God's Infallible Roll Call Text: Isaiah 34:16-17
Introduction: The Divine Guarantee
We live in an age of profound skepticism. Our experts are frequently wrong, our politicians consistently lie, and our cultural promises turn to ash in our mouths. We are told to trust the science, and then the science changes its mind. We are told to follow our hearts, and our hearts lead us into a swamp. In such a world, the concept of an infallible, unchangeable, absolutely certain word is not just foreign; it is offensive. It strikes the modern mind as arrogant, simplistic, and fanatical.
And yet, this is precisely what the Christian faith offers. We do not offer a set of religious suggestions, pious hopes, or spiritual platitudes. We present the ironclad word of the living God. And here in Isaiah 34, after a terrifying description of God's judgment upon Edom, a judgment so total that the land will be turned over to the screech owl and the desert vulture, the prophet issues a stunning challenge. It is a challenge to all the doubters, all the scoffers, and all the nervous nellies, both then and now. In essence, God says, "Go ahead. Check my work. I dare you."
The preceding verses describe what scholars call decreation language. The hosts of heaven dissolve, the skies roll up like a scroll, and the mountains melt with blood. As we have seen elsewhere in Isaiah, this is not a prophecy about the end of the space-time universe. It is the prophetic description of the total collapse of a nation, a political order. God is talking about the destruction of Edom, the perennial enemy of His people. Their entire world is coming to an end. It will be so thoroughly desolate that it becomes a haunt for wild animals. And then, having laid out this catastrophic prophecy, God underwrites it with His own character. He does not just predict the future; He guarantees it. These two verses are God's signature at the bottom of the contract, His seal on the deed of judgment.
This is not just about Edom. This is a statement about the nature of God's Word and the nature of His world. God's prophecies are not vague predictions like those of Nostradamus, where you can drive a truck through the ambiguities. They are precise, detailed, and certain. And our text tells us why: because the God who speaks the future is the same God who governs the future. His word is not a forecast; it is a decree.
The Text
Seek from the book of Yahweh, and read:
Not one of these will be missing;
None will lack its mate.
For His mouth has commanded,
And His Spirit has gathered them.
He has cast the lot for them,
And His hand has divided it to them by line.
They shall possess it forever;
From generation to generation they will dwell in it.
(Isaiah 34:16-17 LSB)
The Open Invitation to Scrutiny (v. 16a)
The passage begins with a command that is also a challenge.
"Seek from the book of Yahweh, and read..." (Isaiah 34:16a)
What is this "book of Yahweh?" In the immediate context, it refers to the scroll of Isaiah's own prophecy. The prophet has such confidence that his words are God's words that he invites future generations to pull out the scroll, dust it off, and audit the results. This is a direct assertion of divine inspiration. Isaiah is not offering his opinion. He is taking dictation. This is why we say, before reading the sermon text, "These are the words of God." It is not a pious formality. It is a foundational truth claim. The Bible is not a book that contains the word of God; it is the Word of God.
This is God's standing challenge to all paganism and all secularism. The false gods of the nations could not do this. As Isaiah taunts them elsewhere, "Show us the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that you are gods" (Is. 41:23). They couldn't, because history was not in their hands. You cannot unpack what you cannot pick up. But the God of Israel is the sovereign Lord of history. He declares the end from the beginning because He is the beginning and the end. Therefore, His book is not a collection of religious folklore. It is the script of reality. He invites scrutiny. He says, "Read it. Check the details. Compare the prophecy to the fulfillment." This is a faith that is not afraid of the facts. It is a faith grounded in historical, verifiable events.
The Divine Roll Call (v. 16b)
Next, God specifies the precision of His fulfillment.
"Not one of these will be missing; None will lack its mate." (Isaiah 34:16b LSB)
The "these" refers to the creatures listed in the preceding verses who will inherit the wasteland of Edom: the hawk, the owl, the jackal, the vulture. God is saying that when He turns Edom over to the wild beasts, every single creature He has named will show up. It will be a perfect attendance. No one will be marked absent on the divine roll call. This is not a general prediction of "desolation." It is a specific manifest of the new tenants.
The phrase "None will lack its mate" has a double meaning. On the one hand, it is a literal promise. The desolate land will be so perfectly suited for these creatures that they will thrive there, pairing up and breeding. It will become a ghastly, but flourishing, anti-Eden. But on another level, the language of "mating" or "pairing" refers to the prophecy and its fulfillment. Every prophetic word will be paired with its corresponding historical event. Not one of God's promises, or in this case, His warnings, will be left a bachelor. Every word will find its mate in history. There will be no loose ends, no unfulfilled clauses, no forgotten details.
The Unstoppable Decree (v. 16c)
The reason for this certainty is then given, and it is the bedrock of a Reformed worldview.
"For His mouth has commanded, And His Spirit has gathered them." (Isaiah 34:16c LSB)
Here we see the distinction between a prediction and a decree. A weatherman predicts rain. God commands it. God's mouth, His spoken Word, is not descriptive; it is creative and causative. When He speaks, reality rearranges itself to comply. This is the same power we saw in Genesis 1. God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. Here, God says, "Let there be vultures in Edom," and the vultures will come. The prophecy is certain because the command is sovereign.
And notice the agency. "His Spirit has gathered them." Once again, as in creation, the Trinity is at work. The Father decrees through the spoken Word, and the Spirit executes that decree. The Spirit of God, who hovered over the waters of creation, is the same Spirit who will hover over the ruins of Edom, gathering the appointed creatures by a divine instinct. This is not chaos taking over. This is a controlled demolition and a divinely managed re-population project. God's sovereignty extends to the flight patterns of vultures and the nesting habits of owls. There are no maverick molecules in His universe, and no rogue birds.
The Sovereign Allotment (v. 17)
The final verse seals the deal with the language of covenant inheritance.
"He has cast the lot for them, And His hand has divided it to them by line. They shall possess it forever; From generation to generation they will dwell in it." (Isaiah 34:17 LSB)
This is the language Joshua used when dividing the Promised Land for the tribes of Israel (Joshua 18). God cast the lot. His hand used the measuring line. It was a divine, unalterable inheritance. Here, in a stroke of stunning, terrifying irony, God uses the exact same language to describe bequeathing the land of Edom to wild beasts. He is the great landlord of the earth. He gives Canaan to Israel, and He gives Edom to the screech owl. The same sovereign hand that blesses is the hand that curses.
The casting of the lot and the measuring line signify a deliberate, precise, and permanent assignment. This is not a random infestation of animals. It is a planned, surveyed, and deeded inheritance. And the ownership is permanent: "They shall possess it forever; From generation to generation they will dwell in it." The judgment on Edom is not temporary. It is final. This is a terrifying thought. God's judgments, when final, are eternal.
Conclusion: Trust the Book
So what does this ancient prophecy about Edom and its new, feral inhabitants have to do with us? Everything. It teaches us how to read our Bibles and how to view our world.
First, it teaches us that God's Word is absolutely trustworthy. Every promise in this book will find its mate. Every prophecy will be fulfilled. The same mouth that commanded vultures to gather in Edom is the mouth that commanded, "This is my beloved Son; listen to Him." The same Spirit who gathered the owls is the Spirit who gathers the elect into the body of Christ. The same hand that measured Edom for destruction is the hand that was pierced to measure out grace for us. If God is this meticulous about a curse, how much more meticulous is He about His blessings?
Second, it teaches us that God is absolutely sovereign. History is not a random series of unfortunate events. It is a story being written by a sovereign author. He is not just sovereign over the big things, like the rise and fall of nations. He is sovereign over the small things, like the gathering of animals. This should be a profound comfort to the believer. The God who directs the vulture to its carrion is the God who directs your life. Nothing is outside His control. Nothing can touch you apart from His decree.
Therefore, we are to do exactly what the text says. "Seek from the book of Yahweh, and read." Do you want to know what the future holds? Read the book. Do you want to understand the turmoil in our world? Read the book. Do you want to know who God is, who you are, and what He has done to save you? Read the book. For in this book, we find that the same God who judged Edom has provided a refuge from judgment in His Son. He has cast the lot for us, His people, and our inheritance is not a desolate wasteland, but a new heaven and a new earth. He has divided it to us by the line of His grace, and we shall possess it forever. And not one of His promises to us will ever, ever be missing.