Commentary - Isaiah 41:1-7

Bird's-eye view

Here in the fortieth chapter of Isaiah, the Lord throws down the gauntlet. The setting is a great cosmic courtroom, and God is both the plaintiff and the judge. He summons the nations, the coastlands, to stand trial. The central question before the court is one of competence and sovereignty. Who runs the world? Who directs the course of history? Is it the pantheon of idols that the nations craft with their own hands, or is it Yahweh, the God of Israel?

God presents His first piece of evidence: a great conqueror from the east, a man we know from history as Cyrus the Persian. But history is just the exhibition hall; God is the one who put the exhibit there. He is the one who awakened this man, who calls him, and who makes his path victorious. The nations see this and are, quite rightly, terrified. Their response is not repentance, but a frantic, almost comical, attempt to bolster their own man-made gods. They encourage one another and work diligently to manufacture and secure their idols, nailing them down so they will not totter. The contrast is stark and deliberate: Yahweh, who calls forth generations from the beginning, versus the idols that cannot even stand up on their own. This is a masterful takedown of all creaturely pretensions to power.

Outline

Commentary

1 “Coastlands, listen to Me in silence, And let the peoples gain new power; Let them come forward, then let them speak; Let us draw near together for judgment.

The proceedings begin with a command for silence. When God is about to speak, the intelligent creature shuts his mouth. The coastlands and peoples represent the Gentile nations, the ends of the earth. God summons them to a legal disputation, a judgment. He tells them to gain new power, which is a piece of glorious divine sarcasm. "Go ahead," He says, "muster your strength. Get your arguments in order. Consult your best philosophers and your most reliable idols. And then, let us draw near together." This is not a negotiation between equals. This is the Creator calling His creatures to account for their cosmic rebellion.

2 Who has awakened one from the east Whom He calls in righteousness to His feet? He gives up nations before him And has dominion over kings. He makes them like dust with his sword, As the wind-driven chaff with his bow.

Here is God's opening argument, and it is a thunderbolt. He asks a rhetorical question: Who has awakened one from the east? The implied answer is obvious, it is Yahweh and no other. This one from the east is Cyrus, the Persian king whom God would later call His "anointed" (Isaiah 45:1) to deliver Israel from Babylon. God is the one who stirred him up, who called him in righteousness to accomplish His just purposes. The victories of Cyrus are not his own. God is the one who gives up nations before him. The mightiest kings are nothing. His sword and bow make them like dust and chaff, scattered effortlessly. This is a picture of absolute sovereignty. Human history is not a chaotic series of random events; it is a story being written by a sovereign author, and He uses whomever He pleases as the pen.

3 He pursues them, passing on in peace, By a way he had not come with his feet.

The conqueror's progress is supernaturally swift and safe. He passes on in peace, or 'in safety,' because God is with him. He travels roads he has never seen before, moving with a speed that defies normal military logistics. This is not the story of a brilliant general's campaign; this is the story of God's providence making the way for His chosen instrument. When God has a job for a man to do, He clears the path. The obstacles that would stop any other army simply melt away.

4 Who has worked and done it, Calling forth the generations from the beginning? ‘I, Yahweh, am the first; and with the last, I am He.’ ”

After presenting the evidence of Cyrus, God drives the point home with another question. Who is the ultimate actor behind all this? Who is the prime mover? It is the one who has been calling forth the generations from the beginning. This is a staggering claim. God is not just intervening in history; He is the author of it. He summons each generation onto the stage of the world. Then comes the great declaration of His eternal nature: I, Yahweh, am the first; and with the last, I am He. He is the Alpha and the Omega. Before anything was, He is. After everything is done, He will be. He brackets all of created time and reality. This is the God who is putting the nations on trial, and against such a God, there is no defense.

5 The coastlands have seen and are afraid; The ends of the earth tremble; They have drawn near and have come.

The reaction of the world to God's work is predictable. They see His power displayed in the rise of Cyrus, and they are terrified. A deep existential dread settles over them. Their world is being shaken, and their gods are silent. So they have drawn near and have come, not to Yahweh in repentance, but to each other in a panicked huddle. This is the reflex of fallen man: when confronted with the power of God, he runs to other men for comfort and confirmation in his rebellion.

6 Each one helps his neighbor And says to his brother, “Be strong!”

Here begins the great satire. What is the world's solution to the problem of a sovereign God? A pep rally. They turn to one another with hollow words of encouragement. "Be strong!" It is the blind leading the blind. Their strength is a shared weakness, a collective whistling past the graveyard. They are trying to shout down their fear, but they have no foundation for their courage. Their only hope is that if enough of them say "Be strong," it might somehow become true. It will not.

7 So the craftsman strengthens the smelter, And he who smooths metal with the hammer strengthens him who beats the anvil, Saying of the soldering, “It is good”; And he strengthens it with nails, So that it will not be shaken.

This verse is a masterpiece of inspired mockery. The project that is supposed to make them strong is the construction of an idol. We see the whole assembly line. The craftsman encourages the goldsmith. The one smoothing with the hammer encourages the smith at the anvil. They are all patting each other on the back, marveling at their own handiwork. They inspect the soldering and declare it good, a pathetic echo of God's declaration over His own creation. And the final, crowning absurdity: after all this work, they have to fasten the idol with nails so that it will not be shaken. The god they have made to save them from the God who shakes the nations is himself in danger of toppling over. This is the essence of idolatry. It is the worship of something that is less powerful than its own worshippers. The nations are terrified of a God who calls forth generations, so they build a god that needs to be nailed to the floor.

Application

The central lesson of this passage is the absolute and meticulous sovereignty of God over all of human history, and the corresponding foolishness of all idolatry. We are constantly tempted to believe that the events we see on the news are driven by chaotic human forces, by presidents, kings, and corporations. But Isaiah reminds us that God is the one who raises up and puts down. He called Cyrus then, and He is directing all rulers now to accomplish His good purposes, chief of which is the salvation of His people and the glory of His Son.

The second lesson is a warning against the sophisticated idolatry of our own day. We may not be smelting idols and nailing them to the floorboards, but we have our own projects. We look to the state for our salvation, to technology for our hope, to our 401(k)s for our security. We tell one another to "be strong" as we build our towers of Babel. This passage calls us to see the folly of it all. Any source of strength and security that is not the living God is an idol, and every idol will ultimately disappoint and fail. It cannot stand on its own. Our only true hope is in the God who is the First and the Last, the one who holds all of history in His hands.