It Isn’t Good – Isaiah 41:1–7

As a kid I used to like playing the board game Stratego.  Two players, each with an army of multiple specialists (spies, miners, etc.) went to war with each other.  The best strategy won.  Yahweh says the nations are playing Stratego with Babylon but for all their strategy they will not win.

Listen to me in silence, O coastlands; let the peoples renew their strength; let them approach, then let them speak; let us together draw near for judgment.

Who stirred up one from the east whom victory meets at every step?  He gives up nations before him, so that he tramples kings underfoot; he makes them like dust with his sword, like driven stubble with his bow.  He pursues them and passes on safely, by paths his feet have not trod.  Who has performed and done this, calling the generations from the beginning?  I, the LORD, the first, and with the last; I am he.

The coastlands have seen and are afraid; the ends of the earth tremble; they have drawn near and come.  Everyone helps his neighbor and says to his brother, “Be strong!”  The craftsman strengthens the goldsmith, and he who smooths with the hammer him who strikes the anvil, saying of the soldering, “It is good”; and they strengthen it with nails so that it cannot be moved.  (Isaiah 41:1-7 ESV)

Isaiah begins to reveal God’s plan to raise up a nation that will conquer, and so be a  punishment to all the nations who are in rebellion against Him, including Israel.  In another prophecy Yahweh will name the ruler of this nation, Cyrus of Babylon, but for now He challenges the nations (“the peoples”) to do their best to withstand Cyrus.

They will not be able to because Yahweh, the first and the last, who determines the course of events from the beginning, is giving him victory.  Nevertheless, the nations work hard at strengthening their armories, encouraging one another to work as one, and to upgrading their idols.  They congratulate themselves on making ready in this way, but their doom is sure.

When we face danger we sometimes muster our strength and beef up what we have relied upon in the past to get us through.  Instead, we should look to God.  He alone determines the course of history and our lives.  He is offering us a chance to see that and see the futility of our own devices.  Will we trust Him?

Yahweh calls Himself here “the first and the last”, as He does elsewhere in Isaiah (44:6; 48:12).  There is one other who has been called “the first and the last” and that is Jesus,  calling himself that in Revelation 1:17, 2:8 and 22:13.  Jesus is God and he can be trusted with our lives.

Discussion Questions

1. Is it wrong to band together with others and encourage each other and make preparations together to face a common foe?
2. Is God saying it is wrong to band together to fight Babylon and Cyrus?  What is His concern?
3. What is God saying His position is in history?
4. Even when people are leaning on their preparations and power to fight they may also lean on their God.  When isn’t that “good”?
5. Why would someone choose to rely on their own means or strategies to give them victory?
6. What self-devised strategies do you rely upon to make your way in life?