A Word in Season: No Other Rock (Isaiah 44:8)

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Here is a pressing question for your soul, and here is a pressing question for the times.

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Is there any God like the God of the Bible? Is there anyone who can rival him?

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Anyone who rules over him? Anyone alongside of him, or anyone who is over him?

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Anyone who can be for you everything that you need? Who can do for you what

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God himself has promised to do? The prophet Isaiah asks and answers that question in various ways repeatedly in the course of his prophecy.

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Ever since Isaiah saw the glory of the Lord high and lifted up there in the temple, recorded in Isaiah 6, a conviction and an awareness of the uniqueness of the majesty of God has gripped him.

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He is persuaded that the one he deals with, who he calls the Holy One of Israel, there is none like him.

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And the Lord then uses Isaiah, having given him that vision, to impress upon his people again and again the supremacy of the

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God who has loved them and who has saved them and who has made promises to them. And it's a similar question that we then need to face.

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In Isaiah 44, the prophet is speaking about the good things that God has promised to his people.

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And then, as he often does through Isaiah, the Lord challenges the people with questions and assertions.

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He is the first and he is the last. Who can do what he has done? Who can provide what he has provided?

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Has he not demonstrated as well as declared over and over again who he is and what he does as a reflection of who he is?

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And then in Isaiah 44 and verse 8, the Lord asks that central question.

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Who is, is there a God besides me? Is there a

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God besides me? Where else will you go? To whom else will you turn?

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Where else will you look in time of need and in need of blessing?

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To whom else will you now go? What power can rival his?

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What wisdom can rival his? What love can rival his? What mercy can rival his?

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What history can rival his of his dealings with his people? What faithfulness?

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What goodness? What kindness? The Lord points his people back to the history of his dealings with them, to his revelation of himself.

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Indeed, when he spoke to the people through Moses in Deuteronomy, one of the things that was spoken there was that there is no rock like our rock.

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That was Moses' declaration. And this is the language that is picked up by Isaiah. Indeed, there is no other rock.

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I know not one. God, if you like, puts forth his own omniscience.

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God assesses with perfect vision and penetration anything and everything else that could be imagined to stand alongside or over him.

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And he himself declares, there is no one who is like me. There is no other rock.

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There's no other strength, no other foundation for your hope and your confidence, no other refuge to which you can turn, no other anchor point to which you can tether.

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There is no one else who can both promise and fulfill, who can speak and who can do all that he speaks.

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And that then is both the challenge and the comfort to God's people. It's a challenge because in this fallen world, we have an instinct to look for some other rock, some other refuge, some other source of confidence.

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And again and again, we will be disappointed by that sinful pursuit of letting our eyes drift off of God and onto other things as the source of hope.

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And it's also our comfort because this God is our God. He has undertaken to be for us.

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And with such a God as our rock, we have then all the confidence and all the joy that we need.

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Perhaps you're still looking for a rock. Perhaps you're still looking for a refuge, for a foundation, for an anchor point.

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If you are, remember this, that there is no other rock.

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There is no God like the God of the scriptures. There is none who can stand alongside him, none who stands above him, both to save and to bless.