Bible Strands
Isaiah 40:8
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God speaks to Israel in exile, immediately after declaring "the people are grass" (40:7) and just before commissioning the herald to proclaim good news to Zion (40:9). The verse is the pivot: their transience is established, then the permanence of God's word is set against it.
The words — יָקוּם (ya.Kum), "it will stand," is a simple future (qatal) asserting a firm, unqualified standing, not a conditional or aspirational one. It is paired with לְעוֹלָם (le.'o.Lam), "for ever," which closes the temporal window.
The thread — Jesus echoes the contrast in Mark 13:31 and Matthew 24:35, applying it to His own words; 1 Peter 1:25 quotes the verse directly and identifies "the word" as the gospel proclaimed to the readers.
Why it lands — The verse forces a choice of trust: the reader is either grass or is anchored in the word that stands. It asks nothing less than that a person reckon with which of those two they actually are.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.
Cross-references
- Mark 13:31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.
- Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.
- 1 Peter 1:25 but the word of the Lord stands forever.” And this is the word that was proclaimed to you.
- Psalms 119:89 Your word, O LORD, is everlasting; it is firmly fixed in the heavens.
- Matthew 5:18 For I tell you truly, until heaven and earth pass away, not a single jot, not a stroke of a pen, will disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.
- Isaiah 55:10 For just as rain and snow fall from heaven and do not return without watering the earth, making it bud and sprout, and providing seed to sow and food to eat,
- Isaiah 46:10 I declare the end from the beginning, and from ancient times what is still to come. I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and all My good pleasure I will accomplish.’
- John 10:35 If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken—
- Isaiah 59:21 “As for Me, this is My covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit will not depart from you, and My words that I have put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth or from the mouths of your children and grandchildren, from now on and forevermore,” says the LORD.
- John 12:34 The crowd replied, “We have heard from the Law that the Christ will remain forever. So how can You say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?”