Thus saith the LORD, Where is the bill of your mother's divorcement, whom I have put away? or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold, for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is your mother put away.
Wherfore, when I came, was there no man? when I called, was there none to answer? Is my hand shortened at all, that it cannot redeem? or have I no power to deliver? behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a wilderness: their fish stinketh, because there is no water, and dieth for thirst.
I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.
The Lord GOD hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: he wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned.
The Lord GOD hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back.
I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.
For the Lord GOD will help me; therefore shall I not be confounded: therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed.
He is near that justifieth me; who will contend with me? let us stand together: who is mine adversary? let him come near to me.
Behold, the Lord GOD will help me; who is he that shall condemn me? lo, they all shall wax old as a garment; the moth shall eat them up.
Who is among you that feareth the LORD, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God.
Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks: walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of mine hand; ye shall lie down in sorrow.
A FIRE OF DYING SPARKS
‘Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks: walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of Mine hand; ye shall lie down in sorrow.’
Isaiah 50:11
In this text the many fictitious sources from which men seek to derive happiness are compared to a fire kindled, and sparks struck out by way of relieving the darkness of the night. It is of course implied in the metaphor that true happiness, the real and adequate complement of man’s nature, resembles the Divinely created and golden sunlight.
I. This comparison does not lead us to deny that pleasure and gratification of a certain kind are derivable from worldly sources.
II. Consider the drawbacks of worldly enjoyments.—(1) Unsatisfactoriness adheres in their very nature, inasmuch as they are all (more or less) artificial. (2) The fitful character of the enjoyment derived from worldly sources renders it comparable to a fire and sparks struck out. (3) A fire requires constantly to be fed with fresh fuel, if its brilliancy and warmth are to be maintained. (4) But perhaps the chief drawback of the worldling’s so-called happiness is that it is consistent with so much anxiety—that it is subject to frequent intrusions from alarm, whenever a glimpse of the future untowardly breaks in upon his mind.
—Dean Goulburn.
