Mills, John Milton: The God Who Enjoys Hiding Things ~ Isaiah 45;

Isaiah 45. The message tonight is the God who enjoys hiding things and revealing things as well. I'll read three scriptures, and then I trust bring many more to your attention. twenty five verse fifteen. Verily, thou art a God that hidest thyself, O God of Israel, the Savior. A God that hidest thyself. Now, Proverbs twenty five. someone told me that a young man spoke on that text, and I was thinking about it, and so I said, well, I will add to it and see what happens. Proverbs forty five verse two. It is the glory of God to hide a thing. It's translated conceal a thing, but it's the identical Hebrew word. So in Isaiah forty five, Isaiah said, Thou art a God that hidest thyself. It is the same word, and it says it is the glory of God to hide a thing, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter. And let's look at Romans eleven. You'll find that Romans nine, ten, and eleven are the historical parts of this book of Romans, dealing with the nation of Israel, Israel past, present, and future. And so after examining the history of Israel from first to last, and the last is yet in the future, this is what Paul says in verse thirty three: Oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. For who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his counselor? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him and through him and unto him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen. Let us speak to the Lord again in prayer. Now, Father, we are thankful for this book that you have put into our hands. Let us know the change it has made in our lives. We are thankful for the sun that thou has placed in the heavens. We are thankful for the light from heaven that is contained in thy word. We are thankful that it's given by inspiration of God. It's profitable. Not one jot or tittle shall pass away until all is fulfilled. We thank you, Father, that thou hast exalted thy word above all thy name. We thank you for its excellency, and we are thankful that it tells us things that we could never know. It deals with an area of which man has no knowledge. So, our Father, from what we've read and other things that shall come to mind, we pray that thy spirit shall illumine. Thy word is light, and thy spirit is he who comes and guides into all truth. So may that be our portion this night. Prepare hearts for those who hear, and empower the lips of him who speaks, and glorify the name of thy Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray. Amen. The character and personality of a person is discerned by what they say, how they behave, the things that they make with their hands, and God is no different. That's the remarkable thing. Let me verify that. It says, the heavens declare the glory of God, the firmament shows his handiwork. Then the heavens tell us something about God, about his character. Paul tells us what it is. It says in Romans one, it says they declare his eternal power and Godhead. So God tells us something about himself by his universe. But he also tells us things about himself and his personality by what he has given us, what he says of himself in the scriptures, and the way that he arranges the history of the world, and the way that he arranges the events that occur in your life. All of these things reveal the personality, the character of God. And the remarkable thing is this, that I have found out, because Isaiah found out, and the author of Proverbs uh twenty five two found out, and Paul found out, that God is a God who enjoys, who delights in hiding things. How is that? It's just the way that he is. He could have made known unto man truth any way that he pleased. When he sent his son from heaven, he could have made known his mind any way that he pleased. But just as Samson had certain characteristics about himself, a personality, God is similar. Samson delighted to put riddles before people and challenge them to solve that riddle. Out of the strong came forth meat, and out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness. He said, answer that riddle. And when it was answered, he said, you would not have ever learned my riddle unless you had plowed with my heifer. There was a personality about Samson, and also when he slew his enemies, he said, with the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jawbone of an ass have I slain a thousand men. Samson was a poetical man, and Samson enjoyed riddles. And of all things, the remarkable thing is that God enjoys riddles as well, and he enjoys poetry, and he enjoys putting challenges before man, and he enjoys hiding things. How do I know that? Because I've given you three scriptures, and had you gone and traced every occurrence of God hiding and concealing and putting out of sight things, you would have seen, just as Isaiah saw, that God is a God who delights in hiding things. Now, in the case of Isaiah, he was one who was most intimate with God, one of the prophets that have the most revealed to him about the Lord Jesus Christ, about the nation of Israel. And when God had revealed these things to him, he said this. He said, you are a God that hides yourself. Isn't that remarkable? I would have thought that the entrance of thy word giveth light, but Isaiah understood the workings of God in history and in the lives of men, and he said, Thou art a God that hidest thyself. All right. He is a God who enjoys, who delights, who takes pleasure in hiding things. Now, I wrote you in Proverbs twenty five verse two. Listen to this. It says, it is the glory of God to hide a thing. The glory of kings is to search out a matter. To say, well, to hide a thing, yes, in this word. This is a book of light, but it's a book of light in which God has hidden things. He says the truth is there, but I've hidden it. Now you go and find the truth in that book. That's why some people open it and say, I can't understand it. God did not intend you to understand all of it immediately. There are some portions he's made so simple that a child could be saved. The Lord Jesus says this, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. John says this, he that hath the sun hath life. Can you understand that? You say yes. Well, can you understand this? No man hath ascended into heaven, save he that came out of heaven, even the Son of Man who is in heaven. Can you understand that? You say no. Who can? And so God has put abstruse things in his word as well as the simplest of things, and the simple things are there that man may become his children, and then he says, now go on and seek to discover the things that I've hidden, that I've concealed in the word of God. So that's the challenge. Now, the third was this. He is telling about his ways. Think now. It speaks about the works of God, the word of God, and the ways of God, because that's what he says in Romans chapter eleven. Having considered God's dealings with the nation of Israel in relation to the nations, Paul, having examined it all and been illumined by God, he says, oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. And so Paul said, you can't find them out. You can't find out God's. And the author of Proverbs says, you can't find out his word. And Isaiah says, you cannot find out his dealings with man, his purposes in history. So, God is a God that hides himself, but he hides himself the way that I play with children and hide things. In Pennsylvania, when I come up, there are three children in the house, and when I come, they say, Uncle John, bring some candy and hide it. Now, why do you think they want me to hide the candy? So that they can't find it? Of course not. And what I do is to hide it to the degree of their ability to find it. I could make it so that they couldn't find it. I could climb and put it on something so high they couldn't see, and I could put it under something so heavy they couldn't lift it up. But what I do is just place it in a certain place that is a little difficult to find, but I know if they search hard, they'll be able to find it, and when they do, they rejoice. And so it is my purpose to hide things that they might be found. And it is God's purpose to hide things that they may be found. There are some things that God hides, and you will never find them. And when you consider all the ways and the works and the word of God, you will discover that without his illumination, you would never be able to find out anything. And first of all, Isaiah says it, and then Ecclesiastes corroborates just what Isaiah had told us. Isaiah said, verily, you are a God who hides yourself. Now, this is after a life of communion with God. Looking into the way that God works through history and in the lives of man, Isaiah says, you hide yourself. That's the kind of God you are. And this is what Ecclesiastes says. He says, God hath put one thing next to another so that you cannot find out anything under the sun. Ecclesiastes understood that God have arranged things so that you could not understand. It says this, in the day of prosperity, rejoice. And then he says, and in the day of mourning, he says, God has put one beside the other that you might not find out anything upon the earth. Why? Because God is a God that hides things, and that is his nature. He gives us riddles, but understand this, that every riddle that God gives has an answer, but it cannot be found out unless we search, unless we prove ourselves to be nobles. This is what it says in Proverbs twenty five two: It is the glory of God to conceal a thing. The glory of kings is to search out a matter. How much searching have you done to find answers in the word of God? And if you've searched a day, a week, a month, a year, and you haven't found the answer, then do you think that God made things so easy that you could find out everything in a day? Some spend a lifetime searching the scriptures, and finally, near the end of their lives, they find an answer to one problem that has been puzzling them their whole life long. But then God says, you've searched diligently and honestly, and I am going to reveal an answer to you. So God is a God who enjoys hiding things, and he enjoys revealing things as well. So what does this mean? It means that as I go through life, and I see God's dealings among the nations, and God's dealings in my life as an individual, and in your life, we will utter with Isaiah, you are a God who hideth yourself. Isn't that strange? I would have thought that God was the God who revealed himself. But God is making known to Isaiah the explanation of what is going to happen. He's explaining what has happened in the past. He says, I'm the one who caused it. He said, I'm going to tell you what's going to happen in the future. He said, I'm going to cause that. And having explained to Isaiah the past and the future, Isaiah says, verily, you are a God who hides yourself. You would have thought that Isaiah, having received the answer to say, you are a God who reveals yourself. But he has understood that only by the intervention of God could man ever understand the way that God deals among the nations and in the hearts of individuals. And how many of you have ever understood all the sorrows and pains and disappointments that have come into your life as much as you have devoted your life to God and searched the scriptures and prayed, and things did not work out as you thought they had? You see? It's the same way with the Lord Jesus, the Savior, when he performed his mightiest miracle, and nothing happened. He said, go unto thee, cohesion, go unto thee, Bethsaida. He pronounced his rules, but then, having seen what happened, he said, I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth. He understood that it was the way of God, and so he thanked his Father, Lord of heaven and earth. So first of all, we have to understand that God hides himself, but he hides himself that he might be found, and he hides himself that you, by faith, even though you cannot sense his presence in a physical way, by faith you understand that God is with you when you walk through the valley of the shadow of death. When you go through fire or water, God is still there. Now let me ask you, when our Savior called his twelve apostles, and he was with them for over three years, and then he went back to heaven, was he any less with them when he went back to heaven and when he was on earth with them for over three years? You say he said, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. If he said he's with us to the end of the world, then he said, I'm with you in my absence as well as when I was with you in my presence. And so we are looking for some physical manifestation of the presence of God. But what you have to understand is that when God hides himself, he's still there. Let me give you an example, because it's so lovely from the word of God. When our Savior had fed the five thousand, through the sending of the multitudes of waves, and he told his apostles to get into the boat and row to the other side. And after he had sent the people away, he went up into the mountain alone to pray. And from that great distance in the night, he looked down and he saw his disciples rowing upon the Sea of Galilee. They had rowed three miles, and it was impossible for them to get to the other side. And he sat there and he watched. Now, was he with them? You say, well, not in the same sense as when he came down and walked upon the water and came to them, but was he with them? You say, yes. Understand that he was watching them as he, as he gave them command to row, and he saw them as they exerted their strength hour after hour, and the destination that he had given them, given them, they were unable to arrive. And so the Lord Jesus came, and immediately they were at their destination. But understand that God is a God who hid himself. But though he was not with them there physically, he was with them, he was watching them, he was caring for them, and when the time came that he should be with them physically, he manifested himself. That is what God wants us to know. The Lord Jesus had been teaching his disciples for those three years, and then he said, I have many things to tell you, but you can't know them now. He said, but I'm going to send the comforter, and he will guide you into all the truth. Now, since the Lord Jesus had gone back to heaven, are we being any less taught by the Spirit of God as when the Lord Jesus was on earth teaching his disciples? You say, no, we're being taught more. Why, of course we are. We are being guided into all the truth. He gave us the beginning of the truth, but it's difficult for us to understand, and personally, I would prefer the Lord's presence, just as when I was a little boy, I had to go to the dentist, and I asked my mother if she would go in with me, and she said yes. And when I was a little boy, that's understandable. And some of you would say, well, I wish my mother would go in with me now when I'm mature, and I can understand, but that isn't the way it's done. When you grow older, you have to go in by yourself. And so God, in our youth, comforts and manifests his presence, and then he says, now you've grown up, and you must understand that I am a God who hides myself, but I'm still here. You must understand that. He hides himself to be revealed. Now, understand about poor Job, because just as Mark six is a profound illustration of the presence of God in his absence, a God who hides himself, so is the book of Job. In the portion that was read to us, Job said, oh, that I knew where I might find him, that I might even come into his presence. And then this is what he said. Having said that, he understood that God was a God who hid himself. And not only that, but one of his friends made this comment. He said, can you by searching find out God? Can you find out the Almighty to perfection? And the answer is no. He said, it is higher than heaven, it is deeper than hell, it is longer than the earth, it is broader than the sea. You never, by searching, can find out God. But all of these things are acknowledging that there is a God, but he is inscrutable. He is a God who hides himself, and you have to know that, and you have to accept by faith all the apparent contradictions that come into your life, or else what happened to Asaph will happen unto you. Asaph in Psalm seventy three said, truly God is good unto Israel, even to such as are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet were almost gone, my steps were well not slipped, for I was envious at the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. And he went on that way, and his soul was tormented. He said, I can't endure it. And he went on that way until he went into the sanctuary of God and considered their latter end. He said, now I know. He said, whom have I in heaven but thee, and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee, that will guide me with thy counsel and afterwards receive me to glory. But Asaph at first said, you are a God who hides yourself, and as Job, he said, you cannot be found. But then he went to the sanctuary of God, and then he understood. And so he is God who hides himself, but he hides himself to be understood, just as when you played with children. And I can remember a dear brother back in Goldsboro. There was a little girl about two or three years old, and they would go out in the front yard, and he would go and hide behind a tree and say, now come and find me, and she would look behind one tree and another, but finally he would allow her to find him. But that was the game. You hide yourself that you might be found, and when he was found, a smile came on her face, and she rejoiced. And this is what God expects us in our lives, in the happenings of the world, and in the experiences in our own souls. He expects us to say, you're a God who hides yourself, but at the same time, he expects a God who hides himself to be found. He hides himself in his dealings with the nations and with us as individuals, in his works. Now, he hides himself in his word. It is so strange how light and truth and a correct interpretation is present in the word of God, and yet in spite of it, and the entrance of thy word giveth light, men can read it, and they stay in obscurity. It says in Matthew thirteen that the Lord Jesus spoke in parables. Why? He said, because I want them to see and not see. It is God telling them. But the Lord Jesus said, blessed are your eyes, for they see. Here is a parable, and one man can read it, and he's reading the same thing you are, and he can make hide and a tail, head nor tail of it. He doesn't understand what it means, and another one reads it, and he can understand. And it's like this. I've laughed so much in the interpretation of these parables. It's like this, concerning the nation of Israel. How it is that some can look upon Israel and think that, yes, Israel in the Old Testament means the descendants of Jacob, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Zebulun, Issachar, Dan, Gad, Asher, Naphtali, Joseph, Benjamin, all of their descendants, those are the Israelites. But when you come to the New Testament, it's the church. What I did was this, looked up every occurrence of the word Israel and Israelite, and in our King James Bible, the word Israel occurs seventy times, and the word Israelite nine times, and sixty nine out of the seventy times, Israel means this. Paul said, my kinsman according to the flesh. He said, I am a Benjamite. I am an Israelite. You say, well, an Israelite is a descendant of Israel. Physical, it is one that is national, and that's what Israel means. I can show it sixty nine out of the seventy times, and yet you come to Galatians six and it says, peace be unto the Israel of God, and they say that's the church. How could a man, when God has given you the interpretation sixty nine times, you come to the seventieth time and you throw away what he's told you the sixty ninth time? A strange thing. Now, if it had to be, if everything else in the Bible were contradicted by that being what it means so evidently, then we could give it another interpretation. But it says at this present hour there is a remnant according to the election of grace, and that remnant is the Israel of God in the church, because the church is composed of Jew and Gentile, and that remnant in the church is the Israel of God. It's the only way, according to the seventy occurrences, to interpret it, but it says it's the glory of God to conceal a thing. And I've seen learned men give profound interpretations that are fine, and yet they will come to a parable, come to a word, and they become lost as to what it means, because God has concealed it, but I would say that God has revealed it in giving us its meaning sixty nine times. I would think we would know the seventyth time, but it says it's the glory of God to conceal a thing. The glory of kings is to search it out. And this is what I found also. When it comes about marriage and divorce, it seems to be a profound subject to man. But I discovered that you only have to know the meaning of the word ponia, and then the whole thing becomes simple because God has placed it that way. And so it is the glory of God to conceal a matter. The glory of kings is to search it out. And some of the things are so difficult that we're still searching. People are trying to reconcile the genealogy of Christ in Matthew one and in Luke chapter three and harmonize that with the genealogies in the book of Chronicles and Genesis. And if there are things that are apparently are contradictions, they are not contradictions. God says, they are things that I put there. I have concealed them. It's a challenge to you to search it out, and this is what God wants us to understand. Now, realize that this hiding of God himself and hiding of things in his word, if you know that and he's told you in advance, then if you go to the scriptures and something is difficult and is concealed, do not say, I wish Paul or Peter or David or Moses had put it there in a different way. It is there precisely the way that God wants it. It is simple when God wants it to be simple, and it is difficult when God wants it to be difficult because he has concealed the thing. And if it is difficult, he says, this is a challenge to you. The search it out. And in like manner, I told you what Isaiah found out about God hiding himself, and also what Job found out about God hiding himself. And three people in the Psalms find the same thing. This is what the psalmist says in Psalm ten. He says, Lord, he says, why do you hide yourself in times of trouble? Isn't that remarkable? I would think in times of trouble God would reveal himself, but the psalmist said, you hide yourself in times of trouble. He found out the same thing that Isaiah did. Also in Psalm fifty five, David says this. He said, hide not thyself on my supplication, that when we pray at times, God hides himself. And in Psalm eighty nine verse forty six, again, God hides himself. In all these various circumstances, men have discovered that God hides himself. But understand, if God hides himself, then it is not accidental, but it is intentional, and we are to know that God is there, and that things are going on just as God wanted them to go on, and that he hides himself for your benefit. So keep this in mind. Now, also the ways of God. It is impossible to discover them. I was asked to speak on the history of Israel from beginning to end, and having seen the dealings of God with the nation of Israel, I say, you're a God whose ways are past finding out. For this reason, God said, I want you to go into the land Canaan. He said, once you get there, he said, I'm going to send with the sentence into the land of Egypt, and they're going to stay there for four hundred years, and then I'm going to take them into the promised land, and then, because of their sin, I'm going to disperse them among the nations, and then, under Cyrus, I'm going to bring them back, and then, because of their sin again, I'm going to disperse them to the ends of the earth, and at the very last, I'm going to regather them for the final time in the land that I promised them. And seeing the dealings of God, you say, how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. If God had them in the promised land where he wanted them to be, why did he tell them to go down into Egypt and stay there four hundred years? I can't give you that answer. And why, if he sent them down to the land of Goshen and all was well at first, why then did eventually they become slaves and remain slaves until that four hundred years was ended? So God is a God who hides himself. God is a God who hides himself when we pray in times of trouble. God is a God who conceals things in the scripture, and God is one who also makes his ways past, finding out that there are challenges. But understand this and rejoice in it, that God is not only a God who enjoys hiding things, but he is a God who enjoys revealing things. When he is about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, he has a conversation with Abraham, and this is what he said. He says, shall I hide from Abraham that which I am about to do, seeing he shall become a great and mighty nation, and in him shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, for I've known him to the end, that he may, may command his family and those after him to do righteousness, to follow the way of God. God said, shall I hide from Abraham that which I'm about to do? God delights to reveal things as well to certain ones. The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him, and he will reveal unto them his covenant. Now, in like manner, this is what Amos said. He said, shall God do anything except he first reveal it unto his prophets? And so all the things that are going to happen that he wants us to know, God reveals these things unto his prophets. So whatever God would have us to know, God reveals to us, and God delights to reveal it to us. But he does not immediately reveal it to us. He lets us go through experiences in life until finally, in Matthew sixteen he asked this question. He says, whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am? And they said, why, Elijah, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, one of the prophets. He said, whom do you say that I am? And Peter said, you're the Christ, the Son of the living God. And the Savior said, bless not thou Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father who is in heaven. You see, the Father revealed it unto him, not at the first, but at the first, when he stilled the storm, they said, who is this that even the winds and the waves obey him? But later they say, surely thou art the Son of God. And so God is a God that reveals himself. It pleases him as much to reveal, even more, than to conceal a thing, because when a man has searched diligently enough to understand the ways of God and to accept by faith what he does not understand about God's hiding himself in our lives and in our experiences, when he accepts that, then God will reveal things to us. A fact, so broken, so crushed by failure to understand the blessings upon the wicked and the sufferings of the righteous, he said, it was too painful for me until I went into the sanctuary of God. And he said, then God revealed it to me, and all was well. And he said, I have nobody in heaven but you, and I want no one on earth beside you. And so God is a God who loves to hide things and to reveal things. And the things, it says in Deuteronomy twenty nine, the secret things belong not to the Lord, but the things that are revealed are revealed unto the sons of men, that they may do them. So, settle it in your mind that God himself, his way, his word, it's something that is hidden, but it's hidden by God, and the solutions can be found. Be like a king and search out the answers. Time is gone. Let us pray. Now, Father, we're so glad that just as the world is confused, so your children are confused. But they say in their hearts there is no God. They say there is no meaning for life. They say all that is above it has sprung from nothing. We understand, our God, that it has not, that that you are the maker, you are the creator. All things were made through your son, and without him was not anything made that has been made. We are thankful, our God, that you've shown us that. And yet, our Lord, throughout our lives, others tell us now we see through a glass darkly, but let us understand that at least we see darkly, and you've told us that you're behind it all, and that while you hide yourself, you are hidden, and you can be found. And while you conceal things in your word, they are concealed there, and they can be found. And your ways that are past finding out to perfection and understanding of them can be ascertained. So let us be like kings and nobles, and let us be those who search to the best of our ability and reveal unto us the things that you would have us to know, and let our hearts rejoice. And let us be like Asaph, found in the sanctuary of God, saying, whom have I in heaven but thee, and there is none upon earth that I desire besides thee. We thank you, O God, the God who hides yourself. In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.