Pastor Tom Johnson, May 30, 2021
It was the year that King Uzziah died. We learn from 2 Chronicles chapter 26 that King Uzziah became king when he was 16, was a good king, fortified the walls and watchtowers, and loved agriculture. But his downfall was pride. Uzziah is not a priest. But his ego gets the best of him. He enters the temple and begins to offer incense at the altar. 80 priests rush in to confront him and admonish him to leave. Instead, he becomes angry. And the Lord strikes him with leprosy. For the rest of his life, Uzziah is unable to enter the Temple. According to the Law, no one with leprosy is permitted to enter the Temple. Lepers are ritually unclean.
Isaiah’s vision brings closure and greater clarity to this whole story. Instead of entering the Temple to project his own greatness and ego, Isaiah sees the Lord sitting on his throne. The Lord is high and lofty. The hem of his robe fills the temple. In other words, the Lord stands so tall he barely fits into the temple. Those mysterious creatures—the seraphim—fly with one of their three sets of wings. They worship and proclaim the uniqueness, grandeur, and wonder of the Lord: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.”
Holy, holy, holy—three times because the holiness of God transcends our language, understanding, and human experience. “Holy” means unique, special, unlike anything else—sacred—set apart from all that is of this world. Isaiah is in the very presence of God and sees him in all his glory. Isaiah is never the same. In fact, no one who sees God is supposed to be able to physically withstand the experience and live to tell about it. To see God, or be in his presence, is a near-death experience. It began with our first parents Adam and Eve.
You’ll remember that God said the day they ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil they would die. They ate. Their eyes were opened. They heard the Lord walking in the Garden of Eden. They hid themselves in shame and fear wondering what God might do—probably expecting immediate death. Instead, they were promised a Son who would one day undo the curse of death (Gen 3). You’ll remember Jacob who feared for his life and spent the night in prayer wrestling with a Man who later identified himself as the Lord. He survived with a dislocated hip. Jacob called the place “The Face of God” and says, “I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved” (Gen 31). You’ll remember Moses who wanted to see the Lord’s glory. God put him into the cleft of a rock to protect him and gives him this warning: “you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live” (Exod 33).
That is why Isaiah talks about his own demise and the demise of his people when he sees the Lord. “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Isaiah confesses that his lips and his peoples’ lips are unclean. They all failed to please God by their words. Isaiah’s lips and his peoples’ lips are what caused Isaiah to see their own sinfulness and their own mortality. God says in Isaiah chapter 29 that his people “honor me with their lips but their hearts are far from me” (v. 13).
This Holy Trinity Sunday, we still cannot fully understand the mystery and grandeur of Triune God—three Persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—and one God. His holiness and perfection accentuates our lack of holiness and perfection. Like Isaiah, we also carry the burden of uncleanliness in our lives. We began this service with the words, “Most merciful God, we confess that we are by nature sinful and unclean.” There may be a particular area of our lives that constantly reminds us of our brokenness, frailty, mortality, and sinful condition as human beings. For Isaiah, it was his lips. Our lips, our thoughts, and our deeds have not furthered the Kingdom but stained it with our action and inaction.
When King Uzziah sins, God strikes him with leprosy—on the forehead. Perhaps it is a sign that his thoughts are unclean—pride had filled and swelled his head. And so it is fitting that God would answer Isaiah’s faithful confession of unclean lips by meeting him exactly where he needed it. He sends one of the seraphs to the altar—the place where animals were sacrificed and burned for the forgiveness of sins—he takes a burning coal and touches Isaiah’s lips with it. He says as he singes Isaiah’s lips, “You’re guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” God brings forgiveness exactly where Isaiah feels he and his people need it the most. He is now ready to serve as God’s prophet and use those same lips for the glory of God and the edification of God’s people. He says, “Here am I send me.”
And so we stand before Almighty God today. We have confessed our unclean thoughts, words, and deeds. And instead of crushing us and our turning to ash, God brings us grace from his Altar just as he did Isaiah—not a red-hot burning coal but bread and wine that touches our lips, enters our mouths, and delivers forgiveness. It’s not animal sacrifice but the Body and Blood of Jesus—the second Person of the Holy Trinity who gave himself on the Cross of Calvary for the life of the world. So we are also ready to be sent out as his ambassadors of grace—not with burning coals but tongues set afire by the Holy Spirit. The Father sends us out to proclaim his love, forgiveness, and eternal life through his eternal Son.
Come Holy Ghost, Creator blest,
And make our hearts Your place of rest;
Come with Your grace and heav’nly aid,
And fill the hearts which You have made.
Your light to ev’ry thought impart,
And shed Your love in ev’ry heart;
The weakness of our mortal state
With deathless might invigorate.
(“Come, Holy Ghost, Creator Blest” LSB 498, vv. 2 & 4)
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