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F it weren't for Nahum 2:8 &
13, we might have a tough time figuring out what chapter 2 is all about. But,
based upon those verses we can tell that Nahum is speaking about the demise of
Nineveh. He uses what seems to me to be an intensely poetic style in this
chapter to describe the fall of Nineveh, but the result is plain enough. The
same thing that Assyria had done to Israel (Nahum 2:2) was going to be done to
Nineveh. And, just like Assyria won as a result of a providential purpose, so
also the fall of Nineveh would be the result of God's intervention. The
invading Babylonians (Nahum 2:4) and the flood of the Tigris river (Nahum 2:6)
were certainly not incidental. Nineveh had made God their enemy. They had owned
the truth previously (during the days of Jonah), but by the time Nahum came
around, they had forsaken it altogether. Just like Isaiah wrote to his
audience, "Truth is fallen in the
street, and equity cannot enter" (Isaiah 59:14). Nineveh was doomed
because Nineveh was wicked.
The only hope for Nineveh lay in
their humble acceptance of the absolute authority and exclusivity of the one
true God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. At one point, He had been the God of
Nineveh too (see Jonah 3:10). But their rejection of Him and of His truth was
complete. Remember, "Blessed is the
nation whose God is the LORD..." (Psalm 33:12, 18 & 19), and, "Righteousness exalts a nation: but sin
is a reproach to any people" (Proverbs 14:34). That should make us consider the condition of
our own nation.
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