Trust In God: Isaiah 12

How should we respond the to passing of a year?  There are many events that transpire during the year, some good, some bad.  How would the Bible urge us to respond?  What about next year?  What should our confession be going into the new year?

For the third year in a row I have preached the last Sunday of the year at Risen Life Church.  The great thing about preaching the last Sunday of the year is that I get to preach on whatever I want!  Now usually I select a text that takes into account the New Year and so this year I selected Isaiah 12 for my sermon.

Isaiah 12 is a song of response to the Salvation that God has accomplished.  Chapters 1-5 of Isaiah really form a large introduction informing Israel how they have walked away from God.  They forsook the law, pursued their own desires, and trusted in their possession, other nations, and themselves instead of God.  In Isaiah 6-9 we get Isaiah’s vision of the thrown room of God where Isaiah is healed of his sins and commissioned as God’s prophet.  Isaiah in these chapters prophesies of the coming child, Immanuel, and urges king Ahaz to stop trusting in other nations and trust in God instead.  Isaiah 10-11 speak of God’s plan to pour out judgment on the nations and Israel for their sins as well as salvation yet to come.  In Isaiah 12 we get a song of response from those that God has saved.  It is interesting to note that this is a prophecy of the response God’s people will make when God ushers in salvation. 

If we had to summarize Isaiah’s message throughout the whole book it is to trust God above all else.  And that is what we need to say as we look back at the year behind us and to the year ahead, “God, I trust you.”  Trust for Isaiah looks like trusting God instead of man (Isaiah 2:33), trusting God instead of idols (Isaiah 44:15-17), and trusting God instead of ourselves (Isaiah 10:12-14).  Isaiah wants his readers to have a radical trust in the one true God that is able to save.

In Isaiah 12:1 we see God is trustworthy because God has accomplished our salvation while we were his enemies.  Paul picks up on this idea in Romans 5:6-11.  If God loved us enough to save us while we were living in sin as his enemies, He can be trusted to carry us through this life and complete our salvation.  The confession in Isaiah 12:2 becomes the pattern of confession we need to make.  In fact, if you have trusted Christ as your savior you have probably made a similar confession.  We make this confession when we are first saved and every time God does a work in our life until we finally make this confession as the glorified people of God living in the new heavens and new earth.

When we come to understand the Gospel through the work of the Holy Spirit in our heart and mind and confess our trust in Christ a funny thing happens.  We respond with praise and thanksgiving as well as proclaiming what God has done to the rest of the world (Isaiah 12:3-6).

As we head into the New Year lets confess our trust in God similar to Isaiah 12:2.

I hope you enjoy my sermon from the last Sunday of 2014.  There are many more details in my sermon than I have written above so I encourage you to listen.  As always, I love to hear your feedback.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE SERMON

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