Back comes the word of the Lord, which, to make clear the meaning, we

take the liberty of expanding a little:

Yes, Isaiah, the grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but you have been

looking in the wrong direction.  Israel's restoration will not be

accomplished by the arm of flesh, or by the wisdom of the world.  No

leagues or covenants or movements will ever plant Israel back into the

land of promise; that is the glorious prerogative of the Lord Himself.

He that scattered Israel, shall gather him; He will watch over His word

to perform it.  Isaiah, for the moment, you have forgotten one thing:

'The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it'

'The word of our God shall stand for ever'.

In this 'green and pleasant land' of England there is nothing so

ubiquitous and persistent as 'grass'.  It shows everywhere, enduring the cold

of winter and the heat of summer, but, in Bible lands, grass is a fitting

symbol of that which is transitory.  When He would speak of something that

was passing, our Saviour referred to the grass of the field 'which to day is,

and to morrow is cast into the oven' (Matt. 6:30).

Peter quotes Isaiah 40:6 and places the symbol of frailty between

references to the incorruptible seed of the Word of God and that enduring

Word of the Lord which, by the gospel, was preached by the apostles (1 Pet.

1:23 -25).

When he would speak of the fleeting character of riches, James also

uses the same figure, saying, 'So also shall the rich man fade away in his

ways' (Jas. 1:10,11).

Allusions in the Psalms also indicate this same tendency of the grass

to wither and fade; 'for they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and

wither as the green herb' (Psa. 37:2).  Again the figure is used in that

magnificent Psalm of Moses, where he calls upon men to number their days, and

describes them as spending their years as a tale that is told:

'They are like grass which groweth up.  In the morning it flourisheth,

and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down, and withereth' (Psa.

In another Psalm we are told that,

'He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust.  As for man,

his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.

For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof

shall know it no more.  But The Mercy Of The Lord Is From Everlasting

To Everlasting' (103:14 -17).

If, despite the frailty of the flesh emphasized in his prophecy, Isaiah

had no cause to doubt but that the Lord would fulfil His promise, he is

nevertheless inspired later in the same prophecy to enforce the lesson,

saying, concerning the return of the redeemed to Zion:

'I, even I, am He That comforteth you: who art thou, that thou

shouldest be afraid of a man that shall die, and of the son of man

which shall be made as grass' (Isa. 51:12).