n his burden taken
off his back, and it is only after his burden is off and a Shining One
has said to him, Thy sins be forgiven, that a second Shining One comes
and strips him of his rags and clothes him with change of raiment. Now,
why, it may be asked, has Christian had to carry his burden so long, and
why is he still kept so ragged and so miserable and he so far on in the
pilgrim's path? Surely, it will be said, John Bunyan was dreaming indeed
when he kept a truly converted man, a confessedly true and sincere
Christian, so long in bonds and in rags. Well, as to his rags: filthy
rags are only once spoken of in the Bible, and it is the prophet Isaiah,
whose experience and whose language John Bunyan had so entirely by heart,
who puts them on. And that evangelist among the prophets not only calls
his own and Israel's sins filthy rags, but Isaiah is very bold, and calls
their very righteousnesses by that opprobrious name. Had that bold
prophet said that all his and all his people's _un_righteousnesses were
filthy rags, all Israel would have subscribed to that. There was no man
so brutish as not to admit that. But as long as they had any sense of
truth and any self-respect, multitudes of Isaiah's first hearers and
readers would resent what he so rudely said of their righteousnesses. On
the other hand, the prophet's terrible discovery and comparison, just
like our dreamer's dramatic distribution of Christian experience, was, to
a certainty, an immense consolation to many men in Israel in his day.
They gathered round Isaiah because, but for him and his evangelical
ministry, they would have been alone in their despair. To them Isaiah's
ministry was a house of refuge, and the prophet himself a veritable tower
of strength. They felt they were not alone so long as Isaiah dwelt in
the same city with them. And thus, whatever he might be to others, he
was God's very prophet to them as his daily prayers in the temple both
cast them down and lifted them up. 'Oh that Thou wouldst rend the
heavens and come down . . . But we are all as an unclean thing, and all
our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and our iniquities like the wind
have taken us away.' Thousands in Israel found in these terrible words a
door of hope, a sense of fellowship, and a call to trust and
thanksgiving. And tens of thousands have found the same help and
consolation out of what have seemed to others the very darkest and most
perplexing pages of the _P