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Seeing Everyone Enjoy the King | Isaiah 65:17-25

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Senior Pastor Damein Schitter continues our Advent series, Seeing Everyone Enjoy the King, preaching from Isaiah 65:17-25.  Anchored in God’s promises, Pastor Damein confronts the pitfalls of complacency and triumphalism in our pursuit of hope for the future. Complacency risks making us passive, while triumphalism tempts us to rely solely on human effort. Through inspiring examples of redemptive entrepreneurship and community-focused initiatives, Pastor Damein explains how a hope grounded in God's future work can inspire meaningful action today. His sermon emphasizes the call to align our efforts with God’s values, fostering justice and love for our neighbors.

Hope is more than just a comforting idea—it’s a sustaining force, an unshakeable certainty rooted in Christ’s work. With that in mind, Pastor Damein explains how biblical imagery and even pop culture, like the Hunger Games, highlights the power of hope to transcend fear and sustain us through life's challenges. He closes by inviting God's presence into both our joyous and sorrowful moments, preparing our hearts for the ultimate fulfillment of His promise.

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone. This is Pastor Damian. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, orlando. At New City, we believe all of us need all of Jesus for all of life. For more resources, visit our website at newcityorlandocom. Thanks for listening.

Speaker 2:

And wait for your return. Help us to see your glory and love through the reading and preaching of your word. Through Christ, our Savior, we pray Amen. Please remain standing, if you're able, for the reading of scripture from Isaiah 65, 17 through 25. For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind, but be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create. For behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy and her people to be a gladness. I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people.

Speaker 2:

No more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress. No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old and the sinner, a hundred years old, shall be accursed. They shall build houses and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit. They shall not plant and another eat. They shall not plant and another eat, for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity, for they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the Lord and their descendants with them.

Speaker 2:

Before they call, I will answer While they are yet speaking. I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together. The lion shall eat straw like an ox and dust shall be the serpent's food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, says the Lord. This is God's word. Thanks be to God.

Speaker 1:

Thank you, merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, no matter where you are. Hopefully, that is to say your personal preference. Hopefully it's not too early to say Merry Christmas at this point. Yeah, I, just the way that you guys responded you seemed timid. I'm just saying now it's okay, this is the final Sunday of Advent, so you can embrace it, and if you don't, I mean just try it. Just try to embrace it, merry Christmas. Thank you, I really appreciate that. That was for me. Well, this is the final Sunday of Advent and tonight I do hope you come back and join us for our Advent finale service.

Speaker 1:

It's one of my favorites of the year, for sure, and one of the things we've been doing every week in Advent, whether you have known it or not. We've been following the four-chapter story of creation, fall, redemption, and that leaves today consummation, and so consummation is something that God does, as we saw in the text. There's nothing that we can do to bring those things about, and so today we're going to reflect on what is this tension of hope, where we live lives of hope based on something in the future, something that only God can do, something disconnected from the work of our hands and yet still somehow giving meaning to the work of our hands. And so today we're going to explore that in three points. But before I tell you what those are, let me tell you about something else that happened quite a long time ago.

Speaker 1:

So in 1939, millions flocked to New York City. I wonder if any of you know why, in 1939, they flocked to New York City. They flocked to New York City captivated by the World's Fair which was hosted there that year, and the theme was called the World of Tomorrow, and the idea was visitors marveled and were invited to see the future of technology, the future of communities, the future of communities, the future of civilization. Exhibits like Futurama was an exhibit that you got on a moving track and it moved you toward what technological advancement would move civilization toward. Basically, what is the future? Shaped by human ingenuity, and so exhibits all over wanted to show how science and technology would bring about progress, and so how highways would thread through harmonious cities and technology would eliminate poverty and eventually a type of utopia would be reached. And so the fair actually embodied what Christopher Watkin, an author, calls modernity's forward-looking hope, and this is the idea, or the belief that through innovation and effort I lost my note here through innovation and effort, humanity could overcome these things, that is, superstition, ignorance and general barbarism, to build a better world. End quote.

Speaker 1:

And so the reality is, though of course we know that history tells a different story, because April 30th, the day after my birthday, was when this World's Fair in New York opened up. But many of you maybe know what happened later that fall. In that same year, in 1939, world War II erupted. And so the world of tomorrow that, in April that year, seemed so possible in the fall of that year, seemed so impossible, or at least improbable. It seemed what once seemed close now seemed distant in the chaos and destruction of a global conflict. And so the optimism of the world's fair, like so many dreams of modernity, faltered in the face of human brokenness. And so this moment in history, like many moments in history, reveals something very deep about this tension that we feel in the human heart in a broken world.

Speaker 1:

Again, as Christopher Watkin observes, modernity defined itself in terms of time a relentless push toward a better future, always up and to the right, and of course this borrows from the Christian hope of redemption, but falls far short of it. Now, many of us, even as Christians, we breathe the spirit of this age, it's our age. We profess a belief in ultimate redemption that God is bringing, but our hope is much more shaped by the fragile promises of progress or, depending on who you are, maybe the cynicism of disappointment. So your capacity for hope is linked to either the circumstance of progress what it seems like right now or the cynicism of despair, because what things seem like right now, and ultimately what we do, is we fail to see the heart of God, we fail to see the plan of God, we fail to see the purposes of God and we have hearts that are dependent on human achievement rather than God's unchanging promises to renew all things, which we saw in our text. And so, in Isaiah 65, isaiah speaks into this tension that we feel of a world that's broken, yet a longing in our heart for redemption.

Speaker 1:

And Isaiah speaks to this tension with clear vision of a very particular type of hope. It's not the fragile hope of human progress or of despair and cynicism, but it's a hope grounded in the unshakable promise of God, and Isaiah points us to a future so certain. I mean listen to this. God declares behold, I create new heavens and a new earth. And it's Advent this season that reminds us that this hope has already begun. That reminds us that this hope has already begun. It's already begun to break into the present in our Lord Jesus Christ, and it will be fully realized when he returns. And, of course, this is the hope that we desperately need, a hope that's strong, a hope that's secure, not a hope that's fragile or fickle, depending on our circumstances or our mood. We need a hope not shaped by the modern age, but by the saving promises of God. And so, in order to explore this tension in the text today, I want to look at it in three points, that is, the nature of this hope, the need for this hope and the nearness of this hope.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so, first, the nature of hope. Well, let's look in our text. If you have a Bible here, in Isaiah 65, the text that we just heard, starting in verse 17, we read "'For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth'", and again in verse 18,. So the first thing we see about the nature of this hope that is given to us, to a people who have just come out of exile, to a people who find themselves in a very hopeless situation, having been destroyed, their land taken from them and now seemingly with no future hope, or at least a distant hope. It's to these people that God speaks his promises.

Speaker 1:

And what's so important is that the nature of this hope is not based in the circumstances, it's based in God. The text says I create. You see, it's not the work of human hands that create this certain hope, but it's actually the work of God that accomplishes it. And the reason that this is so important for us is because God is not hampered by any restrictions or any circumstances, or any history or any fickleness. No, you see, god can make all things new because he's God.

Speaker 1:

And so the nature of Christian hope, any true Christian hope, is a hope that God brings. It's a hope that disrupts and interrupts. It's a hope that comes from without. And of course, this is the hope of Christmas. Right, the hope wasn't that we somehow could groom our Messiah, that we somehow could prepare a king, but no, god had to come from outside. And in fact, the story of the Bible is one where God is always coming down. It is always bad news when humans try to go up. I mean, of course, you just think about the Tower of Babel, for example. What a great idea. You know what we should build a tower up to the heavens, and then the text shows us that God, in a humorous way, has to stoop low. He has to stoop low to even see the tower and what we see is all of redemptive. History hinges on this that God comes down. God comes down to redeem and this is our hope. And Advent shows us that the Christian hope, yes, comes from with outside of us. It is God who comes down. But what we also see in this text is that hope is rooted in a future reality, a certain reality, and for Christians, this certain reality roots our hope. It's a hope that is sustained not by progress or ingenuity, but by God, period. You see, what this does is it frees us from looking around to the circumstances of our world to see if our hope is sure. We may look around.

Speaker 1:

You know what this is like and you just seem, think, because of the way your week is going or your day is going, you just feel more hopeful, right, you're like you know what? I just feel hopeful. I'm not sure why, but it just feels right. I'm in a good mood, but of course there are other days, and sometimes they're in the same day. All of a sudden, you think I don't know how this is going to work out. I mean, I am not very hopeful about this. It's like when you come home and someone says, how was your day? You're like my day was terrible. And then they say, well, tell me more about that. And what you actually realize is you had one 30 minute conversation. That was bad. That was it. The rest of the day was fine. But even that conversation shapes the whole way you experience your world.

Speaker 1:

Right, do you see the fickleness of circumstances and placing our hope in that? But the beauty of the christian hope is no matter how you feel or how your day is going, or when you look around the world to see the circumstances. Our hope is not secured or sustained by those things. It's actually beyond us. Things could be going poorly, but when God comes everything will be different. Things could be going well, but when God comes everything will be different, because our Christian hope is sustained in something that only God can do, not what we can do now.

Speaker 1:

If you're like me, you might be thinking okay, but what about right now? What about human action now? What about the work of my hands now if, if what I'm doing doesn't bring about God's promises but only God brings about his promises, then does that just mean that I live status quo? Does that just mean that I just sort of let go and let God? No, of course not. It's actually the opposite.

Speaker 1:

You see, if hope comes from without, and whenever God wants to bring it, we don't simply sit back and let God do his thing right. We don't simply point out the folly of the vision of the world fair and say look at those fools. They think they can bring about redemption, they think they can bring about a hope. No, we don't do that. We don't allow injustices and suffering to remain in front of us and say, well, there's nothing I can do about that, because only God redeems, only God brings about hope. No, that's not what we do. You see, what we do is we love our neighbor as ourselves and we steward our gifts and our opportunities in the very work of our hands to reflect God's promises and values. You see, the tension that we live in now is that, because our future is so certain, it doesn't matter our circumstances. We give ourselves to the love of our neighbor with all of the agency and resources that we have. You see, it's not the work of our hands that sustains our hope, but it is our future hope that God does that actually sustains the work of our hands. And so this is the call for us.

Speaker 1:

And, of course, there are two pitfalls when we start talking about hope, and that only God brings ultimate hope. One would be complacency, where we tend to believe that human actions are irrelevant because it's God who's going to bring redemption anyway. Well, that would be one pitfall. Another pitfall would be what could be called triumphalism, where we overly rely on human effort. We think that the world's future is primarily driven by the work of our hands, the work of humans. But Christian hope, in a very interesting but important way, actually fuels more sustainable work, and the reason is is because Christian hope is in the future of what God is going to do. Christian hope actually fuels active engagement now in addressing injustices, because God's redemption encompasses all of creation.

Speaker 1:

And we see that from our text, and I'll get there now. Look with me in verses 17 through 19. Right, what we see is we see that God is creating a new heavens and a new earth, a place where people are rejoicing, a place where there's no more sounds of weeping. There's no more sounds of weeping, there's no more cry of distress. And you see, of course this description goes far beyond anything that the world has ever seen. But what it also does is it invites us as believers, these readers, to not only yearn for more of this, but to live in light of this story, leaning into it until God does it. You see, god reveals what he's going to do in the future, and then he calls us to work toward that end, not ultimately to bring it about, but rather to live in light of it, because we know where things end, we know the true story, we know what God is doing. And so, for example, this is why redemptive entrepreneurship is such a huge gift to the world. That is to say, we know that people using their gifts to start businesses committed to cultivating a better world and flourishing communities this is good news for the world. Businesses committed to cultivating a better world and flourishing communities this is good news for the world. And I mean any type of entrepreneurship, from tech to toilets.

Speaker 1:

It doesn't matter To steward the gifts that we have to bring about the flourishing of people insofar as we can, not with the hope that somehow we're bringing the kingdom, but rather that we're living in light of it that we're embracing the things that somehow we're bringing the kingdom, but rather that we're living in light of it, that we're embracing the things that God values, that we're embracing the love of our neighbor. Also, research Think about people giving themselves to research to cure illnesses, to seek the flourishing of communities. All of these things are good. All of these things don't become our ultimate hope, but they're sustained by the fact that we know what our ultimate hope is. We don't trust in the work of our hands, but because we trust in the work of God's hands, the work of our hands now is sustained because we do it out of love for God, not a building of our own kingdom. You see, the nature of hope is rooted in the reality that God is the one who brings things about, that he is our ultimate hope, and this understanding sustains our current work, that it is God who brings redemption, not us. And so we see that the nature of our hope is rooted in a future that God will accomplish. And now what I want to point out is it's not just something that is good to have, that is hope, but it's something that the human heart needs. And that's our second point, that our need for hope is seen.

Speaker 1:

Now, before I get to the text in verses 20 through 23, I want to share a quote from a best-selling book series, great literature called the Hunger Games and a hundred million copies. Shockingly, and if you don't know, the Hunger Games is about a future world where kids are chosen to compete in a deadly game on TV. So that's what it's about. Kids are chosen to compete in a deadly game on TV. So that's what it's about. And these people are controlled by a cruel government. Okay, that's about all you need to know.

Speaker 1:

But there is this dialogue. President Snow is the president of all of these districts and he's talking to another character named Seneca Crane. Okay, and so President Snow says to Seneca why do you think we have a winner? Because every year when they have the Hunger Games, there's always a winner. So he says why do you think we have a winner? And Seneca Crane frowns and he says well, what do you mean? And President Snow says well, I mean, why do we have a winner? I mean, if we just wanted to intimidate the districts, why not round up 24 of them at random and execute them all at once? It would be a lot faster. And now Seneca stares confused and President Snow says it's hope.

Speaker 1:

Seneca says hope, president snow says yes, hope, it's the only thing stronger than fear. He says a little hope is effective. A lot of hope is dangerous. A spark is fine as long as it's contained. You see, while a little heavy-handed, of course, like I said, great literature, there is deep truth in it. Right, there is deep truth in it. Right, there is deep truth in it. That is to say, humans are hope-shaped creatures. The goodness of your experience of today is directly connected to what you think will happen tomorrow. Right? If you don't think there's any good in your future, you will not be a happy person. You see, in verses 20 through 23, what we see is a future with no more weeping or distress or death, no more futile work. We see a picture of longevity and stability, one of flourishing and blessing.

Speaker 1:

Let's read the text no more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days. If you've ever had that experience, or been around someone who's had that experience, you know that there's something so wicked and wrong in the death of an infant, and what it does is it cultivates in you a deep longing that this is not the way it's supposed to be. When you're around someone, no matter how old, there's this as they're moving towards death, there's this tension that you experience which is, I know, it would be far better for them to be with the Lord. And yet there's something so wicked about this, there's something so wrong about this and we see our text speaking to this that there's this that an old man who does not fill out his days, this will not be known. You see, in verse 21,. They shall build houses and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

Speaker 1:

What this is speaking to is the desire to have meaning in the work of our hands, where what we're doing actually produces good for ourselves and for others, where we're not separated from the fruit of our labor. And I could go on. But you see, this picture that we have of the true Christian hope is one in which all things are made right, all of the longings of our heart find their true end, their true satisfaction. You see, we are hope-shaped creatures, we are future-oriented, we are hope-driven. You know, I once heard a story about two men and both of them at the same time, for the same crime, and both of them at the same time for the same crime, unfairly, had been sentenced to 10 years of hard labor.

Speaker 1:

And as they were moving from the jail into this facility where they were going to be giving themselves for 10 years to this hard labor in this camp, one of the men learned that his wife and children had actually died in the struggle that brought about this sentence. The other man found out in the same way that, in fact, his wife and children had survived and that they were waiting for him to return on the other end of this 10 years of hard labor. And so, as you can imagine, a couple years in. The man whose wife and children were not waiting for him, the man who had no hope of a future reconciliation, of a future restoration, he got sick and when he got sick he gave up, and when he gave up he actually died. Whereas the man who also got sick, who also worked hard, who also was oppressed and abused in this situation, this man, the one who had hope of this restored relationship with his wife and children, knowing that his wife and children were waiting for him, that they would be reconciled, they would be brought back together. It was this hope that sustained this man through this suffering. Of course, you can think about a biblical example like Jacob right, who is working seven years for his wife, and those seven years were as if they were one day.

Speaker 1:

You see, hope has the power to sustain. We are hope-driven creatures, and we all know what this is like. The need for hope runs deep. It's essential to the human condition. A life without hope is a life without meaning, and you see, here's the thing, though, is that because our hearts are so designed for hope, they will grab on to whatever hope they can find, and so often our hearts settle. We settle for false hopes, we settle for hope that actually cannot and will not sustain us. We settle for the hope of achievement, the hope of this time next year will be better, this time next week will be better. And then we get there, and eventually we realize well, I keep pushing off. I keep pushing off because false hopes do not sustain, and these false hopes give way to cynicism, where we think you know what this suffering is? Just the way it's gonna be, and I just need to grin and bear it. And we shut off our desire, because we're taught by our experience that to desire is to open ourselves up to be wounded.

Speaker 1:

Cs Lewis points out I can't remember where, but he points out the deep connection between hope and desire. And he says the man who stops desiring can no longer hope. And so, you see, it's really important that we guard our heart. Our hearts need hope, but there are so many false hopes, and so what this passage invites us to is actually a certain hope, a future hope, and what this season reminds us of again is that the hope that sustains is the hope that God brings. It's God himself. And so that brings me to our final hope, which is that I'm sorry, our final point, which is the nearness of hope. So this text has shown us the nature of hope God brings it. It showed us our need for hope, that we are hope-shaped creatures, but also tells us about the nearness of this hope.

Speaker 1:

Look in verse 24. The Lord says Before they call, I will answer, and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. You see, what we see here is the relationship where God is intimately present and attentive to his people. And what else does this point to than the incarnation, emmanuel God with us. That in this Advent season, jesus, who is Emmanuel God with us, that in Jesus, god is not distant but near, listening and responding to his people with divine care and immediacy, that not only do we have a certain hope that God will bring in the future that sustains us, but we have the nearness of this hope now in our Lord Jesus Christ. That as we walk through life, managing this tension, this longing, recognizing that things are not the way they're supposed to be, god is not far off but he's present with us, and that we can approach the king in prayer, in confidence, knowing that Christ has already secured the way for intimate communion with the Father.

Speaker 1:

We don't have to rely on our own strength or abilities or plans. We don't have to rely on our own strength or abilities or plans. We rely entirely on Jesus and his finished work for us. Our own strength is as reliable, as one author said, as propping ourselves up on a broken reed. Just think about that image. To rely on your own strength is though you would trust a broken reed and you would lean into it and of course it collapses.

Speaker 1:

Our hope is not in the work of our hands. Ultimately, it's in Jesus, our near and living hope. It's not only do we have a certain hope, not only do we have a near hope, but this hope has a name, god with us, the Lord Jesus Christ, the one we sing to. We hope in a person that accomplishes what we could never accomplish. We hope in a person who defends us when we are without hope. We hope in a person who defeats our enemies and even lays down his life for us. God's redemptive purpose has succeeded and he has subdued the serpent in judgment, as he promised.

Speaker 1:

Look with me in verse 25. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together, the lion shall eat straw, like the ox and here it is and dust shall be the serpent's food. This is God's fulfilling of that promise in Genesis 3.15. That the seed would crush the head of the serpent. It's fulfilled in Jesus, our Messiah. And so this season, our hope is sure and it's near. We can trust in the nearness of Jesus, who hears even our unspoken cries, and we rest in the assurance that, through Christ, god's attention to our needs is constant. He is loving, and it's rooted not in our worthiness or in our obedience, but in Jesus's perfect work on our behalf.

Speaker 1:

Let's pray on our behalf. Let's pray, father, as we end this final Sunday in Advent, this consummation that we look toward. We look toward your promise that you will make good on it, that we can trust you, that we, in the work of our hands, respond to the certainty of the fulfillment of your promises. And I pray for brothers and sisters here in this room, some of which feel the pain of loss in this season. Would you be near to them? You said that you hear them before they even call to you. There are some brothers and sisters here who feel so joy-filled and I'm so grateful and I pray that all around them would see that joy as an enjoyment and foreshadowing of the ultimate hope that we have. And, lord, as we sing even later tonight, would you fill our hearts with hope, would you give us a deep sense of your nearness and the certainty that you are making all things new? And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.