Narcissism Smugly Slaughters the Servant King




muffled

Yes, the Preacher even wore earmuffs to muffle the Word.

An article in response to a sermon preached by Rev Archer on Isaiah 42:10-17

There are mishandled sermons, and then there are sermons that massacre the text. Isaiah 42:10–17 marches across Scripture like a divine procession—God commands creation to sing, summoning coastlands to cry out, rising as a warrior, levelling mountains, leading the blind, exposing idols, shaming their worshippers.

No preacher can enter this passage without trembling unless something inside him has never been raised to life. Archer did not tremble; some of his listeners drifted off to sleep. Archer smiled — the limp smile of woke piety. He carried into the pulpit a flaccid gentility perfectly calibrated to kill the text without leaving fingerprints.

By ‘woke,’ I do not mean the pseudo-political radicalism you preen yourself with. I mean the spiritual posture of soft-spoken moral sensitivity — compassion as performance, gentleness as virtue-signal, a therapeutic tone that confuses niceness with righteousness and leaves nothing but saccharine in the soul.” Your sermon was soaked in this sin, that fathers in the Reformed tradition called spiritual pride in its most deceitful form—the hidden enthronement of yourself beneath the guise of humility (what modern language would call covert narcissism). 

My dear Reader, bear with me on this. The anatomy of Archer’s sermon reveals the method of slaughtering the Word when a preacher has a primary goal of promoting himself.

Open your Bible. Turn to Isaiah 42 and read the first 17 verses. Isaiah roars, “Sing to the LORD a new song!”

Archer replies, “Sometimes we need to slow down and notice beauty…” If this does not strike you as vomit on the roses, then cry out for life from the living God.

When God commands the earth to sing, only a foolish preacher offers tips on emotional attentiveness. When God issues a royal decree, the woke pastor hands out scented devotional disinfectant. The exchange is obscene. A divine shout is carried into the pulpit, and you Mr Woke, marched into His pulpit and massacred it.

Where the verse fixed the LORD as the blazing object of worship, You made worship a self-improvement exercise. Worship became a therapeutic loop, its purpose to “lift us,” “refocus us,” “re-center us.” Isaiah summons all creation to adore God. You summoned your congregation to tidy their inner life. The LORD exited the centre; the people entered it.

Then came the “new song.” In Scripture, a new song erupts only when God acts—redeeming, rescuing, judging, intervening. You, Mr Woke, proclaimed no divine act, no intervention, no revelation. You called for a response without offering a cause.

The horizon of the text spans the ends of the earth—the islands, the deserts, the mountain peaks, the Gentile nations had been promised redemption. This was a mighty act the Lord promised. You collapsed that cosmic summons into the confined dimensions of personal reflection from distractions and screen time. Isaiah’s horizon is cosmic. You sliced it down until it was claustrophobically internal. You used the cosmic work of God to draw attention to yourself with repeated jokes about New Zealand. You got the laughs you crave for.

Then you sunk the knife in and twisted it with verses 13-17—the war-charge of God.


The LORD strides forth like a mighty man.
He shouts.
He stirs up His zeal.
He levels landscapes.
He leads the blind.
He exposes idolaters and shames them.

You, Mr Woke, as you publicly preened yourself, removed this God altogether.
You replaced the Warrior King with the god of self that you worship: mild, ambient deity—gentle, cautious, emotionally soothing. A God the text does not recognise. A God Isaiah never preached. A God incapable of frightening or saving anyone. You even handed out earmuffs at the door just in case there was anyone who might hear Him roar.

Look at what you did to the King:

The Servant God vs Archer

Charge: Silencing the Warrior of Isaiah 42:13

The court convenes.
Prosecutor: Isaiah son of Amoz.
Defendant: Archer.
Exhibit A: Isaiah 42:13.

 

Isaiah:

“Pastor Archer, thus says the LORD:
‘The LORD goes out like a mighty man;
He shouts;
He shows Himself mighty against His foes.’
Why did you preach Him as a hesitant observer waiting for your congregation’s attention?”

Archer:
No reply.

 

Isaiah:

“When I revealed the LORD crying out like a warrior, you delivered Him like an embarrassed  old man clearing His throat. When I displayed His zeal, you concealed it beneath air freshener. When I showed His might, you buried it under emotional reassurance.

Tell this court, preacher:
By what authority did you declaw the Almighty?”

Archer:
Silent.

 

Isaiah (closing):

C’mon Archer. Speak up now. This is your chance.

 “You erased the Lord’s shout.
You muted His war cry.
You hid His zeal beneath your tone.
You preached a God who is nothing like the God of this text.
This is not exposition.
It is suppression on a grand scale.”

Court adjourned.

 

Archer, you did not simply mishandle Isaiah 42:10–17; you silenced the God who thundered within it. You did not merely neglect the Servant God; you edited Him out. You trimmed His command until it sounded safe. You shrank His horizon until you felt you could manage the Holy God. You dissolved His zeal until it felt polite. You changed the cry of the Lord into muzak. You turned His global summons into inner housekeeping. You turned His glory into a mood lamp. You turned His judgment into metaphor. You turned His leading of the blind into encouragement to try harder.

And here, Archer, your own words rise up to condemn you. In your sermon you joked about ‘weeds over your broccoli,’ as though spiritual blindness were nothing more than a gardening quirk. But the text you handled thunders with divine judgment, not dietary humour. If weeds over your broccoli is the metaphor you reach for in the presence of the Warrior-God, then the least of your problems is horticulture — the real problem is that you think the Holy One speaks in the tone of your compost bin.

And you did it with the serene, therapeutic softness of a man convinced of his own compassion. But where will you be when your congregation stands before the God of Isaiah on Judgment Day?

But let me ask you directly—because the passage itself now demands it:

Archer, do you truly believe you have silenced the God you just tried to slaughter?
Do you imagine the Warrior of verse 13 waits for your permission to shout?
Do you believe the LORD whose voice shakes the islands will bow before your tone?
Do you think the God who levels mountains can be rendered harmless by your pastoral softness?

And the evidence is plain:

No exposition of sin.
No definition of sin.
No confrontation by the text.
No connection between sin and Isaiah 42.
No Servant dealing with sin.
No blindness of Israel as sin.
No idolatry as sin.
No judgment as the consequence of sin.

Your Christ hangs around your neck as a good luck charm.

But the God of Isaiah 42 cannot be tamed.
He will shout.
He will rise.
He will judge.
He will lead.
He will expose your idols and your carefully curated image.

And the Servant you smothered still stands.

And so, Archer, hear this and hear it well: the God you tried to smother will not stay silent. The God you tried to blacken will reveal His glory. The God you sprayed scented air freshener on will fill His temple. You may smother His roar beneath your wokeness, but He will rise and rip it to shreds.

You can continue to try and drown His command beneath your therapeutic murmur, but His voice will shatter your pile of chaff to the four corners of the earth. The Warrior you erased will rise, the LORD you muffled will shout, and the Servant you smothered will stand radiant on the last day—while every sermon that buried Him will be dragged into the light and burned like the straw it always was.

You tried to slaughter the Servant with your smugness, Archer.
But the Servant lives, and He will not yield His glory to you.