The helplessness of superstition.
Here a mass of thought is found, struggling for expression as the new-lighted fuel struggles into flame.
I. THE ORACLE SEALED. 'Tis time to make an end. Let what has been written remain, rolled up and sealed and kept, until the day when those taciturn letters shall find their tongue and burst into flame. And, indeed, every true thing may be said to be "written down for the time to come, forever and ever." It may be lost sight of for a time, but only to be recovered. For though the records of human thought, nay, the human mind itself, is a palimpsest, oft scribbled over, the eternal writing of God upon the conscience is indelible, and will be seen, despite willful blindness and pedantic glosses. The testimony we bear is first and last for the eyes of God. The Roman poet (Hor; 'Ep.,' Ephesians 1:20) seems to dread the fate of oblivion for his verse at certain moments—cannot brook the thought that his roll shall be packed into its case and left unread. But such was not to be the fate of the poetry of Horace, nor of any true poetry. God can read through the closed pages of true lives, and faithful utterances find audience in the court of angels, in the hails of eternity.
II. PLEDGES OF FUTURE GOOD. "I and the children whom Jehovah hath given me are signs and omens in Israel on the part of Jehovah of hosts, who dwelleth on the Zion-mount." His own name meant "God's salvation;" those of his children, as we have seen, "The remnant will return" (or, "be converted"), and "Hasten-booty, Speed-spoil." For the soul that is strong in faith is also strong in hope, and it makes its own omens, or finds omens where others can see none.
III. MAGICAL SUGGESTIONS REPUDIATED. The wizard, the magician, the "medium," as he is now called, was in great vogue in the days of Ahaz. Just as at modern séances, these media would imitate the supposed voices of ghosts in some low chirping or muttering tone. What keener satire could be launched against such practices than that of the prophet! It is indeed turning to the dead, instead of to the living and the true God. Where the taste for truth is spoiled, the appetite for the extraordinary and marvelous springs up; and men will fall headlong into the greatest follies, provided they flatter their self-conceit, though wide awake to their interest, and keen to detect the impositions of others in general.
IV. TOO-LATE REPENTANCE. The language is condensed, the thought fused in a mass. But the meaning seems to be—too late will the weak and wicked apply to the true oracles they had forsaken for the false. "In extreme distress, and afflicted with the pangs of starvation, the man rushes as a maniac through the land, curses in the moment of his terrible distress and exasperation his god and lord whom he vainly and slavishly served, and directs his eyes upwards to the true God. But when he looks down to the earth again because he had discerned no light above, he sees there the most dreadful darkness and distress, without any ray of light, without any hope breaking through it, and thus he is hunted forth again into the darkness to perish therein (cf. Job 15:22, Job 15:23; Job 18:5, Job 18:13)" (Ewald).—J.
HOMILIES BY W.M. STATHAM