FEAR OF GOD AND MAN
Isaiah 51:12-13. I, even I, am He that comforteth you, &c.
I. THE TWO PARTIES SET OVER AGAINST EACH OTHER, “Man that shall die,” &c.; and “the Lord thy Maker, that hath stretched forth the heavens,” &c. It is a main object of the Scriptures to set in the most vivid contrast the meanness, emptiness, nothingness of man; and the all-sufficiency, the majesty, and the glory of God (Isaiah 51:7-8; Job 4:13-19; Job 14:1-2; Psalms 39:5; Isaiah 40:6-7; James 4:14). In striking contrast with man’s nothingness, the Scriptures set forth the majesty of God’s glory (Genesis 1:1-3; Psalms 113:5-6; 1 Chronicles 29:11; Job 38:4-11; Job 38:16-17; Job 38:34-35; Psalms 18:6-15). Not even the language of inspiration could measure the boundless interval which lies between finite and infinite, the creature and the Creator, sinful mortals and a holy God.
II. MAN, RATHER THAN GOD, IS PRACTICALLY THE OBJECT OF REVERENCE, RESPECT, AND FEAR. The whole system of society seems founded on the principle that human sanctions are above Divine. To keep society in order, it is necessary, even where the Lord hath spoken with the most awful sanctions He can employ, that the law of the land should interpose with its more effectual and prevailing influence.
Look at some instances in which these two authorities do not act conjointly. Debts to man are paid; what we owe to God gives us little uneasiness, perhaps none. In courts of justice there is watchful vigilance to observe the rules laid down, in every minute punctilio; it is forgotten that the King of kings is present wherever we turn our eyes. The presence of God, though admitted in a way, produces not half the controlling influence that the presence even of the most insignificant of their fellow-mortals would do. “It is a shame,” says the apostle, “even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret;” and yet these secrets are all known to God. The eye of God no more interrupts sinful pleasure than does the notice of infancy or the stupid stare of one of the inferior animals. But, speaking generally, the fear of man, or in other words, the law of public opinion, is the great regulator of life. Other passions are submissive to the master-passion—the fear of man. The profane swearer masters his tongue in refined society. The Sabbath is kept out of regard to man. Debts of common honesty are lightly regarded; debts of honour are binding. The case is too clear to need more proofs. Of by far the greater portion of society it may be affirmed, that “all their works they do to be seen of men.” To an extent, of which they are not themselves aware, the law of opinion, and not the law of God, is their rule of life. The Bible comes to them filtered through man’s opinion, only the filtering is not a purifying process.
III. THE EMPHATIC QUESTION, “WHO ART THOU?”
The inquiry seems to have been first addressed to those whose prevailing fear of man was the result, rather of weakness under trying circumstances, than of carnal blindness and depravity of heart; it seems intended for the encouragement of God’s people when threatened with dangers, and particularly when harassed by the terrors which cruel enemies inspire; “I, even I, am He that comforteth you;” then come the words before us, followed by the pathetic expressions, “And hast feared continually,” &c. “And where is the fury of the oppressor?” As much as to say, “O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?” To such the text brings reassurance and encouragement.
But with far different emphasis does it apply to those who, in the genuine spirit of the world, pay that homage to man which they refuse to God. The tone is that of indignation and surprise, “Who art thou?” What reasonable intelligence can fear him who can only kill the body, rather than the dread Being who holds the keys of death and hell? It can only be accounted for in one way, viz., that the senses, which can alone take cognizance of God, are closed. But such judicial blindness is no cloak for this sin, since man brings it on himself (Romans 2:17-21). To us, favoured above God’s ancient people, with what redoubled force does this voice of expostulation speak! Well may God apply to us such affecting words as are contained in Scripture (Isaiah 5:4).
CONCLUSION: “Who art thou,” that “worships and serves the creature more than the Creator”? Can man “arise and save thee in the time of thy trouble”? Can the world “pluck from memory a rooted sorrow”? Can it lighten the darkness of a dying hour? O then, “cease from man, whose breath is in his nostrils!”—H. Woodward, M.A.: Church of England Magazine, vol. xxii. pp. 56–61.
The fear spoken of is misplaced fear; hence fear that weakens and leads astray, and makes unfaithful to God, as well as makes the child of God miserable.
I. SOME OF THE CAUSES OF GROUNDLESS AND DISPROPORTIONATE FEAR.
1. Our over-estimating of temporal interests. Even supposing men do their worst, and the furnace of worldly trouble be heated to its utmost, “who art thou,” whose interests are so high, and wide-spreading, and enduring, that thou shouldest be greatly cast down? Will the wealthy man lose his sleep, and become miserable, because he has lost sixpence in the street? Not if his mind is sound. If he does, he is diseased; and our souls are diseased if our whole horizon is darkened by mere worldly loss and trouble.
2. Our turning of our eyes wholly to the seen, and shutting them to the unseen. God is invisible; “man” and worldly difficulties are visible, prominent to the eyes of sense. We must walk by faith and not by sight, if we are to walk calmly and nobly. Faith is the evidence of things not seen. If we allow the visible and sensible to tyrannise over us, they will scourge us more cruelly than Egyptian taskmasters did their slaves. “Lord, increase our faith,” and we shall be able to sing, “God is a present help in trouble.”
3. Unbelief in God’s fatherly interest in us. “Who art thou, that thou shouldest be afraid of a man,” &c. Thou dost not realise or remember who thou art. A child of God, redeemed by Christ, the very hairs of thy head numbered.
II. SOME THOUGHTS WHICH INSPIRE AND KEEP UP COURAGE.
1. Man and all created powers are weak; God is omnipotent. “God stretched forth the foundations,” &c. Man is feeble as the grass. Greater is He that is for you than all that can be against you.
2. Man and all created powers are short-lived; God is eternal. Opposed to thee is “a man that shall die;” on thy side are the everlasting arms. Make the eternal God thy refuge, and thou wilt not fear them that can kill the body, and have nothing more that they can do.
3. The Lord is “thy Maker.” There is endless hope in that thought. He that has made knows our frame, and will have mercy on the works of His hands.
4. He has intimate individual knowledge of thee and sympathy with thee. The prophet passes from the plural of the context into the singular in the text. “Thou,” “Thy.” Our relations with God are individual. He holds each of us by the hand.
5. He values thee far above the material earth and heaven. He that made and maintains them will not forget His child, that can look in His face, and know, and trust, and love Him. Whether would the mother make surest of saving her jewels or her child in a shipwreck? He has proved His incomparable love to thee in Christ.—The Homiletical Library, vol. ii. p. 71.
THE MORTALITY AND FRAILTY OF MAN
Isaiah 51:12. Man that shall die, and the son of man which shall be made as grass.
David, when musing upon the sublime scenery which the heavens presented, proposed a question of vast importance: “What is man?” Man is a wonderful being. “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” What the psalmist uttered, modern science has more fully established. “It is impossible to contemplate this admirable and beautiful temple of the deathless spirit without awakened wonder. It is one of the finest pieces of mechanism which can possibly be contemplated.” He is an intelligent being. As such he is nature’s king—the world’s monarch. What majestic powers he possesses! (P. D. 2376, 2380, 2381, 2400.) He is a spiritual being. “That must be a spiritual being which is conscious that it exists, and yet cannot be divided into parts. Having a spiritual nature, man is capable of constant thought, perpetual improvement in knowledge, of enjoying union with the Deity, a continual increase of happiness, and everlasting life. These give him a superiority over the brute creation, and render him morally responsible for all his ways.” He is a guilty and depraved being (Romans 1:29-31; Romans 3:12-18). He is also a mortal and a frail being, and these are the facts presented for our consideration in the text.
I. Man is mortal. “Man that must die.” All men—even the most mighty—must soon become the lifeless tenants of the tomb. [1572] For death has entered our world by sin, and all who have ever lived, save Enoch and Elias, have died, or shall die. It matters not, however beautiful or talented, &c., you must die (H. E. I. 1536, 1537; P. D. 677, 751, 752). God hath decreed it—hath declared it (Psalms 90:3; Isaiah 51:6; Hebrews 9:27).
[1572] When the vault containing the remains of the royal Charlemagne was opened by the Emperor Otho, the body was found, not reclining, but seated on a throne, with a crown on his fleshless brow, kingly robes covering his skeleton, a sceptre in his bony hand, a copy of the Gospels on his knee, and a pilgrim’s pouch fastened to his girdle. What a humiliating picture of human dignity! What an ineffectual attempt to retain the appearance of life, even amidst the horrors of death! That ghastly skeleton, as it fronts you with a mournful grin, teaches the lesson that even kings must die; crowns and sceptres cannot ward off the blow of the destroyer; he enters alike peasant cot and palace hall.
II. Man is frail; he is “as grass.” [1575] We are “as grass”—
1. In the frailty of our nature. “How fragile is the grass! a breath, an atom, a touch, will kill it. So with man. We are not like the cedars of Lebanon, or the oaks of Bashan.” Like the springing grass, we shall soon pass away. What is human life? A mere temporary state of existence (Job 7:1; Psalms 90:10; Psalms 144:4; 1 Peter 1:17). A short and uncertain duration of being (Job 14:1; Job 16:22; James 4:14). What is your life?
[1575] P. D. 2383, 2384. The comparison of a human being with grass is very beautiful, and quite common in the Scriptures. The comparison turns on the fact, that the grass, however green or beautiful it may be, soon loses its freshness; is withered; is cut down, and dies (Psalms 103:15-16; Isaiah 40:6-8, a passage which is evidently referred to by Peter in his first epistle, Isaiah 1:20; Isaiah 1:24; James 1:10-11). This sentiment is beautifully imitated by the great dramatist in the speech of Wolsey:—
“This is the state of man: to-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him;
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,
And—when he thinks, good easy man, full surely
His greatness is a-ripening—nips his root,
And then he falls.”
“A flower that does with opening dawn arise,
And flourishing the day, at evening dies;
A winged eastern blast, just skimming o’er
The ocean’s brow, and sinking on the shore;
A fire, whose flames through crackling stubble fly;
A meteor, shooting from the summer sky;
A bowl, adown the bending mountain rolled;
A bubble breaking—and a fable told;
A noontide shadow, and a midnight dream;
Are emblems which, semblance apt, proclaim
Our earthly course.”—Prior.
2. In the uncertainty of our lives. In all seasons the blade dies. Every moment some grass withers. Every second some man dies—either the infant, the youth, or the aged. But we know not the day or the hour.
3. In the unnoticeableness of our dissolution. Unnumbered blades of grass wither and die every day, yet the landscape is as beautiful as ever, for others spring up and take their place. So with man. Multitudes are dying every day, but all goes on as usual. [1578]
[1578] If the death of ordinary individuals be but as the casting of a pebble from the seashore into the ocean, which is neither missed from the one nor sensibly gained by the other, the death of the more extraordinary ones is but as the foundering of a piece of rock into the abyss beneath: it makes at the time a great splash, but the wave it raises soon subsides into a ripple, and the ripple itself soon sinks to a placid level.—J. A. James.
CONCLUSION.—What effect ought these truths to produce? They should lead,
1. To the diligent improvement of human life. The great business of life is to know and serve God (1 Chronicles 28:9; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20; 1 Timothy 4:8; Philippians 3:8; Ecclesiastes 12:13). Can anything be more important, more rational, more excellent? To seek and secure the salvation of your soul. What a work to be accomplished! and all during this short, this uncertain life! Be diligent.
2. To constant readiness for death (H. E. I. 1562–1566; P. D. 730, 734).—Alfred Tucker.