Nahum: When Gods Wrath is Full

Introduction

open to Nahum 3

Edom and Ninivah rebellion and repentance But....

This message we will look at today is addressed again to Ninivah.

Nahum comes 60 to 80 years after Jonah,

So the people that head Jonah are mostly gone.

God uses the ends and the means

We see something similar happening in this nation.

The generation he saw the terrible World War II

They saw the depression

There is a semblance of prosperity.

This will give you a little picture of what happened in Ninivah.

Please Stand for the Reading of God’s Word

Nahum 3:1–19 ESV

1 Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and plunder— no end to the prey! 2 The crack of the whip, and rumble of the wheel, galloping horse and bounding chariot! 3 Horsemen charging, flashing sword and glittering spear, hosts of slain, heaps of corpses, dead bodies without end— they stumble over the bodies! 4 And all for the countless whorings of the prostitute, graceful and of deadly charms, who betrays nations with her whorings, and peoples with her charms. 5 Behold, I am against you, declares the Lord of hosts, and will lift up your skirts over your face; and I will make nations look at your nakedness and kingdoms at your shame. 6 I will throw filth at you and treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle. 7 And all who look at you will shrink from you and say, “Wasted is Nineveh; who will grieve for her?” Where shall I seek comforters for you? 8 Are you better than Thebes that sat by the Nile, with water around her, her rampart a sea, and water her wall? 9 Cush was her strength; Egypt too, and that without limit; Put and the Libyans were her helpers. 10 Yet she became an exile; she went into captivity; her infants were dashed in pieces at the head of every street; for her honored men lots were cast, and all her great men were bound in chains. 11 You also will be drunken; you will go into hiding; you will seek a refuge from the enemy. 12 All your fortresses are like fig trees with first-ripe figs— if shaken they fall into the mouth of the eater. 13 Behold, your troops are women in your midst. The gates of your land are wide open to your enemies; fire has devoured your bars. 14 Draw water for the siege; strengthen your forts; go into the clay; tread the mortar; take hold of the brick mold! 15 There will the fire devour you; the sword will cut you off. It will devour you like the locust. Multiply yourselves like the locust; multiply like the grasshopper! 16 You increased your merchants more than the stars of the heavens. The locust spreads its wings and flies away. 17 Your princes are like grasshoppers, your scribes like clouds of locusts settling on the fences in a day of cold— when the sun rises, they fly away; no one knows where they are. 18 Your shepherds are asleep, O king of Assyria; your nobles slumber. Your people are scattered on the mountains with none to gather them. 19 There is no easing your hurt; your wound is grievous. All who hear the news about you clap their hands over you. For upon whom has not come your unceasing evil?

May God Bless the Reading of His Holy, Infallible, and Sufficient Word

Lets Pray

Transition

The Lord blessed Ninavah with repentance but that repentance has not been lasting. Here it is 60 years later and the Lord has sent another messenger. Lets look at verse 1-7

Body

The Bloody City

Nahum 3:1–7 (ESV)

1 Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and plunder— no end to the prey! 2 The crack of the whip, and rumble of the wheel, galloping horse and bounding chariot! 3 Horsemen charging, flashing sword and glittering spear, hosts of slain, heaps of corpses, dead bodies without end— they stumble over the bodies! 4 And all for the countless whorings of the prostitute, graceful and of deadly charms, who betrays nations with her whorings, and peoples with her charms. 5 Behold, I am against you, declares the Lord of hosts, and will lift up your skirts over your face; and I will make nations look at your nakedness and kingdoms at your shame. 6 I will throw filth at you and treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle. 7 And all who look at you will shrink from you and say, “Wasted is Nineveh; who will grieve for her?” Where shall I seek comforters for you?

bloody city is Ninavah.

Woe, is pronounced.

“they stumble over the bodies”

I want to be clear on this point because there is so many lies and confusions.

Jesus is God. Jesus is Yhwh. There is no separation between the God that spoke these words and the God who redeemed his elect.

There is no separation between the God who ordered the destruction of every Canaanite man woman and child and the God who was a verging born baby.

prostitute, means?

So when verse 5 says “Behold, I am against you, declares the Lord of hosts”

Transition

And when they hear they think, we cannot be undone. Lets look at verse 6-16

Wickedness Cannot be Compared

Nahum 3:8–16 (ESV)

8 Are you better than Thebes that sat by the Nile, with water around her, her rampart a sea, and water her wall? 9 Cush was her strength; Egypt too, and that without limit; Put and the Libyans were her helpers. 10 Yet she became an exile; she went into captivity; her infants were dashed in pieces at the head of every street; for her honored men lots were cast, and all her great men were bound in chains. 11 You also will be drunken; you will go into hiding; you will seek a refuge from the enemy. 12 All your fortresses are like fig trees with first-ripe figs— if shaken they fall into the mouth of the eater. 13 Behold, your troops are women in your midst. The gates of your land are wide open to your enemies; fire has devoured your bars. 14 Draw water for the siege; strengthen your forts; go into the clay; tread the mortar; take hold of the brick mold! 15 There will the fire devour you; the sword will cut you off. It will devour you like the locust. Multiply yourselves like the locust; multiply like the grasshopper! 16 You increased your merchants more than the stars of the heavens. The locust spreads its wings and flies away.

“Thebes” became the city know as Alexandria

Calvin Comments here, “Nahum, after having adduced the example of Alexandria, now shows that nothing would be able to resist God, so that he should not deal with Nineveh in the same manner; and he declares that this would be the case, Thou also, he says, shalt be inebriated.”

Assyria replaced Egypt as a world power.

When God points Egypt, he is saying don't relay on being a world power. It didn't save Egypt.

God I am not as bad as them will not work.

Whining in their hearts, we cannot be over thrown.

This has happen to every power that has ever exist.

Egypt,

Assyria

Babylon

Medo-Persia

Greece

Rome

All gone

There are no powers that will stand against him.

Does it seem that evil is winning,

Sexualization of children

Murder of children in the womb

The mutilation of Children

The attack on the family

Secularization of our world.

None! of these power that have set themselves up against King Jesus will stand.

CHAPTER 32 p1 “God has appointed a day wherein he will judge the world in righteousness, by Jesus Christ; to whom all power and judgment is given of the Father; in which day, not only the apostate angels shall be judged, but likewise all persons that have p 2494 lived upon the earth shall appear before the tribunal of Christ, to give an account of their thoughts, words, and deeds, and to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether good or evil.”[2]

Transition

Self confidence is a low view of God, his power and his holiness. Look to verse 17-19

Creation will Praise the Just Creator

Nahum 3:17–19 ESV

17 Your princes are like grasshoppers, your scribes like clouds of locusts settling on the fences in a day of cold— when the sun rises, they fly away; no one knows where they are. 18 Your shepherds are asleep, O king of Assyria; your nobles slumber. Your people are scattered on the mountains with none to gather them. 19 There is no easing your hurt; your wound is grievous. All who hear the news about you clap their hands over you. For upon whom has not come your unceasing evil?

Lets focus in on verse 19.

The wickedness of Assyria was already renown.

Remember verse 1 what a bloody city it was.

All of creation will celibate the sentencing of the reprobated to hell.

We don’t think like this because we do not understand the depth of sin and the holiness of God.

Conclusion

So we cannot escape the cross, we must cling to it know that without it, we are those that are rightly condemned

Every condemned creature will pronounce judgment in themselves.

For what is it to say Christ is Lord.

The scriptures do not lie, every knee will bow every tong will confess that his is Lord and they to their own shame.

Pray pothers and sisters that the Lord continue to grant you repentance to you until that day, because otherwise, like Ninivah, you are toast, pun intended.

Benediction

Numbers 6:24–26 ESV

24 The Lord bless you and keep you; 25 the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; 26 the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.

References

[1] John Calvin and John Owen, Commentaries on the Twelve Minor Prophets, vol. 3 (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 494.

[1] R. C. Sproul, ed., The Reformation Study Bible: English Standard Version (2015 Edition) (Orlando, FL: Reformation Trust, 2015), 2493–2494.

Bibliography

Calvin, John, and John Owen. Commentaries on the Twelve Minor Prophets. Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010.

Sproul, R. C., ed. The Reformation Study Bible: English Standard Version (2015 Edition). Orlando, FL: Reformation Trust, 2015.