Mission Sermon on Isaiah 62:1-7

Mission Observance — 25 September AD 2011

Sermon Theme: The Lord’s Delight

Summary: The Lord delights in giving wonderful gifts to mankind. He also delights in those who hear his Word, trust His promises, and receive His gifts with joy. Through Isaiah, He promises to restore Zion and to shower her with delightful treasures. He also promises that Zion — His covenant people — will be a delight to Him.

These prophecies find their ultimate fulfillment in Jesus, who delighted in keeping His Father’s commands and celebrated His opportunity to save God’s people by dying on the cross, thus giving them the gifts of forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. However, salvation didn’t stop with Israel but goes out “to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. (Luke 24:47)”

Now salvation has come to us and God calls us to delight in the gifts He pours out upon us in Christ Jesus. As the Church, the Lord calls us, His bride, by the name “My Delight Is in Her.” As His Delight, we continue to hear His watchmen-pastors calling us to repentance and bringing us His forgiveness through Word and Sacrament. And as the delightful Word of Christ first spread from Jerusalem following the Ascension and Pentecost, so it flows out from the Church to places around the world.

Note: Anna Campbell, a daughter of the congregation, presented a picture show detailing some of her work as a volunteer medical mission worker in Haiti. She had earlier read the day’s Old Testament in Haitian Creole, which is why you hear it referenced in the sermon.

Text: For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet, until her righteousness goes forth as brightness, and her salvation as a burning torch.

The nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the Lord will give.

You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married.

For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.

On your walls, O Jerusalem, I have set watchmen; all the day and all the night they shall never be silent. You who put the Lord in remembrance, take no rest, and give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise in the earth. Isaiah 62:1-7

Scripture quoted from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Audio: Click to hear the MP3 of The Lord’s Delight, preached to the saints of God at Saint Paul’s Lutheran Church, Saline City (Slater), Missouri.

Other Readings: Psalm 96; Romans 10:11-17; Luke 24:44-53

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