Intro: Have you ever seen something that was clear as day, but you could not make others see it? Have you ever thought something was so obvious, but you could not enable others to grasp it? Have you ever just scratched your head and thought, “Surely, folks cannot be this obtuse, this blind, and this cowardly!”?

We’ve all surely seen the simulacra and emojis that illustrate the feeling.

But what’s amazing is the prevalence of the blindness. Spiritual blindness, in particular.

Scripture speaks to it … I was in Romans 11. The Apostle Paul writes this way about it–about blindness, spiritual obtuseness, a hardening of the soul, a cataracts of the eyes:

The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened, ⁸ as it is written,

“God gave them a spirit of stupor,
    eyes that would not see
    and ears that would not hear,
down to this very day.”

⁹ And David says,

“Let their table become a snare and a trap,
    a stumbling block and a retribution for them;
¹⁰ let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see,
    and bend their backs forever.” (Romans 11:8-10, ESV)

This darkening of their eyes is a judgment for their rejection of the truth. They have a “spirit of stupor,” God says of them via the Apostle Paul. And they have ears but cannot hear.

Takeaway: The reality is that there really is no end to some people’s blindness, obtuseness, and hardheartedness. The good gets banished and crucified, and evil is rewarded. And the evil system just rocks right along without so much as a hiccup. God help us.