← ArchiveIsaiahGet Your House in OrderDateOctober 27, 2019SpeakerDr Josh BurnhamTextIsaiahPassages in this sermonIsaiah 381:38Isaiah 38:14:302 Kings 188:57Psalms 9010:29Luke 2311:212 Kings 2026:49Matthew 7:727:35Ephesians 132:01Ephesians 1:1332:07TranscriptMachine transcribed. Click any line to jump there.0:00Music Music Music0:30Music1:00Music1:30anyone have a page number for me 633 if that doesn't get you there it will get you really close 633 in the pew bibles isaiah 38 isaiah 38 it's rare often in our lives that you truly can know the thoughts or the mind or the heart of someone now historically there have been um rare occasions where we have found the diaries of men and women and so we can look into their hearts and to their1:58minds for example plenty the younger not to be confused with plenty the elder plenty the younger living in the ancient world experienced personally firsthand mount vesuvius blowing up and covering pompeii in ashes and even today they found some of those remains so that's an instance where we know the mind and the heart of plenty the younger another couple that we have heard of that um you know you2:25might not know personally but you know of in american history lewis and clark who went to the new world and they categorize everything that they experienced even to their dinners and their lunches and they begin to write about what their minds and their hearts experience when they counted all of these new animals one of which would have been the woodpecker now can you imagine this is just where2:51my mind goes when i'm reading stories like this can you imagine when they first laid eyes on the woodpecker lewis was like that bird just ran into the tree clark said no no no no that bird he's ramming his head into the tree and lewis said we have to get this down they won't believe what this bird's going mad what is he doing we take it for granted that we know what the woodpecker's doing to be the first person to from europe to see that and say they they're not going to believe what we saw so we3:21have a firsthand knowledge of lois and clark and frank living in amsterdam a young jewish lady in war war two and dialoguing personally how she experienced as she hid from the nazis who tried to ravage her nation and her lineage that's rare and today we have another one of these opportunities where we get to see and to be a part of witnessing a man's personal experience when he was told for the first time i have3:51bad news it's terminal you're going to die three thousand years ago hezekiah received news that he had a major illness and that it would end in death so today we're going to look at that and say lord how can we get our lives in order lord if that were to happen to me today how would i live differently4:15radically for the sake of jesus christ so today's message simply entitled get your house in order from isaiah 38 1. so let's read isaiah beginning in verse 38 starting with verse 1 in those days hezekiah king we'll get to him later became terminally ill4:44the prophet isaiah son of amos came and said to him this is what the lord says set your house in order for you are about to die you will not recover hezekiah turned his face to the wall and he prayed to the lord he said please lord remember how i have walked before you faithfully and wholeheartedly5:11and i have done what pleases you and hezekiah began to weep bitterly verse 4 the word of the lord came to isaiah again go and tell hezekiah this is what the lord god your ancestor david says i have heard your prayer i have seen your tears look i am going to add 15 years to your5:36life and i will rescue you from the city and the grasp of the king of assyria i will defend this city and this will be a sign to you that the lord will do what he has promised i'm going to make the sun's shadow that goes down on the stairway of ahaz come back 10 steps so the sun's shadow went back the 10 steps and6:05it had descended and verse 9 begins a personal autobiographical poem that hezekiah writes in response his prayer in response to this event in his life let's pray father help us today help us today get our houses in order lord help us not wait until it's too late6:33and my prayer personally is that it would not take this news to waken us up lord we do not pray for tragedy we do not pray for death and calamity but lord we pray that you your spirit would wake our hearts and our minds up right now lord show us urgency may we not sit idly by6:55but may your spirit empower us to live for you because you are worth it father that is our prayer reorient our lives prioritize our lives in a way where you would get the glory and the honor forever and ever we pray this in jesus name amen so in those days verse one what a wake-up call right i mean verse one7:19in those days hezekiah became terminally ill now at this point hezekiah was a young man history tells us he was around 39 years old and i'd begin to think how would i react right now if isaiah text me and said josh bad news you're gonna die the the illness7:44that you have it is fatal thus says the lord how would how would we react think about that for a moment it's easy for us to say well this is historical narrative this happened to hezekiah but surely it wouldn't happen today but what if it did what if the lord said josh you have a week8:11some of you have lived through that with those that you you love and in all of this you might be seeing thinking right now to yourself well what did hezekiah like what did he do to deserve this news that's a great question to ask because oftentimes we think well he must have been a great center he must have been a horrible king well actually hezekiah was one of the one of the five8:41good kings of the southern kingdom of judah hezekiah actually the word of the lord says this about hezekiah listen to what second kings 18 verse 3 says about hezekiah he did what was right in the lord's sight just as his ancestor david has done so what was hezekiah's reward for living a righteous life9:06we read it right his reward was in those days hezekiah became terminally ill this was a life threatening illness and it was commonplace for the kings and those that were sick to to ask one of the prophets hey come give me good news tell me what the lord says and hezekiah could not have chosen a more9:32prominent powerful prophet than isaiah and isaiah comes and he does not give a judgment to hezekiah he gives a statement of fact and this is isaiah's word did you catch it in verse two he says hezekiah get your house in order i don't know if you felt the weight of those words but there's something visceral and9:57powerful about a god defining moment in your life some of you have been through that you you know i was there when i heard this about my husband or my wife or my child or my grandparents there's someone i loved and i i have been through this and i remember the weight and i remember how it shaped my life the psalmist would say it this way psalm 90 psalmist says lord teach me10:29to number my days carefully so that i may develop wisdom in my heart the psalmist says lord teach me this truth or let let me think about the number of my days so that that i may live wisely lord let me not be so foolish to think i will live forever and and waste my life and so are we doing our young people in a justice when they when we say you have your whole life ahead of11:00you maybe we should today lord teach them to number their days so that they may live wisely live urgently live passionately lord help us get our homes in order is that not exactly what the thief on the cross does in luke chapter 23 you have one that's mocking jesus and the the other is saying well he we deserve it jesus does not and the second thief looks at jesus and says jesus remember me remember me and jesus11:27says what to this thief truly i tell you that today you will be with me in paradise what does the thief do he is getting his house in order on the cross so i ask right now what will be your wake-up call what will be your wake-up call maybe you need a spiritual reset maybe you look at your life11:56recently and you have been just spinning your wheels spiritually you've been running the rat race and listen we get it they we run the race too we have fall fest tonight and then we have makeup soccer games on tuesday night and then there's something at the school on on tuesday night monday we make up games then we have wednesday night church and then thursday night we have something else and then friday night it's like whoo and then saturday we have something else and it's like lord when will12:26it slow down and god's saying well josh when were you going to look at me because i promise that i will give you rest even in the moments of busyness maybe you are like me and you say god i i need a spiritual reset lord i need to keep the main things the main things and the plain things the plain things lord let me i was praying with the brother this morning and our prayer was lord help us help us12:55live in the moment father if we're having a conversation if we're speaking truth to someone lord let us not go to the next conversation lord let me not go to the next appointment but let me just understand your grace in my life today because tomorrow will take care of itself so would you just have the boldness right now to say lord i want you to spiritually reset and recharge my life right now lord today right now father i want you to reset my life and lord if you do it with some news13:25like this father i i will trust in you and lord if you use some other way but father i want your spirit to work in my life to reset me because i want to live a life of of passion and live a life where i am pursuing jesus because i believe the opposite of a wake-up call is a wasted life and one of my fears is i will get to heaven one day and see god face to face and he will say josh13:55you did a lot of things but you wasted you wasted so much time you know when you had a chance to share christ with this person and i know your mind was on that next appointment but you missed it you wasted it lord help us not waste help us not waste those conversations when we're driving to school with our kids help us not miss the conversations when we're calling someone on the phone or help us not14:23waste when we open your word in the morning and we know hey i have to get out of the house at seven o'clock but i have 15 minutes lord help me not be thinking about what i have to do next but help me just say god i want to know you and rest in you right now maybe for you it's just realizing that cracker barrel will wait today and god wants you to rest in him right now may we understand the joy of14:48resting so with that with this wake-up call then how does hezekiah now put us into a places that where we pursue christ well look at verse 2 and 3 this is what hezekiah does when he hears this this horrible news and he he says and he does in verse 2 he turns his face to the15:15well now that's a interesting historical fact we're going to come back to that and then he prays to the lord so hezekiah's first response was to turn his face not to god but he turns his face to the wall he just looks at a wall right this is not the willing law and the the grandeur of the temple this is the wall in his inner parlor and i think what hezekiah is showing us today is that15:43when we reorient our lives when we get our houses in order the first place we have to start is we need to look into our hearts so hezekiah puts his face to the wall he says i don't want anyone else in here lord it's just me and you and my heart and we see that he begins to weep bitterly so for hezekiah his illness led him to self-examination we have no record where hezekiah looks at isaiah and he says this is not fair16:08don't you know what second king says about me i have honored god there they're only they're not even five good kings yet right there's only about three and i'm one of them that would be hall of fame territory one out of three in the major league baseball hall of fame16:33lord this is not fair this is not what i signed up for no hezekiah turns his face to the wall and he says lord this is my heart so what does your heart say today what does your heart say about your life and we have some similar phrases in english right hit the wall it's a place where16:58athletes they just can't go anymore they can't run anymore the germans say it this way in german they would say which means the the man hit with a hammer it's almost this picture of you're running your life you're running a race and a man just comes up and like hits you in the back of the achilles and you fall down and the reality is some of us in life have felt that way haven't we but you feel like you're17:25living and your your things are going good and then bam out of nowhere isaiah just throws a hammer into your life and i believe hezekiah is saying we must look at our hearts look at your hearts and open your heart to the lord this is the heart of the covenant is the heart of the man after seeking after god's own heart and then he begins to weep did you catch that look at17:55verse three he says please lord please remember how i have walked before you faithfully lord and wholeheartedly and i have done what pleases you and he begins to weep i believe hezekiah gives permission to his heart to grapple with his news so i turns to the wall he says lord i want to spend time with my heart and18:22and understand what this news is going in my life and it's a reminder to me and to you listen we all grieve in different ways and we must give permission to our hearts to feel the weight of bad news isaiah does not come to hezekiah and say you know what it's going to be okay just deal with it suck it up god gave you 39 years and isn't that not what we do sometimes the people who are grieving18:52they have opened their heart they've laid their heart bare before god and we almost want to say quit doing that and hezekiah is saying no this is raw emotion i'm going to give my heart to god i'm going to examine my own heart why because god can see how we feel god can see how you feel today19:20in the heart of house cleaning the first step is self-examination and will you give permission to your heart today to say seek christ i lay you bare before the lord that is the first step in cleaning our house verse 2. secondly what hezekiah does he turns his face to the wall and then he does what with his voice face to the wall voice to the lord and he says to the lord in verse 2 verse 119:45he says hezekiah he says lord remember how i have walked before you faithfully and wholeheartedly and have done what pleases you so after we look to our hearts and we self-examine our lives we then look to the lord we should say god i need you so suffering leads hezekiah straight to where20:10to god that's that's what suffering should do for the christian we should not say god this is not fair don't you understand where i am a member of a church don't you know what i have done for you no we should say god i need you more than anything right now god let me seek you father let me follow20:35you and why would hezekiah go to the lord because he knows he's going to find mercy he knows he's going to have a response hezekiah knows that god is going to hear him he doesn't he doesn't appeal to the the transcendence of god he doesn't say god if you're up there i could really use you right now20:57now how does hezekiah pray lord i i need your eminence god i need you right now here in this place god it's just me and the wall and you and lord i need you father my covenant father god i need you and when was the last time you felt the nearness of god in your life21:27but when's the last time when you were praying you just felt like god was sitting right next to you and you almost had to open your eyes and say whoa lord you're there that's the promise we have through the holy spirit that we can in our darkest of days we can say god i can't see you but i know you're21:50here that is your promise and so lord i appeal to your eminence god i need you right here in my life spurgeon but say it this way nearness to god brings likeness to god the more you see god the more of god will be seen in you and i could almost see hezekiah looking to the sky saying god right now in this moment i need you where it is our house begin to take shape is when we look to god and say god i need22:20you right here and the greatest threat to your faith is for satan to make you think that god is not close like satan wants you to think that god saved you through his son he sent the holy spirit he just wound you up and he let you go it's a good luck that's not what god does for us but god says i am22:43i am with you and i will be with you even to the ends of the the age that is the promise we have in jesus christ so set your house in order today lay your heart bare before god and look to god his nearness and say god i need you and i want you god i don't care about everyone else here just me and23:07you man what a beautiful picture of the god's nearness he is here praise god that he is here and hezekiah continues in his prayer he looks to the wall and he lays his heart bare he looks to god and he begins to pray and he says this we've already read it several times he says he says please god lord remember god remember how i have walked before you faithfully23:36remember not like my granddad the king but lord i i walk like david did and lord remember i have done what pleases you and he begins to weep now here is conviction in our lives we must be able to look at our life and say god i am living a life that honors you and this is what stopped me in my tracks when24:01i was reading this scripture to this week i begin to ask the question god can i pray this prayer if we're honest right could you could could i literally pray out loud god remember how i have walked before you faithfully or do i need to pray god remember remember remember how unfaithful i was24:27could i pray this prayer and lord i have wholeheartedly done what pleases you well and may my life be able to say that i want to get my house in order to a place where i can pray this prayer i want my kids one day at my deathbed where there is this week or years from now for them24:51to be able to say i we have a father who had his house in order and he walked in your ways lord and he was wholehearted before you and god we will celebrate we will praise your name because of what our father did and as we dedicated um baby barrett today that's my prayer for matt and their family that one day barrett will be able to look at his mom and dad and say god look at the life that they25:16lived so can you can your life say this hezekiah uses the word wholeheartedly he didn't say halfway or half heartily god doesn't ask us to clean out some of our closets he asked us to set our house in order and if we're honest some of us come to faith and we say god i will give you this closet the pantry and i will give you this closet but every other room is mine and god says no25:43josh i want your whole heart oh that we could pray prayers like hezekiah can you today could you honestly if i call on you to pray right now could you honestly stand up and say god you know how i've walked faithfully before you god wholeheartedly so listen to my prayer oh that we could pray that may that be the desire of our hearts again verse 3 look to your heart look to the lord26:12look to your life and then we see this in verse 3 and it's hidden here but we're going to unpack it shortly hezekiah says please lord remember there's power in remembrance by the way lord remember how i have walked faithfully before you and wholeheartedly and have done what pleases you and he begins to weep the word of the lord came to isaiah now here's something interesting that you do not see in isaiah but we26:43see what we find in second kings chapter 20. so hezekiah delivers this message and he leaves by the time hezekiah gets to the courtyard of the king the lord begins to work in isaiah's life so isaiah delivers a message by the time he's in the courtyard the lord says hold up i have heard the prayer of hezekiah go back in and so we see this answer to the this prayerful petition of hezekiah27:09and what we see here in this passage that god is waiting on us to pray god wants us to pray we're going to talk about it does god change his mind so hold that thought but god what does jesus tell us in matthew 7 7. he says hey ask you want you ask and it will be given so if we believe jesus at his word which27:35i think is a really good idea if you have not been given then i am probably not asking ask and it will be given seek and you will find knock and the door will be open now some of you are thinking million dollars here we go bankroll my bucket list no it has to be in the will of god without selfish motives28:03for his kingdom's sake but the lord says if you ask i will give god wants to give us a good gift he doesn't give you a snake when you ask for bread god wants to lavish upon you what he desires in your life and that's exactly what's going here in hezekiah's life so a quick aside when hezekiah prays so clearly god through isaiah tells hezekiah you are going to die right shake your head if you agree with28:31that and it's going to be soon right yes okay so hezekiah prays and then god says just kidding but some people read the text that way that's not what god is saying the lord heard his heart and he added years to his life in verse 4 and following 15 years to be exact what is going on here28:55well god is not necessarily responding to the faithfulness of hezekiah god is responding to his faithfulness god is responding to the lord's faithfulness remember how hezekiah prays hezekiah says lord did you forget already okay hezekiah prays lord remember now there is a long list of29:15rememberances in the scripture and it's interesting how the lord responds to hezekiah listen to his listen to the lord's response verse 5 he tells isaiah go back and tell hezekiah this is what the lord god of your ancestor david now why would god call david into the picture because the lord remembers you see what was29:42god's promise to david that you will always have a man on the throne and what we don't know at this moment but what we expect and we think is that that hezekiah had yet to have a son and so hezekiah might be saying god don't you remember what you promised god don't you remember what you promised30:12david that we there would always be someone remember remember lord remember my faithfulness and how i have honored your covenant so now lord remember your covenant so what is going on here in the sovereignty of god the lord allows hezekiah to see part of the picture if the lord would have said you're about to die but then you're going to pray and then i'm going to give you 15 years hezekiah probably would not have prayed but there's many30:38times in our life where god shows us part of the picture so that we will completely depend upon him god did not change his mind he he heard this prayer and he did what he was going to do and he wanted hezekiah to completely trust in him so hezekiah prays and now god listens to this prayer and he appeals to the covenant and so what31:03is the promise david will have a man on the throne so almost in similar parallel imagery hezekiah has a decision to make much like abraham remember abraham is through this son isaac i will make you a man of many nations and then god says to abraham i want you to kill this son of promise i want you to sacrifice his child so abraham has a choice to make am i going to cut out the lineage of god31:33or am i going to completely surrender my life to the lord in the same way hezekiah is saying god i know your promise but lord will i completely trust in you in this moment right now we have similar promises today let me give you one promise we should look to the promises of god in our lives ephesians chapter one i love this picture of what god is doing for those who love him and are called32:01according to his purposes ephesians 1 13 in jesus in him you were sealed now let me just say about your salvation some people say well can i lose my salvation what god has sealed no one's going to unseal right you try to you try to break that box you can't this god has sealed for the promise of redemption32:25the promise of the holy spirit when you have heard the word of truth the gospel of your salvation and when you believed the holy spirit i love this imagery the holy spirit is the down payment of our inheritance until the redemption of the possession of the praise of his glory listen we must look to the promises of god when you say i just don't feel like god working in my life32:54go back to this verse and say god if i have believed in your son jesus i am sealed like stevie wonder right i am signed sealed and one day i will be delivered but until i am delivered there's a down payment on the delivery and it's the holy spirit man what what a glorious promise we have oh the promises of god are always faithful and because of hezekiah's prayer the lord says i have seen33:20and i have heard look to the promises of god finally let's go back to verse one set our house in order that's the charge given to hezekiah here in verse one the prophet isaiah comes to him the prophet isaiah by the way means the lord saves and and isaiah comes and says god is not saving33:50you you will die set your house in order and we see in this prayer of hezekiah what god has done in his his life for instance look at verse 17 really quick this prayer look at what hezekiah says this is his diary right he's he's unfolding his life before us now this is what my diary would sound like this dear josh i cannot believe what god just did34:23worst news worst news ever but that's not what hezekiah says hezekiah says verse 17 indeed it was for my own well-being that i had such intense bitterness wow34:44i don't know if i could have written that and then he says this he says but your love lord your love has delivered me from the pit of destruction you have thrown all my sins behind your back you want to know35:06what a house in order sounds like that's a house in order lord it was for my own well-being that you sent that news and you have thrown my sins away so if i i if isaiah and hezekiah could stand before us today and give us any thoughts about getting our houses in order what would be their quick cliff notes version35:36about getting your house in order i think hezekiah would say this one remember to leave a legacy remember to leave a man leaves his house in order not when his will is effective not when he has set up his kids with a good retirement plan or wealth a man gets his house in order when he has instructed36:00his family in the ways of the lord hezekiah would say make sure you have passed on your faith make sure you can say like me lord examine my ways i have walked before you faithfully and wholeheartedly can you say that today if not i pray that you would just spend some right now spend some time praying and say god i want that i want that legacy in my life truth number two i think hezekiah would say36:27this live with urgency there's no man who lives as urgent as a man who who knows that they are dying there is no time to waste keep the main things the main things seek the lord and unashamedly follow him lord teach us to number our days that we may live with wisdom we don't know and we waste so much time and so36:51many resources in our life live with urgency i think truth number three that we see is application i hezekiah would simply say if you're if you are putting off conversations in your life that you need to have don't put those off if you do not have restitution with someone who's harmed you make restitution if you have not forgiven37:19someone that you should be forgiving do it today if there are broken relationships that you need to repair do that today do not let the sun set on your wrath do not be with the lord one day and he says josh you missed it you had chads have conversations call someone up and tell them that you love them don't let them don't make them guess before you leave here today grab someone say look you might not know this37:45i haven't told you but i want you to know i love you and i'm praying for you and may god be honored in your life have those conversations today and if you have a teenager here who is or a young person here and they are a thorn in your flesh because they are hormonal and they are crazy or the you have a toddler who is throwing a temper tantrum i want you to look at them before you leave and say i you are you've lost your mind38:13but i love you and i don't love you because of what you do i love you because you're mine and in so that's exactly what god does for us i don't make them guess have those conversations i think hezekiah would tell us this run to the lord run to yahweh don't wait till tomorrow the greatest threat to you coming to faith is satan making you think do it tomorrow i know that the holy spirit's convicting38:40you of your sin but just wait you're not ready yet no you are always ready for grace run to the lord and i think hezekiah would say this never be scared to pour out your heart before the lord never be scared to weep before god and say lord i'm going to turn to the wall and i'm going to pour out my heart to the wall because i know that you you see what i feel oh lord i'm tired of the mask39:09the danger in sensational moments like hezekiah experienced i think we have two avenues it's like this man i read about recently who planted a fig tree and he loved that fig tree and this first beautiful crop of figs he picked them by himself and he took them to his room by himself because he was going to eat them by himself because he wanted to be the first to taste of this crop39:39and he bites into the first fig and he sees a worm so he spits it out and throws it on the floor and he takes another fig and he eats the fig and he finds a worm and he spits it out and he finally says okay i'm tired of this he eats the third fig and he looks and there is a worm and so he gets up and he says i've had enough of this so he gets up from his chair and he goes to the wall he40:05turns off the light he goes back to his chair and he finishes the figs40:20if we're not careful church we can hear these stories we can see our need we can close our bibles and we can say it won't happen to me we turn out the light and if the holy spirit is drawing you and you realize your life is not what it is or what it should be and god is calling you to himself just know that jesus loves you and he loved you while you were still sinner and he loved you enough to take your place on the cross and you say well that's not fair it's not but it's the gospel40:49and he died in your place and he rose again and that if you would believe in him the bible says that you will be saved and that you will be sealed by the holy spirit and the holy spirit in your life is a down payment for the inheritance that god is building for you if your life is not what it should be do not wait lay your heart before god and say god you know41:16what i already am i am a sinner and today i need you to change me don't wait don't wait because god has brought you here to hear this good news that you might follow him maybe you're here and this is your wake-up call you just need to pray lord i need my house in order god i want to be a man who one day can stand before you and say41:47but it was for my benefits well thank you for loving me hezekiah says in 39 38 19 he says this about god the living only the living can thank you as i do today a father will make your faithfulness known to children is your house in order if you were to die today and you were to stand42:12before the throne and god would say to you josh why should i let you into my heaven that you could say confidently you shouldn't but jesus jesus took my place and he paid for my redemption and lord you said you promised me if i believe i will be yours so god i will stand upon your promises42:41and oh that jesus would look at us and say god father i took his place god wait he's in our family now we've adopted him oh lord put our houses in order this morning let me pray← Previous in IsaiahWeep So You Can FeastNext in Isaiah →Comfort Sweet ComfortMore sermons on Isaiah →
