Nahum I
Sermon Notes
Nahum
1:1-15
The Burden
of Nineveh
August 23,
2015
Lynchburg,
Virginia
EXHORDIUM
This
letter is somewhat unique. It is a prophecy against Nineveh. We know little of
Nahum. He is prophet of Israel but is speaking to the conquering power. He is
prophesying sometime between 663-612 BC.
Keep in mind that Assyria is the
occupying force at this time of the northern kingdom. They conquered Samaria,
the capital of the Northern Kingdom in 722 BC.
Also, keep in mind that Jonah had preached to
Nineveh before Assyria attacked the Northern Kingdom and took Samaria in the
sixth year of Hezekiah.
In the fourteenth year of Hezekiah, Sennacherib
took all the fenced cities of Judah and set his sights on Jerusalem. Hezekiah
paid tribute to Sennacherib to keep him out of the city.
Jonah’s reluctance to preach to them was
directly related to their threat to Israel. His fears were realized. God
forgave Nineveh when they repented and He did not destroy the city at that
time. And some time later, they returned to their former ways, both in their
internal sins as well as their sins against God’s people by attacking Israel
and Judah.
The time of Sennacherib’s attack is around 700
BC.
2 Kings 18:28 Then Rabshakeh stood and cried
with a loud voice in the Jews’ language, and spake, saying, Hear the word of
the great king, the king of Assyria: 29 Thus saith the king, Let
not Hezekiah deceive you: for he shall not be able to deliver you out of his
hand: 30 Neither let Hezekiah make you trust in the
LORD, saying, The LORD will surely deliver us, and this city shall not be
delivered into the hand of the king of Assyria.
31 Hearken not to Hezekiah: for thus saith the
king of Assyria, Make an agreement with me by a present, and come out to
me, and then eat ye every man of his own vine, and every one of his fig
tree, and drink ye every one the waters of his cistern: 32 Until I come and take you away to a land like
your own land, a land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land
of oil olive and of honey, that ye may live, and not die: and hearken not unto
Hezekiah, when he persuadeth you, saying, The LORD will deliver us. 33 Hath any of the gods of the nations delivered
at all his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? 34 Where are the gods of Hamath, and of
Arpad? where are the gods of Sepharvaim, Hena, and Ivah? have they
delivered Samaria out of mine hand? 35 Who are they among
all the gods of the countries, that have delivered their country out of mine
hand, that the LORD should deliver Jerusalem out of mine hand?
Assyria does, in fact, attack Jerusalem but they
are turned away.
2 Kings
19:6 And Isaiah said unto them,
Thus shall ye say to your master, Thus saith the LORD, Be not afraid of the
words which thou hast heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria
have blasphemed me. 7 Behold, I will send a
blast upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land;
and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.
2 Kings
19:15 And Hezekiah prayed
before the LORD, and said, O LORD God of Israel, which dwellest between
the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of
the earth; thou hast made heaven and earth.
16 LORD, bow down thine ear, and hear: open,
LORD, thine eyes, and see: and hear the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent
him to reproach the living God. 17 Of a truth, LORD, the
kings of Assyria have destroyed the nations and their lands, 18 And have cast their gods into the fire: for
they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone:
therefore they have destroyed them. 19 Now therefore, O LORD our
God, I beseech thee, save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the
earth may know that thou art the LORD God, even thou only.
2 Kings 19: 2 Therefore thus saith the
LORD concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor
shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against
it. 33 By the way that he came, by the same shall he
return, and shall not come into this city, saith the LORD. 34 For I will defend this city, to save it, for
mine own sake, and for my servant David’s sake.
2Kings 19:35
And it came to pass that night, that the angel of the LORD went
out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five
thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were
all dead corpses.
So Assyria is turned away and forced to
fight her battles elsewhere. This gives Jerusalem reprieve for a while. About
90 years after this, Nineveh is destroyed by the Babylonians, who then also
attack and destroy Jerusalem 25 years later.
Date 663-612
Jonah preached to Nineveh prior to 722. B.C.
Nineveh
fell to Babylon in 612. B.C.
Jonah was reluctant to preach to them because they were the
dominant world power and greatest threat to Israel.
Samaria
fell to Nineveh in 722 B.C.
About 100 years later, Nineveh herself is destroyed by the
Babylonians.
EXEGESIS
Nah. 1:1
The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the
Elkoshite.
Nah. 1:2
God is jealous, and the LORD revengeth; the LORD revengeth,
and is furious; the LORD will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he
reserveth wrath for his enemies.
The God of the Old Testament is the God of the
New Testament. He does not change. It is important for us to realize this when
we read words about God being jealous and taking revenge and being furious. He
brings wrath to His enemies.
This is the burden against Nineveh. Nineveh is
an enemy of God. But keep in mind that this is not nationalism. The Ninevites
repented under the preaching of Jonah and God relented of His design of
judgment against them.
They are enemies now because they have pursued
wickedness and cruelty and have attacked God’s people.
3 The LORD is
slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked:
the LORD hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are
the dust of his feet.
The God of the Old Testament is slow to anger.
He is slow to anger but He is not incapable of anger. Sin provokes Him and when
He acts, His actions are terrible.
4 He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and
drieth up all the rivers: Bashan languisheth, and Carmel, and the flower of
Lebanon languisheth. 5 The mountains quake at
him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the
world, and all that dwell therein. 6 Who can stand before his
indignation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? his fury is
poured out like fire, and the rocks are thrown down by him.
God is sovereign over all things. He is
sovereign over nature and nations. This is an important point. We reason from
the general to the particular. If God is sovereign even over the wind and rain
and sea, of course He is sovereign over men and nations. Because He is the creator and ruler of all
things, we owe our allegiance to Him. This is true of all men and nations and
His law applies to all.
7 The LORD is
good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knoweth them that trust in
him. 8 But with an overrunning flood he will make an
utter end of the place thereof, and darkness shall pursue his enemies.
The Lord is good. He defines goodness. We cannot
accuse God of injustice. He does not act unjustly. Those who look to Him find
Him a stronghold in the day of trouble. In the midst of that, the Lord takes
note of His own. Darkness pursues His enemies.
Nah. 1:9
What do ye imagine against the LORD? he will make an utter end:
affliction shall not rise up the second time.
10 For
while they be folden together as thorns, and while they are
drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
11 There is one
come out of thee, that imagineth evil against the LORD, a wicked
counsellor.
12 Thus saith the LORD;
Though they be quiet, and likewise many, yet thus shall they be cut
down, when he shall pass through. Though I have afflicted thee, I will afflict
thee no more. 13 For now will I break his yoke from off thee,
and will burst thy bonds in sunder.
Numbers are not an obstacle for the Lord. He
defeats mighty armies with smaller armies. The Lord uses wicked nations to
discipline other wicked nations. Assyria had been his instrument in judging
Samaria. Now Babylon is His instrument in judging Assyria and Nineveh.
Again, we see that the Lord is sovereign. His
rules apply to all nations. They are all culpable for their behavior.
14 And the LORD hath
given a commandment concerning thee, that no more of thy name be sown:
out of the house of thy gods will I cut off the graven image and the molten
image: I will make thy grave; for thou art vile.
The Lord speaks harshly of the Ninevite gods and images.
He call them vile.
15 Behold upon the
mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace! O
Judah, keep thy solemn feasts, perform thy vows: for the wicked shall no more
pass through thee; he is utterly cut off.
Good news is coming to those of Judah who are
besieged by the Ninevites and those who have been taken captive. The good news is that the enemies and captors
will be judged.
This announcement is one of peace to His people.
The Lord exhorts them to keep their solemn feast and perform their vows. He
calls them back to obedience at the time that Nineveh is judge.
They do not fully respond to this. Nineveh is
judged but Judah does not fully repent of her evil. Within forty years, they
will destroyed by Babylon.
2: 8 But Nineveh is of
old like a pool of water: yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall they
cry; but none shall look back. 9 Take ye the spoil of
silver, take the spoil of gold: for there is none end of the store
and glory out of all the pleasant furniture. 10 She is empty, and void, and waste: and the
heart melteth, and the knees smite together, and much pain is in all
loins, and the faces of them all gather blackness.
Nineveh
was one like a pool of water, a place of deep refreshment, a place of nourishment
and strength. But now the water will flee away. The health and strength and
rest will be no more. They are loaded with spoils from the nations they have
conquered but now they will be spoiled, the gold, the silver and all pleasant
furnishings. They all will flee away at their judgment.
Their faces used to be bright with
health and life and fatness. Their faces now turn to blackness, the face of
darkness, sickness and leanness.
Nah. 2:11
Where is the dwelling of the lions, and the feedingplace of
the young lions, where the lion, even the old lion, walked, and
the lion’s whelp, and none made them afraid? 12 The lion did tear in pieces enough for his
whelps, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his holes with prey, and
his dens with ravin. 13 Behold, I am
against thee, saith the LORD of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the
smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions: and I will cut off thy prey
from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be heard.
Assyria had been the lion. They had been the
predator attacking their enemies and devouring them. Now they are the prey and
God is the lion.
Nah. 3:1
Woe to the bloody city! it is all full of lies and
robbery; the prey departeth not;
Nineveh was a particularly bloody city. They
were very cruel to those they defeated.
If their adversaries resisted them, they made a
cruel mockery of them by cutting off their hands and feet and impaling them on
poles. They also flayed, or skinned alive their captors. With others, they cut
off their noses and even their private parts. Still others, they beheaded and
placed their heads on a pole to carry around as a sign of their complete
victory. They truly were a bloody city.
Nahum 3: 4 Because of the multitude
of the whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that
selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her
witchcrafts. 5 Behold, I am against thee, saith the
LORD of hosts; and I will discover thy skirts upon thy face, and I will shew
the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame.
Whoredoms, harlotry, witchcraft, deceit,
enslavement were the ways of Nineveh. God takes note of these things in all
nations.
This should be encouraging to us and frightening
to us. It is encouraging because no matter where this wickedness is
perpetrated, the Lord takes notes. He notes it and if there is no repentance,
He brings chastisement and eventually judgment. We who love truth and justice
should rejoice at this.
It is frightening because we see many of these
sins currently being done in our own land. There are many adulteries. Men and
women are not faithful to their spouses. There is rampant sexual promiscuity
and it is defended vigorously, even within certain elements of the church. It
should not surprise us to see the manifestations of sexual promiscuity.
Abortion, sexually transmitted diseases, fatherless families, women and
children dependent upon the government for survival, an assault on the
definitions of marriage. We see all of these things rampant in our culture. How
can we not expect God to act against us as Americans?
But He also takes note of His people. Amidst the
enemies, He finds His people and takes not of them for blessing.
The Lord says that He will take such wickedness
and expose their skirts upon their face. He will lift up their skirts and
expose their nakedness. This is currently happening to Planned Parenthood. They
are being exposed for what they really are. They cannot hide the shame of their
nakedness.
This is likely to happen in various sectors of
the hypocritical church. It is also likely to happen to our government
officials who lie and steal and take advantage of the poor. The State Lottery
comes to mind, as well as a host of bureaucratic taxation.
EXHORTATION
With
whom do we identify? If I ask you, Of what country are you a citizen? What is
your answer? I would like us to think about this for a while. Perhaps we
identify America too closely with God’s kingdom? It is true that America
belongs to God, as do all the nations. The Lord Jesus is at the right hand of the
Father ruling Heaven and Earth from heaven.
But American is not the same as God’s
Kingdom. America is not the same as Ancient Israel. We, Christians, are
foremost, citizens of God’s Kingdom. Our greatest desire should be to see His
Kingdom prosper, to see Him bless His Kingdom on Earth.
Furthermore, we should expect God to
hold men and nations accountable for their behavior. This means that when there
are a multitude of bloody and egregious sins in a nation, that God takes note.
We are in such times in our own country.
So, we pray for repentance for God’s
people and revival among the heathen in our land. And we should expect God’s
favor upon us to the extent that there is repentance. But if there is no
repentance, we should expect God to be faithful to His truth and to His people.
AND, we should rejoice at His justice as He builds His Kingdom to fill the
whole Earth.
