Hidden Prophets of the Bible by Michael Williams

Author:Michael Williams [Williams, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: REL006730 Religion / Biblical Studies / Prophets
Publisher: David C Cook

WHY NAHUM SHOULD MATTER TO YOU

The book of Nahum can understandably make us uncomfortable. We don’t like to hear about judgment, and Nahum proclaims almost uninterrupted judgment! But we can’t appreciate the full impact of Nahum’s message until we realize that the judgment he relentlessly describes is that which we also deserve.

As we read Nahum, we can eventually be lured into adding our “Amen!” to the judgment decreed for such a wicked people. But then we remember that all of us at one time were like the people of Nineveh—enemies of God and deserving his wrath (Ephesians 2:3). And reading about the divine judgment that will surely come against such enemies of God enables us to understand and appreciate more fully what Jesus has delivered us from. After all, who needs to be delivered if there is nothing to be delivered from? We not only realize what we’ve been delivered from, but we also see what Jesus was not delivered from. God’s judgment against his enemies is just, and Jesus—the only One who deserved to have it “pass over” or bypass him—was willing to have the incomprehensible enormity of it fully “pass over” or rain down upon him. What we deserved, he experienced. What he deserved, we experience. We are given access into the refuge of God’s love and care. We no longer have to fear God’s judgment.

But when we trust in the Lord, we are still subject to mistreatment by those who oppose God and his people. How should we deal with these modern-day “Assyrians,” those who marginalize, oppress, and murder God’s people? The biblical answer directs our focus in two directions—one on ourselves and one on our enemies.

Regarding ourselves, the New Testament echoes the reassurance provided by the book of Nahum: There will be a day when we will be delivered from the presence and power of sin, just as we have already been delivered from the penalty of sin. “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain” (Revelation 21:4), because those who cause it will be removed. Several hundred years after Nahum, the apostle Paul encourages similarly beleaguered believers with a related message: “God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled … This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels” (2 Thessalonians 1:6–7).

A second biblical answer to the question of how we should deal with contemporary “Assyrians” is even more profound. It directs our attention not to ourselves and our situation but to our oppressors and their situation. Perhaps disappointingly for us, God does not direct us to strike back at them. But he does direct us to participate with him in retaliatory redemption. In one sense, we are to continue to pray for their destruction. It is all right for us to pray for them to cease to exist! But our prayer should be that they cease to exist by becoming new creations through faith in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17).

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