Isaiah
40 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. 2 Speak warmly to Jerusalem, and call out to her that her time has expired, that her guilt is taken into favor, that she had from Jehovah’s hand double for all her sins.
3 Hark, a voice calling out “Clear Jehovah’s road in the wilderness, level in the desert a street for our God! 4 let every valley be raised and every mountain and hill taken down, and the hilly surface become level and the broken ground a plain! 5 and Jehovah’s glory will be disclosed, and all mortals will see it together, for Jehovah’s mouth has spoken.”
6* Hark, a voice saying “Call out!” and one saying “What shall I call out?” “All flesh is grass, and all its winsomeness like field flowers: 7* grass dries up, flowers fade, because Jehovah’s wind blows on them; the people is grass after all. 8 Grass dries up, flowers fade, but the word of our God will last forever.”
9 Up with you to a high mountain, bringer of good news to Sion; lift your voice strongly, bringer of good news to Jerusalem; lift it up, do not be afraid; say to the cities of Judah “Here is your God!” 10 Here is the Lord Jehovah coming with strength, his arm ruling for him; here comes his pay with him, his result before him. 11 He will tend his flock like a shepherd, gather lambs in his arms and carry them in his bosom, and guide those that have sucking young.
12** Who has measured the water of the sea in his hollowed hand and gauged the sky by his span, and packed the soil of the earth into a half-bushel measure, and weighed mountains with a steelyard and hills with a balance? 13 who has gauged Jehovah’s spirit, or been coaching him as adviser? 14 whom did he consult with, who tutored him, and taught him of the correct course, and taught him intelligence and directed him to the road of good judgment? 15 Here nations count for a drop hanging on a bucket and for the dust blown off a balance, here he lifts islands like a powder, 16 and Lebanon is not adequate to make a fire nor its beasts for a burnt-offering, 17* all the nations are like nothing in his presence and count like a nothing and a blank to him,— 18 and to whom will you compare Deity, and what likeness will you set up for him? 19 The statue an artisan has cast, and a goldsmith coats it with gold and works silver chains. 20 The man impoverished with contributions chooses wood that will not rot, looks out a skilled artisan to get up a statue that will not totter. 21 Will you not know? have you never from the first been told? do you not understand about the laying of the foundations of the earth? 22 He who sits over the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the sky like a gauze and spreads it like a tent to live in; 23 who reduces potentates to nothingness and makes judges of earth equal to zero,— 24 they have not even been planted, the seed has not even been sown for them, the cuttings for them have not even rooted, and he has blown on them too and they have dried out; and a tempest carries them off like straw. 25 And to whom will you compare me and have me parallel? says the Holy One. 26* Lift your eyes on high and see who created these: he who brings out their legions by number, summons them all by name; of great in powers and mighty in strength not one is truant.
27* Why do you say, Jacob, and talk, Israel, “My path is unseen by Jehovah; my God passes by my rights”? 28 Do you not know, or have you not heard? the eternal God Jehovah, the creator of the ends of the earth, does not faint or tire; his understanding is inscrutable; 29 he gives strength to the faint one and plentiful vigor to the powerless. 30 And young men will faint and tire and men in their youthful prime will stumble down, 31 but those who hope in Jehovah will have freshening strength, take wing like eagles, run without tiring, walk without fainting.