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Is God Calling Me to Missions? Do You Understand the Wretched Nature of Sin? · Reformed Thinking

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Imagine breaking your arm right? You go to the hospital, they put
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you in front the X-ray machine. Yeah, and it's pretty much
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instant. Right.
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Within minutes, the Doctor points to this, this jagged
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white line on a glowing screen. And there's a specific comfort
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in that. Oh, for sure you have a clean
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binary answer. Yes, it is broken or it is not
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broken. The problem is visible, it is
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categorized. But then you step away from the
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physical body and you try to diagnose the human soul.
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And that is a totally different story.
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Right. Suddenly that X-ray machine
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shows absolutely nothing. We try to look at the spiritual
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condition of humanity, and the diagnostic landscape is well,
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it's incredibly murky. Yeah, it really is.
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So welcome to Reform Thinking, our deep dive into the texts and
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ideas that shape faith. Today we are looking at a
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rigorous theological analysis of the biblical call to missions.
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Which is a heavy topic that's so necessary.
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Yeah, we. Were taking a hard look at how a
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true understanding of human sin contrasted with divine holiness
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dictates how the Church sends workers to the nations.
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And we have some fascinating material to work through.
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Today we are pulling from excerpts of Caleb Suko's
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writing, specifically 2 pieces, right?
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Is God calling me to missions? Do you understand the wretched
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nature of sin is the first one? Yeah, and the second one is when
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holy God sends sinful men to the nations.
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Our anchor for this discussion is the book of Isaiah,
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specifically the 1st 8 verses of chapter 6.
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Such a famous passage. It is, and our approach is going
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to be highly analytical. We need to examine the
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historical geopolitical crisis of 8th century BC Judah, and
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we're also going to breakdown the grammatical mechanics of the
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original Hebrew. Text to really get at the
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authorial intent. Precisely, the goal is to
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uncover the intent behind the text.
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And the mission for this deep dive is to strip away the modern
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therapeutic illusions of safety that creep into modern
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evangelicalism. Which is so common today.
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Everywhere we want to uncover the historical and theological
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necessity of forensic justification in the missionary
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call. But to understand the theology,
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we first have to ground these massive concepts in a specific
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time and place. Right, you have to know the
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history. Yeah.
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So we have to travel back to the year 740 BC.
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The text explicitly anchors itself with a very specific time
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stamp in the year that King Uzziah died.
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That phrase carries so much weight.
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It does to put you, the listener, in the right
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headspace. Imagine your own country
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experiencing an unprecedented economic boom.
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The borders are fortified. You have absolute military
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supremacy. Everything feels incredibly
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safe. Right.
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You have lived under this warm blanket of national security for
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over half a century, and then overnight you lose your
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invincible leader. That historical context is
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critical for grasping the psychological state of the
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original audience. I mean, Uzziah's reign lasted
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for 52 years. 52 years, that's a lifetime.
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It is. Think about the generation
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impact of that timeline. For the vast majority of the
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population of Judah living at that moment, King Isaiah was the
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only king they had ever known. He was just this constant
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stabilizing fixture in their universe.
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Yeah, the historical records detail his administrative
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genius. Under his rule, agricultural
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projects flourished across the region.
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He built towers in the desert and dugout many cisterns because
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he had large herds. He loved the soil, as the tech
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said. He did, but he wasn't just a
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farmer. No, the military expansion is
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what really gave the people that illusion of safety.
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Absolutely. He modernized the entire
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military apparatus. He organized a highly trained
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standing army of over 300,000 men.
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That is massive for that era. Huge.
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And he equipped them with Shields, Spears, helmets, coats
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of mail, bows and stones for slinging.
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And perhaps most notably, he introduced advanced defensive
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engines in Jerusalem. Like catapults and things.
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Yeah, we're talking about machines designed by skillful
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men placed on the towers in the corners of the city walls.
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They were designed to shoot arrows and hurl large stones at
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any approaching enemy. Wow.
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Judah had not seen this level of national prestige, innovation
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and secure borders since the days of King Solomon.
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So there is this massive external prosperity, but as the
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sources point out, this material blessing acted as a deceptive
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facade. It masked a lot of internal rot.
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Yeah, it masked a massive spiritual decay within the
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society. The people looked at their
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military might, their bustling markets, their impenetrable
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walls, and they assumed God was giving them a rubber stamp of
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approval. They equated material wealth
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with spiritual health. Which is a classic mistake.
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But that illusion shatters in Two Chronicles 26.
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The tragic reversal comes crashing down.
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Uzziah's pride swells. Yeah, he decides his immense
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political success entitles him to religious authority.
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Which is a huge boundary to cross.
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He essentially attempts to usurp the Auronic priesthood.
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He marches straight into the temple to burn incense on the
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altar. Now we have to pause here,
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because to a modern reader, burning incense sounds like a
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harmless religious just. Like lighting a candle or
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something. Right.
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But the temple operated under strict lethal protocols of
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holiness. It was not a place for casual
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visitation. The priests were consecrated
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specifically to handle the elements of the sanctuary.
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By bypassing the priests and attempting to offer the incense
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himself, Uzziah was violating a very strict boundary.
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Yeah, a lethal 1. Which gives us a great
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opportunity to explain the mechanism of Old Testament
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holiness. It wasn't just arbitrary anger
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from God. The temple was essentially
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designed like a spiritual nuclear reactor.
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That is a brilliant way to phrase it.
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Yeah, the holiness of God was the radioactive core.
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The priests were given the specific divinely ordained
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shielding, the rituals, the blood sacrifices, the garments
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to interact with that core safely.
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Right, without that shielding, you don't survive.
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And Uzziah, high on his own political success, decides he
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doesn't need the shielding. He walks right into the reactor.
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That is an incredibly accurate way to picture the scenario.
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He walks in, the priests try to stop him.
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He becomes enraged at them and immediately God strikes him with
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a leprosy right there beside the incense altar.
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Just instant judgement. The physical disease breaks out
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on his forehead. The king, who had conquered
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nations and built war machines, is suddenly rendered
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ceremonially unclean. He is rushed out of the temple
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and forced into isolated quarantine.
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He lives the rest of his life completely cut off from society,
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living in a separate house while his son Jotham takes over the
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administration of the palace. Which creates an immediate,
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terrifying power vacuum. You have a nation that has
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relied on this singular strongman for 50 years and he is
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suddenly gone. So my question is, how did this
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sudden internal instability interact with the rising foreign
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threats of that specific? Era because the geopolitical map
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wasn't exactly peaceful at that time.
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The timing is horrifying. At the exact moment Judah loses
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its invincible king, the Neo Assyrian Empire is aggressively
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expanding under the leadership of a ruthless king named Tiglath
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Pilliser the Third. A terrifying figure.
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Assyria was not just a neighboring army, it was a
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brutal expansionist machine. Their military campaigns were
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characterized by calculated psychological terror.
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What kind of things were they doing?
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They were known to skin their enemies alive, impale city
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leaders on stakes outside Concord gates and deport entire
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populations to break their national identity.
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Oh wow, so absolute brutality. Yeah, the geopolitical horizons
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were growing incredibly dark. Neighboring nations were already
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being crushed under the Assyrian boot.
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Yet despite this massive external threat looming on the
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horizon, Judah remained completely blinded by their own
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religious routines. The sources described their
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condition as covenantal formalistic ritualism.
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They were still going to church, so to speak.
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They were scrupulously offering the Levitical sacrifices.
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They maintain the liturgical prayers.
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They visited the temple courts on the required feast day.
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Going through all the motions. But they had successfully
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decoupled their outward religious performance from any
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inward reality. They were outwardly compliant
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with the liturgy while remaining inwardly corrupt.
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They assumed their physical descent from Abraham and their
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possession of the temple building guaranteed their safety
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against Assyria. Which was a fatal
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miscalculation. I love the specific phrase the
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sources use for this condition. Billboard blindness.
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Oh, that's a great concept. Think about your daily commute
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to work. You know the first time you
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drive past a massive, brightly lit billboard, it catches your
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eye. You read the slogan right, but
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after driving past that exact same sign every single day for
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six months, your brain completely filters it out.
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You do not even see it anymore. It becomes background noise.
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It just. Fades into the scenery, yeah.
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The sources argue that routine religious attendance and simple
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behavioral modifications create a spiritual version of Billboard
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blindness. You get so used to the routine
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of hearing about grace, singing the songs, performing the
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rituals, that you become entirely numb to the actual
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horror of sin. You mistake your own civil
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decency for radical holiness. And that disconnect between
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outward ritual and inward reality is the specific target
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of the author here. We see this dynamic mapped out
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perfectly in the literary structure of the book itself.
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The author does not just tell us the people are blind, he
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structures the text to force the reader to confront that
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blindness. Which brings up a massive point
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of debate among scholars regarding the placement of
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Chapter 6, because when you read it, chapter 6 contains Isaiah's
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dramatic cult of ministry. Yes, the commissioning scene.
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A lot of critical scholars look the manuscript and argue that
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someone must have scrambled the scrolls over time.
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They argue that Chapter 6 is misplaced and belongs at the
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very beginning of the book. The critical assumption is often
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that ancient texts are haphazardly assembled, you know,
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like they just threw pieces together.
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But reading the text as a cohesive canonical design
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reveals a brilliant, highly intentional structure.
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Chapters one through 5 function as a devastating prosecuting
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brief against the nation of Judah.
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God is laying out the specific charges before he ever
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introduces the prophets personal Commission.
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Exactly. The prosecution does not hold
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back. God is laying out an airtight
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legal case. The sources detail the song of
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the vineyard found in Isaiah chapter 5.
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That's a tragic agricultural metaphor.
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It is God describes planting a vineyard on a fertile hill.
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He clears it of stones, plants, choice vines, builds a
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watchtower in the middle of it, and hews out a wine VAT.
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He gives the vineyard every possible advantage to produce
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good fruit. Every advantage.
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But when the harvest comes, the vineyard yields wild, poisonous
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grapes, and the text explicitly defines those wild grapes as
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injustice, oppression and bloodshed.
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And then the legal brief continues with six terrifying
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woes pronounced against the society.
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Isaiah stands at the prosecuting attorney, pointing his finger at
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specific cultural sins. He calls down judgement on the
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greedy land grabbers who hoard real estate.
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Joining house to house and adding field to field until
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there's no room left for anyone else.
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Yeah, he calls out the drunkards who chase strong drink from
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early morning until late at night.
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He condemns the cynics who mock God, demanding that God hurry up
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and show his work so they can see it.
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And he specifically calls out the people who literally swap
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moral categories, the ones who call evil good and good evil.
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Who put darkness for light and light for darkness?
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Right. For five entire chapters, Isaiah
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is the righteous, finger pointing prosecutor.
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He is standing in the courtroom, laying out the undeniable guilt
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of his peers. He is the moral compass of the
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nation. Calling out everyone else's
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corruption, but then the page turns to chapter 6 and the
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camera suddenly flips. The shift is violently sudden.
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The prophet who has spent 5 chapters pronouncing all these
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woes upon his corrupt society, is suddenly brought into the
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immediate presence of Yahweh of hosts.
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And in a fraction of a second, the prosecutor becomes the
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defendant. Notice what he does not do.
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He doesn't look at God and say Lord, look at all these terrible
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people we have to deal with down here.
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Look at the drunkards and the land grabbers.
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But he doesn't point the finger anymore.
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He looks at the throne and his immediate visceral reaction is
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to cry out. Woe is me.
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That implication is staggering for you listening right now.
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Isaiah was arguably the most morally upright human being in
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the entire nation of Judah. He was the prophet.
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He was the truth teller. He was the one fighting for
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justice, yet the moment his life is measured against absolute
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divine holiness, he stands completely condemned.
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His relative human righteousness is exposed as totally
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insufficient that literary. Progression is highly
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intentional. The external horizontal sins of
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the society detailed in chapters one through 5 are just symptoms
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of a deeper disease, right? The vision in chapter 6 exposes
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the vertical reality, the radical corruption of the human
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heart before a perfectly holy God.
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The structure forces the reader to realize that before Isaiah
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can be sent to prophecy to a broken nation, he has to realize
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he is part of the brokenness. But this isn't just a clever
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literary device For the reader. Isaiah's reaction in the text.
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This total implosion is a physiological response to the
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sensory overload of the temple. All the imagery is overwhelming.
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The text gives us these huge physical details of the vision.
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He sees the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up.
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The train of his robe fills the entire temple space.
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The thresholds of the mass doors are literally shaking.
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And the house is filling with thick smoke.
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The sources point out that this specific imagery echoes the
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classic cynetic theophany. Right.
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A theophany is a visible manifestation of God to
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humankind. The smoke and the shaking ground
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immediately recall the terrifying presence of God
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descending on Mount Sinai when the Law was given to Moses.
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It's meant to be terrifying. An environment is engineered to
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convey absolute, unapproachable supremacy, and attending this
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throne are the Seraphim. Let's talk about them for a
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second. The Hebrew word seraphim
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literally translates to burning ones.
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These are angelic beings and they are calling out to one
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another with what is known as the Trisogon.
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The superlative Hebrew triplication of the word Holy,
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holy, holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts.
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The whole earth is full of His glory.
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Let's breakdown why that repetition matters, because in
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English we might just use bold font or an exclamation point to
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emphasize a word. Or right in all caps yeah.
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But in Hebrew syntax, there is no comparative or superlative
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form of an adjective built into the word itself like we have in
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English with holy, holier, holiest.
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So how do they express it? To elevate a concept, you repeat
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it. To say something is holy.
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Holy is to say it is supremely holy.
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But to repeat a word three times is the ultimate superlative.
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It is the highest possible elevation of a concept in the
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Hebrew language. It is reserved exclusively for
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the holiness of God. The root word here is kwadosh.
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It denotes absolute qualitative otherness and moral purity.
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So it's not just that God is really, really good.
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No, God's holiness is not just a heightened version of human
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goodness. It is a completely different
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category of existence. I want to ask about a specific
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detail regarding those seraphim. The text says each one has 6
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wings, with two they fly, but with two they hover their faces
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and with two they cover their feet right?
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If these are sinless heavenly creatures who have never
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rebelled against God, why are they using their wings to shield
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themselves in this environment? It goes back to that nuclear
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reactor analogy you used earlier.
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The supreme majesty of God requires absolute reverence,
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even from unfallen sinless creatures.
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Even the Angels need shielding. The burning angels veil
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themselves because the sheer radiance of God's unmitigated
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holiness is overpowering. They cover their feet as a sign
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of creaturely humility, acknowledging the vast
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difference between the Creator and the created.
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That really puts things in perspective.
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If sinless beings must cover their faces in trembling
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adoration, it makes the casual flippancy of fallen human beings
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highly inappropriate. It completely dismantles any
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notion of a seeker sensitive, trivialized approach to the
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divine. Which perfectly explains why
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Isaiah absolutely loses his mind in verse 5.
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He sees this environment, he hears the shaking of the doors,
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and he screams, Woe is me, for I am lost, for I am a man of
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unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
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lips, for my eyes has seen the King, the Lord of hosts.
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Let's perform a linguistic breakdown of that cry, because
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the English translation softens the blow of what Isaiah is
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actually experiencing. Yeah, woe is me almost sounds a
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bit melodramatic in modern English.
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It does, but the Hebrew exclamation he uses is oi, which
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translates to woe. It is a prophetic declaration of
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doom. It is the exact same word he
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just spent Chapter 5 hurling at the corrupt society.
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Oh wow, so he's cursing himself. He turns the prophetic curse
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upon himself, and the verb he uses for I am lost is nidmeti.
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What is the mechanical function of that specific verb?
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It is the nephal perfect of the root dama.
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In Hebrew grammar, the nephal stem denotes A passive or
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reflexive voice. It means to be structurally
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ruined, cut off, or forced into silence.
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Isaiah isn't just saying I feel guilty, he is saying I am being
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undone. He is hitting a structural self
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destruct button. He's falling apart of the seams.
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He is being passively ruined by the sheer weight of what he is
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looking at, and he immediately identifies himself with the
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ceremonial term tame, which means unclean or defiled.
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Which is a heavy word in that culture.
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It is the exact same word a leper would have to shout when
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walking through a crowd. And he zeroes in specifically on
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his mouth. I am a man of unclean lips.
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The sources make a brilliant connection here to the New
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Testament, specifically drawing a line to Luke 6.45 where Jesus
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says that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
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The Greek word used in Luke for abundance is parasima.
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It describes a boiling over a surplus that violently floods
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out of a container because it can no longer be held back.
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Like a dam breaking. Think of the Lips as the
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spillway of the Hearts reservoir.
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The water that spills over the dam is the exact same water that
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is held in the lake, right? If the water spilling over the
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Lips is unclean, it is an infallible diagnostic proof that
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the massive reservoir of the Heart is a factory of
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corruption. The outward speech perfectly
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diagnosis the inward depravity. Isaiah isn't confessing to a
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minor speech impediment or saying he occasionally uses bad
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language by indicting his lips. He is confessing a totally
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corrupted human nature. Yes, the lips are just the most
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visible evidence of the internal rod.
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He realizes that his core nature is entirely incompatible with
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the burning holiness he is currently witnessing.
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And what stands out to me is how completely paralyzed he is by
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this diagnosis. He possesses no human resource
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to fix his condition. None at all.
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He can't scrub his own lips clean.
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He can't offer a quick prayer to balance the scales.
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He requires an intervention from completely outside of himself.
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Which leads us right into the mechanical grammar of verses 6
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and seven describing the cleansing.
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Yeah, Isaiah stands entirely frozen.
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He does not reach for the coal. He does not assist the Angel in
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any way. The cleansing is entirely
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passive on his part. That passive grammar is
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essential. It demolishes 2 specific
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theological errors that are highly prevalent today, which
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the sources specifically mentioned.
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Pelagianism and Arminianism, yes.
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Wait, I need to jump in here because these are heavy terms
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and they deal with concepts that modern listeners often push back
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against. They absolutely do.
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The idea that a human being has zero part in their own rescue
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offends modern sensibilities. We'd like to think we have free
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will, that we can pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.
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It is a natural human reaction to want to retain some credit
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for our salvation. Pelagianism is an ancient heresy
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that argues the human heart is essentially A neutral tablet.
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Look a blank slate. Right.
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It suggests that humans are completely capable of choosing
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righteousness and cleaning themselves through sheer moral
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willpower. Which Isaiah clearly couldn't
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do. No, and then Arminianism, while
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acknowledging the reality of the fall and the need for grace,
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still clings to the idea of a cooperative human will.
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So God does his part. We do our part.
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It suggests that God offers the grace, but the human must
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initiate the process by choosing to accept it.
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But the text of Isaiah 6 shows something entirely different.
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It shows monarchism in action. Let's breakdown the mechanics of
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monarchism. Monarchism is the theological
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concept that salvation is entirely A sovereign, unmerited
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divine action. The prefix mono means 1 and
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ergon means work. One worker.
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God acts alone to save a Sinner who is incapable of saving
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himself. Isaiah literally does nothing in
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this scene. He just stands there, ruined.
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A serif flies to him. The action is entirely initiated
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and completed by Heaven. Let's look at the specific
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physical instruments of this divine pardon.
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The Angel uses tons to take a burning coal, which in Hebrew is
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ritzba from the altar. The Miz beach.
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The elements are highly symbolic and carry massive theological
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weight. The altar is the place of
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sacrifice. It is the place where blood is
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shed to satisfy justice. And what happens when the coal
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touches him? When the Angel touches the blood
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soaked burning pole to Isaiah's lips, a forensic transaction
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occurs. The Angel declares, Behold, this
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has touched your lips, your guilt is taken away and your sin
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atoned for. A forensic transaction, meaning
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a legal exchange, has taken place.
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Precisely, the Hebrew word for guilt is Avon, which refers to
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the heavy liability or the punishment due for wrongdoing.
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The debt, basically. The word for sin is chatat,
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referring to the offense itself. The missing of the mark to be
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atoned for comes from the root kafar, meaning to cover, to
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appease, or to propitiate. So it's a complete wipe of the
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record. Notice the incredible reversal
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happening here? The burning holiness of the
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altar, which by all rights should completely consume the
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unholy Sinner standing before it, instead consumes his sin.
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Oh wow, the fire purifies instead of destroys because it
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comes from the altar of sacrifice.
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That is a staggering image, but we have to push the theological
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timeline forward. A strictly Old Testament reading
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leaves the picture incomplete. How do we know who Isaiah is
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actually looking at? Because this isn't just a
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generic glory vision of heaven. No, it is highly specific and
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the New Testament leaves no ambiguity about it.
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The apostle John in his Gospel, specifically in John 12.41,
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references this exact vision. What does John say?
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John writes. Isaiah said these things because
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he saw his glory and spoke of him.
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And in the context of John 12, the hymn is referring directly
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to Jesus. So Isaiah saw the glory of the
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pre Incarnate second person of the Trinity.
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He is looking at Jesus Christ sitting on the throne.
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That changes everything about how you read the passage.
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Yes, the majestic, terrifying holy king that causes the temple
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to shake is the pre Incarnate Christ, and we can connect the
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altar in Isaiah's vision directly to the historical
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reality of Calvary. The cross.
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The coal saturated in the essence of blood sacrifice
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represents penal substitutionary atonement.
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Breakdown how that substitution works mechanically.
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On the cross, the perfect Lamb of God bore the terrifying fire
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of divine judgement. The wrath of God against sin was
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poured out on Christ. He took the head.
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He satisfied the legal demands of divine justice.
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He took the punishment so that the Sinner wouldn't have to.
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So when the coal touches Isaiah's lips in the vision, it
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is a visual prophetic representation of Christ's
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righteousness and sacrificial death being applied to a ruined
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Sinner. The guilt is removed because the
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penalty has been paid on the altar.
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And only after the subjective forensic cleansing is applied
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can the prophet actually hear the voice of God.
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The sequence is absolute. He is ruined by the vision, He
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is redeemed by the altar. And then the call comes, verse 8
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And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send,
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and who will go for us? And Isaiah responds immediately,
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Here am I send me or in the original Hebrew henge.
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It is vital to recognize the emotional state of that
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response. His response is the joyful,
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unhindered overflow of a justified soul.
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It is not an act of self determination.
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He isn't volunteering out of a sense of arrogant confidence.
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It is not some romantic summons to a foreign adventure.
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He goes willingly and urgently because he has been thoroughly
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pardoned. He knows the terror of the
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judgement, and he knows the belief of the grace.
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Which forces us to connect this ancient Commission to how the
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Church operates today. I want to address you, the
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listener, directly, because the sources issue a very strict
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warning against a modern epidemic, the danger of
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substituting the Great Commission with a purely
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humanitarian social gospel. This is a huge point of
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contention today. Now I want to play devil's
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advocate for a second because this is where modern listeners
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might get incredibly uncomfortable.
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The text explicitly says the digging wells, building medical
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clinics and providing food are beautiful, common grace
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expressions of Christian love. They absolutely are.
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Jesus healed the sick. He fed the hungry.
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So why do the sources argue that these activities fail as the
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primary missionary call to a modern year?
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Saying that building a medical clinic is a secondary issue
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sounds incredibly harsh. It sounds harsh until you
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understand the eternal stakes of the theology we just mapped out.
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The sources are arguing from the premise that humanity's most
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fatal disease is unremitted sin, not physical poverty.
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OK, unfact that. Let's be unequivocally clear,
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bodily suffering is a grievous reality in a fallen world and
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Christians are absolutely called to alleviate it.
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Compassion is a non negotiable fruit of the Spirit.
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Right, you can. You can't just ignore suffering.
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However, if you zoom out and look at the eternal timeline, a
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cleaner village filled with unforgiven sinners still faces
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the terrifying divine judgment that made Isaiah scream Woe is
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me. The physical relief is
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temporary. The spiritual condition is
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eternal. Exactly.
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The primary motivation for missions must be preaching the
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forensic justification of a ruined Sinner through the blood
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of Christ. So if you provide clean water to
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a community but withhold the message of the cross, you have
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missed the core of the Commission.
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You have treated the symptom while ignoring the terminal
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cancer. The true missionary call is not
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just to improve the living conditions of the world, but to
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declare how a holy God has made a way to pardon guilty rebels.
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Which brings a massive ecclesiastical application to
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the table. Local churches have a heavy
26:39
responsibility here. They really.
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Do they must verify their missionaries using objective,
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biblical qualifications? They shouldn't be sending people
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just because a young person has a restless desire to travel or a
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vague, undefined sense of compassion for the poor.
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The vetting process must be rigorous.
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Churches must send workers who have personally wrestled with
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the depravity of their own hearts, who have been crushed by
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the weight of the holiness of God, and who have found their
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absolute, unshakable security in the Atonement.
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If a missionary candidate has not experienced the sequence of
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Isaiah 6 ruin followed by redemption, they have no message
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to carry to the nations. That dynamic, clearly a person
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who only sees human physical need may become an excellent
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philanthropist. And the world needs
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philanthropist. But a person who sees divine
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holiness, human guilt and atoning grace becomes a herald.
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They become a true missionary. They carry the only needs that
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can actually save a soul from the fire.
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That is the distinction the sources are fighting to
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preserve. Philanthropy is horizontal.
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It deals with man to man relationships.
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The gospel is vertical. It reconciles dead men to a holy
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God. Let's recap the distinct logical
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flow dictated by the text. Because the sequence we have
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walked through today is everything, You cannot bypass
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the step. They have to happen in order.
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Revelation of God's absolute holiness leads to the complete
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ruin of human pride. That structural ruin leads to
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the desperate, passive need for redemption, and that objective
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blood bot redemption leads to a passionate surrender to the
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mission. And we must offer a final,
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intensely practical application from the sources here.
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You do not need an airplane ticket or a stamped passport to
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apply this text to your life. No, it starts right at home.
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The call to speak to your next door neighbors, your family
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members, and your coworkers with urgency requires the exact same
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foundational grasp of holiness and grace.
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If you cannot look at your own city, your own neighborhood, and
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understand their desperate need for Christ, flying across an
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ocean to a different continent will not magically change your
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perspective. The mission field is wherever
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you are currently standing. Which brings us right back to
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where we started today. We talked about how we crave the
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clean binary of an X-ray, the visible, undeniable proof what
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is broken, but the spiritual reality is far more invasive.
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I want to leave you, the listener, with the final
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provocative thought to ponder as you go about your week.
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It's. A challenging thought.
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We established earlier, through Isaiah's reaction and through
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the Gospel of Luke, that your daily casual vocabulary is the
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infallible diagnostic tool of your heart's hidden reservoir.
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It is the spillway. The words you speak reveal the
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actual condition of your nature. So if that is true for the words
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you speak out loud, consider this What would a transcript of
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your private, unspoken thoughts this past week reveal to a
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perfectly holy God? Wow, that's heavy.
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If every judgement, every lust, every arrogant assumption, and
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every bitter grievance was printed on a page and held up
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against the blazing purity of the throne room we saw in Isaiah
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6, how would you fare? Not well.
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The diagnostic X-ray of your soul isn't murky to him.
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It's blindingly clear he sees the reservoir.
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He sees everything. The only question that remains
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is whether you're standing in your own fragile temporary
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righteousness or if your lips have been touched by the burning
29:58
coal from the altar of Christ.