Context No. 2559 of 4322 · Isaiah
Context · Reflection
Isaiah 40:1-16: in context
1“Comfort, comfort my people,” says your God. 2“Speak comfortably to Jerusalem, and call out to her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received of the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.” 3The voice of one who calls out, “Prepare the way of the LORD in the wilderness! Make a level highway in the desert for our God. 4Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The uneven shall be made level, and the rough places a plain. 5The LORD’s glory shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it.” 6The voice of one saying, “Cry out!” One said, “What shall I cry?” “All flesh is like grass, and all its glory is like the flower of the field. 7The grass withers, the flower fades, because the LORD’s breath blows on it. Surely the people are like grass. 8The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God stands forever.” 9You who tell good news to Zion, go up on a high mountain. You who tell good news to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with strength! Lift it up! Don’t be afraid! Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold, your God!” 10Behold, the Lord GOD will come as a mighty one, and his arm will rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. 11He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom. He will gently lead those who have their young. 12Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and marked off the sky with his span, and calculated the dust of the earth in a measuring basket, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance? 13Who has directed the LORD’s Spirit, or has taught him as his counselor? 14Who did he take counsel with, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding? 15Behold, the nations are like a drop in a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on a balance. Behold, he lifts up the islands like a very little thing. 16Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor its animals sufficient for a burnt offering.
Isaiah's word of comfort rises to a vision of God so large it staggers the mind. Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, he asks, or marked off the heavens with a span, or weighed the mountains on scales? The nations are a drop in a bucket to him, a speck of dust on the balance. And then, in the same breath, this immense God is described tending his flock like a shepherd, gathering the lambs in his arms and carrying them close to his heart.
Hold the two pictures together, because that is the point. The God who cups the oceans in his palm and weighs the mountains is the same God who gathers lambs in his arms and gently leads the ones with young. His vastness does not make him remote, and his tenderness does not make him small. The hand large enough to measure the sea is the hand that carries the weak close to his chest. We tend to imagine that a God great enough to run the universe could not be bothered to carry me. Isaiah insists on both at once: unimaginably vast, and tender enough to carry the lambs.
Do I know that the God who holds the oceans in his hand is the same God who gathers me, weak as a lamb, close to his heart and carries me?
Sources
- Isaiah 40:12: Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and marked off the sky with his span, and weighed the mountains in scales?
- Isaiah 40:11: He will feed his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arm, and carry them in his bosom.
- Isaiah 40:15: Behold, the nations are like a drop in a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on a balance.