I’m the Problem

“Indeed, the Lord’s hand is not too short to save, and His ear is not too deaf to hear. But your iniquities have built barriers between you and your God, and your sins have made Him hide His face from you so that He does not listen. For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers, with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, and your tongues mutter injustice. No one makes claims justly; no one pleads honestly. They trust in empty and worthless words; they conceive trouble and give birth to iniquity. They hatch viper’s eggs and weave spider’s webs. Whoever eats their eggs will die; crack one open, and a viper is hatched. Their webs cannot become clothing, and they cannot cover themselves with their works. Their works are sinful works, and violent acts are in their hands. Their feet run after evil, and they rush to shed innocent blood. Their thoughts are sinful thoughts; ruin and wretchedness are in their paths. They have not known the path of peace, and there is no justice in their ways. They have made their roads crooked; no one who walks on them will know peace. Therefore justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us. We hope for light, but there is darkness; for brightness, but we live in the night. We grope along a wall like the blind; we grope like those without eyes. We stumble at noon as though it were twilight; we are like the dead among those who are healthy. We all growl like bears and moan like doves. We hope for justice, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us. For our transgressions have multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us. For our transgressions are with us, and we know our iniquities: transgression and deception against the Lord, turning away from following our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering lying words from the heart.” (Isaiah‬ ‭59‬:‭1‬-‭13‬ ‭HCSB‬‬)

I don’t know if you have siblings, but I grew up with three brothers. What’s ironic and encouraging is that they are probably reading these words. Over the years, we’ve stayed close even though we live far away from each other. That’s one of the great things about our modern lifestyle and technological advancements. I can pull a device out of my pocket and instantly communicate with my brothers who live a long way away from me, from the mountains and almond groves of California to sweltering plains of Oklahoma to the azure blue coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. We share more than just DNA, we share a love that is grounded in the faith our parents taught us and demonstrated for us.

What does all of that have to do with this week’s focal passage? I love my brothers and they love me, but we were never angels. There’s a reason my dad lost his hair at a young age. When four boys get together, there’s not much they can’t get into and destroy. But one thing we were really good at was blaming each other for whatever trouble we created. I can’t tell you how many times I blamed one of my brothers for something I had done and they did the same to me. 

I remember my mother keeping a long switch (usually a very limber willow limb) on the dash of our family station wagon. When things got out of hand in the back seat, like they often did, she would grab that switch and reach back and swing it. When you swing a long, limber willow switch around the back seat of a station wagon, nobody is spared. At least one of the four of us would be saying, “but it wasn’t me!” My mother would respond, “Well, I’m sure you deserved it for something else.” And she was always right, we did. I’m quite certain I deserved far more spankings than I ever received.

What do my ramblings about four rowdy and mischievous boys have to do with our passage in Isaiah? Well, just about everything. Let’s start by skipping over the details of verse one, for now. Don’t worry, we’ll come back to those. For now, the basics of that verse will get us going. It poses a deeply theological dilemma, is God able to able to do anything about the mess our world is in? Why doesn’t He respond to our cries for justice in this unjust world?

One of the dangers of being a prophet of God is that He often calls them to speak out on topics that are culturally unpopular and personally offensive. If a prophet only says what the people want to hear then he’s not a prophet, he’s their puppet. In our day and age, that’s not a prophet of God but a social media algorithm. In truth, what Isaiah is telling us is something much of our culture and the modern church seems to reject – it’s a systemic problem. What? Wait, that can’t be right. Can it?

I’ve listened with great interest at the debate that has raged in our culture over the issues of racism, hatred and sexual abuse. Some were making the claim that the issues are systemic to our social, political and cultural institutions and even corporate structure. To my surprise, many Christians balked at the very idea. How can our institutions be plagued by systemic problems and issues? Because these institutions are staffed by broken, sinful people; people who rebel against and continually defy God and His ways. So, it is a systemic problem but the root cause is deeper than any of them wants to admit.

That brings me to the main thrust of this passage, the sin of the people and the impact it has on our culture and on our lives, in particular. As we get into this passage, you need to notice the change in the structure from second person to third person, then from third person to first person. That’s not incidental, it is intentional. There is intent in the way Isaiah uses these words to address the issue. It moves the focus from you to them and from them to us. Pay attention to that change because I need your focus to change in coordination with God’s focus on this issue.

Initially, Isaiah wants us to hear these words clearly: “your iniquities have built barriers between you and your God, and your sins have made Him hide His face from you so that He does not listen.” That is the overarching message for Isaiah’s book, your sin is separating you from your God. Fortunately, God doesn’t leave us wallowing in our sin without a solution. 

In normal religious practices we would just need to “up the ante” or increase our pious worship. In practical terms, we would need to bring bigger, better bulls or lambs for sacrifice or, in our case, put a larger amount in the offering plate. If $5 doesn’t get God’s attention, maybe $20 will do it. What, $20 isn’t enough? You don’t think God really wants that much, do you? Yes, yes I do… He doesn’t want a pittance, He wants a sacrifice. He doesn’t want your money, He wants YOU!

You may think I’m kidding. If so, pay attention to the next verse: “For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers, with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, and your tongues mutter injustice.” God is responding, but not to the religious piety and worship being offered up. He’s responding to the way “you” live your life on a daily basis. Worship is empty and hollow when it is missing the day-to-day life of obedience for God’s glory. Notice, He moves from being very general about “your” iniquities and sins to being very specific about your hands covered in blood, your fingers dripping with defilement, your lips speaking lies, your tongues muttering injustice.

Next, God broadens the charges by switching from a second person “you and your” to a third person “they and their”. Again, we started with some general accusations about speaking lies and muttering injustices but now He gets specific: “No one makes claims justly; no one pleads honestly.” These are legal terms used in court proceedings, just claims and honest pleas. In other words, they’re not using the courts for justice but rather to get just what they want. This seems to really reflect our current culture and political climate. We don’t seek what’s right, we seek what’s right for ourselves.

Then God’s accusations begin to show how those actions lead to results: “They trust in empty worthless words; they conceive trouble and give birth to iniquity. They hatch viper’s eggs and weave spider’s webs. Whoever eats their eggs will die; crack one open, and a viper is hatched.” Empty words are worthless and untrustworthy. They just conceive trouble and give birth to sin and rebellion (iniquity). Our words are the expression of our hearts. They are our will and our desires put into action. When we give ourselves over to them, they result in “viper’s eggs and spider’s webs.”

We often miss that. Go read that, again. When our desires get expressed without the guidance of God and His Word then they result in things that we don’t really want. More specifically, our desires hatch ideas and take actions (eggs) that seek to destroy us and our best laid plans (webs) can’t cover up our shame and nakedness. Our sin-filled actions result in eggs that poison us or hatch open and bite us or produce webs that are unable to clothe us in righteousness. God sums it up like this: “their works are sinful, their hands are filled with violence, their feet run after evil and they rush to shed innocent blood.”

Now, Isaiah draws a contrast between the highway God is building (see Isaiah 35 and 40 – we’ll also encounter it again in chapter 62) and the pathway His people have chosen: “…ruin and wretchedness are in their paths. They have not known the path of peace, and there is no justice in their ways. They have made their roads crooked; no one who walks on them will know peace.” Let that sink in a bit. The roads or pathways of life we design, lay out and walk are all crooked and cannot result in the peace we seek. The only way to find the life we really desire is to travel the road that God has laid out. You simply can’t get there any other way. 

“Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John‬ ‭14‬:‭6‬ ‭HCSB‬‬)

Finally, we move from second and third person references to first person: “Therefore, justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us. We hope for light, but there is darkness; for brightness, but we live in the night.” In case you didn’t catch it, that’s very personal. If I were to ask any person I met on the street if they were perfect, I believe they would respond with a resounding:  “NO!” I suspect you would respond in the very same way to that question. 

We readily recognize that we aren’t perfect, but that’s a very generic statement. God needs to get personal and cause us to recognize and acknowledge our personal involvement in this situation. He needs us to understand how are our words are hollow and empty, our actions are sinful, our hands are bloody and our fingers drip from the violence. This isn’t just about “you and your” iniquities or “their sinful works and violent acts”. This is about you and me, this is about us and we. We’re culpable in this situation and responsible for this mess.

Let me get specific with you. You won’t follow God’s path until you admit your own isn’t working. You can’t walk the highway of God until you’re willing to abandon your own crooked path. You won’t seek a new life until you admit this one isn’t cutting it. You CANNOT walk in the light of God until you are willing to admit you’re walking in the darkness of your own sin. You’ll never be “born again” until you admit you’re dead in your own sinful choices (see Jn. 3:3-21 and Eph. 2). You will never discover the solution to life’s problems until you admit you’re part of the problem. 

That’s exactly where God has brought us to in this Isaiah passage: “We grope along a wall like the blind; we grope like those without eyes. We stumble at noon as though it were twilight; we are like the dead among those who are healthy. We all growl like bears and moan like doves. We hope for justice, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us. For our transgressions have multiplied before You, and our sins testify against us. For our transgressions are with us, and we know our iniquities: transgression and deception against the Lord, turning away from following our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering lying words from the heart.” (Isaiah‬ ‭59‬:‭10‬-‭13‬ ‭HCSB‬‬)

Yes, it’s a systemic problem. It pervades us and everything we conceive, create, and touch. Our political, social, cultural and, yes, even our theological institutions are ultimately broken because we are a broken people. Our churches are not perfect, even though we seek and serve a perfect savior. But they’re broken by design. Now that might startle you, at first. You might even question it. But I can assure you, scripture says that God has done this by design. We are cracked clay vessels so that the real treasure, glory of God, is on full display through our obedience and service. 

“Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us.” (2 Corinthians‬ ‭4‬:‭7‬ ‭HCSB‬‬)

I know, it’s hard to admit your way doesn’t work. It’s a pride thing. That’s one of the HUGE cracks in these “clay vessels” we inhabit. But it is only when we kneel before Almighty God in humility, contrition and repentance that He lifts us up, restores us and begins this incredible work of amazing grace in us. It is only when we finally recognize that the problems in this world are not caused by “you” or “them” but really by US that we begin to find our way onto the highway of holiness that leads us to God. We love to blame everyone else, but the only solution is to admit: “I’m the problem.”

If you’re at that point, let me encourage you to do what I stated above: kneel before God, be open and honest with Him about your failures and your fears. Submit to Him and ask Him to forgive you and to take control of your life and be your LORD. Then seek Him through prayer and seek obedience through reading learning and obeying His Word. Then find a church or home fellowship that preaches the whole truth of God’s Word and be a part of it. You need them and they need you.

If you’re still resisting God’s work in you, let me remind you that you can’t know peace until you surrender to the only One who gives peace. You’ll grope along like someone without eyes until you surrender to the light of the world.

Either way, drop me a note and know I’ll be praying for you…