SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/24/2014
8:22 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
Babylon’s Triumphant Invasion
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Jeremiah
46:13-26
Message of the
verses: “13 This is the message
which the LORD spoke to Jeremiah the prophet about the coming of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to
smite the land of Egypt: 14 “Declare in Egypt and proclaim in Migdol,
Proclaim also in Memphis and Tahpanhes; Say, ’Take your stand and get yourself
ready, For the sword has devoured those around you.’ 15 “Why have your mighty
ones become prostrate? They do not stand because the LORD has thrust them down.
16 “They have repeatedly stumbled; Indeed, they have fallen one against another.
Then they said, ’Get up! And let us go back To our own people and our native
land Away from the sword of the oppressor.’ 17 “They cried there, ’Pharaoh king
of Egypt is but a big noise; He has let the appointed time pass by!’ 18 “As I
live," declares the King Whose name is the LORD of hosts, "Surely one
shall come who looms up like Tabor among the mountains, Or like Carmel by the
sea. 19 “Make your baggage ready for exile, O daughter dwelling in Egypt, For Memphis will become a desolation;
It will even be burned
down and bereft of inhabitants. 20 “Egypt is a pretty heifer, But a horsefly is coming from
the north-it is coming! 21 “Also her mercenaries in her midst Are like
fattened calves, For even they too have turned back and have fled away
together; They did not stand their ground. For the day of their calamity has
come upon them, The time of their punishment. 22 “Its sound moves along like a
serpent; For they move on like an army And come to her as woodcutters with
axes. 23 "They have cut down her
forest," declares the LORD; "Surely it will no more be found, Even
though they are now more numerous than locusts And are without number. 24 “The daughter of Egypt has been
put to shame, Given over to the power of the people of the north." 25
The LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, says, "Behold, I am going to punish
Amon of Thebes, and Pharaoh, and Egypt along with her gods and her kings, even Pharaoh and those who
trust in him. 26 “I shall give them over to the power of those who are
seeking their lives, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and
into the hand of his officers. Afterwards, however, it will be inhabited as in the days of old,"
declares the LORD.
Warren Wiersbe writes that historians tell us that this occurred
in 568-567 B. C. and along with the action sermon that Jeremiah preached in
Jeremiah 43:8-13 it happened just as we read about in this section and 43:8-13
which reads as follows: “8 Then the word
of the LORD came to Jeremiah in Tahpanhes, saying, 9 "Take some large stones in your hands
and hide them in the mortar in the brick terrace which is at the entrance of
Pharaoh’s palace in Tahpanhes, in the sight of some of the Jews; 10 and say to them, ’Thus says the LORD of hosts,
the God of Israel, "Behold, I am going to send and get Nebuchadnezzar the
king of Babylon, My servant, and I am going to set his throne right over these
stones that I have hidden; and he will spread his canopy over them. 11 "He will also come and strike the land
of Egypt; those who are meant for death will be given over to death, and those
for captivity to captivity, and those for the sword to the sword. 12 “And I
shall set fire to the temples of the gods of Egypt, and he will burn them and
take them captive. So he will wrap himself with the land of Egypt as a shepherd
wraps himself with his garment, and he will depart from there safely. 13 “He
will also shatter the obelisks of Heliopolis, which is in the land of Egypt;
and the temples of the gods of Egypt he will burn with fire."’"”
The soldiers of Egypt ran over each other in order to get
out of the way of the invading Babylonian army just as we read about in the
texts above, (verses 46:13-15).
In verse 17 we see that the Babylonians soldiers called Pharaoh
a “big noise” something we might call a loudmouth or a big mouth in today’s
language, or we may say that he is full of hot air, at any rate it was not a flattering
comment, and in verse eighteen we see that Nebuchadnezzar filled the horizon
with a huge mountain of soldiers.
Now I think that one of the things that we can see from
this section of Scripture is the Jealously of God, which is one of His
attributes, and in fact when we read the Ten Commandments we can see it in the
very first one: “3 “You shall have no
other gods before Me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any
likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water
under the earth. 5 “You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD
your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the
children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, 6 but
showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My
commandments (Exodus 20:3-6).” Why do I
say this? Well I believe one of the main
reasons that God brought Nebuchadnezzar to defeat Egypt was because of their
worship of false Gods, and this happened at the very beginning of the nation of
Israel when God sent ten plagues to destroy Egypt and each of them was one of
their gods that they worshiped. Now you
may say that God was using a nation who worshiped idols to defeat another one
that worshiped idols and you would be right, but when we get to chapters 50-51
we will see Jeremiah will tell of the upcoming defeat of Babylon and in the
fifth chapter of Daniel you can read about how mighty Babylon falls in one
night. Dr. Wiersbe writes on the defeat
of Egypt “Nebuchadnezzar won and Pharaoh Necho lost because God decreed
it. But God also decreed that Egypt
would be restored (vs. 26), a promise He also gave to Moab (48:47), Ammon
(49:6), and Elam (v. 39).”
Israel’s assured future (Jeremiah 46:27-28): “27 “But
as for you, O Jacob My servant, do not fear, Nor be dismayed, O Israel! For,
see, I am going to save
you from afar, And your descendants from the land of their captivity;
And Jacob will return and be undisturbed And secure, with no one making him
tremble. 28 “O Jacob My servant, do not fear," declares the LORD, "For I am with you.
For I will make a full end of all the nations Where I have driven you, Yet I
will not make a full end of you; But I will correct you properly And by no means leave you
unpunished."”
The sermon that our Pastor preached this morning fits in
with these two verses even though it was from the 95th Psalm. We learned that God’s wrath, which is one of
His attributes is not only for unbelievers, but for believers too, only in a
different way for the wrath of God on unbelievers results that they end up in
hell, while the wrath of God for His children is to cause them to learn that
they are not walking with the Lord and He wants to correct that. The last part of Psalm 95 speaks of what
happened in the wilderness with Israel walking around for 40 years because of
their sin, and that walking around was the wrath of God against a rebellious people. God tested Israel and they failed the
test. Remember that God tests His
children and Satan tempts God’s children.
The children of Israel had just seen ten miracles from God to defeat
Egypt and then God divided the Red Sea to allow the children of Israel to cross
on dry land and then when they ran out of water they began to complain, and
when they decided that they needed to send spies to spy out the Promised Land
they became frightened and would not attack the people in the Promised Land so
God caused them to walk around for forty years in the wilderness until all
people 20 years and older died, thus a new generation of Israel conquered the
Promised Land. Now we seem to see the same
thing over again in the book of Jeremiah as Israel again sees the wrath of God,
but God promises that He will not destroy them, but He will restore them and
bring them back to their land which He did, however it could be that these two
verses picture when God brings them back to their land to stay.
John MacArthur from his study Bible writes the following
on these two verses: “Though Israel has
been scattered to the nations, the nations will receive their judgments, and
the Lord will restore Israel (repeated from 30:10, 11) from dispersion to its
own land (as in Jer. 23:5-8; 30-33). No
matter what judgment fall on Israel, they will not be destroyed, as Paul
reiterates in Rom. 11:1, 2, 15, 25-27).”
8/24/2014 9:12 PM
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