1 00:00:00,000 –> 00:00:04,400 I wonder if you’d open your Bible, please, at Isaiah chapter 57 the last two verses that 2 00:00:04,400 –> 00:00:07,080 were read and also the beginning of the chapter. 3 00:00:07,080 –> 00:00:13,480 If you do have your Bible open you’ll be able to see with me clearly that this chapter begins 4 00:00:13,480 –> 00:00:16,900 and ends in completely opposite ways. 5 00:00:16,900 –> 00:00:22,500 Look at Isaiah 57 and verse 2 just so that we know where we are in the scriptures. 6 00:00:22,500 –> 00:00:26,980 God says those who walk uprightly enter peace. 7 00:00:26,980 –> 00:00:34,779 They find rest as they lie in death, so they upright, no peace, and they’ll find rest in 8 00:00:34,779 –> 00:00:36,900 death. 9 00:00:36,900 –> 00:00:41,360 Now look at the end of the chapter, verses 20 and 21, which were read. 10 00:00:41,360 –> 00:00:48,619 The wicked are like the tossing sea which cannot rest whose waves cast out mire and 11 00:00:48,619 –> 00:00:49,619 mud. 12 00:00:49,619 –> 00:00:55,000 No peace, says my God, for the wicked. 13 00:00:55,000 –> 00:01:01,020 And so this chapter with its contrasting beginning and end is telling us that there are two entirely 14 00:01:01,020 –> 00:01:03,860 different destinies for these two groups of people. 15 00:01:03,860 –> 00:01:14,500 The upright who will experience rest and the wicked who will never know what it looks like. 16 00:01:14,980 –> 00:01:22,820 Now we live in a culture of relentless activity and we’re seeing over these three Sunday mornings 17 00:01:22,980 –> 00:01:30,800 of which this is the second, that our greatest need is to find what it means to rest. 18 00:01:30,820 –> 00:01:34,779 And if you were here last week, you may recall that we saw that when the Bible talks about 19 00:01:34,779 –> 00:01:38,099 rest, it’s not talking about sleeping. 20 00:01:38,099 –> 00:01:43,500 For the simple reason that the Bible tells us that God rests, and we know that God never 21 00:01:43,500 –> 00:01:45,699 slumbers nor sleeps. 22 00:01:45,699 –> 00:01:49,879 Secondly, we found out that the Bible, when it talks about rest, is not talking about 23 00:01:49,879 –> 00:01:54,059 leisure, it’s not talking about lying in a hammock by the beach with a cool drink on 24 00:01:54,059 –> 00:02:01,639 a warm day, for the simple reason that, we read here, that the wicked never rest. 25 00:02:01,639 –> 00:02:05,419 And quite clearly, a wicked person is capable of lying in a hammock on a warm day with a 26 00:02:05,419 –> 00:02:08,660 cool drink by the beach. 27 00:02:08,699 –> 00:02:13,399 So we’ve been trying to explore together, what is then this rest that the Bible talks 28 00:02:13,399 –> 00:02:18,539 about, that God enters into that the wicked cannot know and, as we’ll see next week, is 29 00:02:18,539 –> 00:02:21,419 to be found in Jesus Christ. 30 00:02:21,419 –> 00:02:26,160 And we are working with this definition together, that when the Bible talks about rest, it is 31 00:02:26,160 –> 00:02:33,619 talking fundamentally about a purpose fulfilled and a project completed. 32 00:02:33,619 –> 00:02:37,500 God illustrated this in the pattern of creation. 33 00:02:37,539 –> 00:02:39,880 He finished His work. 34 00:02:39,880 –> 00:02:43,539 And when He finished His work, He completed all that He had planned to do. 35 00:02:43,539 –> 00:02:48,460 He accomplished what He intended, then He entered into His rest. 36 00:02:48,460 –> 00:02:55,279 And the Bible refers to this rest as Sabbath, a special day that God still gives to His 37 00:02:55,279 –> 00:03:00,419 people to enter into this experience of completion. 38 00:03:00,419 –> 00:03:07,000 We saw that it is intended by God to be a window in time in which we get a glimpse of 39 00:03:07,179 –> 00:03:07,679 eternity. 40 00:03:07,679 –> 00:03:12,539 That’s why it’s so wonderful for us to gather together and to worship God like this. 41 00:03:12,539 –> 00:03:19,940 This is the climax of living because it is an anticipation of what it will be when all 42 00:03:19,940 –> 00:03:26,940 of God’s people are gathered in His immediate, and then visible presence, with great joy 43 00:03:27,419 –> 00:03:29,300 and in His blessing. 44 00:03:29,300 –> 00:03:33,139 This is an anticipation of all that is to come. 45 00:03:33,160 –> 00:03:37,899 God weaves into the pattern of every week, six days of labor, one day of entering into 46 00:03:37,899 –> 00:03:39,940 rest when that work is finished. 47 00:03:39,940 –> 00:03:46,940 He weaves that pattern into our ordinary lives so that will be like a weekly snapshot in 48 00:03:47,119 –> 00:03:50,779 miniature, of the big picture of what your life is all about. 49 00:03:50,779 –> 00:03:55,559 Because God, big picture, gives to you a certain number of days to live in which there is a 50 00:03:55,559 –> 00:03:59,880 certain amount of work that He calls you to accomplish during your years on this earth. 51 00:03:59,919 –> 00:04:05,919 And when that is over, you will enter into His immediate presence in Jesus Christ, into 52 00:04:05,919 –> 00:04:07,080 that rest. 53 00:04:07,080 –> 00:04:12,080 If you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, you will enter into a day that is unlike any other. 54 00:04:12,080 –> 00:04:16,380 That is the big picture of the Christian life. 55 00:04:16,380 –> 00:04:21,239 Well that’s what rest looks like for God’s people, and that was our subject last week. 56 00:04:21,239 –> 00:04:28,239 And today we’re going to discover that God makes it very clear that there are some people 57 00:04:28,880 –> 00:04:35,100 who will never enter this rest. 58 00:04:35,100 –> 00:04:42,100 Look at verse 20, the wicked are like the tossing sea which cannot rest. 59 00:04:44,760 –> 00:04:51,760 There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. 60 00:04:53,239 –> 00:04:56,559 The wicked, let’s just hear what the scriptures are saying, and then we will begin to think 61 00:04:56,619 –> 00:05:00,040 about it’s meaning together, but what this is clearly saying, just as you look at that 62 00:05:00,040 –> 00:05:07,040 verse, God’s saying the wicked are incapable of rest. The wicked will never experience 63 00:05:07,859 –> 00:05:14,140 it, enjoy it, or enter into it. Now that’s very important because a lot of 64 00:05:14,140 –> 00:05:19,119 people today are living with the idea that whatever we do in this life, it will all be 65 00:05:19,119 –> 00:05:25,000 all right with everybody in the end. You know how that’s most often expressed, how could 66 00:05:25,160 –> 00:05:31,600 a loving God who’s kind and good ever send anybody to hell? You must have heard that 67 00:05:31,600 –> 00:05:36,619 question asked. But quite clearly, God is saying something 68 00:05:36,619 –> 00:05:43,220 different. And as we open our bibles, it is very important for us today to understand 69 00:05:43,220 –> 00:05:50,239 it. I am convinced increasingly that the church of Jesus Christ in our culture needs to speak 70 00:05:50,920 –> 00:05:58,160 about wickedness. Because we live in a world in which wickedness is on our television screen 71 00:05:58,160 –> 00:06:05,160 every day in life. And if we do not address what God says to wickedness, we will become 72 00:06:05,179 –> 00:06:12,179 irrelevant to the world in which we live. Just since last week I worked here, a suicide 73 00:06:13,000 –> 00:06:20,000 bomber destroys himself and many others in a bus filled with people returning from offering 74 00:06:20,839 –> 00:06:27,839 prayers. That’s wickedness. A terrorist drives a vehicle outside the UN headquarters in Baghdad, 75 00:06:33,559 –> 00:06:39,899 destroys their centre of operations, and takes the lives of more than 20 innocent people. 76 00:06:40,720 –> 00:06:47,720 That’s wickedness. And the extraordinary thing as we live in this world is that for the last 77 00:06:53,299 –> 00:07:00,100 20 years the pundits of postmodernism have been telling us that there is no such thing 78 00:07:00,100 –> 00:07:07,100 as wickedness. Think about what postmodernism has been saying in our culture for at least 79 00:07:07,660 –> 00:07:14,000 the last 20 years. There is no such thing as truth, they say. Only what’s true for you. 80 00:07:14,000 –> 00:07:21,000 There is no such thing as right. Only what’s right for you. There is no such thing as wrong. 81 00:07:22,040 –> 00:07:27,859 Only what’s wrong for you. There is no such thing, they have said, for 20 years and more, 82 00:07:27,859 –> 00:07:34,859 as good and evil. All that there is are different cultures that define good and evil in different 83 00:07:35,859 –> 00:07:42,859 ways, and no one culture or no one person can say that their idea of right and wrong 84 00:07:44,380 –> 00:07:51,380 is better than anybody else’s. Our culture has been filled with that philosophy. We’ve 85 00:07:52,500 –> 00:07:59,500 been paying school fees for our kids to be taught this in secular university. Now we 86 00:08:00,420 –> 00:08:07,420 discover, to our absolute horror, that there are communities and cultures who have defined 87 00:08:09,959 –> 00:08:16,959 good as killing Jews and Americans in as large numbers as possible with the greatest horror 88 00:08:20,079 –> 00:08:26,899 and the greatest pain possible. More than that, we have discovered that there are communities 89 00:08:27,059 –> 00:08:33,900 of people who have defined good as including destroying themselves in order, they say, 90 00:08:33,900 –> 00:08:40,900 to enter into an everlasting reward. Now, according to postmodernism that our 91 00:08:42,719 –> 00:08:46,719 kids have been taught for these last twenty years and that many of us have imbibed in 92 00:08:46,719 –> 00:08:53,719 our thinking, nobody can say that that’s wrong. 93 00:08:54,640 –> 00:09:01,479 So I find it a huge relief, don’t you, to turn from CNN or BBC or ABC or whatever it 94 00:09:01,479 –> 00:09:08,239 is that you get your news from, to turn from all that to the Bible and to find that in 95 00:09:08,239 –> 00:09:15,239 the Bible, we are told of one living God who created the heavens and the earth, is lord 96 00:09:15,239 –> 00:09:22,239 over every culture, even those that rebel against Him, and that He is in charge. He 97 00:09:24,080 –> 00:09:30,919 tells us definitively what is good and what is evil, He defines good and evil, and as 98 00:09:30,919 –> 00:09:37,919 the Creator He has the right to do so for all people in all cultures and in every generation. 99 00:09:38,320 –> 00:09:45,280 And He is guiding the history of this world on a definite course that will climax on a 100 00:09:45,280 –> 00:09:52,039 day when He will create a new heaven and a new earth, it will be the home of righteousness 101 00:09:52,039 –> 00:09:59,039 and evil or wickedness will be outside forever. I ask you, can anyone seriously believe… 102 00:09:59,039 –> 00:10:13,539 outside forever? I ask you, can anyone seriously believe, that the God of the Bible would receive 103 00:10:13,539 –> 00:10:21,200 someone who blows themselves to smithereens. Taking the lives of innocent people with them 104 00:10:21,200 –> 00:10:26,539 into the immediate presence of God. And that the God of the Bible would then look them 105 00:10:26,539 –> 00:10:31,299 in the face and say, wow, wasn’t the best choice you could have made but come on and 106 00:10:31,299 –> 00:10:40,940 enter my happiness anyway. It’s ludicrous. So let’s get into the world of the Bible that 107 00:10:40,940 –> 00:10:54,020 precisely addresses the world in which we live. The wicked will never enter God’s rest. 108 00:10:54,059 –> 00:11:03,799 There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. That’s what the Bible says to us. I trust 109 00:11:03,820 –> 00:11:08,299 that we’re absolutely convinced about its relevance. Let’s now begin to explore what 110 00:11:08,299 –> 00:11:15,979 it means. I want to ask two simple questions. One – what is wickedness? And two – why 111 00:11:15,979 –> 00:11:22,599 is it that the wicked can never rest? What is wickedness and why is it that the wicked 112 00:11:22,679 –> 00:11:31,659 can never rest? Firstly then – what is wickedness? First – wickedness is perversity. Perhaps 113 00:11:31,659 –> 00:11:37,760 the best definition or description of wickedness would be in Isaiah chapter 5 and verse 20 114 00:11:37,760 –> 00:11:38,599 where God says, 115 00:11:38,599 –> 00:11:44,659 Woe to those who call good evil and evil good. 116 00:11:44,659 –> 00:11:50,099 In other words – God says there are some people who take the values and the commandments 117 00:11:50,159 –> 00:11:55,159 that he has given and they turn them completely upside down, what God says is good, these 118 00:11:55,159 –> 00:12:02,159 folks say is bad, and what God says is evil, these folks say is good. 119 00:12:02,840 –> 00:12:07,340 In other words – there is a perversity that turns everything that God has said and revealed 120 00:12:07,340 –> 00:12:14,340 on its head. So for example – when someone says, we can’t have one God giving ten commandments, 121 00:12:14,739 –> 00:12:21,739 we can’t have one God giving ten commandments, that’s wickedness. When someone says, you 122 00:12:25,260 –> 00:12:31,099 know it’s ok to believe in God but giving unconditional commitment of your life to obeying 123 00:12:31,099 –> 00:12:37,820 him – that sounds a little bit extreme. And someone speaks like that – that’s wickedness. 124 00:12:37,820 –> 00:12:40,979 God says you’ll have no other gods before me. The wicker person turns that entirely 125 00:12:40,979 –> 00:12:43,919 on his hands on his head and says Oh my goodness that sounds like extremism, very dangerous, 126 00:12:44,039 –> 00:12:51,039 don’t touch it. When someone says making your own decision about another life is good, 127 00:12:54,059 –> 00:13:01,059 especially if that other life is within you, you need to think about yourself first – that’s 128 00:13:02,859 –> 00:13:09,859 wickedness. When someone says, you know, adultery can be good, especially if it’s a really 129 00:13:10,840 –> 00:13:17,840 caring relationship that you’ve discovered. I remember a lady coming to me in the church 130 00:13:19,159 –> 00:13:23,140 I pastored in London. She said to me, you know, I’ve been working with a counsellor 131 00:13:23,140 –> 00:13:28,760 for some months, and he has said to me that the thing I most need to do to improve my 132 00:13:28,760 –> 00:13:35,760 emotional health is to have an affair. What do you think? And I said to her, I think he’s 133 00:13:36,640 –> 00:13:43,640 taken what God says is evil and told you it’s good. And that’s wickedness. That’s 134 00:13:45,000 –> 00:13:52,000 what it is. Perhaps the greatest example of wickedness 135 00:13:52,780 –> 00:13:57,340 in the Bible is Pharaoh. You remember God speaks to Pharaoh and he says, let my people 136 00:13:57,340 –> 00:14:04,340 go. But Pharaoh will not recognise the authority of God over his life, and he sets himself 137 00:14:04,580 –> 00:14:10,599 against God. He makes that choice. He chooses an opposition to all that God has commanded, 138 00:14:10,599 –> 00:14:17,599 and so he puts himself in the position that can only result in his own downfall. 139 00:14:17,599 –> 00:14:23,460 So wickedness is first and foremost about perversity, turning things upside down, saying 140 00:14:23,460 –> 00:14:30,239 what God has called good is evil and saying what God has called evil is good. Secondly, 141 00:14:30,239 –> 00:14:40,359 wickedness is a choice. Psalm 52 talks about an evil man called Doeg the Edomite. There 142 00:14:40,359 –> 00:14:47,080 are some names that make me awfully glad to be called Smith. Doeg the Edomite is one of 143 00:14:47,080 –> 00:14:57,280 them. He was one of Saul’s henchmen who committed a mass murder of 85 priests in a town called 144 00:14:58,000 –> 00:15:06,659 Knob. This is what God says about him. Psalm 52 verse 3, you love evil rather than good. 145 00:15:06,659 –> 00:15:13,659 It’s a deliberate choice. You love evil, you are drawn to it, you thought it was a good 146 00:15:13,659 –> 00:15:20,979 thing to slaughter 85 priests, that’s what you chose. Rather like Jesus’ words, you remember 147 00:15:20,979 –> 00:15:26,820 he said that men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. So wickedness 148 00:15:26,820 –> 00:15:35,020 is not something you slip into. It is a definite choice. The wicked have chosen, like Pharaoh, 149 00:15:35,020 –> 00:15:45,539 to set themselves against God. They love what God hates. They value what God condemns. 150 00:15:45,539 –> 00:15:49,539 So from that I think we can put together a simple definition of wickedness that it is 151 00:15:49,940 –> 00:16:00,820 perverse choice to live in opposition to God. Wickedness is a perverse choice to live in 152 00:16:00,820 –> 00:16:08,239 opposition to God. And of course it draws its very nature from the character and life 153 00:16:08,239 –> 00:16:12,520 purpose of the devil himself. I found something rather interesting I’d never noticed before 154 00:16:12,799 –> 00:16:19,799 in reading this week. You know the name devil comes from the Greek word diabolos, and if 155 00:16:19,799 –> 00:16:27,719 you divide diabolos up, it’s really two words, dhia which means through, and balos which 156 00:16:27,719 –> 00:16:32,739 means to throw. By the way balos is where we get our word bowling for those who like 157 00:16:32,739 –> 00:16:41,080 to go 10 pin bowling? To throw, balos, you see. So the word devil, or diabolos, means 158 00:16:41,200 –> 00:16:48,200 to throw through. Now, some of us enjoy going bowling, you know the 10 pins get set up at 159 00:16:48,380 –> 00:16:54,659 the end of the lane, and then you take the ball, and you throw it through the pins. You 160 00:16:54,659 –> 00:17:00,659 try and knock down what has been set up. By the way for those of you who are getting nervous, 161 00:17:00,659 –> 00:17:06,020 there’s nothing wrong with bowling, it’s a very good thing to do. I could sense some 162 00:17:06,160 –> 00:17:10,439 nervousness about where this illustration is going. It’s only an illustration. I once 163 00:17:10,439 –> 00:17:17,439 scored 300 myself, and it only took five games to do it. But isn’t that a great picture 164 00:17:17,819 –> 00:17:24,819 of who the devil is, and what he’s all about? Satan’s purpose is to tear down what God has 165 00:17:25,520 –> 00:17:32,520 built up. That’s wickedness. Well now, why then, if that is what wickedness is, do the 166 00:17:33,020 –> 00:17:40,020 wicked never rest? Three reasons from the scriptures. One. The wicked never rest, because 167 00:17:41,800 –> 00:17:48,800 they cannot avoid the evidence of God. Paul makes this very clear in Romans, in chapter 168 00:17:51,560 –> 00:17:56,839 1. The wicked have taken the stance of opposition to God, but the God they have chosen to oppose 169 00:17:57,459 –> 00:18:00,180 reveals his glory in 170 00:18:02,739 –> 00:18:07,260 a thousand ways all around them, and so they have to relentlessly keep pushing him away. 171 00:18:07,800 –> 00:18:14,380 In Romans, chapter 1, in verse 18, the wrath of God is being revealed from Heaven against 172 00:18:14,380 –> 00:18:21,380 the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth, since what may be known 173 00:18:22,319 –> 00:18:26,719 about God is plain to them. 174 00:18:26,719 –> 00:18:28,020 This is very interesting. 175 00:18:28,219 –> 00:18:34,300 God has made what may be known about him plain to the wicked, is what Paul says. 176 00:18:34,300 –> 00:18:37,760 So they’re left with no alternative because this revelation is very clear, they have to 177 00:18:37,760 –> 00:18:43,359 close their eyes to it and they have to constantly resist every way in which this eternal God 178 00:18:43,359 –> 00:18:48,300 reaches into time and speaks to them. 179 00:18:48,339 –> 00:18:52,800 God has made himself known, Psalm 19, The heavens declare the glory of God. 180 00:18:52,800 –> 00:18:55,479 Day after day they pour forth speech. 181 00:18:55,479 –> 00:19:00,619 You only need to go out into the countryside to see some reflection of the glory of the 182 00:19:00,619 –> 00:19:04,579 work of our creator. 183 00:19:04,579 –> 00:19:11,959 If you want to be god-less in this world, you have to go around with your eyes closed 184 00:19:11,959 –> 00:19:16,459 and that, Paul says, is exactly what the wicked have chosen to do. 185 00:19:16,459 –> 00:19:21,119 They suppress the truth by their wickedness. 186 00:19:21,119 –> 00:19:26,760 And some people have to spend an enormous effort to keep God at a distance. 187 00:19:26,760 –> 00:19:28,500 The creation speaks about Him. 188 00:19:28,500 –> 00:19:31,719 Your conscience speaks about Him. 189 00:19:31,719 –> 00:19:40,060 The fingers of a tiny baby speak of His creative glory. 190 00:19:40,060 –> 00:19:44,920 And even in the darkest places, something of God may be revealed in a thousand ways 191 00:19:44,959 –> 00:19:47,439 to the wicked. 192 00:19:47,439 –> 00:19:52,920 In this month’s Christianity Today magazine, Philip Yancy tells a wonderful story of Ernest 193 00:19:52,920 –> 00:19:58,839 Gordon, a British officer in the Second World War who suffered appalling conditions as a 194 00:19:58,839 –> 00:20:03,719 prisoner of war who was sent to work building the Burma-Siam railway. 195 00:20:03,719 –> 00:20:12,680 He speaks of how each day, Gordon joined a work detail of prisoners to build a track 196 00:20:12,680 –> 00:20:17,000 through a low lying swampland. 197 00:20:17,000 –> 00:20:22,640 If a prisoner, he says, appeared to lag, a guard would beat him to death or decapitate 198 00:20:22,640 –> 00:20:23,640 him. 199 00:20:23,640 –> 00:20:24,640 I mean this is evil. 200 00:20:24,640 –> 00:20:28,239 This is as dark as it gets. 201 00:20:28,239 –> 00:20:32,239 More men simply dropped dead from exhaustion, malnutrition or disease. 202 00:20:32,239 –> 00:20:37,439 I think there were 80,000 altogether died in this camp. 203 00:20:37,439 –> 00:20:42,319 But something was a stir in the prison camp, something Gordon would later call the miracle 204 00:20:42,479 –> 00:20:45,599 on the River Quay. 205 00:20:45,599 –> 00:20:50,020 For most of the war, the prison camp had served as a laboratory of survival of the fittest. 206 00:20:50,020 –> 00:20:51,760 Every man for himself. 207 00:20:51,760 –> 00:20:53,300 Men lived like animals. 208 00:20:53,300 –> 00:20:57,959 And for a long time, hate was the main motivation for staying alive. 209 00:20:57,959 –> 00:21:03,280 Recently, though a change had come, one event in particular shook the prisoners. 210 00:21:03,280 –> 00:21:07,160 A guard discovered that a shovel was missing. 211 00:21:07,160 –> 00:21:10,079 When no-one confessed to the theft, he screamed, 212 00:21:10,079 –> 00:21:11,219 ALL DIE! 213 00:21:11,219 –> 00:21:12,640 ALL DIE! 214 00:21:12,640 –> 00:21:18,060 He raised his rifle to fire at the first man in the line. 215 00:21:18,060 –> 00:21:21,040 At that instant, an enlisted man stepped forward and said, 216 00:21:21,040 –> 00:21:22,599 I did it. 217 00:21:22,599 –> 00:21:27,040 Enraged, the guard lifted his weapon high in the air and brought the rifle butt down 218 00:21:27,040 –> 00:21:31,599 on the soldier’s skull, killing him. 219 00:21:31,599 –> 00:21:36,839 That evening, when the tools were inventoried again, the work crew discovered that a mistake 220 00:21:36,920 –> 00:21:39,119 had been made. 221 00:21:39,119 –> 00:21:42,760 No shovel was missing! 222 00:21:42,760 –> 00:21:46,300 One of the prisoners remembered these words. 223 00:21:46,300 –> 00:21:50,199 Greater love has no man than this. 224 00:21:50,199 –> 00:21:54,859 Than that a man lay down his life for his friends. 225 00:21:54,859 –> 00:21:56,959 Extraordinary! 226 00:21:56,959 –> 00:22:06,439 Even in this darkest hole on earth, God is breaking through. 227 00:22:06,439 –> 00:22:12,880 And the problem for the wicked is that they can never rest, for even in the darkest place, 228 00:22:12,880 –> 00:22:22,119 the evidence of this unavoidable God speaks, and cries out to them. 229 00:22:22,119 –> 00:22:26,400 And it may be that in some way you see in your life—even though you’re here at church 230 00:22:26,400 –> 00:22:29,280 and maybe not quite sure why you are here, there’s all kinds of reasons for coming—but 231 00:22:29,459 –> 00:22:40,040 the reality is, maybe for some of us, that you’re pushing God’s advances and claims 232 00:22:40,040 –> 00:22:48,599 upon your life away to a distance, and it’s taking an enormous energy to do that—and 233 00:22:48,599 –> 00:22:55,680 you don’t know anything about rest for that reason. 234 00:22:55,680 –> 00:23:00,939 The wicked cannot rest because they cannot avoid the evidence of God who keeps breaking 235 00:23:00,939 –> 00:23:04,959 through into this world, even in the darkest place. 236 00:23:04,959 –> 00:23:13,599 Secondly, they cannot rest because they cannot resolve their inner conflict. 237 00:23:13,599 –> 00:23:19,260 Look back in Isaiah chapter 57, please, and verse 20 and 21. 238 00:23:19,260 –> 00:23:23,359 The wicked are like the tossing of the sea. 239 00:23:23,359 –> 00:23:24,939 The powerful picture. 240 00:23:25,900 –> 00:23:33,500 The tossing sea that cannot rest, whose waves cast up mire and mud. 241 00:23:34,959 –> 00:23:36,760 I will never forget the morning… 242 00:23:36,760 –> 00:23:43,119 It’s about 20 years ago now, I was attending a conference on the South Coast of England 243 00:23:43,119 –> 00:23:46,979 and having traveled there on my own. 244 00:23:46,979 –> 00:23:50,520 You know how you get into that kind of mood when you’re away for a few days and out of 245 00:23:50,520 –> 00:23:51,520 routine. 246 00:23:51,520 –> 00:23:53,900 You say, I’m going to eat less, I’m going to train more and all this kind of thing. 247 00:23:53,900 –> 00:23:58,420 So I decided that I was going to get up early in the morning and go and swim in the ocean. 248 00:23:58,420 –> 00:24:04,140 First light, I was there, the only soul to be seen on the beach. 249 00:24:04,140 –> 00:24:05,140 In I went. 250 00:24:05,140 –> 00:24:08,500 It was a stupid thing to do. 251 00:24:08,500 –> 00:24:17,180 Having got out some distance, I started to swim back to the shore, and after about 20 252 00:24:17,180 –> 00:24:22,339 minutes, realized that I hadn’t made any progress whatsoever. 253 00:24:22,359 –> 00:24:25,900 And some of you may know that moment of panic where you realize that you’re in trouble, 254 00:24:25,900 –> 00:24:27,479 and there isn’t a soul around. 255 00:24:29,040 –> 00:24:34,000 The force of the tide was pulling me out. 256 00:24:35,099 –> 00:24:39,300 Obviously, I survived, but that’s as far as we’re going with that. 257 00:24:39,300 –> 00:24:44,959 Now, that’s the picture that Isaiah uses of the wicked. 258 00:24:44,959 –> 00:24:47,520 The wicked are like the tossing of the sea. 259 00:24:47,520 –> 00:24:53,160 In other words, the experience of the wicked is that there are forces at work within their 260 00:24:53,160 –> 00:24:59,680 own nature that are pulling them in all kinds of conflicting directions. 261 00:24:59,680 –> 00:25:07,180 See, in the Bible sin is a choice, but it is also a power. 262 00:25:07,180 –> 00:25:14,640 And the more you give yourself to it, the stronger the grip that it will exercise over 263 00:25:14,640 –> 00:25:16,520 you. 264 00:25:16,520 –> 00:25:20,400 That is why the wicked can never be free. 265 00:25:20,400 –> 00:25:26,839 The wicked are never free because they are constantly pushed and pulled around by raging 266 00:25:26,839 –> 00:25:35,800 passions that exist within their own nature that master them and they cannot gain control 267 00:25:35,800 –> 00:25:37,459 over. 268 00:25:37,459 –> 00:25:39,900 The power of greed drives them. 269 00:25:39,900 –> 00:25:42,439 The power of hate drives them. 270 00:25:42,439 –> 00:25:44,760 The power of lust drives them. 271 00:25:44,760 –> 00:25:47,420 The power of envy drives them. 272 00:25:47,420 –> 00:25:53,439 And these currents that run deep and dark within the human soul are overpowering within 273 00:25:53,439 –> 00:25:54,920 the very nature of the wicked. 274 00:25:54,920 –> 00:26:00,640 That is what constitutes the wicked to be so. 275 00:26:00,640 –> 00:26:08,439 These currents, Isaiah says, are constantly throwing up new schemes for evil. 276 00:26:08,439 –> 00:26:12,079 New ideas as to what could be done next. 277 00:26:12,239 –> 00:26:17,359 The waves cast up mire and mud. 278 00:26:17,359 –> 00:26:20,500 This is the same as what the Lord Jesus said in Mark chapter 7. 279 00:26:20,500 –> 00:26:30,560 Remember, from within out of men’s hearts come evil thoughts, and immorality, and theft, 280 00:26:30,560 –> 00:26:37,239 and murder, and adultery, and greed, and malice, and envy, and slander. 281 00:26:37,239 –> 00:26:40,920 These things come from within a man, Jesus said. 282 00:26:40,920 –> 00:26:44,560 Now, the wicked are like the tossing sea. 283 00:26:44,560 –> 00:26:46,140 It never rests. 284 00:26:46,140 –> 00:26:51,160 They’re are always stirring up some new evil. 285 00:26:51,160 –> 00:26:56,439 The muck of the human heart is always being driven out into the open. 286 00:26:56,439 –> 00:27:00,060 Now, Paul knew about this. 287 00:27:00,060 –> 00:27:05,000 You remember, for many years before he came to Jesus Christ and was mastered by the Lord 288 00:27:05,479 –> 00:27:12,479 Jesus, he was consumed by a passionate hatred of Christian believers that drove him to make 289 00:27:13,880 –> 00:27:20,900 murderous threat, murderous threat. 290 00:27:20,900 –> 00:27:24,079 Later he wrote about his experience in Romans Chapter 70. 291 00:27:24,079 –> 00:27:29,380 He looking back is able to say when I want to do good, I find evil is right there with 292 00:27:29,380 –> 00:27:30,380 me. 293 00:27:30,380 –> 00:27:34,079 It’s a current that’s inside of my very nature. 294 00:27:34,099 –> 00:27:38,660 I find myself, he says, like a prisoner to a law that seems to be working itself out 295 00:27:38,680 –> 00:27:43,400 in my very nature, in my members. 296 00:27:43,400 –> 00:27:51,119 The ends up by saying, oh, wretched man that I am who’s going to deliver me from this. 297 00:27:51,119 –> 00:27:58,420 Something was going on inside me, he says, at that time that I didn’t understand and 298 00:27:58,420 –> 00:28:01,979 I couldn’t overcome. 299 00:28:02,859 –> 00:28:08,380 Now, this is the Bible’s picture of the wicked. 300 00:28:08,400 –> 00:28:14,260 They can never rest because they cannot avoid the evidence of God who keeps reaching out 301 00:28:14,260 –> 00:28:17,439 to them and they keep pushing Him away. 302 00:28:17,439 –> 00:28:23,319 They can never rest because they cannot resolve the inner conflict that arises from deep, 303 00:28:23,319 –> 00:28:29,359 dark currents within their own nature that push and pull them around and constantly foam 304 00:28:29,819 –> 00:28:34,880 up new ideas for doing what displeases God. 305 00:28:34,880 –> 00:28:41,880 Thirdly, they cannot rest because they cannot change their condition in eternity. 306 00:28:42,420 –> 00:28:49,420 Verse 21 of Isaiah 57, there is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. 307 00:28:50,739 –> 00:28:56,760 Now, notice these words right in the middle, says my God. 308 00:28:56,780 –> 00:29:03,780 This is the declaration of Almighty God. And the ultimate reason why the wicked will never 309 00:29:05,180 –> 00:29:12,180 have peace is that God says so. Contrast that with the beginning of chapter 310 00:29:12,760 –> 00:29:15,780 57. Just look back at verse 2 one more time. 311 00:29:15,780 –> 00:29:22,780 Those who walk uprightly, God says, enter into peace, they find rest as they lie in 312 00:29:23,140 –> 00:29:27,199 death. But there is no peace we are now being told 313 00:29:27,199 –> 00:29:33,459 for the wicked. God has said they will never rest. 314 00:29:33,459 –> 00:29:40,459 Now, the point here is very simple, if a man or a woman spends their entire life resisting 315 00:29:41,500 –> 00:29:48,500 God, that will not end or change at death. See, what happens at death, very simply put, 316 00:29:49,400 –> 00:29:56,400 is this. When you die, what’s at the heart of you becomes the whole of you. If you are 317 00:30:01,199 –> 00:30:06,459 a true believer, although you will have many conflicts and temptations and struggles and 318 00:30:06,459 –> 00:30:12,160 failures and all the rest of it, at the heart of you, if you are a true believer, you love 319 00:30:12,160 –> 00:30:17,680 God. The reason you love God, is that you have been born again by the Holy Spirit you 320 00:30:17,839 –> 00:30:23,079 are a new creation at the heart of you, whatever your conflicts and whatever your failures, 321 00:30:23,079 –> 00:30:30,079 at the heart of you, you love God. And when you pass death, pass through death, everything 322 00:30:32,300 –> 00:30:39,300 else will fall away from you as a disused shell. And what is at the heart of you will 323 00:30:39,300 –> 00:30:46,300 become the whole of you. When we see Him, we will be like Him. We will enter rest because 324 00:30:47,560 –> 00:30:52,900 His purpose in us is fulfilled. His project in us is completed, and everything that we 325 00:30:52,900 –> 00:30:58,540 have set our hearts upon to be like Jesus will be complete. That is the rest of the 326 00:30:58,540 –> 00:31:05,540 believer, because the work is done. But the wicked have made a perverse choice to live 327 00:31:06,540 –> 00:31:13,540 in opposition to God. At their heart, whatever else goes on in their lives, at their heart, 328 00:31:15,699 –> 00:31:22,479 they have set themselves against God. And when the wicked go through death, everything 329 00:31:22,479 –> 00:31:27,099 else falls away like a shell. And the heart of the wicked becomes the whole of the wicked 330 00:31:27,099 –> 00:31:34,099 so that they enter into eternity in opposition to God. 331 00:31:35,739 –> 00:31:42,739 And that, of course, is the final reason why the wicked never rest. Because having chosen 332 00:31:45,099 –> 00:31:49,920 an opposition to God, they have set themselves a purpose that by definition can never be 333 00:31:49,920 –> 00:31:56,920 fulfilled, a project that can never be completed in all eternity. That is the hell of hell. 334 00:31:57,400 –> 00:32:04,400 There will never come a time when the wicked are able to say, we have dethroned God. 335 00:32:06,000 –> 00:32:13,000 There will never in all eternity come a moment when the wicked can say, our purpose has been 336 00:32:13,119 –> 00:32:20,119 accomplished. There is no peace for the wicked, says my God. 337 00:32:27,680 –> 00:32:34,680 Now, I don’t suppose for one moment that if there were some folks doing a Gallup poll 338 00:32:34,839 –> 00:32:39,640 as we leave the service shortly, who asked the question, do you think that you are wicked, 339 00:32:39,640 –> 00:32:46,219 I don’t think any of us would say yes. I think if Gallup asked all the way across America 340 00:32:46,219 –> 00:32:52,599 they’d hardly find anyone who says I’m wicked. But maybe you have recognised a little reflection 341 00:32:52,599 –> 00:33:02,739 of yourself this morning. That you have resisted, and maybe even now are resisting, the claims 342 00:33:02,739 –> 00:33:11,780 of God upon your life. You want to be your own God. You want to write your own rules, 343 00:33:11,780 –> 00:33:19,060 you’re just looking for God to bless them. As God has reached out to you in many ways, 344 00:33:19,060 –> 00:33:27,219 you’ve put a lot of energy into distancing yourself and keeping him away. You’ve begun 345 00:33:27,219 –> 00:33:32,540 to experience an inner conflict that you cannot resolve. There are things going on in you 346 00:33:32,540 –> 00:33:38,619 that you say, oh, of course I could stop doing that, I could change. But you know you can’t. 347 00:33:38,619 –> 00:33:48,380 And that’s why you haven’t. And the last thing you want to do is to spend eternity 348 00:33:48,380 –> 00:33:52,760 in that war that is going on inside you right now. 349 00:33:52,760 –> 00:34:02,219 And God has an invitation for you, a choice that you can make, and with this we’re going 350 00:34:02,219 –> 00:34:07,439 to come to prayer together. Turn back one page and I’m simply going to read this verse 351 00:34:07,599 –> 00:34:15,520 because it is God’s own word in Isaiah 55 and verses 6 and 7. 352 00:34:15,520 –> 00:34:21,840 This is what God says. 353 00:34:21,879 –> 00:34:23,840 Isaiah 55 6 and 7. 354 00:34:26,159 –> 00:34:34,159 Seek the Lord while he may be found, call on 355 00:34:34,159 –> 00:34:40,639 him while he is near. He’s near now. 356 00:34:41,439 –> 00:34:46,719 Let the wicked forsake his way. 357 00:34:46,959 –> 00:34:48,959 See, the future for the wicked is clear. 358 00:34:50,479 –> 00:34:55,760 If you don’t want that future, there is only one way for you to go you must forsake the way 359 00:34:55,760 –> 00:35:08,639 of the wicked. Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts, let him turn to the 360 00:35:08,719 –> 00:35:19,120 Lord, and he will have mercy on him, to our God, for he will freely pardon. 361 00:35:21,199 –> 00:35:24,320 So word of God, let’s bow in prayer in his presence together. 362 00:35:27,439 –> 00:35:31,280 Just a moment to reflect on what God says to us in his Word, 363 00:35:32,080 –> 00:35:36,879 then we’re going to have an opportunity to make a prayer from the Bible our own. 364 00:35:39,520 –> 00:35:43,439 Are you ready to give up resisting the claim of God 365 00:35:43,439 –> 00:35:46,560 on your life, pushing him away when he reaches out to you? 366 00:35:48,320 –> 00:35:52,080 Are you ready to quit trying to be your own God, writing your own commandments? 367 00:35:54,800 –> 00:36:01,120 Are you willing to forsake that way and turn to the Lord who holds out mercy to you? 368 00:36:01,120 –> 00:36:11,679 He offers pardon to all who will come but coming to him means forsaking your way. 369 00:36:15,360 –> 00:36:18,639 God’s mercy is offered to you in Jesus Christ. 370 00:36:20,639 –> 00:36:27,679 Wicked men nailed him to a cross, and there he died for you. 371 00:36:27,679 –> 00:36:34,479 I’m going to suggest a prayer from the bible that you can offer to God right now. 372 00:36:36,719 –> 00:36:39,760 A prayer of a man called David who once did what was wicked 373 00:36:41,760 –> 00:36:46,399 but he turned to God and God changed him. 374 00:36:46,479 –> 00:36:51,760 Words are going to be on the screen from psalm 51 and let’s make them our own 375 00:36:52,719 –> 00:36:56,080 as we read them aloud together to God. 376 00:36:58,080 –> 00:37:04,320 Have mercy on me, oh god according to your unfailing love. 377 00:37:04,479 –> 00:37:10,000 Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. 378 00:37:10,959 –> 00:37:18,000 I know my transgressions and my sin is always before me. 379 00:37:18,000 –> 00:37:25,120 Against you you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. 380 00:37:26,320 –> 00:37:33,040 Create in me a pure heart oh god and renew a right spirit within me. 381 00:37:33,040 –> 00:37:41,679 Create a right spirit within me. Give me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me. 382 00:37:41,679 –> 00:37:52,560 Lord, hearthe prayers that are offered from the heart in repentance, 383 00:37:52,560 –> 00:38:01,760 in faith, and in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.