Isaiah 19

Every land has its pride and glory. In the state that we live in we are proud of a rock formation on the side of a mountain that looks like the rugged face of an old man. In recent years this has become more obviously absurd since the rock formation fell off of the side of the mountain. Some of the residents wanted to hold a memorial service for the "Old Man of the Mountain." His image still appears on the license plates of our cars, though the "man" who never was in now most decidedly gone.

The ancient Egyptians had a more reasonable boast in the River Nile. It's waters were necessary for the prosperity of the economy. Without the overflow of the Nile the field would have no water and would produce no grain. The effect of this disaster would be felt by so many within the nation, both high and low, if the river ever became dry and parched.

Who has power over the Nile? If some evil person or nation could dry out the Nile by an act of will, the nation would be brought to her knees. But there is a good God who can dry up the bed of the sea by His own command, and all nations must finally bow before Him. In Isaiah 19 we read that it is this good God's intention to do this very thing, and many will humble themselves before Him in the midst of their great suffering.

The Lord is stronger than the supposed gods of any nation who must cringe before Him when He comes in power. All the Egyptian idols would be unable to keep the Nile flowing, and thus to deliver the nation from disaster. The people of Egypt and her proudest leaders would also be brought low and would have to eventual admit their inability.

Leadership is a wonderful gift of God. There is little doubt that some people are able to inspire the confidence of their countrymen and lead them in the crucial moments that define the future and which require a more then perfunctory courage. But above all those leaders and beyond all of the people who would follow, there is a God who really has defined the future before any subordinate leader forged a pathway of strength. If He chooses to show the counsel of wise men to be foolishness, or to turn friends into adversaries and brothers into enemies, He can easily throw a nation into confusion in a moment. They may turn to their idols or consult the dead, but all of it will be for nothing if the Lord God Almighty has purposed to bring a people low.

Isaiah indicates that this will happen to Egypt. This part of the story is not very surprising to anyone who knew the heritage of God's dealings with Egypt. In this land God's people were slaves for hundreds of years. They cried out to God and He delivered them through the hand of Moses. He humbles the Egyptians and their king with miraculous signs and wonders displayed through the agency of His chosen mediator.

The surprise of Isaiah 19, similar to the good news for the tribal groups associated with Cush in Chapter 18, is that God has a wonderful plan of grace which will most certainly reach the Egyptians. Throughout the great exodus of Israel from the grip of Egypt, God had made a very definite distinction between Egypt and Israel. One group gets drowned in the Red Sea, the other crosses on dry land. How shocking is it then when God tells us here that His intentions for Egypt (and also for Assyria) will be intentions of grace!

These nations had no right to partake in the sacrifices, the offerings, and the vows of the Jews. They were strangers to the law of the circumcised and could not partake of the assemblies and rituals of those who worshiped God in the temple in Jerusalem. Yet here we are told that there is a day coming when both the Egyptians and the Assyrians will know the Lord and will fear Him. Using the prophetic idiom of Old Testament sacraments and regulations, Isaiah announces that there will be a strange common bond between the Egyptians, the Assyrians, and the Jews in some future day.

Somehow they will all worship together. Their practices will not be some compromise of three very different systems of religious rituals and customs. These people will all worship the God of Jacob, and they will be blessed by God, and will in turn be a blessing to the earth, rather than a terror to the weak. This is an amazing miracle, and it can only be fulfilled in Christ. Though Old Testament words are used since the original audience is presented this amazing truths in the words of their own devotional practices, the reality of the prophesy can only be a New Testament fulfillment based on the common bond of a Jewish Messiah.

Through Jesus, Egypt and Assyria are called the people of God, the work of Yahweh's hands, the inheritance of the Lord. Just as not all Israel is Israel, in the words of the Apostle Paul, not every individual Egyptian and Assyrian will be counted among the people of the Lord. Yet many will be counted as the beloved people of God, bought by the blood of Christ, and granted the gift of faith in the name of our glorious Messiah. Surely we have not yet seen the greatest fulfillment of this wonderful prophesy, but in our day we can almost taste it as we see indigenous church planting movements springing up in the Middle East in the midst of great suffering.

Only God could have done this, and He appears to be doing it even in our generation through the message of the Christian gospel. This is no time for the nations of the world to turn to powerless Egyptian deities or empty and false philosophies that only bring slavery. Through freedom Christ we have been set free, and nothing - not even the worst persecution - can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.