HH, Sir Godfrey Gregg D.Div
“The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones: the sycomores are cut down, but we will change them into cedars.” Isaiah 9:10
It was difficult to convince these Israelites that they were sinners. Driven from one refuge — they took shelter in another. The bricks have fallen down, they said — but we will rebuild with hewn stone.
Just so, I have many subterfuges and coverings for my guilt. Convicted on one indictment — my pride shapes another excuse. Forced back from the outer walls — my pride retreats into the citadel.
My imagination paints the ugly thing in fair colours — as the parents of my race hid from God’s face among the green leaves and the bright flowers of Paradise.
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 discords and tumults within me — as in the midst of the hot battle the soldier forgets his mortal wound.
The round of gaiety and pleasure absorbs me — as sometimes the inhabitants of a plague-stricken city give themselves up to recklessness and riot.
My blameless creed and my religious observances hinder me from seeing leprosy that is eating into my heart and life — as the broad phylacteries and the long prayers of the Pharisees prevented them from confessing that they were white-washed sepulchers.
Thus, when the bricks are fallen down — I rebuild them with hewn stone, and when the fig trees have been felled — I will replace them with cedars. But from all my false refuges, may God with loving severity and invincible sweetness drive me — drive me into true self-knowledge, and lowly penitence, and His own everlasting arms!
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