The Strange Isaianic Mission

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

He said, “Go and tell this people: “`Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’ Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”

Then I said, “For how long, O Lord?” And he answered: “Until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the LORD has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken. And though a tenth remains in the land, it will again be laid waste. But as the terebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.”

Isaiah 6:8-13

Isaiah 6 speaks about a strange commission given to the prophet by God. Isaiah, who lived in the eighth century, had a long prophetic career. Isaiah 1:1 tells us he prophesied from the reign of King Uzziah to the reign of King Hezekiah of Judah. Tradition tells us that the evil king Manasseh cut the prophet Isaiah in two in his old age.

The book of Isaiah is called the Romans of the Old Testament. Chapters 6 and 40 are of key significance because in these chapters Isaiah was summoned to the presence of God to receive specific commissions, first to a ministry of judgment and then to a ministry of comfort. From Isaiah we learn that God would summon first Assyria and then Babylon to chastise his people for their sins. Then he would call Cyrus of Persia to set them free.

The importance of Isaiah is seen from the fact that it is quoted no fewer than sixty-six times in the New Testament, second only to the psalms.

Context of Moral Sickness

There was great peace and economic growth in Judah during the reign of King Uzziah (791-740 B.C.) due to the decline of the superpower Assyria. But this peace and prosperity resulted not in greater spiritual growth but in religious externalism. Uzziah himself became arrogant and flouted the holiness of God by entering the Holy Place to burn incense as a priest. Because of his sin, Uzziah became a leper and had to live as an unclean person for the rest of his life. The name Uzziah means “the Lord is my strength,” but in this incident Uzziah became mere “Uzzah,” which means “strength.”

Not only did Uzziah become ungodly, but the whole nation also forgot God and became wicked. In Isaiah 1:4 God describes his people, saying, “Ah, sinful nation, a people loaded with guilt, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption!” In Isaiah 1:6 he says, “From the sole of your foot to the top of your head there is no soundness-only wounds and welts and open sores, not cleansed or bandaged or soothed with oil.” God’s people became morally sick and thoroughly corrupt.

In Isaiah 5 the prophet pronounced six woes upon this morally sick nation:

1. “Woe to you who add house to house and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the land” (v. 8). This speaks of the people’s greed and materialism, their flouting of the law of God and their oppression of people by buying up their land.
2. “Woe to those who rise early in the morning to run after their drinks, who stay up late at night till they are inflamed with wine” (v. 11). This speaks of the people being given over to drunkenness and pleasure.
3. “Woe to those who draw sin along with cords of deceit, and wickedness as with cart ropes. . .” (v. 18).
4. “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil” (v. 20). This speaks of the perversion of truth and justice.
5. “Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight” (v. 21).
6. “Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and champions at mixing drinks, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, but deny justice to the innocent” (v. 22).

Thus, Isaiah pronounced judgment upon the nation as a whole. Now, in Isaiah 6, there is the question of what would happen next, since King Uzziah died after reigning fifty-two years. There are four points we want to examine from this passage: First, the vision of Isaiah; second, the confession of Isaiah; third, the cleansing of Isaiah; and fourth, the strange commission of Isaiah.

Isaiah’s Vision of the Great King

In the year King Uzziah died, Isaiah was given a vision of another King who will never die, the Great King over all kingdoms of the earth. He is the King, the Adonai, the all-ruling and all-conquering Sovereign Lord. In Isaiah 7:18 we are told how powerful this Great King is: “In that day the Lord will whistle for flies from the distant streams of Egypt and for bees from the land of Assyria.” In Isaiah’s view these national superpowers are seen as flies and bees who can be summoned to do God’s will.

How could Isaiah see God? After all, John 1:18 says, “No one has ever seen God,” and the Bible tells us that no one can look on the holy God as he truly is and live. But this vision given to Isaiah was designed to save rather than to destroy. All those who have ever seen God have seen him in a shielded way and, therefore, they lived.

Isaiah saw God “seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple.” The Great King whom Isaiah saw is the Sovereign Ruler of all. He is beyond human manipulation, and is praised continually by the angelic beings which are called here seraphs. This is the only place in the Bible where seraphs appear. They are the burning ones which Isaiah describes as flames of fire with six wings. Their eyes and feet are covered because, though they are holy, they would not look directly at the glory of this Great King. With two wings they flew above the King, declaring, “Qadosh, qadosh, qadosh!” or “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts! The whole earth is full of his radiant glory.”

At the praise of the seraphs the doorposts of the temple began to shake and smoke filled the temple. This vision told Isaiah that God was present in the midst of his people. Kings may die, superpowers of the world may disappear, but the King of kings and the Lord of lords lives and rules forever.

God Is the Center of Everything

This vision also tells us that the center of everything is God. In Revelation 4 we read that the center of everything is heaven, the center of heaven is the throne, and the center of the throne is the Lord.

This Lord was seen by Isaiah especially in terms, not of his power nor of his wisdom, but of his holiness. That is why we say, “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.” This holiness has to do with his brightness, separateness, and otherness from us. The true and living God dwells in unapproachable light. He is apart from us. He is transcendent. He alone is the self-existing, infinite Creator God. He alone is the Redeemer of the sinful. He alone is characterized by moral majesty. The cry, “Holy, holy, holy,” is a super-superlative, which emphasizes the totality of his moral transcendence from us. We find it used also in Revelation 4:8.

The picture before us, then, is of a totally sinful people and a King who is totally holy. In Isaiah 40 we get an idea of the transcendence of this King in whom we are asked to put our trust. In verse 12 the question is posed, “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand?” In verse 13 we read, “Who has understood the mind of the Lord, or instructed him as his counselor?” In verse 15 we read, “Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket; they are regarded as dust on the scales; he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust.” In verse 17 we read, “Before him all the nations are as nothing; they are regarded by him as worthless and less than nothing.” How many brilliant, powerful people don’t want to believe in God! But the Bible says they are nothing, worthless, less than nothing, dust, mist, vapor, grass.

In verses 21-23 we find a further description of God: “Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood since the earth was founded? He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in. He brings princes to naught, and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.”

Then in verses 25-26 we read: “‘To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?’ says the Holy One. ‘Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: who created all these?'” Verse 28: “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.” But look at verses 29-31: “He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, and they will walk and not be faint.”

The Confession of Isaiah

The second point is the confession of Isaiah. In Isaiah 5 the prophet pronounced six woes to the nation of Israel and in Isaiah 6 he had the great vision of the Lord. But rather than producing rapture or ecstasy in him, this vision filled Isaiah with sheer terror. A true revelation of God’s glory and majesty will always do that because as God’s holiness is revealed, so also our sinfulness.

In Isaiah 6:5 we hear a seventh woe: “Woe to me! I am ruined!” Isaiah came to realize his radical depravity and said, “I am undone. I am silenced. I am utterly ruined. I now realize that not only is the nation unclean but I myself am unclean and therefore unfit to come to the presence of God and serve him. I am condemned and excluded. I have seen the King; therefore, I know I must die.” Peter had the same reaction when he realized Jesus was God. In Luke 5:8 he said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” Our arrogance will vanish instantly when we see God in his glory.

“I am a man of unclean lips,” Isaiah declared. In other words, he was saying, “My lips are unclean because my heart is unclean. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The very imaginations of my thought are only evil continually. I know I have been sinful from conception.” In Romans 3:10-18 Paul speaks of this utter sinfulness of man:

As it is written:

“There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no-one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no-one who does good, not even one.”

“Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.”

“The poison of vipers is on their lips.”

“Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”

“Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know.”

“There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

Isaiah says, “How can I praise God as the seraphs? I am a sinful man. Without cleansing I am without hope.”

Cleansing for Isaiah

The third point is that there was cleansing for Isaiah (Isaiah 6:6-7). We cannot come to God and speak about degrees of sinfulness. God demands perfection so that we may have fellowship with him. He is not satisfied with some comparative righteousness. The prophet Isaiah was unclean, just like the nation Israel, so he pronounced a woe upon himself. He identified with the unclean nation because he saw his own uncleanness. But Isaiah could not cleanse himself because there is no self-salvation. Isaiah had to be cleansed by another, but it could not be another man. God himself had to clean him up because salvation is of the Lord. Therefore God commanded a seraph, a burning one, to cleanse Isaiah. This seraph, this flaming fire, flew toward Isaiah with a burning coal taken from the altar and touched Isaiah’s mouth with it.

What was the meaning of the seraph’s actions? As we look at the text, we see that the meaning is not left to us to interpret, but God himself explains. There is the deed and the word that explains the deed; there is the fact and the interpretation of the fact. God performed this deed and God interprets it for us.

The Bible tells us that the touch of the burning coal instantly took away Isaiah’s guilt. No longer unclean, he was now justified, saved, and clean. The live coal was from the altar, which represents the blood sacrifice and substitutionary atonement. The altar represents propitiation, a sacrifice of another that turns away the divine wrath that was against us and causes God to be favorably disposed to us so that he shows us mercy, as we read in Leviticus 17:11: “For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.”

Throughout Isaiah we read of God’s plan to cleanse his unclean people. In Isaiah 1 we read about how foul the people of God had become. Yet in the middle of this chapter, in verse 18, we find an amazing manifestation of of God’s grace. Notice how God addresses his wicked, perverted, arrogant people: “‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the Lord. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.'” This is speaking about some way in which God will cleanse them of their sins and guilt and make them clean. But he does not reveal the means of that cleansing in Isaiah 1. We have to go all the way to Isaiah 53 to find the way God is going to do it. In Isaiah 53:5-6 we read about someone who is going to be crucified in place of God’s people for their sins:

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

In the New Testament we read several times about the propitiatory sacrifice of Jesus Christ. In Matthew 26:28 Jesus told his disciples, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” In Romans 3:25-26 we read, “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished-he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.” In 2 Corinthians 5:21 we read, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Finally, in Hebrews 9:22 we read that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness,” no cleansing, no justification, no sanctification, no redemption. There is nothing!

Our sin was punished in another, in God’s Son. Through his substitutionary atonement we are forgiven and justified. That is the idea taught in this picture of a live coal being taken from the altar and touching the mouth of the guilty Isaiah. When that happens, he becomes clean, and his cleansing is all of God. God planned it, God executed it, and God applies it personally, not only to Isaiah, but to us.

In Isaiah 6 we find Isaiah’s vision of the King seated on the throne in great moral majesty. It is a throne of judgment, but all of a sudden, it becomes a throne of grace for Isaiah. In the same way, through the blood of Christ the throne of judgment has become for us the throne of grace to which we can draw near with confidence.

Isaiah’s Strange Commission

Fourth, we want to look at the strange commission given to Isaiah in Isaiah 6:8-13. In verse 8 he says, “Then I heard the voice of the Lord.” Having been cleansed and reconciled to God, Isaiah was permitted into God’s presence, where he overheard these words: “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” Notice the word “us,” which speaks of the Trinity. This was the eternal council of the triune God.

In Genesis 3 God came to Adam and Eve after they had sinned and promised a savior to die in their behalf. PGM God did not have to send anyone to redeem man; he does not have a plan of redemption for angels. But here we see Isaiah overhearing God’s plan. “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” the voice of the Lord asked. God needed human servants who were cleansed to perform his holy mission. So Isaiah responded, “Here am I. Send me!” Those who are saved by grace want to serve God out of great gratitude.

King David was a sinner, and in Psalm 51 he asked God to have mercy upon him and cleanse him from bloodguiltiness. In verse 13 he describes what he will do having been cleansed: “Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.” Those who are saved and cleansed will work for God. They will volunteer unconditionally: “God, I heard you saying, ‘Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?’ I will go.”

So Isaiah said, “Behold, here I am; send me.” These are the words of the redeemed. Remember the man from whom a legion of demons were cast out? Not wanting to go home, he told Jesus, “I want to follow you.” Jesus said, in essence, “That is a good desire, but the answer is no. You can serve me best by going back to your place in the Decapolis and telling your people what God has done for you.”

What, then, was the strange commission God gave to Isaiah? God told Isaiah to pronounce a message of judgment on God’s people. In verse 9 we read, “Go and tell this people: ‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing but never perceiving.’ Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes.” This amazing statement is repeated in the New Testament six times.

Notice the central importance of this commission. It is speaking about the preaching of the gospel and how, for the vast majority of people, their hearts will be hardened, their ears will become dull, and their eyes will become blind when they hear the gospel. This is an amazing phenomenon. In other words, Isaiah’s strange mission was to go and make the people’s hearts calloused, their ears dull, and their eyes blind by preaching the good news of salvation to them.

There are people who have been born and brought up in churches who have heard the gospel over and over again throughout their lives. But what is the result of all this ministry? Their hearts have been hardened, their ears made dull, and their eyes blinded. Such people stand in stark contrast to those coming from no church background, whose blind eyes are opened and whose hearts are made soft, all by the same gospel as it is preached. This is the strangeness of Isaiah’s commission.

In verse 11 Isaiah asked the Lord, “For how long, O Lord?” What was God’s answer? “Until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken.” In other words, God was pronouncing destruction upon Judah.

The Strange Effect of the Gospel

There are many other places in the Bible that also speak about this strange effect. In Zechariah 7:11-12 we read, “But they refused to pay attention; stubbornly they turned their backs and stopped up their ears. They made their hearts as hard as flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the Lord Almighty had sent by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. So the Lord Almighty was very angry.”

We see this hardening taking place even in Christian homes. When the father preaches the word to his children, they are either made alive or dull. To some the word becomes the word of death; to others, life.

This strange result of preaching the word of God is what we call judicial blindness. It happened even when Jesus Christ preached. In John 12:37-41 we read,

Even after Jesus had done all these miraculous signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him. This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet:

“Lord, who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”

For this reason they could not believe, because, as Isaiah says elsewhere:

“He has blinded their eyes and deadened their hearts, so they can neither see with their eyes, nor understand with their hearts, nor turn-and I would heal them.” Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus’ glory and spoke about him.

If you are sleeping or your mind wanders when the word is preached, it is because God has blinded your eyes. It is a sign of judgment, of judicial blindness.

Jesus spoke about this judicial blindness in the parable of the sower. He told his disciples, “To you it is revealed; to those on the outside it is not revealed. To you the knowledge of the kingdom is given; to them it is not given.” When Moses spoke to Pharaoh, the Bible tells us that Pharaoh hardened his heart, but God also hardened it. How strange this sounds to us! We tend to think the gospel comes only to save people. Yes, it does save some people, but it also does a strange thing: it condemns and confirms others in their death.

A Remnant Shall Repent

In Isaiah 6:12 God said this hardening would continue “until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken.” In verse 13 we read, “And though a tenth remains in the land . . .” A remnant of people remained in the land. What does God say would happen to them? “it will again be laid waste.”

This also is puzzling. Does this mean that God’s purpose to save people was going to be abandoned? No. In verse 13 we read further, “But as the terebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.” The tree would be cut down but the stump would remain. The stump represents a people who are holy to God.

In this chapter we see three types of people who can be illustrated as concentric circles. The outer circle, which is the vast majority of the people in the nation of Israel, was expelled from the land. The second circle, which is a tenth of the outer circle, will also be laid waste. But then there is a little circle in the center-it is called the stump. It represents the holy seed, that is, the holy people. God is holy and thus he will have a holy people, called holy seed, here represented by Isaiah and his children.

Thus, in the strange mission of Isaiah there is a silver lining. Although the terebinth and oak trees were cut down, there was not complete destruction. So we read in verse 13, “so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.” In Isaiah 11 we read that out of that stump will come a shoot, Jesus Christ, the chosen one, and in him a holy people.

The Strange Mission of Jesus Christ

Isaiah was not the first one who said to God, “Here I am; send me.” Someone else in the eternal council answered that call: “Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?” The Son of God, Jesus Christ himself, said he would go to accomplish salvation for God’s people. Psalm 40:6-8 speaks of this:

Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but my ears you have pierced; burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not require. Then I said, “Here I am, I have come-it is written about me in the scroll. I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”

Isaiah was full of sin and could not save anyone. But there is One without sin, One who is God/man-One who is holy, pure, undefiled, separate from sinners yet identifying with a sinful nation of people. It is he who died on the cross so that we could be saved.

The live coal of Isaiah 6 is speaking about the cross on which Jesus Christ died. There we see full provision for our salvation, which is applied to us directly by the Holy Spirit, not by a seraph. So the writer to the Hebrews says, “Then [Jesus Christ] said, ‘Here I am, I have come to do your will’ . . . . And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Hebrews 10:9-10).

What About You?

In conclusion, let me ask you some questions. Have you seen the Great King? Or are you so taken up with your brilliance, your greatness, your beauty that you cannot see the true and living God? If you are all focused with yourself, that is a curse. The center of the universe is heaven, the center of heaven is the throne, and the center of the throne is God, of whom the seraphs cry, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.”

Have you seen this Great King, who has all authority? Have you seen him seated on the throne, high and lifted up? Have you seen him as your Judge? Have you seen him through the preaching of the word? Have you seen yourself as utterly sinful, ruined, unclean, condemned? That is repentance. That is self-awareness, self-knowledge. It is in his light we see light and the truth of our own condition. Have you sought the cleansing of the blood of Jesus Christ? Is your guilt removed? Or are you among the vast majority of those who treat the glorious God with contempt by not believing the message of salvation, that God’s judgment is about to fall on you? Believe me, it is going to happen.

God’s purposes will always stand, and he will save his people from their sins. Though they are likened to a stump, out of the stump there will come a shoot, called the Branch, and God’s people are identified with him.

In Isaiah 9 we read, “To us a child is born, to us a son is given.” He is the Savior, Christ the Lord. He will have a holy seed, who, like Isaiah, will repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. This holy seed will repent and believe. They will be drawn by God, they will come, they will confess, they will be forgiven, and they will be justified. Then, for the rest of their lives, they will be taken up with the service of Jesus Christ. Such people are God’s people, chosen not only historically but also eternally. Like Isaiah they also shall be cleansed and comforted.

Isaiah tells us that to the unbelieving God shall be a consuming fire, but to us who believe he shall be a cleansing fire who thus enables us to declare his praises. Before, we couldn’t do it, but now we have been called out of darkness to declare his praises. Having been touched by the live coal of the altar, we are cleansed in our lips as well as in our hearts. The cross of Christ is the full provision for salvation.

So you must ask yourself: The gospel of the cross has been coming to you for some time through your ministers or parents. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2:15-16, “For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other the fragrance of life.” This is strange work, a strange mission. It is a mission of life for a few and a mission of death for many.

Today you are invited to enjoy life. As you hear the word, you should ask, “Who is this Jesus Christ?” The answer will be, “He is the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Then you should ask, “What must I do to be saved?” The answer is, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” Amen.