Bible Reading:
Isaiah Chapter 57 Verse 15
The Habitation of God
Isa 57:15 "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones." In the previous verses God has been speaking through His prophet Isaiah to the Jews who had gone after idols. Verse 1 refers to how God had been taking some of His own people to be with Himself in heaven before the judgement fell on the ungodly Jews. Godly people were perishing yet the Jews were taking no notice, unaware that the true believing people of God were entering in to peace for eternity away from the sin and trouble in the land. The Jews to whom the prophet spoke were confident they were alright because they thought they were good.
God points out just how he saw them. They were sinful worshippers of false gods who'd left the true God and gone after the gods of the other nations. They worshipped openly on the mountain tops always seeking to find what they were looking for by following false religion rather than the truth. They looked to their king to look after them but in all they did they only sank lower in sin and got nearer to hell. All this they did, verse 11, voluntarily. Nobody made them afraid and threatened them if they didn't behave that way. This is the way of the heart of everyone. Left to ourselves, we seek, more and more, to go our own way of sin because our nature is sinful.
In verses 12 and 13 God warns them that He has seen the things they think are acceptable as righteous deeds but what they're doing will not profit them and also, that those they might rely on in time of trouble will be of no help because the wind will blow their helpers away in their day of need.
In verse13 God declares the only right way to be safe and at peace. Only those who put their trust in God shall live in the land. Such as trust The Lord are those who want to see the way to God opened up for His people to go to Him.
In Isa 57:15 God declares something of His greatness. "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place." God continues His speech to the nation by telling them something of Himself by the way He names and describes Himself. He is The High and Lofty One that inhabiteth eternity whose name is Holy.
Something high and lofty is something or someone that towers above their surroundings. Something or someone who is much greater than all around. Have you ever sat on the lawn at home or in a park and spent some time looking down at the grass? There's all sorts of beetles and bugs and beasties running about amongst the grass roots going about their business. Or perhaps you've been at the top of a high tower and looked down on the people below. How small people seem when seen from a great height. The term might refer to someone who is much more important than other people, someone of an exalted position. All sorts of people and things might be considered as high and lofty.
God is The High and Lofty One. The only One Who is really high and lofty, higher and loftier than all else. There is noone so exalted as God. Everything about God is high and lofty. Our Uncreated, Eternal God towers above all that is high and lofty in His creation. Isa 40:22 "It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:" This is what this verse is talking about. When God looks down on us He sees us as but tiny creatures. He is far above us on His throne in heaven yet He looks down and sees far more about us than we see about those bugs in the grass, or other people from a tower, or even ourselves for that matter. God is high in all His abilities, higher than we could ever imagine. He knows all there is to know about all of us.
The Bible tells us that God is The Eternal God.He states in this verse that He inhabits eternity. It's difficult to understand eternity. Think of an ordinary day. The day begins in the morning at a moment after midnight the previous day. When we get up at 5 or 6 or 7 already part of the day is passed and gone and we only have 19,18 or 17 hours left. The day will end at midnight and be over and gone. So it is with all our days and weeks and months and years. Our life-time ticks away toward its end.
Eternity never began, it has always been there. Eternity will never end. No matter how long a person is in eternity there is never any less of eternity in front of them than when they first went into eternity. Eternity is the place where we all must go one day when our life on this earth comes to an end. This verse tells us that eternity is the place that God inhabits.
We all inhabit England, Africans inhabit Africa, Americans inhabit America. God inhabits eternity. When we go to eternity we will find ourselves in the place where God is and always has been and always will be. We will come into His presence and have to stand before Him. When God brings time to an end then everyone who has ever lived will be in eternity.
To come to eternity for us is a great step. There is no going back once we're there. To go into eternity for us is to experience a tremendous event. We go either to peace in heaven or judgement in hell but with our little human minds we cannot really fully comprehend what it is to which we're going. We read in 1 Cor 2:9-10 "But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God." God is so great He is at home in eternity. It is where He lives. Time does not mean the same to God as it does to us. God sees time passing as we do but He is not governed by time like we are. Also in 2 Pet 3:8 "But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." Minutes tick by and we grow older. We change with the passing years. God does not change. In Mal 3:6 we read "For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed."
God declares His name to be Holy. Holiness is separation from all that is sinful and defiled. God names Himself Holy to tell us how perfect and sinless He is. There is not the tiniest hint of anything remotely sinful in God. All He thinks and says and does is perfect in every way. There is no shadow of turning aside from the straight path of perfection. James 1:17 "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." God does not turn aside from His path of perfection, He does not vary in His declared purpose to do good. He dwells in His high and holy place, a place that is a fit and suitable place for The High and Holy God to dwell in.
It is difficult for us to even begin to understand the absolute greatness of God. It is beyond us to fully take in what it means to inhabit eternity or the height of Gods majesty or the loftiness of His person. It is awe-inspiring to consider the "otherness" of God. To ponder the place where God dwells is to consider a subject beyond our experience, a place more wonderful than we could ever realise without going there.
But see where else God dwells. God dwells " with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, " God dwells with those of His creatures who have repented of their sin and humbly asked for His forgiveness. This Great High and lofty One Who inhabits eternity Whose name is Holy and Who is used to dwelling in His Own High and Holy place is One Who dwells with sinners who have been brought to salvation. What mercy and grace God shows in doing this. He dwells in the cleansed hearts of rebel sinners. Even though He is used to living in the highest most glorious place yet He dwells by His Holy Spirit in the hearts of people He has brought to know Him. What a difference in homes.
Would a great Emperor who had a thousand room palace choose to go and live in a one-room shack? Especially if He had to go to great expense to personally clean it out so he could live there.
God, in His Sovereign wisdom and grace spared not His only begotten Son but freely delivered Him up as The Sacrifice for sin that whosoever believes on Him should not perish but be cleansed of sin and justified before God and that God Himself should come and dwell with that saved sinner.
Has God saved you? Has God shown you the terrible nature of sin and the punishment due to sinners? If He hasn't then pray that He will. Has God given you the gift of faith in The Lord Jesus and true sorrow and a turning away from sin? If He hasn't then pray that He will. Has God shown you that your only hope is to be cleansed of your sin and made righteous in His sight by the work of The Lord Jesus in His life and His death and His resurrection? If He hasn't then pray that He will.
If God has done all these things for you then He has come to you and begun to dwell in your heart. Isn't that a wonderful thing? But how holy ought we to be if God is to dwell in us. He is The High and Lofty One who dwells in the high and lofty place. We ought not to expect Him to dwell anywhere less holy when He dwells with us. God has said that His people should be holy as He is holy. The Lord Jesus agreed that a holy life is summed up in the words of a certain Jewish lawyer who came to Him and enquired about how to get eternal life. Luke 10:27 "And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself."
If God dwells in us we should be marked by our love first to God and also to everyone else. The Bible is plain Rom 13:10 "Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." The day will come for all of us that we'll cross into eternity and into Gods presence to give an account and enter our final home. As Peter writes in 2 Pet 3:11-12 "Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?" This life and this world will end. Will you dwell with God in the next life if He has not dwelt with you in this? Would you spend eternity with a stranger? Of course not. We must be saved in this life or perish in the next.
