Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2305
“If you will not believe, surely you shall not be established.” Isaiah 7:9.
As I told you in the reading, Isaiah had a very heavy commission from God. He was to go and speak to people who would not hear him and to be to them a messenger rather of death, than of life. Though the message, itself, would be full of life, yet they would refuse it, and so bring upon themselves a tenfold death. As a sort of experiment in his work, he was called upon, first, to go and speak to king Ahaz, that wicked king. He knew in his own soul that what he had to say would be rejected, but, nevertheless, at the command of God, he went to speak to the king. He was told where he would meet him. God knows where to send His faithful servants. He has arranged every circumstance about the true preacher— what he shall say and where he shall say it—and every congregation is a picked congregation for God’s sent servants. He knows who comes and who is away. He knows how to adapt the message with great specialty to the individual case of each person who is within sound of the preacher’s voice and He knows how to adapt even the voice, itself, to the ears of every hearer. We know all this, for we have had abundant evidence of it again and again.
The tidings which Isaiah took to Ahaz were very pleasant ones. He was not to be afraid of the king of Israel and the king of Syria. These men were determined to destroy him and his people, but they were only like smoking firebrands, almost extinct. Their power would soon come to an end and, therefore, the Prophet told the king not to be distressed, but to be quiet and to wait patiently till he saw what God would do. Then he challenged the faith of Ahaz and warned him that if he did not believe, neither would he be established! Isaiah anticipated what was all too true, that Ahaz would not trust, that he would prefer to look to outward means, send for the king of Assyria and lean upon an arm of flesh rather than put his trust in God. He might have waited, surely, and not have indulged his fears until there was reason for them, but no, he must be all in a fright and a fume notwithstanding that God had said to him, by His servant, Fear not, neither be faint-hearted.”
Well now, these words of Isaiah to Ahaz furnish us with a warning and an encouragement. God seems to speak out of this blessed Book to you and to me, tonight! Certainly, He speaks to me—I hope to you, also—“If you will not believe, surely you shall not be established.”
I. Our first head shall be, GOD DESERVES TO BE BELIEVED. We cannot say this of everybody. Many men deserve to be believed—their character is such that we are bound to trust them. Some men, on the other hand, ought not to be believed—their character is such that we would be foolish to confide in them. But I say, tonight, of Him who created the heavens and the earth, the God of this Word of God, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that He claims to be believed and He deserves to be believed!
For, first, He is God and, being God, He cannot lie. The conception of a lying God may be possible to a heathen, but I trust that to you it is quite out of the question. The very idea of “God” to us means perfect truthfulness, indisputable veracity—God who, from the very necessity of His Nature, cannot lie. He can do anything that is right, but He cannot do a wrong thing. He cannot say an untruthful thing. He cannot, either in word, or deed, or thought, be guilty of falsehood. He is God and He cannot lie. To impute a lie to God is blasphemy! I will use no softer word. You have brought dishonor upon the sacred name when you have, in any way, connected the name of Jehovah with a lie. “Has He said, and shall He not do it?” Oh, Beloved, do not treat the Lord as if He were a liar! Remember that when you doubt His promise—since you know He can fulfill it if He wills, for He is Omnipotent—when you doubt His promise, you are casting a
suspicion upon the veracity of the Eternal God! Do you mean to do that? Have you never read that word of the beloved and loving disciple, “He that believes not God has made Him a liar; because He believes not the record that God gave of His Son”? Did you really mean to make God a liar? Were you guilty of such infamy as that? Well, I will say no more upon that point but He deserves to be believed because He is God. It is essential to every true idea of God to believe that God must be true.
He deserves to be believed because His Word has always been true. Any person who is a student of prophecy knows how literally, even in small things, the prophecies of God have been fulfilled. There was a little book which was published, some time ago, by Mr. Urquhart, of Weston-super-Mare, upon fulfilled prophecy. I gave a copy to a Brother, the other day, and on writing to me, he said that he had found it much more interesting than any story or novel he had ever read in his life, and vastly more astounding than any romance, for every jot and tittle, to the dots of the i’s, and the crosses of the t’s, in the prophecies of God’s servants, had been recorded in history! In the ruins of Tyre, Sidon and Babylon, and the like, we have, in every stone, a witness of the faithfulness of God to His Word!