What Does Isaiah 40:31 Mean?
But those who wait upon the LORD exchange their strength; they rise on wings like eagles; they run and do not tire; they walk and do not faint.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.THE KEY
The word for “wait” branches into both “hope” and “cord,” so waiting is expectation held taut, and the verse places renewed strength inside that tension.
THE MEANING
Waiting on the LORD is held expectation, and strength changes into fresh capacity. The result is not one kind of motion: you rise, run, and keep walking without being spent.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that waiting means being stalled: here the ones waiting are the ones whose strength changes and whose movement opens into rising, running, and walking.
THE ROOT
קוֹיֵ
qōvê
GROWS FROM
קוה
To wait for, hope for, or look eagerly toward.
“wait upon” in this verse is qōvê. The verse names those who wait with this root, whose branch תִּקְוָה (tiqvah) can mean both hope and cord. Waiting carries an image of expectation drawn taut toward what is coming, rather than an empty pause.
ALSO GROWS
tiqvah: Hope, expectation; also a cord or line, as in Joshua 2:18.
תִּקְוָה
The cord gives waiting a concrete image: something held toward a point ahead.
qivviti: I waited or expected, as in Psalm 40:1.
קִוִּיתִי
This first-person form shows the root as lived expectancy, a directed waiting.
יַחֲלִיפוּ
yaḥalifu
GROWS FROM
חלף
To pass, change, or replace; by extension, to renew or sprout anew.
“exchange” in this verse is yaḥalifu. Chalaph holds change and regrowth together: strength passes into a changed state, like a tree putting forth shoots again. The verse makes that renewed capacity visible in soaring, running, and walking.
ALSO GROWS
yaḥaliph: It will sprout again, as the tree does in Job 14:7.
יַחֲלִיף
Renewal here carries the image of fresh growth after a cut tree appears spent.
ḥaliphah: Change or renewal; Job 14:14 speaks of “my change.”
חֲלִיפָה
This noun shares the root’s sense of passing into another state.
THE PATTERN
Renewal is a continuing change that restores movement across both lifted and ordinary life.
Be stretched toward the LORD; hold fast, and he makes your heart firm; be stretched toward the LORD.Who fills your mouth with goodness, and your youth is made new like the eagle's.Therefore we do not give out; though our outer person is worn through, yet our inner person is made new day after day.THE THREAD
Be stretched toward the LORD; hold fast, and he makes your heart firm; be stretched toward the LORD.Psalm 27 repeats the same Hebrew root for “wait” and joins it directly to a strengthened heart. Beside Isaiah, that inward strengthening opens into every pace: rising, running, and walking.
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