Isaiah 10

God always had a plan for the Jewish people -- He would reveal himself to them and they would spread that knowledge to the rest of the world. But he didn’t reveal how that plan would actually work until he spoke through Isaiah.

Isaiah made prophecies that were fulfilled by Jesus more than 700 years later. The reason that it took so long is that a lot had to happen in between. The nations of Judah and Israel were no different than their neighbors in Isaiah’s time, worshipping other gods and ignoring God’s commands as if they had never heard them at all. They had to be punished and reshaped into something that God could actually use.

One of the most important parts of the Old Testament is the way that it shows God working through history. It wasn’t just Israel. Every country had a role to play. He raised up a tool that he would use against His own people — Assyria. The Assyrians were the most powerful military force the world had seen at the time. They conquered Israel and brought Judah to the brink of destruction, leaving the Jewish people no choice but to depend on God:

Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath. I send him against a godless nation, I dispatch him against a people who anger me, to seize loot and snatch plunder, and to trample them down like mud in the streets.  

 - Isaiah 10:5-6 

But the Assyrians had no concept of the Jewish God. They certainly didn’t believe in His power. So they looked at their military and political dominance and assumed that they were the ones responsible for it. They became proud and arrogant, believing their own myths because they were blind to the way the world actually worked. The same thing happens to any successful person or group of people who don't believe in God.

Faith in a higher power is the only thing that can keep people humble. The king of Assyria had nearly unlimited power. No country could stand in his way. No army could defeat him. Anything that he wanted, he could have. Why wouldn’t he think that he was a god?

When the Lord finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, “I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes.”  

For he says: “By the strength of my hand I have done this, and by my wisdom, because I have understanding. I removed the boundaries of nations, I plundered their treasures; like a mighty one I subdued their kings.”  

 - Isaiah 10:12-13 

Modern people who lack faith fall into the same trap. They take credit for their own success and develop an inflated opinion of themselves. There’s only one possible outcome once you start down that path. Their pride blinds them and they bite off more than you can chew.

Assyria was one of the first great empires in world history. But it certainly wasn’t the last. The same pattern repeats itself over and over — The more powerful they become, the more they lose any sense that there are limits to their power.

I’ve seen that first hand as an American citizen. Most US elections are portrayed as a battle of good and evil. The only question is which side is which. What gets lost are the underlying assumptions that both sides agree on. Every presidential candidate, whether Republican or Democrat, says that the US is the greatest and most powerful country in human history.

photo: charles roderick

Maybe we are. But having that type of power should worry everyone. It’s not something to be proud of.

This is how Ezekiel, another Old Testament prophet who lived about 120 years after Isaiah, described Assyria:

Consider Assyria, once a cedar in Lebanon, with beautiful branches overshadowing the forest; it towered on high, its tops above the thick foliage. So it towered higher above all the trees of the field; its boughs increased and its branches grew long, spreading because of abundant waters. All the birds of the sky nested in its boughs; all the animals of the wild gave birth to its branches; all the great nations lived in its shade.  

- Ezekiel 29:3-7 

Does this not sound like America? The US has the biggest economy and military in the world. The amount of money the US spends on its military compared to every other country is staggering:

There are a couple of temptations when you have this much power. The obvious one is that there is no one who can prevent you from imposing your will on the world stage. The only restraints you have are the ones you put on yourself.

The more subtle temptation is believing that your power is a sign of your superior virtue and wisdom. After all, if you are that successful, you must be doing something right.

Americans know the second temptation well. All you have to do is look back at the invasion of Iraq. The US didn’t credit God as the source of our prosperity. We looked at our economic and military power and figured that it came because we had a superior form of government. The natural conclusion is that we needed to spread that government to the rest of the world. So we invaded another country to free them, which hasn’t exactly turned out well over the last 15 years.

There aren’t many situations where a country operating on Biblical principles should be invading anyone. There’s nothing in the Bible about how Christian countries need to rule the world. If anything, it’s the opposite. The only mandate that Jesus gave his disciples was to go make more disciples. But they were supposed to do that on a personal level, not a political one. The idea was that they would create ministries like Jesus - traveling the world, investing in a few people at a time, and planting local churches wherever they went.

Both Peter (1 Peter 2:13-17) and Paul (Romans 13:1-7) urged their followers to stay out of politics. They didn’t want to destabilize governments. Their goal was to add more people to the church, not gain political power.

Nor was Israel ever supposed to be an empire in the Old Testament. Their political boundaries were firmly established. They were supposed to be a model for the world, not conquer it.

That was the lesson that Ezekiel drew from the collapse of the Assyrian Empire, which happened between Isaiah’s time and his own:

Therefore no other trees by the waters are ever to tower proudly on high, lifting their tops above the thick foliage. No other trees so well-watered are ever to reach such a height; they are all destined for death, for the earth below, among mortals who go down to the realm of the dead.

- Ezekiel 29:14 

There are a lot of warnings about the dangers of empires and nations who think too highly of themselves in the Old Testament. It always ends the same way.

It all comes back to first principles and how you view your place in the world. There are two ways to look at it. You can believe you are responsible for your own success. Or you can accept that God is ultimately in charge of your life.

One way leads to pride. The other leads to humility. Every person and country has to decide for themselves which path to follow.

Does the ax raise itself above the person who swings it, or the saw boast against the one who uses it? As if a rod were to wield the person who lifts it up, or a club brandish one who is not wood!  

 - Isaiah 10:14