Pastor, Tell Us Pleasant Things!

These are rebellious people, deceitful children, children unwilling to listen to the Lord’s instruction. They say to the seers, “See no more visions,” and to the prophets, “Give us no more visions of what is right. Tell us pleasant things, prophesy illusions. Leave this way, get off this path, and stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel!”

Isaiah 30:9-11

“Pastor, tell us pleasant things!” As a minister of the gospel I am called to bring you good news. This text tells us how the Israelites demanded that the prophet Isaiah adjust his message to suit their interests and desires. They wanted to hear only pleasant things. But before a prophet can prophesy good things, he must preach certain necessary bad news. Before a pastor can bring good news, he must preach certain unpleasant things. Before the gospel can be proclaimed, the law must be preached.

Necessary Unpleasant Things

I am well aware that people do not like to hear unpleasant things, but they are necessary. What, then, are some of these unpleasant things we must preach? First, we must say that in the beginning, after God created the heavens and the earth out of nothing, Adam and Eve sinned against God. There was a fall which affected the whole universe, and that, as a result of the fall, all are now born sinners. Genesis 6:5 describes the extent of man’s sin: “The Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.”

We must say that not only are we born sinful, but we practice sin daily. The apostle Paul tells us we are by nature dead in trespasses and sins. We are guilty before God Almighty, and the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. The Bible says it is appointed for man once to die and then comes the judgment. There is a final judgment and eternal death in hell awaiting every unrepentant sinner. The true God is not good and evil, but holy and righteous. He gave us laws which we are to obey.

Also, we must say that the Scripture is the very word of God, the only infallible revelation of reality. It tells us Jesus Christ is God/man, the only Savior of the world. There is no savior outside of him; to be saved, we must repent of our sins and trust in Jesus Christ alone. There is also no possibility of self-salvation based on any perceived human merit of our own; all our righteousness is like filthy rags.

We speak about renouncing all atheism and the idolatry of creature worship. In Isaiah 7 we see the prophet confronting Ahaz, who was so fearful his knees shook. When Isaiah came to Ahaz and told him to trust in God, he refused. Instead, Ahaz sought help from the Assyrians by giving them money. Later, during the time of Hezekiah, the unbelieving leaders of Judah also refused to trust in God. Like Ahaz, they used their money to seek help, this time from Egypt (Isaiah 30-31). But the hard truth is that when we try alternative ways of saving ourselves, it will only result in shame, disgrace, and destruction. We can only be saved by the gospel.

Isaiah 30:1-2 tells us, “‘Woe to the obstinate children,’ declares the Lord, ‘to those who carry out plans that are not mine, forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit, heaping sin upon sin; who go down to Egypt without consulting me; who look for help to Pharaoh’s protection, to Egypt’s shade for refuge.'” How many of us have done this type of thing? We do not want to consult God, because seeking the counsel of God spells weakness in our culture. The people of Isaiah’s day refused to seek God’s counsel, preferring to seek help from Egypt, even though Egypt had earlier practiced genocide on them. They ignored the prohibition God gave when he redeemed them out of Egypt, forbidding them to return to Egypt for help. They ignored the fact that Egypt itself was weak and worthless; how could it give any help to Israel? In fact, in Isaiah 30:7 the Lord called the weak country of Egypt “Rahab, that Do-Nothing.” Sennacherib’s assistant, the Assyrian field commander, said about Egypt, “Look now, you are depending on Egypt, that splintered reed of a staff, which pierces a man’s hand and wounds him if he leans on it! Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who depend on him” (Isaiah 36:6).

Alternative ways of salvation will never work. Isaiah was telling the Israelites, “Don’t you remember that God, the God of Israel, defeated all the Egyptian gods when he brought about your deliverance from Egypt?” But the greatest reason that Israel was not to trust Egypt was given in Isaiah 31:3: “But the Egyptians are men and not God; their horses are flesh and not spirit.” Isaiah was pointing out that the Egyptians were only creatures, made of flesh and so weak. God wants us to rely on him, the omnipotent God. We are fools if we trust in ourselves or in anybody else; all are but men! It is foolishness for a creature to trust in another creature.

Wrong Pleasant Things

But who wants to listen to unpleasant things, even if they are true? The people of Isaiah’s day told him to speak pleasant things to them, even if they were not true. Let us then examine what are some of the wrong pleasant things people say.

In Isaiah 30:10-11 the people told the prophet, “Give us no more visions of what is right!” They were saying, “Do not preach what is straight, true, righteous and real. Do not preach from the Bible! Instead, tell us pleasant things; prophesy illusions.”

Then they said, “Leave this way,” meaning the way of God (v. 11). They were saying, “Do not tell us to travel on the narrow way of God that leads to eternal life. Do not speak to us about discipleship and obedience to God. Do not speak about Christ’s deity and sinless human nature, his substitutionary atonement, his resurrection, his lordship, and his ethics. And especially do not speak about his coming again to judge and to save his people. Do not bring God into our view. We are sick and tired of seeing the Holy One of Israel!”

But the purpose of preaching is to exalt God so that people can see him, fear him, love him, trust in him, and be saved. Jesus said, “But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself” (John 12:32). The primary job of ministers of the gospel is to bring the Holy One of Israel into the purview of our vision. But these people were saying to Isaiah, “Don’t you ever tell us right things. Do not hold before us the Holy One of Israel or preach the word in such a way that we are brought to see the holy God. We hate him and his law.” And if you read this passage carefully, you notice they were saying to the prophet, “Please lead us away from the straight path and lead us astray.”

These people were like King Ahaz, who did not want to hear anything about the holy God whom Isaiah saw in his vision of chapter 6. Ahaz would rather seek help from the Assyrians in the north than from Israel’s God. They were like King Ahab (2 Kings 22), who hired four hundred hired prophets to always prophesy smooth, pleasant things to him. When Ahab wanted to go and fight against the Syrians, they said in unison, “Go ahead; you will be victorious.” Wanting to believe the false prophets, Ahab went out to fight, but the prophets were false: Ahab was killed in the battle.

False ministers preach exactly what people want to hear. They base their messages on polling results because they want to be popular and make more money. After all, if they preached the truth, they fear they would not be popular and would not make money. Many preachers choose to preach pleasant things, things they know their people want to hear, things that will please and entertain their people. They praise their listeners, speaking often of self-esteem and moral relativism. They only speak positive things, being careful to approve of what the people want to do and never rebuking or correcting them. They tell stories to make people laugh. They preach humanism, psychology, politics, and new morality. They do not preach from the Bible. In fact, they say the Bible cannot be trusted because it is full of errors and not fit to be read by modern scientific man. They preach evolution, saying that in the beginning was nothing, then matter came out of that nothing, then a little life came out of lifeless matter, then man came out of that life, then reason came out of non-reason-all of which took billions of years to accomplish. The reason they want to preach this is that if there is no Creator God, there is no morality, no truth, and no laws except one: To always do one’s own thing.

False ministers always proclaim smooth things, but these are wrong pleasant things. They say that man is evolving-he is good, and getting better every day-without God! They declare that man is by nature good, not a sinner. They say there is no God and no law, and, therefore, no judgment, heaven or hell. They say this life is all there is and we must make sure we have a good time. It is like a patient going to a doctor who is a quack. The phony doctor will say, “You do not have any cancer. In fact, I am surprised how good your health is. I think you should write a book and go on television and radio and tell everyone the secret of your perfect health.” But the patient goes home and dies within a few days. That is what wrong pleasant things do to human beings.

Right Pleasant Things

But there are pleasant things which are right. Unlike the four hundred false prophets of Ahab whose pleasant prophecies resulted in Ahab’s untimely death, true ministers like Isaiah, Micaiah and Amos and others preached everlastingly true and pleasant things-things that result in salvation.

True ministers refuse to preach according to poll data. They refuse to pursue popularity; rather, they endeavor to be faithful ambassadors of Christ. They are often hated, persecuted, slandered, and sometimes killed. But when a sinner comes to such a true prophet, he will be told the truth about his deadly rebellion against God and shown the way of perfect salvation in Jesus Christ.

A true prophet always speaks eternal truth. He speaks of the law of God and the pervasiveness of sin, of man’s real guilt and God’s just wrath upon sinners. He speaks of the judgment of God and of hell, but he also speaks of the way of eternal salvation and of the Redeemer, Jesus Christ, the eternal Son who took upon himself human nature, yet was without sin. He declares that this Jesus Christ truly is the Lamb of God who died on the cross for our sin and the sin of the whole world. He says that Jesus Christ was crucified for our sins and raised up for our justification. He proclaims that everyone who repents and believes on the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved forever.

Salvation and Strength from God

What, then, are the pleasant words God wants us to hear? In Isaiah 30:15 we read, “This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel says. . . .” Notice who is speaking: the Holy One, the Sovereign One, the only Savior. These words which the Israelites were refusing to hear were the very words of God. They told Isaiah, “Don’t speak God’s word to us. Tell us pleasant, smooth things. Don’t ever speak to us about the way of the Messiah, the narrow, straight way that leads to life!”

But what was the word of God to his people? “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.” Repentance is illustrated by the prodigal son, who went away from his father to live in sinful pleasure in a far country, but later repented and returned to his father. In the same way God was saying that Israel must turn from trusting in Egyptian military might and return to the true and living God.

“In quietness and trust is your strength,” Isaiah declared. Every sinner is engaged in the frenetic activity of self-salvation, trying to achieve that which he never can. He works very hard to save himself, whether through accumulating wealth or power or by other means. But God’s way of salvation is quietness and trust in God. “Therefore,” Isaiah was telling the people, “stop all this self-saving, frenzied activity! Put your trust in God alone, and you will discover strength.” The Hebrew word is geburah, which means the strength of a warrior. In the same way, Jesus told his disciples, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you.” When we trust in God, we receive strength so that we can live victorious lives. Every unbeliever is a weak person, but the one who trusts in God alone is strong. We must learn that salvation is not by human merit but by grace alone, given to those who merited divine wrath.

In Isaiah 28:16 we find another hard saying that the people of Israel did not want to hear: “So this is what the Sovereign Lord says: ‘See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who trusts will never be dismayed.'” Here the Messiah is likened to a massive stone, a strong foundation on which we can rest, a foundation that will bear all our problems.

Here, then, is the gospel: In repentance and rest is our salvation, in quietness and trust we will find the strength of a warrior by which we can resist the devil, resist temptation, and live for God’s glory. That is why we must hear true preaching of the gospel. We must come through the narrow way. The people of Israel were telling Isaiah, “Get out of that way! Don’t let us walk on God’s way. Please lead us astray into hell, destruction, misery, anxiety, and worry.” But the real preacher says, “Come to the narrow way and walk in it, because it alone is the way of repentance, faith, the word, righteousness, holiness, eternal life, peace, and hope.”

These are the true pleasant things, are they not? I pray we will cease from all self-help and reliance on our own merit and trust only on the merit of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

This is the good news God speaks to us: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” And what is the proof of true repentance? Rest. If we are saved, we will rest in God. We will experience peace rather than anxiety.

Isaiah 37 tells us that someone did listen to this message from God and found rest. When Assyria was invading Judah, Hezekiah, son of King Ahaz, was trying to depend on Egypt for help rather than on God. But then he repented and trusted in God. (PGM) He told Isaiah, in essence, “All right, tell me what to do.” Then Hezekiah prayed to God, and God delivered Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib. And when Sennacherib went home, he was killed; he never bothered Judah again.

Weep No More!

In Isaiah 30:18 we read, “Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you.” For all who are worried, puzzled, confused, and burdened, here is a profound statement: “The Lord longs to be gracious to you, he rises to show compassion to you.” Visualize the mighty, holy, most wise, omnipotent, just God looking upon us sinners. God is so great, yet he longs to be gracious to us and forgive all our sins and make us his beloved children. The Lord longs to bring us out of the miry clay and plant our feet upon the solid rock.

In verse 19 we read, “O people of Zion, who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more.” This is not a meaningless statement. Why does God say we no longer have to weep? Because, for our benefit, God destroyed death by the death of his Son. Why do people weep? They are afraid of death. But here is God’s promise: “O people of Zion who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more.” Certainly, that is good news!

The wrath of God due us was poured upon his Son, Jesus Christ; it was taken away from us and put on him. Psalm 30:5 says God’s anger will last only for the night: “Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” If you want joy this day, you can have it; God longs to be gracious to you.

Psalm 126:1-6 tells us we do not need to weep because God brings his exiles back:

When the LORD brought back the captives to Zion, we were like men who dreamed. Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. Then it was said among the nations, “The LORD has done great things for them.” The LORD has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.

Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like streams in the Negev. Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him.

Another reason not to weep is found in Isaiah 61, where we read about the ministry of the Messiah. Here we find the true pleasant things. The world gives us sweet things first and then sour, because it is telling us illusions, and there is a sweetness in illusion. But God tells us the sour things first, that we are going to die if we have not trusted in Christ. Then he reveals the sweet things, that we can be saved through Jesus Christ. Let us, then, read about the real, everlastingly pleasant ministry of Jesus Christ:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because the Lord anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion-to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor (Isaiah 61:1-3).

In Revelation 7:17 we find yet another reason not to weep: The Lamb of God is in the center of his people. So we read, “For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

So Isaiah proclaims, “O people of Zion who live in Jerusalem, you will weep no more.” This is the divine declaration to everyone who repents and rests in Jesus Christ. We will weep no more. And not only does Isaiah tell us not to weep, but he adds, “How gracious he will be when you cry for help! As soon as he hears, he will answer.” That is another reason we must not weep: God will not only hear our prayers, but he will answer them instantly.

God Gives Us Teachers

In verse 20 we read, “Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more.” Actually, “teachers” here means the Teacher, who is God. When he hides himself, it is because of our sin, and we are in deep trouble. But here we are told to weep no more; God is no longer hiding. When we repent and return to God, he will reveal himself to us. When that happens, all our weeping will cease.

Additionally, God will open our eyes to see him and our ears to hear his word. No longer will we say, “Stop preaching right things to us!” Instead, we will say, “Preacher, please preach the word. Lift Jesus higher and higher, that we may behold him, trust in him, and be saved.” Thus, in verses 20-21 we read, “[Y]our teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice from behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.'”

Oh, there was a time we hated the instruction of God! Verse 9 says we were “children unwilling to listen to the Lord’s instruction.” But now all that is changed, and he gives us teachers who give us the counsel of God. In 2 Timothy 3:16 we read, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.” God himself opens our eyes and ears to see the Teacher and hear his words.

This is the regenerative work of the Holy Spirit. Has God done that for you? Satan blinded our eyes so that we would not see Jesus Christ. But when the Holy Spirit opens our eyes, we want to see Jesus Christ and hear the gospel. Our hearts will throb as we hear the word of God. And if we stray from that narrow way, from behind there will come a word-the voice of the Teacher coming through the preachers: “No, don’t go that way. This is the way; walk ye in it.” As we are filled with the Holy Spirit, he will guide us in the word of God through the teachers God has called and appointed, teachers who are unashamed of the gospel.

What about You?

Let me ask you: Will you repent and return to the true and living God even this day? Will you abandon all efforts of self-salvation? Will you reject all lies and illusions and philosophies of men? Will you pay heed to the counsel of God? Will you have Jesus Christ as your Savior?

Jesus saves only sinners. He did not come to seek the righteous; therefore, I urge you to come to him as you are. Do not try to clean yourself up or make yourself acceptable to God. That would only be adding sin to sin. Come as you are and he will make you clean. Come, confessing your sins, and he will forgive them all. What is the one thing you must to do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Entrust yourself to him, now and forever.

A story is told of a French king who, upon meeting with an ambassador from a foreign country, told him, “I want to take you to the French galleys where convicted criminals are working. I will give you the freedom to set one person free-whomever you want.” The men went to the galleys where the ambassador interviewed several convicted criminals. The first one said, “I did wrong, but it was not my problem. Other people made me to do it.” The next man said, “The truth is, I am perfectly innocent, but I was convicted by false witnesses.” Then he went to a third man, who said, “Sir, I have done this evil deed. I deserve to be here.” This was the man the ambassador pardoned.

We cannot be pardoned by the Lord Jesus Christ when we cover up our sin or blame others. The only way to receive forgiveness is to acknowledge our sins as the prodigal son did. We must pray with the publican, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” God longs to be gracious to us and save us; the question is, are we willing to be saved?

This is the gospel I speak to you. These are the truly pleasant things. Jesus said, “What does it profit if you gain the whole world and lose your soul?” Therefore, let me ask you again: Will you have Jesus Christ as your Savior? If you say yes, he will save you and give you the strength to resist temptation and live for God’s glory.

I pray we will stop trying to evade the hard realities of the gospel, repent of our sins, and return to the true and living God who alone can give rest to our souls. May we realize that we have no merit of our own and that all our righteousness is like filthy rags. There is still room at the cross for you. Amen.