WHAT IF THE PROPHECY WAS ABOUT US?

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In Christ, Mark

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Note: I had a brief respite away from the blog which included Thanksgiving celebration with family, conclusion of the two Master’s classes I was taking through Old Dominion University, and completing a business trip abroad. Thanks for your patience during that period of pause and reflection. Today, the day before Christ’s coming, brings us to an important point to ponder, a point that I pray will illuminate Christmas day as a day of hope and love and joy as our Savior Jesus comes in a lowly Bethlehem manger to save us all.

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

A Prophecy Against the Philistines

This prophecy came in the year King Ahaz died:

Do not rejoice, all you Philistines, that the rod that struck you is broken; from the root of that snake will spring up a viper, its fruit will be a darting, venomous serpent. The poorest of the poor will find pasture, and the needy will lie down in safety. But your root I will destroy by famine; it will slay your survivors.

Wail, you gate! Howl, you city! Melt away, all you Philistines! A cloud of smoke comes from the north, and there is not a straggler in its ranks. What answer shall be given to the envoys of that nation? “The Lord has established Zion, and in her His afflicted people will find refuge.”

A Prophecy Against Moab

A prophecy against Moab: Ar in Moab is ruined, destroyed in a night! Kir in Moab is ruined, destroyed in a night! Dibon goes up to its temple, to its high places to weep; Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba.

Every head is shaved and every beard cut off. In the streets they wear sackcloth; on the roofs and in the public squares they all wail, prostrate with weeping. Heshbon and Elealeh cry out, their voices are heard all the way to Jahaz. Therefore the armed men of Moab cry out, and their hearts are faint. My heart cries out over Moab; her fugitives flee as far as Zoar, as far as Eglath Shelishiyah. They go up the hill to Luhith, weeping as they go; on the road to Horonaim they lament their destruction. The waters of Nimrim are dried up and the grass is withered; the vegetation is gone and nothing green is left.

So the wealth they have acquired and stored up they carry away over the Ravine of the Poplars. Their outcry echoes along the border of Moab; their wailing reaches as far as Eglaim, their lamentation as far as Beer Elim. The waters of Dimon are full of blood, but I will bring still more upon Dimon—a lion upon the fugitives of Moab and upon those who remain in the land.

Send lambs as tribute to the ruler of the land, from Sela, across the desert, to the mount of Daughter Zion. Like fluttering birds pushed from the nest, so are the women of Moab at the fords of the Arnon. “Make up your mind,” Moab says. “Render a decision. Make your shadow like night—at high noon. Hide the fugitives, do not betray the refugees. Let the Moabite fugitives stay with you; be their shelter from the destroyer.”

The oppressor will come to an end, and destruction will cease; the aggressor will vanish from the land. In love a throne will be established; in faithfulness a man will sit on it—one from the house of David—one who in judging seeks justice and speeds the cause of righteousness. We have heard of Moab’s pride—how great is her arrogance!—of her conceit, her pride and her insolence; but her boasts are empty.

Therefore the Moabites wail, they wail together for Moab. Lament and grieve for the raisin cakes of Kir Hareseth. The fields of Heshbon wither, the vines of Sibmah also. The rulers of the nations have trampled down the choicest vines, which once reached Jazer and spread toward the desert. Their shoots spread out and went as far as the sea. So I weep, as Jazer weeps, for the vines of Sibmah. Heshbon and Elealeh, I drench you with tears!

The shouts of joy over your ripened fruit and over your harvests have been stilled. Joy and gladness are taken away from the orchards; no one sings or shouts in the vineyards; no one treads out wine at the presses, for I have put an end to the shouting. My heart laments for Moab like a harp, my inmost being for Kir Hareseth. When Moab appears at her high place, she only wears herself out; when she goes to her shrine to pray, it is to no avail.

This is the word the Lord has already spoken concerning Moab. But now the Lord says: “Within three years, as a servant bound by contract would count them, Moab’s splendor and all her many people will be despised, and her survivors will be very few and feeble.”

A Prophecy Against Damascus

A prophecy against Damascus:

“See, Damascus will no longer be a city but will become a heap of ruins. The cities of Aroer will be deserted and left to flocks, which will lie down, with no one to make them afraid. The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim, and royal power from Damascus; the remnant of Aram will be like the glory of the Israelites,” declares the Lord Almighty.

“In that day the glory of Jacob will fade; the fat of his body will waste away. It will be as when reapers harvest the standing grain, gathering the grain in their arms—as when someone gleans heads of grain in the Valley of Rephaim. Yet some gleanings will remain, as when an olive tree is beaten, leaving two or three olives on the topmost branches, four or five on the fruitful boughs,” declares the Lord, the God of Israel.

In that day people will look to their Maker and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel. They will not look to the altars, the work of their hands, and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles and the incense altars their fingers have made. In that day their strong cities, which they left because of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to thickets and undergrowth. And all will be desolation. You have forgotten God your Savior; you have not remembered the Rock, your fortress. Therefore, though you set out the finest plants and plant imported vines, though on the day you set them out, you make them grow, and on the morning when you plant them, you bring them to bud, yet the harvest will be as nothing in the day of disease and incurable pain.

Woe to the many nations that rage—they rage like the raging sea! Woe to the peoples who roar—they roar like the roaring of great waters! Although the peoples roar like the roar of surging waters, when He rebukes them they flee far away, driven before the wind like chaff on the hills, like tumbleweed before a gale. In the evening, sudden terror! Before the morning, they are gone! This is the portion of those who loot us, the lot of those who plunder us.

A Prophecy Against Cush

Woe to the land of whirring wings along the rivers of Cush, which sends envoys by sea in papyrus boats over the water. Go, swift messengers, to a people tall and smooth-skinned, to a people feared far and wide, an aggressive nation of strange speech, whose land is divided by rivers. All you people of the world, you who live on the earth, when a banner is raised on the mountains, you will see it, and when a trumpet sounds, you will hear it.

This is what the Lord says to me:

“I will remain quiet and will look on from My dwelling place, like shimmering heat in the sunshine, like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.” For, before the harvest, when the blossom is gone and the flower becomes a ripening grape, He will cut off the shoots with pruning knives, and cut down and take away the spreading branches. They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey and to the wild animals; the birds will feed on them all summer, the wild animals all winter.

At that time gifts will be brought to the Lord Almighty from a people tall and smooth-skinned, from a people feared far and wide, an aggressive nation of strange speech, whose land is divided by rivers—the gifts will be brought to Mount Zion, the place of the Name of the Lord Almighty.

A Prophecy Against Egypt

A prophecy against Egypt:

See, the Lord rides on a swift cloud and is coming to Egypt. The idols of Egypt tremble before him, and the hearts of the Egyptians melt with fear. “I will stir up Egyptian against Egyptian—brother will fight against brother, neighbor against neighbor, city against city, kingdom against kingdom. The Egyptians will lose heart, and I will bring their plans to nothing; they will consult the idols and the spirits of the dead, the mediums and the spiritists. I will hand the Egyptians over to the power of a cruel master, and a fierce king will rule over them,” declares the Lord, the Lord Almighty.

The waters of the river will dry up, and the riverbed will be parched and dry. The canals will stink; the streams of Egypt will dwindle and dry up. The reeds and rushes will wither, also the plants along the Nile, at the mouth of the river. Every sown field along the Nile will become parched, will blow away and be no more. The fishermen will groan and lament, all who cast hooks into the Nile; those who throw nets on the water will pine away. Those who work with combed flax will despair, the weavers of fine linen will lose hope. The workers in cloth will be dejected, and all the wage earners will be sick at heart. The officials of Zoan are nothing but fools; the wise counselors of Pharaoh give senseless advice. How can you say to Pharaoh, “I am one of the wise men, a disciple of the ancient kings”? Where are your wise men now? Let them show you and make known what the Lord Almighty has planned against Egypt.

The officials of Zoan have become fools, the leaders of Memphis are deceived; the cornerstones of her peoples have led Egypt astray. The Lord has poured into them a spirit of dizziness; they make Egypt stagger in all that she does, as a drunkard staggers around in his vomit. There is nothing Egypt can do—head or tail, palm branch or reed.

In that day the Egyptians will become weaklings. They will shudder with fear at the uplifted hand that the Lord Almighty raises against them. And the land of Judah will bring terror to the Egyptians; everyone to whom Judah is mentioned will be terrified, because of what the Lord Almighty is planning against them. In that day five cities in Egypt will speak the language of Canaan and swear allegiance to the Lord Almighty. One of them will be called the City of the Sun.

In that day there will be an altar to the Lord in the heart of Egypt, and a monument to the Lord at its border. It will be a sign and witness to the Lord Almighty in the land of Egypt. When they cry out to the Lord because of their oppressors, He will send them a savior and defender, and He will rescue them. So the Lord will make Himself known to the Egyptians, and in that day they will acknowledge the Lord. They will worship with sacrifices and grain offerings; they will make vows to the Lord and keep them. The Lord will strike Egypt with a plague; He will strike them and heal them. They will turn to the Lord, and He will respond to their pleas and heal them.

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance.”

A Prophecy Against Egypt and Cush

In the year that the supreme commander, sent by Sargon king of Assyria, came to Ashdod and attacked and captured it—at that time the Lord spoke through Isaiah son of Amoz. He said to him, “Take off the sackcloth from your body and the sandals from your feet.” And he did so, going around stripped and barefoot.

Then the Lord said, “Just as my servant Isaiah has gone stripped and barefoot for three years, as a sign and portent against Egypt and Cush, so the king of Assyria will lead away stripped and barefoot the Egyptian captives and Cushite exiles, young and old, with buttocks bared—to Egypt’s shame. Those who trusted in Cush and boasted in Egypt will be dismayed and put to shame. In that day the people who live on this coast will say, ‘See what has happened to those we relied on, those we fled to for help and deliverance from the king of Assyria! How then can we escape?’”

A Prophecy Against Babylon

A prophecy against the Desert by the Sea:

Like whirlwinds sweeping through the southland, an invader comes from the desert, from a land of terror. A dire vision has been shown to me: The traitor betrays, the looter takes loot. Elam, attack! Media, lay siege! I will bring to an end all the groaning she caused. At this my body is racked with pain, pangs seize me, like those of a woman in labor; I am staggered by what I hear, I am bewildered by what I see. My heart falters, fear makes me tremble; the twilight I longed for has become a horror to me. They set the tables, they spread the rugs, they eat, they drink! Get up, you officers, oil the shields!

This is what the Lord says to me:

“Go, post a lookout and have him report what he sees. When he sees chariots with teams of horses, riders on donkeys or riders on camels, let him be alert, fully alert.” And the lookout shouted, “Day after day, my lord, I stand on the watchtower; every night I stay at my post. Look, here comes a man in a chariot with a team of horses. And he gives back the answer: ‘Babylon has fallen, has fallen! All the images of its gods lie shattered on the ground!’”

My people who are crushed on the threshing floor, I tell you what I have heard from the Lord Almighty, from the God of Israel.

A Prophecy Against Edom

A prophecy against Dumah:

Someone calls to me from Seir, “Watchman, what is left of the night? Watchman, what is left of the night?” The watchman replies, “Morning is coming, but also the night. If you would ask, then ask; and come back yet again.”

A Prophecy Against Arabia

A prophecy against Arabia:

You caravans of Dedanites, who camp in the thickets of Arabia, bring water for the thirsty; you who live in Tema, bring food for the fugitives. They flee from the sword, from the drawn sword, from the bent bow and from the heat of battle.

This is what the Lord says to me: “Within one year, as a servant bound by contract would count it, all the splendor of Kedar will come to an end. The survivors of the archers, the warriors of Kedar, will be few.” The Lord, the God of Israel, has spoken.

A Prophecy About Jerusalem

A prophecy against the Valley of Vision:

What troubles you now, that you have all gone up on the roofs, you town so full of commotion, you city of tumult and revelry? Your slain were not killed by the sword, nor did they die in battle. All your leaders have fled together; they have been captured without using the bow. All you who were caught were taken prisoner together, having fled while the enemy was still far away. Therefore I said, “Turn away from me; let me weep bitterly. Do not try to console me over the destruction of my people.”

The Lord, the Lord Almighty, has a day of tumult and trampling and terror in the Valley of Vision, a day of battering down walls and of crying out to the mountains. Elam takes up the quiver, with her charioteers and horses; Kir uncovers the shield. Your choicest valleys are full of chariots, and horsemen are posted at the city gates. The Lord stripped away the defenses of Judah, and you looked in that day to the weapons in the Palace of the Forest.

You saw that the walls of the City of David were broken through in many places; you stored up water in the Lower Pool. You counted the buildings in Jerusalem and tore down houses to strengthen the wall. You built a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the Old Pool, but you did not look to the One who made it, or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.

The Lord, the Lord Almighty, called you on that day to weep and to wail, to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth. But see, there is joy and revelry, slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep, eating of meat and drinking of wine! “Let us eat and drink,” you say, “for tomorrow we die!” The Lord Almighty has revealed this in my hearing: “Till your dying day this sin will not be atoned for,” says the Lord, the Lord Almighty.

This is what the Lord, the Lord Almighty, says:

“Go, say to this steward, to Shebna the palace administrator: What are you doing here and who gave you permission to cut out a grave for yourself here, hewing your grave on the height and chiseling your resting place in the rock? “Beware, the Lord is about to take firm hold of you and hurl you away, you mighty man. He will roll you up tightly like a ball and throw you into a large country. There you will die and there the chariots you were so proud of will become a disgrace to your master’s house. I will depose you from your office, and you will be ousted from your position.”

“In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the people of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will become a seat of honor for the house of his father. All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots—all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars.

“In that day,” declares the Lord Almighty, “the peg driven into the firm place will give way; it will be sheared off and will fall, and the load hanging on it will be cut down.” The Lord has spoken.

A Prophecy Against Tyre

A prophecy against Tyre:

Wail, you ships of Tarshish! For Tyre is destroyed and left without house or harbor. From the land of Cyprus word has come to them.

Be silent, you people of the island and you merchants of Sidon, whom the seafarers have enriched. On the great waters came the grain of the Shihor; the harvest of the Nile was the revenue of Tyre, and she became the marketplace of the nations. Be ashamed, Sidon, and you fortress of the sea, for the sea has spoken: “I have neither been in labor nor given birth; I have neither reared sons nor brought up  daughters.”

When word comes to Egypt, they will be in anguish at the report from Tyre. Cross over to Tarshish; wail, you people of the island. Is this your city of revelry, the old, old city, whose feet have taken her to settle in far-off lands? Who planned this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns, whose merchants are princes, whose traders are renowned in the earth?

The Lord Almighty planned it, to bring down her pride in all her splendor and to humble all who are renowned on the earth. Till your land as they do along the Nile, Daughter Tarshish, for you no longer have a harbor. The Lord has stretched out his hand over the sea and made its kingdoms tremble. He has given an order concerning Phoenicia that her fortresses be destroyed. He said, “No more of your reveling, Virgin Daughter Sidon, now crushed! “Up, cross over to Cyprus; even there you will find no rest.” Look at the land of the Babylonians, this people that is now of no account! The Assyrians have made it a place for desert creatures; they raised up their siege towers, they stripped its fortresses bare and turned it into a ruin.

Wail, you ships of Tarshish; your fortress is destroyed! At that time Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, the span of a king’s life. But at the end of these seventy years, it will happen to Tyre as in the song of the prostitute:

“Take up a harp, walk through the city, you forgotten prostitute; play the harp well, sing many a song, so that you will be remembered.”

At the end of seventy years, the Lord will deal with Tyre. She will return to her lucrative prostitution and will ply her trade with all the kingdoms on the face of the earth. Yet her profit and her earnings will be set apart for the Lord; they will not be stored up or hoarded. Her profits will go to those who live before the Lord, for abundant food and fine clothes.

Isaiah 14:28 through Chapter 23

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Nine plus chapters of prophecy against nations to include Israel’s blessed city of Jerusalem. This is what we find between the end of Isaiah, Chapter 14 through Chapter 23. It’s a tough read as we see city after city and nation after nation called out by the Lord Almighty for judgment. All of it brought one question to mind.

What if the Lord’s prophecy was against us?

More on that in a minute. First, let’s look at each of these words of warning from the Lord.

1. The Philistines.

You may recall the Philistines. They weren’t exactly friends with the Israelites or God for that matter. There was consistent warring between the nations and you may remember that they had a giant named Goliath that no one dared fight, that is except for a young shepherd boy named David who stepped up with a sling and hurled a stone that scripture tells us sank into the giant’s forehead and downed him. The mighty Goliath died that day, not by the hands of the young David but rather at the hands of a Lord who delivered the victory, the Lord who made a habit out of delivering His people to victory in the Bible, the Lord who still delivers us from victory this very day.

It’s obvious that the victory was not coming for the Philistines. Rather, they could expect only destruction

2. Moab.

Moab was another continuous enemy of the people of Israel. As a result, ruin and devastation was in their future, ruin and devastation that would drive the people into deep mourning expressed by the shaving of their heads, the removal of their beards, and the donning of sackcloth. The once powerful nation would be brought down low by the Lord, survivors would be few and feeble. Moab’s wealth and dignity would be carried away, its arrogance and conceit dashed away.

3. Damascus.

Damascus was the capital of Aram (present day Syria) and thus the home of the Arameans who were also enemies of the people of Israel. The Lord’s prophecy wastes no time in proclaiming the fortified city’s future for it would become a heap of ruins and be rendered powerless. Disease and incurable pain awaited the people as they fell into the Lord’s judgment for forgetting Him. There’s little doubt they remembered God in the midst of His wrath and it would have been so much easier if they would have decided to commit themselves fully to Him instead of turning away. Perhaps there’s a lot for people to take away from this fact, to not repeat the mistakes of the past.

4. Cush and Egypt.

The Cushites, who resided in what was ancient Ethiopia, gained control of Egypt and ruled there from 715-663 BC. All people who would come against God’s people would face His resistance and fight a losing battle when opposed by His almighty power. No one can come against God and triumph. No one.

Before and after the Cushites, the Egyptians were a powerful force in the region and less than receptive to worshipping anywhere close to the way God expected. We know they chose to worship many false gods, an act and attitude that consistently brought on God’s discipline, even unto His own chosen people. Note here the imagery as the idols the Egyptians worshipped trembled before the Lord and left the worshippers melting with fear, weaklings before the Lord of all consuming power and might. The Lord’s judgment upon Egyptian territory would usher in desolation and despondency, both byproducts of experiencing the judgment of God. And both the Cushites and Egyptians would be humiliated and shamed after being conquered by the Assyrians, left with no one to turn to for they had relied on man and not on God. Unfortunately, we’re repeating the mistakes of the past in many ways today.

5. Babylon.

When God placed the judgment of exile on His people in the southern kingdom of Judah, they were attacked and taken away for seventy years by none other than the Babylonians. But the Babylonian empire didn’t stand any more than any other dynasty that rose to power. Rather, they found their defeat at the hands of the Persians, the invader predicted to come in the scriptures. With this coming, Babylon was prophesied to fall and all the images of their false gods shattered on the ground. Used by God as a source of judgment on His people, the Babylonians chose to continue worshipping their idols and in the end, it cost them everything.

6. Edom.

Of interest, the land of Edom was the home of Esau’s descendants, Esau being the eldest of Isaac’s sons who lost the birthright to his brother Jacob. You may recall Esau’s anger against his brother for the deceiving way he tricked Isaac into blessing him with the birthright and so it comes a little surprise that this was only a precursor to the warring relationship the people of Edom had with Israel. Thus, it’s of little surprise that Edom made the list of judgment prophecies from the Lord to Isaiah.

7. Arabia.

The Arabs were not spared from God’s judgment, not even close. They too would first fall under siege of the Assyrians and then the Babylonians, their archers no match for the swords wielded by their opposition. Their splendor was about to end and their warriors would largely exterminated on the battlefield.

8. Jerusalem.

We know the people of Israel has fallen out of favor with God so far that He was taking their punishment to a new level. If they were not going to live for Him and Him alone in the land He gave them, then they could go and live as strangers, exiled in a foreign land for seventy years. Perhaps, that would be enough time for them to get their priorities straight and place God first again in everything.

The people of Israel and Judah came under attack, with the northern kingdom defeated by the Assyrians and the southern kingdom (which included Jerusalem), first falling under siege of the Assyrians before ultimately being finished off by the Babylonians after the Lord stripped away their defenses. Even after the initial assaults, the people of Israel were more reliant on themselves to rebuild things than they were God, and He wasn’t going to stand for that. He didn’t then and He won’t today.

9. Tyre.

Ezekiel 26 does a good job of documenting God’s displeasure with Tyre and passing a judgment that would be carried out by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon who would destroy Tyre and level it into flat rock, vulnerable and plundered by the nations. Pride and arrogance, enemies of the Lord, would be no more and Tyre would forgotten for seventy years, ironically the length of the Israelite captivity. Sometimes the judgment of God is not just confined to a moment or a day or even weeks or months. At times, it may last for many, many years.

So what are we to do with the scriptures today? What do we take away that can help us as we live our lives every day?

As stated earlier, I think a good place to start would be to ask ourselves the key question of the day:

What if God passed on a prophecy about you and me?

There would certainly be enough to draw from, right? Think about our sinfulness and how we have turned from God to follow our own ways or the ways of the world. Consider how many times we have violated His commands and fallen short of His expectations. Frankly, it’s a miracle that He hasn’t wiped off the face of His creation a long time ago and we would have deserved it.

I think we need to realize this if we’re going to really appreciate the true meaning of Christmas and the arrival of a baby sent from God to save us all from the sins that should have led to our annihilation. Instead of destruction and desolation and obliteration, we find hope and grace and mercy and forgiveness in that lowly Bethlehem manger through Jesus, God’s one and only son who was born of the virgin Mary who conceived by the Holy Spirit. God’s deepest love for us all came in the gift of that infant child, born in the most humble of circumstances but carrying the fullest measure of His Father’s power, a power through which He could do (and still does do) all things, a power that would save anyone who placed their faith and trust in Him.

As we enter yet another Christmas, let us not open one single gift without pausing to give thanks for God’s greatest gift of all to us, His children: the gift of salvation through Jesus. It’s a gift that will ensure our life story will have a happy ending with the promise of a life eternal with God the Father and Christ Jesus, the One who put the Christ in Christmas.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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