Isaiah 9:10

PRESUMPTUOUS SELF-DECEIVERS

‘The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones.’

Isaiah 9:10

I. It was difficult to convince these Israelites that they were sinners.—Driven from one refuge, they took shelter in another. ‘ The bricks are fallen,’ they said, ‘ but we will build with hewn stones.’

So I have many subterfuges and coverings for my guilt. Convicted on one indictment, I shape for myself another plea. The customs and fashions of the day blind me to my peril, as there were mourners in the Middle Ages who concealed their grief under a dress of purple and gold. The whirl of business dulls the tumults within me, as in the midst of battle the soldier forgets his mortal wound. The round of pleasure absorbs me, as sometimes a plague-stricken city gives itself up to recklessness and riot. My blameless creed and my religious observances hinder me from seeing the leprosy that is eating into my life.

II. Thus, when the bricks are fallen, I build with hewn stone; and when the sycamores are cut down, I change them into cedars. But from all my false refuges may God, with loving severity, drive me—drive me into true self-knowledge, and lowly penitence, and His own everlasting arms.