Isaiah 29:9-12 - Homilies By W. Clarkson

Spiritual incapacity.

Our powers, as men and women, are limited enough; and it may well be that those of God's children who move in wider spheres and are endowed with greater capacities look down in wonder, if not with amusement, on our large pretensions. Yet we talk freely of the incapable, the feeble, the helpless, as if we ourselves were strong. There are various degrees of power and weakness among us, but the most important belong to that kind of incapacity to which the text refers.

I. ITS DOMAIN . The prophet treats of spiritual helplessness. We see and lament physical incapacity in the shape of blindness, deafness, paralysis, etc. We also have to treat mental incapacity in the form of intellectual feebleness, decline, imbecility, insanity. But by far the saddest sight in the view of God is spiritual incapacity—that moral condition in which the soul has lost its native powers, is destitute of those acquirements which would enable it to stand side by side with the holiest of the heavenly world, lacks the wisdom by which it might defend itself against its adversaries, and is therefore the prey of the worst evils, forfeits its birthright, and moves towards its doom. This incapacity affects the soul in all its higher and more serious relations—in its relation to God, to those to whom it is under obligation, to its own character.

II. ITS TWO PRINCIPAL MANIFESTATIONS .

1. Blindness . "The spirit of deep sloop" the closing or covering of the eyes ( Isaiah 29:10 ). The last, or nearly the last, effect of sin is to take away the faculty of spiritual insight; so that a man cannot see those things which a human soul ought to recognize at once, the recognition of which is indispensable to its very life; viz. the presence, the claims, the power of God; the excellency of his service; the unworthiness and insufficiency of sensual gratifications and worldly ambitions; the deathfulness of sin, etc. But to the spiritually incapable these things are as if they were not. Such souls are as unconscious of these realities as is a man in a deep sleep, or as is one whose eyes are covered, of the objects which are before him.

2. Error . "They stagger, but not with strong drink" ( Isaiah 29:9 ). As a man under the influence of stimulants cannot "walk straight," but staggers from side to side or wanders out of his way altogether, so men who are robbed of their rightful powers by sin fail to walk straight on in the path of rectitude: they deviate into

III. ITS COMPLETENESS .

1. It extends to the highest ,—he has covered the eyes of "your rulers" ( Isaiah 29:10 ); to those who lead and who, being blind themselves, will certainly mislead ( Matthew 15:14 ); to those whose social influence is strong and, in ibis ease, most pernicious.

2. It includes the specialists— the privileged, those who profess to have peculiar access to truth: "The seers hath he covered." Woe to the land, to the Church, whose religious teachers are unable to see the directing finger of God, and are giving way to dreams of their own imagination!

3. It embraces those instructed in oilier thin , is . It is not only the unlearned that cannot read at all, but the learned men also, who are blind to the truths of God ( Isaiah 29:11 , Isaiah 29:12 ). Here, in nature, in providence, in Scripture is a glorious, three-volumed work, the full work of God; here are sacred truths which enlarge the mind and elevate the soul, which beautify and ennoble life, prepare for death, and fit for immortal blessedness. But, with powers diminished, depraved, or destroyed by sin, they who can learn other lessons and read other secrets are as undiscerning as the most illiterate boor in presence of a language of which he does not know the alphabet, as helpless as the finished scholar in presence of a roll the seal of which he cannot break!

IV. ITS EXPLANATION . How can we account for this depravation of man's spiritual powers? It is the fitting penalty of sin; it comes in the righteous judgments of God: "The Lord hath poured out upon you," etc. ( Isaiah 29:10 ). It is the retribution attached to a guilty non-use or misuse of spiritual faculty; it is a "woe" that is always working: "From him that hath not " — does not use, or abuses his talents—"shall be taken away even that which he hath" ( Matthew 25:29 ).—C.