The Pride of Self-Confidence (Nahum 3:8-19)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/27/2016 10:09 PM

My Worship Time                                                                 Focus:  The Pride of Self-Confidence

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Nahum 3:8-19

Message of the verses:  “8 Are you better than No-amon, Which was situated by the waters of the Nile, With water surrounding her, Whose rampart was the sea, Whose wall consisted of the sea? 9 Ethiopia was her might, And Egypt too, without limits. Put and Lubim were among her helpers. 10 Yet she became an exile, She went into captivity; Also her small children were dashed to pieces At the head of every street; They cast lots for her honorable men, And all her great men were bound with fetters. 11 You too will become drunk, You will be hidden. You too will search for a refuge from the enemy. 12 All your fortifications are fig trees with ripe fruit- When shaken, they fall into the eater’s mouth. 13 Behold, your people are women in your midst! The gates of your land are opened wide to your enemies; Fire consumes your gate bars. 14 Draw for yourself water for the siege! Strengthen your fortifications! Go into the clay and tread the mortar! Take hold of the brick mold! 15 There fire will consume you, The sword will cut you down; It will consume you as the locust does. Multiply yourself like the creeping locust, Multiply yourself like the swarming locust. 16 You have increased your traders more than the stars of heaven-The creeping locust strips and flies away. 17 Your guardsmen are like the swarming locust. Your marshals are like hordes of grasshoppers Settling in the stone walls on a cold day. The sun rises and they flee, And the place where they are is not known. 18 Your shepherds are sleeping, O king of Assyria; Your nobles are lying down. Your people are scattered on the mountains And there is no one to regather them. 19 There is no relief for your breakdown, Your wound is incurable. All who hear about you Will clap their hands over you, For on whom has not your evil passed continually?”

Looks like Nahum was consumed with the words you, your, and yourself as we look at this last section in the book of Nahum this evening in our evening Spiritual Diary.  By using these words to describe the Assyrians we can see why Dr. Wiersbe entitled this section like he did as we see they did have pride and they were self confident.  As we go through this section we will look at a number of images to show the Assyrians their weakness and this will assure them of their ultimate defeat.

The first image we will look at is a fact about their history as they defeated the Egyptian city of Thebes or No-Ammon as seen in our text in verse eight.  This happened in 663 BC and Nahum writes about this in verses 8-11.  Dr. Wiersbe writes “If you visit Karnak and Luxor in Upper Egypt, you will be at the site of ancient Thebes.  This capital city of Upper Egypt was sure it was safe from any invader, yet it went down in defeat before Assyria.  Like Nineveh, Thebes was situated by waters which were supposed to be their defense, but the city fell just the same.  Thebes had many allies, but they couldn’t protect her.”

I am sure you have heard the statement “what goes around comes around,” and that is what happened to the Assyrians as what they did to Thebes the Babylonians and Medes did to them as we read some very graphic statements coming from the pen of Nahum in verse ten.  Nahum was arguing that since this happened to Thebes, why could it not happen to Assyria. 

Verse twelve shows us that the conquest would be as easy as it would be like ripe figs dropping into a person’s mouth.  Why was this so easy?  Dr. Wiersbe writes “Because the ferocious Assyrian soldiers would be drained of their strength and be like women:  weak, afraid, and unable to meet the enemy (vv. 13-14).”  Dr. Wiersbe writes the following endnote:  “This image is not meant to demean women in any way, whether civilians or in the armed forces, or to suggest that women lack strength and courage.  The biblical examples of Rahab, Deborah, Jael, Ruth and Ester prove that Scripture can magnify the courage and service of dedicated women.  However, we must keep in mind that the ancient world was a masculine society; women were kept secluded and certainly wouldn’t have been expected to participate in battles.  Phrases like ‘weak as a woman’ were current; both in Isaiah (19:16) and Jeremiah (50:37; 51:30) used them.”

Next we look in verses 15-17 at the images of insects.  This is not so hard to understand when we know what insects can do to things like corps as locusts can come onto fields of grain and look like a dark low cloud and when they are done nothing remains which is what Nahum is saying was going to happen to the Assyrians. 

Assyria was like a scattered flock as verse eighteen describes or it was even like a wounded body that has no way to be healed as seen in verse 19-a.  There was no way that their alleys would be rescuing them during this battle, in fact at the end of verse nineteen we read:  “All who hear about you Will clap their hands over you, For on whom has not your evil passed continually?”

Dr. Wiersbe concludes “God punishes cruel nations that follow inhumane policies and brutal practices (Amos 1-2).  Whether it’s practicing genocide, exploiting the poor, supporting slavery, or failing to provide people with necessities of life, the sins of national leaders are known by God and He eventually judges.

“If you question that fact, go and search for Nineveh.”

1/27/2016 10:42 PM