Foreign invasion.
This powerful picture points to the threatened Assyrian invasion.
I. THE IMAGE OF A WARLIKE ADVANCE. It is wrought out with singular boldness. Jehovah of hosts is conceived as lifting up a signal visible to the far-off nations, and sounding at the same time a whistle-cry, so that they swiftly gather together and come in troops from the horizon. Then rapid and unbroken is their march. Not a foot tires, not a warrior drowses or sleeps, or stays to rest. Not one looses his girdle, or the thong of his sandal, as the eager host presses on. The arrows are all sharpened, the bows all spanned. The sound of the horses' hoofs strike and flash like flint-stones, and the chariot-wheels roll on like the rush of a whirlwind. The air is full of a horrible roar, as of lions hastening to their unescaping prey. Such a picture is the faithful representation of the mood of the soul in its guilt and alarm. For nature reflects all our moods. Her sounds and sights are ever full of foreboding and terror to the self-condemned conscience. But the conscience at peace will throw forth its light upon all external gloom, and convert, what seem to others the sounds of hell broke loose, into the celestial times of eternal love.
II. THE IMAGE OF THE EARTHQUAKE. The rage in the heavens will be like a tempest at sea. And when the stricken ones turn to the firm land, there is a darkness which only reflects the anguish of their souls—thick darkness, and the light is hidden. No gloom we can conceive in nature, no sounds of overwhelming violence, nor sights that strike horror to every breast, can rival the terrors which the guilty soul may know. The soul is the real theatre of all these Divine dramas. So far as we can read the faces of men or look into their breasts, some stand for fear and some for hope; some the scenes of great quaking and terrors, some still conscious where the soft, still voice of the God of mercy is ever heard. As the vex humana stop may be used to sound the accents of prayer amidst a storm, so in trouble the psalms of the believer make a music of comfort. "God is our Refuge and Strength …. Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed, and the mountains be cast into the midst of the sea …. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our Refuge." "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty."—J.
HOMILIES BY W.M. STATHAM