Isaiah chapter 40, we're going to be looking at verses 12 through to the end of the chapter in two sermons. And in this first sermon, my basic goal for us is to understand the thrust of this passage and how to apply it to our present circumstances. Why does God speak to his people the way he speaks to them in these verses? What's the basic concern? And how does that basic concern apply to our own lives now, so many years later? That's the concern of the sermon this morning. And then when we return to this passage, Lord willing, in two weeks' time, we'll descend into more particulars and examine some of the specific things that God places before his people in these verses. Let's go ahead and read it through. Isaiah chapter 40, verses 12 through 31. And as we turn to God's word, let's once again go to him in prayer and ask for his blessing now as we spend time in the scriptures. Let's pray. Lord God in heaven, we pray now for the Spirit's work in turning our hearts toward you. And for making your word to come alive within our hearts. That our hearts might burn within us. as the Spirit opens the eyes of our faith to see the glory of our Triune God. Break through, Father, the hardness of our hearts. Cleanse us by the sanctifying fire of the Spirit applying the blood of Christ to us. And may our knowledge of you not ever remain a mere knowledge of proposition, but may it be that blessed knowledge of the redeemed who know the one in whom they have believed. May it be the knowledge of the covenant, the knowledge of intimate relationship, the knowledge of salvation, the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Isaiah chapter 40, beginning in verse 12. Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand? Measured heaven with a span and calculated the dust of the earth in a measure? Weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance? Who has directed the spirit of the Lord or as his counselor has taught him? With whom did he take counsel and who instructed him and taught him in the path of justice? Who taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding? Behold, the nations are as a drop in a bucket and are counted as the small dust on the scales. Look, he lifts up the aisles as a very little thing, and Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor its beasts sufficient for a burnt offering. All nations before him are as nothing. and they are counted by him less than nothing and worthless. To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness will you compare to him? The workman molds an image, the goldsmith overspreads it with gold, and the silversmith casts silver chains. Whoever is too impoverished for such a contribution chooses a tree that will not rot, He seeks for himself a skillful workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter. Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers. who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He brings the princes to nothing. He makes the judges of the earth useless. Scarcely shall they be planted. Scarcely shall they be sown. Scarcely shall their stock take root in the earth, when he will also blow on them, and they will wither, and the whirlwind will take them away like stubble. To whom then will you liken me? Or to whom shall I be equal? Says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high and see who has created these things, who brings out their host by number. He calls them all by name. By the greatness of his might and the strength of his power, not one is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel? My way is hidden from the Lord, and my just claim is passed over by my God. Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might, he increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. they shall walk and not faint. This last week, social media, other media, was, of course, flooded, as it has been these past number of years, 17 now, I think. by pictures and videos and remembrances of what happened September 11th, 2001. I was a freshman in college and that particular day all of the freshmen of my class were gathered in what was called freshman colloquium. And I remember plain as day the dean coming into that freshman colloquium and announcing the beginning of the events of that day. And all of a sudden, life was a little different, a lot different for many, but for everyone, life was a bit different from that moment forward. There are these moments in life, they can be national moments, like September 11th, or they can be very personal, intimate moments. But there are moments in life when the control and the mastery we thought we had over our circumstances is shown to be a delusion. Moments that take that fabricated foundation out from under us and leave us reeling. Moments that leave even the most prideful, self-assured individual confronted with their smallness and their weakness. How do you respond to these moments? We all develop patterns of reaction. We take everything we know or everything we think we know about the world, about our existence, and we process those moments with that information to make sense of whatever trial it is that has pressed us up against the wall. Where do you go? How do you respond? What do you preach to yourself in the quiet of those moments when trials threaten to overwhelm you? Well, during Isaiah's life, the prophet Isaiah, God's people faced enormous challenges. Foundations were being removed. Weakness and smallness were revealed. But God's people did not respond well. Look with me again at verse 27 in our passage. We're going to be coming back to this verse again and again this morning. What is Israel's response? My way is hidden from the Lord, and my just claim is passed over by my God. Do those words sound painfully familiar? Maybe we've never said them in that exact combination. Maybe we've never allowed them to be uttered out loud. Maybe we have. But in the midst of struggle and hardship, when the ground seems to be shifting and sinking under your feet, have you ever allowed similar thoughts to creep into your mind and into your heart? God doesn't see. Or at least, if He sees, He must not care to see. Maybe you've never said it with the hardness of heart that we see there in verse 27. Maybe you have. But it brings the message of Isaiah chapter 40 intimately close, perhaps uncomfortably close to our own lives and circumstances. Their temptation is our temptation. Does God see my struggles and difficulties? Does God care? Isaiah prophesied to Judah during some of the darkest days of her existence as a nation. a period of intense turmoil both spiritually and politically. When Isaiah is still a boy, the northern kingdom of Israel is invaded by Assyria and destroyed, wiped out. And as Isaiah grows up, Assyria travels south into Judah. By the time Isaiah is called into the prophetic ministry, Assyria has marched southward, wreaking destruction through Judah and making it all the way to the gates of Jerusalem. And it would seem as though Judah's fate is about to be Israel's fate, one of total destruction. Now, that's a story for another time, but the Lord miraculously saves Jerusalem from the Assyrian threat. But all the while, as a prophet of God, Isaiah is calling on Judah to repent and to return to the Lord. And all the while, in various ways and with various responses, they are refusing to do so. And so Isaiah prophesies of a coming destruction, that Jerusalem itself will be destroyed and the church cast out of the land of promise. That God has been and will be chastising his people for their spiritual waywardness, for their spiritual adultery, But the church did not yet have ears to hear what Isaiah was preaching. Hence that hardened complaint of verse 27. My way is hidden from the Lord. My just claim is passed over by my God. And what is our great need in that moment? In that moment when we're tempted to resonate in our hearts with Israel's complaint. In that moment when the small nagging voice in your head says, you know, Israel's got a point. Sometimes when I look at the circumstances of my life, it's hard to come to the conclusion that either God doesn't see or God doesn't care. Verse 28, have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Verse 21, these questions that the Lord pours out before his people. The everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. Verse 23, it is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He brings the princes to nothing. He makes the judges of the earth useless. In other words, our great need in those moments is to be lovingly but firmly rebuked for our forgetfulness. Israel had forgotten. And we can be tempted to forget as well. And what is it that we forget? Behold, the nations are as a drop in a bucket, and are counted as the small dust on the scales. All nations before him are as nothing, and they are counted by him less than nothing and worthless. What we forget is that there is no one like God. We forget that what the confession says is in accordance with reality. What we speak with our lips when we recite our catechism, that God is infinite, that God is eternal, that God is unchangeable, that this accords with reality concerning the nature of God. As different from, separated from all the works of His hands. And what happens when we forget these things? Well, we start looking to other things to be God. We look to princes. We look to judges. We look to nations. We look to the great things of this world. to fulfill that function. We fashion idols and we call upon them. And notice, did you notice in verse 29, we try really hard. We choose trees that won't rot. We don't want our false idols rotting on us. We prepare them so that they will not totter. In other words, we create our idols well so that they at least have the illusion of being dependable. When we forget God, we fashion idols, we do it to the best of our ability. But we do so in our folly and to our peril. And when we do so, we need to hear the have you not known, and the have you not heard of verses 21 and 28. We also need verses 18 and 25. Verse 18, to whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare to him? Verse 25, to whom then will you liken me? Or to whom shall I be equal? Says the Holy One. We forget that He is the Holy One. We forget that He has no equal, that there is none like Him. Many people then, many people now look to the stars for assurance and guidance and stability. Well, what does the Lord say to that? Lift up your eyes on high, go ahead and see who has created these things. who brings out their host by number. He calls them all by name. By the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, not one is missing." And if you gather together all of these verses, the Lord is saying, you are surrounded by many great things. There are great things on earth. And if you lift your eyes up, there are great things in the heavens as well. But what do they all share in common? Whether the great things on Earth or the great things above the Earth, what do they all share? Well, they are all created. They are not the creator. They are the created, whether princes or judges or nations or galaxies. I will lift up my eyes to the hills from whence comes my help. My help comes from the Lord who what? Who made heaven and earth. We are to remind ourselves of who our God is. That he is not like the deities we fashion for ourselves. We pretend that they will not rot. We construct them so that they will not totter, but they fail and they perish. And they crumble to dust and come to nothing. But our God made heaven and earth. And that's what Israel had forgotten. They had forgotten, if we can put it this way, the godness of God. And forgetting his godness, They began to look elsewhere for those things which only He could provide. And God's remedy in such a situation is actually quite simple, but glorious beyond measure in its simplicity. He comes to His people and says, here I am. Behold your God. This is who I am. You have forgotten. You have made me to be like you. And you need to be reminded. Verse 18, that I am to be likened to nothing in this creation. For I am the Holy One of Israel. You know, sometimes we convince ourselves that our sins, our problems, our struggles are just so amazingly complex that unless we attend to these hundred different things, and unless all of these various things come together, there's just no hope that our circumstances could ever get any better. When our actual problem is that we have forgotten God. We have forgotten who He truly is. And forgetting Him, we think that the first order of business is figuring out in exhaustive detail everything that we need to do to fix ourselves. When actually, the first order of business is to be still and know that I am God. Psalm 46, the nations raged, the kingdoms were moved. He uttered his voice, the earth melted. He makes wars to cease to the end of the earth. He breaks the bow and cuts the spear in two. He burns the chariot in the fire. Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted in the earth. And it's on the basis of those realities that the psalmist can begin Psalm 46 proclaiming and confessing, God is our refuge and strength, a very present hope in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. Maybe it's the case this morning that in all the frenzied activity of your life, all the busyness, all the turmoil, all the struggle that you feel looming over you from every angle, you've stopped being still and knowing that He is God. Yes, the Bible prizes action. but action that is born out of true knowledge and faith in the living God. Action that is born out of forgetfulness that God is the Holy One of Israel, that sort of action has a name. And that name is idolatry. And it's frightening, isn't it? It's frightening how imperceptibly the process can take place over time. And in our hearts, God stops being the transcendent Lord, exalted above all creation, and starts being a word that we use without any real understanding of what we're saying. Because again, we've made him to be like us. We have limited him. We have pressed him into the finite limitations of our own capacities. And our lives are in turmoil, and we're struggling, and we don't understand why. And so what do we start to say? My way is hidden from the Lord, and my just claim is passed over by my God. And then, what grace, what gentleness and mercy and patience that God comes to us lovingly but firmly. Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He. and all nations before him are as nothing. He brings the princes to nothing. He makes the judges of the earth, you know, if you can't think of those verses without your mind going to chariots of fire, he makes the judges of the earth as a vanity. Lift up your eyes on high and see who has created these things. You know, there are a lot of great things about city life. Thinking about verse 26, but the view of the night sky is not one of them. You know, get yourself out into the country where you're away from the lights or if you can't do that, you know, in our modern age, go online, look up images from the Hubble telescope. And then read Isaiah chapter 40 and verse 26. Lift up your eyes on high and see who created these, who brings out their host by number. He calls them all by name. By the greatness of his might and the strength of his power, not one is missing. We're going to come back to this passage once more and look more extensively at the various things that God teaches us about His nature and character here in this chapter. But this morning, I want us to begin by meditating on the first thing that Isaiah chapter 40 teaches us about God. And that is simply to remind us that He is God, and that we are to remember what that means. And even more specifically, that He alone is God. Not you, not any man, not any group of men, not anything in all creation, whether on earth or in the heavens. To whom then will you liken me? Or to whom shall I be equal? Says the Holy One. Here's another way to put it, and follow me carefully on this. There is lots to do in the Christian life after you embrace the knowledge of God's true Godness. Lots to do with that knowledge. But there is nothing to do in the Christian life before you embrace that knowledge. Often we get really excited about all the stuff we need to do. And so we rush off to do all the stuff. But we never stop to truly and deeply know the God of the stuff. And what happens? Well, before long, we crash and burn in our frenzied doing, because we're doing it in our own strength. And we're mad and frustrated, and the thought creeps back, my way is hidden from the Lord. And my just claim is passed over by my God. And again, the grace and gentleness and mercy and patience of the Lord toward us. Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. Do you notice how Isaiah moves from verse 26 to verse 27 so effortlessly, so beautifully? Here he is talking about stars and galaxies hundreds and thousands of light years away and telling us, look up To the stars in the heavens and understand who has made these things understand who names them understand the one who controls their every movement And then all of a sudden verse 27 We're looking up to the stars, and then he just plunges down into the depths of our own hearts The God who has not forgotten the smallest of motion of the farthest star, he has certainly not forgotten you. He neither faints nor is weary, and his understanding is unsearchable. Don't limit him. If you're limiting him, it's because you've forgotten who he is. Do you need that reminder this morning? Do you need to remember the godness of the living God? Do you need to remember that Isaiah chapter 40, we read it in our responsive reading, includes a promise that will come to fulfillment in this same God becoming man? Do you need to remember that the word became flesh and dwelt among us. Do you need to remember that your name was inscribed on Jesus' palms even as he went to the cross for your sins? Isaiah 49. That the one who upholds the universe by the word of his power is the same one who upholds your heart and gives you strength. That the one who shepherds the stars also shepherds and restores your soul. If you are weak and weary and need strength, look to no one but Jesus. who is God become man. The Word made flesh, the glory of God made manifest. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Isaiah 40 surveys all those places we look for strength and security when we've forgotten God and Reminds us they will all come to nothing. They will be blown away as the dust on the scales But not so the Lord Jesus He gives power to the weak and to those who have no might he increases strength Even the youth shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. Let's pray. Lord God in heaven, the sin that remains in our heart, the influence of this fallen world in which we live, both of these influences would have us to limit you. to denature your godness, to make you like us, to press us into our finite limitations, capacities. But Lord, let us confess that you alone are God, that you are to be likened to nothing in all of creation. and that this is the cause of our worship. This is cause for praise and for adoration. The faith of our hearts and the adoration of our tongues. And Father, where we have yielded to these influences, Graciously remind us by your word and spirit who you truly are. Bring us back to a joyful confession of your godness, though we cannot comprehend you in that godness, yet we confess it and rejoice in it. And Lord, frustrate the designs of the evil one, who would keep us from true knowledge of your glorious and majestic transcendence. May we know you as you are. May we look to Jesus and behold the light of the glory of the knowledge of our God. May we walk in that knowledge and in all the struggles and temptations and difficulties of life turn our hearts to you and cry out to you and call upon you for strength and for salvation. And as we do this, Father, may all glory and honor and praise belong to our God. And we do pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.