Isaiah 54:4 Fear not; for you shall not be ashamed: neither be you confounded; for you shall not be put to shame… To many religious people the burden of the past is the heaviest of their lives. No difficulties and trials of the present can match it for bitterness. They look forward calmly and hopefully to whatever the years may bring. Even the valley of the shadow has little terror for them, believing as they do that they will be shepherded through that to the eternal fold. And yet they are often weighted by a sore burden of the past; they are hag-ridden by shadows of dead days. Sometimes it is the very greatness and success and joy of the past which induce this constant recollection. But the burden of the past, which is more in keeping with the thought of our text, is not the recollection of some joy or success, but of some failure, some sorrow, some loss, some sin, some shame. And to some who live ever under the shadow of this memory it would mean new life to them if the promise came to them with the meaning it had in the prophet's lips, "Thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more." Of course, there is a certain sense in which we cannot forget, and are not meant to forget. Experience has its lessons to teach. All religion begins with repentance, and the appeal to repentance is an appeal to memory. But the promise of our text is a tacit condemnation of the sentimental brooding on the past, whatever that past may be, which weakens the present life, which keeps a man from gathering up the fragments of his life that remain, keeps him from doing his duty calmly, and giving himself to whatsoever things are true and pure and lovely and of good report. If we believe in the eternal love of God we must not let any pale ghost of the past, spectral figures of the night, chill our blood and keep us from our pilgrimage. 1)o not fear that this Christian doctrine of the forgiveness of sin will make sin easy; it is the only thing that can make sin impossible — the light that drives out the darkness, the love of God that fills the heart and leaves no room for evil, not even for evil memory. (Hugh Black, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. |
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