Gospel & Eschatology: The Highest of Mountains

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Gospel & Eschatology: The Highest of Mountains

December 18, 2022

This episode, we walk through Isaiah 2:1-4 concerning the mountain of the Lord. All nations will, without a doubt, stream to Mount Zion and learn peace. This is great hope for the world for all those that pursue peace. The only way the nations will find peace on earth is through the son of God, the Lord Jesus. Thanks for listening!

Key Text:

* Isaiah 2:1-4

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Transcript

(music) Don't think I will even ask you to make Jesus Lord of your life. That's the most preposterous thing I could ever tell you to do. Jesus Christ is Lord of your life.

Whether you serve him or not, whether you bless him, curse him, hate him, or love him, he is the Lord of your life because God has given him a name that is above every name, so that the name of Jesus Christ every knee shall bow, and tongue confess that he is Lord. Some of you will bow out of the grace that has been given to you, and others will bow because your kneecaps will be broken by the one who rules the nations with a rod of iron.

(music) And I'll not apologize for this God of the Bible.

(music) Welcome, friends, to the For the King podcast, where we proclaim the edicts of the king, namely, in chief, that Yahweh reigns. He is reigning. He is the king.

And I am your host, Rocky Ramsey. I am joined once again on these Sunday episodes with my brother, Bryce Ramsey. What's up, Bryce? How are you doing? Doing well.

How about yourself? I'm doing all right, dude. I recently have been growing up my beard, and I'm really enjoying it. I'm really enjoying it.

I've never grown it out before, and I'm really enjoying it. I'm doing well. I actually never knew that I had a brother in Tildriss now.

You thought I was your sister because I have clean shape, and I couldn't grow any facial hair, so you could only say I'm a girl, I guess, until you see the facial hair. Well, yeah, now I have a beard, so that's been enjoyable. But thanks for asking.

I appreciate it. Okay, so, friends, thanks for joining us this week. We are going to be looking at Isaiah 2, verses 1-4, and I'm going to read it first, and then we will comment on it and hopefully give you guys something helpful to think about with this text.

So, Isaiah 2, verses 1-4, "The word that Isaiah, the son of Amos, saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, and it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, 'Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths, for out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people, and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore." So, that's our verse, our set of verses this week, Isaiah 2, verses 1-4. So, as we get into this, the first thing I wanted to do was to establish and define what's happening at the very beginning of this text here when it gives us time marker, and it shall come to pass in the last days, and then the rest of the text. So, Bryce and I wanted to talk about that from a partial, preterist understanding of the last days, and it just bears on Scripture that this is the truth.

It's not just partial preterism, it's just how the Scriptures talk about the last days. So, we're going to give you some proof texts for our claim that the last days here are the days of the Messiah, the days of Christ. Hebrews 1, verse 2 says that in the former days, God spoke to us through His prophets, but in these last days, God has spoken to us through His Son.

So, that's our first text here. The last days that are happening, God spoke to us through Jesus, and when did that happen? Well, when Jesus incarnated, was incarnated, and spoke to us, and gave us the very words of God. Right.

Anything there, Bryce? I mean, that just text is just so obvious right there. We already have a basic understanding that prophecy has ceased. In some capacity, even continuationists recognize that in some capacity, there's no inscriptionation anymore.

Scripture isn't being written. Right. So, we can have a discussion about whether or not this gift of prophecy and maybe some fallible sense can exist, but everyone can agree in that text right there, Christ is no longer speaking in the same way today than He was back then, obviously.

Exactly. Yep. Yeah.

So, that's the position we're going to take. I don't think this isn't too controversial. Yeah.

Acts 2 quotes, it's Peter at Pentecost giving his sermon. He quotes, you know, the things that are happening at Pentecost, people speaking in tongues. So, Peter quotes Joel chapter 2. Yeah.

I forget which verse it is. Is it Joel 2.10 or something? I forget exactly what is it, Bryce? Yeah, it's around there. I have Acts 2 open.

Okay. Awesome. Yeah, I guess.

Where are you going to read that for us? Yeah, I can read that. It's so starting in verse 14 it says, "But Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice and said unto them, Ye men of Judea and all ye that dwell in Jerusalem, be this known unto you and hearken to my words. For these are not drunken, as you suppose, seeing as it is but the third hour of the day.

But this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel." So he's quoting it. "And it shall come to pass them the last days, saith God, I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh." Exactly. So this is coming at the day when the spirit, which was prophesied by Jesus in John 14 and John 16, the spirit of comfort and the helper, the advocate will come to his people and he will dwell with them.

So this outpouring clearly happened here at Pentecost. So this is marking the last day. And there is no other Pentecost.

Right? Pentecost isn't a cycle throughout history, though revival is a cycle throughout history. But instead what you see is a special time when the spirit fell upon the apostles to do the work of setting the foundation of the church. Exactly.

Yeah, amen. So there's another text right there. The last days are the time of the apostles and the Messiah.

Okay. And then 1 Corinthians 10 11, you were going to bring up too, Bryce. Yeah.

Paul says that these things serve as an example for us, referring to talking about the crossing of the Red Sea, the rocket followed up in the wilderness. And he says these things served an example for us upon whom the end of the world, or specifically the Greek word Aeon, the end of the age has come. So this is clearly marking the last days are actually referring to the end of the Old Covenant.

Yeah. The end of the Old Covenant. And this is clearly seen when you keep reading through the book of Acts and Acts chapter 10 verse 13, it says that that which is growing old and obsolete is ready to vanish away.

And it's talking about the Old Covenant. There's no longer these sacrificial rites any longer, but we have Christ who is the once and for all sacrifice. So these last days or this end of the age is the last days of the Jewish covenant.

Exactly. First Corinthians 7, I think 31 also says the former form of this world is passing away. Yeah.

So it's talking about there's a brand new world coming in this new world of Christ, Christ, new world order Jesus Christ. And that's just like Peter says. He talked about that world and Noah, which was the religion.

Exactly. Yeah, there were different. There's different worlds per se throughout the text of Scripture.

And now we're living in the newest new world, the new heavens and the new earth. And that's why when Jesus says I came to cast fire on the earth and know that it were already kindled. What he's referring to, I think, is talking about that day of Pentecost, the tongues of fire that are falling from heaven.

Yeah, that's good. That's good. Okay, so we don't want to get too much in the bushes here.

We want to kind of stay on the dominion, the dominion theology thing. So, you know, that's where we're placed in the last days. Everything that came at the rest of verses two, three and four are in the days of the Messiah and the apostles, the last day.

So what happens? Well, the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hills and all nations shall flow unto it. So here's the second point. So last week we talked about, or I guess it'd be two weeks ago since I missed an upload.

Sorry about that, guys. The last episode of our Sunday was on Ezekiel 47, talking about the slow filling and fullness of the living water flowing out of the New Covenant temple. So what we see there, like we already talked about, just go listen to that episode if you're interested in how we dealt with that.

We see that the living water comes out of the temple and slowly permeates and grows deeper and deeper throughout the whole face of the earth. Now, when the healing balm of the gospel, the living water of Christ has went to the nations, well, now the nations will flow back. They will come back to the temple to worship God, to worship Yahweh.

They come back. So we see a reversal here where the nations are now flowing unto the hill, uphill against gravity, right? So that's kind of a hard thing to conceive of. But the nations are flowing to God's hill, to Mount Zion.

That's the direction of the flow, no longer away from God's presence, but to God's presence to worship Him. Right. And then, yeah, anything there, Bryce, or did you want to go to 1 Corinthians 3? Well, we're going to quote it later, but it's important to know that there's so many texts that reference the Holy Temple.

Well, I guess we can, yeah, go ahead and get in 1 Corinthians 3 and then go off from there. But, yeah, 1 Corinthians 3 says that you are the temple of the living God. And this is talking to the church.

It's referring to the church. Peter says that we are the living stones that are being built up, these spiritual stones. We're building up God's house.

Exactly. So when you see the physical temple, primarily Christ is the temple, but we have this mystical union with Christ. We are united to Him.

We are His body. So Christ is specifically and primarily the temple of God, but we are also the temple of God, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3. And the reason for that is because we're united to Him. Yeah.

So we are the Lord's house. There is no longer any more physical temple being built because we are the temple of God. We are being built up as precious stones more and more.

And this is, again, post-millennial because the temple is continually being built and erected. Exactly. Yeah.

It's not going to be slowly torn down. It's going to be slowly built up. Exactly, Christ.

That's good. And I also wanted to bring up, like, with Galatians 4 and Revelation 21 with heavenly Jerusalem, right? So we see here at the end of verse 3 that the Word of the Lord will go forth from Jerusalem. Well, you know, where's Jerusalem at now? Do we care about like the physical city of Jerusalem? No.

Now the new Jerusalem is the church, the temple of God, the hill, the hill of God in Christ. So we need to think about this in the last days here. We got to remember this is the days of Christ, where now the temple no longer matters.

There's actually the new actual fulfillment of the temple in God's people and established by Christ as the cornerstone of Ephesians 2. Right. And one of the practical reasons why there's no longer a physical temple is we're not offering physical sacrifices. But instead, as Paul says in Romans 12, we offer spiritual sacrifices.

Yeah, exactly. So we do these things in the heavens because that's where the truth – and that's, again, in the book of Ezekiel – or sorry, in the book of Hebrews, Paul refers to when Moses was being given the designs on Mount Sinai for how man ought to have constructed and built the temple. He says that he was given a blueprint, essentially, and the blueprint was in heaven.

He was on earth as it is in heaven. He was building a temple here, as he saw the Lord showed to him in heaven. So when you see in the book of Hebrews where Paul is referring to these things were a shadow or a type of the things that come, it's showing that the true temple has always been in heaven.

Yeah. And it was because of man's sinfulness and our fallen state that the Lord did covenant with them and gave them grace, but he gave them grace in shadows and types. Yes.

Yeah. And the true temple is in heaven where we actually have them. Yeah, that's awesome.

Yep. That's really good, Bryce. Thank you for that.

So that ties in well with Hebrews 12 at the end there where it talks about the saints have now this this cloud of witnesses by faith has come to Mount Zion. Yeah. And we've received a kingdom that cannot be shaken this kingdom of this now highest mountain.

It can't be shaken down. It can't be tore down. Yeah, you can't undo.

Like we said earlier, the temple of Christ is the cornerstone, the foundation of the prophets and apostles now with being built up throughout history. It can't be torn down. It can't be shaken and destroyed.

Christ is the cornerstone of that. And that's a very powerful stone. And then also first Peter 2 29 you were going to bring up Bryce.

Yeah, it's where Peter says you are the chosen race, the royal priesthood. So we saw the old covenant. This priesthood was given to given to the Levites specifically.

But when it's being quoted, it's referring to them being a chosen nation as Israelites. And we are the Israel of God. The children of Abraham are those who have faith in Christ.

We are his seed. That's good. So yeah, so hopefully you guys can see.

So here's the three points we've done so far. We're about to get the last one. The last days of the days of the Messiah, all the nations will flow to the Lord's house, which is now this holy temple, which is the church.

And Christ is the cornerstone of that temple. And he's the foundation of that great holy mountain. And it can't be destroyed.

So that's where we're getting the dominion theology in this text. All the nations are going to flow to this temple. And God's temple is going to have dominion over the whole earth.

I had one more note real fast. On the second point here where the nations will flow to Christ. Remember that this is all an outflow of the gospel.

Right. This is the gospel scope series. So when Jesus says, just as the serpent was lifted up, so too, the Son of Man will be lifted up.

And when lifted up, He will draw all men to Himself. Exactly. So that's the nations flowing into Christ is the conquest of Christ on the cross that He has His arms open and extended wide for all to be drawn near to Him.

Yeah. So. Exactly.

No, thanks for that. That's good. Yeah.

OK, so that's the case for making for this. The last point as we as we finish up here in verse four here. He shall judge among the nations and shall rebuke many people.

This is this is Jesus and they shall be when he does that when he rebukes them, he brings them. They flow to him. What's going to happen right now? Remember, we're living in the post the last days.

We're living in the new covenant age and he sorry. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation.

Neither shall they learn war anymore. So they're beating their metal warring items, swords and spears that you would use for war. They've now beat that metal and reformed it into productive garden tools, agriculture tools.

So instead of now fighting, you know, the chaos ensuing from sin ruling the world and Satan ruling the world because he did in the old covenant age. He was he was the ruler of the world. But guess what? Now the ruler of this world has been cast down.

Yeah. That's actually quoted. That's three, three occurrences.

And John does Jesus say he's about to cast out Satan and judge him. So no longer now is there this warring chaoticness to the world from the nations inflamed and wrath from being basically aggravated by Satan and sin. But now as the gospel goes forth and Christ is lifted up and victorious on the cross, now they're going to start.

They're not going to learn war anymore. And there's going to be peace. And this this reminds us as it is Christmas season here.

And Isaiah nine here, six through seven, Jesus is referred to as the Prince of Peace. So the increase of his government, we already talked about that text in this in this gospel scope and dominion series. We already talked about that.

But what we highlighted there is that as his government increases, there will be more peace. And we see here in this text that in the last days, the nations are going to actually burn peace and they're not going to fight any longer. So this is what Jesus as the Prince of Peace is winning for the world.

He's creating peace. He came to God so loved the world that he sent his only son to die for the world to save the world. He bought the world by his blood.

Jesus is creating peace on Earth. So whenever you go out to hear the gospel, you know, you're a you're a ambassador of peace. You know, that's what we're doing on this podcast.

That's what Christians do. We bring peace. Any thoughts there by.

Yeah, I'd like to bring up two good quotes that I read to you beforehand. One from Athanasius and one from origin. I thought these are really good.

So Athanasius, an early church father, he said this. When the sun as you and when the sun has come, darkness prevails no longer. Any of it that may be left anywhere is driven away.

So also now that the divine epiphany of the word of God has taken place, the darkness of idols prevail no more in all parts of the world and every direction are enlightened by his teaching. So he's picking up on the exact same themes or rather we're picking up on the same themes that he taught on. Yeah, that Christ in the last days that he taught, he was a prophet.

In the last days, God sent his son as a prophet to give to us his words and also that Christ has procured for himself a kingdom and that of the increase of his government and a peace that will be no end. And origin says a very similar thing. He's another early church father and he says this.

It is evident that even the barbarians, when they yield obedience to the word of God, will become most obedient to the law and most humane. And every form of worship will be destroyed except the religion of Christ, which will alone prevail. And indeed it will one day triumph as its principles take possession of the minds of men more and more every day.

That is just so good right there. I know that is really good. And this is just a mere quote of men.

This is men who have read the scriptures and this is the conclusion that they came to. When the divine epiphany, when the word of God came into the world, he conquered sin and death. He came that he might destroy the works of him who had the power of death, which is Satan, and that he saved at the right hand of God, where he will put all of his enemies under his footstool.

So now the last days are past and his kingdom has been erected and his mountain has been lifted up high. Now we see the conquest of Christ and taking all the nations because they all have been given to him for a possession. Now notice, somebody quickly I'll say that somebody can bring in, "Well, I pick up my newspaper in the morning and what I read is that there's a massive war in Ukraine." You know, of course we're living in the last days because doesn't the Bible say that lawlessness will abound? Right, that there will be sorcery and drunkenness and you know, of course people are lawless.

They're trying to steal our children away from us and our government. Wickedness is abounding. So if what you say is true, then how can these things be true? So the easy answer to that is we walk by faith, not by sight.

That's as simple as it is. All we have to do is read what God's word says and we believe it. When God said to Abraham, "You're going to have a son," and Sarah laughed, right? What did Abraham do? It said that he hoped against hope.

So as Christians, our hope is not in what we see in this world. Our hope is in the God who conquered through the cross. So we need to stop doing newspaper exegesis and we need to simply just read what God's word says and believe it.

Because these texts that we said are clear. This is the clear teaching of all the church, everything we just taught. That's the clear teaching of all the church.

Exactly. That was really good, Bryce. Thanks for that.

So hopefully you guys heard that. I mean, it is a challenge. We are broadcasting a challenge to many Western Christians that have a pessimistic view of the future and the kingdom of God.

We are challenging you on that. We just read you a text that's very optimistic about the kingdom of God, Mount Zion. So I hope you can feel the weight of that, the challenge.

Go read Isaiah 2 for yourself. Go look at it. Connect it to the full counsel of God's word and you'll see a theme, which is that Jesus actually did something pretty significant on the cross and he's winning the whole world for himself.

That's the theme. So thanks so much for listening, guys. Check me out on forkingpodcast.com and obviously my Twitter, my gab and Bryce is on gab too.

So check us out. Kind of the stuff we're doing on there, trying to put the gospel through social media. If you guys have any inquiries or questions, just reach out to me at forkingpodcast@gmail.com. And I would love to answer any questions or objections you have.

Thanks so much for listening, guys. To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, the honorary glory forever and ever. Amen.

Sole dayo, mortal.

[Music]