Up Close & Personal Part I

Saturday, March 05, 2005
Up Close & Personal Part I


Isaiah 6:1-3

6:1 The year that King Uzziah died was approximately 740 B.C..

o 6:1ff Isaiah was given a difficult mission. He had to tell people who believed they were blessed by God that instead God was going to destroy them because of their disobedience.

o 6:1ff Isaiah’s lofty view of God in Isaiah 6:1-4 gives us a sense of God’s greatness, mystery, and power. Isaiah’s example of recognizing his sinfulness before God encourages us to confess our sin.

o His picture of forgiveness reminds us that we, too, are forgiven. When we recognize how great our God is, how sinful we are, and the extent of God’s forgiveness, we receive power to do his work.

o How does your concept of the greatness of God measure up to Isaiah’s?

o When we read Is 6 we are assured of 3 things:
§ God is holy.
§ We are not.
§ The part of us that is not like God, will surface when we are around God.


6:1-3 the throne, the attending seraphs or angels, and the threefold holy all stressed God’s holiness. Seraphs were a type of angel whose name is derived from the word for “burn,” perhaps indicating their purity as God’s ministers. In a time when moral and spiritual decay had peaked, it was important for Isaiah to see God in his holiness


Malachi 3:3 (NLT)
He will sit and judge like a refiner of silver, watching closely as the dross is burned away. He will purify the Levites, refining them like gold or silver, so that they may once again offer acceptable sacrifices to the Lord.

Malachi 2:17-3:6

2:17-3:6 God was tired of the way the people had cynically twisted his truths. He would punish those who insisted that because God was silent, he approved of their actions or at least would never punish them. God would also punish those who professed a counterfeit faith while acting sinfully (see Malachi 3:5).

3:2-3 In the process of refining metals, the raw metal is heated with fire until it melts.
o The impurities separate from it and rise to the surface.
o They are skimmed off, leaving the pure metal.
o Without this heating and melting, there could be no purifying.
o As the impurities are skimmed, the reflection of the worker appears in the smooth, pure surface.
o As we are purified by God, his reflection in our lives will become more clear to those around us.
o God says that leaders (here the Levites) should be especially open to his purification process in their lives.



1 : to free (as metal, sugar, or oil) from impurities or unwanted material3 : to improve or perfect by pruning or polishing 5 : to free from what is coarse, vulgar, or uncouth1 : to become pure or perfected2 : to make improvement by introducing subtleties or distinctions

Refining is freeing gold/silver from impurities.

We have an opportunity to be skimmed:

o Adam ran and hid and wasn’t “freed”. Sin makes you run and hide from God…even when you think you’re not.
o Others who ran to Jesus were freed i.e. the demoniac of Gedara

*Sin not only caused us to not be like God…we began to create after our own broken image.

3When Adam was 130 years old, he had a son who was just like him, his very spirit and image, and named him Seth. (Gen 5.3)


48The First Man was made out of earth, and people since then are earthy; the Second Man was made out of heaven, and people now can be heavenly. . (1 Cor 15.48

tselem, tseh'-lem; from an unused root meaning to shade; a phantom, i.e. (figurtive) illusion, resemblance; hence a representative figure, especially an idol :- image, vain shew.

maskiyth, mas-keeth'; from the same as Hebrew 7906 (Sekuw); a figure (carved on stone, the wall, or any object); figurative imagination :- conceit, image (-ry), picture, × wish.

pecel, peh'-sel; from Hebrew 6458 (pacal); an idol :- carved (graven) image.

Romans 8:29 (The Message)
29God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him.

In conclusion:
o We had God’s image…He gifted this to us
o We lost God’s image…we cannot have it both ways
o God sent His Son to remind us of what the image was like
o God sent His Spirit to empower us to regain that image.
o The great refiner wants to watch over us until He sees Him image in us!!!
o Then, we will see Him again!!