THE COUNSELLOR

There is no more dangerous road than that leading to idolatry. From verse 12 until Isaiah announces, ‘There is no peace ... unto the wicked’, 48. 22, God remonstrates with those intoxicated with the appeal of idols like the nations worshipped. He begins in verses 11-17 by questioning their understanding of the majestic greatness of God. He is the Counsellor to whom all should turn, not a Solomon, attended by old counsellors, nor Reho- boam, leaning on younger ones, 1 Kgs. 12. 6-11.

This Counsellor is not limited by the measures men use to determine volume, the handful or the ‘measure’, possibly about seven litres or a little more than an imperial gallon. Would He measure length by the span, or weight as men did in the two kinds of balances mentioned in the verse? Ah, no! This Counsellor is not limited by the measures of men, even when they use light years to calculate the vastness of space.

Nor is His wisdom acquired from men, as seen by the rhetorical questions in verses 13 and 14. God was not educated under the master of some school. No man was at His side to advise or chastise. The graduate of any school is limited by the mind of the tutor under whom he studied. But the counsel chambers of eternity reserved no place for puny man, nor could the mighty intellect of angels have contributed to the great plan of salvation. Will the mind of man instruct some craftsman about the idol he is to construct to represent this Counsellor?

Even taken collectively, the might of nations is of microscopic proportions in the light of the greatness of this Counsellor. They are no more than the drop of water adhering to the bucket when one thinks it has been emptied, or the fine dust, settling on to the balances and cursorily blown off before they are used in some commercial transaction.

Perhaps some thought that God’s greatness was assessed by the munificence of the many worshippers He attracted. Fearlessly, the Counsellor is presented as greater than an offering of all the animals of Lebanon, requiring all its wood for the altar. All would be too mean to speak His worth or show His glories forth. ‘To whom then will ye liken …’ the Counsellor?