Isaiah / God Defends Israel Against the Nations and Idols

God Defends Israel Against the Nations and Idols

Isaiah 41:1-29

Chapter 41

¹ Be silent before me, O islands, and peoples, renew strength; they draw near, then they speak together for judgment; let us approach. ² Who stirs up from the east righteousness, calls him to his foot, gives nations before him, and kings he treads, gives them like dust of his sword, like driven stubble of his bow? ³ He will pursue them—he will pass in peace—a path with his feet he will not come. ⁴ Who acted and made, called the generations from the beginning? I, the LORD, first, and with the last ones I—he. ⁵ The isles saw and were afraid; the ends of the earth trembled. They drew near and came. ⁶ A man helps his friend, and to his brother he says, "Be strong." ⁷ The craftsman strengthened the refiner, the smoother; the hammerer strengthened the striker. At a time he said to cling, "It is good," and he strengthened it with nails; it will not totter. ⁸ And you, Israel my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, seed of Abraham my lover. ⁹ I have held you from the ends of the land, and from its nobles I have called you, and I said to you, "You are my servant; I have chosen you and not rejected you." ¹⁰ Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I have strengthened you, indeed I have helped you, indeed I uphold you with my righteous right hand. ¹¹ Behold, all who are angry at you will dry up and be put to shame. The men of your dispute will be as nothing and perish. ¹² You will seek them but not find them—the men of your oppression, those who were like none and like nothing, the men of your warfare. ¹³ For I, the LORD your God, am the one holding your right hand, the one saying to you, "Do not fear, I am helping you." ¹⁴ Do not fear, worm of Jacob, remnant of Israel. I have helped you, says the LORD, your redeemer, Holy One of Israel. ¹⁵ Behold, I have made you a sharp new threshing sledge with teeth; you will thresh mountains and powder them, and you will make hills like chaff. ¹⁶ You will winnow them, and the wind will carry them away, and the storm will scatter them, and you will exult in the LORD; in the Holy One of Israel you will glory. ¹⁷ The poor and the needy seek water, but there is none; their tongue is parched with thirst. I will make them drink—I, the LORD, their God, the God of Israel. I will not abandon them. ¹⁸ I will open rivers on the lips and place springs in the midst of the valleys; the wilderness to a lake of waters and the land of parched ground to outlets of waters. ¹⁹ I will give in the wilderness fir, shittah, and myrtle, and oil tree; I will set in the plain cypress, pine, and box together. ²⁰ in order that they fear and know and consider and understand together that the hand of the LORD has done this, and the Holy One of Israel has created it. ²¹ Approach near with your dispute, says the LORD; bring near your bones, says King Jacob. ²² Let them bring near and tell us what the first things will befall, what they are—tell it, and we will take heart to our heart and we will know their end times, or make us hear the coming things. ²³ Declare the signs backward, and we will know that you are gods. Even do good and do evil, and we will be astounded and we will be seen together. ²⁴ Behold, you are from nothing, and your works are from no-work—an abomination. He will choose in you. ²⁵ I stirred him up from the north, and he came from the rising of the sun. He calls in my name, and he comes, prefects like chomer and like a former tramples clay. ²⁶ Who has declared from the beginning and we would know, and from before and we would say, "Righteous"? There is none declaring, there is none causing to hear, there is none hearing your words. ²⁷ "the first to Zion, 'Behold, there they are,' and to Jerusalem I will give a bringer-of-news" ²⁸ And I looked, and there was no man, and from these there was no counselor. And I asked them, and they returned a word. ²⁹ Behold, all of them are iniquity and nothingness, their deeds wind and chaos, their libation offerings.