Study – Grow – Know

Prophecies of Isaiah, Pt 6

August 22, 2017 at 8:24 AM 2 comments

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Hillah, Iraq (May, 29th 2003) — A U.S. Marine Corps Humvee vehicle drives down a road at the foot of Saddam Hussein’s former Summer palace with ruins of ancient Babylon in the background. Operation Iraqi Freedom is the multi-national coalition effort to liberate the Iraqi people, eliminate Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and end the regime of Saddam Hussein. U.S. Navy photo by Photographer’s Mate 1st Class Arlo K. Abrahamson. (RELEASED)

In our previous article in this series – Part 5 – we highlighted aspects of Isaiah 6. There, we dealt with the abject horror Isaiah himself experienced as he stood in God’s Presence. Because of that acute awareness of his own corruption he cried out that he was a man of unclean lips and the people he dwelt among were also a people who suffered from the same sinfulness (Isaiah 6:5).

In this article we’re going to move ahead a few chapters to parts of Isaiah 13 and 14. In these sections, God foretells the future – what He plans to do – regarding the Babylonian Empire. If one simply reads Scripture and takes it in its most plain, ordinary sense, it is clear proof that God exists and that He is sovereign over all of humanity’s affairs. He guides the nations, with a special view toward Israel, and will ultimately bring things to His predetermined end.

Several decades ago, so-called “higher criticism” came into vogue. It was (and remains), a determined effort to negate the validity of Scripture. This is often done by pointing to the prophetic areas of the Bible and casting doubt and aspersions on the human authors of those sections. For instance, there is the belief within higher critic circles that there were at least two Isaiahs who wrote Isaiah. Critics have gone to great lengths to put forth their hypothesis, which they hope reduces God’s Word to little more than a history book of facts written by people not looking forward to those events, but written instead by people looking back at the events after they happened. This would mean then that the human authors were lying; attempting to give the perspective of living before many of the foretold events occurred when in actuality, according to the higher critics, these human authors lived after the events.

This same “critical” technique is applied to parts of the Pentateuch, Daniel, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and other books. In essence, this belief tends to indirectly call at God as a liar or at least Someone who pulls the wool over our eyes. When all is said and done, however; the truth is that these higher critics are doing their best to remove God Himself from the equation by making it appear as though many of the individual books in Scripture were written by humans that highly exaggerated their position and God’s purpose. The end result is that since the authors wrote about events that had already occurred, God isn’t even in the equation to begin with, therefore, the Bible itself is of no real consequence to humanity except for possibly its prose and historical facts. In short, for higher critics, there is no need for God and He probably doesn’t even exist anyway.

I’ve run into this type of belief repeatedly whether it has to do with what I’ve just explained or in the way the Canon of Scripture came together over the centuries. I’ve run into many who believe that parts of the Apocrypha or some of the writings by unknown authors should have also been part of the Canon but since things were decided by “men” things went seriously askew. The mistake both of these groups make in my opinion, is that they have an extremely shortsighted and erroneous view of God and His sovereignty.

Either God is above all things – everything He created – or He isn’t. Either God has the ability to put His plans into motion even using sinful man’s willful disobedience to accomplish it, or He doesn’t have that ability. He cannot have “a bit” of that ability. God is either fully sovereign or He is not at all sovereign. God cannot be sovereign “to a degree.” It is all or nothing.

This is why I enjoy reading the prophets like Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Jeremiah or others. They speak largely from before prophesied events were to occur. They spoke well before the events they prophesied occurred and in numerous cases, some of the prophesied events have not occurred yet throughout all of human history. This means that these events are still yet future. Isaiah 11 is a case in point. There, we learned that there is a coming day when all the nations would look to Israel for counsel. That day has never been in the past at all. We look for it to be fulfilled still, in God’s time.

In Isaiah 13 and 14, we read of events foretold about Babylon. Isaiah 13:1 begins with the words, “The burden of Babylon…” (KJV). The whole chapter is unmistakably about Babylon. Babylon, led by Nebuchadnezzar, was used by God as the arm of His discipline against Israel and other nations. After Nebuchadnezzar died and his grandson, Belshazzar, blasphemed God by taking the holy vessels removed from Jerusalem’s temple by Nebuchadnezzar (and placed safely in with his treasury), and using them to drink out of at a party of 1,000 (Daniel 5). God reacted and removed the kingdom from Belshazzar by the power of the Medes.

In Isaiah 13:17, Isaiah foretells of this situation.

Behold, I will stir up the Medes against [Babylon], which shall not regard silver; and as for gold, they shall not delight in it. (KJV)

God gets things done and in this case, he moved Isaiah to prophecy regarding Babylon and its demise by the Medes. It is believed that Isaiah prophesied this upcoming historical fact roughly 150 years before it occurred. The actual event took place right around 539 BC. Higher critics say that another “Isaiah” came along after the fact and wrote about the event after either seeing it or hearing about it. The testimony of Scripture (including the New Testament) makes no indication that there might have been more than one Isaiah. In fact, John quotes several places of Isaiah in his same Gospel and attributes both to the same Isaiah (John 12:37–41).

Isaiah 13:19 states very clearly that Babylon, once destroyed, will be no more.

And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. (KJV)

Of course, this is testament to the fact that God controls the course of history. His purposes and only His purposes will prevail. Since Babylon was destroyed, it has never risen again and won’t as a separate entity or empire.

In Isaiah 13:19, the prophet said Babylon would be overthrown, permanently. History confirms that when Cyrus conquered Babylon in 539 BC, it never again rose to power as an empire. Before the time of Cyrus, however, Babylon had been defeated by the Assyrian Empire but was able to recover and later conquer the Assyrian Empire. However, like Isaiah prophesied 2700 years ago, the Babylonian Empire never recovered from Cyrus’ conquest.

Isaiah 14:22-23 paints a very clear picture of what Babylon will become after the Lord finishes dealing with that nation.

22 For I will rise up against them, saith the Lord of hosts, and cut off from Babylon the name, and remnant, and son, and nephew, saith the Lord.

23 I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water: and I will sweep it with the besom of destruction, saith the Lord of hosts. (KJV)

In essence, Babylon will become nothing. God will thoroughly destroy it. Today, parts of Ancient Babylon have been uncovered through archaeological digs. Attempts to reconstruct parts of Babylon continue but it will only be a tourist destination at best. Ancient Babylon is dead and even Saddam Hussein’s attempts to bring it back to life failed miserably.

Isaiah is a prophet who has much to say about the future of Israel and the future of many nations. I cannot imagine being a prophet of God during Old Testament times. Rarely did the people of Israel listen to God’s complaints or concerns. Too often, they disbelieved, harassed, or killed those prophets because they said things they didn’t want to hear. I don’t know if they had “paid” protesters back then, but it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that they did because so much of the Bible condemns Israel and other nations for their harm to the poor and defenseless and the fact that the leaders were always so willing to take bribes.

We know that during Jesus’ time, just days prior to His crucifixion, people were paid off to lie about Jesus (Matthew 26:59), or His resurrection (Matthew 28:11-15). Every generation has people who are willing to sell themselves for financial reward. Let’s not forget Judas, who betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

Like today’s paid protesters of AntiFa, too many people are willing to lie, cheat, steal, or assault for a price. It’s part of the fallen human condition that makes us susceptible to placing ourselves first, even in front of the truth.

Isaiah has a great deal to say about Israel and other nations. His prophecies, uttered by God’s power and insight, lead us to the only conclusion that’s possible – that God is sovereign, that He holds the nations in the palm of His hand, and all history – past and future – will perfectly coincide with His purposes and goals.

Entry filed under: Atheism and religion, christianity, Cultural Marxism, Emotional virtue, eternity, israel, Judaism, Political Correctness, Politically Correct, Politics, Religious - Christian - End Times, Religious - Christian - Prophecy, Religious - Christian - Theology, salvation. Tags: babylon, babylonian empire, balshazzar, cyrus, isaiah, nebuchadnezzar, prophet isaiah, the medes.