e truth of our
text: 'It is thy destruction that thou art against Me.'

The pleading God has from the beginning spoken words as tender as they
are stern, and as stern as they are tender. His voice to the sons of men
has from of old asked the unanswerable question, 'Why should ye be
stricken any more?' and has answered it, so far as answer is possible,
by the fact, which is as mysterious as it is undeniable, 'Ye will revolt
more and more.' God calls upon man to judge between Him and His
vineyard, and asks, 'What could have been done more to My vineyard that
I have not done unto it? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring
forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?' The fault lay not in the
vine-dresser, but in some evil influence that had found its way into the
life and sap of the vine, and bore fruits in an unnatural product, which
could not have been traced to the vine-dresser's action. So God stands,
as with clean hands, declaring that 'He is pure from the blood of all
men; that He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked'; and His word
to the men on whom falls the whole weight of His destroying power is,
'Thou hast procured this unto thyself.'

III. The loving forbearance which still offers restoration.

He still claims to be Israel's Help. Separation from Him has all but
destroyed the rebellious; but it has not in the smallest degree affected
the fulness of His power, nor the fervency of His desire to help.
However earth may be shaken by storms, or swathed in mist that darkens
all things and shuts out heaven, the sun is still in its tabernacle and
pouring down its rays through the cloudless blue that is above the
enfolding cloud. Our text has wrapped up in it the broad gospel that all
our self-inflicted destruction may be arrested, and all the evil which
brought it about swept away. God is ready to prove Himself our true and
only Helper in that, as our prophet says, 'He will ransom us from the
power of the grave'; and, even when death has laid its cold hand upon
us, will redeem us from it, and destroy the destruction which had fixed
its talons in us. All the guilt is ours; all the help is His; His work
is to conquer and cast out our sins, to heal our sicknesses, to soothe
our sorrows. And He has Himself vindicated His great name of our Help
when He has revealed Himself as 'the God and Father of our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ.'

ISRAEL RETURNING

'O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for tho