Nahum 1:1 The Oracle

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All right, so up until this point, we've gone through an introduction, the who, what, where, when, why, how of the book of Nahum.

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Then we went over a historical introduction so that we know what the history behind Assyria was and what the history behind Israel was at the time.

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Today, we're actually gonna enter into the text. All right.

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So if you would, open your Bibles to Nahum chapter one. We're gonna read the whole chapter and then we'll start getting into what it means.

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I'll give you the second to just get there. If you find

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Jonah, go to the right to Micah, and one past Micah, you'll find

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Nahum, Nahum. All right, let's begin with Nahum chapter one, verse one.

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An oracle concerning Nineveh, the book of the vision of Nahum of El -Kosh. The Lord is a jealous and avenging

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God. The Lord is avenging and wrathful. The Lord takes vengeance on his adversaries and keeps wrath for his enemies.

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The Lord is slow to anger and great in power. And the Lord will by no means clear the guilty. His way is in whirlwind and storm and the clouds are the dust of his feet.

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He rebukes the sea and makes it dry. He dries up all the rivers, Bashan and Carmel wither, the bloom of Lebanon withers.

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The mountains quake before him, the hills melt, the earth heaves before him, the world and all who dwell in it.

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Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the heat of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire and the rocks are broken into pieces by him.

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The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble. He knows those who take refuge in him.

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But with an overflowing flood, he will make a complete end of his adversaries and will pursue his enemies into darkness.

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What do you plot against the Lord? He will make a complete end. Trouble will not rise up a second time for they are like entangled thorns, like drunkards as they drink.

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They are consumed like stubble, fully dried. For you came one who plotted evil against the

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Lord, a worthless counselor. Thus says the Lord, though they are at full strength and many, they will be cut down and pass away.

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Though I have afflicted you, I will afflict you no more. And now I will break his yoke off you and will burst your bonds apart.

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The Lord has given commandment about you. No more shall your name be perpetuated, that's what it is, from the house of your gods.

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I will cut off the carved image and the metal image. I will make your grave for you are vile. Behold, upon the mountains, the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace.

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Keep your feasts, O Judah, fulfill your vows, for never again shall the worthless pass through you.

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He is utterly cut off." Those are some heavy words from Nahum.

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And certainly not the words that we hear most evangelical churches talking about today, right?

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Have you heard in any other churches that the Lord is jealous and avenging God? He's wrathful, he takes vengeance on his adversaries.

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This is heavy wording. So this is something that we certainly have to keep in mind and heed, that these are the things that the

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Lord is, right? He is avenging, he is wrathful. He's slow to anger, but he's great in power and by no means will clear the guilty.

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So this morning, we're gonna concentrate on Nahum 1 .1, which reads, an oracle concerning Nineveh, the book of the vision of Nahum of El -Kosh.

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So what we wanna do is find out what is an oracle and what does this term mean?

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I've come to understand when you see an opening line for any book of the Bible, it's packed with information.

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I was amazed at the stuff that was uncovered to me. So with regards to an oracle, we see that oracles sometimes had a prophecies.

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In Isaiah 13 .1, the oracle concerning Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw.

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Isaiah 14 .28, in the year that King Ahaz died came this oracle. Isaiah 15, an oracle concerning Moab.

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Isaiah 17, an oracle concerning Damascus. Ezekiel, say to them, thus says the

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Lord God, this oracle concerns the prince in Jerusalem and all the house of Israel who are in it. Zechariah, the oracle of the word of the

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Lord is against the land of Hadrach. Zechariah, the oracle of the word of the Lord concerning Israel.

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So that's heading up individual prophecies. Then there are times when it heads up the whole book.

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Habakkuk 1 .1, the oracle that Habakkuk the prophet saw. Malachi 1 .1,

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the oracle of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. And obviously,

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Nahum 1 .1, an oracle concerning Nineveh, the book of the vision of Nahum, Nahum the prophet of Elkush, right?

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So what is an oracle? What is an oracle?

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Anybody wanna venture a guess as to what an oracle is? Yes, sir.

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A prophecy, sure. What else? Yes. Proclamation, yep, those are all good answers.

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It's a proclamation, it's a message. Okay, say again? A warning, right?

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These are all good things that comprise what an oracle is. This particular dictionary says oracle is the word massa, and it's a masculine noun, meaning a burden or load by extension, a burden in the form of a prophetic utterance or oracle.

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So an oracle is a word from God. That's a heavy word, all right? It's derived from the verb massa, meaning to lift, to bear, to carry.

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When used to express a burden or load is commonly used to describe that which is placed on the backs of pack animals like donkeys.

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So it's a message with a load or a burden upon it. This oracle is a burden, a heavy message from God and for the

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Assyrians. Now, it's delivered to the Judeans, okay?

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But it's about Assyria. It pertains to both of them, obviously. So this is what he's conveying to Judah about Assyria.

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Massa not only signifies a burden, but also a thing lifted up, pronounced or proclaimed, also a message.

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It's used by the prophets to signify the revelation which they have received from God to deliver to any particular people, okay?

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So this is something that comes directly from God to the prophet that he sees. Anyone who in real life has had to preach the solemn message of God's destruction of the wicked will have no trouble agreeing with Nahum that this word is a burden to bear.

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You know, the prophets being the prosecuting attorneys for God and delivering the sanctions of the covenant to them when they broke it was a heavy thing.

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That was a burden that they had to bear. It's not like when the prophet preaches these things and brings them to the people that he's happy.

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Oh, this is great, look what's gonna happen to you. It's a burden and we're gonna see how that actually applies to Jesus.

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In this verse, it probably depicts the judgment laid on Nineveh and which that city was to bear, endure and undergo.

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It occurs more than 60 times in the Old Testament and usually refers to revelations concerning non -Israelites, okay?

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So the oracle is a heavy burden against those people who were non -Israelites. We also do have oracles that pertain to Israel but for the most part, they're to the nation surrounding

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Israel. Oracles and their abrupt forms are not familiar to most modern readers.

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The themes change frequently and the subjects and objects of the sentences shift without notice. It's quite different than reading a narrative like Jonah.

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So what happens is as we read through Nahum this morning, God will say, what do you plot against the

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Lord? He will make a complete end. Now we have to ask ourself, who is he speaking that to?

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Is he speaking that to Nineveh, the Assyrians or is he speaking that to Judah? Thus says the

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Lord, though they are at full strength and many, they will be cut down and pass away. Though I have afflicted you,

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I will afflict you no more. So the subject changes in there. God is talking about afflicting,

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I'm sorry, cutting away the Assyrians and Nineveh and then he talks about afflicting the

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Jews and says, I'm not gonna afflict you no more. So the subject goes back and forth and we have to be careful as we're reading through it to recognize who exactly he's speaking to and what he's saying so that we don't confuse the two.

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We don't want Israel to think that they're at full strength and they're gonna be cut down.

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That wouldn't be comforting to Israel. That would be a burden, right? So let's continue.

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The oracle here indicates that this is a message that has been given by God. Some translators prefer the word burden to oracle as it focuses the mind more emphatically on the problem that there was in the world at the time and so it became a burden in the heart of God's prophet.

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It's a weighty message for it tells of impending disaster and doom if repentance is not forthcoming in the hearts of the

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Ninevites, right? Think about when Jonah went to Nineveh and he walked in.

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He says, 40 more days and Nineveh is gonna be destroyed. Boom, they all hit the ground. They repented, right?

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Jonah didn't want to go. We know that. Many of the prophets deliver this message and it's a burden.

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It's a heavy thing on their backs that they have to give to the people. Reminds me of Jeremiah 23.

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Says, when one of this people or a prophet or a priest asks you, what is the burden of the Lord? You shall say to them, you are the burden and I will cast you off declares the

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Lord, right? The prophets many times had very harsh words to say to their audience, but it was the truth, right?

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They were not keeping covenant with God. They were not obeying the covenant the way they were supposed to.

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So if you disobey the covenant, God speaks to his prophet, the prophet comes to the people and says, look, if you don't repent, if you don't turn to the

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Lord in faithfulness, cast out the idols, tear down the high places, this is what's going to happen to you.

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Okay, so now he's talking about Nineveh. Nineveh repented, right? But their repentance didn't last.

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Okay, so this is about a hundred years later after that, Nineveh and Assyria is at full force and they're conquering nations again, brutally.

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So this is a message to the Assyrians that this is not going to last. Okay, sure can.

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Right, it's a good point. It is a dual message and we're going to actually get to that, hopefully by the last slide or two.

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What does Nahum mean? It's okay, Nahum means comfort, right? So this message is designed to be a comfort to Judah, okay, but wrath and a warning to Nineveh.

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So it's that dual nature that you said. So God is going to favor Judah once again, even though they were disobedient to him, okay?

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But he's showing how this is a God who will not let the guilty go unpunished. Although Assyria and Nineveh repented, it didn't last, now there's a consequence for that.

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Okay, good. All right, so what is one of Jesus's offices?

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Prophet, right? Do you guys remember the catechism question, question 27? I'll read it because I didn't memorize it either.

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Christ as our Redeemer executes the offices of a prophet, of a priest and of a king, both in his estate and humiliation.

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How does Christ execute the office of a prophet? Christ executes the office of a prophet in revealing to us by this word and spirit, the will of God for our salvation.

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So Jesus is a prophet. And what does he say to the audience of Matthew chapter 11?

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Thanks, I'm glad you asked, you ready? Matthew chapter 11. Then Jesus began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done because they did not repent.

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Woe to you, Chorazin, woe to you, Bethsaida, for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

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But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you.

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And for you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades.

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For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.

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Does he not sound like an Old Testament prophet with this heavy burden for the people who did not repent at his signs, wonders, miracles, at his word, telling them who he was, right?

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So Jesus fulfills the office of a prophet. And he would go on to say in Matthew 11, 28, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

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Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

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For my yoke is easy and my burden is light, right?

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He says this in contrast to the unrepentant cities, Jesus' burden is light.

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In other words, it will be a joy for those whom the son chooses to reveal himself to.

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A little bit later on in Matthew 11, the father says to Jesus, you will reveal to them whoever you want to be known, right?

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In other words, Jesus reveals himself to those who he wants to reveal himself to. He doesn't reveal himself to everyone.

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So what do you think? How does this apply to the oracle, the burden of Nahum? How does this apply to Jesus?

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There's coffee in the back. He's going to get it, all right?

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Does not Jesus have a burden for the people? He's telling them, you need to repent.

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I did signs, I did miracles in your midst. It's going to be worse for you than it's going to be for Sodom and Gomorrah.

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But then he says, my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

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What do you think that means? Christ is going to carry the burden.

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Now, it's difficult in the sense that now we have to keep the commandments, but then I'm going to show you another verse that says my commandments are not burdensome, right?

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So when you compare this to the oracle, to Assyria, how he's going to crush them,

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Jesus says, my yoke is easy, my burden is light. I'm going to bear the burden on your behalf as your prophet, priest, and king.

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He's contrasting the woe he just pronounced on the unrepentant cities of Bethsaida, Chorazin, and Capernaum.

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Woe to you if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon. They would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

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With those whom the son has been revealed to and those who will come to him for rest, for rest for their souls, right?

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So he's the prophet who comes with this message, but he tells them, put your faith and trust in me.

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Yes, Mike? It looks like they're basically saying that the burden of repentance is better than the burden of judgment.

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Sure, that's a good way to put it. Sure, in repentance your burden is going to be much lighter than it will be in unrepentant disobedience.

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Jesus is going to carry that burden for us. Now, is the burden light for Jesus? No, no, he's going to have to bear the wrath of God for the sins committed by us on himself.

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It's a place he never had been with God the Father. He's always been in perfect relationship with him.

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Now to have to become sin and have God's wrath poured out on him, that's huge, that's big, but he is going to take the burden on himself, right?

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For the joy set before him, right? He endured the cross for us. What's our part in this?

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1 John 5 .2, by this we know that we love the children of God. When we love God and obey his commandments, for this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments and his commandments are not burdensome.

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For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith.

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Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the son of God. So by placing faith and trust in Jesus, we escape the judgment of God, right?

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We are now in Christ. You are either in Adam or you are in Christ.

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And you know, we're going through that book on Wednesday nights, all things work together for good. Romans 8 starts off by what?

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Saying there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And how does it end?

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Nothing will separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord. So we go from no condemnation to no separation.

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When you recognize that we earned the wrath of God, based on our actions, our sinful actions, but Jesus is gonna take that burden on himself.

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And he says, keep my commandments. My commandments are not burdensome. He gives us his spirit, changes our hearts so that we can follow him in faith.

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Now, does it mean that we'll live a perfect life? No, we're gonna live a faithful life because the gospel is that your faith and trust is in Christ alone.

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This is not a performance based system. Jesus performed on our behalf and earned our salvation fully.

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We now place our faith and trust in him so that when we do fail, like we're gonna talk about every

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Sunday from the pulpit, we have this precious promise that if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness, we can go to God again and again and again.

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Seven times we get knocked down, seven times we get up. But those commandments are not a burden, they're a joy, they're a delight for us to love

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God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and love our neighbor as ourself. Good?

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All right, let's continue. All right, so now this is an oracle concerning Nineveh.

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Now, why is that important? Nineveh, Assyria. Has what?

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Oh yeah, this is 100 years after Jonah. They repented, now they left their repentance, they're back to their old ways.

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This is really important because Nineveh, Assyria, is the dominant power in the world.

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You know, to overthrow Nineveh would be like, at a point in time, to say, like, the

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United States was overthrown. The superpower of the world has been decimated. So here,

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Nahum's oracle is focused on Nineveh, which became a serious capital city in 704

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BC, and thus, in this book, represents the empire as a whole. In the ancient world,

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Nineveh was a large city boasting multiple temples, irrigated royal gardens, an immense defensive wall of nine miles around, one mile thick, encircling the city and surrounded by a moat.

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It was a military powerhouse. During Nahum's time, it was a strongly fortified garrison with 1 ,200 towers and a population of over a quarter of a million people.

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This is a powerhouse. For someone like Nahum to say what

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God says, that Assyria is gonna be overthrown, torn down, none of its bricks are gonna be left.

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It's like, oh my goodness, how is that possible? Only by the power of God.

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They were the most dominant power in the ancient world. Okay, I was trying to think of a good example aside from the

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United States, but it doesn't quite work. The other important thing here to realize is that this is,

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God judges people collectively and individually, okay? This is an oracle of Nineveh, which means it concerns the whole nation.

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Repeatedly, Nineveh is described as that great city. Remember in Jonah, the great city, Nineveh, great city.

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Here, Nineveh stands for Assyria as a whole and conveys the idea of evil forces arrayed against the people of God.

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So it's kind of like a type. However, this is going to represent judgment upon the whole nation, not just individuals.

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God judges nations, which is what we're gonna talk about now. Nineveh was a wicked, imperialistic, and deceitful metropolis with an arrogant and unscrupulous lust for power and domination manifested in merciless warmongering.

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In addition to its military exploits, Nineveh was condemned for its ruthless trade practices and insatiable materialism.

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Against this evil city, Nahum delivered this message that no earthly power that defied

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God's law would finally escape his judgment. For his original audience and all subsequent readers,

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Nahum vividly portrayed the wrath of God whose way is in the whirlwind and the storm.

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This same book also declares the goodness of God. That was R .C. Sproul. So again,

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God's looking at the nation of Assyria and judging it as a whole. God judges nations.

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Among other things, the prophecy of Nahum shows us that God not only deals with individuals as individuals, he also deals with nations as nations.

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This is the prophecy which sets forth more clearly than any other the truth concerning the wrath of God in its national application.

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Nations will be held accountable to God. So when we look at our country and we see the things that the

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United States is doing and how the church has not risen up against these things and done its job in being a witness to the world around us,

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God is judging us. Look at how many children we abort every year. Look at how we exploit people and we're greedy and the things that we do militarily around the world that we shouldn't be doing.

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These are things that God is going to judge America for. Okay, let's see.

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God judges nations, Jeremiah 18. If at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, and if that nation concerning which

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I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. And if at any time

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I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, and if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then

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I will relent of the good that I intended to do to it. So America has a chance.

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If we turn from our sin, repent and turn back to God, if the church does its job and goes out and evangelizes and preaches the gospel and sees hearts changed and we see the spirit move and we have reformation and revival come to our country,

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God will relent, right? That's the prayer. We have to pray for our leaders.

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We do this every Sunday and Wednesday. Prayer is a mighty weapon. We need to be people of prayer, praying constantly for our leaders, as much as we like or dislike them, right?

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We need them to understand. We need God's Holy Spirit to open their eyes, their ears and their hearts, as well as our own.

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We have to repent of our own sins that we commit on a regular basis and turn back towards the

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Lord, walking in faithfulness. We see this in Isaiah, an oracle concerning Babylon, an oracle concerning Assyria, an oracle concerning Philistia, Moab, Damascus, Cush, Egypt, right?

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These are all nations that will be judged by God, right?

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And this points in a tangential way to what we know as federal headship, okay? When you're in Christ, we're judged as being in Christ or we're in Adam, Adam would be our federal head if we weren't believers.

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If you're a believer in Jesus, Jesus is your federal head. He's the one who represents you. If you don't have

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Jesus representing you, you have Adam representing you, okay? And obviously, if you're in Adam, you're in your sin.

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You need to repent and trust in Christ for salvation. Very important. Okay, so is judgment always bad?

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Let me ask you that. No, why not? Okay, that's one way of looking at it.

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Judgment causes people to run back to God. We're scared, let me go back to God to be protected.

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Why else? Mike? There's justice in it, sure, yes.

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Points to the glory of God. But how do I say it without giving you the answer?

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Why else is judgment good? What are you gonna get?

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Less evil, right? Yes, Julie. Thank you, rewards the righteous, thank you,

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Julie. How else are you gonna get rewards if you're not judged based on what you do, right?

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Second Corinthians five, we're also gonna stand before the judgment seat of Christ and receive our rewards done in the body, whether good or bad, good or evil.

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So our rewards are based on our behavior. Thankfully, if you're in Christ, there's no condemnation. There's no chance of you going, experiencing

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God's wrath, and there's no separation between his love. But the things you do here matter, okay?

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So a lot of times I'm hearing people talking, well, we're Calvinists, you know, really nothing matters.

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None of our actions matter. Yes, they do. Your actions matter, all right? What you do here counts for eternity.

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That's another sprawl line, okay? We, our actions here are gonna determine the rewards we receive in heaven.

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They're not gonna determine our destination. That was determined by Christ, thankfully. But our rewards, what we receive on the other side is based on what we do here.

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Very important we realize that. So judgment is not always bad. Judgment is not always punishment.

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In a broad sense, it is God's evaluation as to the rightness or wrongness of an act of a creature, whether human or angelic, using the standard of God's own righteousness and holy character.

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In a more specific sense, judgment refers to the future event when God, through Jesus Christ, will judge all people, whether righteous or wicked, for their work is done while on earth.

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The New Testament indicates that all people, whether Christian or not, will be judged according to their deeds.

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However, Christians will be accepted in light of the work of Christ on their behalf. Thank God for that.

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Thank God for Jesus. In the Old Testament, divine judgment commonly takes the form of earthly blessing.

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Harvest, national security, right? If the Israelites were obeying God and they were faithful to him, their harvest would be plentiful.

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They would be protected from their enemies just for being obedient to God's commands.

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But they would receive punishment, plagues, earthquakes, exile for disobedience, right?

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So that's, again, the covenant sanctions that they would have received in the Old Covenant. Okay, so this is a revelation concerning the book of the vision.

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It's like, really, we're gonna have to study what a book is? Yeah, we're gonna, actually. So, it's the word sepah, right?

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A masculine noun meaning a document, a writing, a book, or a scroll borrowed from an Assyrian word meaning missive or message.

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This word can refer to a letter, a divorce decree, proof of purchase, deed, a book in which things were written for a need in the future, a book of laws, or a genealogical record.

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So now, which do you think, some, none, all, which do you think these apply?

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What would the book of Nahum be considered? Yeah, I wish

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I could get that on the thing, but I just wanna repeat it for the people who couldn't hear you say that. Every single one of these nations that have a book directly related to him, or an oracle directly related to him, did have a relationship with Israel, a covenantal relationship with Israel.

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And next week, we're gonna see, in verse two, in verse two and three,

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God uses his name, Yahweh, five times in two verses, and that's his covenant name.

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And that's gonna lend good insight into why he's coming down on those people. Thank you, excellent point, excellent point.

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Yeah. Right, yeah, definitely. Right, God honors the covenant, right.

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Okay, it's the book of the vision. So this was more than a message communicated to Nahum in words or phrases from God.

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Because this is a vision, in some way, Nahum saw it. We see the vivid description, descriptive way

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Nahum writes, we understand that the book records what he saw in the vision. It's very poetic, and I'm hoping to get into that, to understand that a little bit better.

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So this is something that Nahum saw, because it's the book of the vision. And Isaiah 2 .1,

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the word of Isaiah, the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Isaiah saw the word, and in some sense,

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Nahum did also. Okay, so this is something he saw. It's the book of the vision. And in fact, it's gonna relate to revelation.

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We'll see that in a second. So oracle focuses more on the contents of a weighty prophecy of judgment, whereas vision relates to the process by which

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God communicates to the prophet's inner perception. Okay, so the oracle is the message.

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The vision is what Nahum sees and delivers that to the people of Judah.

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So the phrase, the book of the vision, puts Nahum in the same class as the book of revelation.

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John said that a loud voice told him, write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus, Myrna, Pergamon, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.

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Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning, I saw seven golden lampstands.

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Like John, Nahum recorded the events that he'd seen in his mind, but which had not yet happened in history.

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So one of the things that's coming is the destruction of Nineveh, and we're actually gonna see that that happens.

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Okay, so it's the book of the vision of Nahum of Elkosh, right?

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The final words of Nahum 1 .1 introduce our prophet. We know nothing about Nahum except for his name, hometown, and time period.

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However, in the Bible, names have a purpose. There's a reason why we see these names, and there's meaning behind each one.

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Think about it. What does Abraham mean? Father of many nations.

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Thank you, Zach, there you go. Why is that important? That's what he was gonna be.

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God names him father of many nations before he was the father of many nations, right? So now

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Abraham is hearing, every time somebody calls him Abraham, they're hearing father of many nations, father of many nations, father of many nations.

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He's hearing it over and over and over, and finally it comes to pass, and to the people around him who were calling him

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Abraham, they're like, this guy can't have kids. He's not gonna be the father of many nations.

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But guess what? He is, he becomes the father of Israel, right? Grandfather of Israel, I should say.

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All right, Peter, what does Peter mean? Rock, all right. Not the rock upon which we build the church, all right?

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Jesus means, who knows what Jesus means? Jehovah saves, right?

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Jehovah saves, that's who Jesus is. He's the savior, Jehovah saves. Nahum means comfort or compassion.

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Like Ray? Ray Comfort, oh gosh, very good.

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That's very good, thank you, brother. Thank you, brother, yeah. He fits right in, he fits right in.

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You've been hanging with Jerry at all, did I know? All right, okay, just checking. All right, so his name,

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Nahum's name, strikes people as either fitting or ironic, depending on the perspective of the interpreter.

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Many people consider the name appropriate because his message brought relief to those who had suffered the brutality of Assyria.

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Others note the violent language in the book and suggest Nahum's parents misnamed him, right?

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How could this message of destruction come through a guy whose name is

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Comfort? The Comforter, right? It just doesn't make sense. So Nahum spoke a message of compassion, yet he held, watch this, from Elkosh, a town name for God's hardness.

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So the word Elkosh means God is severe. We don't know the town's location.

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It has been suggested that Elkosh was renamed Capernaum when later inhabitants wanted to identify it as his hometown.

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So what do you think the term Nahum of Elkosh means? God's comfort in his judgment?

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That's certainly one way to do it. That one way to explain it. What else? Say again?

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Yeah, God is severe and he's comforting. Those two things like last week we heard, it's a fearful thing to fall in the hands of a living

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God. But wait, God is love. Yes, but he's also just and you're guilty.

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Yes, yes, yes,

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God is just and he's good and you can't separate those two things, right? Again, this brings for me, anytime people are like, well,

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God is love. He's not a God of wrath or judgment. I say, well, you gotta go back to the cross because on the cross, when

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Jesus is hanging on the cross, you see the incredible mercy and love of a

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God who would put his son in your place. At the same time, you see the incredible wrath of what your sin deserves on Jesus.

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You cannot separate God's mercy and love from his wrath. Both go hand in hand.

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If you don't have both, you don't have the gospel, okay? You can't separate his mercy from his justice.

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Those things need to be seen because the solution to that equation is the cross. You separate those things or say, well,

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God is just love and Jesus appeased the wrath of the father so he's not wrathful anymore or judging anymore.

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No, God doesn't change, right? It's very, very important that we recognize that.

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So this shows you the unity of God's compassion and his severity, his justice.

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Nahum's life included suffering under the most malicious king in Assyria's history and the most atrocious king in the

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Davidic line, Manasseh, whose gross wickedness against God and his subjects reached unthinkable levels.

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Like I said last week, tradition says he cut Isaiah, the prophet, in half, he sawed him in two.

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Nahum no doubt witnessed abominable deeds practiced by foreigners and both his kinsmen alike.

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None of the theories regarding Elkosh's location have strong evidence to support them. We may conclude, however, that the town endured a catastrophe attributed to God's chastisement.

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The word Nahum of Elkosh form a fitting theological introduction to this book which unites

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God's compassion and his severity. This is the God who will comfort us in the midst of severity.

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Now you can go. Yeah, definitely.

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Yeah, and we have to recognize that as believers, especially now in light of what's going on in the world, we haven't come under physical persecution yet.

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It may happen. And if it does happen, people's faith is gonna be shaken. Like how could

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God possibly allow this to happen to me? And that's why we have to be people of the book.

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We have to recognize that God is a God of severity and a God of comfort at the same time.

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All right, your life is not your own. You were bought with a price. We're to love God to the point of death, right?

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To not value our lives over his kingdom. Yes. Definitely.

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And listen, knowing the big picture from Genesis to Revelation is very, very important.

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And what do we see modern day churches doing? They take a sliver of the story and focus on that.

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You have churches that all they're bent on is signs, wonders, and miracles. That's it.

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All we're bent on is healing. You have other churches that are bent on God's love. God loves everyone, just loves everyone the same, right?

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Then you have churches, solid churches that understand that we don't believe just in sola scriptura, that God's word is the only infallible rule of authority.

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We hold to tota scriptura, all of scripture from Genesis to Revelation. This is everything

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God revealed to us and wants us to know about him. We are not to cut that down and we are not to expand it more than what it is.

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We stick to the word of God. We do not add to the words. We do not take away from the words.

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We live in the word. We abide in Christ Jesus. He's the perfect reflection of God the father to us.

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If you've seen me, you've seen the father and we don't throw out God's law, right? There's other churches, oh, it's all grace.

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It's all grace. It's all grace. Certainly it's grace, but God has a law.

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How are we to, Jesus says, my commandments are not burdensome. He didn't say my commandments don't exist, don't worry.

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He says, keep my commandments. That's important. We don't throw the commandments out.

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Okay, any other questions? We're good? Okay, let's close in prayer.