1. "Long before fraudulent festivals and empty investments, there was Babylon, the ancient world's original deep fake. She looked magnificent, powerful, and unstoppable. And by the world's standards, she was. But behind the crown was cruelty, behind her power was pride. She built an empire on an illusion, a lie that she was untouchable, even divine."

2. "When we try to become more than human, when we try to be gods, we actually become less than human. Nebuchadnezzar tried to ascend to divinity and descended to the level of a beast. Pride doesn't elevate us, it degrades us. It makes us cruel, not compassionate. It turns us into predators, not people."

3. "Pride always cheats God of His glory."

4. "God takes a people and makes them his own. Babylon takes whole people and breaks them. God takes broken people and makes them whole."

5. "We tend to be the harshest with those when we think about ourselves the most. Our proud cruelty often comes out to those who disrupt our kingdoms. We withhold warmth, raise our voices, and make people feel small. That's the cruelty of pride."

6. "Pride hides best behind competence. Babylon had an impressive resume. Centuries of success, innovation, and power. But in claiming to be wise, she became a fool. Pride takes good gifts and uses them to justify our independence from God."

7. "Sin never shows the full picture. It promises pleasures but hides the pain. It advertises freedom but delivers chains. Sin's power is in the picture it paints, not the truth it tells."

8. "We can rationalize any sin as long as it's hidden. We minimize sin's weight with our wisdom and knowledge. Pride convinces us we don't need God. We take His faithfulness for granted. We barely notice His presence. We treat His forgiveness like the watch on our wrist, forgetting it's even there until we need it."

9. "I swung between arrogant entitlement and self-loathing despair. But through it all, God was doing surgery, cutting to heal, not from infertility. That wasn't my biggest problem. It was my sin."

10. "All of our I am statements lead to death. All of Jesus's I am statements lead to life."

Observation Questions

1. In Isaiah 47:1-3, what specific images does God use to describe Babylon's humiliation, and what actions is she commanded to take?

2. According to Isaiah 47:4, what three names or titles does Isaiah use to describe Israel's God, and how does this interrupt the pronouncement against Babylon?

3. In Isaiah 47:6, what does God say He did with His people, and how did Babylon respond to those God gave into her hand?

4. What claim does Babylon make about herself "in her heart" in verses 8 and 10, and what does she believe will never happen to her?

5. According to Isaiah 47:9 and 11, what will come upon Babylon, and what will her sorceries and enchantments be unable to do?

6. In Isaiah 47:12-15, what does God sarcastically challenge Babylon to do, and what is the final verdict given in verse 15 about those who have done business with her?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why is it significant that God commands Babylon to descend from her throne to "sit in the dust" (v. 1) and take up the work of grinding flour (v. 2)? What does this reversal reveal about how God responds to human pride?

2. How does Babylon's claim "I am, and there is no one besides me" (vv. 8, 10) constitute an act of cosmic treason against God? Why is this particular phrase so significant in light of how God identifies Himself in Scripture?

3. The sermon connects Isaiah's prophecy to the accounts of Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar in Daniel. What pattern do these kings follow, and what does their fate teach us about the relationship between pride and judgment?

4. In verse 4, Isaiah interrupts the pronouncement of judgment to remind the exiles that God is their "Redeemer," "Lord of hosts," and "Holy One of Israel." How do these three names provide hope to God's captive people while also reinforcing the certainty of Babylon's doom?

5. Why does the chapter end with the devastating words "There is no one to save you" (v. 15), and how does this statement serve as both a warning to Babylon and a message of hope to Israel?

Application Questions

1. The sermon asked, "What impresses you?" In what areas of your life are you tempted to be impressed by things that look powerful or successful but are ultimately "deep fakes"—built on illusions rather than lasting truth?

2. Babylon's pride expressed itself in cruelty toward the vulnerable (v. 6). When you feel threatened or when someone disrupts your plans or comfort, how does pride show up in the way you treat others—especially those with less power than you?

3. The sermon noted that "pride hides best behind competence." In what areas of strength, success, or knowledge are you most tempted to become self-sufficient and forget your dependence on God? What would it look like to invite God to humble you in those areas?

4. Babylon tried to cope with God's exposure by doubling down on her own strategies (vv. 12-13). What coping mechanisms or "enchantments" do you turn to when God exposes sin in your life, instead of turning to Him in repentance and confession?

5. The sermon encouraged believers to "bring people into your fight with sin" through confession. Is there a specific sin or area of pride you need to confess to a trusted brother or sister this week? What is one practical step you can take to pursue that kind of accountable community?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Genesis 11:1-9 — This passage recounts the Tower of Babel, where humanity's original attempt to "make a name for ourselves" was scattered by God, establishing the pattern of pride and divine judgment that Babylon embodies throughout Scripture.

2. Daniel 4:28-37 — This passage describes Nebuchadnezzar's humiliation and restoration, illustrating how God brings proud rulers from throne to dust and how acknowledging God's sovereignty leads to restoration.

3. Daniel 5:1-31 — This passage records Belshazzar's feast and the writing on the wall, showing how Babylon's king refused to learn from his predecessor's humiliation and was judged that very night.

4. Revelation 18:1-24 — This passage announces the fall of "Babylon the Great," showing how the pattern of proud, self-sufficient opposition to God culminates in final judgment at the end of history.

5. Philippians 2:5-11 — This passage presents Christ's voluntary descent from His throne in contrast to Babylon's forced humiliation, showing that the path to true exaltation is through humble obedience, not self-exalting pride.

Sermon Main Topics

I. What Impresses You? The Fyre Festival and Babylon's Illusion

II. Deep Fake: God Exposes Pride's Illusion of Power (Isaiah 47:1-7)

III. Deep Cut: God Diagnoses the Disease (Isaiah 47:8-11)

IV. Deep Work: God Dismantles False Securities (Isaiah 47:12-15)

V. Christ: The Only "I Am" Who Saves

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Detailed Sermon Outline

Good morning. If you guys will take your Bibles and open up to Isaiah 47, that's on page 617 in the Pew Bible. Isaiah 47, page 617. I want to ask you a question. What impresses you?

Success? Social circles? Yourself? In 2017, social media influencers started promoting a luxury music festival in the Bahamas. Sounds like you already know this story.

Tickets were selling around $100,000 a piece. It was being advertised as the cultural experience of the decade. People were impressed. They wanted a ticket. When attendees arrived, They found disaster relief tents, soggy cheese sandwiches, and chaos.

The Fyre Festival went up in flames because it was built on a fraud.

People invested their money, their trust, in something that looked impressive but wasn't real. The kingdoms of this world are devoted to fleeting things.

Ambition, power, fame, materialism? Are you impressed with what will truly last, or are you impressed with what this culture tells you will last?

Long before fraudulent festivals and empty investments, there was Babylon, the ancient world's original deep fake. She looked magnificent, powerful, and unstoppable. And by the world's standards, she was. But behind the crown was cruelty, behind her power was pride. She built an empire on an illusion, a lie that she was untouchable, even divine.

And in doing so, she set herself against the living God. Let's hear how God responds.

To Babylon, starting in verse 1 of Isaiah 47. Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans! For you shall no more be called Tender and Delicate. Take the millstones and grind flour. Put off your veil, strip off your robe, uncover your legs, pass through the rivers.

Your nakedness shall be uncovered, and your disgrace shall be seen. I will take vengeance, and I will spare no one. Our Redeemer, the Lord of hosts is His name, Is the Holy One of Israel. Sit in silence and go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans. For you shall no more be called the mistress of kingdoms.

I was angry with my people. I profaned my heritage. I gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. On the aged you made your yoke exceedingly heavy.

You said, I shall be mistress forever, so that you did not lay these things to heart or remember their end. Now therefore hear this, you lover of pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, I am and there is no one besides me. I shall not sit as a widow or know the loss of children.

These two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day, the loss of children and widowhood shall come upon you in full measure in spite of your many sorceries and the great power of your enchantments. You felt secure in your wickedness. You said, no one sees me. Your wisdom and your knowledge led you astray. And you said in your heart, I am and there is no one besides me.

But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away. Disaster shall fall upon you. For which you will not be able to atone. And ruin shall come upon you suddenly of which you know nothing. Stand fast in your enchantments and your many sorceries with which you have labored from your youth.

Perhaps you may be able to succeed. Perhaps you may inspire terror. You are wearied with your many counsels. Let them stand forth and save you. Those who divide the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall come upon you.

Behold, they are like stubble. The fire consumes them. They cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. No coal for warming oneself is this, no fire to sit before. Such to you are those with whom you have labored, who have done business with you from your youth.

They wander about, each in his own direction. There is no one to save you.

Here's the timeline, a little back story of where we're at in Isaiah. When Isaiah gave this prophecy, Israel wasn't in exile yet. That was still 150 years away. But Isaiah saw it coming. Babylon would rise, Jerusalem would fall, and God's people would be taken captive, and God would not abandon them.

So Isaiah has 66 chapters, and there's three different sections. The first 39 chapters are warnings of judgment against God's people for their idolatry and sin. Chapters 40 to 55 are hope to future exiles. And then the 56 to 66 are about ultimate restoration. And our chapter today, 47, falls right in that middle section, a message of hope to captives.

Well, this isn't the first time that we've heard about this ancient city of Babylon, and it won't be the last. Babylon represents a pattern that we see throughout Scriptures, the enemy of God's people. They first show up in Genesis 11 as Babel. Remember that? They all got together to build a tower.

They said, Let us make a name for ourselves. At the end of the Bible in Revelation 18, they represent every worldly city. From Genesis to Revelation, their aim has been their name. They're defined by self-sufficiency, pride, and opposition to God. So as we walk through this chapter today, the book of Daniel will bring this prophetic judgment to life.

Daniel is in exile in Babylon, and he's watching this prophecy unfold through two Babylonian kings, Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar, in three different accounts. So we'll see them follow the same pattern that Isaiah 47 describes. They project power, they claim divinity, They refuse to submit to God, and they fall. And we need to learn from them before it happens to us.

Isaiah shows us how God confronts pride in three movements. So here are the three points for today.

Deep, fake, verses 1 through 7. God exposes pride's illusion of power.

Point number one, deep fake, verses 1 through 7. Point number two, deep cut. This is going to be verses 8 through 11. Deep cut, God diagnoses the disease. Deep cut, verses 8 through 11.

The last point, deep work, verses 12 through 15.

God dismantles false securities. So deep fake, deep cut, deep work. But remember, this is addressed to God's exiled people. So it's a warning to Babylon, but ultimately it's a message of hope to Israel. The God who judges your oppressor is the same God who will redeem you.

Let's begin, deep fake, verses 1 through 7. Babylon presents herself as a radiant queen, clothed in luxury and sitting on a throne of world power. But God pulls back the curtain. He's holding up a mirror to show his people who Babylon really is. Let's go back to verse 1.

Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for you shall no more be called tender and delicate. Isaiah is giving us this image of this princess who's been served her whole life. She's gotten everything she wants. She's never worked.

She sits high on her throne, untouched and untouchable. She sees herself as secure and superior. She's built the throne out of smoke and mirrors. But God says, Come down, get off the throne, sit in the dust. The dust is where defeated enemies sit.

It's where mourners sit. It's where the humiliated sit. And God is saying to this proud city, you, reign is over. God's judgments are humbling Babylon in the very thing she takes pride in.

Her unending reign, and her assumption that she'll last forever. In Daniel chapter 4 verse 30, we see God humbling one of Babylon's kings, Nebuchadnezzar. He's standing on his palace roof looking over the magnificent city he's built, and this is what he says, Is not this the great Babylon which I have built by my mighty power?

As a royal residence, and for the glory of my majesty. Those moments, those words left his mouth, God's judgment fell. Nebuchadnezzar literally lost his mind and lived like an animal for seven years. From throne to dust, from palace to field, from king to beast. You see the irony there?

When we try to become more than human, when we try to be gods, we actually become less than human. Nebuchadnezzar tried to ascend to divinity and descended to the level of a beast. Pride doesn't elevate us, it degrades us. It makes us cruel, not compassionate. It turns us into predators, not people.

That's what pride always does. It promises you'll rise, but it makes you fall. Not just fall from power, but fall from humanity itself. Oftentimes, God uses the very things we boast in to humble us. Nebuchadnezzar boasted in his building projects.

So God took away his ability to even think like a human. He boasted in his majesty, so God gave him the appearance of an animal. God calls individual kings off their thrones and eventually the whole nation down to the dust and into darkness when Cyrus invades and frees God's people about 70 years after Babylon takes control. Let's pick up in back in Isaiah, verse two. Take the millstones and grind flour.

Put off your veil, strip off your robe, uncover your legs, pass through the rivers. Grinding flour with millstones was the cruelest and lowest form of work. Labor reserved for the lowliest of slaves. Babylon has stripped God's people of dignity and value and God's judgment will do the same thing to her. And it's not just labor, it's exposure and shame.

Put off your veil, strip off your robe. These remarks of public disgrace. Babylon who prided herself on beauty will be stripped bare. Verse three, your nakedness shall be uncovered, and your disgrace shall be seen. From throne to dust, from dominion to captivity, from robes to rags, from queen to slave.

God will spare no one. And in verse 5, their reign will end in darkness when they're conquered. Babylon's obsession with pride and power leads to her exposure leads to disgrace, and leads to darkness. And that's what God does to pride. He doesn't just correct it, he reverses it.

God uses the very things Babylon boasts in to humble her. Her throne becomes dust, her beauty becomes disgrace. God opposes the proud.

God is judging Babylon for their arrogance and cruelty. God gave his people over to Babylon, and Babylon took credit for it. They thought it was them that did it. They thought they had done something. Look at verse 6.

I was angry with my people. I profaned my heritage. I gave them into your hand. You showed me no mercy. On the aged you made your yoke exceedingly heavy.

They showed God's people no mercy. Especially to the most vulnerable. Babylon was merciless to those who deserved compassion.

We tend to be the harshest with those when we think about ourselves the most.

Our proud cruelty often comes out to those who disrupt our kingdoms. We withhold warmth raise our voices, and make people feel small. That's the cruelty of pride. Why were they cruel? Look at verse seven.

You said, I shall be mistress forever so that you did not lay these things to heart or remember their end. Babylon thought she would reign forever. She was so arrogant that she never considered there would be consequences. She never took God's warnings to heart. She never imagined an end to her power.

Verse 7 shows us why Babylon was cruel in verse 6. Because they thought they were above correction.

Babylon assumes they have immunity from consequences. Their self-sufficient arrogance has blinded them to their rebellion against God.

She's making fraudulent claims to reign forever. They're lying about who's in control and they're cheating God from the glory that's due to Him. Pride always cheats God of His glory.

God is pronouncing devastating judgment on Babylon and suddenly Isaiah awkwardly interrupts the flow. Let's look back at verse 4. Our Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts is His name, is the Holy One of Israel. So Isaiah interrupts because it's crucial that God's people remember this truth. The judge who exposes Babylon's pride is the same God who will rescue them.

Isaiah gives us three names and each one matters. First, he is their redeemer. The Hebrew word that's used here is for the kinsman redeemer. This is the one who had the right to buy back family members sold into slavery. Israel is enslaved and God is saying, I am your redeemer.

I will buy you back. I will restore what was lost. Second, he's the Lord of hosts or the Lord of heaven's armies. Babylon thinks she's powerful because she has the greatest military in the world. But God commands forces she can't even see.

The host of heaven. The astrologers look to the stars for answers, and God says, I have armies upon armies amongst those stars. You have no idea who you're dealing with. Third is the Holy One of Israel. The word used here means set apart.

Pure, transcendent, morally perfect. Babylon claimed to be divine, but she's morally corrupt, cruel, unjust. God is perfectly righteous, unstained by sin. God gives His people these three names to give them comfort and confidence in their captivity. He's the only one that can save them, not just from Babylon, but ultimately from their greatest oppressor, sin and death.

These three names tell us everything we need to know about the judge. He's their redeemer. He's the only one that will rescue them. And it's because of the covenant that they're in, not because they're great. But he's the Lord of hosts.

He has the power to humble Babylon and that he's the holy one. He's the only one with the right to judge them. The one bringing judgment on Babylon is the same one who will rescue his people. God's not impressed by Babylon's architecture, knowledge, wisdom, or wealth, and he's not impressed with ours. He can't be swayed by political opinions or tempted with backroom dealings to secure trade agreements.

Cultural revolutions don't change his mind. In God's eternal hands, Pride always results in humiliation. Cruelty always results in judgment. False security always results in ruin.

God is Israel's Redeemer. He takes a people and makes them his own. Babylon takes whole people and breaks them. God takes broken people and makes them whole. God doesn't just wipe away the smoke and mirrors of Babylon, he reaches beneath them.

The deep cut starts here. What looked untouchable is exposed for what it really is, cosmic treason, a bold claim to sit on a throne that belongs to God alone. So these next verses don't just show Babylon's vanity, they reveal the root of her pride and the consequences she can't escape. It's point number two, deep cut, verses 8 through 11. Verses 1 through 7 showed us Babylon's humiliation from throne to dust, from queen to slave.

But now God goes deeper. He's not just addressing what Babylon did, he's exposing what Babylon believed. Look at verse 8. Here's where God diagnoses the disease. Now then, hear this, you lover of pleasure, who sits securely, who says in your heart, 'I am, and there is no one besides me.

I shall not sit as a widow or know loss of children.' Babylon's self-worship reaches its peak with this claim. These are words that belong to God alone. They're claiming to be God. This claim to divinity isn't new for Babylon. In Daniel chapter 3, King Nebuchadnezzar built a 90-foot golden statue of himself.

Talk about the epitome of vanity. And he commanded the entire empire to bow down and worship. Music played, people bowed, except three young men.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Let me pause for a second. For the kids that are here, if you guys haven't read the book of Daniel, it's amazing. I couldn't put it down this week. So read it with your parents this week.

It's not that long. You'll love it. Okay, so three guys didn't bow down. They were brought before the king. Nebuchadnezzar was furious.

This is what he says, Is it true that you refuse to worship my statue? I'll give you one more chance. Bow down or burn. And this is what he ends this with, and who is the God who will deliver you out of my hands? Who is the God that will deliver you out of my hands?

That's the same claim we just read in verse 8, I am and there is no one besides me.

Nebuchadnezzar isn't content to be king. He wants to be God. What are the three men's responses? Even if our God doesn't save us, we will not bow. So into the fiery furnace they went.

When Nebuchadnezzar looked into the furnace, he sees four men walking around unharmed. What God will deliver you out of my hand? Let me tell you about my God. Our God, our Redeemer, the one who commands armies on high, He is unstained and untouchable. Babylon claimed divinity, but the real God exposed the lie.

When God revealed Himself to Moses at the burning bush, He said, I am who I am.

The name declares God's eternal and self-existent nature. And in John 8, Jesus claims the same name before Abraham was, I am. Babylon's claiming the name that belongs to God alone. She doesn't just want security, she wants sovereignty. And if we're honest, we all have our own I am statements.

Don't we? Our own areas where we've enthroned ourselves, our own securities we've built apart from God to give us absolute control of our lives, a cheap substitute for sovereignty. Do you notice how Babylon says this statement? She says it in her heart. God sees what is done in secret and will judge wicked acts and idolatrous hearts.

And look what flows from that belief in verse 8.

I love pleasure. I'm secure. Nothing bad will happen to me. I mean, that is the American dream. Pride builds a world where we are God.

It builds a world where we are in control. Look down at verse 10. You felt secure in your wickedness. You said, no one sees me. Your wisdom and your knowledge led you astray, and you said in your heart, I am, and there is no one beside me.

There it is again, the claim to divinity. But notice what led her there, her wisdom and knowledge. Wisdom and knowledge should lead us to confess that the Lord is God. Instead, Babylon's wisdom led her to conclude that she was God. She felt secure in her wickedness because she convinced herself no one could see her.

Her knowledge became her God.

Pride hides best behind competence. Babylon had an impressive resume. Centuries of success, innovation, and power. But in claiming to be wise, she became a fool. Pride takes good gifts and uses them to justify our independence from God.

For those of you who are successful, when was the last time you asked God to humble you?

When was the last time you prayed for the gift of humility?

Sin dethrones God and enthrones self. It's that same lie that Satan whispered in the garden.

You will be like God. It started off so innocently. It's just a piece of fruit. But sin never shows the full picture. It promises pleasures but hides the pain.

It advertises freedom but delivers chains. Sin's power is in the picture it paints, not the truth it tells.

We can rationalize any sin as long as it's hidden. We minimize sin's weight with our wisdom and knowledge. Pride convinces us we don't need God. We take His faithfulness for granted. We barely notice His presence.

We treat His forgiveness like the watch on our wrist, forgetting it's even there until we need it.

A proud heart declares, I am, and there is no one besides me. And there's no more dangerous place to be than fighting God for his throne. What happens when a creature claims to be the creator? Calamity comes in a moment, and no defense can stop it.

Look at verse 9: these two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day: the loss of children and widowhood shall come upon you in full measure. Those are the things she was taking pride in, in spite of your many sorceries and the great power of your enchantments.

Those are the very things that Babylon said would never happen to her, and all of a sudden they'll happen suddenly. All of her sorceries, all of her enchantments, everything she was trusting in, useless. Look at verse 11. But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away. Disaster shall fall upon you, for which you cannot atone, and ruin shall come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing.

Evil, ruin, and destruction will fall on Babylon. They cannot conjure it away with their spells. They cannot appease or make atonement to any of their idols to reverse the disaster. The judgment is final. They can't control what will happen to them.

What Babylon thought, what Babylon thought was unshakable security is severed in an instant. The deep cut is painful but purposeful. It reveals the infection of pride beneath the surface. What do you do when calamity or sudden loss enters into your life? How does control show up instead of allowing God to expose sin?

Let me tell you how God used sudden loss in my own life to expose sin. This past year, my wife and I celebrated 20 years of marriage. When we got married, I had two goals. I want to be a father, and I want to grow a beard like Mark Feather.

Well, as you can tell, that beard didn't happen, and I don't think it ever will. I just don't have the genetics for it. And fatherhood took five long years. Through this season of infertility, the Lord began to expose a deep fake in my heart.

Not just my impatience, but my entitlement. I believed I deserved certain blessings.

And when I didn't get them, bitterness crept in toward those around me who conceived quickly.

How cruel is that? My proud heart kept saying, I deserve more. When I should have been saying, I already have more than I deserve.

Those years were a deep cut. I'd like to be able to tell you it happened in a month, but it took about five years. Lord exposed layers of pride, envy, and anger. I just kept peeling them back. I didn't even know they were there.

I swung between arrogant entitlement and self-loathing despair. But through it all, God was doing surgery, cutting to heal, not from infertility. That wasn't my biggest problem. It was my sin. Babylon did their own deep work to save themselves, and that brings us to the final section, deep work.

Verses 12 through 15, deep work. After the exposure and the cut, Babylon still tries to fix things on her own. Man's nature is that when we're confronted and exposed instead of turning to God we turn to our own devices, our own ways to cope. Babylon does the same thing. When God cuts deep she does the deep work to save herself.

She keeps trusting in the very illusions that God said would bring her low. Listen to verse 12.

Stand fast in your enchantments and your many sorceries with which you have labored from your youth. Perhaps you may be able to succeed. Perhaps you may inspire terror. Sin always reaches farther than we think. Once God exposes the pride in Babylon's heart, he keeps showing her how she tries to protect that false worldview.

He says it back in verse 11. He told her, you can't charm away evil. You can't atone to prevent disaster, and you can't predict when ruin will come.

Now in verses 12 through 15, Babylon is doing the exact same thing God said she couldn't do. He taunts her. Stand fast in your enchantments and your many sorceries. It's that same tone. You guys remember that story from 1 Kings 18 with Elijah and the prophets of Baal?

Maybe your God's asleep. Maybe your God's going to the bathroom. Keep doing what you've always been doing.

How's that working out for you? God exposes the foolishness of our efforts. All those years of spiritual manipulation, all that confidence and control, all that continued effort and coping. No one can save you.

God does the same thing to us, right? He exposes our sin. He shows us the foolishness of trying to keep our kingdom together.

Go ahead, keep indulging. Maybe this time it really will take the pain away. Go ahead, keep blaming everyone around you. Maybe that'll make you feel better this time. Go ahead and keep buying more things.

Maybe it really will bring joy this time. Go ahead and keep venting or calling it processing.

Maybe this time it will solve all your problems. Verse 13 presses further. You are wearied with your many counsels. Let them stand forth and save you. Those who divide the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall come upon you.

Babylon is exhausted from trying to control the future. No amount of stargazing or predictions can save you. No amount of astrology or strategy can rewrite what God said would happen.

What's exhausting you in your fight to control things?

Where are you weary from not surrendering? Babylon refused to learn. You'd think after what happened in Nebuchadnezzar, after he was humbled from palace to field, after he finally acknowledged that God is sovereign, you'd think the next king would be different.

But in Daniel 5, King Belshazzar throws a massive party. Get this, the audacity of this guy. He brings out the sacred vessels stolen from God's temple in Jerusalem and uses them to drink wine while toasting the gods of gold and silver.

He arrogantly boasts in the same pride that destroyed the king before him. Suddenly a hand appears and writes a mysterious message on the wall.

Belshazzar is terrified.

In Daniel 5, this is the phrase that it uses to describe Belshazzar's fear.

I'm pretty sure is the only phrase in the Bible like this. His face turns pale, and this one right here, his knees knock together. Have you ever been so afraid your knees knock together?

So he calls for the wise men, the enchanters, the Chaldeans, the astrologers, the same ones that Isaiah 4713 talks about, and they can't interpret it. All their counsel, all their wisdom, all their predictions. This is what God says to Belshazzar through Daniel. You know that the Most High God rules the kingdom of mankind and sets it over whom he will. And you, his son, have not humbled your heart, though you knew all this.

But you have lifted up yourself against the Lord of heaven. But the God in whose hand is your breath and whose all are all your ways, you have not honored.

That very night, Belshazzar was killed.

There is no one to save you.

Isaiah brings another blow in verse 14. Behold, they are like stubble. The fire that consumes them, they cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. No coal for warming oneself is this. No fire to sit before.

It's not a campfire. This is the consuming fire of God's judgment. Everything they built to sustain their illusion burns like dry husks in the wind. And verse 15 delivers the final word: Such to you are those with whom you have labored, who have done business with from your youth. They wander about, each in his own direction.

There is no one to save you. In the end, Babylon is utterly alone. Everything she thought that could save her has failed and fled.

There is no one to save you.

This is a hard chapter. You know, usually when I preach, people are like, oh, great chapter of praying for it. It's gonna be awesome. This week, everyone's like, Ooh, read that chapter of praying for you.

This chapter ends with devastating words, There is no one to save you.

Remember, this is addressed to God's exiled people as a message of hope. Comfort. The God who judges the oppressor is the same God who will redeem his people.

Babylon said, I am and there is no one beside me. She tried to ascend to godhood, but God brought her down to the dust. There is no one to save proud and sinful hearts. So Christ came down to the dust from his throne. He emptied himself.

He took the form of a servant. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. He who knew no sin became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God. And then And that death led to resurrection, not just his, but ours also. If we repent and trust in him, he will give us new hearts.

When Jesus says, I am, he dismantles the proud and sinful heart. I can feed myself.

I am the bread of life.

I can see for myself.

I'm the light of the world. I don't need anyone. I am the Good Shepherd. I'll find my own way. I am the way, the truth, and the life.

Christ exposes what sin promises but can't deliver. All of our I am statements lead to death. All of Jesus's I am statements lead to life.

If you're here and you don't know Christ, the very nature of your heart is Babylon.

You're saying the same thing, I don't need anyone.

How do I know? Because I used to be in that spot. But you're heading where Babylon went. Judgment and destruction.

It's where we're all headed. And one day you will hear, There is no one to save you. But today, God offers you the only I am that leads to life, Jesus Christ. You don't have to head on the be on the road to Babylon anymore. You can be on the road to Zion.

Turn from your sin. Trust in Him. He's the only one who can save you.

And to the Christians who are here, How's your relationship with sin and pride? How's that working out for you?

1 John says, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

James says, Confess your sins to one another and pray for each other so you may be healed. Try something different this week. Bring people into your fight with sin. Confess with courage and humility. His Spirit will give it to you.

I promise.

Our hope is only in our redeeming God who sent Christ to do what we could not do. Let's pray.

Father, we thank you for exposing the deep fake of our pride by showing us the disease of our sin.

May your Spirit do the deep work to truly change our hearts to proclaim from now until eternity, all glory be to Christ. In Jesus' name, amen.