Wicked Men Compared to Mountains

    WICKED MEN COMPARED TO MOUNTAINS

    "Thou shall thresh the Mountains, and beat them small, &c., Isa 41:15.

    "Upon all high Mountains, that are lifted up" &c., Isa 2:14.

    "Who art thou, O great Mountain?" &c., Ec 4:7.

    PARALLELS

    I. MOUNTAINS are high and lifted up, and seem to have the pre-eminence: so the wicked princes and potentates of the earth are high in power, and seem to be lifted up in pride and arrogancy, and to have pre-eminence over the righteous.

    II. Mountains are hard to be removed out of their places: so the wicked, having taken such root in sin, &c., it is very hard and difficult to remove them and make them become plain. This was, it is true, one great design of the ministry of John Baptist; "Every valley shall he filled, and every Mountain and hill shall be brought low," &c., Lu 3:5. But this work is not done upon the spirits of Wicked Men, but by the mighty power of God.

    III. Mountains and hills are commonly barren and unprofitable ground: so the Wicked, who are lifted up in pride and arrogancy, &c., are spiritually a barren, useless, and unprofitable sort of Men.

    IV. Mountains were accounted places of defence, whither Men used to fly in time of danger, though in many times they failed them: so Men oft-times fly to the lofty enemies of God, oppressing, tyrannical powers of the earth, to secure themselves from approaching dangers; but in vain, alas, is salvation looked for from these Mountains and hills in the day of God's anger.

    INFERENCES

    In this saints have cause to rejoice; God hath promised to throw down all the hills and Mountains of the earth; that are lifted up: "Who art thou, O great Mountain! Before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain," Ec 4:7.