The Insignificance Of Man

Isaiah 40:6-8

Great beyond description, great beyond imagination, great beyond our loftiest praise is the Lord our God! In the light of God’s greatness and glory as God, it is an astonishing thing that God should be mindful of man, especially when we see the answer given in the Bible to the question -- “What is man?” Man is set before us in the Word of God as the peculiar, distinct object of God’s mercy, love, and grace; but what is he? “What is man?” Anyone who knows and acknowledges the greatness of God, will also freely acknowledge the utter insignificance of man.

The Problem

The problem with this generation is that man is the object of adoration and worship, and not God. Man is exalted; and God is made to be insignificant. In the Word of God and among the people of God it is the other way round.

Churches today, following the lead of the self-serving false prophets who occupy their pulpits, everywhere bow and scrap before men. Who has not seen the man worshipping notice, “We can’t spell ch_rch without ‘u,’” on church signs and billboards? I’ve news for this generation. You are not that important. God has been spelling church without you for two thousand years! God almighty does not need you, or me.

The Question

As soon as David looked up to heaven and beheld God’s indescribable greatness, his heart was humbled, his pride was withered, and he cried, “What is man, that thou art mindful of him?” (Ps. 8:4).

The fact is, it is impossible for anyone to have both great views of God and great views of man. Those who imagine that man is great think God is insignificant. Those who know that God is great know that man is insignificant.

“What is man, that thou art mindful of him?” Here is greatness and littleness, grandeur and nothingness, excellence and corruption, majesty and meanness, God and man.

The Answer

“What is man?” The Word of God gives us many answers to the question. None of them are very flattering. “All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field” (Isa. 40:6). “Verily, every man at his best estate is altogether vanity” (Psa. 39:5). “Men are a lie” (Psa. 62:9). Man is a shadow, dust, a vapor, vanity, nothing!. Indeed, all the human race lumped together in one huge mass of humanity is described by God as being “counted to him as less than nothing and vanity!”

“What is man?” Do not ask philosophers what they imagine, educators what they read in books, scientists what they see under microscopes, psychologists what they see in asylums, or sociologists what they hear from tests. Ask God who made us. He declares in his Word that man is fallen, depraved, sinning, sinful, cursed, condemned, helpless, dying flesh. Men are grasshoppers before him. Men are the dust of the earth, no more. Man is a lump of clay. Man is a puff of smoke, a mist of vapor, the small dust of the balance, a drop in a bucket. Man is insignificant!

You are nothing; and I am nothing. No matter how many of us nothings you put together, nothing added to nothing is still just nothing. God, teach us to know our nothingness, that we may look to Christ for everything!

Don Fortner