Day 153: God Sovereign Over Kings and Rulers 2

June 2

Today's Connected Readings: 

• Isaiah 14:3-32; 17:9-18:7; 40:12-17; 47:1-15;  63:1-6;
• Jeremiah 4:5-9; 9:23-26;  16:19-21;  25:14-29
• Daniel 2:17-23; 4:17,32; 7:15-28; 11:1-45 [Psalm 46:6]

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome to the Canon Connected, where we read the connections, see the connections, and study the connections of the Bible. Thank you so much for joining us here on day number 153 of the Canon Connected. And right now we are studying the sovereignty of God and all the many different ways in which the Bible speaks to that, and it speaks to it through a very um rich and meaningful variety of phrases and attributes of God and titles for God, names for God, even that we've studied, and definitely the position of God as we're studying it now, because I say that because no matter what, human authority or powers or rulers, I mean, exist in ancient history until the future, until Jesus comes back. All of them, all of them, have to seed, have to submit, have to be governed by, to be ruled by, to be dominated by the God of Christianity. And this is truly a biblical aspect to the uh the sovereignty of our God. And so yesterday we saw through the Psalms and as well as um one of the stories in the book of Acts, which references Psalm 2 very clearly in a very, very poignant way in regards to Jesus' death, because the authorities of that day, Jewish and Roman, both uh had Jesus crucified, and yet it was it was God's plan. They they submitted in one sense, so they were sinful in one sense, but in another sense they they carried out God's plan because he is sovereign, and the way that Jesus died was exactly how God wanted him to die. The very time, uh just the right time Christ died for the ungodly, and in the manner in which he was killed through crucifixion was from God. We saw it through the Psalms yesterday, and today we're going to see it through the prophets, and a lot of verses today for sure, and I hope that again that it's digestible. I want it to be, and I don't really apologize for the amount of verses that are in some of these readings, but I also know that um the more there are, the, the, the, the more overwhelming it can be. But I do hope that again, you had you had time today to really, you know, slowly work through these and uh and really appreciate how each one of them speaks to a wide variety of nations, which we've seen before, even all the way back to Sodom and Gomorrah. God judged a lot of nations, his own people by fire, not just Sodom and Gomorrah. And in the same way, we see how God dominates, he overthrows, he crushes, you know, human authorities, human kings all throughout the Bible, um, and his his his from his own people as well as many other nations who were wicked. And the first one we see from Isaiah 14, and part of the passage we read today, is even often considered a commentary on Satan falling from the sky, Satan falling from heaven, you know, because he rebelled against God. But there's no doubt that the specific, you know, direct, you know, um for a first importance application for us is that this is referring to the king of Babylon. And I'll just read a few verses from Isaiah 14. It says, In that wonderful day, Nebuchadnezzar, by the way, when the Lord gives his re people rest from sorrow and fear, from the exile, okay, from slavery and change, you have taught the king of Babylon. You will say, The mighty man has been destroyed. Yes, your insolence is ended. All right, your rebellion is ended, for the Lord has crushed your wickedness and broken your evil rule. And in verse 23, later he says, I will make Babylon a desolate place of owls filled with swamps and marshes. I will sweep the land with the broom of destruction. I, the Lord of heaven's armies, the Lord God of hosts, have spoken. The Lord of hosts, the Lord of heaven's armies, the NLT says, has sworn this oath. It will all happen as I have planned it. It's God's will, God is sovereign. It will be as I have decided. I will break the Assyrians when they are in Israel, the north the the country that exiled the northern kingdom. I will trample them on my own mountains, my people will no longer be their slaves, nor bow down under their heavy loads. I have a plan for the whole earth, a hand of judgment upon all the nations, God says. The Lord of heaven's armies has spoken. Who can change his plans? Isn't that sovereignty? All right. With his hand, when his hand is raised, who can stop him? That's the kind of terminology, the phrases that I was using in question form here, of course, to start this whole, you know, series of discussions, you know, days ago now. Um Isaiah 17. Um, this is actually God's own people, as well as Damascus Ephraim, sometimes used for the northern kingdom, uh, just like Jerusalem is a representative of the southern kingdom, and sometimes even just calling it Salem. But it says, the largest cities will be like a deserted forest, like the lands of the Hivites and the Amorites, abandoned when the Israelites came here so long ago. It will be utterly dead, um, desolate. Why? Because you have turned from the God who can save you, have forgotten the rock who can hide you, so you may plant the finest grapevines and import the most expensive seedlings. They may sprout on the day that you set them out. Yes, they may blossom on the very morning you plant them, but you will never pick any grapes from them. Your only harvest will be a load of grief and unrelieved pain. Listen, the armies of many nations roar like the roarings of the sea, hear the thunder of the mighty forces as they rush toward the like thundering waves. But though they thunder like breakers on a beach, God will silence them, and they will turn away. They will flee like chaffs scattered by the wind, like a tumbleweed whirling before a storm. I don't know if you if it's too much of a banal, you know, like even maybe even a worldly word to say trash talk, but I do think there are times where again God speaks in ways that absolutely is supposed to put people in their place. Um even see that in Job. I think he does that to Job as well. Isaiah 18 to Ethiopia. Um again, a lot of similar, you know, terminology. All you people of the world, everyone who lives on earth, when I raise my battle flag on the mountain, look, when I blow the ram's horn, listen, for the Lord has told me this, I will watch quietly for my dwelling place, as quietly as the heat rises on a summer's day, or the morning dew forms during the harvest. Even when you begin your attack while your plans are ripening like graves, the Lord will cut off your new growth with pruning shears. He will snip off and discard your spreading branches, your mighty army will be left dead in the fields for the mountain vultures and wild animals. Again, just this kind of reminds me as well, even though it was dogs, but even you know, the stories of uh of King Ahab and Jezebel, and the prophecies against them and the execution of those prophecies in the time of Jehu. Um, just the humiliation of their defeat. It's not just God defeats them, he humiliates them. Humbling is not a strong enough word, I think, in some of these stories. The vultures will tear at their corpses all summer, the wild animals will gnaw at their bones all winter. That is God's saying again, at that time, the Lord of heaven's armies will receive gifts. Um, they will bring the gifts to Jerusalem where the Lord of heaven's armies dwells because he's undefeated, he is sovereign, and he no kingdom can stand up to him. And you see again some overlap here, some of the previous days. In Isaiah 40, beautiful and yet powerful, you know, you know, testimony of God. You know, who else has held the oceans in his hand? Behold our God, seated on his throne, that song. Who has measured off the heavens with his fingers? Who else knows the weight of the earth or weighed the mountains on hills on a scale? Who is able to advise the Spirit of the Lord? Who knows enough to give him advice or teach him? So it's possible you can have Romans 11, 33 through 36 and similar passages like that as the basis for that song, Behold Our God. But this is probably, I'm I don't know for sure, but I'm gonna guess this is uh a part of the inspiration for that song. But it goes on to say, did someone teach him what is right or showing the path of justice? For no, for all the nations of the world are but a drop in the bucket. They're nothing more than dust on the scales. He picks up the whole earth as though it were a grain of sand. All the wood in Lebanon's forest and all of Lebanon's animals would not be enough to make a burnt offering worthy of our God. Wow, isn't that powerful? Oh, and the offering again, offering animals was part of their sister, their sacrificial system. And there is just like the love of God, you know, saying if we had, you know, all the ink and the world that could filled up canyons and the sky to ride on, we we couldn't express the love of God in the same way here. The worthiness of God as sovereign over the nations, sovereign over the entire world. There's no animal that exists that could be that could convey his worthiness. The nations of the world are but nothing to him. In his eyes they count for less than nothing, mere emptiness and froth. Then Isaiah 47 in Babylon, our Redeemer, whose name is the Lord of heaven's armies, is the Holy One of Israel. O beautiful Babylon, sit now in darkness and silence. Never again will be known as the Queen of Kingdoms. For I was angry with my chosen people and punished them by letting them fall into your hands for seventy years. But you, Babylon, showed them no mercy. You oppressed even the elderly. You said I will reign as the queen of the world. You did not reflect your act and on your actions or think about your consequences. Listen to this, you pleasure-loving kingdom, living at ease and feeling secure. You say, I am the only one, and there is no other. I will never be a widow or lose my children. Well, both of those things will come upon you in a moment. Widowhood and the loss of children. Yes, these calamities will come upon you despite all your witchcraft and magic. You felt secure in your wickedness. No one sees me, you said, but your wisdom and knowledge have led you astray, and you said, I am the only one, and there is no other, which is true of God, of course. So disaster will overtake you, and you won't be able to charm it away. Calamity will fall upon you, and you won't be able to buy your way out. A catastrophe will strike you suddenly, one for which you are not prepared. Now use your magical charms, use your spells that have worked all these years. Maybe they will do you some good. Maybe they can make someone afraid of you, but of course, and even says, No, all the advice you've received has made you tired. We're all your astrologers and stargazers, and that's that's the kind of thing I think about with Joseph interpreting the dreams in Daniel as well. They didn't do them out to anything. Only God can interpret those dreams. In the same way here, God did this to Babylon. They couldn't do anything to stop it because God is sovereign over all nations, all rulers. Isaiah 63, Edom. Who is this who comes from Edom from the city of Bozrah with his clothing stained red? And that means what it sounds like. Again, this is God as a warrior, right? I didn't include this one, but it's it's it's good enough here. Okay, who is this in the royal robes marching in his great strength? It is I the Lord announcing your salvation. It is I the Lord who has the power to save. Why are your clothes red as if you have been treading out grapes? I have been treading the wine press alone. No one was there to help me. In my anger I have trampled the enemies as if they were grapes. And it does get kind of graphic, so I'll leave that one to you, reading. And then Jeremiah, God, you know, talking to his own people, shout to Judah and broadcast to Jerusalem, tell them the sound of the alarms of the land, run for your lives, flee to the fortified cities, raise a signal flag, a warning to Jerusalem. Flee now, do not delay. A lion stalks in his den, its den, a destroyer of nations, it has left its lair and is headed your way. It is going to devastate your land. Your towns will lie in ruins, and no one living within them any more. So put on clothes of mourning and weep with broken hearts, for the fierce anger of the Lord is still upon us. Jesus known as the lion of the tribe of Judah. I don't know if this is supposed to be a connection at all, but God is compared to a lion, a devouring lion. Um, Jeremiah 9, do not let the wise boast in their wisdom, the or the power boast, or powerful boast in their power, quoted by Paul and Corinthians. Um the rich boast in their riches, but those who wish to boast and boast should boast in this alone, that they truly know me and understand that I am the Lord who demonstrates unfailing love and who brings justice and righteousness to the earth, and that I delight in these things. I, the Lord, have spoken. A time is coming, says the Lord, when I will punish all those who are circumcised in body, but not in spirits. All the Egyptians, Edomites, Amorites, Moabites, Ammonites, Moabites, the people who live in the desert, remote places, and yes, even people in Judah. All like like all these pagan nations, the people of Israel also have uncircumcised hearts. In Jeremiah 16, now you, Lord, are my strength and fortress, my refuge. Our ancestors have left us uh nations around the world will come up to you and say, Our ancestors have left us a foolish heritage, they have worshiped worthless idols. Can you make their can you make the can people make their own gods? They are not real gods at all. The Lord says, Now I will show them power, I will show them my might. At last they will know and understand that I am God. Jeremiah 25. Many nations and great kings will enslave the Babylonians just as they enslaved my people. I will punish them in proportion to the suffering they will cause my people. This is what the Lord God of Israel says. And then Daniel, for to close, and I'll just uh to do these briefly because we're going to go into more detail about Daniel 2, Daniel 4, Daniel 7, and Daniel 11 and other readings. But the idea that you can see here from all of these dreams, all the in the especially of the kingdoms, the four kingdoms that that rise up and then they all fall, because is that you can see that every kingdom, every empire does rise, and it does fall, because there's only one that is going to reign eternally, and that is the God of Christianity, Jesus Christ, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. But I will read this though, because I love this from Daniel chapter 2. And by the way, Daniel 11 is very rich and very deep. It deserves more than just a short treatment, but that's the idea again, even if it's about Alexander the Great, and even if the last part is ultimately about the Antichrist or whatever, the idea is whoever these powers are, they will rise and they will fall. But I'll close with this because we're going to study again these these four chapters whenever we talk about why God didn't want his people to have kings. Um, because kings uh were they God was supposed to be their king. Jesus supposed to be their king, and so kings led them astray so often, kings failed them, and kings let the power go to their heads. And ultimately, God is their king. And that's what we see from these chapters in Daniel. But I close with this. Then Daniel praised the God of heaven. He said, Praise the name of God forever, forever and ever, for he has all wisdom and power. He controls the course of world events, he removes kings and sets up other kings. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the scholars, he reveals deep and mysterious things and knows what lies hidden in darkness, though he is surrounded by light. I thank you and praise you, God of my ancestors, for you have given me wisdom and strength. You have told me what we ask and reveal to us what the king demanded. That's because God is sovereign. God is the sovereign God of the universe. And so we see that, you know, that all the other kingdoms will fail. They'll all cede, they'll all they'll all collapse, they'll all be destroyed, they'll all be knocked out. Remember, we Roman Empire was ancient history to us. There may be small, subtle ways in which what happened then affects us today, but not really. But what happened with Jesus from 2000 years ago deeply affects the world today because he is the eternal king and he is the sovereign king, and all other kingdoms will bow down to him and have have fallen, um, whereas his is eternal, it's everlasting, it's forever. So tomorrow we are going to uh continue uh with this idea, but we're changing the subject just a little bit too instead of God is sovereign over kings and rulers, is we are to worship God as sovereign over all, and it's the same kind of pattern. We'll start with the Psalms and then we'll go to the rest of the Bible. So still continuing with this study on sovereignty. I'm enjoying it. I hope you are as well. So come back and be with us again tomorrow as we continue to read the connections, see the connections, study the connections. Thank you.