The Comfort of Divine Retribution

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Isaiah 47 NKJV

1 “Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; Sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans! For you shall no more be called Tender and delicate. 2 Take the millstones and grind meal. Remove your veil, Take off the skirt, Uncover the thigh, Pass through the rivers. 3 Your nakedness shall be uncovered, Yes, your shame will be seen; I will take vengeance, And I will not arbitrate with a man.” 4 As for our Redeemer, the Lord of hosts is His name, The Holy One of Israel. 5 “Sit in silence, and go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans; For you shall no longer be called The Lady of Kingdoms. 6 I was angry with My people; I have profaned My inheritance, And given them into your hand. You showed them no mercy; On the elderly you laid your yoke very heavily. 7 And you said, ‘I shall be a lady forever,’ So that you did not take these things to heart, Nor remember the latter end of them. 8 “Therefore hear this now, you who are given to pleasures, Who dwell securely, Who say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me; I shall not sit as a widow, Nor shall I know the loss of children’; 9 But these two things shall come to you In a moment, in one day: The loss of children, and widowhood. They shall come upon you in their fullness Because of the multitude of your sorceries, For the great abundance of your enchantments. 10 “For you have trusted in your wickedness; You have said, ‘No one sees me’; Your wisdom and your knowledge have warped you; And you have said in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’ 11 Therefore evil shall come upon you; You shall not know from where it arises. And trouble shall fall upon you; You will not be able to put it off. And desolation shall come upon you suddenly, Which you shall not know. 12 “Stand now with your enchantments And the multitude of your sorceries, In which you have labored from your youth— Perhaps you will be able to profit, Perhaps you will prevail. 13 You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels; Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, And the monthly prognosticators Stand up and save you From what shall come upon you. 14 Behold, they shall be as stubble, The fire shall burn them; They shall not deliver themselves From the power of the flame; It shall not be a coal to be warmed by, Nor a fire to sit before! 15 Thus shall they be to you With whom you have labored, Your merchants from your youth; They shall wander each one to his quarter. No one shall save you.

The assumption of entitlement

I shall continue forever

I have the right to rule

Moral consequences do not apply to me.

Everyone else must obey

Everyone else must be moral

Everyone else must defer to me.

Entitlement is what happens when the natural lust for power is fulfilled.

God grants us power in order to bless. To protect, to serve, to provide.

But without any checks, power quickly morphs into entitlement. That which was meant for good becomes a means of death.

The Cruelty of Entitlement

God gave Babylon the power to execute judgment on his people. But they had no restraint.

they said in their heart - “I am, and there is none like me”

The cry of every narcissist. That word is greatly overused. But I am not speaking clinically, but spiritually.

The entitled man never sees the rights, the loves, the fears, the wants, the longings of another heart. He eventually only sees other people as the means to get what he wants.

The Heidelberg Catechism states that we are prone by nature to hate God and our neighbor.

This is our natural state, apart from the new life of the Holy Spirit.

The entitled person is one whose lust has become hardened, his restraint is gone, and God has given him over.

His hatred of God and his neighbor is complete. It is a sign of God’s just judgment.

Since he can never get what he desires - he can never escape death, pain, loss, desire for intimacy and fear - he demands more and more, blames everyone around him, and lusts for more and more control.

Proverbs 30:13–17 NKJV

13 There is a generation—oh, how lofty are their eyes! And their eyelids are lifted up. 14 There is a generation whose teeth are like swords, And whose fangs are like knives, To devour the poor from off the earth, And the needy from among men. 15 The leech has two daughters— Give and Give! There are three things that are never satisfied, Four never say, “Enough!”: 16 The grave, The barren womb, The earth that is not satisfied with water— And the fire never says, “Enough!” 17 The eye that mocks his father, And scorns obedience to his mother, The ravens of the valley will pick it out, And the young eagles will eat it.

This is not given to us to cause us to doubt our salvation, or God’s love for us.

These passages are given to give us the comfort of knowing that we aren’t crazy, we aren’t who the entitled person says we are.

God sees. God knows. And God’s retributive justice is always perfect.

Babylon’s cruelty and God’s retribution

Their harshness is legendary. They stripped the captives naked, drove them without mercy, on foot, for thousands of miles, enslaved them.

They mocked them, beat them and laughed at their pain and misery.

And God pays back everything that they did to his people.

He strips them and leaves them powerless - open to exploitation, like a virgin.

No throne

No protection

enslaved - grinding their own meal (Dabney complaining that he had to do domestic chores)

Into exile themselves - walking naked across streams and rivers, no veil (the greatest shame)

And God will not negotiate with them.

The reason for their power

They were given power to execute God’s judgment.

But they thought that they were God themselves.

They had no mercy, they had no pity, they forgot that they also were human beings, dependent entirely upon God for life and breath and everything.

And you said, “No one sees. No one cares. I do as I please and will continue forever.”

Therefore, God says this:

Judgment

They will be finished in a moment.

God gave them wisdom and knowledge and wealth and power, and they used it to exploit, destroy, crush and oppress. They were warped into thinking that they WERE gods.

(American history - the “providences” - we are wealthy landowners, therefore we are as gods in the church, and enslaving others is our god-given right)

And evil comes suddenly because God is not mocked.

Inevitable judgment

No one can take them from the hand of God

When God comes in judgment, who will protect them?

Babylon used astrology, sorcery and their religion to bolster their own entitlement and enslave their neighbors.

God allowed it for his own purposes.

But now judgment is coming.

Everything that they depended upon for their continued prosperity will fall.

God will make the sorcerers foolish.

The dominionism of the 70s and 80s depended upon creating a whole army of Christian Youth, ready to enact God’s laws.

But those youth abandoned the church, and the dominionists became more and more desperate.

That which Babylon depends upon is turned into judgment against her.

History

Cyprus conquers Babylon, but that was just a partial fulfillment.

Alexander conquers again, and sets his capital north - in Seleucis. The elite from Babylon are exiled and the city gradually descends into ruins.

Today, there is much mystery. The site was found in 1899, but there is controversy. Only bits and pieces remain.

Retributive justice.

The exact equal is heaped upon the heads of God’s enemies. God’s judgment is never, ever too severe or too lenient. It is exactly equal.

Ezekiel 18 NKJV

1 The word of the Lord came to me again, saying, 2 “What do you mean when you use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, And the children’s teeth are set on edge’? 3 “As I live,” says the Lord God, “you shall no longer use this proverb in Israel. 4 “Behold, all souls are Mine; The soul of the father As well as the soul of the son is Mine; The soul who sins shall die. 5 But if a man is just And does what is lawful and right; 6 If he has not eaten on the mountains, Nor lifted up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, Nor defiled his neighbor’s wife, Nor approached a woman during her impurity; 7 If he has not oppressed anyone, But has restored to the debtor his pledge; Has robbed no one by violence, But has given his bread to the hungry And covered the naked with clothing; 8 If he has not exacted usury Nor taken any increase, But has withdrawn his hand from iniquity And executed true judgment between man and man; 9 If he has walked in My statutes— And kept My judgments faithfully— He is just; He shall surely live!” Says the Lord God. 10 “If he begets a son who is a robber Or a shedder of blood, Who does any of these things 11 And does none of those duties, But has eaten on the mountains Or defiled his neighbor’s wife; 12 If he has oppressed the poor and needy, Robbed by violence, Not restored the pledge, Lifted his eyes to the idols, Or committed abomination; 13 If he has exacted usury Or taken increase— Shall he then live? He shall not live! If he has done any of these abominations, He shall surely die; His blood shall be upon him. 14 “If, however, he begets a son Who sees all the sins which his father has done, And considers but does not do likewise; 15 Who has not eaten on the mountains, Nor lifted his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, Nor defiled his neighbor’s wife; 16 Has not oppressed anyone, Nor withheld a pledge, Nor robbed by violence, But has given his bread to the hungry And covered the naked with clothing; 17 Who has withdrawn his hand from the poor And not received usury or increase, But has executed My judgments And walked in My statutes He shall not die for the iniquity of his father; He shall surely live! 18 “As for his father, Because he cruelly oppressed, Robbed his brother by violence, And did what is not good among his people, Behold, he shall die for his iniquity. 19 “Yet you say, ‘Why should the son not bear the guilt of the father?’ Because the son has done what is lawful and right, and has kept all My statutes and observed them, he shall surely live. 20 The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. 21 “But if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all My statutes, and does what is lawful and right, he shall surely live; he shall not die. 22 None of the transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him; because of the righteousness which he has done, he shall live. 23 Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?” says the Lord God, “and not that he should turn from his ways and live? 24 “But when a righteous man turns away from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and does according to all the abominations that the wicked man does, shall he live? All the righteousness which he has done shall not be remembered; because of the unfaithfulness of which he is guilty and the sin which he has committed, because of them he shall die. 25 “Yet you say, ‘The way of the Lord is not fair.’ Hear now, O house of Israel, is it not My way which is fair, and your ways which are not fair? 26 When a righteous man turns away from his righteousness, commits iniquity, and dies in it, it is because of the iniquity which he has done that he dies. 27 Again, when a wicked man turns away from the wickedness which he committed, and does what is lawful and right, he preserves himself alive. 28 Because he considers and turns away from all the transgressions which he committed, he shall surely live; he shall not die. 29 Yet the house of Israel says, ‘The way of the Lord is not fair.’ O house of Israel, is it not My ways which are fair, and your ways which are not fair? 30 “Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways,” says the Lord God. “Repent, and turn from all your transgressions, so that iniquity will not be your ruin. 31 Cast away from you all the transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why should you die, O house of Israel? 32 For I have no pleasure in the death of one who dies,” says the Lord God. “Therefore turn and live!”

God’s judgment is always perfect.

These passages have been used to terrify children and keep the powerful in power. But these are not given in order to terrify Babylon into submission. God has already given them over.

It isn’t the oppressed and the burdened and the child and the poor that are addressed in this passage.

It is Babylon. The rich, entitled, cruel one who has abandon all sense of love for the humanity of others.

This passage is given to the oppressed.

When the entitled one prospers and seems to be immune to prosecution, when the wicked escape over and over, when they hurt and destroy with impunity, the soul can be crushed.

Consider Psalm 73

Psalm 73 NKJV

A Psalm of Asaph. 1 Truly God is good to Israel, To such as are pure in heart. 2 But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled; My steps had nearly slipped. 3 For I was envious of the boastful, When I saw the prosperity of the wicked. 4 For there are no pangs in their death, But their strength is firm. 5 They are not in trouble as other men, Nor are they plagued like other men. 6 Therefore pride serves as their necklace; Violence covers them like a garment. 7 Their eyes bulge with abundance; They have more than heart could wish. 8 They scoff and speak wickedly concerning oppression; They speak loftily. 9 They set their mouth against the heavens, And their tongue walks through the earth. 10 Therefore his people return here, And waters of a full cup are drained by them. 11 And they say, “How does God know? And is there knowledge in the Most High?” 12 Behold, these are the ungodly, Who are always at ease; They increase in riches. 13 Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain, And washed my hands in innocence. 14 For all day long I have been plagued, And chastened every morning. 15 If I had said, “I will speak thus,” Behold, I would have been untrue to the generation of Your children. 16 When I thought how to understand this, It was too painful for me— 17 Until I went into the sanctuary of God; Then I understood their end. 18 Surely You set them in slippery places; You cast them down to destruction. 19 Oh, how they are brought to desolation, as in a moment! They are utterly consumed with terrors. 20 As a dream when one awakes, So, Lord, when You awake, You shall despise their image. 21 Thus my heart was grieved, And I was vexed in my mind. 22 I was so foolish and ignorant; I was like a beast before You. 23 Nevertheless I am continually with You; You hold me by my right hand. 24 You will guide me with Your counsel, And afterward receive me to glory. 25 Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. 26 My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. 27 For indeed, those who are far from You shall perish; You have destroyed all those who desert You for harlotry. 28 But it is good for me to draw near to God; I have put my trust in the Lord God, That I may declare all Your works.