Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

The prophet Isaiah’s world was unraveling before him. By his time, the once-proud united kingdom under Kings David and Solomon had already been fractured for two hundred years. Almost right after that split, the northern kingdom of Israel fell deep into idol-worship and the evil ways of foreign overlords like Queen Jezebel. And among the faithful people that were left down south in the tribe of Judah, even they were starting to fall away from the Lord. And then as if anything worse couldn’t have possibly happened, King Uzziah suddenly died. King Uzziah was a good king. He followed what the Lord said and governed well as God’s representative in the Kingdom of Power. He reigned fifty-two years, starting from the age of sixteen. He was the only king Isaiah had ever known up to this point.

But then came a dark day in the history of King Uzziah’s reign. The book of Second Chronicles unfolds the fateful story. King Uzziah defiantly took the burning incense pot from the altar of incense right in the middle of the temple. He proceeded to violate the worship of God and nullify the Lord’s grace when he disregarded the warnings of Azariah the high priest along with 80 other priests who tried to get in his way and stop this terrible thing. As the king’s anger flared against God’s holy servants there in the temple, the Lord Himself stepped in and right then and there He afflicted King Uzziah with leprosy that broke out on his forehead like a special-effect in a sci-fi thriller movie. When this happened they rushed him out of the temple, and he went willingly without resistance, and for the rest of his life, King Uzziah suffered the effects of his disease and his gross disobedience against God. He was never allowed to set foot in the temple again. He had to hand over his rule as king to his son, and was left in the leper’s quarters to die alone and in disgrace.

All of the kingdom of Judah was stunned. Isaiah may well have been, too. This beloved king, this great moral anchor of the land, had one brief fit of self-centered pride that turned him against the Lord Whom he had so faithfully served in the past. If King Uzziah could fall to such depths, what hope would there be for the rest of the nation? There seemed to be a crisis on the horizon. All hope would soon be lost for the people of God. When this king whom God deposed in shame finally did pass away, Isaiah the preacher faced a very uncertain future. This once faithful people was getting increasingly corrupt and their lips had already become unclean. If they found themselves in the presence of the Almighty God, there would quite literally be hell to pay.

Not even a year had passed by yet, and suddenly Isaiah is confronted with what could have been his worst nightmare. It is likely that he’s in the temple; he could actually be not too far from the very spot where the Lord’s holy anger broke out against the king. Then the magnificent glory of the Triune God appeared to Isaiah right there where he stood. High and lifted up He was on the judgment throne, with the flowing kingly robes filling up the massive temple building. Imagination itself is too shallow to take in this glorious sight. The burning, white-hot angels, known as the seraphim, were singing the unending song of heaven right in Isaiah’s hearing. This song of heaven whose words you know: Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of Sabaoth, heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Isaiah may at first have been stunned with wonder and amazement. But it was only a moment. Evidently, when you see the almighty power of God, the blinding light of perfection shines on your sinful, imperfect heart. That’s what happened at least to Isaiah. Immediately, he was painfully aware of the guilt of sin, not only Isaiah’s sin, but the sin of the entire people as well. The uncleanness was evident on the lips, as the prophet pointed out, because hidden sinfulness becomes quite plain when the sinner opens his mouth. The Apostle James (3:7-8) wrote something very similar to this: “Every kind of beast and … creature can be tamed by mankind, but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.” A rebellious insurgent such as this has no business dwelling in the presence of the Lord of Hosts.

The same is true for you. Since you are a sinner, as am I, God’s holy law gives you no right to enter His courts. You may have the freedom of religion and assembly as a citizen of this country, but your thoughts, words and deeds provide clear evidence that you would rather be enslaved to the passions of your own heart and flesh, serving the every sadistic whim of Satan instead. Your lips are unclean because there are those whom you have hurt with your words. Trouble and crisis seem ever on the horizon. Your world may be unraveling before your eyes, whether it is a direct result of your own sin, or perhaps because of somebody else’s sin. It’s as if nothing worse could possibly happen. Isaiah’s nightmare is playing out in real life when you compare yourself to the righteous, perfect, unattainable standard of God’s law. In the prophet’s own words: Woe is you for you are lost, you are undone.

But all of a sudden, a wonderful thing happens. Isaiah saw it himself. A seraph stops singing the heavenly song for a moment. At the Lord’s command, this bright angel heads for the altar of sacrifice and brings from it a burning coal with tongs. He touches the prophet’s lips. The burning kills and cleanses at the same time. Those beautiful words spoken by a messenger of God resound in the sinner’s ear: Your guilt is taken away, your sin is atoned for. Isaiah is set free. He is given a vocation with which he gets to do that which is pleasing to God, and with willing heart and voice he exclaims to the Triune God: “Here am I! Send me!”

Is it any different with you? It isn’t, except in your case, your loving heavenly Father did not make a mere angel stop singing momentarily to bring you a lump of coal. Instead, He allowed His only-begotten Son to go forth out of heavenly glory and put on human flesh; the creator of time and space now subject to these things. Rather than carrying a pair of tongs, Jesus instead bore down under a heavy cross, but with that cross was the infinitely heavier burden of your sins and the sins of the whole world. His death under the burn of God’s judgment is the perfect atoning sacrifice that truly belongs on that altar, for it is the only death than can pay the price to buy you back your freedom. Instead of burning your lips with holy fire, your Savior crucifies your sinful nature, and drowns it in the water of your Baptism, so that just as Christ was raised through the glory of the Father, so you may be raised from your death, and walk in the newness of divine life. That’s what those words, “assumption of humanity into God,” mean in the Athanasian Creed: Jesus did not stop being God the Son when He became Man, that would be conversion of the divinity into flesh. But rather, He did restore the divine image to mankind so that you may have perfect unity with God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. His called messenger, the servant of the Word, announces this declaration sent straight from God’s judgment throne: Your guilt is taken away, your sin is atoned for. Holy, Holy, Holy is the Three-in-One and One-in-Three God.

And just as Isaiah was given a vocation in which he may serve according to God-given talents, you have been given your calling as well. Note that you do not have the same vocation as Isaiah, yet there’s some little corner of this vast world that God has created where you are already qualified and called to do what He declares to be holy work. Concerning this place in life that the Lord set aside for you, He has set you free from your sin so that you too may respond, “Here am I! Send me!”

The world may still crumble around you. Terror and crisis may still be your lot in this life. In fact, persecution may increase because of Satan’s bitter opposition to the Truth. But one thing is most certainly true: A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. (Psalm 91) Why? Because you have the Lord’s eternal Word to strengthen you. You have Christ crucified so that your eyes may be comforted by the ransom price paid in your place. Hope is not lost. You have Jesus’ Body and Blood to touch your lips with forgiveness, and the song of the angels in the liturgy to lift up your hearts away from this sinful world and unto the Lord. Celebrate the Holy Trinity with Isaiah and with all the host of heaven, because saying the Athanasian Creed may be a mind-numbing, tongue-twisting experience now, but the eternal salvation that it stands for is awesome beyond what words can express.

Blessed be the Holy Trinity and the Undivided Unity. Let us give glory to Him because He has shown His mercy to us!

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
II Chronicles 26 King Uzziah
James 3:7-8 No man can tame the tongue.
Psalm 91 A thousand may fall at your side…
Is. 6:1–8 Here am I! Send me
Ps. 29 The voice of the LORD is over the waters
Acts 2:14a,22–36 God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.
John 3:1–17 unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.