Isaiah 40 contains God’s message of comfort to his people. The name Isaiah means “The Lord is salvation,” and the writing reflects an acknowledgement of God’s sovereignty over His people and even pagan nations. This chapter talks about the forgiveness of sins through the death and resurrection of Jesus and the exercise of God’s mercy. God called for a highway to be built over which His people could return to their homeland. God tells them that their suffering is over, and their sins are forgiven. He also promises to reveal his glory and power, and to care for them like a shepherd. This encourages the church of God not to complain, but to trust in the power and wisdom of God, who gives strength to the weary and helps those who hope in him. I say long after the bible critics are dead and buried, the word of God and His promises will still be alive in His truth will last forever.
It reads in Isaiah 40:1-31 KJV> Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. The voice of him that cried in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The voice said, Cry. And he said, what shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field: The grass withered, the flower faded: because the spirit of the Lord blow upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withered; the flower faded: but the word of our God shall stand for ever. O Zion, that brings good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, that brings good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God! Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him: behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young. Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance? Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counsellor hath taught him? With whom took he counsel, and who instructed him, and taught him in the path of judgment, and taught him knowledge, and shewed to him the way of understanding? Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing. And Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering. All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity. To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto him? The workman melted a graven image, and the goldsmith spread it over with gold, and castes silver chains. He that is so impoverished that he hath no oblation choosen a tree that will not rot; he seeks unto him a cunning workman to prepare a graven image, that shall not be moved. Have ye not known? have ye not heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he that sits upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretches out the heavens as a curtain and spread them out as a tent to dwell in: That bringeth the princes to nothing; he maketh the judges of the earth as vanity. Yea, they shall not be planted; yea, they shall not be sown yea, their stock shall not take root in the earth: and he shall also blow upon them, and they shall wither, and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble. To whom then will ye liken me, or shall I be equal? saith the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one failed. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speaks, O Israel, my way is hidden from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my God? Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainted not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.