Isaiah 10:6
6 I will send [shalach] him
against an hypocritical [chaneph] nation, [gowy] and against the people [`am]
of my wrath [`ebrah] will I give him a charge, [tsavah] to take [shalal] the spoil,
[shalal] and to take [bazaz] the prey, [baz] and to
tread them down [suwm] [mirmac] like the mire [chomer] of
the streets. [chuwts] KJV-Interlinear
6 I send it
against a godless nation And commission it against the people of My fury To
capture booty and to seize plunder, And to trample them down like mud in the
streets. NASB
Send, ‘shalach,’ means to
send, to appoint, to bring, to conduct.
And it is God who is
causing Assyria to invade and attack Samaria.
But how is that?
Give him charge, ‘tsavah,’
means to appoint, constitute, to give permission, to send with authority.
To spoil and to tread
down, is the action of an invading army against an inferior enemy.
In time of war, diplomats
are not sent in ahead of the invading army to negotiate a settlement. That time has already passed and it is now
the army’s turn to resolve whatever the problem is or has been.
Prior to the declaration of
war, it is the diplomats who conduct and pursue solutions. When that fails, then the diplomats or
ambassadors are called home and the next step is to send in the army. The invasion is preceded with a bombardment
and then followed by the invasion. This
has been the pattern of national war confrontation for the history of humanity.
Sometimes solutions are
achieved, and sometimes solutions were never intended to be achieved, depending
on the integrity, or lack of it, of the parties. With evil nations, payment of tribute is sometimes
acceptable, but that cost often times gets bigger and bigger and then is
refused and the evil party demanding the payment sends in his army.
This is the pattern of
Christianity and how God deals with Satan as well. Satan is given chance after chance to accept
truth, but of course he never will. Satan uses all of his resources to turn the
world into total evil and finally there will come a last straw and God will
call home all of his diplomats. That is
the Rapture.
What happens next is the
prophecy of the Tribulation, wherein total chaos and violence occurs throughout
that seven year period, and as many as possible are saved, and then finally the
ultimate invasion of Christs’ second-advent occurs resulting in the total and
complete annihilation of Satan and all evil.
And then the establishment of Gods kingdom, on this earth will occur. Satan is de-throned and imprisoned for a
period of 1000 years.
But I am a bit off subject
here.
That is the pattern of
nations and war.
When war occurs, then the
time of diplomacy is over and most likely not desired by the invading army as
far as evil is concerned, and things get real ugly for the nation being
invaded. Death and destruction and
looting and the taking of all spoils and such becomes their immediate agenda.
And God, through His
perfect foreknowledge, due to the divine decrees, knows the nature of Samaria
and of all nations, and God knows what is coming in terms of failed national
relations. Therefore, God permits the
invasion, as it relates to the divine decrees, which is nothing more than the
result of the thoughts and actions of peoples in those nations.
This is necessary in
order the prune out the evil within a nation in order to preserve that
nation. You have to cut out the dead
wood on a plant, so to speak, in order to restore that plant to health.
Now know this. God did not send Assyria an email instructing
them to invade Samaria. No such
conversation occurred. They may well
have read the prophecies of Isaiah and presumed that it applied to them, but
even that is irrelevant, as God did not speak directly to them. Nor does it
legitimize their invasion and leave them as unaccountable for their sins and
activity in that invasion.
All evil gets its due
judgment, and even though Assyria may seem to be getting off easy, they will receive
their just punishment in due course.
There has never been justification for evil and never will be. But learn to distinguish the difference
between Gods permissive will and Gods application of justice, and Gods many devices
for the control of history.
