The Righteous way!

“Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; fear ye not the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their reviling. For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool: but my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation from generation to generation.(Isaiah51:7-8)"

There is that subtle conflict that faces a man doing his best to follow the ways of righteousness and order his life according to the laws of God.
Deep in his heart he knows that what he is doing is the correct thing. It is the lasting and eternally profitable thing to do. But then the rest of the multitudes around him are making fun of him as if he is the stupid one.
They make him feel as if he doesn't know what he knows. They deride him as if he's behind, he's backward... he's outdated. The pressure often comes from the fact that he is alone and they are a multitude. He alone sees the value of what he is standing upon; all the others see value in something else. Worse still, the multitude can readily point to the benefits of their own way but he has to tell one long, lonely story of someone else, somewhere who benefited from this his own righteous way. And he and his principles look unreal, unreliable and in all sense unreasonable. That is the problem. That is the pressure. That is the source of the "fear" that God was talking about.

Yes, the righteous way is a lonely way.

The godly route is a narrow route, it doesn't accommodate the multitude. It doesn't, most times, accommodate “collleaguing”! It doesn't allow conferencing! No! It doesn't allow comparisons and competition with mates and acquaintances. Those that must go that way must look straight on . . . focussed, only on Jesus and His demands. And that is a real pressure on mortal minds like ours.

Many times we wonder if God "understands" this pressure. Many times we wish He will just allow us go the multitude way . . . and, as God, still bring His will to come to pass, after all He can do all things. Can He not?
Why doesn't God work through the normal easy way of least resistance that the world and her multitude normally advocate? Simply because, God is not a man! And he is not like the sons of men that will eventually buckle under pressure! He knows the way of the multitude is the way of man . . . slippery and untrustworthy! He knows that one day, these same confident boasting crowds of men will come around to repent and say "I'm sorry.