Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out the heavens with [his] span, and grasped the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in a balance, and the hills in scales?
Isaiah's chapter of comfort turns to questions no one can answer. Who has ever handled the oceans, the sky, the dust and the mountains as if they were small enough to hold and weigh? The questions are not there to crush us. They introduce the One doing the measuring, and who He is changes everything.
The chapter has just promised a Deliverer. This verse tells us who He is.
From verse 12 on, when we ask who this great and loving Deliverer is, we find He is no petty conqueror — not the kind the Rabbis imagined, or the kind Israel's earthly desires craved so long and so eagerly. He is the Creator. How strange that such a height of glory should be unwelcome! ... The Spirit of God first identifies the Messiah with God. He sets out what He is: the eternal, Almighty and only wise One, the Creator and Governor of all things, the Holy One, Jehovah of Israel.
Each image in the verse takes something we cannot handle and puts it in a hand that can.
God is so great that the mighty oceans lie in the hollow of His hand like a few drops of water. The expanse of the heavens, which has no limit for us, is only the span of His hand. The dust of the earth, the mountains and the hills are small things, weighed in His scales.
Our instruments were never built for work like this:
Every human measuring instrument falls short of the vastness and perfection of His works.
The words "measure," "scales" and "balance" are more than poetry. They say creation is exact — and Isaiah said it long before anyone could test it.
We have only been learning to find deeper truth than we were at all aware of in the prophet's challenge: "Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand ... and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?" What science knew anything about such measurement in the day when that question was asked? How many centuries has it taken to bring man's slow feet to where the prophet stood? But we can now see that we may take this as true in the fullest sense: God weighs and measures every bit of the earth's dust.
The same scales weigh the powers that frighten us.
We live in a day when nations rise up, assert themselves, and arm to the hilt to enforce their will. What are they in the presence of God? They are like a small drop that may hang on a fingertip when lifted out of a bucket of water. Or like the small dust left on the scales after someone removes the thing weighed in them — so small that no one pays attention to it. He counts the nations that look so imposing and threatening to us as "less than nothing, and emptiness." It is good for us to measure them by God's standards and not by our own.
The same hand that measures the seas also gathers lambs. The two pictures belong together.
People go into the edge of outer space at enormous cost, labour and risk. But God covers the whole of the heavens with the span of His hand. He holds the seas, with all their power and vastness, in the hollow of that same mighty hand. And that hand of power is the hand of love: "He will tend His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs in His arms; He will carry them in His bosom." No wonder this precious chapter begins, "Comfort, comfort My people, says your God."
The image of the restless sea held in check has a personal use.
There have been times in our lives when we were self-willed and seemed impossible to tame, like the great sea... The sea lies in the hollow of God's hand, and His power holds back all its fierce anger. In the same way He held and restrained us in those days. We were in the hollow of His hand. We felt the restraint, chafed at it and tried to break free from it, but we could not... How shall we bless for ever that mercy which held us within bounds and kept us back from destruction?
- The hand measures. The oceans sit in its hollow. The sky is its span. Mountains sit on its scales. Creation is not too big for God; it is small in His grip.
- The hand is exact. Weights and balances say the universe is exact. God weighs and measures every grain of the earth's dust — and Isaiah said so centuries before anyone could prove it.
- The hand weighs nations. Armed powers that look overwhelming come out as a drop from a bucket — measure them by His standard, not yours.
- The hand belongs to the Deliverer. The One coming to save is no small conqueror; He is the Creator, and Scripture here ties the Messiah to God Himself.
- The hand carries lambs. The same hand that holds the seas gathers the weak into His arms. Power and love are one hand — that is why the chapter opens with comfort.
Who hath directed the Spirit of Jehovah, and, [as] his counsellor, hath taught him?
The verses just before this one call the waters, the heavens and the mountains to witness that God made them all. Now the question turns inward: who ever advised the mind behind that work?
Israel was waiting for a great and loving Deliverer. The prophet tells them who that Deliverer is — and the answer was not welcome.
The verses from 12 on tell us who this great and loving Deliverer is. He is no minor conqueror, such as the Rabbis pictured and Israel's earthly desires craved so long and so eagerly. He is the Creator. How strange that such a height of glory should be unwelcome! Even then, God's warning of His judgement on idolatry is the first great question in this part of Isaiah's prophecy — and it concerns Israel even more than the nations. His people would turn away from the LORD more and more and follow the nations in their worship of idols. But before the Spirit of God deals with this evil, He first identifies the Messiah with God, and dwells on what He is: the eternal, Almighty and only wise One, the Creator and Ruler of all things, the Holy One, the LORD of Israel.
Creation shows that a mind of counsel and understanding stands behind it. This verse presses one step further back and finds no one there. Older translations ask who directed the Spirit of the LORD; the ESV asks who has measured it.
The waters beneath, the heavens above, and the earth with its mountains and hills all bear witness that He is nothing less than the Creator of the universe. The universe does tell of a God of counsel and judgment, a God of knowledge and understanding. But who directed the Spirit of the LORD? Clearly the wisdom of God is behind the universe. It is just as clear that no one is behind God. In creation God is alone.
A craftsman studies his material and improves. God learns nothing from what He has made. That rules out a popular picture: a God who is slowly getting better at His work.
Not so God. The Creator can learn nothing from His creation. The universe was conceived in His infinite mind, and He cannot receive any instruction from it… "For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?" (Rom. 11:34)… He has not, as some suppose, been doing the best He can from the start. He has not been fighting off the advances of evil, meeting the opposing power as well as He is able, and always improving on the past as His intelligence grows. "You thought that I was one like yourself" (Ps. 50:21) is the charge He makes against the wicked, and all are guilty of that charge who have not learned Him in Jesus.
Isaiah does not leave the vision in the abstract. Having seen the Creator whom no one instructed, he immediately measures world powers against Him.
However great their power and importance in the eyes of man, when seen in the presence of the majesty of God they are but "a drop from a bucket" and "as the dust on the scales". The isles of the Gentiles are for God only "fine dust" that He can take up and use at His pleasure. They may defy God and at times oppress His people, but before God they are "as nothing", and indeed counted as less than nothing, for they are emptiness.
The apostle Paul takes up this question in 1 Corinthians 2, and gives it an unexpected turn. What no man could reach into, God gives by His Spirit.
What makes it even more striking is the application the apostle adds from Isaiah 40:13. There the prophet insists on the supremacy of the LORD's intelligence, as he had already insisted on His infinite goodness and power. God searches all things, yet no one can search Him: "Who has measured the Spirit of the LORD, or what man shows him his counsel?" In divine things the Christian is just as free from man's measuring and instruction, and this through the Spirit of God living in him… the apostle credits the Christian with the mind, the intelligence, of Christ, in whom God's wisdom is. So he makes ours now by grace, as people who have the Holy Spirit, what belongs to God by nature — wholly independent of man, and beyond man's discovery.
God does not lay His whole plan open to our minds. Obedience, not understanding, is what puts a person inside it.
When we obey and walk in the mind and word of God, He puts us in the path that this infinite, all-embracing wisdom has arranged. No creature without a will of its own ever leaves that path; only self-will departs from it. God does not reveal His wisdom as something our minds can take in, because then we would not be in our place in it. Simply receiving His word gives us our place and our duty, according to the perfect wisdom that has ordered it all and understands it all.
- Alone. Wisdom stands behind the universe. No one stands behind God: in creation He is alone, and He learns nothing from what He made.
- Unlikened. The Deliverer Israel longed for turns out to be the Creator Himself — which is why God's warning against idolatry stands first here.
- Unexpected. Paul turns the question around. Through His Spirit, God gives the believer the mind of Christ — the very mind no man could instruct.
- Unhindered. We do not have to survey that wisdom before we obey. Receiving His word puts us on the path it has already arranged.
With whom took he counsel, and [who] gave him intelligence, and instructed him in the path of judgment, and taught him knowledge, and shewed him the way of understanding?
Here God asks a run of questions, and each one expects the same answer: no one. No one advised Him. No one taught Him justice. They come in a chapter meant to comfort a discouraged people. So why does a suffering nation need to hear that no one ever taught God?
The chapter has promised a Deliverer. Ask who He is, and the answer rises far above what Israel had been hoping for.
The verses from 12 tell us who this great and loving Deliverer is. He is no petty conqueror, such as the Rabbis imagined and the sinful desires of Israel craved so long and so eagerly. He is the Creator. How strange that such a height of glory should be unwelcome! ... But before the Spirit of God deals with this sin of idolatry, He first identifies the Messiah with God. He dwells on what He is: the eternal, Almighty, and only wise One, the Creator and Governor of all things, the Holy One, Jehovah of Israel.
The verse asks who advised God and who taught Him. Trace His knowledge back, and the search stops.
The waters beneath, the heavens above, and the earth with its mountains and hills all stand as witnesses that He is none less than the Creator of the universe. The universe does indeed tell of a God of counsel and judgment, a God of knowledge and understanding. But who directed the Spirit of the LORD? Clearly the wisdom of God is behind the universe, but it is just as clear that there is no one behind God. In creation God is alone.
If God took advice from no one, He is not slowly getting better at what He does. That cuts at anyone who pictures God as a bigger version of himself.
The Creator can learn nothing from His creation. The universe came out of His infinite mind. He could never receive any instruction from it... He has not, as some suppose, been doing the best He can from the start. He has not been struggling against the spread of evil, meeting the opposing power as well as He is able, and always improving on the past as His intelligence grows. "You thought that I was one like yourself" (Ps. 50:21) is the charge He makes against the wicked, and it is a charge of which all are guilty who have not learned Him in Jesus.
Paul takes up this challenge and turns it around.
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What makes it even more striking is the application the apostle adds from Isaiah 40:13. For there the prophet insists on the supremacy of Jehovah's intelligence, as he had before insisted on His infinite goodness and power. He is unsearchable Himself, yet He searches everything: "Who has measured the Spirit of the LORD, or what man shows Him His counsel?" The Christian is just as free from man's measuring and teaching in divine things, and this through the Spirit of God living in him... For the apostle credits the Christian with the mind of Christ, in whom God's wisdom is. So he claims for us now by grace, as those who have the Holy Spirit, what belongs to God by nature and lies wholly beyond man's reach and discovery.
Paul asks these same questions himself, borrowing them from Isaiah. In his hands they measure man against God.
His thoughts are guided by the Spirit and still run along the lines of that gospel-preaching prophet. So he takes up Isaiah's language, as given in the Greek Old Testament, and asks boldly, "Who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counselor? Or who has given a gift to Him that he might be repaid?" (See Isa. 40:13-14.) These are questions worth asking... How small man appears! God works for His own glory.
These questions lead somewhere practical. Because no one instructed Him, our own thinking has to give way to His.
Who has been HIS counsellor? Who showed HIM the way of understanding? HE makes known to us HIS counsels, and directs our minds in the way of understanding, as we wait on Him. His thoughts, not the ones that start in our minds, are to remain! His strength, not ours, will prevail; and it is this which He wants us to have.
- Creator. The Deliverer Israel longed for is no petty conqueror. He is the Creator, the Messiah identified with God Himself.
- Alone. Creation points back to a God of counsel and understanding. But no one stands behind God. In creation He is alone.
- Complete. He learns nothing from what He made. He is not doing His best against evil and improving as He goes. The God who needs no teacher has nothing left to learn.
- Given. Isaiah puts this wisdom beyond every human reach. The Spirit gives it to the believer: the mind of Christ, in whom God's wisdom is.
- Trusted. The One no one instructed makes His counsels known. He directs our minds as we wait on Him. His thoughts remain instead of ours, and His strength prevails instead of ours.
Behold, the nations are esteemed as a drop of the bucket, and as the fine dust on the scales; behold, he taketh up the isles as an atom.
God has just told a discouraged people to look up and see their God. Now He sets the world's great powers on the scales, and they weigh no more than a drop or a speck of dust — so why do they still frighten us?
One writer puts both pictures back into everyday life: a bucket of water, a set of scales.
We live in a day when nations are rising up and asserting themselves, and arming to the hilt, to enforce their will. What are they in the presence of God? They are like a small drop that hangs on a finger-tip when you lift it out of a bucket of water. Or like the little dust left on the scales after someone takes off the goods that were weighed there — so slight that no one pays it any attention. The nations that look so grand and threatening to us He counts as "less than nothing and emptiness." It is good for us to measure them by God's standards and not by our own.
The nations have not shrunk. What changes is the light they stand in.
Having caught a vision of the Creator, the prophet turns to view the nations in the light of His glory. In the eyes of man their power and importance may be great. But in the presence of the majesty of God they are only "a drop from a bucket" and "the dust on the scales". The coastlands of the nations are for God only "fine dust" that He can take up and use as He pleases. They may defy God and at times oppress His people, but before God they are "as nothing", and indeed counted as less than nothing, for they are emptiness.
One writer ties this weighing to the Messiah promised in the same chapter.
The good news centres in their divine Messiah, who will feed His flock like a shepherd, the Ruler and Judge of all the earth. His wisdom and power have already shone in creation, and they reduce all the nations to zero compared with Him. That is without even mentioning their folly in likening Him to a carved image, or Israel's unbelief of His watchful eye and effective help. He will surely appear at the right moment.
Isaiah 40 opens with the word "comfort." Cutting the world's powers down to a drop is not a lecture on how big God is. It is aimed at a tired people.
Note that Isaiah 40, in comforting Israel, shows the nothingness of flesh (in Israel as elsewhere) and of the nations of idols compared with God. But the power and tirelessness of God secures Israel in grace. He who waits on Him, the LORD, renews his strength.
The weighing of the nations sits beside two very different pictures: the arm that holds up creation, and the arms that gather lambs.
How great He is. He never wearies or faints. But here lies our comfort: His heart is as tender toward His own people as His arm is strong in creation. Behold your God, you fearful saints, and take fresh courage. "He will tend His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs in His arms; He will carry them in His bosom" (v. 11). His arm upholds creation, but His bosom is the resting place for His lambs.
Another writer turns the same wonder into a personal confession.
He rolled the mountains together. He laid valleys, seas and rivers in their places. He calls all the stars by name, so that not one is missing. This is the God who loves me! Our hearts bow down before the wonderful wisdom, skill and greatness of such a God. And this God, who spans the heavens and measures the sea in the hollow of His hand, describes Himself as One who notices the falling sparrow and counts the hairs of His people's heads (Matthew 10:29).
- Weighed — a bucket and a set of scales: a drop clinging to a finger, dust left on the pan. Too slight for anyone to notice.
- Measured — nations look huge by our standards. In the light of the Creator's glory they are nothing, and God picks up whole coastlands and uses them as He pleases.
- Meant as comfort — the chapter opens with comfort. Cutting the world powers down to zero is meant to rest a discouraged people in God's untiring strength.
- Meant as rebuke — if God is this great, shaping an image of Him out of wood or gold is folly. Doubting His watchful eye is unbelief.
- Meant for you — the arm that upholds creation is the bosom that carries the lambs. The God who weighs the nations counts the hairs on my head.
And Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt-offering.
Isaiah 40 comforts a discouraged people by describing the God who is coming to them. Then the prophet turns to the altar. Even the whole forest of Lebanon, with all its animals, falls short as fuel and offering. That raises a sharp question. If nothing we bring is enough for God, what is worship for?
The verse belongs to a long passage where God answers the question of who this promised Deliverer really is. One writer traces the shock of the answer:
From verse 12 on we learn who this great and loving Deliverer is. He turns out to be no petty conqueror, such as the Rabbis imagined and Israel's earthly desires craved so long and so eagerly. He is the Creator. How strange that such a height of glory should be unwelcome! ... Before the Spirit of God deals with this wickedness, He first identifies the Messiah with God. He dwells on what He is: the eternal, Almighty, and only wise One, the Creator and Governor of all things, the Holy One, Jehovah of Israel.
Lebanon was the mountain range famous for its cedars. In the Bible, the cedar stands for more than timber:
The cedar is a majestic tree. It speaks of the elite of mankind, high up in their pride. But the Lord breaks them down by His voice, as indeed He will humble all the pride of man.
So the verse takes the best timber and the biggest herds, and calls the total too small.
Nothing is enough because God lacks nothing. One writer puts the rule plainly:
Man can never make God his debtor, though he is always trying to do so. Psalm 50, the first chapter of Isaiah, and Acts 17 all prove the same thing. Man, whether Jew or Gentile, keeps trying to give something to God. But the effort is wasted. God's reply to the man who tries to make Him his debtor is, "If I were hungry, I would not tell you." God must be the giver, man the receiver.
Another writer adds that we have nothing of our own to give:
He is supreme above all, and only in this way can He be near to all. He does not live in temples made by hands, which shut Him in. Human hands do not serve Him, as if He needed anything. He is enough in Himself, the Source and Centre of all. Life and breath and all things are only His gift. So no one can make Him his debtor, or give Him anything except what is already His own.
If the whole of Lebanon is not enough, the worshipper is left with one open path — and it is receiving, not paying:
What then could he do for One who needs no help from His creatures? For Him, "Lebanon would not suffice for fuel, nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering." How could he repay Him? There could be only one way — to receive the cup of salvation and call on the name of Jehovah. He could not add one ray to God's glory. He was to receive from Him and so glorify Him.
The shortfall is not the end of the story. It points to the one offering that does measure up:
The redemption which God has paid for us is no amount of perishable things, such as silver and gold. Lebanon would not suffice for fuel, nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering. Nothing less than the precious blood of Christ would do. God valued our salvation at no less cost than the pouring out of His soul unto death.
Why can nothing else do? It is a question of scale:
The sacrifice can only be what the person is, or the victim offered. If the offering is a bull or a goat, the sacrifice can only be finite. It makes nothing perfect as to sin before God, for God is infinite. In other words, a finite offering cannot meet the claims of the infinite God.
Seeing God on this scale changes what other offers look like. Abraham is shown breathing the atmosphere of exactly these verses when a king tried to enrich him:
The bread and wine, and the blessing of the priest of the Most High God, had raised Abram to such a height that he could, in one sweeping glance, take in the vast possessions of heaven and earth, and then look down from there on the contemptible proposal of the King of Sodom and reject it.
- Creator — The Deliverer Israel waited for is the Creator Himself. God identifies the Messiah with Himself.
- Cedar — Lebanon gives the best that nature and human pride can offer. It still falls short of one burnt offering.
- Debtor — God needs nothing and owns everything. No one can put Him in his debt, since all we bring was already His.
- Cup — We cannot add one ray to His glory. The one response left is to receive: take the cup of salvation and call on His name.
- Christ — What Lebanon could not supply, God supplied Himself. A finite offering cannot meet an infinite God. Nothing less than the blood of Christ would do.
All the nations are as nothing before him; they are esteemed by him less than a cipher, and vanity.
The prophet tells a frightened people to weigh the nations on the Creator's scale. Two questions follow: how can whole nations count as nothing before God, and why would a prophet sent to comfort a broken people say it?
This verse follows a set of questions about who advised God when He made the world. No one did.
The waters below, the heavens above, and the earth with its mountains and hills all stand as witnesses. They testify that He is nothing less than the Creator of the universe. The universe does tell of a God of counsel and judgment, a God of knowledge and understanding. But who directed the Spirit of the LORD? Clearly the wisdom of God stands behind the universe. Just as clearly, no one stands behind God. In creation God is alone.
Two pictures come just before this verse: a drop and a speck of dust. Both show a quantity too small for anyone to notice.
They are like a small drop hanging on a fingertip, lifted out of a bucket of water. Or like the fine dust left on the scales after the weighed goods are taken off — so small that no one takes any notice of it. He counts the nations that look so impressive and threatening to us as "less than nothing and emptiness." It is good for us to measure them by God's standard and not by our own.
Nations are strong, and they can do damage. This verse sets that strength beside God's majesty.
Having caught a vision of the Creator, the prophet turns to look at the nations in the light of His glory. Their power and importance may be great in the eyes of man. But seen in the presence of the majesty of God, they are only "a drop from a bucket" and "the dust on the scales". The islands of the nations are for God only "a very little thing" that He can pick up and use as He pleases. They may defy God and at times oppress His people. Yet before God they are "as nothing" — counted as less than nothing, for they are empty.
If the nations weigh nothing, then the images they carve and the men who rule them weigh nothing either.
So God is great beyond all our thoughts, as verse 18 shows. In the presence of His glory, how foolish and worthy of scorn are the makers of carved images that cannot even move, as verses 19 and 20 say. And how weak and small men are, appearing only as grasshoppers, with their princes and judges as nothing and emptiness, like stubble before a whirlwind... We do well to think hard about this magnificent passage. For this God of indescribable power and majesty has made Himself known to us in Christ as our Father.
Kelly turns the same weighing on idols, and shows what it means for God's own people.
His glory and power serve His goodness to His people. So they will rejoice that their Shepherd is nothing less than Jehovah, who counts all creation a very little thing, and the nations less than nothing. What a death-blow to any likeness of Him — to an image carved by man!
This greatness is not meant to crush the reader. It is meant to comfort.
How great He is. He never wearies or faints. But here lies our comfort: His heart is as tender toward His own people as His arm is strong in creation. Behold your God, you fearful saints, and take fresh courage... His arm upholds creation, but His bosom is the resting place for His lambs.
The weighing of the nations leads to one response.
Even the nations look large now, with their conflicts and their skill in destruction. To Him they are the fine dust on a balance. "All the nations are as nothing before Him," and empty! He counts them as less than a zero (v. 17)! WAIT UPON HIM!
- Alone. No one stood behind God when He made the world. He took counsel from nobody.
- Weighed. Nations are the drop clinging to a finger and the dust left on an empty scale — too small for anyone to notice.
- Nothing. They can defy God and oppress His people, and still count as less than nothing, because they are empty.
- Nobody. The same weighing flattens carved images and princes. Rulers are stubble in a whirlwind.
- Comfort. The arm that upholds creation carries the lambs. So weigh the nations by God's standard, and wait on Him.