having the joy of being blessed with children, as well as the pain of losing two via miscarriage and stillbirth, I confess reading this was quite difficult and emotional for me.

And yet, as much as I was grieving over the murder of her first child, I actually was grieving over Chai Ling as well.  In a very real biblical sense, she knew better, namely that murder is wrong (Romans 1:18ff.; 2:12-16).  And yet in another real sense, she was the victim of ignorance and a Satanic government system.  She was the victim of trying to find love in a finite man, because she had never truly heard of the love of God for the world in Jesus Christ.  She was, as Paul says, an ignorant Gentile having no hope and without God in this world (Eph. 4:17-18; 2:11-12).

To console herself from the emotional, physical, and spiritual pain of abortion, she threw herself even more into her studies, which of course as an idol could never deliver her.  Before she knew it, she was pregnant again, and this time concealed her going to the abortion clinic for fear of her dad's wrath.

By the end of the book (I don't know why I read the endings so often), she has become a Christian and is fighting for more than mere political freedom in her country; she is fighting for the freedom that only comes in a personal relationship in the God-man Jesus Christ (Gal. 5:1).

The moral of the story: we don't know the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God (Rom. 11:33).  So often, in our rage against injustice we forget that sinners sin by nature.  We really shouldn't be all that surprised.  The reason the world is broken is because it is desperately in need of the saving gospel of Jesus.  Like Chai Ling, the world will continually seek solace & comfort from the "course of this world", which only brings more bondage & slavery to the god of this world (cf. Eph. 2:1-3; 2 Cor. 4:4).

Last night at prayer meeting, we grieved over another instance of injustice in the Federal court system.  Basically, a hockey coach, guilty of numerous accounts of sexual abuse of boys he had been coaching, was given a slap on the wrist (2 years in prison).  But what was sweet was that we not only prayed for justice to be meted out by God; we also, and especially, asked that this man would be regenerated and saved by Jesus Christ.  Vengeance is not ours to repay.  God alone holds that prerogative (Rom. 12:19-21; Heb. 10:30).

How are we to respond to sinners in a fallen world?  Even sinners who kill babies?  Sinners who are trying to change the laws in our education system?  Sinners who gossip about us, lie about us, hurt us, use us, abuse us?

Rather than hating our enemies, Jesus explains how His kingdom works: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, revealing that you are children of your Father in heaven" (my translation of Matt. 5:45a).  Why?  "Because," Jesus continues, the Father acts in the same way towards those who hate Him (5:45b).

Paul says that instead of acting in wrath & rage against those who oppose the Kingdom, we are to feed our enemies when they are hungry, and to give them something to drink when they are thirsty, "for by so doing you will heap coals upon their head" (Rom. 12:20).  Paul closes the chapter by encouraging the gospel-remembering believers (12:1-2) "not to be overcome by evil, but to overcome evil with good" (12:21).

In 1 Cor. 6, after listing & categorizing a motley crew of Hell-deserving sinners, Paul says, "And such were some of you."  I wonder what Chai Ling's reaction was when she read the glorious verse for the first time.  I wonder if she wept for the praise of the mercy she found in Jesus when she read the next sentence, "But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God" (6:11).  Brethren, because of grace, mercy triumphs over judgement! (James 2:13)

May God give us the grace to love our enemies, and pray that God would save them.  They are already condemned.  Jesus came not into the world to condemn the world (because it already is), but that through Him the world might be saved (John 3:17).  May the gospel of hope for the chiefest of sinners be the theme of our song, for truly, beloved, such were some [read: "all"] of us!

In Christ, and for the glory of His name to the ends of the earth, China included,
Pastor Ryan

Can One Be a Christian if Jesus is Not Their Lord? (Part 10 - Ephesians)

Ephesians also destroys the unbiblical notion that one can be a Christian whilst living a life characterized by unrepentant sin.

As mentioned in the very first part of this series, Paul addresses his Christian readers as "saints".  Though the Catholics are certainly wrong in their depiction of such people as being a sinless subclass of super Christians, some Protestants have overreacted in the other direction, completely emptying the Greek word (which is derived from its Hebrew ancestor) of its original meaning.

The word translated by many English versions as "saint" is hagios.  Derived from the Hebrew quadosh, the word is often used of Yahweh Himself, and carries the connotation of being "set apart".  When used for God's people, the idea becomes "set apart for special [i.e. "Yahweh's] use."  Thus, we see that often in the OT, God's people were to be "different" from the nations, because the God whom they worshiped was likewise set apart from the false gods of the nations.  In the OT world, the "god" whom one worshiped determined one's lifestyle.  This is why I am so often perplexed when I see so many 'professing' followers of Christ resembling not Him, but the world (which likely betrays the fact that despite their profession, they really worship themselves & the world, not Christ).

When Yahweh calls Israel to be "holy even as [He] is holy" (Lev. 11:44-45), the word translated "holy" both times is quadosh.  And so the full force of the word is seen when God calls His quadosh (saints) to be quadosh (holy).  Those who are called by God are to resemble Him in the world and to the world, which is ultimately for the world (see Exo. 19:5-6).

This is the background that Paul is drawing from.  Saints are simply those who have been set apart by God and for God.  The idea of someone calling themselves a Christian, yet living a life that looks no different from the world is an unfortunate & God-belittling anomaly.

Likewise in 1:2, the believers (pistoi) in Ephesus are also called "faithful" (pistoi).  Again, the notion that a believer (pistos) can live a life of unfaithfulness (apistos) to Christ is something that entirely foreign and alien to the Word of God.

A couple of verses later, Paul says that such believers were "chosen in Christ from before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before Him in love" (1:4).  Thus, those who are not growing in holiness ought to question their calling & election (cf. 2 Pet. 1:10).

Moreover, God's people have literally received "the redemption" in Christ (1:7).  Not only have they been emancipated from the penalty of sin; in addition to this glorious truth, the cross has also dealt a severing death blow to the power of sin, the flesh, the world, and the devil.  "In Christ", believers are no longer slaves to sin, and are thus to live lives in conformity to this truth.  Therefore, believers must "no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds" (4:17).  Those who have truly "learned Christ" are to daily put off the old man, as well as put on the new man, "created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness" (4:21-24).

In addition to this, those who have received the monergistic gift of regeneration, evidenced by believing the gospel of our salvation (1:13), are to work out their salvation by walking in the good works which God has prepared for His people.  Not only does God predestine that we be saved; He also predestines that those who are saved will indeed live progressively holy lives (cf. 2:5-10).  Who are those who have been saved by grace through faith in Christ?  Who are "God's workmanship created in Christ"?  The answer is simple: those who "walk in good works," that is, those whose lives are characterized by grace-enabled good works (which Paul elaborates upon in chapters 4-6).

The temple that believers are incorporated into (i.e. the church) is called "holy" in 2:21. As God's elect people in the earth, they are thus called to be different from the nations (see 4:17ff.).  As God's holy temple, believers are called to be "imitators of God" (5:1), which involves positively walking in love (5:2), as well as negatively putting off things like sexual immorality, impurity, covetousness, filthy talk, crude joking, and ungodly relationships (5:3-7).  Rather than being like the world, believers, as light, are to expose the world's darkness, rather than participate in it (5:8-13).

Believers are watch carefully how they "walk" in this world (5:15; cf. 2:10), redeeming the time (5:16).  This requires not being filled with wine or living debauched lives, but rather being filled with the Holy Spirit who enables us to live lives of obedient worship (5:17ff.).

Jesus has not only saved His bride (i.e. the church) to be saved from the penalty of sin; He has also saved her for the purpose of presenting her to Himself "in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish" (5:27).  He cleanses His people by the "washing of the water of the Word" (5:26).

Thus those whose lives do not evidence such cleansing have "no part" in Jesus (cf. John 13:8, 10); such people should question if they have ever been "set apart", or "sanctified" (Eph. 5:26, verbal form of hagios) by Jesus (recall the similar argument made in the beginning of this post regarding 1:2).

Of course, as I have mentioned in almost every post ad nauseum, I am not advocating or teaching perfectionism here.  1 John 1:5-10 negates that.  God's people still battle with sin because they still are bearing the weight of a fallen body, living in a fallen world (kosmos), and battling a ruthless enemy (Eph. 6:10ff.).  However, God's people will nonetheless, by the power of the gift of the Holy Spirit (1:13), live differently in this world.  That's what it means to be holy.  As God's people gaze upon Christ in the gospel, they will inevitably be transformed, or cleansed by it (2 Cor. 3:18).

Those who walk not in love to Jesus are anathema (cf. Eph. 6:24).  Those who do not walk in loving obedience to Jesus (cf. John 14:15, 21, 23-24) simply do not belong to Him.

In Christ and for His glory to the ends of the earth, through His "set apart" bride,
Pastor Ryan

A Picture of Hope

As I get older, I am beginning to notice just how many of my parents' peculiar hobbies are beginning to evidence themselves in my own life.  Things like the love of cooking and gardening, things I used to think were for old, boring people, have intruded the desires' chamber in my heart, as I now find myself getting excited over the same things I once used to think were lame.

My mom is a "plant-o-holic".  The house I grew up in literally is filled with all sorts of plants: big, small, tree, flower, common, exotic, tender, tough, pretty, ugly...you name it.

In my room, I only have two.  They were given to me by a couple that attended our church for a year or so, and then left.  In an earlier post, I mentioned that I keep them in my room, as I see in them beautiful & living illustrations of some important biblical truths for the Christian life.

This plant was once a thriving beast.  And then it got some kind of infection that began decimating all the leaves, and even the stalks.  So, in an emergency effort to save the plant, I gave her a good ol' pruning.  Though the plant does not look like much now, the disease has been removed, and the process of recovery has begun.  New shoots are appearing out of their former, apparently lifeless stalks.

This is a beautiful picture of the hope of Israel in the 7th century B.C.  Israel, because of Yahweh's sovereign grace, was a thriving nation, flourishing under God's unique blessing upon His chosen people.  However, in her prosperity she let her guard down and allowed a ruthless & cancerous contagion - sin - to enter, which left unchecked began to decimate the nation at every level.  Because Yahweh loved His people too much to let them wallow in their sin, some painful pruning was in order.  Emergency surgery was required to save the nation from self-destructing into oblivion.  And so, metaphorically speaking, He cut her down, using the foreign nations to purge & discipline her.

Inevitably such pruning would bring about despair to God's people, as they would certainly wonder if He had forsaken His covenantal promises made to Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob.  And so Yahweh, Israel's intimate Savior, inspired a prophet named Isaiah to prophesy hope to Israel, even though all she saw around her was hopelessness.  In Isaiah 11:1-3, 8-9 we read:

Behold, the Sovereign LORD of Hosts will lop the boughs with terrifying power; the great in height will be hewn down, and the lofty will be brought low. He will cut down the thickets of the forest with an axe, and Lebanon will fall by the Majestic One.

There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.  And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD...

In that day the Root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples - of Him shall the nations inquire, and His resting place shall be glorious.  In that day, the Lord will extend His hand yet  second time to recover that remains of His people.

Any Jew alive at that time knew that this was explicitly referring to God's promise to send His Messiah to the earth to rescue His beaten down & broken people, and then set up the Kingdom of God among the elect remnant.

This pathetic looking plant reminds me that regardless of how hopeless and despairing things might appear to my eye, God is at work.  His promises to His people will never fail.  About 100 years after Isaiah prophesied, God raised up another prophet named Habakkuk, who reminded the people:

"The vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end - it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it: it will surely come, it will not delay" (2:3).

If God has saved you, look with eyes of faith to the fact that God's promises to His people will not return to Him void (Isaiah 55).  Even in the great pains we experience in life, He is sovereignly working all things out to conform to the end He designed, for His glory (Eph. 1:10, 13-14; cf. 1:6; Rom. 8:28).  Not only is He God.  He is good.

Pastor Ryan