God creates assemblies to reveal his glory in Christ.
Hakone, Japan
When I first visited Japan on vacation, we went to Hakone to see Mt. Fuji. This treasured gift from a dear family member has been a great memory. 
Made by a craftsman in Hakone 箱根町, it may look like a painting, but it’s actually made of wood.
Wood Works
From Hamagatsu’s kendama in Kure to the Lloyd-Wright Lincoln Logs in Chicago, men like making things with wood.
Wooden Sticks–Making vs. Creating
When I was a boy my friend Steve and I played ice hockey on the same team. Each player usually had 2 wooden hockey sticks so they wouldn’t be without a stick if one broke
We were making pucks fly through the air with our wooden sticks on the ice. Off the ice, we wanted to make it fly fast.
As someone who enjoyed woodworking, Steve’s dad fired up his band saw and easily cut and shaped a bow and arrow for Steve and me out of old wooden hockey sticks.
Steve’s dad made something strong and fun out of wood. Yet, as I grew up, my eyes were always drawn toward bigger, stronger, and faster things.
There’s a distinct difference between making things by repurposing materials like wood and creating something out of nothing.
Something from Nothing?
God is the only one who can truly create something from nothing. God introduces himself as creator through his creation in Genesis 1:1. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
The word for created in Hebrew is בָּרָא bârâʼ, baw-raw’. The word picture is fashioning an arrow from a stick. To shape something. To fashion it by cutting.
But it’s worlds apart from making a bow and arrow out of an old hockey stick because the hockey stick was made by a creature using existing materials.
The creator God said, “Let there be light and there was light.” Genesis 1:3
God created something amazing—from nothing at all!
• God created Adam from dust.
• God created Eve from Adam.
• God created us in his image.
Creating something out of nothing is impossible with man, but not with God.
The Limitless Creator God
The point is that all of existence was created by and belongs to God. All authority comes from Him. God sets kings in their places and can use them as he chooses. “The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will.” Proverbs 21:1
Dueling Desires
“What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.
James 4:1-5
You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people!
Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”
We just read about an internal war that rages within Christians. Our unmet desires boil over in anger––burning other believers—created in God’s image.
We zealously worship created things and value them as more important––more desirable than the One True God. God is jealous for us. These creations never satisfy us. God demands exclusive worship in assembly forever.
The Original Mission Impossible
God sent a man named Isaiah to speak to an idolatrous people to address their debased desires. The people were worshipping idols of wood and metal that couldn’t save.
Didn’t they know?
“The everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth” doesn’t share his glory with any created thing? (see Isaiah 40:28)
Hadn’t they heard?
“I am the LORD; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.” Isaiah 42:8
Isaiah’s Calling
They would hear from their creator through the lips of the prophet Isaiah. God called Isaiah to speak on his behalf. But before Isaiah responded to God’s call, something radical happened. He saw God’s throne surrounded by burning ones–created creatures called seraphim worshipping God:
“In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke.”
Isaiah 6:1-4
Isaiah was undone.
He said:
“Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”
Isaiah 6:5
It’s as if this display of God’s glory left him hopelessly crying out:
• I’m cut off
• I’m entirely unclean
• I’m smack dab in the middle of impure people
Unlike king Uzziah who fell into pride, Isaiah didn’t dare rush into God’s glorious presence. Uzziah, blinded by his success, ended up excluded from God’s glorious assembly.
The LORD of Hosts
God’s repeated his title twice in the first five verses of Isaiah chapter 6. The LORD of hosts. The LORD of hosts, or Yahweh, who created and named the host of stars in the sky,
“Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these? He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name; by the greatness of his might and because he is strong in power, not one is missing.” Isaiah 40:26
And as if that wasn’t enough, He also created the host of heaven which is pictured as an army in Isaiah 31:4.
“You are the LORD, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you.”
Nehemiah 9:6
Strength & Fullness
There’s an intentional fullness to the things God forms.
“For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited!): “I am the Lord, and there is no other.”
Isaiah 45:18
There’s a strength that the Creator empowers.
“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”
Isaiah 40:28-31
Divine Distinction
God the creator and all created beings (from powerful kings to common people) are totally separate.
Different thoughts. Different ways.
Omnipotent God above … earth-bound men below.
Do we see our utter sinfulness in the light of God’s perfection like Isaiah did? Are we undone or magnifying what we’ve made? Do we worship the works of our hands rather than the creator God? Have we made God in our image, rather than understood the truth that as creatures, we’re created in his image … to worship him?
You Are Valuable to God in Jesus Christ
Belief is evidenced by a changed mind and trust in Jesus’ death and resurrection for the forgiveness of our sins. No longer do we struggle to create our own identity. We stop striving to be valuable to God. Instead, we’re made righteous through faith in Jesus Christ. God favors us in spite of who we are as sinful people because we trust in Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection.
Not only can the Christian dwell with God because of Jesus, but in Christ we can be a place that God chooses to dwell in by the Spirit.
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Ephesians 2:19-22
So, we’re neither kings like Uzziah, nor prophets like Isaiah, how can we be a place that God chooses to dwell in by the Spirit?
Because of Jesus
- Because Jesus, the creator, entered into creation as a man.
- Because Jesus, the ultimate king, came down from his heavenly kingdom, suffered and lived as a servant, and received a crown of thorns at the end of his life.
- Because Jesus, the truth, and ultimate prophet, was blindfolded and beaten while being told: “prophesy, who hit you.”
- Because Jesus, the highest priest, offered himself up as the ultimate sacrifice.
- Because Jesus lived the life we should have lived, and yet paid the penalty of our sins by dying the death we should have died,
- Because of Jesus, we receive the right that is his, to be with God forever.
So because of Jesus, the saints are:
• a dwelling place for God,
• part of a holy temple in Christ,
• members of God’s household, built on Christ the cornerstone.
God creates assemblies for his glory to dwell, in Christ, by the Spirit!
Are you in the household of God? Are you part of this holy temple in the Lord Jesus Christ?
Bearer of Bad News
There may be a good reason that most English test results like IELTS and Eiken are reported either online or mailed to students. Not many people want to be the bearer of bad news if a student fails.
Can you imagine being commissioned to speak about God’s assessment of Israel’s failure to live up to their covenant agreement with God?
You share it with sinful people who won’t hear from you or understand you. You then watch your own people captured by invading enemies.
Tough mission, right?
What was God’s purpose behind Isaiah’s mission in the Old Testament?
It’s the same purpose that fuels the church now and the assembly of victorious saints throughout eternity.
God creates assemblies to reveal his glory in Christ!
Christians belong to the universal assembly God created to reveal his glory in Christ. God has made himself known through assemblies he creates.
The Root Reveals the Redeemer
Isaiah speaks of a remaining remnant of God’s people. God’s chosen people had departed from the Lord and were soon to be carried into captivity.
But, there was to be a remnant of Israelites that would return to Judah. The very lineage our prophet, priest, and king Jesus Christ came from. Isaiah said,
“And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward. For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.”
Isaiah 37:31-32
And there he is again, the LORD of hosts. Zealous to assemble his remnant. Zealous to gather his people.
In the Old Testament, the LORD of hosts created and commanded assemblies for his glory.
“Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, you survivors of the nations! They have no knowledge who carry about their wooden idols and keep on praying to a god that cannot save. Declare and present your case; let them take counsel together! Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the LORD? And there is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me. “Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other.
Isaiah 45:20-25
God Created the Church (assembly) for His Glory
In the new testament, we see that God still creates an assembly for his glory through the church universal. The word church or ekklesia means assembly. Speaking of Jesus, the scriptures teach us:
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church.”
Colossians 1:15-18 (a)
God Creates an Eternal Assembly of Victorious Saints for His Glory
The LORD of hosts creates and commands assemblies for his glory in Christ. He did it in the Old Testament. He does it now in the church age of the new testament.
And glimpsing into the future we see a great assembly worshipping the Lord Jesus: “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands” Revelation 7:9
The new Jerusalem that God creates will be glorious! Kings of the earth will assemble in a breathtakingly beautiful city created by God. A city with streets of pure gold, pearls, precious stones, gates, angels, names of saints, and the list goes on. A heavenly country where God is not ashamed of his new creations in Christ. But something is missing in this heavenly city, also described as a country.
There is no temple. No church. No sun.
The temple of the new Jerusalem is The Lord God Almighty and the lamb, Jesus Christ. They will illuminate it.
Isaiah spoke of the new heavens and new earth like this:
“For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.” Isaiah 65:17
John spoke about the creation of the new Jerusalem also:
“And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” Revelation 21:2
“The one who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God. Never shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name.”
Revelation 3:12
God’s created assembly has been great in the temple, is great in the church and will be great eternally in the new Jerusalem! He will have allegiance. He will get a standing ovation. He will see knees bow and hear tongues confess.
God will have a created assembly that displays his glory in Christ!
The fullness of a future assembly in heaven has been created and awaits Christians in heaven. “For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” 2 Corinthians 5:1
Jesus himself said,
“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.” John 14:1-3
This is no last-minute panic build by the creator God. The creator isn’t short on supplies.
So what do we do with the truth that God creates assemblies to reveal his glory in Christ?
We remind each other that anyone in Christ is God’s possession. Anyone in Christ is a new creation!
Are you in Christ?
If you’re in Christ, the creator God made us for himself; for his glory.
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:10
Men, remember that we are fearfully and wonderfully created in Christ with a body to be used for his glory, not our selfish pleasures.
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Whatever your eyes see, wherever your heart goes, your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you. Whatever the objects of our affections, may they all be exposed by the light of our Lord Jesus as we confess our sins to our brothers in Christ.
“For it is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that is illuminated becomes a light itself. So it is said: “Wake up, O sleeper, rise up from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” Ephesians 5:12-14
“He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. James 4:5-6
We’re not waiting for the glimpse of God that Isaiah saw. Rather, we “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.” Hebrews 12:14 Living a holy life is not works-based, but grace-given in Christ!
Watch out for the temporary beauty that this world parades before your eyes. Those shiny appeals that demand your attention as they:
• drain your devotion to Christ
• attempt to clothe you with distractions,
• and delight one’s eyes (until they don’t).
We should all run from the pride of life that caused Uzziah to offer a strange offering to the Lord. Instead, follow Christ––triumphantly spreading the sweet fragrance of the knowledge of him––everywhere you go.
Run from anything that
• tempts your flesh,
• draws your eyes and
• reinforces your rights as a (__________), rather than who God created you to be in Christ.
We should focus less on who is right and who is wrong and more on the grace God has given us in Christ.
Build your lives skillfully and fully on the foundation of Jesus Christ. Everything else and everyone else will most likely disappoint you in some way. Follow Paul’s example as you build your lives on the foundation of Jesus Christ.
For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building. According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 3:9-11
Christians, build with your best because the day is coming where God will reveal his glorious work done in Christ, through our lives, for His glory as he assembles us together to enjoy God forever.
Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.
1 Corinthians 3:12-15
Thanks for reading!
Wayne
God is Eternal