Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Spotify | TuneIn | RSS | More
Text: Nahum 2-3
Nahum describes the fall of one of the most powerful empires this world has ever seen. This vast kingdom was reduced to dust twenty-six centuries ago. People dig through the dirt to find memories of a once-thriving metropolis with elaborate architecture and thriving commercial activity. Generations of people for which this once mighty empire has no relevance. Nahum described the assassination of one of the world’s most powerful leaders in history. He described the destruction of one of the most powerful nations the world has ever seen.
Nahum describes the sudden destruction of Nineveh without any of God’s protection
- The LORD says, I am against thee (2:13)
- Chapter 2 describes the terror and panic in the city as the city is destroyed. It describes the military blitzkrieg that God uses to destroy the city.
- Verse 1 says the hammer of God’s condemnation has come. It is Babylon according to Jeremiah 50:23.
- Verse 7, Huzzab is a nickname like the “Big Apple”
- Verse 8 describes a centuries-old body of water that seems to have always existed, but it’s about to be scattered and destroyed.
- Verse 9 describes the hope and trust of Nineveh being taken away. Riches profit not in the day of wrath.
Woe to Nineveh
- 3:1-4 describe the reason for God’s wrath. The real problems that communities, societies, states, and nations face are character and moral problems.
- I am against thee (3:5)
- Indicting questions are asked like in verse 7. You bullied and struck fear into the nations around you, who will come to your aid?
- And questions like verses 8-10 where Nineveh is asked how she is any different than previous empires who have been reduced to nothing?
- The leadership in Nineveh is worthless. Are they stupid? No. Do they not know business well enough? No. Are these leaders not held in high regard? Are they not world-savvy? The bureaucracy and leadership of Nineveh and Assyria are very successful in the world, but they are poor leaders because they have no fear of God.
- And ultimately there is no one, no god, that will remove your guilt before the Almighty Holy One of Israel.
- Nineveh is finally destroyed 250 years after Jonah preached in the city. About one hundred years after Sennacherib was assassinated, the wickedness of Nineveh and the Assyrian empire has come to fruition.
There was some attempt to reanimate the city of Nineveh, or at least honor some of the remains of the city. Some of the artifacts were mounted and displayed to honor the history of that lost city during the 20th century by UNESCO. But in 2015 a group known as ISIS took bulldozers and hammers to the artifacts. To this day, the attempts by the United Nations (UNESCO) to preserve the ancient city of Nineveh contend with theft and destruction. To this day the dirt mound of a site that was once Nineveh is a home to snakes, and owls, and jackals, and thieves.
