"Unconscious Unreality"

"Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge..." Isaiah 5:13a

"The deadliest Pharisaism today is not hypocrisy, but unconscious unreality."
-Oswald Chambers

God is pointing out through Isaiah the dangers in lacking a firm grasp of reality. The "knowledge" that God's people lacked was that they were His "work" and "operation," (vs. 12) that Israel was His "vineyard" and Judah His "precious plant." (vs. 7) They did not grasp the reality that they were God's: made by Him, for Him. This lack of knowledge destroyed them.
"My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge..." (Hosea 4:6) I must say in all honesty that this is the sad fact of the modern Christian, a fact that I see most prevalent right here in Crichton College. There is no search for knowledge, no grasping for and of reality, no want for truth. People blow in with preconceived notions about God and the world, and instead of trying to find the truth about God and the world, they find every thing under the sun that bolsters there preconceived notions against any words of truth. If you hate one denominations way of looking at things, you will find everything out there that proves you right, and the process of seeing if they are actually true (or if there is ANY truth in them at all) never crosses your mind. We would much rather know those things that patronize our already established beliefs, whether they be true or no.
Ask yourself: what would happen if your beliefs (about ANYTHING) ran up against the truth, and your beliefs were weighed and found wanting? What then? Would you increase in knowledge, grasp reality, grow in the nurture and admonition of the Lord? Or would your pet beliefs dominate reality?
Unfortunately, this is the plight of Crichton College (and this generation of Christians in general): we do not want knowledge, we do not want the truth; we want what will succour our way of thinking in the face of truth, because truth would mean change, and change is terrifying.
But therein lies the error: truth is NOT mere change; truth is FREEDOM (John 8:32). Any belief, notion, or idea that comes at odds with the truth is not another "point of view," or "perspective," or "way of looking at it." It is bondage. Freedom is found only in the truth. Everything else is a heaping up of chains upon ourselves.
"Jesus saith unto him, I am...the truth..." (John 14:6) To be of Christ is to be of the truth (John 8:31, 32); to be of God is to be of the truth (John 8:45-47). What delight have we in falsehoods, bondage, and slavery? Why will we continue to succour and feed those things that only chain us down? "Why should ye be stricken anymore?" (Isaiah 1:5a) "Arise, shine..." (Isaiah 60:1a), we are not children of darkness, but of light (Colossians 1:12, 13; I Peter 2:9). How long will we fool ourselves into thinking that sustaining our false, pet beliefs in the light of knowledge is the right way to go? How many more Crichton College students (both honors and otherwise) will read Aristotle, Plato, Freud, Bacon, Milton, Lewis, Sayers, Chesterton, Jung, Paul, Peter, John, etc., not out of a search for truth, but out of a search for what will bolster their comfort zone? If the truth brings desolation, then let desolation come, and with it the glory of freedom.
"...their honorable men are famished, and their multitudes dried up with thirst." (Isaiah 5:13b) How people will starve themselves is amazing! Christ stands ready to feed us with the truth, and we ignore the milk and honey, preferring instead garlic and cucumbers. We shall never be filled.
"Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure..." (Isaiah 5:14a) The presence of death is a sure sign of the absence of the truth. No matter what makes us feel good (even if it seems to heal old psychological wounds), whatever is not of the truth is lies, unreality, and death. Do not work the death sentence on yourself; stay free, "walk in the light, as He is in the light," (I John 1:7) wherever that light may lead you.