Isaiah 5.5 44-45

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Isaiah 44:6–20 ESV

6 Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: “I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god. 7 Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me, since I appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come, and what will happen. 8 Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.”

The beginning of chapter 44 shows God calling out His people and pouring His Spirit on them. There is a uniqueness to this God and to His people, they are specified and they are His. Now these verses here in 6-8 reinforce the uniqueness and might of God. And look at the focus of this section: it is contrasting YHWH with other gods. YHWH is everything, the first and the last, He is above all, He is before all, He is infinite and eternal. So great is He that in comparison any other god is nothing. Whatever those false gods are, they belong in an entirely separate category from YHWH.

And then in v. 8, God calls us away from fear, as His witnesses, that we would trust Him in all things for, as it says, there is no rock beside Him. There is nothing secure, nothing certain except for Him.

Now, I want to take a second to talk about who this is for. Often through our Isaiah study we’ve talked about Isaiah’s original audience, a people probably worried about enemies and then a people in exile. But I want to remind us all: this is also for us. We’re the intended audience. Not Isaiah’s intended audience, but the Holy Spirit’s intended audience when He gave Isaiah these visions and directed him to these words. We are the intended audience who Isaiah 44 in light of Acts 1-2, in light of the Holy Spirit being poured out at Pentecost and Jesus’ call to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth.

Here is v. 8: you are my witnesses! Yes, he’s talking about an exiled Israel, but he’s also talking about us. He’s saying, that no matter what we see out there in the world, no matter the culture around us, the bad news of the day rampant worship of false gods, none of these things should make us fear because our God is above all of these things. And we should not fear in our mission to be His witnesses. What is it that gives you anxiety when considering sharing your faith? God says, I am the rock, stand firm on me and fear not, be my witness!

But v. 9-20 will also give us further reason to not be afraid for God in this passages shows us the result of idolatry.

Isaiah 44:6–20 ESV

9 All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. 10 Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? 11 Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human. Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together. 12 The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. 13 The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house. 14 He cuts down cedars, or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it. 15 Then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes a part of it and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also he makes a god and worships it; he makes it an idol and falls down before it. 16 Half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat; he roasts it and is satisfied. Also he warms himself and says, “Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire!” 17 And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!” 18 They know not, nor do they discern, for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand. 19 No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?” 20 He feeds on ashes; a deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”

Isaiah is mocking the idol worshippers by giving us this satirical prophetic vision. First we get the example of the ironsmith who is fashioning an idol. What happens to him while he’s crafting this idol? He gets tired and hungry, his strength fails, he has to stop working. He has grown faint. Do you see the irony? We’ve already heard in a number of places in these chapters in Isaiah that those who wait on the Lord will not grow tired and weary, but will renew their strength. But those who make for themselves an idol or iron? they will grow tired and even though they are making an idol to be worshipped, that false god has no power to renew their strength.

That’s the satirical edge here. The craftsman pours his strength and energy into creating this idol and will receive nothing in return. He becomes exhausted by the very act of manufacturing what he believes will save him and yet it cannot.

A modern day example: What are the things that we hope will give us strength and salvation? Money? Our American addiction to work? These things will take everything from you if you let them—and they can only give you so much in return, and they certainly cannot save you.

Then we move on to the carpenter who plants a great tree that is to be used to fashion an idol to be worshipped. But along the way he needs fire, so he takes part of the wood from this tree and burns it, then takes that fire and warms himself and bakes with it. Then he takes some of that wood and makes a god and worships it. He falls down on his knees and worships the very same thing that was just cooking his dinner. Over half he uses to cook meat, the other half he calls it is his god and hopes for deliverance. Do you see the carpenter’s problem?

He has lost the distinction between that which is holy and that which is material, he does not understand the difference between creator and created and he is trying to make created material—a tree—into a holy, transcendent, powerful god.

The sacred and profane represent an ontological distinction: the sacred belongs to God’s immortal realm, while the profane characterizes the mortal human world.1 Nothing created is inherently holy; .2 An idol, by contrast, attempts to collapse this boundary—it claims to be simultaneously material (profane wood or metal) and divine (sacred object of worship). The problem isn’t that the ordinary exists, but that treating the extraordinary as ordinary violates the distinction between realms that must be maintained.3

This makes the idol not merely ineffective but theologically incoherent. When YHWH appears, there is the requisite reminder of the essential difference between Creator and created.4 God’s holiness designates apartness—God raising himself above all others and all that is created, maintaining absolute uniqueness and transcendence.2 The carpenter’s god, fashioned from material he himself shaped and partially burned, cannot embody this radical otherness. It remains stubbornly, irreducibly of creation, yet claims to be sacred.

Isaiah’s mockery exposes this as spiritual delusion. The idolater’s blindness isn’t merely logical confusion—it’s a failure to perceive the categorical boundary that defines reality itself. The One who is Other in nature provides the means by which Israel can live in the full reality of his nature and share his aversion to all that is fundamentally unreal, shown most graphically in distinctions between clean and unclean, sacred and profane.4 The idol represents the ultimate confusion of these categories.

Modern Day examples:

The sacred-self, I am both holy and transcendent and true, but also I am weak, frail, and failing (and prone to sin!)

Modern idolatry is not the worship of bad things, but the worship of insufficient things. It is asking the ordinary to do the work of the holy. The idol is always a category error—created matter pretending to transcend creation. From technology to money to politics, we’re looking for the holy and transcendent in all the wrong places.

In idolatry, as Isaiah satirizes, humanity attempts to elevate something created and profane—wood, metal, human achievement—to the status of the divine. This is a human-driven effort to collapse the boundary, resulting in a confusion of categories where the created is mistakenly worshipped as the Creator. It’s a delusion where the creature seeks to make God in its own image or from its own materials, blurring the essential distinction between the two.

The Incarnation, however, represents the inverse, and a divinely initiated act. Here, the truly Sacred, the Creator, condescends to take on the created, the “earthy and creature-ly,” in the person of Jesus Christ. This is not a confusion of categories, but a unique and miraculous union where the divine nature remains fully divine, and the human nature remains fully human, in one person. The boundary is not collapsed by human delusion, but bridged by divine love and power, precisely for the purpose of salvation.

Let’s finish today with the rest of chapter 44, a reminder of who God is, and who we are in relation to Him

Isaiah 44:21–28 ESV

21 Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant; I formed you; you are my servant; O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me. 22 I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud and your sins like mist; return to me, for I have redeemed you. 23 Sing, O heavens, for the Lord has done it; shout, O depths of the earth; break forth into singing, O mountains, O forest, and every tree in it! For the Lord has redeemed Jacob, and will be glorified in Israel. 24 Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: “I am the Lord, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself, 25 who frustrates the signs of liars and makes fools of diviners, who turns wise men back and makes their knowledge foolish, 26 who confirms the word of his servant and fulfills the counsel of his messengers, who says of Jerusalem, ‘She shall be inhabited,’ and of the cities of Judah, ‘They shall be built, and I will raise up their ruins’; 27 who says to the deep, ‘Be dry; I will dry up your rivers’; 28 who says of Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd, and he shall fulfill all my purpose’; saying of Jerusalem, ‘She shall be built,’ and of the temple, ‘Your foundation shall be laid.’ ”

The idols of Isaiah’s satire were not personal, they could not sustain, they were material, nothing holy, not transcendent.

This God? YHWH? He formed His people, He formed us, He has the authority and power to forgive and blot out our sins and redeem us. He commands worship from all of creation, from all people, from every tree, from the heavens, from the mountains.

This God made all things and spread out the whole earth by Himself and He will bring about all that He purposes, including the redemption of his people.

Look here, the end of 44 is a vision of Jerusalem being inhabited again, the cities of Judah being built up, Israel returning from exile and building up the ruins of their nation. And then we get a name, Cyrus—the one day future king of Persia who God says is His shepherd, that through this pagan King, God will bring about His purpose.

God will take the lower things of this world, the enemies of His people, the violent things, and redeem them for his salvation and purpose. He did that on the cross of Jesus, taking this instrument of death, that which was meant to overthrow the king of the Jews, and it became the glory of God through Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Indeed, the same is true today, God takes the things of our suffering and will use them for His glory and our good, for our transformation and spiritual maturity.