Isaiah 40:12–26

The Lord Has No Equal

¹²Who else has held the oceans in his hand?

Who has measured off the heavens with his fingers?

Who else knows the weight of the earth

or has weighed the mountains and hills on a scale?

¹³Who is able to advise the Spirit of the Lord?

Who knows enough to give him advice or teach him?

¹⁴Has the Lord ever needed anyone’s advice?

Does he need instruction about what is good?

Did someone teach him what is right

or show him the path of justice?

¹⁵No, for all the nations of the world

are but a drop in the bucket.

They are nothing more

than dust on the scales.

He picks up the whole earth

as though it were a grain of sand.

¹⁶All the wood in Lebanon’s forests

and all Lebanon’s animals would not be enough

to make a burnt offering worthy of our God.

¹⁷The nations of the world are worth nothing to him.

In his eyes they count for less than nothing—

mere emptiness and froth.

¹⁸To whom can you compare God?

What image can you find to resemble him?

¹⁹Can he be compared to an idol formed in a mold,

overlaid with gold, and decorated with silver chains?

²⁰Or if people are too poor for that,

they might at least choose wood that won’t decay

and a skilled craftsman

to carve an image that won’t fall down!

²¹Haven’t you heard? Don’t you understand?

Are you deaf to the words of God—

the words he gave before the world began?

Are you so ignorant?

²²God sits above the circle of the earth.

The people below seem like grasshoppers to him!

He spreads out the heavens like a curtain

and makes his tent from them.

²³He judges the great people of the world

and brings them all to nothing.

²⁴They hardly get started, barely taking root,

when he blows on them and they wither.

The wind carries them off like chaff.

²⁵“To whom will you compare me?

Who is my equal?” asks the Holy One.

²⁶Look up into the heavens.

Who created all the stars?

He brings them out like an army, one after another,

calling each by its name.

Because of his great power and incomparable strength,

not a single one is missing.