Isaiah 8:12-14 Say you not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say, A confederacy; neither fear you their fear, nor be afraid.… I. The sinful fears of most good men spring out of their IGNORANCE; all darkness disposes to fear, but none like intellectual darkness. You read (Song of Solomon 3:8) how Solomon's lifeguard had every man his sword upon his thigh, "because of fear in the night." The night is the frightful season, in the dark every bush is a bear; we sometimes smile by day to see what silly things those were that scared us in the night. So it is here; were our judgments but duly informed, how soon would our hearts be quieted! There is a fivefold ignorance out of which fears are generated. 1. Ignorance of God. Ignorance and inconsiderateness lay at the root of the fears expressed in Isaiah 40:27. 2. Ignorance of men. Did we consider men as they are in the hand of our God we should not tremble at them as we do. 3. Ignorance of ourselves and the relation we have to God (Isaiah 51:12; Genesis 15:1; Nehemiah 6:11). O that we could, without vanity, but value ourselves duly. according to our Christian dignities and privileges, which, if ever it be necessary to count over and value, it is in such times of danger, when the heart is so prone to sinking fears. 4. Ignorance of our dangers and troubles. We are ignorant of — (1) The comforts that are in them. Paul and Silas met that in a prison which made them to sing at midnight, and so have many more since their day. (2) The outlets and escapes from them (Psalm 68:20; 2 Peter 2:9; 1 Corinthians 10:13). 5. Especially ignorance and inconsiderateness of the covenant of grace. II. Another cause of sinful fear is GUILT UPON THE CONSCIENCE. No sooner had Adam defiled and wounded his conscience with guilt, but he trembles and hides himself (Proverbs 28:1; Isaiah 33:14). To this wounded and trembling conscience is opposed the spirit of a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7). An evil conscience foments fears and terrors three ways. 1. By aggravating small matters. So it was with Cain (Genesis 4:14), "Every one that meets me will slay me." Now every child was a giant in his eye, and anybody he met his over-match. 2. By interpreting all doubtful cases in the worst sense that can be fastened upon them. If the swallows do but chatter in the chimney, Bessus interprets it to be a discovery of his crime; that they are telling tales of him and saying, Bessus killed a man. 3. A guilty conscience can and often does create fears and terrors out of nothing at all (Psalm 53:5). III. No less is the sin of UNBELIEF the real and proper cause of most distracting fears (Matthew 8:26). Fear is generated by unbelief, and unbelief strengthened by fear, as in nature there is an observable circular generation, vapours begetting showers and showers new vapours. 1. Unbelief weakens the assenting act of faith, and thereby cuts off from the soul, in a great measure, its principal relief against danger and troubles (Hebrews 11:27). 2. Unbelief shuts up the refuges of the soul in the Divine promises, and by leaving it without those refuges, must needs leave it in the hand of fears and terrors. 3. Unbelief makes men negligent in providing for troubles before they come, and so brings them by way of surprises upon them. 4. Unbelief leaves our dearest interests and concerns in our own hands; it commits nothing to God, and consequently must needs fill the heart with distracting fears when imminent dangers threaten us (1 Peter 4:19; 2 Timothy 1:12; Proverbs 16:3). IV. Many of our fears are raised by THE PROMISCUOUS ADMINISTRATION OF PROVIDENCE in this world (Ecclesiastes 9:2; Ezekiel 21:3; Habakkuk 1:13). The butcheries of the Albigenses, Waldenses, etc. 1. We are apt to consider that the same race and kind of men that committed these outrages upon our brethren are still in being, and that their malice is not abated in the least degree. Cain's club is to this day carried up and down the world, stained with the blood of Abel, as Bucholtzer speaks. 2. We know also that nothing hinders the execution of their wicked purposes against us but the restraints of providence. 3. We find that God hath many times let loose these lions upon His people. The best men have suffered the worst things. 4. We are conscious how far short we come in holiness of those excellent persons who have suffered these things, and therefore have no ground to expect more favour from providence than they found. The revolving of such considerations in our thoughts and mixing our own unbelief with them, creates a world of fears, even in good men, till, by resignation of all to God, and acting faith upon His promises (Romans 8:28; Psalm 91:15; Isaiah 27:8; Revelation 7:17), we do, at last, recover our hearts out of the hands of our fears again, and compose them to a quiet and sweet satisfaction in the wise and holy pleasure of our God. V. OUR IMMODERATE LOVE OF LIFE AND THE COMFORTS AND CONVENIENCES THEREOF may be assigned as a proper and real ground and cause of our sinful fears, when the dangers of the times threaten the one or the other (Revelation 12:11; Acts 20:24, 25). 1. Life is the greatest and nearest interest men naturally have in this world, and that which wraps up all other inferior interests in itself (Job 2:4; Genesis 25:32). 2. That which endangers life must, in the eyes of the natural man, be the greatest evil that can befall him. 3. Though death be terrible in any shape, yet a violent death by the hands of cruel and merciless men is the most terrible form that death can appear in. VI. Many of our sinful fears flow from THE INFLUENCES OF SATAN upon our phantasies. By putting men into such frights he weakens their hands in duty, as is plain from his attempt this way upon Nehemiah (Nehemiah 6:13), and if he prevail there, he drives them into the snares and traps of his temptations, as the fisherman and fowler do the birds and fishes in their nets, when once they have frighted them out of their coverts. ( J. Flavel.) Parallel Verses KJV: Say ye not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say, A confederacy; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid. |
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