Episode 259: The Leader To Come | Tim Henderson+

Introduction

Alright friends, how you doing? Good. Did Bob surprise you with that Isaiah 11 thing? Anybody geared up for Matthew 24, if you're reading in your bulletin? So here's what happened, I'm not supposed to be here today, Quig's supposed to be here, but he's sick. And so he was supposed to preach on Matthew 24 which is why you might have been ready for that, but he called me, he's sick, he's very sad to not be with you and I think he's sad to be sick. He's not dying, you look horrified, he just has a flu, it'll be great. But he feels miserable and terrible, so he's not here, he hates not being here, he wants me to send his greetings and his love. He will be with us next Sunday, he's supposed to be away because he's not just our local pastor, he's a bishop, which means he oversees a bunch of churches. He's supposed to be on a trip next week, he's gonna cancel that, so he'll be back here next week and he'll teach Matthew 24. And he asked me to kind of pinch hit and we're gonna look at Isaiah 11.

So, Brian's on vacation, Quig's gone, and so Barb has had to like manage 500 changes in the last, you know, hour and a half. It's gonna be smooth like butter though, okay? You won't even notice, maybe, alright? And if you do, we don't want to hear about it. Alright. Quigg also wanted me to point out to you, do a little bit of arithmetic here. Here's what's amazing about this church. You guys are, I mean, I've said this all time, this is the favorite church I've ever been a part of in any city or state I've ever lived in. And one of the things that's so amazing about you is you're so unbelievably generous. And in particular, you're generous in the month of December. If you do a little bit of arithmetic here, we got about a $2,700,000 budget and we're at about 2,100,000.0, which means that we're on track. But the only reason we're on track is because every year you guys are unbelievably generous in the month of December. So we're like, we need $500,000 in the month of December, which sounds like a ton of money. Right? And yet year after year after year, you guys come through and just give faithfully and generously to the Lord. So we're expecting it's gonna meet our budget, but it's $500 in four weeks. So y'all might wanna get on that. Okay? Alright.

The Leading Hope and Disappointment

So, alright. Isaiah 11 is where we're gonna go. Let's go to the first slide, guys. Take a look. 21%. What do you think? That's the answer to a question. What do you think the question is? What is the question to which 21% is an answer, Katherine? How many people give? No. Oh, I bet it's higher than that. I don't know. But that's a nice segue. I don't know what it is. No? This is an impossible question to answer. You wanna guess? 21%. 21% is the number, the percentage of Americans that think that Congress is doing a good job. 21%. Alright? That's a low number.

How about you? How do you feel about our political leaders? Are you like, man, our president, our governor, our senators, our congress they're crushing it. They're so good. They are so completely disinterested in personal gain and ambition. They always know the right end, and they just consistently pursue the righteous path to that end. Is that anybody? Anybody in that camp? Right? You guys, Isaiah 11 is about the perennial hope and the perennial disappointment. That someday, one day, any day, today, we will have a righteous leader. Someone will arise who will just crush it. Right? Everything they do will be good and right. They will rule in wisdom and honor. They will be so wise that they will just always know the best thing to do. His motives will be so pure that he'll never be braiding his own interests, or his reelection interests, or his crony's interests into decisions that he makes.

Someday, he will come, and he will be so powerful that he will be able to defeat his enemies, disarm our enemies. He'll be so faithful, so perfectly faithful, that he will not use us as a means to another end, but we will legitimately be the end that his focus is upon. Isaiah 11 is about the day. Someday, all that will be true, even if it's never been true for a day in your life. And I do know that that is too much to hope for. But this first Sunday, what's today? Do you know what today is? It's the first Sunday of Advent. What's Advent about? Anticipation. Anticipation. It's about waiting, which is why Eric said, we are waiting, we are waiting, we are waiting for you.

Isaiah 11 is about one of the things, I think it's about the chief thing that we're waiting for. Lord, when will you come? When will you do it? When will things be made right? And so our guide here is Isaiah 11. Isaiah 11 is all about the one who will fulfill these hopes. But because it's from Isaiah, it's from the prophets. And the prophets were just absolutely across the board super super weird. Right? We could pick any prophet. If you study the prophets, they were a very strange group of people. Ezekiel, a lot of weird things about all of them. Maybe one of the strangest things about Ezekiel is that this one time he laid down on his side for a year and a month. And all he did, well, the only thing he would eat for that year and a month was he would eat this weird mixture of beans and lentils and grains. I don't even know what lentils are, but it's something in that beany, grainy place. And he would cook them. Do you know this part? He cooked this meal over human poop. True story. For a year and a month. And then, when he was all done, he rolled over on his other side and he did it again for a month and a week. Okay? Ezekiel was a strange guy. Hosea, strange guy. What is Hosea famous for? What's the weirdest thing in his life? Married a prostitute. Just to make a point. Right? It's an odd these are not a normal group of people. Isaiah did a whole bunch of weird stuff, and he's the guy that we're looking at today. Isaiah, one of the strangest things, he said he spent three years outside in public, and he was either completely naked or in his underwear. And the language is not exactly clear. Basically, says that he was naked, but we've kinda been like, probably not actually naked. Maybe he's just running around in his undies. Okay? But strange guys. They're all they're all they love to make a vivid picture in often very strange and self depreciating ways.

Okay? And so, as I teach Isaiah 11, I feel like in order to be faithful to Isaiah 11 and the strangeness of it, we wanna try to import some of that, some of his love, his imagery. Happily, I will remain clothed for the entire message. Okay? But we are gonna rely on his images. And what I wanna give you are four images and four meanings of those images. My hope is that the imagery, like, by bringing in some of the propheticness of this, it'll stick. You'll remember it. That tomorrow you'll be like, what are you, what the heck I talk about? I don't know. But there are these four images and they'll they'll remain. That's the goal. You ready?

The Images and Their Meanings

Image number one. Tell me what this is. And I learned in the first service, I can't hold it like this because you'll answer it one way. I have to hold it like this. What is this? What is it? A branch, right? This is a branch, okay? Isaiah's image, Isaiah loves the image of the branch. He uses it over and over and over again. Take a look, look at Hosea Arbena, Isaiah 11 verse one, he says this, a shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse, from his roots a branch will bear fruit.

Okay? Isaiah loves it, it gets picked up by Jeremiah, it gets picked up by Zechariah. It shows up over and over throughout these writings. It even gets picked up by Gad that the older people here will remember. Do you know the name David Koresh? What was his cult called? Branch Davidians. That's this, this is what they're talking about. He was talking about the Branch of David. And I don't bring in David. David Koresh was bad news, but he was harvesting a good thing. He was using genuine biblical imagery and then kinda misusing it, right?

Here's what Isaiah is, here's what's going on with this. And I want you to figure out what's the image mean? Why does he talk about a branch? Isaiah four two says, in that day the branch of the Lord will be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the pride and the glory of the survivors in Israel. Isaiah six, it's a little bit different here, but he just kinda goes back to the start of it. Isaiah six, though a tenth remains in the land, it will again be laid waste. But as a terebinth and the oak leaf stumps when they're cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.

Jeremiah 23. Remember, Jeremiah steals it. The days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous branch, a king who will reign wisely and do what is just and right in the land. You hear the same anticipation of a leader that would come? He will be a branch. What does that mean? We'll figure that out in a second. And Isaiah 11 kinda brings the stump and the branch together. A shoot will come from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a branch will bear fruit.

Okay? Now there are two things to take from this. When we think about the branch, what does it mean that this rule will be a branch? Two things. Number one, it's humble origins. When Isaiah begins this imagery, he's talking about a stump, it's like a seed in a stump, and the idea is that this thing looks like it's dead, it looks like it's over, it looks like nothing. You just walk by it on a path. You would not notice it, but from that stump is gonna come this spring, which is gonna grow, and second thing, not only humble beginnings, but total domination. He's gonna spread out, like a branch's reach far, has a far reach, he's fruitful. So this guy, this image, this branch is supposed to conjure this idea of this humble beginnings that goes to fill the earth and to stretch. Okay? Why do you think well, of all, who's Jesse? Why is it the stump of Jesse? Who's Jesse? It's David's father. Okay? But it seems kinda weird. Why doesn't he just call it the stump of David? Why does he go back to Jesse instead of rooting this branch in David as others do? You know why? I think it's I think this is why. When you think of David, you probably think of the glorious king. He defeated Goliath. He expanded the empire. He's the greatest king we've ever had. And if you're thinking of this guy as being the descendant of David, in this moment, he's like, you're gonna think he's the son of the king. He's the one who grows up with prestige and royalty. But no, no, no. This guy's origin is we go back another click to Jesse, to this group of no ones from nowhere. He wants you to have some sense of when he comes, he will not be a person of privilege, but he will be of humble beginnings, but his reach will be incredible. His fruitfulness will be unparalleled. He will grow and cover the earth.

There's a little bit of this sense in Song of Solomon chapter two, where the wife, the woman says, like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my lover among the young men. I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. Her husband is this embodiment of this place under the branches, a place of protection and lavish joy. Isaiah envisions a righteous leader like that.

So, first image, what's the first image? It's a branch. What does it mean? Humble beginnings to? Great spread. Dominant success.

Number two. The stranger. It's a little more esoteric. Stay with me. Alright. You ready? This isn't the image. This is the image. Oh, can you feel it? No? Yeah, I can see your hair. Can you feel it? What is it? Oh, look at that hair go. What is it? It's the wind. Okay. Now you guys, in Hebrew, the word for wind, spirit, breath, it's all the same thing, it's Ruach. Okay? Here's how he says it here in Isaiah 11. He says, the Ruach of the Lord will rest on him, the Ruach of wisdom and understanding, the Ruach of counsel and of might, the Ruach of the knowledge and the fear of the Lord.

When the Old Testament talks about the spirit of God coming and resting on the people of God, it always means the same thing. It always means that ordinary, normal, common people will be enabled to do extraordinary, unusual things every time. Whenever you see the spirit of God come upon his people, it's always about enabling them to do things they wouldn't be able to do.

So in Exodus 31, it says, see, I've chosen Bezalel, son of Uri, the son of Hur of the tribe of Judah. Check it out. And I have filled him with the spirit of God, with skill, ability, and knowledge in all kinds of crafts to make artistic designs, for work in gold, silver, bronze, to cut and set stone, to work in wood, and to engage in all kinds of craftsmanship. This dude was a master artist because the spirit of God, the ruach, was upon him. Right? Maybe most famously is Samson. Right? Samson, it says this, look at it, it says, the spirit of the Lord came upon him in power so that he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as he might have torn a young goat.

Okay? So first of all, how strange is it that he thinks that the illustration that'll help this make sense to you is the way you would tear a young goat in half with your bare hands? Is that vivid? Like, yeah, I get it now. I mean, who's ever done that? Okay. The idea is that he's incredibly powerful and we think it's the hair. Right? We think it's his locks. It's not. It's the spirit of God that has come upon him in power. Or how about this, do you know the high point in the Old Testament of spirit empowerment? It's not the lavish creativity of these craftsmen. It is not the ridiculous like power of Samson. The high watermark of spirit empowerment, a ruach coming upon you, is that it gives you the ability to actually obey. It's Ezekiel 36, he says this, I will give you a new heart and I'll put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Ruach in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. You guys, the Old Testament foresaw the day that the spirit of God would come upon his people and enable us, good night, to be genuinely obedient. My guess is that the older you are, the more you understand how impressive that actually is. For we are untamable beasts. If the day could come that you could subdue you, we would count that quite an accomplishment. And it is to that end that the spirit of God comes upon us. And that's what he's saying, when this guy comes, when this leader comes, he will be wise and understanding, he will be powerful, but most impressively, he will genuinely fear God. He will be obedient. Okay? So number one, he's a branch. What does that mean? Humble beginnings to? Great spread. Number two, the Ruach, the spirit, the wind, the breath will rest upon him and he will be both excellent and exceedingly obedient. You with me? Okay.

Number three. Where is number three? Barb, this way. Number three. What does this what is this? If I were coming at you in the dark, what is okay. This look at the text. I might give you a hint. This is a rod. Okay. What does this thing suggest to you? Are you afraid yet, Jim? Okay. It is power, it is force, it is strength. That when this guy comes, he comes with a rod, however, it's a funny rod. Take a look at the It says this, he will not judge by what he sees with his eyes or decide by what he hears with his ears, but with righteousness he will judge the needy, and with justice he'll give decisions for the poor of the earth. And check it out, he will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips, he will slay the wicked.

The rod of his mouth and the breath of his lips. This ruler, when he comes, will have an anointed and powerful tongue. It is by his words alone. He does not come with a ferocious army to smash your head in. He comes and he has this word that he speaks and his word alone is powerful. When God made the world, he just spoke it into he said, let there be light, and there was light. He he accomplishes things by simply speaking them into being, and this one will come, and he will subdue his enemies with the rod of his mouth by merely speaking. And when he comes, he will be so great, so truthful, so gracious that his words alone will have determining power. He doesn't need an army because his words will rule. It is a rod, but it's a rod unlike any that you've ever seen.

The Final Image and Its Significance

Fourth image is the most extensive. It gets the greatest amount of time in the text. And it's not about him. It's about the results that he produces. Okay? Take a look. Here we go. Final image. You gotta bear with me because this was a last minute thing. Okay? What does this look like to you? Okay. Can you see the horn? It's a unicorn. This, you guys, is a ferocious predator. It's my dog is a ferocious predator, so it's a little chewed up. But here's the thing. Okay? What what I want you to see with this is with this terrifying beast right here, is that this ferocious predator cannot harm you. It will not harm you. It's pretty soft and cuddly. Right? Listen to what he says. Check it out. Verse six, the wolf will live with the lamb. That doesn't happen. The leopard will lie down with the goat. The calf and the lion and the yearling together, and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, the young will lie down together, the lion will eat straw like the ox, the infant will play near the cobra's den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper's nest. There are wolves, there are leopards, there are lions, there are snakes, and no one gets bit. And by the way, I'm not gonna cut this stuffed animal in half today. Okay? Last time I did that, some children cried so that no one will be harmed today at all. Everything is just fine. Okay? So this animal here, this ferocious predator is meant to remind us that when he comes, we'll be safe. There will be no more harm. The next verse, in fact, verse nine says, they will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain. Because the result of the rule of this branch who is empowered by the spirit, who has a rod like mouth, is cuddly predators. It's safety. The day is coming when we will be safe.

It's the depiction of rulers. This is like ubiquitous. Throughout the whole text, the Bible depicts rulers as being ferocious, as being self-serving, as being animalistic towards the people they're supposed to serve. In fact, Zechariah, maybe one of the pinnacle moments of this, Zechariah sees political leaders as shepherds who do not care for the lost or seek the young, or heal the injured, or feed the healthy. It says instead that they eat the meat of the choice sheep and they tear off their hooves. Like, it's just this sense of brutality and viciousness and senseless cruelty, the discarding of people. That is how the Bible sees most of political leaders through most of time. In the book of Daniel, it figures them as vicious, devouring beasts, one after another, scrapping for power.

The day is coming when it will not be so, when a better leader will arise. The day will come when one will come who will lead in righteousness and in faithfulness. You will not need to vote for him because the Father has already given him the nations to rule. And as we enter into this month, this advent of waiting, one of the things for which we wait is a truly righteous leader. I wonder which image, what do you need this morning? You yourself. There's this branch. Do you need to know that one day he's going to succeed? He really will. He'll completely dominate the earth. Right now, my guess would be that nobody is all that happy with how their stocks performed in 2022. Anybody? And if so, what'd you do? Right? Maybe 2023 will be better, and maybe it won't. Right? We don't know. Maybe Bitcoin, and maybe not. We don't know. But what we do know is that he will branch out. He will have total domination. Or maybe it's this, maybe you have some sense of, oh, to have one I won't. It's okay. Everybody be quiet. You're safe. Will one come genuinely empowered by the spirit of God? Absolutely excellent. Absolutely obedient. Is that what you long for? Like, probably the day. Or maybe it's this, you just need to know that we're gonna win. That somebody will have such power that his word alone will carry the day. I would say for me right now, it's probably this. Of these images, this is the one that hits me the most, because I'm so weary of lies dominating, false words that just carry the day. Have you noticed that? Just as insane. Somebody said that a lie can spread halfway around the world before the truth puts on its boots. But the day is coming, and you might need to know it. The truth will reign. Righteous words will carry the day.

Or maybe you just need to know, the world feels unsafe, and you just need to know that the things are going to get safer. That all the ravenous harms of this broken world will be defanged, transformed, and that all will serve the branched out, spirit empowered, rod like mouth of the righteous one. Because there's a name that I've not even mentioned yet today, but we've been talking about them the whole time. Every bit of this is fulfilled in Christ. That when Jesus came, he began something that will be completed when he comes again. And you we're living in Advent. Advent is the time that we look back to his first coming. Right? And we kind of we're reliving. We're waiting for Christmas. We're waiting for Christmas. We're waiting. It says, how soon? When will it come? Right? But we're also using that to kind of slingshot ourselves around it to remind us that we are waiting for him to come back. He's coming back. And when he comes back, Hebrews says, he will not come to bear sin, but to bring salvation. He will come to fulfill Isaiah 11.

You guys, he is the vine and we are the branches. When he says that in John 15, he's picking up this imagery. Right? And he's saying, it's even better than and it's not merely that we will hide underneath his branches. Do you hear this? We'll be united to him. We will become his branches. He connects with us. He he he relates to us in a way that's as close as a husband to a wife, as a branch to a tree, as a head to a body. He unifies himself to us. Right? When he comes, when he when he comes again, he will come absolutely in the fullness of the power of the spirit. He does all things well. He is supremely excellent at everything, and he has a spirit of exceeding obedience. He is the fulfillment of the one on whom the Ruach rests. And he comes, his word is so interesting. In John one, it says that he is the word. In Hebrews one, he is the final word. In first Peter one, he is the living word. And again, back in Hebrews, he sustains all things by his powerful word. He is the fulfillment of it all. And when he comes, finally, finally, finally, finally, in him we will be safe.

First John five says that if you are in Christ, the one who is born of God keeps you safe, and the evil one cannot harm you. It's all in him. It's always all in him. He's the end of every story. It all points to him. And so this year, this advent, I wanted to ask you, right now, as you think about this, what are you waiting for? What is the thing you long for? What is the thing you need? My pledge to you is that the ultimate fulfillment of whatever you're looking for will be found in him. It is in Christ that all these images and so much more finds its fruition. And I pray that this year and every year, you would find it in him.

Invitation and Closing

We invite you to come forward this morning, and maybe there's something you wanna talk to him about, some burden you're carrying, something you're so tired of waiting for. How soon? Lord, fix it. I grow impatient. I grow weary. He can hear that. Come and ask him, Lord, now? Now? Or maybe this, do you know what is the single thing that delays his return? What what must happen before he comes again? This is it. Catherine's quoting Matthew twenty four fourteen. This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. If you wanna hasten his coming, share the gospel. Support a missionary. Pray for the unreached peoples of the world. He gave us a commission. He said, listen, I'm the king of all things. I reign over all. Here's what I want you to do. Go tell everyone everywhere to bend the knee that I will transfer them from the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of light. And when you finish doing that everywhere to all peoples, then I will come back.

We hasten his coming by the proclamation of the gospel throughout the earth. So you might come forward and pray, Lord, what's my role in that? What do you want me to give? What do you want me to pray? Where do you want me to go? What do you want me to do to hasten your coming? Come soon, Lord Jesus. I invite you to come down. You can pray out with all by yourself here on the curved rails, with a friend in the straight rails, and then we'll meet together at the table.

Lord Jesus, it's because you are so great. You are the branch of humble beginnings. You are the one who comes in the power of the Ruach, the wind, and the spirit. It is your tongue, your word that reigns supreme. And Lord Jesus, it is in you that we are finally made safe. Come soon. Come soon. Come soon. We love you. We long to see you. Empower us to be what you want us to be in these days of waiting. Amen.