Page 96 - Isaiah Student Worktext

That Paul writes it somewhat differently in Romans is significant. He says at ‘the name of Jesus, every
knee will bow’. Although separate entities, God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are One.

Despite the trials and tribulations that God’s people will face, in the end, the Lord will justify them, for
His glory.

Chapter 46 - Main Idea: Idols are crushing burdens that sinners carry,
to their own destruction, but the living God carries His children from
their birth to their old age, even to their glorious salvation.

One of the best illustrations I have seen regarding idols: man has to carry
them, but God carries us.

So very much of Isaiah is devoted to Babylon and its ultimate destruction. Chapter 46-47 detail a
destruction that is yet to come for the actual city of Babylon, but also points to the ultimate destruction
of evil.

V. 1-2 Bel was the chief god of the Babylonians, also known as Marduk. Nebo was Bel’s son. These
names are reflected in some well-known names: Nebuchadnezzar; Belshazzar, Belteshazzar, all in the
book of Daniel.

These two verses indicate the physical burden that these idols were: to move them about, the carriages
were heavily loaded, causing them to ‘bow down’ and rendered them unable to deliver the burden. The
result was that they [would be] taken into captivity.

Of course, the symbolism here is that any idol we carry becomes a burden and leads to ‘captivity’.

V. 3-5 Three times in this chapter, God says either ‘listen to Me’ or ‘remember this’, calling us to the one
true God.

God reminds them, and us, that He has ‘upheld’ us from our birth and will continue to do so throughout
our lifetime, even to ‘gray hairs’.

Remembering that this was addressed to a contemporary audience of idol worshipers, God challenges
them to compare Him to the false idols made by human hands.

V. 6-7 This is something of an Old Testament parable. A wealthy man, carrying silver and gold, goes to a
craftsman to commission him to make a ‘god’. Upon its completion, the man immediately bows down
and worships the idol. He didn’t worship the sacks of gold and silver that he carried in, but now that it is
shaped and fashioned, he worships it.

He then would take it home and set it on a shelf. There it would remain until or unless someone moved
it.

Though someone might cry out to the object, it will not hear or answer.

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