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The God who saves
The Gospel according to Isaiah 1.0
Isaiah 1:10-20
by Eric Stillman
November 11th, 2007

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Well, good news for all you who live near shopping centers – mall traffic season has begun already.  That’s right, apparently Thanksgiving is not happening this year and we’re moving straight to Christmas.  And since I always let the world dictate what I preach on, I’ve decided to begin my Christmas series today.  Actually, I’m kidding about the world dictating thing, but I am beginning a series from the Old Testament book of Isaiah that will last for the next seven weeks, ending at Christmastime.  One of the most remarkable things I have found about Jesus and the Bible is that the story of Jesus is not just told in the four books known as the gospels – Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.  The incredible thing that the early Christians discovered and we testify to today is that the whole Bible points to Jesus and the salvation that is found in Him, from Genesis to Revelation.  For this reason, I’ve titled this series the gospel according to Isaiah, because over the next seven weeks I think you’ll be amazed at just how clearly this book, written 700 years before the birth of Jesus, speaks of the salvation that is to be found in Jesus.  There are many passages in Isaiah that point ahead to a Messianic figure who is to come and save the people of Israel, whatever “save” means.  Over the next seven weeks I’ll be discussing some of the highlights of this fascinating book. 

Today I want to start with an important question that will set the groundwork for the rest of this series - What is the book of Isaiah & how do you read it?  Isaiah is commonly called a prophetic book, and if you’re anything like me, you struggle to read the prophetic books, because it’s not always obvious why they were written, how they relate to the rest of the Bible, and what they have to say to us today.  Even the most fundamental questions aren’t easy, like what is a prophetical book?  What does it mean that Isaiah was a prophet?  Now, this means that there will probably be less immediate application from today’s sermon, but spending time discussing the big picture and how Isaiah fits into it will definitely help you apply the rest of the series to your life and help immensely with how you read the Bible, I believe.

In order to properly read Isaiah, you must understand three things:

1) salvation history – there is a history to God’s saving work in the world that will inform your reading of Isaiah

2) what was happening during Isaiah’s lifetime – the hard thing about reading the prophets is that they are obviously speaking to situations that are centuries ago about which we have no idea, so it can be hard to know how to relate them to today; or, it can be easy to misinterpret them as speaking to today’s world when they’re really not

3) the function of prophecy – what does it mean that Isaiah was a prophet?  What was their role?

First, salvation history.  Isaiah, or Yshua Yahu, means God is salvation – so it’s pretty clear that salvation is going to be an important subject.


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