Listen to me in silence, O coastlands;
let the peoples renew their strength;
let them approach, then let them speak;
let us together draw near for judgment.
2 Who stirred up one from the east
whom victory meets at every step?
He gives up nations before him,
so that he tramples kings underfoot;
he makes them like dust with his sword,
like driven stubble with his bow.
3 He pursues them and passes on safely,
by paths his feet have not trod.
4 Who has performed and done this,
calling the generations from the beginning?
I, the Lord, the first,
and with the last; I am he.
5 The coastlands have seen and are afraid;
the ends of the earth tremble;
they have drawn near and come.
6 Everyone helps his neighbor
and says to his brother, “Be strong!”
7 The craftsman strengthens the goldsmith,
and he who smooths with the hammer him who strikes the anvil,
saying of the soldering, “It is good”;
and they strengthen it with nails so that it cannot be moved.
8 But you, Israel, my servant,
Jacob, whom I have chosen,
the offspring of Abraham, my friend;
9 you whom I took from the ends of the earth,
and called from its farthest corners,
saying to you, “You are my servant,
I have chosen you and not cast you off”;
10 fear not, for I am with you;
be not dismayed, for I am your God;
I will strengthen you, I will help you,
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
11 Behold, all who are incensed against you
shall be put to shame and confounded;
those who strive against you
shall be as nothing and shall perish.
12 You shall seek those who contend with you,
but you shall not find them;
those who war against you
shall be as nothing at all.
13 For I, the Lord your God,
hold your right hand;
it is I who say to you, “Fear not,
I am the one who helps you.”
14 Fear not, you worm Jacob,
you men of Israel!
I am the one who helps you, declares the Lord;
your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.
15 Behold, I make of you a threshing sledge,
new, sharp, and having teeth;
you shall thresh the mountains and crush them,
and you shall make the hills like chaff;
16 you shall winnow them, and the wind shall carry them away,
and the tempest shall scatter them.
And you shall rejoice in the Lord;
in the Holy One of Israel you shall glory.
17 When the poor and needy seek water,
and there is none,
and their tongue is parched with thirst,
I the Lord will answer them;
I the God of Israel will not forsake them.
18 I will open rivers on the bare heights,
and fountains in the midst of the valleys.
I will make the wilderness a pool of water,
and the dry land springs of water.
19 I will put in the wilderness the cedar,
the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive.
I will set in the desert the cypress,
the plane and the pine together,
20 that they may see and know,
may consider and understand together,
that the hand of the Lord has done this,
the Holy One of Israel has created it.
The Futility of Idols
21 Set forth your case, says the Lord;
bring your proofs, says the King of Jacob.
22 Let them bring them, and tell us
what is to happen.
Tell us the former things, what they are,
that we may consider them,
that we may know their outcome;
or declare to us the things to come.
23 Tell us what is to come hereafter,
that we may know that you are gods;
do good, or do harm,
that we may be dismayed and terrified.
24 Behold, you are nothing,
and your work is less than nothing;
an abomination is he who chooses you.
25 I stirred up one from the north, and he has come,
from the rising of the sun, and he shall call upon my name;
he shall trample on rulers as on mortar,
as the potter treads clay.
26 Who declared it from the beginning, that we might know,
and beforehand, that we might say, “He is right”?
There was none who declared it, none who proclaimed,
none who heard your words.
27 I was the first to say to Zion, “Behold, here they are!”
and I give to Jerusalem a herald of good news.
28 But when I look, there is no one;
among these there is no counselor
who, when I ask, gives an answer.
29 Behold, they are all a delusion;
their works are nothing;
their metal images are empty wind. Isaiah 41 ESV
Isaiah 41 Court is in session
1. Listen to me in silence - The cities and nations surrounding the Mediterranean Sea and it's islands are being called to court. Some see a broader translation of "all nations" or "distant lands".
Let the peoples renew their strength - God has stated that there are no other gods before Him, and if these people are to come before the righteous, all knowing Judge and Creator, then they need to do their homework. The accusation is against their idolatry, so He is giving them time to prepare their argument.
The problem is that while those who wait upon the LORD have the LORD’s limitless strength, those from distant lands have no god of strength to help them. “The repetition of the phrase ‘renew their strength’ (cf. 40:31) may well be ironic. Perhaps as the exiles renew their strength in the true God, so the nations are ironically exhorted to do the same – but in their man-made deities!” (Grogan)
2-4. Who stirred up one from the east - Persia is east of Babylon in Iran, and in verse 25 it further traces the steps of Cyrus when he conquers and unites with the Medes of the north. God is posing to the nations the question, "Who did this, which of your gods, idols, is able to raise up a kingdom, tell of it before Cyrus is born, and accomplish righteous judgment by a people who don't know Him." East of Israel is also Ur of the Chaldeans, and this is where long before God called out Abraham, from a land of idols and superstition. Abraham would otherwise not have known the true God, would not have found Him on his own. God made a unilateral covenant with him, and told him he would be the father of a great nation. This later proved unlikely by human understanding because his wife Sarah was past the age of child bearing, her menstrual cycle had already stopped and her womb had been barren until God intervened, calling life up from a dead place. "Calling the generations from the beginning."
I, the Lord, the first, and with the last; I am He - Those who teach a Christ outside of deity preach another Christ. He was the Word in the beginning, eternally present with God, one with God, and through Him all things were made. Which of the angels, the idols, kings, queens or any other thing could lay claim to such? God initiated history, and He is directing it's course.
…16He held in His right hand seven stars, and a sharp double-edged sword came from His mouth. His face was like the sun shining at its brightest. 17 When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. But He placed His right hand on me and said, “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last, 18the Living One. I was dead, and behold, now I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of Death and of Hades.… Revelation 1: 16-18
…12“Behold, I am coming soon, and My reward is with Me, to give to each one according to what he has done. 13I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End. 14Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by its gates.… Revelation 22: 12-14
…13Then Moses asked God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is His name?’ What should I tell them?” 14God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”15God also told Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’ This is My name forever, and this is how I am to be remembered in every generation.… Exodus 3: 13-15
5-7. The coastlands have seen and are afraid - Once they saw the power of God, as in Egypt with the plagues, the people trembled. Once they know of His holiness and so His hatred of sin, men become discouraged, for now I see what I am not. The harlot Rahab responded differently to the testimony of God's strength, and her household was saved in the fall and taking of Jericho. The rest of the city witnessed Israel coming across the Jordan, but they looked to their walls.
Everyone helps his neighbor - They encourage each other against wisdom. There is so much of this in the apostate church, "religion is about you, you are special, you will reach your full potential, you got this."
And they strengthen it with nails so it cannot be moved - They see a God that is to be feared, but look to themselves, their own knowledge and strength to find the answer. If past idols have failed them then they will make a stronger one, a bigger one, anything but repent. A very clear picture of this is the Philistines and Dagon, their idol bowed prostrate to the Ark of the Covenant, so they picked it up, but then he bowed and was left a stump, so they sent the Ark away from themselves. Men run away from the true God, but cling to the idols of their imagination. They create a protective bubble around themselves, surrounding themselves with people of like minds, sheep leading sheep.
8-13. But you, Israel, My servant - This is the people God has set apart to Himself, those that painted the blood upon the doors when the Angel of Death passed over.
“Israel is twice addressed as servant (literally ‘slave’), that is to say a person without position or rights – but this servant belongs to a great master.” (Motyer)
The offspring of Abraham, My friend - What an amazing designation, "friend of God."
…22You see that his faith was working with his actions, and his faith was perfected by what he did. 23And the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “ Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called a friend of God. 24As you can see, a man is justified by his deeds and not by faith alone.… James 2: 22-24
…14You are My friends if you do what I command you. 15No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not understand what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, because everything I have learned from My Father I have made known to you. 16You did not choose Me, but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will remain—so that whatever you ask the Father in My name, He will give you.… John 15: 14-16
Fear not for I am with you - He was with Israel in Babylon and had already planned their deliverance. Their God was not a god made with hands, and so they had much reason to hope.
Shall be put to shame and confounded - It is not Israel that men hate so much as it is their God. The gods of their enemies will become a shame to them, so the church should remember this and not adopt such things. Those idols were preferred because of men's fallen nature and reprobate minds. The gods men like and conceive always excuse the sins they love. Men hate the idea of denying themselves.
16For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith,e as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”f
God’s Wrath on Unrighteousness
18For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,g in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
26For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. Romans 1: 16-32
14 - 16. Fear not, you worm, Jacob - This is the way the nations saw Israel, and this is how most will see a suffering Messiah, for cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. Jacob was a deceiver and loathed by his brother, but his Redeemer is holy, and will bare the weight of his sins, the wrath of God against sin.
“The name Jacob, as applied to Israel here, always points back to Israel’s lowly and deceitful past, so that it is by no means an honor.” (Bultema)
…5They cried out to You and were set free; they trusted in You and were not disappointed. 6But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.7All who see me mock me; they sneer and shake their heads:… Psalm 22: 5-7
Your redeemer is the Holy One of Israel - The kinsmen redeemer is a familiar institute in their laws. Ruth 2 , Ruth 3 . He is signifying their adoption and redemption as family.
17-20. When the poor and needy seek water - Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled. This looks forward not only to the sustaining of Israel, but also her turning back to God, and the joy of the Millennial reign of Christ.
21-29. Set forth your case, says the Lord - Court is in session, let the defendant speak. Let him answer this.
Tell us what is to happen - What does the future hold? I ask you wood, metal, the work of men's hands, now tell. Sadly if men make it then they have to make it speak as well, and this can only be deception. When you don't want God, this is what you get.
…14Because of the signs it was given to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived those who dwell on the earth, telling them to make an image to the beast that had been wounded by the sword and yet had lived. 15 The second beast was permitted to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship it to be killed. 16And the second beast required all people small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their forehead,… Revelation 13: 14-16
Do good or do harm - If you are really gods and not just inanimate objects fueled by superstitious men, then bring rain, or cause drought, bless or destroy. This is much like the time of the taunting of Elijah against the false prophets of Baal.
An abomination is he who chooses you - Men were made in God's image, to glorify Him in spirit and truth.
Today, idolatry is still an abomination. Though few bow down to statues, many still fashion a god of their own opinion, and decide that is the god they will respect. Even many churchgoers do this today. “The spiritual conflict experienced today is exactly of the same nature and of the same character as you find depicted here. The issue is still unsettled in the minds of men, though it is settled eternally in the mind of God. The world is still making every effort to put the best possible show upon its worship of the creature rather than the Creator. Its worship is more the patronizing of the shell of religion than bowing in submission before an empty cross, and occupied throne, and the King of kings in glory.” (Redpath)
I stirred up one from the north - Idols can't decree such things, shape and govern history, create time and space.
“Cyrus had the greatest respect for Jehovah, as we can read in his proclamation concerning the freeing of Israel in Ezra one. In it he states correctly that Jehovah had given him all the kingdoms of the earth.” (Bultema)
ii. “The ‘north’ is included because the Persians conquered the lands north of Babylon before invading her borders.” (Wolf)
Their metal images are empty wind - Judgment.
