Mama Don't Forget

Have you ever thought about this? We think about heaven. We think about eternity to come. Jesus has a resurrected body, and yet it's not a perfect body. He has on his resurrected body the marks of his own crucifixion. In eternity right now, in heaven right now, he bears the marks from the cross. And this is like, this is for you.

You know, we often sing about this in our church:

Five bleeding wounds he bears received on Calvary. They pour effectual prayers. They strongly plead for me. Forgive, Oh forgive, they cry. Forgive him. Oh forgive, they cry. Nor let that ransomed sinner die.

This is what's given to us. God, like a mother with a baby. God with our names engraved.

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This is Christ the King's sermons. Christ the King Sermons is a ministry of Christ the King Presbyterian Church located in Raleigh, North Carolina. CTK is a community rooted in the depth of the gospel, refined by hard conversations, fueled by meaningful relationships, and committed to redemptive work in Raleigh.

Good morning. Glad to see you all here. It's been a big weekend for our church. We had Marty Solomon in. It was a terrific conference this weekend. We did record it. If you missed it, it will be available soon on our resource page of our website. And one of the sweet things was he mentioned the passage I'm preaching on this morning and talked about it, which felt awesome. I hope if you missed that, you will go back. It was incredibly encouraging.

We're going to be in Isaiah chapter 49 today, and we're going to be reading verses one through seven, thirteen through 17. Our custom is that we read God's word aloud together. So if you'd find that in your bulletin or on the screen behind me, we're going to read today. I'm reading from the CSB, the Christian Standard Bible. Let's read God's word together.

Coasts and islands, listen to me. Distant peoples pay attention. The Lord called me before I was born. He named me while I was in my mother's womb. He gave my words like a sharp sword. He hid me in the shadow of his hand. He made me like a sharpened arrow. He hid me in his quiver. He said to me, you are my servant, Israel in whom I will be glorified. But I myself said, I have labored in vain. I have spent my strength for nothing in futility. Yet my vindication is with the Lord, and my reward is with my God. And now says the Lord who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him so that Israel might be gathered to him. For I am honored in the sight of the Lord and my God is my strength. He says, it is not enough for you to be my servant raising up the tribes of Jacob and restoring the protected ones of Israel. I will also make you a light for the nations to be my salvation to the ends of the earth. This is what the Lord, the redeemer of Israel, his holy one says, to one who is despised, to one abhorred by people, servant of rulers. Kings will see, princes will stand up, and they will all bow down because of the Lord who is faithful, the holy one of Israel, and he has chosen you. Joy, you heavens. Earth, rejoice. Mountains break into joyful shouts for the Lord has comforted his people and will have compassion on his afflicted ones. Zion says, the Lord has abandoned me. The Lord has forgotten me. Can a woman forget her nursing child or lack compassion for the child of her womb? Even if these forget, yet I will not forget you. Look, I have ascribed you on the palms of my hands. Your walls are continually before me. Your builders hurry. Those who destroy and devastate you will leave you. — Isaiah 49:1-7, 13-17 (CSB)

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

The Movie Memento

So long before there was Batman, there was Memento. Christopher Nolan's initial big movie that introduced him to the world was not the Batman franchise, but rather a movie about a man with amnesia. The story is this: Leonard Shelby wakes up and he's had amnesia. He realizes his wife is gone. He realizes someone has killed his wife, and so he's on a mission to figure out who the murderer is, and yet he can't remember anything.

Every day, he wakes up to the same nightmare, and he tries to figure out what's going on. The story is confusing to watch because you're with him every day trying to figure out what's going on. He writes notes to himself in Sharpie, and he writes notes to himself on his body because every day when he wakes up, he has to refigure out what he'd already figured out and then try to figure out some more. It's super disorienting, super confusing to follow along.

This spring, as we're studying through these passages from Isaiah chapter 40 through 66, we are looking at what are called the suffering servant passages of the Old Testament.

There are four classic suffering servant passages, and we're looking at one of those today that's about the suffering servant figure who appears suddenly in the book of Isaiah in this last part and comes bringing good news. The early church saw this and immediately after the resurrection of Jesus, identified the suffering servant of Isaiah. They said, "This is what Christ did for us. This is what he came to do. This is what he is all about, these last chapters of Isaiah." I call this the greatest hits series of the end of Isaiah because there are things that the early church latched on to. Many of you, maybe as a new Christian, opened up your Old Testament. Lots of it didn't make sense, but this made sense. This part made sense to you.

As we're going through this, I keep talking about how in this section of the Bible, it describes in every passage how what sin does and what the servant does for us. A couple weeks ago we looked at how sin poisons, but the servant invites us to the feast. Last week we looked at how sin has this way of disintegrating, but the servant makes us whole. Today we're going to look at two points: life in a fallen world makes us really disoriented, but the servant reorients us.

How Does Life in a Fallen World Disorient Us?

To live as a human being in this world is really disorienting. It's really confusing. News flash, this is a hard time to grow up for those of you who are kids. To live as a person who wants to know God and follow God and be about the things of God is really hard. It's really confusing.

The people of God in exile—and we'll talk about this more in a moment—who first heard these words from Isaiah were exiled from their homeland in Babylon. This is the Southern kingdom, Judah, far away in modern Iraq. They were incredibly confused. What's happened to us? Where is God? What has gone on? Where are we?

There are two ways that we get confused and two ways we get disoriented in this life. One is we feel God's sort of passive neglect, and the other is we almost feel like God's actively against us.

The Disappointments of Life: Mustard Water

This morning's sermon is brought to you by mustard water. You know what mustard water is? Let me paint this scene for you. You go home for lunch, you pull a pack of hot dogs out of the fridge, you get the buns out, you stick the bun in the toaster oven because that's the right way. You cook the hot dog, you put the relish on because that's also the right way. You pull out the mustard and you dump it on and what comes out? Water. You forgot to shake the mustard.

Mustard water is a great depiction for me of the disappointments of this life. The gap between what we expect and what we get.

You get a new car and you get a dent in it—mustard water. You go out and you're wearing new clothes or you've got a new tan, a new haircut. You're looking good. You're looking real good. And then you get home and you realize there's a stain on the backside in a bad place—mustard water. You're hopeful about a new friend who feels like someone genuinely interested in you, and then you find out they're part of a pyramid marketing scheme—mustard water.

Those are the superficial ones. Those are the ones we can laugh about. But let's talk about the ones we can't laugh about. A disappointment with the body of Christ. Disappointment with the sins and the weirdness and the quirks, and maybe even the hurt that you get from a congregation. That's real mustard water. Marriage to the man or woman of your dreams who shared a faith commitment with you—a couple years into marriage seems to have lost interest in you and in life and in faith. That's real mustard water.

We could go on and on. You all have stories that would bring tears this morning because life in a world of sin, fall, death, and destruction is characterized by mustard water. That's what it feels like.

The people of God in exile also felt this way. They have all this good news in this first part of the passage and this invitation:

Shout for joy. Earth rejoice. The Lord has comforted his people. He will have compassion.

And what do the people of Zion say?

You've abandoned us. You've forgotten us.

Do you feel forgotten this morning? Are you disappointed? Does it feel like all is mustard water with God?

But maybe it gets worse than this. Maybe you feel like God's active injury. Maybe you feel like God is actually not just neglecting you, but actively trying to hurt you. When I was in college, my fraternity—and this is an important part that you remember this—was Sigma Phi Epsilon, SPE.

That's what so, as a pledge, my freshman year, they had a uniquely creative and frustrating way of hazing freshmen. And so the idea was you go to the main academic building on Davidson's campus, and you go right before the classes let out from the biggest class schedules of the day, and you lay down on the ground on the sidewalk, and you're a human speed bump. Come on. Speed—like a speed bump, okay? And so you're laying there, and people are walking out of class, they have to kind of do this over you, right, or on you. Not very pleasant.

And I don't know if you can identify with this, but this is how Israel felt. God has not maybe stepped over us, but maybe he's stepping on us. God has given us to our enemies. Later in this passage, it talks about the walls. God says, I remember the walls of the city that have been destroyed. I remember because the people are like, God has not only neglected us. He is against us. He's actively trying to hurt us.

In exile, God has used our enemies. In the Northern Kingdom, they watched the Northern Kingdom—Isaiah's first half of the book, written to the Northern Kingdom about the woe, the fall of the Northern Kingdom. And then here they are in the Southern Kingdom. The Babylonians come in and just run over the country and they take everything. They take the people and deport them. And they're like, where are you, God? This book is written to a despairing people, to a people who are like, my choice is mustard water or speed bumps. That's what I feel like I'm getting from God. Do you feel that? Anybody with me this morning? All by myself up here. No. We know this. And if you feel this way, you need to hear from the suffering servant.

The Suffering Servant as Reliable Narrator

This passage begins with a dialogue between the servant figure that shows up in this book. The servant shows up, and he shows up in many ways—and I'm going to use this very specifically—as a reliable narrator. Now my opening illustration was about the movie Memento, about a man with amnesia, and he is an unreliable narrator. You don't know what's going on because he can't tell you the story. He is unreliable to tell you what's going on, but the suffering servant shows up as a trustworthy narrator. And this is important that we remember this.

You know, one of the things that we are too quick to do is think that we know what's going on and that we can trust ourselves. My perspective's got to be what's real. What I see must be what's reality. You are an unreliable narrator to your own life. Do you know that? You have a form of amnesia where you forget the things that are really true. You forget the things that are really ultimate. In the pressure and intensity and the pain and the good and the bad of this life, we are quick to forget. We also forget who we are. We can become disoriented, and we need a reliable narrator to guide us.

In many ways, the suffering servant shows up not only to suffer for God's people but to tell us what's true in these passages. And there are two things I want to highlight that the servant tells the people: Who God is and what God does.

Who God Is and What God Does

Who God is. In response to God's people—remember, the people said God has forgotten us. The word Zion there is a representative of God's people. Zion says, you've forgotten us, God. And the servant says, no. No. No. No. This is what God is up to. And it's a weird comparison. It's an odd comparison. A woman breastfeeding a baby. A woman with an infant. The servant says something like this: A woman would never forget that she has a baby. A woman feeding a baby wouldn't just get up and run off. How much more God?

See, this is what God is like. This is how God is toward you, and I want to push this kind of hard this morning. I won't make you uncomfortable, and you may think this sermon is being sponsored by lactation consultants of America when I'm done, but I want you to get this. Because breastfeeding—so much is going on when a woman feeds a baby. And it's physical, it's emotional, it's psychological.

Physically, breastfeeding—breast milk is miracle food. It is miracle food. It is highly portable. It doesn't require refrigeration, but way more than that. Breast milk changes in consistency and in content. It adapts as a baby grows. It starts off as colostrum, and then it changes. And it's filled with all these amino acids that are helpful for brain development. It's filled with an exact combination of all the proteins and everything that's needed for a baby's development. Cow milk doesn't come close. Formula doesn't even come close. There's nothing like it. It's a miracle food.

Children who are breastfed have immunities to a lot of things that other children do not. But here's what I want to say: this is how God is toward you. This is how God provides for you.

Think about what physically happens with the mother in feeding a baby. When a mother is not able to feed her baby, she hurts. She aches. It's uncomfortable. And there's something about that where she's like, I need to feed my baby right now. It's uncomfortable not to feed her baby. This is what God is like. God is saying, I have a deep ache to provide for you. I have a deep need to love you and care for you. Abandon you? Never. Never.

The Psychological Bond

Breastfeeding is incredibly psychological. When an infant is born, they have limited eyesight. They can look like they're looking across the room, but they can't see further than about this far—about the distance from a mother's face while breastfeeding. There is a deep psychological bond created when a mother feeds a baby. It requires the mother to sit still. She can't really do much else. Maybe read a book. That's about it. She's gotta attend to this baby.

This is what God is like. God is saying, this is how I am towards you. You have all of His attention, all of His focus. Can God have no compassion on His children? No.

The Emotional Connection

There's something that happens emotionally between a mother and child when she feeds the baby. Breastfeeding releases oxytocin in the mom's body. It promotes feelings of tenderness and bonding and affection. It releases serotonin, the happy chemical. There's something pleasing about what's going on. A mother's milk can let down just thinking about her baby. There's that kind of emotional connection being created.

God chooses this image. God chooses this image to say to you: this is emotionally how I feel connected to you. I'm not trying to be graphic or push this really hard. I don't really care if this makes you uncomfortable because you need to get this point. This is what God is like.

There's a disorientation to life in a fallen world where you may feel like all I'm getting from God is wham, wham, wham—thank you God, can I have another? I'm still breathing. It's hard, and you may feel like God doesn't care. He's far off. He doesn't see you. He doesn't know you. But this is what God is like, and He can be no other way. This is his nature. He's like, I can't even deny my nature for how much I love you. This is the kind of tenderness and intimacy that God has toward us.

If a mother abandoning a baby at a truck stop is unthinkable to us, if a mother who's nursing a baby getting up and running off is unthinkable to us—and it should be—how much more our God? This is what God is like.

What Has God Done?

The servant tells us more. Not just what God is like, but what God has done. We have a saying: if you want to know what someone's really like, don't listen to their words, listen to their actions. See what God has done for us.

I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. — Isaiah 49:16

This is such a unique response of God to the cries of His people. Remember, you've been disoriented, abandoned. But I want you to notice—this isn't like Leonard from my Memento example. It's not a Sharpie on his arm. It's not even a tattoo. This picture of engraving. God engraves us on His hands.

Think about that. How do you engrave something? You get out a hammer and a chisel and you go at it. It's a lot of work and it's really slow because it's that permanent. You go to an old graveyard and the engravings, even if they're faded, you can take a piece of paper and a crayon and you can still read them that way. It's incredible. They last forever. Engraving is that permanent.

So can God forget you? Will God forget about you? No. You're engraved on Him. Engraving is a form of art too. It's beautiful. It's done by an artist, by a master craftsman. It's not done by a seven year old. It's something beautiful to look at.

God is saying, it's not just like I can tolerate you. God is like, I love to look at your name. It's beautiful to me. It's so beautiful to me that I want to have it inscribed and engraved in flowery font. I want to see it. Is He barely able to stand you? No.

There's only one place in the Old Testament where we read of God's people's names engraved. The names of the 12 tribes were engraved on the breastplate of the high priest. They're engraved on the breastplate above the priest's heart, the names of each of the tribes. And it's a symbol of, like, "I love these people. They are close to my heart." This is just taking that image and going another step, going another step toward this.

Where is your name engraved? On his hands. Your hands are maybe the second most public part of your body. When you see a person, you see their face, and the other thing you always see are their hands. We shake hands, fist bump, we high five. You know, we use our hands all the time as part of the way we greet one another. Hands are extremely important, and God is saying, "I want you on one of the most public parts of myself. I want everybody to see that I'm associated with you. This is how I am toward you."

Why would someone engrave on a palm? Can you imagine how painful that is? Engraving on a palm must have hurt terribly. And yet centuries later, after the resurrection, our suffering servant appears in a locked room with his disciples. He comes to somebody who's disoriented, who's bewildered. He comes to Thomas. And right after the resurrection, Thomas had not been there when they first saw the resurrected Jesus. He's like, "If I don't see the holes, I don't believe it's really real." Jesus comes and he holds up his hands—hands where a hammer and a nail have been applied. "Look, Thomas, for you. Look, believe. Don't disbelieve."

The reason you are a beauty to God, one of the reasons that God is so taken with you, is that your names are written on the hands of the very Son of God. Have you ever thought about this? We think about heaven. We think about eternity to come. Jesus has a resurrected body, and yet it's not a perfect body. He has on his resurrected body one of the marks of his own crucifixion in eternity right now. In heaven right now, he bears the marks from the cross. And this is for you.

You know, we often sing about this in our church.

Five bleeding wounds he bears, received on Calvary. They pour effectual prayers; they strongly plead for me. Forgive, oh forgive, they cry. Forgive him, oh forgive, they cry. Nor let that ransomed sinner die.

This is what's given to us. God, like a mother with a baby. God with our names engraved.

Why We Need to Know This

Why do we need to know this? Let me say this by way of conclusion. We need to know this because there's something about what happens when we feel lost—we get ourselves loster. We tend to wander off. In places of disorientation where you're like, "I don't think God really cares," we have a tendency to then justify getting more lost. Wandering off into temptation, wandering off, giving in to besetting sins that we normally would say no to, getting into stuff that we're like, "Normally, I wouldn't do this, but I don't care anymore." Anybody felt that way before?

And this is why we need to know this: Because it's not the law of God that brings us back. It is the love of God that brings us back.

Brian Chapel, he used to be the president of a seminary in Saint Louis called Covenant. He told this story once about his wife taking their two small kids to the Saint Louis Zoo. One afternoon, he wasn't with them. His wife was alone. She took the kids, and they were so excited about going to Big Cat Country. Kids couldn't wait. She got the stroller, and the kids are big enough now they can walk, but they got the stroller because kids get tired and they just want a place to sit and put all the stuff. So they got the stroller, kids are out of the stroller, a blanket gets caught in the wheel, and the kids are not in the stroller. So she bends down to pull the blanket out. She looks up and the kids are nowhere to be seen.

She's like, "Oh, my goodness. Maybe they've just run ahead." So she runs ahead to the next viewing area and they're not there. And she looks up and she sees them in Big Cat Country. Not in the lion cage—they've gotten through this little hole into the lion enclosure that she couldn't fit through. In a split second, she's got a decision: How do I respond to this? What do I do? Lions doing what lions do—not looking real ferocious, but like, the danger is there. She's like, "If I scream, that lion does what lions do. They're there, and they scream, and they're freaked out."

And so she does this. Genius. "Boys, mommy loves you so much. Come give mommy a hug."

And they come running, and they come back out the way they went in, and they come and jump on mom.

When we're lost, it is not the law of God that we need. When your friends are lost and they're getting more lost, it is not law. It's not "you're doing wrong, get on the right pathway, let me hold you accountable." That's not what you really need right now. No. It is the love of God. It is the incredible love of God for sinners that we need to hear about all the time. We forget.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Prayer

Let's pray together. Father, we thank you that this is what you are like. Forgive us for the ways that we always forget and we always doubt and we are like Leonard with amnesia, and we have to be reminded over and over again because somehow we think that you're done, and we forget how permanent engraving is, and we forget how deep a father, a mother's love for her baby is.

Father, would you remind us again? Would you seal these things deep into our hearts? We're so forgetful. We wake up every day and we need to remember. Lord, please help us today. Remind us of your love. Bring us back from the places where we're in danger right now. Lord, we pray this in Christ's name. Amen.