Wonderful Counsellor

Trinity Church Tamworth

Wonderful Counsellor Isaiah 9:1-7 It’s not uncommon, these days, to hear someone say, “I’m seeing a counsellor for that”,or, “I’m in counselling”. There was a time when that information wouldn’t have been offered so willingly. It would’ve been admitting too much need; you certainly wouldn’t put it on your resume or mention it in an interview. Somewhere in the last 20-30 years things have changed. The demand for counsellors, and the number of counsellors, has increased. In Australia in 2022, the career titled “psychologist - counselling and social worker” was the 15 most demanded career. In 2012, it was the 39th most demanded. It’s not surprising that a professor of law at Harvard, Prof. Burman, writes: “Our whole society seems to be facing the possibility of a kind of nervous breakdown”. When you listen to the news, read your newspapers, view the headlines on your screen, you can understand why it is that someone would make that kind of observation. The complexities of modern life, both in public and in private, reveal very quickly our need of help. We know our society is becoming increasingly fractured, and relationships more and more disengaged. If we were tempted to believe that this is unique to our circumstances, that it’s because we live in this cyberspace generation, or it’s because life has become increasingly complex for us, we’re just not up to handling life, we might need to look again. We could look through the history books and be corrected, or, we could just read our Bibles and find that in every generation, men and women were in need of a counsellor. In every generation, men and women need a wonderful counsellor. Isaiah writes to a people 8 centuries before the Lord Jesus who, without news.com or Facebook, were quite aware that they were confronted by war and distress and by a darkness. The Assyrians were coming to smash them. A handful of them were also aware that this kind of darkness which sort to engulf them from the outside, was more than matched by the darkness which sort to undo them from the inside. Let me go back and pick out some things Isaiah has already observed. We might ask, is Isaiah talking about his day or is he talking about our day? 2:7, Their land is filled with silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures; their land is filled with horses, and there is no end to their chariots. Why trust God when we have all that we need? 2:8, Their land is filled with idols; they bow down to the work of their hands, to what their own fingers have made. We worship what we do. We’re infatuated with ourselves. 3:6, For a man will take hold of his brother in the house of his father, saying: “You have a cloak; you shall be our leader”. If you have a nice suit, or the right looks, you’re in the running for the top spot. Don’t worry about questions of character or competency. 3:16, The daughters of Zion are haughty and walk with outstretched necks, glancing wantonly with their eyes, mincing along as they go, tinkling with their feet. Modesty is no longer a virtue – sex is in your face on every street. 5:8, Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land. Our dream is to have bigger and bigger houses. 5:11-12, Woe to those who rise early in the morning, that they may run after strong drink, who tarry late into the evening as wine inflames them! It’s 5pm somewhere in the world. Time to drink. 8:19, And when they say to you, “Inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,” should not a people inquire of their God? Why worry about what God says when you can find out all you want to know from a witch, or at a séance, or in the stars? In case you think that one’s not really us, Americans alone are set to spend around $2.5 billion this year on astrology and fortune tellers. Materialistic, idolatrous, self-loving, arrogant, sex-saturated, alcohol-obsessed, superstitious society. Who is Isaiah talking about? His day or ours? Have we learned nothing in almost three thousand years? This great advanced generation? This great enlightened, progressive society? No matter how bright and breezy we might appear to our friends, we’re living in the dark. Isaiah says of his day and our day, 8:21-22, They will pass through the land, greatly distressed and hungry. And when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will speak contemptuously against their king and their God and turn their faces upward. 22 And they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And they will be thrust into thick darkness. You might be thinking, this seems like quite a sorry picture at the end of chapter 8. Yes, it is. The bible never disguises how bleak things are when God is left out. It states it very, very clearly. Just when we expect God to shut up shop, close the books, consign people to darkness. After all they had chosen to reject him. They had been rebellious in their hearts. At that point we read: 9:1-2, But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish... Why’s that? 2 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. It’s night now, but the day is coming. A new day. And what a great day it will be. The people, v3, will rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest. Here, have another watermelon, heat up another corn cob. They are glad when they divide the spoil. The picture is of the winning team in the dressing room after they’ve won the world cup. There will be good things received on that day. There will also be bad things removed. Fear, in v4, has been replaced by freedom. Military issued boots, v5, have been replaced with marshmallows round the bonfire. Because there will be peace, v7, of which there’ll be no end. Who’s going to do all that? Who’s going to bring the light that destroys the darkness? Who’s going to replace a sense of doom with joy? And just as we’re asking: how many years can some people exist Before they're allowed to be free? Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head And pretend that he just doesn't see? Isaiah says, the answer my friends, is not blowin’ in the wind. The light shines, and darkness goes when, 9:6, a child is born, when to us a son is given. Isaiah have you been eating those mushrooms again? A child is born. Don’t you think we need a warrior? A warrior of warriors? Don’t we need a colossus that will stride human history and straddle the affairs of time? Don’t you think we need the great bully of all bullies so we can beat up all the bullies who have ever lived, beat them all into submission? That’s what we need. Everybody knows you can’t send a child to do a man’s work. God says, “Watch me.” Jesus is the child born. He is the son given who brings light to those living in the shadow of death. And so, the saying really is right: you can’t send a child to do a man’s work. You can’t send someone inexperienced or ill-equipped to do a significant task. Jesus was a child, but he was much more than a child. How do we know that? look at v6: And his name shall be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. What does it mean to say that Jesus is Wonderful Counsellor? Counsellor – Jesus speaks. For us, a counsellor usually is a person who talks us through hard times – marriage difficulties, bereavement or some other loss, behavioural problems, and so on. The word here is bigger than that. Jesus came into this world with more than some helpful advice on how to make it when things get tough, as good as that might be at times. As God’s Counsellor, he does speak to us about marriage and relationships, and suffering and behaviour, about what to do at school or work or retirement. He speaks to us about the human heart and its predicament, about death and eternity and heaven and hell. In fact, there isn’t one part of life that’s left untouched by what Jesus says, and what he says is the only thing that ultimately makes sense of this world, which can be pretty bleak and dark. Every person, in every generation, in every part of this planet needs that. Simply because we don’t have the answers within ourselves. In ourselves, we really have learnt nothing in 3000 years. The song Blowin’ in the Wind did ask some good questions: how many times must the cannonballs fly Before they're forever banned? how many ears must one man have Before he can hear people cry? Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows That too many people have died? but it didn’t have an answer. What qualifies Jesus to teach us and direct us and speak to our souls and lives? Is he qualified? What makes him so special? He is absolutely qualified. First, because he came as a man. Fully human. Therefore, he knows what it’s like. He knows what it’s like to live in this dark world, and to face the pressures and struggles and temptations that go with that, without succumbing to that. The apostle John says that Jesus knew all people, and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man. He knows us through and through, and exactly what we need. Just knowing what we need is not enough. Can he deliver it? Absolutely. Not only did Jesus come as a man, but he came from heaven. Jesus said, “I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak.” He knows exactly what we need to hear – and he has the truth that is straight from heaven itself to answer that need. Therefore, what he says is not up for grabs. It’s not us though we get to decide whether what he says is true. We don’t get to tell Jesus how it should be. It’d be like me trying to give tips to Beethoven on how to compose a concerto. Or to Paul MacCartney on how to write a No.1 hit. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Asking me what I think of what Jesus says is like asking an ant what he thinks of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5. The question is not what do I make of Jesus’ words … but what do his words make of me? He has come into this world to explain this world, and to explain me. He has come into this world to reveal God to me and to this world. Not hesitantly, well this is just my opinion – but with such authority that the people who heard him speak were left astounded. Remember at the end of the Sermon on the Mount (Mt 7:28): when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, 29 for he was teaching them as one who had authority. No one talks like this man. Not partially, well I’ll just give you a bit of a head start – but telling us absolutely everything we need to know in this world. Not to answer every question – but enough of them to lead us to his Father, in wonder, love and praise, to know him and live for him, to have light. His word is sufficient and complete. Don’t go past it will you. Don’t try and add anything to it, but hear him, the Counsellor, the Revealer, the Teacher. He knows you personally. He diagnoses you properly. He delivers you powerfully. Why wouldn’t you listen to him? Where else have we to go when you alone have words of eternal life? How do you know you’re listening properly? Wonderful – Jesus silences The word “wonderful” today has lost a lot of meaning. We talk about eating a wonderful curry, playing a wonderful cover drive, wearing a wonderful coat. You can hardly read Facebook for 2 seconds without reading about wonderful this and wonderful that, followed by 2 dozen exclamation marks. When Isaiah says Wonderful Counsellor, it’s not even so much an adjective, but might better read Wonder Counsellor. The Counsellor who is full of wonder – as in the Seven Wonders of the World. To say ‘you’re a wonderful woman’ is one thing. To say ‘you are a wonder woman’ is another thing altogether. Psalm 77 says, you are the God who works wonders; you have made known your might among the peoples. A wonder is something you stand in front of and are awestruck. Isaiah is saying ‘here is the Counsellor full of wonder.’ Here is someone you can’t get your mind around … someone beyond normal understanding … someone mind-boggling. Christmas is a time for looking again at the astounding, mind-blowing, somewhat beyond understanding fact that God himself came into this world. Not as an angel, or some kind of extra-terrestrial being, or a big bully. He came into this world as a child, a son given. It’s almost beyond belief that the God who made mountain ranges and galaxies could be contracted to the point where he becomes an embryo in the womb of a young girl. Just think about it for a moment. God who is eternal, came into time. God who made everything, became part of creation. God who is limitless, limits himself to living in that womb. You slept beneath the stars You named and numbered Were tempted in a desert You designed. Or as Charles Wesley wrote in one of his hymns: Our God contracted to a span, Incomprehensibly made man. When you compound that with the answer to why? Why would God do that? You discover that he does it to rescue haters, people who hate him, to rescue them from their own darkness. The Innocent received our condemnation And paid for the rebel’s cost. What!? How can that possibly be true? It is true, it happened in history, in a real time and real space, he physically came. If this God who came has spoken, what should we do? There was an article in the Guardian recently titled, How to be a good listener: the experts’ guide. Step one: stop talking. It went on to explain how to listen to a friend who is down, your spouse, at work, your children, someone who is angry. Step one: stop talking. Well, how much more when it comes to listening to Jesus. Step one: stop talking. If you were standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon, would you really be inspired to start talking about how many games of scrabble you’ve won, or how awesome your lemon soufflé recipe is, or what level your Pokémon’s at? If Beethoven came in and asked if he could play a little number he wrote on the piano, would we say, “Yeah sure, that’ll make nice background music while we chat.” We’d stop and listen. How much more when it comes to the Lord Jesus? What could you possibly say that he doesn’t already know? Isaiah says in chapter 40, and Paul repeats it in Romans 11, who has understood the mind of the Lord or instructed him as his counsellor? In Isaiah’s day, kings were known by their counsellors. The greater the king, the greater the number of people you could have around you acting as your advisors. Your stature was directly related to the number of people you could call upon; advisor for this, advisor for that, advisor for the next thing. What kind of king has no advisors? No counsellors? This king. Step one: stop talking. Now there are other steps of course, but this is the first one. Christmas is a time for looking again at the wonder of Jesus. Retailers want you to be impressed with glittery lights, new toys, and improved electronics. God’s saying, “Forget that, be impressed with my Son. This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased, listen to him.” He, and he alone, brings true light to a dark world. As you hear: (step two) ask. Ask that you’ll be left loving and trusting and obeying Jesus. In a dark, dark world, with your own dark, dark heart, the light will shine on you, because these are the words of Jesus, the Wonderful Counsellor. It is astounding to think that your answer to the tyranny and darkness and distress and sin in this world is to be found in a child, in Jesus, that the deliverance which brings joy to the people of God isn’t some vague notion, but something brought about by a birth in history on earth at a definite time and in a definite place. Bring us then we pray, out of the darkness and distress and warfare of our own rebellious hearts and leave us listening to and loving the Lord Jesus. May your truth dawn, and may we discover that you are a beautiful saviour and wonderful counsellor, in Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.