The precise nature of the charge is to be carefully considered. The Name
is the sum of the revealed character, and that Name has been despised.
The charge is not that it has been blasphemed, but that it has been
neglected, or under-estimated, or cared little about. The pollution of
the table of the Lord is the overt act by which the attitude of mind and
heart expressed in despising His Name is manifested; but the overt act
is secondary and not primary--a symptom of a deeper-lying disease. And
herein our Prophet is true to the whole tenor of the Old Testament
teaching, which draws its indictment against men primarily in regard to
their attitude, and only as a manifestation of that, to their acts. The
same deed may be, if estimated in relation to human law, a crime: if
estimated in relation to godless ethics, a wrong; and if estimated in
the only right way, namely, the attitude towards God which it reveals, a
sin. 'The despising of His Name' may be taken as the very definition of
sin. It is usual with men to-day to say that 'Sin is selfishness'; but
that statement does not go deep enough unless it be recognised that
self-regard only becomes sin when it rears its puny self in opposition
to, or in disregard of, the plain will of God. The 'New Theology,' of
course, minimises, even where it does not, as it to be consistent
should, deny the possibility of sin: for, if God is all and all is God,
there can be no opposition, there can be no divine will to be opposed,
and no human will to oppose it. But the fact of sin certified by men's
own consciences is the rock on which Pantheism must always strike and
sink. A superficial view of human history and of human nature may try to
explain away the fact of sin by shallow talk about 'heredity' and
'environment,' or about 'ignorance' and 'mistakes'; but after all such
euphemistic attempts to rechristen the ugly thing by beguiling names,
the fact remains, and conscience bears sometimes unwilling witness to
its existence, that men do set their own inclinations against God's
commands, and that there is in them that which is 'not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed can be.' The root of all sin is the
despising of His Name.
And as sin has but one root, it has many branches, and as working
backwards from deed to motive, we find one common element in all the
various acts; so working outwards from motive to deed, we have to see
one common character stamped upon a tragical variety of acts. The
poison-water is exhibited in many variously coloured and tasted
draughts, but however unlike each other they may be, it is always the
same.
The great effort of God's love is to press home this consciousness of
despising His Name upon all hearts. The sorrows, losses, and
disappointments which come to us all are not meant only to make us
suffer, but through suffering to lead us to recognise how far we have
wandered from our Father, and to bring us back to His heart and our
home. The beginning of all good in us is the contrite acknowledgment of
our evil. Christ's first preaching was the continuation of John's
message, 'Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand'; and His
tenderest revelation of the divine love incarnated in Himself was meant
to arouse the penitent confession, 'I am no more worthy to be called Thy
son,' and the quickening resolve, 'I will arise and go to my Father.'
There is no way to God but through the narrow gate of repentance. There
is no true reception of the gift of Christ which does not begin with a
vivid and heart-broken consciousness of my own sin. We can pass into,
and abide in, the large room of joyous acceptance and fellowship, but we
must reach it by a narrow path walled in by gloomy rocks and trodden
with bleeding feet. The penitent knowledge of oar sin is the first step
towards the triumphant knowledge of Christ's righteousness as ours. Only
they who have called out in the agony of their souls, 'Lord, save us, we
perish,' have truly learned the love of God, and truly possess the
salvation that is in Christ.