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‘But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost.’
2Co_4:3
A thing may be ‘hidden’ and made invisible to the eye from one or other of three causes: the organ of vision may be weakened or destroyed, or there may come in something between which obstructs the sight, or it may be an act of sovereignty to ‘hide’ it.
I. Weakness of vision.—The Apostle assigns to the Corinthians the first cause. He says that Satan, whom he calls ‘the god of this world,’ hath ‘blinded their minds.’ The spiritual nerve is destroyed. The retina of the mind is out of order. The right image is not formed. There is no reflection of the object inwardly. You have not the capacity of seeing such things as these.
II. Light obscured.—Something has come in between you and truth. You look through a darkening medium, over a thick world. A big sin hinders the view. Heaven is eclipsed. You cannot see God.
III. God’s sovereignty.—It may be true of you, you have driven God to do an act of retributive justice. What you would not see you cannot see. There cannot be sight without light, and the light, which you have neglected, has been withdrawn. God has given you up to the darkness which you chose.
IV. What is at the root of all this?—What underlies the threefold process? Why is the religious faculty of your mind destroyed? From what road is that intervening barrier which shuts out God and heavenly things? For what cause has God ‘blinded your eyes, and hardened your heart; that you should not see with your eyes, nor understand with your heart, and be converted, and He should heal you’? Why does He ‘hide’ Himself and His truth from you? The answer to all three questions is one—your sin. You would not give up your sin. You were not prepared to accept the Gospel of His grace on the conditions. And so sin dulled the perceptive power: sin drew the veil: one sin was punished by another sin; and then that sin by another—till God retired into a distance from you, too far for you really to see Him. Sin did its own proper work. Sin gendered unbelief. You were afraid of the light, because the light condemned you. From long darkness your heart grew dark. Gradually the whole field of moral light was ‘hidden.’ And because you hated holiness, holiness became too bright a thing for you to look at.