Sunday, December 6, 2020

The Wonderful Counsellor

1.1 INTRODUCTION
I would like to thank God for using me as the speaker this morning and

Reverend Burgess for giving me the opportunity to bring the Word of God

1.2 SCRIPTURE VERSE

The word is taken from Isaiah 9: 1-7 (English Standard Version)

9 [a] But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the
former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the
land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of
the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.[b]

2 [c] The people who walked in darkness

have seen a great light;

those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,

on them has light shone.

3 You have multiplied the nation;

you have increased its joy;

they rejoice before you

as with joy at the harvest,

as they are glad when they divide the spoil.

4 For the yoke of his burden,

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and the staff for his shoulder,

the rod of his oppressor,

you have broken as on the day of Midian.

5 For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult

and every garment rolled in blood

will be burned as fuel for the fire.

6 For to us a child is born,

to us a son is given;

and the government shall be upon[d] his shoulder,

and his name shall be called[e]

Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

7 Of the increase of his government and of peace

there will be no end,

on the throne of David and over his kingdom,

to establish it and to uphold it

with justice and with righteousness

from this time forth and forevermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

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1.3 SERMON

Today’s sermon is entitled Wonderful Counsellor

I have just read a portion of the book of Isaiah, and so where are we in
history?

We are between 760-700 BC and Judah was being attacked by Israel and
Syria.

Why was the Hebrew nation split into Judah and Israel?

When Solomon died, the ten northern tribes refused to submit to his son,
Rehoboam and they revolted. This was because Rehoboam rejected the
elders' counsel regarding the people’s request, repeat after me, counsel,
preferring the counsel of the "young men who had grown up with him"
repeat after me counsel. From this point on, there would be two kingdoms
of Hebrews: in the north - Israel, and in the south - Judah.

The Israelites formed their capital in the city of Samaria, and the Judaeans
kept their capital in Jerusalem.

At that time Judah was being attacked by Israel and Syria. Judah was
being ruled by King Ahaz and he wanted help. Isaiah counselled him to
look to God and he will save you, repeat after me, counsel but he ignored
Isaiah counsel and decided to join with Assyria king who took over Syria
and eventually Israel, but then Ahaz died, and Hezekiah became king. He
listened to God’s counsel repeat after me, counsel and God defeated
Assyria in 1 night when Assyria tried to take over Judah.

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Now, somewhere in the aforementioned narrative the character Isaiah was

introduced. Isaiah prophesied to a nation under the reign of four Judean
kings—Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. The prophesied when the
nation had turned a deaf ear to the Lord. It is this Isaiah that wrote the book
of Isaiah.

Isaiah has 66 chapters which can be divided into 3 parts;

1. Chapters 1-39 deals with king Ahaz and king Hezekiah and warns
about trouble coming from Babylon.
2. Chapters 40-55 God inspires Isaiah to talk to the Jews in exile in
Babylon even though the exile would not happen until a next 100
years.
3. Chapters 56-66 Isaiah writes to the future generation of God’s people
after the exile.

Essentially the Isaiah says God is holy and judges sin, but God is the only
one that can save us. God can save all of us through the messiah and
Isaiah announces that the messiah who is Jesus Christ is for everyone. It is
this messiah we read about in Isaiah 9:6 For to us a child is born, to us a
son is given; and the government shall be upon[d] his shoulder, and
his name shall be called[e] Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

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Let’s examine and expound on the text

“Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given.” Do you see the difference
in the sentence?

Jesus Christ is a child in His human nature and born of the Virgin Mary. He
is, thus, in His humanity, a child born.

Notwithstanding the aforementioned, Jesus Christ is God the Son, He is

not born, but given, begotten of His Father from before all worlds,
begotten—not made, being of the same substance with the Father. He is a
blessing bestowed on us.

It is worth noting that if you believe this child is born to you, then you are
born-again! Although the change is within, it manifests itself outside. The
proof of our Christlikeness is not what we feel, but what you do and how we
live. Matthew 7:15-20 says that you will know them by their fruit. How do
you know that change seen outside is a manifestation of the change
inside?

Wrestling. All who watched wrestling back in the day. I see some of yall still
watch wrestling. When I was younger, was fascinated with wrestling as
presented by the WWF and WWE. Drop kicks. Tombstone pile driver and
stonecold stunner. I remember power punches being fired and the
opponent with great dexterity defended with a well time guard.

Then I saw a live wrestling match, not a WWF or WWE, just a wrestling
match and I saw that all of the action was pre-arranged, and the attacks
and defences were not earnest.

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The attacks and the defence are not real. There is no heart in the fighting
after all. They do not fight as roughly as they would if they were real
enemies. Then I realised that this wrestling not real. So, sometimes people
pretend to be very angry against sin. But watch a little while and you will
see it is only a performance! He does not give his blows out of order; there
is no earnestness in his blows. It is all pretense it is only mimic stage play.
When the wrestlers have ended their performance, they shake hands with
one another. That is why we must take care, then, that your outward life is
not a mere stage play. On the other hand to be a man after God’s own
heart we must walk in the counsel of God.

Counsel. Counsel can be either good or bad. For example, of bad counsel
was in the garden of Eden, for it was by counsel the world was ruined when
satan in his craftiness counselled Eve to eat of the fruit of the tree of
knowledge of good and evil. However, there is good counsel, Christ
counsel.

Today I’d like to discuss the three-fold sense of our Lord Jesus Christ
Counsel:

1) First, He is Counsellor; with God the Father. He sits in the cabinet

council of the King. He has admittance into the privy chamber and is
the Counsellor with God.
2) In the second place, Christ is a Counsellor in that He communicates
to us on God’s behalf what has been done in the great council before
the foundation of the world.
3) Thirdly, Christ is a Counsellor to us and with us, because we can
consult with Him and He counsels and advises us as to the right way
and the path of peace.
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The Lord Jesus Christ was with God the Father before the world was
created. God said, “Let us make man” and they did. Colossians 1:16 says
For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible
and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things
have been created through him and for him.

Psalm 24: 1 The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and
they that dwell therein.

Imagine you friend invites you ta party, you arrive and there are lots of
people, decorations, food and drinks. There is enough for everyone to
worry about anything. You can just enjoy yourself and focus on the people
around you. That’s what a good host wants for their guests. God is the host
and we humans are his guests in a world of opportunity and abundance.
However, we seem to be living in a world of scarcity, but this scarcity isn’t a
lack of resources, but rather, the problem is our mindset that God cannot
be trusted. Maybe there isn’t enough and maybe I need to take matters into
my own hands and once we are deceived into that mind set of God will not
provide all my needs, we can justify the impulse to take care of me and
mine before anyone else. So, when you are worried about how you will
make it just remember that our Lord Jesus is Counsellor with God the
Father. He sits in the cabinet council of the King. He has admittance into
the privy chamber and is the Counsellor with God. And trust him when he
says that God, our host is generous, trust Jesus because he sits in the
privy chamber. He has the most intimate access to the king, the host of this
world we live in.

The second point is that Christ is a Counsellor as He communicates to us

on God’s behalf. God does not act towards this world like a man who
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makes a watch and lets it have its own way till it runs down. He is the
controller of every wheel in the machine of providence! He has left nothing
to itself. We talk of general laws and philosophers tell us that the world is
governed by laws and then they put the Almighty out of the question. Now,
how can a nation be governed by laws apart from a sovereign, or apart
from magistrates and rulers to carry out the laws? All the laws may be in
the statute book, but take all the police away; take away every magistrate;
remove the high court of parliament—what is the use of law? Laws cannot
govern without active agency to carry them out! Nor could nature proceed
in its everlasting cycles by the mere force of law. God is the great power of
all things. He is in everything. Not only did He make all things, but by Him
all things consist!

Let us remember that, in the council of eternity, the best was ordained that
could have been ordained

Remember Genesis 28:10-22 Jacob left Beer-sheba and went towards

Haran. 11He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night,
because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it
under his head and lay down in that place. 12And he dreamed that there
was a ladder* set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the
angels of God were ascending and descending on it. 13And the Lord stood
beside him* and said, ‘I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and
the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your
offspring; 14and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you
shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the
south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed* in you and in your
offspring. 15Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go,

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and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done
what I have promised you.’

In the council of eternity, the best was ordained that could have been
ordained.

God made a promise to Jacob, but Jacob is now at a point where he

believes he has lost a son and the land that God promised him is going
through a famine. I’m sure he was wondering kind of trouble is this, where
God is.

This is the midnight our God, its dark and very quiet.

Weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.

Oh Jacob, the Lord is about to provide for you in Egypt, Oh Jacob the son
you taught you lost, Joseph, a great and mighty man in Egypt! Joseph must
be sold for a slave. He must be accused wrongfully. He must be put into
the pit and prison—and he must suffer. But God was going straight to His
purpose all the while—He was sending Joseph before them into Egypt that
they might be provided for!

And when the good old patriarch saying with the loss of the Joseph and the
famine, “All these things are against me,” however there was not one single
thing against him—everything was ruled for his good! God provided. But
what about the land you promised to Jacob? Jacob had to decide between
God’s Promised Land (Canaan) and the logical place to go (Egypt). How
could Jacob be sure that God wanted him to pack up his large family and
leave the land of Canaan now? He had to seek counsel. Genesis 46:1 says

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So Israel started out with everything that belonged to him. When he

reached Beersheba, he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.

God spoke to Israel in a vision at night. “Jacob! Jacob!” He said.

“Here I am,” Jacob replied.

“I am God. I am the God of your father,” he said. “Do not be afraid to go

down to Egypt. There I will make you into a great nation. I will go down to
Egypt with you. You can be sure that I will bring you back again. And when
you die, Joseph will close your eyes with his own hand.”

The takeaway from this this is, Let us seek the counsel of the Lord when
we are to make any decision and let us learn to leave providence in the
hand of the Counsellor. Also, In the council of eternity, the best was
ordained that could have been ordained. How wonderful is that?

God provides, God provides a way for us to be reconciled to him, through

grace. Grace is unmerited favour. We cannot earn it. Grace was also
discussed in the everlasting council, when the Three Divine Persons
consulted together. Thus, was it arranged the son must suffer; He must be
the substitute; must bear His people’s sins and be punished in their place.
The Father must accept the son’s substitution and allow His people to go
free because Christ had paid their debts. The Spirit of the living God must
then cleanse the people whom the blood had pardoned and so they must
be accepted before the presence of God. That was the result of the
everlasting council.

That wonderful thought—that a God, Himself, should die, that He Himself

should bear our sins, so that God the Father might be able to forgive and
yet exact the utmost penalty. That thought was first struck out from the
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mind of God in the council of eternity when the “Wonderful, Counsellor,”

was present with His Father!

The last point is Christ is A COUNSELOR TO US. A man without a

counselor, I think, must of necessity go wrong.

“Where there is no counselor,” says Solomon, “the people fall.” I think most
persons will find it so. A man says, “Well, I’ll have my own way and I will
ask nobody.” Have it, Sir—have it—and you will find that in having your
own way you have probably had the worst way you could! We all feel our
need, at times, of a counselor.

David was a man after God’s own heart and dealt much with his God. But
he had his Ahithophel with whom he took sweet counsel and they walked to
the house of God in company. Kings must have some advisers.

Woe unto the man who has got a bad counselor. Rehoboam took counsel
of the young men and not of the old men, and they counseled him so that
he lost ten-twelfths of his empire!

Israel made a league with Gibeon and they found out that the Gibeonites
had deceived them. If they had asked counsel, first, no cunning deception
could have imposed on them in the matter!

Saul, the son of Kish, died before the Lord upon the mountains of Gilboa
and in the book of Chronicles it is written, “He died because he asked not
counsel of God, but sought unto the wizards.”

Joshua, the great commander, when he was appointed to succeed Moses,

was not left to go alone, but it is written, “And Eliezer the priest shall be his
counselor, and he shall ask counsel of the Lord for him.” And all the great

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men of olden times, when they were about to do an action, paused and
they said to the priest, “Bring here the ephod,” and he put on the Urim and
the Thummim and appealed to God, and the answer came and sound
advice was guaranteed.

Did you ever seek God’s advice on your knees about a difficulty and then
go amiss? Brothers and sisters, I can testify for my God that when I have
submitted my will to His directing Spirit, I have always had reason to thank
Him for His wise counsel.

We may trust Christ—that in His advice to us there never will be any self-
interest. He will be quite certain to advise us with the most disinterested
motives so that the good shall be to us and the profit to ourselves! Again—
Christ’s counsel is hearty counsel.

Now, Solomon says, “As ointment for perfume, so is hearty counsel.” When
a man throws his own soul into your case he says, “My dear friend, I’ll do
anything I can to help you, let me look at it.” And he takes as deep an
interest in it as you do yourself! “If I were in your position,” he says, “I would
do such-and-such. By-the-by, there is a word wrong there.” Perhaps he
tells you so, but he only tells you because he is anxious to have it all right.
And you can see that his drift is always towards the same end you are
seeking and that he is only anxious for your good! Oh, for a counselor that
could tie your heart into unison with his own! Now Christ is such a
Counselor as that. He is a hearty Counselor. His interests and your
interests are bound up together and He is hearty with you! Christ gives
wise counsel, hearty counsel and sweet counsel all at the same time.

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And now, we must close by noticing that Christ has special counsels for
each of us this morning and what are they?

1) “Cast your burden upon the Lord. He will sustain you. He will never
allow the righteous to be moved.”
2) “Seek you great things for yourself? Seek them not. You who are far
from God, Christ gives you counsel—
3) “COME unto Me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will
give you rest,”

Depend on it, it is loving counsel! Take it! Go home and cast yourself upon
your knees! Seek Christ. Obey His counsel, and you shall rejoice that you
listened to His voice.

1.4 CONCLUSION
In concluding, remember:

1) Christ is Counsellor; with God the Father. He sits in the cabinet

council of the King. He has admittance into the privy chamber and is
the Counsellor with God.
2) Christ is a Counsellor in that He communicates to us on God’s behalf
what has been done in the great council before the foundation of the
world.
3) Christ is a Counsellor to us and with us, because we can consult with
Him and He counsels and advises us as to the right way and the path
of peace.

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He is always wonderful, surpassingly wonderful and altogether wonderful!

Always to be looked at and always to be admired! And again, He is
universally wondered at.

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