Let's open our Bibles to the
book of Nahum, chapter 2. Nahum, chapter 2. And I'm confident that you can
find Nahum now with no problem. No problem at all. But Nahum. Three chapters. This is really
an amazing book. I want to show you something
tonight that that just struck me upon studying this passage
in chapter two, actually beginning with the last verse of chapter
one. The title of the message this evening is taken from verse
two of chapter two. It's the Excellency of Jacob
and Israel. The Excellency of Jacob and Israel. Now chapter two describes the
fall of Nineveh. that great, worldly, idolatrous
city of Nineveh, the capital of the wicked, ruthless, cruel
Assyrian Empire that destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel
and threatened the southern kingdom of Judah so often. And this describes
the fall of that city. Remember, this is the same city
that Jonah preached to a hundred years before. the reluctant prophet
who had to be made to go to Nineveh. And one of the reasons, there
are several reasons Jonah was so reluctant to go. One of them
was that this was a Gentile city, but another reason is because
it was known for its cruelty, especially towards the people
of God, the people of Israel. And Jonah just didn't want to
go there, but God got him there. We read and studied that. He
preached there and The king and the majority, or if not all of
the city, repented. And God spared Nineveh. That
was a hundred years before Nahum. But in that time period of a
hundred years, up until this time of Nahum, the city reverted. The next generation, you might
say, reverted back to their idolatry and their cruelty and their ruthlessness
and their attacks upon the northern kingdom and upon the southern
kingdom. And so, God, through Nahum, preaching to the people
of Israel and Judah, He offered some comfort, some encouragement
by showing that He would be bringing justice upon this enemy, this
great enemy. God would take care of this enemy
of Nineveh. and Assyria. And so chapter 2
and actually chapter 3 also describes the destruction of Nineveh. Chapter
3 mainly gives the justice of it, that God is right to do so. But it actually begins up in
verse 15. In fact, this is kind of a transitional verse between
the first part of chapter 1 and then chapter 2. But it says,
read verse 15 of chapter 1, it says, Behold upon the mountains
the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth
peace. And then he shows you who he's
talking to, O Judah, keep thy solemn feasts, perform thy vows. Now the solemn feasts are indicative
of the whole old covenant. Those feasts, do you remember
the feast days? It would include the Sabbath
days, it would include the ceremonies, all of those things that God
had given to Israel, to Judah, that were pictures and types
and prophecies of Christ and salvation by God's grace in Christ. And this is what God used providentially
to keep this nation together for a time. So he says, keep,
keep thy solemn feast. Hold on, feast upon these things.
Perform thy vows when you promise to obey God. And that's an indication
of faith in God. For the wicked shall no more
pass through thee, he is utterly cut off. And earlier he said,
you're not going to be afflicted anymore. Now what he's talking
about there, and somebody asked me about this last week, you
know, how could he say that Judah would be afflicted no more when
really, if you think about it, the rest of her history she was
afflicted, and of course the northern kingdom was utterly
destroyed. But even Judah was afflicted. I mean, her whole
history basically from the Babylonian captivity all the way up until
the time of Christ was one of affliction. She was under foreign
repression, under foreign governments. But what he means here is you're
not going to be any more afflicted by Assyria. This bunch here is
not going to afflict you anymore. This is it for them. God had
used this wicked nation as an instrument of His justice, but
no more. He's through with them. His long-suffering
with Assyria was now going to be through, and He said, I'm
going to destroy them. Well, it actually didn't take place
until a hundred years later after Nahum, but again, there's a picture
of God's long-suffering. But he says, Behold upon the
mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth
peace. Good tidings and peace. And that's twofold. These good
tidings and this peace that he's speaking of is twofold. First,
it's good tidings and peace for Judah in the destruction of a
great enemy, Nineveh, Assyria. That enemy's going to be gone.
But secondly, it's good tidings and peace in the restoration
of the excellency of Jacob and of Israel. Let's read verse 1
of chapter 2. He says, He that dasheth in pieces
is come up before thy face. And he says, Keep the munition,
watch the way, make thy loins strong, fortify thy power mightily. Now what he's talking to here,
he's talking about the judgment of God against Nineveh. God uses
means that he there ultimately is God, for it is he who is bringing
vengeance upon this nation. Vengeance belongs to God, not
to men. But he's telling Nineveh here,
prepare for battle. Get ready, it's coming. That's
what he's saying. And all your preparation is going
to be futile. Think about that. God's warning
them, in a sense, in this prophecy, even though Nahum is not speaking
to Nineveh personally, he's speaking to them as he preaches to Judah. And he's saying, get ready for
battle. Prepare, he says. Keep the munition. That means
arm yourself. You know, prepare, get your munitions. Watch the way, put your people
out to watch, to warn you what's coming. Make your loins strong,
that is, get set for battle, like a soldier ready to be attacked,
ready to defend. Fortify your power mightily.
In other words, bolster up all the power that you can bolster
up, but it's going to be futile. It's not going to work. Nahum
begins addressing this city in this way. and i you know i'm
not i'm not getting into grammar anything like this but he uses
a tense of the bird here this this whole thing here that that
it is that is prophetic and it's what he's doing here is he's
predicting is common in the script because he's predicting future
events as though they'd already happened these events for future
but he's talking about like it's a done deal how can we not because
this is god who brings to naught things that have not yet come
to pass, who brings to pass those things that are not yet done,
and brings to naught those things that are. You see, God's purposes
and God's prophecies are certain. They're not going to be thwarted
or hindered. What God says is going to be done. And these Assyrians,
they thought they were indestructible. They thought that they could
withstand any judgment and any attack. But God says, you're
going to be destroyed. And in essence, he says, I'm
going to bury you. Now, this happened, as I said,
a hundred years later, by the Medes and the Persians and the
Babylonians. They united to attack Nineveh
and Assyria, and they destroyed that city. So, they were the
ones, that he there in verse one, that's the disperser, that's
the one who scatters. In other words, he's going to
scatter this mighty, powerful, wealthy nation. like a bunch of ants. He's going
to scatter them out. And it's a lesson, and it's a
good lesson for all who imagine under a refuge of lies that they
can withstand the judgment of God. I see a picture here, or
an illustration rather, of people who are so confident in their
own strength, in their own power, in their own professions, in
their own goodness. And no matter what they do to
bolster themselves or to arm themselves or to withstand themselves,
the judgment of God is going to pass through. You know, Isaiah
spoke of it in Isaiah chapter 28 when he was speaking to Judah
and the princes and the nobles of Judah. He said, you've made
yourself a refuge, but it's a refuge of lies. But when the overflowing
scourge comes through, you're not going to stand. You think
you've made a covenant with death and a covenant with hell. It
would go something like this. I know when I die, I'm not going
to hell. I know when I die, I'm going
to be fine. You've made that covenant within
yourself, but it's a refuge of lies, just like Nineveh and all
their strength and all their wealth and all their supposed
glory. It's a refuge of lies, and that's
why we must have Christ for our salvation. That's why we must
have Christ for our forgiveness and for our justification before
God, because God is going to judge the world in righteousness
by Him, that man whom He hath ordained, and that He hath given
assurance unto all men, and that He hath raised Him from the dead.
And if our refuge at that time is not Christ and Him crucified
and risen again, if our refuge at that time is not His blood,
His precious incorruptible blood for all the forgiveness of all
our sins, if our refuge is not His righteousness accounted to
us, Before a holy God, then where will we be? We'll be no better
off than Nineveh. Trying to arm ourselves with
our religion, our experiences, our professions. Whatever it
is, it will not work. And that's what he's showing
here. There's no way to withstand the wrath of God except through
Christ. No way. understand what he's
talking about here look at verse two he says for the Lord hath
turned away the excellency of Jacob as the excellency of Israel
for the empty ears have emptied them out and marred their vine
branches now what that literally says is this it sounds like he's
turning away the exit but what he's doing he's turning back
to them And what he's saying here is literally, for the Lord
is restoring the excellency of Jacob, an excellency they'd lost,
an excellency that Israel lost. What is that excellency? Well,
it means majesty. Some translations translate it
pride, the pride of Jacob. He's restored the pride of Jacob.
Others may say the glory of Jacob and the glory of Israel. The
Lord has restored it. That's what the verse literally
says. Four, he says, those who have plundered her have emptied
them out and marred their vine branches. You see, Christ spoke
of himself as the vine and where the branches. Sometimes Israel
as a nation was spoken of as the vine, God's vineyard, where
he raised his fruit. What he's talking about here
is there's an excellency, there's a glory here, that has been missing
for a while. And what is this excellency?
What is this glory? Well, you know Jacob. You know
who Jacob was. Well, Jacob, the individual,
he's used as a way to describe Israel's shame. Jacob, that sinner. Jacob, that cheater. Jacob, that
supplanter. Jacob, that sinner. We're all
Jacob's, aren't we? I am the Lord, I change not,
therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. You know what we
are? We're Jacob's. And you notice throughout, at
one point in time, I believe this is described in Genesis
35, where Jacob wrestled with the angel, the messenger of the
Lord, which I believe was Christ himself, a pre-incarnate visitation
of Christ. And when Jacob prevailed, And
listen to me now, you know, I've heard people ask about that,
so how could Jacob prevail over him? I'll tell you how he led
him. It was his purpose, he was showing forth something here.
That Jacob got himself into a position as a sinner where he knew that
he must have Christ. Isn't that where the Lord brought
you when you were wrestling in your conscience and in your heart
and in your mind with these issues of sin and righteousness and
how God saves us sin? He brought you to a point in
your wrestling, in your spiritual wrestling, in your mental wrestling,
in your heart wrestling, struggles. He brought you to a point, didn't
he, where you said, I must have Christ. I can go nowhere. I've got nowhere else to go.
I must have cried. And Jacob prevailed. And you
remember there, he changed his name from Jacob to Israel. And Israel literally means, he
that prevails. Sometimes we translate it as
the prince of God, because the L on the end of it means God.
He that prevails with God, he's a prince of God. Either way,
here's what happened. Jacob, the sinner, was made by
the power of God to be one who prevailed with God. He was made
a prince of God, and so he was called Israel. But he never lost
the name Jacob. Now what do we have there? Well,
we have a picture of a sinner saved by the grace of God. We
have a picture of a sinner who has prevailed with God. Now let
me ask you this question. How are we going to prevail with
God? Not by our strength and our power,
but by Christ. The mercy seat, we read about
it in Psalm 80. We sung about it. If we didn't
have a mercy seat, who is that mercy seat? That's Christ and
him crucified and risen again. That's the only way a sinner
can prevail with God. And that's because that's God's
purpose. God's purpose. Well, look on here. Now, the
rest of this book, the rest of chapter 2 and the rest of chapter
3, contains four descriptions of Nineveh's fall. And you can
write across this whole page and the rest of this book is
simply this. Whatever a person or a nation
sows, that's what that person or that nation reaps. That's
what it is. Let me just read through the
rest of chapter 2. Here's the first description.
There's four descriptions. Here's the first one. Look at
verse 3. He speaks of the shield of his
mighty men is made red. Now that's not red with blood
there. That's red in color. That red being the color of war.
The affliction like the red horse in Revelation 64 who removes
peace from the earth. That's what he's talking about.
This is a war. And he said, the valiant men,
even the best of them, are in Scarlet, ready for war. The chariot
shall be with flaming torches in the day of his preparation,
and the fir tree shall be terribly shaken. This is going to be something
that is earth moving. This is going to be something...
Listen, what he's saying here is, Nineveh, I'm getting ready
to shake your world. We were thinking about that,
you know, this storm last night. Boy, we thought we were really
shook, didn't we? And our power went off again. Lloyd, our power
went off again. I thought my world was really
shook. That's light compared to what's going on here. The
flaming torches and all that, like lightning. You don't know
where it's gonna hit, you don't know how powerful it's gonna
be, and you don't really know what it's gonna do, except God says this
is gonna be destruction. And so this is a picture of that.
Look at verse four. He says, the chariots will rage
in the streets, they shall jostle, that means they'll go to and
fro in confusion. That's what that means. One against
the other in the broad ways, no matter how wide the road is,
it's still gonna be everybody scurrying around in confusion. They shall seem like torches,
they shall run like the lightnings here and there. Like I said,
don't know where it's gonna hit, look at verse five. He, that's
the king of Nineveh, he shall recount his worthies, that's
his nobles. What that means is he's going
to call in the best that he's got, the best generals, the wisest
philosophers, his worthies, that's what a worthy is in the ancient
world. Somebody that you would go to
for advice, especially when life and death is the issue. Now here's
what's going to happen. He's going to call in his worthies,
but they shall stumble in their walk. They don't know the way.
They don't know the way out. They don't know the way of escape. They're just chattering fools. They shall make haste to the
wall thereof. That's the walls of the city.
You understand, a walled city back then was really something
impressive. That meant safety to people. You find a walled city and get
in there, but he says they're going to go to their wall, make
haste to the wall they're up, and the defense shall be prepared.
They're going to prepare their defense, but the point he's making
here is there is no defense. There's no defense against the
wrath of God, against sin. God must punish sin. He says
in verse 6, the gates of the rivers shall be opened and the
palaces shall be dissolved. The Tigris River ran right up
against Nineveh and its tributaries. It was said that their engineers
had waterways made into the city. It was real impressive. It was
a great source of supply for them. It was a great source of
defense of Nineveh. But here he's saying that river's
going to be open. It's going to come against them.
What they see as their source of strength and safety is going
to be like a flood against them. God's wrath will consume like
a flood. When I read that, I thought about
Romans 5 and verse 20, where sin therefore abounded, grace
did much more abound. You know, the picture that the
Holy Spirit intends there, when he inspired the apostle Paul
to write that, is a picture of a sinner drowning in a sea of
sin. That's what he's talking about.
Where sin abounded. Where sin literally overflowed
me like a flood. Well, there's no escape from
that except where sin abounded, grace did much more about. That's
the only escape from it is grace. And he says in verse 21 of Romans
chapter 5, that as sin reigned unto death, grace reigns through
righteousness. That's what we've got to have.
The only boat that's going to save us, the only ark that's
going to save us from that flood of sin is Christ, who is our
righteousness. Righteousness unto eternal life
by Jesus Christ our Lord. That's the picture. Here, look
at verse 7. He said, and chazab, that's a word that means it is
decreed. That's what it means. I don't
know why the King James translator just didn't translate it that
way, but it's what it means. It means it is decreed. It's
not a person named Huzzah here, but it is decreed. It's established.
He says, and Huzzah shall be led away captive. It's established
that she shall be led away captive. She shall be brought up and her
maid shall lead her as with the voice of doves, taboring or beating
upon their breasts. beating up on their breasts.
What's he showing? The Lord's judgment of Nineveh
has already been determined. There's nothing to hold it back.
This is God working all things after the counsel of His own
will. This is the sovereign God who's decreed it. It's going
to happen. He said, I'll purpose it. I'll
bring it to pass. And as a result of this, they're
going to be beating on their breasts. They're going to be
in sorrow. Look at verse 8. Actually, this begins the second description
of Nineveh's destruction. Somebody said it's a little more
philosophical because it kind of goes into some of the reasons
here. It ends with a statement about God's reason for this,
why He's doing this, so that men will have no mistake in their
minds that God is just. He says in verse 8, "...but Nineveh
is of old like a pool of water, Yet they shall flee away. Stand,
stand, shall they cry, but none shall look back." That pool there
means something peaceful and calm and cool. And what he's
saying here is that Nineveh, they'll think everything's fine,
everything's at peace. You know it's a mark of a false
prophet when he cries, peace, peace, when there is no peace.
Jeremiah said that twice, Jeremiah 6 and Jeremiah 8. Peace, peace. Satan's first message was essentially
peace, peace when there was no peace. Thou shalt not surely
die. You're okay. You don't know Christ. You don't
know the way of God's grace. You don't know the sovereign
God of this universe who saves by sovereign mercy. But you're
okay anyway. Peace, peace. You see what I'm
saying? And that's what that pool of water represented. And
the commanders, he says, will command people to stand. Stand
firm now, don't let this destroy us, but they won't listen. They'll
disobey and they'll run. That's what he's saying here.
They'll go out and they won't even look back. They'll be so
scared, they won't even look back. Look at verse 9, take ye
the spoil of silver, take the spoil of gold, for there's none
end of the store and glory out of all the pleasant furniture.
Nineveh was known as one of the richest cities in the ancient
world. But here it's going to be plundered. All of its riches,
worldliness, all the riches of the flesh will be taken away
and they'll be left. They're going to be plundered. That's
a good illustration of man in false religion, isn't it? Everything
that he thinks is so valuable, everything that he believes is
so recommending unto God, Everything that he thinks is valuable to
God, his works, his efforts, his will, whatever it is, anything
other than Christ, it'll be plundered, it'll be taken away. You'll hear
Christ say, like he said to those false preachers, depart from
me ye that worketh iniquity, I never knew you. Look on verse
10. She is empty and void and waste
and the heart melteth and the knees smite together. They're
scared, that's what that means. empty, void, waste. In other
words, everything that Nineveh has put value on, she's going
to find out is nothing, empty, void. You know, this is where
God's people come to in repentance. Did you notice that? Everything
that we put value on by nature, of the flesh, of our works, of
our religion. When we see the glory of Christ
and the majesty of Christ and the value of His blood and His
righteousness, what do we say? Just like with Paul, I count
all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus
my Lord. You see where this excellency
of Jacob and Israel's going? The excellency of the knowledge
of Christ. It's all dumb. For there's none
into the store of the glory out of the pleasant furniture. She's
empty, void, waste, the heart melteth. Think about how your
heart would sing. I thought about that again with
those false preachers in Matthew 7. Can you imagine a man coming
before God in his mind just certain that he's okay, he's saved, he's
at peace, he's going to hear God say, well done thou good
and faithful sir, only to hear him say, depart from me? Could
you imagine how your heart would just literally melt and sink? I don't want that to happen to
me or to you. How can we be assured that it
won't? There's not but one way. Look to Christ. Rest in Him. Plead His blood and His righteousness
alone. That's it. And he says, and the
knees smite together, they're scared, much pain is in all loins,
and the faces of them all gather blackness. Look at verse 11.
He says, where is the dwelling of the lions and the feeding
place of the young lions? Where the lion, even the old
lion, walked, and the lions wept, and none made them afraid. You
know, both Assyria and Babylon used the lion as a symbol of
their empires. Because the lion was the king
of the beast. It was a symbol of strength and
power. It would make others afraid.
But what's God saying here through Nahum? That's gone now. That's
gone. Nothing. None made them afraid.
It's gone now. No nation will fear you now.
They came against... I'll tell you what, I thought
about this. I said, here they used the lion as the symbol of
their own strength. And the reason God is bringing
His judgment against them is because they came in essence
against the Lion of the tribe of Judah. Isn't that right? Nobody withstands the Lion of
the tribe of Judah. It's not just a lion that we
glory in. It's the Lion of the tribe of
Judah. The Lord Jesus Christ. The King
of Kings. The King Priest who died for
our sins. Verse 12. He says, "...the lion
did tear in pieces enough for his whelps, and strangled for
his lioness, and filled his holes with prey, and his dens with
raven," that is the ravages. They say that lions usually just
kill enough that they can eat and no more, but Assyria wasn't
like that. They plundered and plundered
and killed and killed. They were once well-fed in abundance,
but now they're starving and left with nothing. But look at
verse 13. He says, Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord
of hosts. I tell you, there's not a more
frightening thing for a nation or an individual to hear. To
hear the Lord, behold, I am against thee. saith the Lord of Hosts,
the Lord of an invincible, indestructible army. He says, and I will burn
her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young
lions. I will cut off thy prey from
the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be heard.
When the Lord God is against you, no one can save you. You hear that? When the Lord
God is against you, no one can save you. But that's not the
end of this story. For when the Lord God is for
you, no one can destroy you. In this book of Nahum, let me
close with, I want you to turn to a few scriptures in closing
here, and I want you to learn something, as I have learned
it too, studying this. And who would have thought it
in the book of Nahum that you would learn something about real,
honest, heart-rending, heart-stirring interpretation of Scripture?
But that's what it is. You say, well, you listen to
all that about Nineveh, and yet in verse 15 of chapter 1, He
says, behold upon the mountains the feet of him that bringeth
good tidings that publisheth peace. Who's he speaking to there?
He's talking to Judah. And what has he said, verse 2
of chapter 2, for the Lord hath turned away or restored, literally,
the excellency of Jacob and the excellency of Israel. What is
the excellency of Jacob? What is the excellency of Israel?
Or better yet, let's put it this way, who is the Excellency of
Jacob? Who is the Excellency of Israel? I'll tell you who, the Lord Jesus
Christ. That was the reason for Israel's
existence. He is the reason for Israel's
existence as a nation. For the Lord had purposed long
before Israel ever became a nation to send a Redeemer, to send a
Messiah. And here he mentions Jacob. Jacob,
that sinner, whose name was changed to Israel. Jacob, describing
Israel's shame. Israel, describing their glory. Speaks of a great transformation
based upon a deliverance from a great enemy. That's what he's
talking about here in Nahum. Great transformation. based upon
deliverance and defeat of a great enemy. And when you hear the
name Jacob, and you hear the name Israel, you must think of
the covenant, God's covenant. Yes, he made a covenant with
the nation Israel, but it was based upon a covenant that he'd
made 430 years, the scripture says, before Israel ever came
into existence, one made with Abraham. And so when you think
of that covenant made with Abraham, which was a covenant of grace,
a covenant of mercy, for Abraham is an example, an illustration,
even an archetype of how God justifies the ungodly. And is that not what we are by
nature? Ungodly? How can God do such
a thing? Well, when you think of His covenant
with Abraham, which went on to be renewed and reconstituted
in his covenant with Isaac and Jacob, the fathers, and even
up through Joseph, and continued through the covenant with the
nation of Israel in type and picture and prophecy. Fulfilled
by the promise think of the promise Jacob is also is a name of promise
for God saves Jacob's again Malachi 3 6 I am the Lord I change not
why does he say he changes not it's not simply that God is immutable
though he is but he's made a promise and God being immutable as he
is cannot go back upon the promise that he made to Abraham and that
promise ultimately is fulfilled all of it eternally and spiritually
in the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ to save his people and
deliver them in a defeat of a great enemy sin he defeated that enemy
on the cross And there we see the grace of God, the excellency
of Jacob, and the excellency of Israel, spiritual Israel,
spiritual Jacobs, of whom we all can identify with, is the
Lord Jesus Christ, our great victor, our great conqueror,
our great redeemer, who defeated our greatest enemy of all, sin,
the flesh, the devil. He defeated them by being made
sin. Christ was made sin. And He went to the cross, having
our sins laid to His account, and as God-man, God in human
flesh, He suffered and bled and died. And what a contradiction
in the eyes of the natural man. In His death came the defeat
of that great enemy, death. The death of death and the death
of Christ, Brother John Owen wrote. Think about it. He is
the victor over the grave. Just like Assyria was a great
enemy that plagued Israel for so many years, and God sent His
power to defeat that enemy, He sent Christ to defeat our enemy
that plagues us all the days of our life. We're justified
in Christ. We're redeemed in Christ. We're
sanctified in Christ. We're forgiven in Christ. We're
made righteous in Him. He who has made sin for us, we're
made the righteousness of God in Him. As He was accounted before
the court of God's holy law and justice, we're accounted, as
He who's accounted sin, we're accounted righteous in Him. Think
about it. Now that's good tidings. That's publishing peace. And
let me show you something here. Look at Isaiah chapter 57. Isaiah,
he took that same message of good tidings and peace, and he
applied it to another great enemy of Israel. Of Judah, rather. Babylon. Look at Isaiah chapter
52. Look at verse 7. Isaiah 52, verse 7. He said, how beautiful upon the
mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings and
that publishes peace. Now, it's not that the feet are
so beautiful, it's the message that the feet are bringing. It's
like in Ephesians chapter 6 and verse 13, when it talks about
the whole armor of God, one of that is the preparation of the
gospel of peace, having our feet shod with the gospel, the good
news of salvation. He says, "...that bringeth good
tidings of good, that publisheth salvation." How can you publish
salvation? You preach Christ and Him crucified
and risen again. You preach His blood for the
forgiveness of all my sins, His righteousness for my complete,
eternal, unchangeable justification before God. "...that saith unto
Zion the church, Thy God reigneth." Turn to Romans chapter 10. Think about this. Romans chapter 10. And somebody
asked me, he said, well, what does that have to do for Judah
in Nahum's day? Well, what is he doing here?
He's setting forth the destruction of Nineveh and Assyria, Israel
and Judah's greatest enemy in this context. God is showing
all Israel that he is their only hope. And to leave him is death. That's why he says, keep the
solemn feast. That doesn't mean just go through
religious rituals. Ultimately, that means look to
Christ for salvation. That's what every one of those
solemn feasts were about. A sinner pleading, begging for
the mercy of God in Christ. The Sabbath. What does the Sabbath
mean? It's not just keeping the day.
There was that aspect of it under the Old Covenant. But what was
the spiritual significance of it? Rest in the person and the
finished work of Christ, the one whom God promised to come.
Cling to Him. That's what Nahum was telling
Judah. Cling to the God of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob. Cling to the excellency of Jacob
and Israel. Cling to Christ. Don't give up.
I'll destroy your enemies, God says, and through you I'll send
the Messiah. who will bring tidings of great
joy for sinners. The scepter will not depart from
Judah until Shiloh comes. That's what he's saying. And
Paul uses this announcement for us today. Look at verse 13 of
Romans 10. He says, For whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And Brother Shepard
helped me with this so much. He preached a message of what
is it to call upon the name of the Lord. And he made this, when
you go back and you look upon how men called upon the name
of the Lord according to the Old Testament, they always called
upon the name of the Lord by sacrifice. What does that mean? That means call upon the name
of the Lord by Christ. The mercy seat. Behold the Lamb
of God. And so he says in verse 14, how
then shall they call in him of whom they've not believed? That's
how you believe in him. Believe him. And how shall they
believe in him of whom they've not heard? This comes under the
preaching of the gospel. Nowhere else. And how shall they
hear without a preacher? God sends his messengers. And
how shall they preach except they be sent? And as it is written,
how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of
peace and bring glad tidings of good things. That's a way to interpret scripture,
isn't it? You know what's being said there.
I mean, what is shown is simply this. It's what our Lord told
the Pharisees. You search the scriptures, for in them you think
you have eternal life. They are they which testify of
me. Yes, even little old Nahum. In those three chapters. A book
that we just normally don't even think about. But there he is. Christ, the excellency of Jacob
and of Israel. One old preacher said that instead
of calling it the book of Nahum, they ought to call it the book
of Hoham. And I thought, well, man, you just haven't seen the
excellency of Jacob and Israel. This is the word of God, right
there. It's the same thing. I believe
it so strongly. You know, when the Lord sent
the disciples down and before he ascended into glory and he
was teaching them out of the scriptures, the Psalms, and the
law, and the prophets, the things concerning himself, the glory
of his person, and the power of his finished work to bring
about the forgiveness of sins and salvation. He was taking
them through these books of the Old Testament, the books of the
Law, the books of the Psalms, the prophets like Nahum, and
He was showing them, now this is what that meant. This is what
it means today. This is how you preach Christ
from the Old Testament. Think of that. And then we see
here too that the preaching of the Gospel is both a message
of salvation, God's goodness, and condemnation, God's severity.
It's a saver of life and death. But God, isn't that amazing how
God the Holy Spirit gives us a really good lesson in how to
view and interpret the scriptures there just by quoting them over
in the Old Testament. We saw that so many times, haven't
we, when we've gone through the minor prophets. Well, it's to
see and it's to preach Christ who is the excellency, the glory
of Jacob and Israel. Is he your excellency? Is He
your glory? Paul said, God forbid that I
should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's
what I pray for myself and for you, that He is truly my excellency. The only excellency I've got.
He is truly my glory. Amen.