The Pulpit Commentary — Isaiah — Volume 2 — Section 125

Vers. 5-8.-God and man: refu.~al,, retribution, resto1·ation. I. THE DIVINE coillln-i>. God deman,ls the glory which is his due (ver. 8). His claim is based on: 1. What he 1·s in himself. "I am the Lord (Jehovah); that is my Name." As the Eternal One, who only hath immortality, the Underived and Everlasting One, who in the very fullest, deepest, and highest sense is God over all, he rightly demands our reverence, our homage, our worship. 2. What he has done for our race, He has "created the heavens," etc. (ver. 5). He is the Divine Author of our own human spirits, the Divine Originator of all material things, the Divine Giver of all surrounding comforts. As the Father of our souls and as the Source of all our good of every kind, God rirrbteously demands our thought, our gratitn<le, our love, our service. II. Oun GUrLTY REFUSAL. Of whatever crimes, or vices, or follies we are guiltless, there is one sin which we must all acknowledge-we have not rendered unto our God "the glory due unto bis Name." "The God in whose hand our breath is, and whose are all our ways, we have not glorified" as we might have done and should have done. In this matter all, even the best, have" come short" (Rom. iii. 23), The great multi- tudes of mankind have been ~adly and guiltily negligent, and we have had to pay- IIT. THE PENALTY OF OUB GOThT. This penalty is very severe; it is manifold; it comprises : 1. Forleiture of the Divine favour. 2. Fear of final condemnation and banishment from the Father's presence. 3. The various ills and evils, including sick- negs, and sorrow, and death, which berall us here. 4. Spiritual deterioriation, 'l'his is, perhaps, tbe saddest and most serious part of our penalty. He that sins against God "wrongs his own soul;" he does that which inflicts on himself most grievous wounds; his own soul suffers harm, the extent and the pitifulness of which no mind can measure, no words express. Tbe text (ver. 7) points to two of these spiritual evils. (1) Mental blindness. Tbe commission of any sin has a far worse result than that of enfeebling bodily health or injuring the circumstances of a man. It clouds his mind; it dulls his spiritual apprehension; he gradually loses his power of distin,;ui8hing between what is right and wrong, pure and impure, reverent and profane, kind and unkind, true and false. Ultimately his vision is confused, and mental obliquity takes the place of clear perception. "His eye iii evil, and his whole body is full of darkness;" he "calls good evil, and evil good ; " he has "blind eyes" (ver. 7). (2) Bondage of the soul. Sin leads down to servitude-to a bondage of which all bodily slaveries and imprisonments are only types and shadows. For, to be held in tbe bars of a spiritual captivity, ofan uuholy lust, of a depraved habit, of an irresistible tendency of mind, to strugµ;le more and more feebly and ineffectually against this, and at last for tbe soul to surreuder itself a hopt!ess caprive,-this is a degra.dation beyond and beneath which it is impossible for man to pass. .But we have the promise of- I V. DIVINE RESTORATION. "I have called thee . . . to open the blind eyes, to bring out tbe prisoners," etc. (vers. 6, 7). Jesus Christ came "to preach dcliver,moe to the captives" (Luke iv. 18). This he does by (1) his enlightening truth; (2) his renewing and redeeming Spirit.-0. Ver. 16.-Tlie 1.1,nrecognized path, "I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known." 'l'he general truth here is that the &.ll-wi110 God ie working on oqr behalf in wa.ys which "re mysterious !'t th11 CH, XLII. 1-25.] THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. 129