25 O Lord, You are my God;
I will exalt You, I will give thanks to Your name;
For You have worked wonders,
Plans formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness.
2 For You have made a city into a heap,
A fortified city into a ruin;
A palace of strangers is a city no more,
It will never be rebuilt.
3 Therefore a strong people will glorify You;
Cities of ruthless nations will revere You.
4 For You have been a defense for the helpless,
A defense for the needy in his distress,
A refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat;
For the breath of the ruthless
Is like a rain storm against a wall.
5 Like heat in drought, You subdue the uproar of aliens;
Like heat by the shadow of a cloud, the song of the ruthless is [a]silenced.6 The Lord of hosts will prepare a [b]lavish banquet for all peoples on this mountain;
A banquet of [c]aged wine, [d]choice pieces with marrow,
And [e]refined, aged wine.
7 And on this mountain He will swallow up the [f]covering which is over all peoples,
Even the veil which is [g]stretched over all nations.
8 He will swallow up death for all time,
And the Lord [h]God will wipe tears away from all faces,
And He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth;
For the Lord has spoken.
9 And it will be said in that day,
“Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited that He might save us.
This is the Lord for whom we have waited;
Let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”
10 For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain,
And Moab will be trodden down in his place
As straw is trodden down in the water of a manure pile.
11 And he will spread out his hands in the middle of it
As a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim,
But the Lord will lay low his pride together with the trickery of his hands.
12 The unassailable fortifications of your walls He will bring down,
Lay low and cast to the ground, even to the dust.
As I read the first verse in each section, it’s easy to agree, and say “Yup, I can get behind that!” I will exalt God, because He does great wonders, and has amazing plans. Got it! And then it goes in an unexpected direction. Cities are destroyed, palaces are no more, and that is God’s plan?
We say God is good, but then how can He do such things, things that don’t seem very good? Of course, context is important here, and we find these aren’t just any cities, but often cities of ruthless nations. In the process of destroying them, God is a defense for the helpless and needy, a refuge from the storm, shade from the heat, and a shelter from those very ruthless people.
It reminds me of Jonah, when he was sent to Nineveh to preach. These people were ruthless, in fact they were some of those very folks whom Isaiah had prophesied their doom. Our perspective is so limited, and we can easily get on Jonah’s side, and think that it wasn’t very good of God to give these people a second chance. Yet God knew how many would repent, and would turn from their wickedness (lots).
So we can either be like Jonah, and bewail the terrible things God “allows”, or even get mad at the things we don’t think He should have done. Or, we can (and should) be like Isaiah, and exalt God. He is God alone, and has worked wonders, and made plans, and will continue to work wonders and fulfill those plans… “with perfect faithfulness.” Not wishy-washy, but perfect in all His ways, loving those who don’t deserve it (all of us), and rescuing us from certain doom. Exalt Him indeed!