So who even comes close to being like God?
    To whom or what can you compare him?
Some no-god idol? Ridiculous!
    It’s made in a workshop, cast in bronze,
Given a thin veneer of gold,
    and draped with silver filigree.
Or, perhaps someone will select a fine wood—
    olive wood, say—that won’t rot,
Then hire a woodcarver to make a no-god,
    giving special care to its base so it won’t tip over! (The Message).

The folly of idolatry is a repeated theme in this section of Isaiah. He spoke into a world littered with idols. The culture the Jews lived in (Babylon) was thoroughly pagan. The people of Israel, and then Judah, had spent years in captivity because they turned from the true God to idols. Israel ‘did time’ in Assyria, and Judah tasted bondage in Babylon.

But they were without excuse. God had made His commands explicitly clear:

And God spoke all these words:

2 ‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

3 ‘You shall have no other gods before me.

4 ‘You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments. (Exodus 20:1-6).

See the emphasis here on how helpless idols are. They have to be helped to stay upright; they need assistance to be kept on their feet! Contrast this with the real God who has strength and gives strength (vv.26, 29-31). We are to trust, not in helpless gods, but in the helpful true and living God.

(See Romans 1:18-23 where Paul exposes the wilfulness behind the blindness of those who worship false gods).