Isaiah 44 Devotional

Worshiping What We Made

“I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud, and your sins like a mist. Return to Me, for I have redeemed you.”Isaiah 44:22 (BSB)

Chapter 44 opens with God promising to pour out his Spirit on Israel's descendants, so that one after another they will say they belong to the LORD (44:3-5). Then Isaiah tells a story that is almost funny. A man cuts down a tree, burns part of it to bake bread and warm himself, and carves the rest into a god he begs for rescue (44:14-17). He never asks whether he is bowing to a block of wood (44:19-20).

The idol depends entirely on its maker, who has to measure, carve, and set it in a shrine (44:13). The living God is the reverse. He formed Israel, and he will not forget them (44:21). He has swept away their sins like a cloud and calls them to return, because he has already redeemed them (44:22). Anything we shape to save us must be kept standing by us. Your Maker needs no help to stand, and his call to return comes with redemption already in hand.

To think about: What have you been relying on that actually depends on you to keep it standing?