Study

a Bible passage

Click a verse to see commentary

Select a resource above

8. Assyria, the Lord's Instrument

¹ The LORD said to me, “Take a large scroll and write on it with an ordinary pen: Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz.” Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz means quick to the plunder, swift to the spoil; also in verse 3. ² So I called in Uriah the priest and Zechariah son of Jeberekiah as reliable witnesses for me. ³ Then I made love to the prophetess, and she conceived and gave birth to a son. And the LORD said to me, “Name him Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. ⁴ For before the boy knows how to say ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the plunder of Samaria will be carried off by the king of Assyria.”

⁵ The LORD spoke to me again:

    ⁶ “Because this people has rejected
   the gently flowing waters of Shiloah
and rejoices over Rezin
   and the son of Remaliah,
⁷ therefore the Lord is about to bring against them
   the mighty floodwaters of the Euphrates—
   the king of Assyria with all his pomp.
It will overflow all its channels,
   run over all its banks
⁸ and sweep on into Judah, swirling over it,
   passing through it and reaching up to the neck.
Its outspread wings will cover the breadth of your land,
   Immanuel Immanuel means God with us.!”

    ⁹ Raise the war cry, Or Do your worst you nations, and be shattered!
   Listen, all you distant lands.
Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
   Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
¹⁰ Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted;
   propose your plan, but it will not stand,
   for God is with us. Hebrew Immanuel

¹¹ This is what the LORD says to me with his strong hand upon me, warning me not to follow the way of this people:

    ¹² “Do not call conspiracy
   everything this people calls a conspiracy;
do not fear what they fear,
   and do not dread it.
¹³ The LORD Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy,
   he is the one you are to fear,
   he is the one you are to dread.
¹⁴ He will be a holy place;
   for both Israel and Judah he will be
a stone that causes people to stumble
   and a rock that makes them fall.
And for the people of Jerusalem he will be
   a trap and a snare.
¹⁵ Many of them will stumble;
   they will fall and be broken,
   they will be snared and captured.”

    ¹⁶ Bind up this testimony of warning
   and seal up God’s instruction among my disciples.
¹⁷ I will wait for the LORD,
   who is hiding his face from the descendants of Jacob.
I will put my trust in him.

¹⁸ Here am I, and the children the LORD has given me. We are signs and symbols in Israel from the LORD Almighty, who dwells on Mount Zion.

The Darkness Turns to Light

¹⁹ When someone tells you to consult mediums and spiritists, who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living? ²⁰ Consult God’s instruction and the testimony of warning. If anyone does not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn. ²¹ Distressed and hungry, they will roam through the land; when they are famished, they will become enraged and, looking upward, will curse their king and their God. ²² Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness.

13. Sanctify Jehovah of hosts himself. We have said that the reason why dangers lead to immoderate alarm is, that wretched men do not raise their eyes and minds to heaven. The Prophet now, therefore, proposes a suitable remedy for allaying terrors, that they who dread the evils which threaten them may learn to give to God the honor due to him. To sanctify the God of armies means to exalt his power highly; so as to remember that he holds the government of the world, and that the beginning and the end of good and evil actions are at his disposal. Hence it follows that, in some respects, God is robbed of his holiness, when we do not immediately betake ourselves to him in cases of perplexity. This mode of expression, therefore, is highly emphatic; for it shows us that no higher affront can be offered to God than to give way to fear, as if he were not exalted above all creatures, so as to control all events. On the other hand, when we rely on his aid, and, through victorious steadfastness of faith, despise dangers, then do we actually ascribe to him lawful government; for if we are not convinced that innumerable methods, though unknown to us, are in his power for our deliverance, we conceive of him as a dead idol.

And let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. He properly adds, that God himself should be the fear and the dread of the people, in order to inform them that there awaits them a just and lawful reward of their crimes and of their contempt of God, when they thus in wretchedness and alarm tremble at dangers. Though he speaks not only of fear but of dread, yet he does not mean that the Jews should be filled with horror at the name of God, so as to desire to flee from him, but merely demands from them reverence for God, and uses both words in order to express continuance. He therefore means that they will be free and exempted from solicitude of mind, if a sincere fear of God be deeply engraven on their hearts, and never pass away from them; and indeed every person who freely devotes himself to God, and undertakes to fear him alone, so as to lay this restraint on himself, will find that no haven is more safe than his protection. But as the ungodly do not cease to provoke his anger by shameless transgression, he harasses their minds by continual uneasiness, and thus inflicts the most appropriate revenge for their careless indifference.