Is God Really in Control?

[podcast]http;//www.revkwon.com/podcast/in_control.mp3[/podcast] I am going to call today’s sermon, “Is God Really in Control?” Let me try to take you with me through what Isaiah has seen. Now, we all know that it’s hard to believe God in control of our lives because we often don’t see it. This makes us question: is God really in control? Just Friday there was a woman who was walking in the city, like any normal and very average day and all of a sudden, a piece of plywood falls from the sky and kills her. Is God really in control? Then there was this story from Saturday, in one morning, seven siblings died (three girls and four boys) in a house fire while they were observing the Sabbath. Is God really in control? But perhaps the plight of people in your neighborhood don’t concern you because you’re up in that social media and that’s all the world that matters, the five inches between your face and your phone or tablet. And the thing that makes you ask whether or not God is in control is when you lose that phone or tablet to the toilet. You just drop it because you’re clumsy and uncoordinated. So you ask God in aggravation: is God really in control? I can go on and on, but I won’t because I think you see where I’m going. There are a hundred and one situations where we ask ourselves whether or not God is in control and every single time we ask that question, we begin to doubt how much He really is in control. Then we fail to believe that our God is really a God who lives. It is at that point, when you find it hard to believe God is in control, that you find God in control and purposeful even when it doesn’t seem it. Lets go to Isaiah 53.

¹Who has believed what he has heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? ² For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. ³ He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

How many people here knew that the Prophet Isaiah was talking about Jesus? Do you believe that this was written 700 years before Jesus? But Isaiah sees it. He sees it so clearly. The funny thing is, nobody believed Isaiah saw it and can see God in control of it. At the time this was written, Israel was having a faith crisis. Most of the country was left in shambles. Whoever was remaining in the country that wasn’t killed or deported, were intermarrying with pagans. There was idol worship and lots of weird stuff happening. In fact, many people started to believe in a number of gods seeing as how God abandoned the Israelites to these armies of other gods. Verse 1: “Who has believed what he has heard from us?” the answer is nobody. Nobody has heard. The reason nobody has heard was because we didn’t recognize who was speaking. It’s hard to believe God is in control when we don’t recognize God in control.  We don’t recognize God’s whole demeanor, His style, His view of life and money and possessions and lust and prayer and worship and pride and humility and fear and faith. We didn’t recognize it because none of it endorsed our own rebellion. I’m telling you right now that God is in control but we don’t accept that, we reject it because we want to be in control. We want to rebel against it. All of us are rebel subjects. We don’t like anyone telling us what to do. And to keep God’s will from conflicting with our own, we just don’t think about him. I want to go to verse 4.

⁴ Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. ⁵ But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. ⁶ All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Did you see that in verse 6? We wall have gone astray—like sheep. Maybe we don’t’ believe God in control because we’re like sheep. But it’s clear in verse 4 and 5 that God, through Jesus, because he takes control of our lives and destinies have taken our griefs, sorrows and transgressions. If you didn’t know before but Isaiah is talking about Jesus. He is talking about how we are rebellious people and how even in our rebellion, God is taking control. This is something Isaiah is telling us to believe. Whether we like it or not, God is coming to take control of our runaway freight train lives. True story, now look at how God does that.

⁷ He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. ⁸ By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? ⁹ And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.

But God knows we are rebellious. He knew that our lives were out of control. That we would not believe Him or in His Son. He knew all of that. That did not bother him at all. In verse 7, Isaiah says, “[Jesus] didn’t open his mouth when he was oppressed or afflicted.” He knew it was coming. He did not say anything. Instead of collapsing in grief over our rejection, Jesus bears our griefs. Instead of increasing our sorrows, Jesus carries our sorrows. Instead of avenging our transgressions, Jesus is pierced for them in our place. Instead of crushing us for our iniquities, he is crushed for them as our substitute. And all the chastisement and whipping that belong to us for our rebellion Jesus takes on himself in order that we might have peace and be healed. That is how Jesus takes control. He did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many. This is the gospel. This is what we believe. But that’s not all of it. There’s more. The gospel doesn’t save unless we see it and grasp it for our own. I want you to recognize something in your life when you believe God is in control as evidenced by the salvation we receive from Jesus Christ. God allows us to see majesty. Let’s go to verse 10.

¹⁰ Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. ¹¹ Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. ¹² Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

The people of this world will be silent because the suffering servant, Jesus, is the sovereign of the universe. He is lifted up. He is greatly exalted. This is what God grants them the eyes to see—the majesty of Jesus. In our lives we see the majesty of Jesus when we believe it is Jesus who is in control of the situations and things in our lives. We believe when our sins are wiped away and our guilt is no more. We will not be condemned by sin. We are justified through Christ. Let’s look at our memory verse for today:

But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. – Isaiah 53:5

Let’s pray. Though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. God highly exalts him and bestows on him the name above names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Amen.