Isaiah 6:5 - Homiletics

Man's unworthiness brought home to him by nothing o much as seeing God.

The natural man is, for the most part, very well contented with himself. He does not deal much in self-scrutiny, and is not often troubled with twinges of conscience. If at any time be has any misgivings, he compares himself with other men, and readily persuades himself that he is quite as good, or even very much better than his neighbors. "God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are," is his self-satisfied utterance; or, if he is not quite so arrogant as this, at any rate he thinks himself "quite good enough"—as honest, industrious, liberal, moral generally, as he needs to be. Occasionally he may be startled a little out of his self-complacency by coming in contact with persons of a different stamp from himself, whom he sees to have a different rule of life, a different conception of their duties to God and man. But it is seldom that he wakes up to any true conviction of, in until in some way or other, there is revealed to him some "vision of God," some conception of the true nature of that pure and holy Being who has made and rules the universe. Once let him open the eye of his soul and see God as he is—perfectly pure, holy, just, immaculate—and he cannot but be driven by the contrast to recognize his own weakness, wickedness, impurity, unrighteousness, deeply engrained sinfulness. Some conviction of sin must flash on him. Well for him if it be deep and strong! Welt for him if it brings him, first to confession ( Luke 18:13 ), and then to earnest, heartfelt prayer for pardon! God's seraph will then haply bring him such a "burning coal" from the altar before the throne of God as he brought to Isaiah, and convey to him the assurance that, for the merits of Christ, his "iniquity is taken away, and his sin purged."