The Downfall of Israel

Introduction

Well, as usual, I’ll start this morning with a question. How many of you are football fans? Maybe half, half of you. If you’re a football fan and you know about football, then you probably know a little something about game film. What game film is is that if one team has an opponent coming up, then they will watch every game that has been played by that team. And they’re hoping to learn something. They’re hoping to find the mistakes that that team has made, and maybe they can capitalize on those mistakes when they play them. They want to see how the opponents played them and the mistakes those opponents made. And we need to avoid those mistakes or the good things that those opponents did when they played that team, and maybe we can do those same things and have that same kind of success ourselves.

Trying to see what’s been done in the past, avoid mistakes, and replicate the successes. That’s all it is.

We have God’s people for centuries. We have them making terrible mistakes. We have them extolling great successes. And we can learn from that.

And it is a tragedy of all tragedies if we fail to learn those lessons. This morning I want to talk to you about Old Testament Israel. And when you think about Old Testament Israel, what comes to your mind? You might say, well, they were God’s people. They were God’s covenant people. He owned everybody. Everybody was his, but in a special way, he chose these people to be his priest and his children and the people through whom he would fulfill the promises. But if we begin to think about the character and the behavior of Old Testament Israel, what comes to mind? You might say failure. And who could argue? The pages of the Old Testament are full of Israel’s failure to live up to that covenant that they had with God.

Someone might say they were complaining, murmuring, absolutely. They epitomize the idea of murmuring and complaining, though they had so much to tell you two words that come to my mind when I think of Old Testament Israel. Frustrating and aggravating. I read those stories and I just get angry and say, how could you not know that God was going to keep his word and judge you and condemn you for doing that? How did you not see that coming? He sent prophet after prophet saying, I’m going to do this if you don’t do that, and still you did it. But again, we fail miserably. If when we look at Old Testament Israel, we don’t think of ourselves. That’s us. We’re God’s chosen people. We have a covenant relationship with him, a special relationship as priest and the fulfillers of God’s promises to mankind.

1. They Forsook the Law of God

And let’s learn from their failures. Let’s look at the game film and say, what did they do wrong? And let’s try to avoid that. This morning I want to talk about the downfall of Israel. And we’re going to look at three broad. You could say that in Old Testament, Israel, that they failed God in literally hundreds of ways. But I would argue that every one of those myriad of failures could be traced back to three broad categories of failures. And they’re the same way that we can fail God today. So let’s talk about the failure of Israel, the three big broad category failures of Israel, and see if we can avoid those ourselves. First of all, they just simply forsook the law of God. God had communicated to his people through his law.

And let’s first talk about what the law is. The law is not just regulations, it’s not just a list of do these things and don’t do these things. Now, certainly the law involves that. But law is an embodiment of the lawgiver. When we look at a law, it tells us about the one who gave that law. That’s true of man’s laws. For good or bad, when you look at the laws of this country, that tells you about the law givers of this country. When we say you can’t do that, that tells you something about who we are. When we say that that’s okay, you can do that.

It tells us who God is. The law reflects the lawgiver. And when we look at the law of God, God was telling his people who he was and who he wanted them to be. But Israel, time and time again failed there. Look with me, if you will, a couple examples of that or illustrations of that. Look in Isaiah chapter 30. Much of what we’re going to talk about this morning is going to come from the prophets. The prophets who would look back as we’re doing this morning, look back at that game film, look back at the history of Israel, and see their failures and point those failures out. And when Isaiah, by inspiration, looks back at Israel’s failure, this is what he sees. Isaiah chapter 30, read with me, verse 9.

That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear the law of the Lord. When Isaiah and his contemporaries are pronouncing judgment upon Israel, they say, here is why, because you will not listen to God.

Two ways in which Israel forsook the law of God.

It was just completely absent from their lives. The second way, and maybe the most prevalent way in which they forsook the law of God is that although maybe it was read in their hearing, and maybe even they could quote portions of that, they failed to make it a part of who they were. You will not listen, God said. Famously, Hosea in Hosea chapter 4 and verse 6 said, My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. They had forsaken the law of God. Is that us? Do an honest evaluation of your life this morning and ask yourself, have you in some way, to some degree, have you forsaken, as Israel did, the law of God.

That you don’t read it, you don’t study it, or you don’t read it or study it as often as you truly should. Is that your condition? Or maybe, as in his Israel’s past, did you you know it, you read it and study it, but it’s not really a part of your life. It’s not really that thing that dictates the way you think and the way you speak and the way that you act, that it’s not really real to you. Look at the warning that’s issued in the book of Hebrews, in Hebrews chapter 5, when the Hebrew writer is discussing a deep subject, and he has to interrupt himself in the midst of that discussion and say, I can’t talk to you about this. At least not the way I want to.

Pick up in that reading. In Hebrews chapter 5, verse 11, he says, of Melchizedek, of whom we have much to say. This is Hebrews 5, verse 11, we have much to say and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God. And you’ve come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. For solid food belongs to those who are a full age. That is those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil. Notice his admonition in chapter 6.

Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God.

2. Failure to Worship God as God Demanded

Again, be honest. Is God’s law, God’s word a part of your daily life? Is God’s word, God’s law, a part of who you are? Does it truly guide and direct everything that you do? If not, we like Israel will fail. Another thing we see over and over again as a reason for the downfall of Israel was their failure to worship God as God demanded and deserved. Now, spoiler.

And the obvious anger that that evoked from God. But let’s think about the times when they weren’t worshiping idols, when they were going to the temple or the tabernacle in Jerusalem. The time that they were offering sacrifices, and we would think that’s when they had it right. But so many times, apart from idolatry, so many times at the tabernacle, at the temple, offering the sacrifices that God had commanded them, God would say to them, I’m not pleased. Look at a couple examples of this in Isaiah chapter 1. Turn back and listen to the words of Isaiah and began, before we even get to that point, began to make an application to us in our worship today. Isaiah chapter 1. Begin reading with me in verse 10.

Isaiah 1, verse 10 says, Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the law of our God, you people of Gomorrah. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me, says the Lord. I’ve had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fed, the fat of fed cattle. I do not delight in the blood of bulls or of lambs or of goats. When you come to appear before me, who has required this at your hand to trample my courts? Bring no more feudal sacrifices. Incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, the Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure iniquity and the sacred meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feast, my soul hates. They are a trouble to me.

I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear.

Cease to do evil. Learn to do good, seek justice, reprove the oppressor, defend the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now and let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool. If you’re willing and obedient, you shall eat of the good of the land. But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword, for the word of the Lord has spoken. What’s interesting in that lengthy text there is that Isaiah, or God through Isaiah is saying, You’re worshiping me, not idols, me. You’re worshiping me at the right place, the temple. You’re worshiping me, the right God, at the right place, on the right days, by offering the right sacrifices, every physical box of worship had been checked.

But God said, I hate your worship. Why? Because he says your hands are filthy.

Number one, lesson number one is God will never accept our worship if it is not in accordance with our everyday life. If we live our life selfishly for sin, for lust, and for Satan, every day of the week, and then we show up on the right day at the right church to sing the right songs, God would say to us, as He said to them, I hate your song service. I despise your prayers and your preaching and your observance of the Lord’s Supper. Why? Because we were doing anything wrong in those acts of worship? No. But because your lives tell a different story than your worship. Lesson number two, turn with me to the book of Malachi. So lesson number one about acceptable worship is that our worship must be consistent with our lives.

The second lesson is that our worship must be offered sincerely. In Malachi chapter one, begin reading with me in verse 7. You offer defiled food on my altar. But you say, in what way have we defiled you? By saying the table of the Lord is contemptible. And when you offer the blind as a sacrifice, is it not evil? And when you offer the lame and the sick, is it not evil? Offer it then to your governor. Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you favorably? says the Lord of hosts. But now entreat God’s favor that he may be gracious to us while this is being done by your hands. Will he accept you favorably? says the Lord of hosts. Who is there even among you who would shut the doors so that you would not kindle fire on my altar in vain?

I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, nor will I accept an offering from your hands. The problem in Isaiah’s day was that they were living ungodly, unrighteous lives and then showing up to the temple. God said no. The problem in Malachi’s day was that they were showing up at the temple, but kind of just going through the motions. That they really weren’t there to worship him. Those two challenges face us today. Let’s talk about that latter one. Sincere worship. Is it important that we do just what God has commanded us to do in worship? Yes. Is it important that we do everything and nothing more than what he is asking worship? Absolutely. But if the downfall of Israel teaches us anything, is this equally important that we worship?

Not that we perform acts of worship, but that we truly worship. And so that demands that we give some thought to what worship really is. Look with me in the book of Psalms. Look at Psalm 89. Every Lord’s day.

Every Lord’s day we must ask ourselves two vital questions if our worship is to be acceptable. Number one is have I lived my life this past week in a way that would glorify God. And secondly, what is worship? What am I here trying to do? Look at Psalm 89. And just look at one verse, verse 7. Psalm 89 and verse 7 says, God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints and to be held in reverence by all those who are around him. That’s worship. Worship is not just the physical posture, but the spiritual posture of us bowing down before God. And if worship ever ceases to be that, God would say of us, would somebody just shut the doors? Now don’t misunderstand what I’m about to say.

The externals matter. Doing what God wants us to do. It ceases to be worship when we offer what we want to offer rather than what God wants us to offer. And so what we do is important. But please understand this that the remedy to improper worship will not begin on fixing the externals.

3. Idolatry: They Put Something Else Above God

Let’s dim the lights. Let’s get a better song leader or a better preacher. Somewhere in this country today in a small assembly. God is being revered and being worshipped in every sense of the word by a congregation of people who can’t carry a tune in a bucket. Being led by a tone-deaf man. And he’s being revered and honored. As someone is by our standards poorly preaching the word. Worship at its very base is an action of the heart. And Israel failed to see that. Lastly, we can’t talk about the downfall of Israel without talking about idolatry.

That’s the number one sin, isn’t it? Every time God, through the prophets, would speak to his people before, during, and after the captivity, and say, You want to know why that happened? One word. Idolatry. Let’s look at one example of that or one statement of that. In Jeremiah chapter 25, God always wanted to make it clear to his people why he was doing what he was doing, why he was blessing them, and why he was condemning them. In Jeremiah chapter 25, begin reading with me in verse 4. And the Lord sent to you, Jeremiah 25, verse 4. And the Lord has sent to you all his servants, the prophets, rising early and sending them. But you’ve not listened nor inclined your ear to hear. They said, Repent now, every one of his evil way and his evil doings, and dwell in the land that the Lord your God has given you and your fathers forever and ever.

To your own hurt. Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts, because you have not heard my words, behold, I will send and take all the families of the north, says the Lord, and Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land against the inhabitants and all these nations all around, and will utterly destroy them and make them an astonishment, a hissing, and a perpetual desolation. God says, You want to know why this is happening? Back to point number one, because you didn’t listen to me, but because you served other gods.

Now they engage what we might call classical idolatry. They’re really a graven image set up there that they would go and bow down to and claim that that was a god or representative of some God that they worship when clearly God had told them not to do that. But when we get to the New Testament, we see that God’s people are engaging in another form of idolatry. Paul would say covetousness is idolatry. Paul would speak of worshiping the creature rather than the creator.

A creature, some graven image, some image of a bird or a beast. But it could also refer to other forms of idolatry. When we worship the creature, man, rather than the creator. Throwing off the shackle of the condemning form of idolatry demands that we accept the fact that there is someone outside of myself who gets the right to tell me what I can do. That’s anathema to our culture. But anything else is idolatry. When we fail to bow the knee and our heart and our obedience and our submission to God, and we say, you and you alone have the right to tell me who I should be and what I should do. We live in a culture who is bowing down at the idol of self.

And Israel is screaming through the pages of history and saying, in him only shall you serve.

Conclusion

Through the mistakes of history, the lessons of the downfall of Israel. They forsook the law of God. When they worshiped Him, it wasn’t with their heart. And they put something else above God. Will you listen to the word of God this morning and worship at His altar and not your own? Maybe you need to become a Christian this morning, and you need to realize that someone other than myself gets to say what I need to do, and I must humbly obey. Would you do that this morning? Maybe you’ve done that and you’ve fallen away. You’ve forsaken the law of God. You’ve become insincere in your worship, or maybe you are guilty of idolatry this morning. Why not repent and come back and bow the knee to the one and only living God?

Can we help you this morning as you render obedience to the gospel? Will you let that be known right now?