Isaiah 41:21

"Produce your cause, saith Jehovah, bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. Let them bring them forth, and declare unto us what shall happen: declare ye the former things, what they are, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or show us things to come. Declare the things that are to come to pass hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: yea, do good, or do evil that we may be dismayed, and behold it together. Behold, ye are of nothing, and your work is of naught; an abomination is he that chooseth you."

The chapter in these verses takes up the imaginary court scene again; and God challenges the pagan gods to show that they are really gods. Let them predict future events, or explain the significance of past events; let them actually do anything at all, either good or evil. Their utter inability to meet such a challenge entitles them to the vehement denunciation that God here made of pagan gods. They are nothing, of no account, helpless, and incapable of doing anything whatsoever, either of good or of evil!

There is a powerful assertion here that God, of course, is able to do what no pagan god could possibly do, the principal thing God here claims being that of the ability to "declare the things that are to come to pass hereafter," in short, the power to give men the revelation of predictive prophecies! The critical denial of this is the complete and irrevocable condemnation of their whole system of Biblical studies. For any person whomsoever to be deceived by so-called Bible scholars who have accepted the dictum of men who follow such satanic rules, that person must first become an unbeliever himself; and afterward from that he will inevitably receive the hardening, blinding, and deluding of his central nervous system, the brain itself. One would be just as wise to ask the devil himself what a given scripture may mean as to accept the comment of such "scholars."

"The word `abomination' transferred to the worshipper of idols in this passage shows how corrupting is the choice of a lie for one's ultimate allegiance."[17] See Romans 1:18-32, where Paul spelled this out in detail.

God's challenge here for the idol gods to predict future events really touched the heathen world on a very sensitive spot, since divination was a major preoccupation of idol gods. Croesus of Lydia was to pay dearly for trusting such gods.

"Croesus of Lydia consulted the famous oracle at Delphi over his prospects of success against Cyrus; and the pagan oracle told him that he would destroy a great empire. He attacked Cyrus all right and destroyed a great empire, but it was his own."[18]