THE DIFFICULTY OF DELIVERING THE DELUDED FROM THEIR DELUSIONS
Isaiah 46:1-2. Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth, &c.
I want to fix your attention on the point where this prophecy stops. In vision Isaiah sees the gods whom the mightiest nations had long worshipped manifestly enfeebled, unable to protect, not merely their worshippers, but also the costly images in and through which they had been worshipped. These, which had been reverently carried in solemn procession by their priests, he sees ignominiously included among the spoils of the conqueror, and packed in common with other spoil on his beasts of burden. The idols to which prayers and sacrifices had been offered, in the hope of thereby securing deliverance from the invader, he beholds carried away into a foreign land. And all that he saw in vision literally occurred. Doubtless he saw much more than this, but he says nothing more. He does not add, “And those that worshipped these captured idols worshipped them no more; they acknowledge that Jehovah is the only living and true God, and Him only do they serve.” This he does not say, because he knew the idolaters would go on worshipping such images as those their own hands had made, and to which they had in vain offered prayers for deliverance. How strange that men should be guilty of such folly under such circumstances! But the folly has not been of rare occurrence. It is not yet a thing of the past. E.g., Her Majesty’s Hindoo subjects worshipping the very same gods whose help their fathers sought in vain when the power of Great Britain was being exerted for their subjugation.
What an extraordinary fact! What other fact is there behind it? For behind every extraordinary fact there is an explanatory fact. This, that it is a supremely difficult thing to deliver the deluded from their delusions.
I. Of this fact the history of idolaters is not the only illustration; there are others in almost every realm of human thought and action.
1. The political realm, e.g., the delusion that “protection” is a good thing for a nation.
2. The social realm. How long it took to convince even a Christian people that slavery is an evil, a crime which Scripture condemns! In like manner, how difficult it is to deliver even intelligent Christian people from the delusion that strong drink used in “moderation” is a good thing, notwithstanding
(1.) that they admit that to those who use it immoderately it is an evil thing;
(2.) that it has been scientifically placed beyond dispute that alcohol is neither food nor fuel; that used in any degree it unnaturally and undesirably increases the work of the heart; and that there is no medical benefit that can be secured by it which cannot be secured by other drugs to which no such moral peril belongs;
(3.) that more moral as well as material evil is caused by its use than by any other destructive force at work in society. In spite of the clear demonstration of all these things, many intelligent and religious people go on using alcohol without compunction of conscience!
3. The scientific realm, e.g., the delusion that vaccination is an evil.
4. The ecclesiastical realm, e.g., the delusion that connection between Church and State is necessarily a blessing to both, or that disestablishment would necessarily be mischievous.
5. The religious realm, e.g., the delusion that Romanism is not a vast unscriptural and superstitious scheme. Its hold upon the Irish; upon many educated English people. Or the delusion that happiness of heart and peace of soul can be found in any other path than that of humble and earnest service of God—in the pursuit of wealth, or rank, or fame, or amusement. Or the delusion that those blessings can be secured by diligence in religious ceremonialism and stern asceticism. Look where we will upon our fellow-men, we see parallels to that which struck us with surprise when we first looked upon idolaters who continued to worship idols the inability of which to help them had been placed beyond doubt.
II. In view of this fact, what are the duties that press upon us?
1. Honest personal examination of our own beliefs and practices (1 Thessalonians 5:21).
2. The maintenance of hope for the future of the great human family to which we belong. The fact we have been thinking about must not be allowed to smite us with despair. Difficult as it is to deliver the deluded from their delusions, one by one the delusions do lose their hold upon them—e.g., idolatry to a large extent, witchcraft, slavery; and in the future truth will achieve still greater triumphs (chap. Isaiah 45:23).
3. Consequently, it is the duty of those to whom any truth has been revealed to go on declaring it, in spite of the seemingly hopeless stupidity of most of those whom they address. By their faithful proclamation of it, they do really, however imperceptibly, further the dispersal of the mists and fogs in which the minds of their fellow-men are enshrouded, and hasten on the day when the unclouded light of truth shall shine upon all men. In that proclamation let us do our part!