Isaiah 14:1-23.  Yesterday we started a new section of Isaiah.  It contains ten messages about the destruction of various proud and powerful nations.  The message yesterday was about Babylon.  I made the point that Babylon was a weak nation during the lifetime of Isaiah but it was not non-existent.  I also mentioned that the original message seemed appropriate for Hezekiah’s time (728-686).  During Hezekiah’s reign in Judah Assyria attacked the land and took the northern kingdom, Israel, captive.  The Assyrian’s would remove leaders and certain skilled people from an area after they captured it.  They would then bring other people from another distant part of their empire in to take their place.  By transplanting parts of a group of people they hoped to break up any tribal loyalties.  The northern kingdom was taken captive in 7222 BC.  Although the Assyrians attacked Judah, the southern kingdom, also they were not able to take the capital of Jerusalem.

Hezekiah’s father was Ahaz.  Ahaz promoted Baal worship (a false Cannanite god, see 2 Chronicles 28:1-4).  He also did not follow the advise of Isaiah but rather invited the Assyrian king to come and defend him, for which he paid a great deal of money.  After defeating Israel and Aram the Assyrians attacked Judah.  Ahaz stayed pro Assyrian in spite of the betrayal.  Hezekiah shared leadership with his father for 13 years.  For the last four years of that overlap he appears to have been the chief leader.  After the death of his father Hezekiah began to reform the spiritual life of Judah and even influenced Israleites who remained in the area of the former northern kingdom.  He also removed the places of idol worship from the land (2 Kings 18:3).  Although Hezekiah was anti-Assyrian he wisely did not stand up to Assyria right away.  During the early part of his reign following his father’s death he was occupied with reforming the spiritual life of the nation.  During those early years Assyria was ruled by a very strong king, Sargon II.  Sargon died in 705 BC and was succeeded by his son, Sennacherib.  Several of the local leaders in the area around Judah saw an opportunity to get out from under Assyrian rule.  In those days smaller nations had to pay tribute, a kind of tax, to the king of a ruling nation or face invasion.  These kingdoms joined together in an alliance against Sennacherib.  Included in this alliance was Egypt (a much larger power but still subject to Assyria at the time).  After consolidating his power at home, Sennacherib marched troops west to deal with the rebellion.  He defeated many of the alliance members to the north of Judah and along the Mediterranean coast.  He then turned his sights on Jerusalem.  With the alliance in shambles Hezekiah decided to pay a tribute by removing silver objects from God’s temple and gold from the walls to pay off Sennacherib.  Sennacherib’s generals marched on Jerusalem anyway.  As the Assyrian generals taunted and threatened from outside Jerusalem, Hezekiah joined up with Isaiah and prayed about the situation asking God for help.  God helped by bringing Egypt into the fight.  The Assyrians retreated from Jerusalem to meet the Eqyptians.  With the direct help of an angel the Egyptian army destroyed 185,000 troops of the Assyrian army.  Sennacherib returned to Assyria where he was murdered by his own children.

The world wrongly saw this as a victory for Hezekiah and sent gifts of honor to him in Jerusalem. Based on 2 Chronicles 32:22-26 and 2 Kings 20:1-21 it appears that Hezekiah proudly accepted these gifts for himself and did not pass the honor on to God.  As a result God made him very sick and Isaiah told him he was going to die.  Hezekiah repented of his pride immediately and God had Isaiah tell him he would live another 15 years (2 Kings 20:1-6; 2 Chronicles 32:24-26).  Ss I said yesterday Babylon was not a major player at this time but they did have a presence.  As we have seen with Judah and the other kingdoms in the alliance, smaller nations were always looking for an opportunity to be free of the larger nations.  At the time of his illness the Babylonians took the opportunity to approach Hezekiah about another alliance, with them.  During that meeting Hezekiah showed the representatives from Babylon all of his wealth and works.  Apparently his pride was not completely gone.  As you might guess from our reading in Isaiah so far, God was not pleased with Hezekiah’s pride and informed him that eventually the very nation he was bragging to would one day carry his descendants and wealth away.  The siege of Jerusalem was in 701 BC and theses other events happened at the same time.  Hezekiah died in 686 BC.  Historically Babylon did become a world power but not until almost 90 years later.  The Assyrian capital, Ninevah, fell in 612 BC to the Babylonians.  The Assyrian king retreated west and called on Egypt for help.  This occurred in 609 BC.  Egypt was able to hold off the Babylonians in the area which had formerly been Israel.  After about 3 years the Egyptians tried to gain more territory but were defeated at the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BC and the Neo (or new) Babylonian empire became the new world power.  At that time the new king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, took some leading people captive from Judah including Daniel (Who wrote the book of Daniel).  In 597 BC Nebuchadnezzar again invaded, this time in response to a rebellion by Jehoiakim king of Judah.  Jehoiakim die before Nebuchadnezzar arrived and his 18 year old son was left on the throne to face the wrath of Babylon.  He was taken captive along with many of the ruling family and also the prophet Ezekiel.  In 586 BC Nebuchadnezzar again invaded in response to yet another rebellion and conquered the city.  He destroyed the temple and took all of the people as captives back to Babylon.  100 years after the death of Hezekiah the prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled.

As we read yesterday Babylon’s days were numbered too, they would be taken over by the Mede’s.  Babylon would remain a symbol of the pride and self-sufficiency of mankind until the day of the Lord however (see yesterday’s post for more).  The post yesterday moved from a future day when God would establish his forever kingdom and destroy the man’s kingdoms to a prophecy about the specific kingdom of Babylon.  This prediction about the end of the Neo-Babylonian empire (539 BC) would not come to pass for over 100 hundred years after the death of Isaiah (no later than 642 BC).  Today’s reading is a continuation of the message about the destruction of Babylon.  Remember that each of the ten messages starts with the idea of it being a “burden” which Isaiah must deliver.  Also contained in this first “burden” is a message about the destruction of Assyria.  We will read that part tomorrow.  And remember we have already seen a prediction of the defeat of Assyria in chapters 8-11.  The fact that this message combines hope about the destruction of both Babylon and Assyria tells us that they both were important at the time the message was first given.  This would fit the time of Hezekiah when Assyria was still in power but Babylon was trying to build an alliance.

In Isaiah 14:1-3 we see that God will have mercy on Israel and will bring them back to their land.  God’s promises are secure.  The rest of today’s reading is in a poetic form in Hebrew.  This poem or song is a word or saying against Babylon.  In the poem or song the king of Babylon is filed with pride and many of his actions are seen as unfair.  But his lovely life and his lovely attitude about himself are contrasted with an ugly future.  Instead of the world praising him they will praise his destruction.  Death is excited to meet him however and has prepared a luxurious bed of maggots for him with worms for a blanket (Ugh!  Can anyone say eternal Fear Factor?).  At the end of the song we see that this total destruction of both the king and his empire are from God.  Some early Christian leaders connected Isaiah 14:12 with Luke 10:18 and felt that Isaiah 14:12 was a description of Satan being expelled from Heaven.  There are many parallels between the attitudes and other descriptions of Satan and this description of the king of Babylon (See also Revelation 9:1; 12:7-9).  It is certainly possible that this song uses compares the evil Babylonian king with the devil but the meaning remains the same, pride leads to destruction and humiliation.  As with the rest of Isaiah so far the duel themes of judgment and mercy are both present.  Pride and the idea that we can do it on our own lead to destruction and humiliation (Can you think of anything worse that a bed of maggots and a blanket of worm?)  On the other hand if we leave our lives and eternities in God’s hands he will take care of us.  Lord help me trust you more.  Give me wisdom about what to do when.  It doesn’t seem like Hezekiah was in trouble for making an alliance, you even used it to save his kingdom.  But he was in trouble for taking the credit after you gave the victory.  Help me be wise and do what is right.  Help me give you the credit when things work out.  Thank you for your patience and mercy.

Isaiah 13:1-22.  This morning we start a new section of Isaiah’s writings.  The first section was an introduction in chapter 1.  That chapter briefly laid out the problem of pride and rebellion against God, specifically in the lives of the people of the southern kingdom, and challenged them (and us) to think about it.  The chapter offered two options, turn back to God and let him help us out of our rebellion or suffer the consequences.  The second section, chapters 2-12 focused on who should get honor or credit, God or man.  Man wants to give himself all the credit for the good in life (interestingly we want to blame God when things don’t go so good), that is pride.  On the other had Isaiah has shown us that God is in control and deserves all the credit, honor, or glory.   This third section continues the two-pronged theme of turning to God or suffering the consequences.  The layout of this section is different, though, from chapters 2-12.  Some scholars think this section starts in chapter 13 and goes through chapter 27 others think it goes only through chapter 23.

The Bible talks about a day when Jesus will return to the earth and establish a physical kingdom here.  We have seen some hints of this in our reading so far, especially Isaiah 9:6-7.  Chapter 2 also talked about a coming day when all the nations of the earth would look to Jerusalem and to God for understanding on how to live (Isaiah 2:2-4).  That chapter also talked about a day of judgment (Isaiah 2:12) for pride.  Although we have seen several predictions of judgment, many of which have already come true in history, there is also a more complete judgment of disobedience and rebellion (sin) coming in the future.  That time period is often called “The Day of the Lord”.  Chapter 13 mentions “the Day of the Lord” in verse 6 and chapter 24 also mentions “that day” (v. 21) and seems to be describing the same day of judgment.  In fact each of chapters 24-27 seem to be focusing on “that day”, then chapter 28 seems to change the topic.  For those reasons it looks like chapters 13-23 form a section of Isaiah’s writings and then chapters 24-27.  Remember though that the whole book is Isaiah’s collection of messages which he had delivered throughout his life, up to the time of writing (Maybe around 680 BC.  See Isaiah 37:38 where he mentions the death of the Assyrian king Sennacherib who was murdered in 681 BC).  He may have written the book over a period of time since different sections seem to focus on slightly different problems in the kingdom.  So far though the book seems to have that two-pronged theme and these other sections may just bb flavored by the times in which the specific messages were originally given.  Chapters 13-23 (27) seem to be particularly appropriate for the times of the fourth king mentioned in chapter 1, Hezekiah.  But this is only one section of a total book that God had Isaiah put together, not just for a certain king but for us too, and we must remember that.

Chapters 13-23 contain ten different “oracles”.  The English word oracle means spoken message but the Hebrew word used by Isaiah is different it means “burden”, something heave which we carry.  He may have meant that the message he was giving was hard, difficult, and serious for him to deliver.  He may also have meant that the truth in the message would be hard for the people of Judah to live through or deal with.  Maybe he meant both.

The first burden that Isaiah delivered is in chapters 13-14.  It is interesting that Isaiah says the burden is about Babylon but right away he launches into a description of “the day of the LORD” (v. 6) where God’s warriors will punish the world for it’s iniquity (a word that means twisted ways)(v. 11) and will exterminate sinners (a word which means to miss the mark or goal)(v. 9).  Mankind will become scarce and the whole earth will shake (vv. 12-13).  This sounds bigger that just Babylon.  During the time of Isaiah Assyria was the strong power in the region.  It rose in the early years of Isaiah’s ministry but was still strong by the time of his death (Tradition tells us that Isaiah was killed by the evil southern king Manasseh.  His reign ended in 642 BC so Isaiah was killed some time between 680-642 BC).  In the years after Isaiah Assyria was ruled by several weak kings (632-612 BC) and was overthrown by the newly powerful Babylonian empire in 612-609 BC.  It is interesting then that this “burden” or heavy message is about the destruction of an empire that was not even a player yet.  Even more interesting is including a message about world-wide judgment within a “burden” about a nobody nation.  In verse 17 the “burden” returns to Babylon indicating that the Babylonian empire would be destroyed by a people group known as the Medes.  Another interesting part of history is that the Medes were actually a part of the Babylonian empire that destroyed the Assyrian empire.  The Babylonian empire was sometimes known as the empire of the Medes and the Persians since it contained these people groups.  Historically the Babylonian empire referred to here is the Neo-Babylonian Empire (Neo meaning new) since there had also been an ancient Babylonian empire about 1000 years before.  This neo-Babylonian empire also contained a people group known as the Chaldeans.  The Chaldeans were the ruling group from about 612 -539 BC.  These people groups live in what is Iran today though their empire spread from the Mediterranean Sea to about India.  So it is interesting that the Medes are listed as the conquerors of the Babylonians.  Historically we know this is exactly what happened when Darius, a Mede, entered the capital and killed Belshazzar the king of Babylon in 539 BC (See Daniel 5).  In that story we see an over confidant Belshazzar throwing a party while his kingdom was being taken over by the Medes and the Persians.  Daniel 5:22-23 tells us that Belshazzar was overthrown by the Medes and Persians because he was proud and did not honor God.  The very themes we see through out Isaiah.

One last piece of the puzzle involves why the universal “day of the LORD” is mentioned at the beginning of this burden about Babylon.  Babylon traces it’s origin back to the tower of Babel in Genesis 10.  In that story mankind decided to group together instead of spreading out over the whole earth as God had instructed.  At that time all mankind shared a common language.  When God saw the rebellion he put a stop to is by causing the people to have different languages.  The result was that mankind spread out over the earth.  Near the end of the times in which we are living mankind will once again try to join together and make a perfect world for themselves.  A world run by man, for man, using all of the wisdom am can come up with.  This new pride filled world will be judged for denying God and for replacing him with mankind.  In the book of Revelation we see the destruction of this new world order.  In Revelation the new world order run by mankind is called Babylon (Revelation 14:8; 16:19; 17:5; 18:1-24).  Babylon is a symbol of the rebellion and pride of mankind.  The events in the book of Revelation parallel descriptions in the Old Testament of the “day of the LORD”.  So it is appropriate of the message about Babylon to look beyond the soon coming destruction of Babylon (in 539 BC) and keep the bigger picture in mind.

It is awesome that God has a big plan in mind but it involves individuals.  In wars there is often “collateral damage” people who are not directly involved in the battle getting hurt and killed.  Kings and generals have to accept that some “innocent” by standers will suffer.  They are looking at the big picture of winning the war or ending the war and trying to protect their troops.  God is concerned about every single individual.  He wants each person to have the opportunity to respond to him, to look for and accept his forgiveness.  The Bible indicates that Jesus died for every single human beings sins (1 John 2:2).  Not everyone will respond but the forgiveness is available.  In our reading today we see that God has the big picture and the final plan but that he was also dealing with what was going on then and there.  Babylon was soon to come to power and it would be a proud kingdom that would deny God, and God would judge their pride.  We too can be proud and ignore God.  Wht then is the message for us?  It is the same message Judah should have gotten, honor God and not yourself or you will suffer.  But there is a hope.  At the end of “the day of the LORD” Jesus returns and rules the world in peace and wealth.  But we do not need to wait until then, the angles announced at the birth of Jesus that there was “peace on earth and goodwill toward mankind”.  John the Baptist told the people to turn back to God for the kingdom had arrived (Matthew 3:2).  Jesus repeated the same message in Matthew 4:17.  Jesus was the beginning of the kingdom, he was the answer.  Turn to God and you can be a part of the kingdom right now, a kingdom which will have it’s fulfillment after the “day of the LORD” when all pride will be dealt with and Jesus will rule on the earth forever.  Thank you god for making people the most important part of your kingdom.  In the movie Field of Dreams the voice told the main character that if he built it he would come. You tells us that if we come you will build it.  Thank you for making heaven free, not requiring us to build something before you will fix our relationship.  Thank you for caring about us.  Thank you for giving us the freedom to love you and for calling out to us.  You are so loving and so patient.  Thank you especially for your forgiveness because I know I could never build a perfect life, to think so is to lift myself up and drag you down.  Lift me up Lord as only you can do and be honored in the process.