Isaiah 59:1-15 Listen! The Lord’s arm is not too weak to save you, nor is his ear too deaf to hear you call. It’s your sins that have cut you off from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore. Your hands are the hands of murderers, and your fingers are filthy with sin. Your lips are full of lies, and your mouth spews corruption. No one cares about being fair and honest. The people’s lawsuits are based on lies. They conceive evil deeds and then give birth to sin. They hatch deadly snakes and weave spiders’ webs. Whoever falls into their webs will die, and there’s danger even in getting near them. Their webs can’t be made into clothing, and nothing they do is productive. All their activity is filled with sin, and violence is their trademark. Their feet run to do evil, and they rush to commit murder. They think only about sinning. Misery and destruction always follow them. They don’t know where to find peace or what it means to be just and good. They have mapped out crooked roads, and no one who follows them knows a moment’s peace. So there is no justice among us, and we know nothing about right living. We look for light but find only darkness. We look for bright skies but walk in gloom. We grope like the blind along a wall, feeling our way like people without eyes. Even at brightest noontime, we stumble as though it were dark. Among the living we are like the dead. We growl like hungry bears; we moan like mournful doves. We look for justice, but it never comes. We look for rescue, but is is far away from us. For our sins are piled up before God and testify against us. Yes, we know what sinners we are. We know we have rebelled and have denied the Lord. We have turned our backs on our God. We know how unfair and oppressive we have been, carefully planning our deceitful lies. Our courts oppose the righteous, and justice is nowhere to be found. Truth stumbles in the streets, and honesty has been outlawed. Yes, truth is gone, and anyone who renounces evil is attacked.
This is where you find yourselves today. You as a society have chosen this path. Many of you who believe in me have chosen to ignore what has been happening for a long time now. So, whether you actively participated in the orchestration of this evil, or were passive participants by not intervening and fighting it, here you are. Neck deep in it. Being controlled by it to one extent or another. What are you going to do? If you are waiting for someone to jump in and save your society, your Nation, your world – well then you will go down with it. This is your battle. Each and every one of you. Either fight to bring back righteousness, faith, morality, justice or stop complaining and slide down the slope to utter darkness. But, hear me: If you are going to complain about it then do something. I will help you. I will not jump in and fix it. That would be a useless gesture which you would not value and would, ultimately, throw away.
Amanuensis 