Isaiah 46–51

False Gods Are Useless

46Bel and Nebo bow down.

Their idols are carried by animals.

The statues are only heavy loads that must be carried;

they only make people tired.

²These gods will all bow down.

They cannot save themselves

but will all be carried away like prisoners.

³“Family of Jacob, listen to me!

All you people from Israel who are still alive, listen!

I have carried you since you were born;

I have taken care of you from your birth.

⁴Even when you are old, I will be the same.

Even when your hair has turned gray, I will take care of you.

I made you and will take care of you.

I will carry you and save you.

⁵“Can you compare me to anyone?

No one is equal to me or like me.

⁶Some people are rich with gold

and weigh their silver on the scales.

They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it into a god.

Then they bow down and worship it.

⁷They put it on their shoulders and carry it.

They set it in its place, and there it stands;

it cannot move from its place.

People may yell at it, but it cannot answer.

It cannot save them from their troubles.

⁸“Remember this, and do not forget it!

Think about these things, you who turn against God.

⁹Remember what happened long ago.

Remember that I am God, and there is no other God.

I am God, and there is no one like me.

¹⁰From the beginning I told you what would happen in the end.

A long time ago I told you things that have not yet happened.

When I plan something, it happens.

What I want to do, I will do.

¹¹I am calling a man from the east to carry out my plan;

he will come like a hawk from a country far away.

I will make what I have said come true;

I will do what I have planned.

¹²Listen to me, you stubborn people,

who are far from what is right.

¹³I will soon do the things that are right.

I will bring salvation soon.

I will save Jerusalem

and bring glory to Israel.”

God Will Destroy Babylon

47The Lord says, “City of Babylon, go down and sit in the dirt.

People of Babylon, sit on the ground.

You are no longer the ruler.

You will no longer be called

tender or beautiful.

²You must use large stones to grind grain into flour.

Remove your veil and your nice skirts.

Uncover your legs and cross the rivers.

³People will see your nakedness;

they will see your shame.

I will punish you;

I will punish every one of you.”

⁴Our Savior is named the Lord All-Powerful;

he is the Holy One of Israel.

⁵“Babylon, sit in darkness and say nothing.

You will no longer be called the queen of kingdoms.

⁶I was angry with my people,

so I rejected those who belonged to me.

I gave them to you,

but you showed them no mercy.

You even made the old people

work very hard.

⁷You said, ‘I will live forever

as the queen.’

But you did not think about these things

or consider what would happen.

⁸“Now, listen, you lover of pleasure.

You think you are safe.

You tell yourself,

‘I am the only important person.

I will never be a widow

or lose my children.’

⁹Two things will happen to you suddenly, in a single day.

You will lose your children and your husband.

These things will truly happen to you,

in spite of all your magic,

in spite of your powerful tricks.

¹⁰You do evil things, but you feel safe

and say, ‘No one sees what I do.’

Your wisdom and knowledge

have fooled you.

You say to yourself,

‘I am God, and no one is equal to me.’

¹¹But troubles will come to you,

and you will not know how to stop them.

Disaster will fall on you,

and you will not be able to keep it away.

You will be destroyed quickly;

you will not even see it coming.

¹²“Keep on using your tricks

and doing all your magic

that you have used since you were young.

Maybe they will help you;

maybe you will be able to scare someone.

¹³You are tired of the advice you have received.

So let those who study the sky—

those who tell the future by looking at the stars and the new moons—

let them save you from what is about to happen to you.

¹⁴But they are like straw;

fire will quickly burn them up.

They cannot save themselves

from the power of the fire.

They are not like coals that give warmth

nor like a fire that you may sit beside.

¹⁵You have worked with these people,

and they have been with you since you were young,

but they will not be able to help you.

Everyone will go his own way,

and there will be no one left to save you.”

God Controls the Future

48The Lord says, “Family of Jacob, listen to me.

You are called Israel,

and you come from the family of Judah.

You swear by the Lord’s name

and praise the God of Israel,

but you are not honest or sincere.

²You call yourselves people of the holy city,

and you depend on the God of Israel,

who is named the Lord All-Powerful.

³Long ago I told you what would happen.

I said these things and made them known;

suddenly I acted, and these things happened.

⁴I knew you were stubborn;

your neck was like an iron muscle,

and your head was like bronze.

⁵So a long time ago I told you about these things;

I told you about them before they happened

so you couldn’t say, ‘My idols did this,

and my wooden and metal statues made these things happen.’

⁶“You heard and saw everything that happened,

so you should tell this news to others.

Now I will tell you about new things,

hidden things that you don’t know yet.

⁷These things are happening now, not long ago;

you have not heard about them before today.

So you cannot say, ‘We already knew about that.’

⁸But you have not heard me; you have not understood.

Even long ago you did not listen to me.

I knew you would surely turn against me;

you have fought against me since you were born.

⁹But for my own sake I will be patient.

People will praise me for not becoming angry

and destroying you.

¹⁰I have made you pure, but not by fire, as silver is made pure.

I have purified you by giving you troubles.

¹¹I do this for myself, for my own sake.

I will not let people speak evil against me,

and I will not let some god take my glory.

Israel Will Be Free

¹²“People of Jacob, listen to me.

People of Israel, I have called you to be my people.

I am God;

I am the beginning and the end.

¹³I made the earth with my own hands.

With my right hand I spread out the skies.

When I call them,

they come together before me.”

¹⁴All of you, come together and listen.

None of the gods said these things would happen.

The Lord has chosen someone

to attack the Babylonians;

he will carry out his wishes against Babylon.

¹⁵“I have spoken; I have called him. ⁿ

I have brought him, and I will make him successful.

¹⁶Come to me and listen to this.

From the beginning I have spoken openly.

From the time it began, I was there.”

Now, the Lord God

has sent me with his Spirit.

¹⁷This is what the Lord, who saves you,

the Holy One of Israel, says:

“I am the Lord your God,

who teaches you to do what is good,

who leads you in the way you should go.

¹⁸If you had obeyed me,

you would have had peace like a full-flowing river.

Good things would have flowed to you like the waves of the sea.

¹⁹You would have had many children,

as many as the grains of sand.

They would never have died out

nor been destroyed.”

²⁰My people, leave Babylon!

Run from the Babylonians!

Tell this news with shouts of joy to the people;

spread it everywhere on earth.

Say, “The Lord has saved his servants, the people of Jacob.”

²¹They did not become thirsty when he led them through the deserts.

He made water flow from a rock for them.

He split the rock,

and water flowed out.

²²“There is no peace for evil people,” says the Lord.

God Calls His Special Servant

49All of you people in faraway places, listen to me.

Listen, all you nations far away.

Before I was born, the Lord called me to serve him.

The Lord named me while I was still in my mother’s womb.

²He made my tongue like a sharp sword.

He hid me in the shadow of his hand.

He made me like a sharp arrow.

He hid me in the holder for his arrows.

³He told me, “Israel, you are my servant.

I will show my glory through you.”

⁴But I said, “I have worked hard for nothing;

I have used all my power, but I did nothing useful.

But the Lord will decide what my work is worth;

God will decide my reward.”

⁵The Lord made me in the body of my mother

to be his servant,

to lead the people of Jacob back to him

so that Israel might be gathered to him.

The Lord will honor me,

and I will get my strength from my God.

⁶Now he told me,

“You are an important servant to me

to bring back the tribes of Jacob,

to bring back the people of Israel who are left alive.

But, more importantly, I will make you a light for all nations

to show people all over the world the way to be saved.”

⁷The Lord who saves you

is the Holy One of Israel.

He speaks to the one who is hated by the people,

to the servant of rulers.

This is what he says: “Kings will see you and stand to honor you;

great leaders will bow down before you,

because the Lord can be trusted.

He is the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.”

The Day of Salvation

⁸This is what the Lord says:

“At the right time I will hear your prayers.

On the day of salvation I will help you.

I will protect you,

and you will be the sign of my agreement with the people.

You will bring back the people to the land

and give the land that is now ruined back to its owners.

⁹You will tell the prisoners, ‘Come out of your prison.’

You will tell those in darkness, ‘Come into the light.’

The people will eat beside the roads,

and they will find food even on bare hills.

¹⁰They will not be hungry or thirsty.

Neither the hot sun nor the desert wind will hurt them.

The God who comforts them will lead them

and guide them by springs of water.

¹¹I will make my mountains into roads,

and the roads will be raised up.

¹²Look, people are coming to me from far away,

from the north and from the west,

from Aswan in southern Egypt.”

¹³Heavens and earth, be happy.

Mountains, shout with joy,

because the Lord comforts his people

and will have pity on those who suffer.

Jerusalem and Her Children

¹⁴But Jerusalem said, “The Lord has left me;

the Lord has forgotten me.”

¹⁵The Lord answers, “Can a woman forget the baby she nurses?

Can she feel no kindness for the child to which she gave birth?

Even if she could forget her children,

I will not forget you.

¹⁶See, I have written your name on my hand.

Jerusalem, I always think about your walls.

¹⁷Your children will soon return to you,

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