Dear Friends in Christ Jesus,
Can we even imagine what it must be like to have enemies destroy your hometown? Or, to take us and the entire population captive? There are cities in the Middle East today that go through this horror not only once but also repeatedly.
This was the future Isaiah saw and wrote about for Jerusalem and its inhabitants. In a little over a century, another prophet, Jeremiah, would lament over the fall of Jerusalem and watch the Babylonians carry her citizens away in chains.
At the same time, both prophets wrote about the day the LORD would restore Jerusalem to new glory. He would sanctify the holy city, make it a safe and secure place, and bring his people home.
The prophets were not writing about the earthly city. They were writing about the New Jerusalem, the home of all the saints, triumphant over sin, death and Satan’s power.
Look ahead with me in hope and joy at this certainty for us and all the Church Militant on earth. The Lord will Glorify the Newly Sanctified Jerusalem. His holy arm has redeemed his people. He will lead his people safely home.
The prophet Isaiah wrote about future things as though they had taken place in the present. He could do that because God’s Word to his people about our future already has taken place in the certainty of God’s promises. As the people considered Isaiah’s words about the future of Jerusalem at the hands of their enemies, they were to wake up from despondency, pull themselves together in the knowledge of the LORD’s deliverance.
“Awake, awake, O Zion, cloth yourself with strength. Put on your garments of splendor, O Jerusalem, the holy city.” God’s people were to exchange their mourning clothes for wedding clothes. Why? The LORD’s His holy arm has redeemed his people. God would use the Persian King Cyrus to free his people and return them to Jerusalem to rebuild.
This is a great picture of our King, Jesus Christ, setting us free with the holy arm of his redemptive work. Our Savior has redeemed us from the guilt and punishment of our sins. He has freed us from the chains of death and the grave. He has freed us from Satan’s power. The Holy Spirit has called us out of unbelief into the church. This is his sanctifying work.
We exchange the ashes of repentance for the oil of gladness. We put off the sackcloth of mourning over our sins and put on the wedding garments of Christ’s righteousness that make us a fit Bride for our holy Bridegroom. While we remain sinners, now we also are saints. A believer is a saint because I am holy with Christ’s righteousness through faith. I am a citizen of the spiritual Jerusalem. Jesus Christ has delivered me by the arm of his strength.
The Lord will glorify the newly sanctified Jerusalem. He has glorified us already even as the church still fights on earth. Today is about our final triumph in heaven. It is about our final deliverance into the heavenly Jerusalem where no enemy can touch us because “The uncircumcised and the defiled will not enter you again.” The Lord will lead his people safely home.
The defiled and unclean would come into the city and destroy it and the temple. God would restore those things not in a physical way but in a spiritual way. This is a picture of the church as God delivers us out of this world where our enemies can tempt us, and deliver us into the New Jerusalem where they cannot enter.
All of this is in God’s hands. He allowed the unclean to be the instruments of his judgment against the idolatry of his nation. The enemies did not have to pay him anything to do that. In the same way, the Lord did not have to pay anything to ransom them. The LORD did both by his power and by his will alone. He is in control. This is what Isaiah’s words mean when he quoted the LORD God, “You were sold for nothing, and without money you will be redeemed.”
The same is true for our redemption from sin and death and the final redemption of even our resurrected bodies. It all is in God’s control. God sends our discipline now and gives us the chance to use our faith against our enemies. Finally, we saints will be triumphant as the Lord takes us out of this vail of tears to himself in heaven. Jesus paid the price of our redemption not with money but with his holy blood.
When God returned his nation to Jerusalem, they would know that he was God. “Therefore, my people will know my name; therefore in that day they will know that it is I who foretold it. Yes, it is I.”
In the day we enter the New Jerusalem in heaven, we will know perfectly our God’s name. We will know perfectly that it was he who foretold our triumph and has given it to us. In Hebrew, “Yes, it is I,” is “Here I am.” All of this triumph for us saints will be ours when we see and hear Jesus come again and say, “Here I am.” We will know his name and that he has kept his word.
The purpose of this prophecy was to give his people hope and joy. The assurance of God’s deliverance in the future was the means to wake them up and have them pull themselves together in warfare.
When we are struggling in this life in the fight of faith, and warring against our spiritual enemies who blasphemes God’s name, it is the promise of saints triumphant that wakes us from despondency. This certain triumph enables us to shake off the dust of despondency, and to remove the chains of fear from our necks and rise up and “sit enthroned.” Jerusalem, the church, will sit enthroned with Christ on the Father’s right hand forever and ever.
On this Saints Triumphant Sunday, we remember our fellow saints who already are triumphant in heaven. We think of family, friends, and members of Bethlehem who now are enjoying that safety and righteousness in the New Jerusalem. We trust the Spirit’s power in the means of grace to keep us in faith for a glorious reunion in heaven. Amen. <SDG>