Isaiah 40

1Bring comfort, bring comfort to my people, says your God. 2Speak to the heart of Jerusalem and call out to her that her time of forced labor is finished, that the penalty for her guilt has been paid, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins.

3A voice calls out: In the wilderness clear a road for the LORD; across the desert plain lay a straight highway for our God. 4Every valley will rise and every mountain and hill will sink; the broken ground will be made flat, and the rugged heights an open plain. 5The glory of the LORD will be unveiled, and every human being will see it together, for the LORD has spoken it with his own mouth.

6A voice says, “Call out.” And someone answered, “What should I call out?” Humankind is grass, and all its loyalty is like a wildflower. 7The grass dries out and the flower droops when the wind of the LORD blows across it; yes, the people are mere grass. 8Grass dries out and flowers droop, but the word of our God holds firm for all time.

9Climb a high mountain, Zion, you who carry good news. Shout with all your strength, Jerusalem, you who carry good news. Shout and do not be afraid. Tell the towns of Judah, “Here is your God!” 10Look, the Lord GOD is coming in power, and his arm will rule for him. Look, he brings his prize with him; what he has won goes ahead of him. 11Like a shepherd he will pasture his flock. He will gather the lambs into his arm and carry them close against his chest, and he will lead the nursing ewes with care.

12Who has measured the seas in the cup of his hand, or marked off the sky with the stretch of his fingers? Who has gathered the dust of the earth into a basket, or set the mountains on a scale and the hills on a pair of balances? 13Who has taken the measure of the Spirit of the LORD? What adviser of his has ever taught him? 14Whom did he ever ask for advice, so as to gain insight? Who trained him in the path of justice, or taught him knowledge, or pointed out to him the road to discernment? 15The nations are no more than a drop falling from a bucket; they count as the dust left on a scale. He lifts up the coastlands like fine powder. 16Lebanon would not supply enough wood for the fire, nor its wild animals enough for a burnt offering.

17Set beside him, all the nations amount to nothing; to him they count for less than nothing, for an empty void. 18Who, then, will you say God is like? What figure could you line up beside him? 19An idol? A craftsman casts it, a goldsmith plates it in gold and refines silver for its chains. 20The one who cannot afford so rich an offering chooses a block of wood that will not decay and goes looking for a skilled carver to mount an idol that will not tip over. 21Do you not know? Have you not heard? Was it not announced to you at the very start? Have you not grasped it since the earth’s foundations were laid? 22He is the one enthroned high over the earth’s round horizon, and the people living on it look like grasshoppers. He draws the sky out like a sheer cloth and spreads it like a tent to dwell in. 23He turns high officials into nothing and makes the earth’s judges like a formless void. 24Hardly have they been planted, hardly have they been sown, hardly has their stem rooted in the soil, when he breathes on them and they shrivel, and a gale whirls them away like straw.

25Who will you set beside me, as though I had an equal? says the Holy One. 26Look up high and see. Who created these? It is he who marches out their ranks in full count and summons every one by name. So vast is his might, so great his strength, that not one fails to appear.

27Why do you say, Jacob, and why do you insist, Israel, “My path is hidden from the LORD, and my God lets my case slip by”? 28Do you not know? Or have you not heard? The LORD is the God of all ages, the maker of the earth to its farthest edges. He does not tire or wear out, and his understanding is beyond all searching. 29He gives strength to the exhausted and builds up the power of those who have none. 30Youths grow faint and run out of strength; young men in their prime trip and go down. 31But those who wait for the LORD will take on fresh strength. They will climb high on outspread wings like eagles. They will run and not wear out; they will walk and not tire.