A TERRIBLE PICTURE
Here is the “word” (vision) which Isaiah “saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:1). The prophet has been enraptured by the wondrous prospect of the distant future, when religion shall be the supreme force of life (Isaiah 2:2), and all men (Isaiah 2:2-3), walking in “the light of the Lord,” shall be at peace with each other (Isaiah 2:4): now he looks down to the present, and how dark and terrible is the picture which he sees before him! He sees—
I. A nation forsaken of God (Isaiah 2:6). One of the most awful of all spectacles: an engine of tremendous power, without a driver, rushing down a steep incline!
II. A nation pursuing childish superstitions (Isaiah 2:6): “They be replenished from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines.” When a nation forsakes God, this is a common result (Romans 1:21-22). Witness the rapid spread in our own day of “spiritualism” among the sceptical and irreligious classes of England and America.
III. A nation seeking strength and safety in alliances with the enemies of God, allying itself with the very powers which Omnipotent Righteousness was pledged to crush! Instead of dwelling apart, as God intended (Numbers 23:9; Deuteronomy 33:28, &c.), and in dependence upon His protection, the Israelites sought to strengthen themselves by alliances with surrounding nations. “They please themselves with the children of strangers.” The same sin is repeated in these days, when God’s people mix with worldly society for the sake of its “advantages.”
IV. A nation blinded by external prosperity to its real condition and peril (Isaiah 2:7). Abounding with every evidence of prosperity, how could they suspect that they were forsaken of God, and that a terrible doom was hanging over them? What is our condition, and what are our prospects as a nation? Let us not lay too much stress upon our great national wealth?
V. A nation given over to a debasing idolatry (Isaiah 2:8; Romans 1:23). A moral degradation extending to all classes (Isaiah 2:9). Just what we behold in Roman Catholic and Ritualistic churches, where rich and poor alike prostrate themselves before the wheaten wafer which their priest has transformed into a god! The prophet himself now becomes part of the picture, and we have—
VI. The awful spectacle of a good man invoking the vengeance of Heaven upon the nation to which he belongs (Isaiah 2:10): “Therefore forgive them not.” This was the natural cry of the prophet’s soul, filled with horror and indignation at what he saw. The imprecations of Scripture are the natural (and fitting) utterance of righteousness in view of wickedness. It is only because the tone of our own spiritual life is so low that we are offended at them. From whom, among ourselves, does the cry for the uplifting of the strong arm of human law against the perpetrators of crimes of violence come? Not from the classes most likely to suffer from them, but from the refined and gentle, who, just because of their refinement and gentleness, are inspired by them with disgust and anger. So it is those who are most in sympathy with God who are most likely to burn with holy indignation against such things as the prophet saw. The men who offer such prayers as this, “Forgive them not,” would be the first to reverse it did the offenders give any sign of repentance.
VII. A crushing doom impending over an unsuspecting nation. No sooner has the prophet uttered his prayer, than he sees it was needless, and that the thunderclouds of the Divine anger were already thickly massed over the guilty nation; without any visible sign there was gathering over them a storm that would suddenly break forth with destructive force. Therefore he breaks out into a strain of impassioned warning and appeal to the very men for whose punishment he had prayed (Isaiah 2:10, &c.)
What lessons shall we learn from our survey of this dark picture?
1. Not to judge of the relations of nations, individuals, or ourselves to God by the test of temporal circumstances. It is an old but gross fallacy that temporal prosperity is a sure sign of the Divine favour (Ecclesiastes 9:1-3; Job 21:7-15, &c.) [517] Let us not ask what our circumstances are, but what our character is, and what our conduct has been. If we are unrighteous, temporal prosperity should alarm us, as a sign that God has forsaken us (Hebrews 12:8).
2. Not to be hasty to impute the temporal prosperity of the wicked to a slumbering of the Divine justice. We need scarcely trouble ourselves to pray for a doom upon the ungodly (Exodus 34:7; 2 Peter 2:3; Job 21:17-18; Psalms 73:18-19; Isaiah 3:11).
3. Let us remember that we ourselves, as sinners, are exposed to the Divine judgments, and let us “enter into the Rock”—“the Rock of Ages,” that, sheltered in Him, we may be safe when the storms of the final judgment shall burst upon our guilty world.
[517] When the Lord hath set thee up as high as Haman in the court of Ahasuerus, or promoted thee to ride with Joseph in the second chariot of Egypt; were thy stock of cattle exceeding Job’s, “seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen;” did thy wardrobe put down Solomon’s, and thy cupboard of plate Belshazzar’s when the vessels of God’s temple were the ornature,—yet all these are but the gifts of Wisdom’s left hand, and the possessors may be under the malediction of God, and go down to damnation.—Adams, 1654.
The eagles and lions seek their meat of God. But though all the sons of Jacob have good cheer from Joseph, yet Benjamin’s mess exceeds. Esau shall have the prosperity of the earth, but Jacob goes away with the blessing. Ishmael may have outward favours, but the inheritance belongs to Isaac.—Adams, 1654.