If you follow the Bible reading schedule, you would have just finished reading Nahum. This sermon will draw teachings from the book of Nahum.

In 1845, there was an Englishman called Laya(?) who was an excavations. There was an Iraqian called Mosu Rasa(?). They decided to organise a dig in Nimrod(?). Laya wasn’t new to this, he had conducted
But what he really wanted to uncover was ancient Babylon. That’s why when he went to Nimrod(?) he really hoped he’d be able to uncover something. On the first day of the excavation, he seemed to have uncovered the boundary of a palace. The next day, he uncovered a huge quantity of alabaster used to plaster the walls of the palace. As he continued, he discovered more tablets that had engravings. They described the king of Assyria and the enemies he had conquered and were subject to him. 4 years later, he excavated the entire city of Nineveh. In 1849, he published a book ‘Nineveh and its remains’. It was a hot selling book.

People have heard about the story of Nineveh but many reckon it’s just a fable. But this excavation caused many to believe it’s a real place.

Nahum 1:14
This verse concerns a prophecy concerning the city of Nineveh. It describes the upcoming destruction and annihilation of their future generations. The carved images they had made would be cut up and put into the grave. The findings of the archaeologists truly attests Nineveh would be destroyed and buried. Only after over two millennial were its remains discovered.

Many people doubted the existence of Nineveh. Today as we take a look at the book of Nahum, it can be summarised as a judgement to Nineveh. The city of Nineveh was built up before 2000 BCE. It was only around 12th C BCE that it became the capital of Assyria. It’s located at present day Mosu in Iraq. It’s a rectangular city. The circumference of the city is 6miles. From the book of Jonah, it takes 3 days to walk the length of the city. Nineveh is a place that collects all the culture and relics of Assyria. Many temples could be found in the city centre. Many of its buildings were lavish. The River Tigris runs through the city. The walls of Nineveh were famous for its breadth and height. It’s said that up to 4 chariots can travel on top of the walls. Nineveh was initially a city state. It had a very effective administrative system. As it gradually extended its power, whether during the time of Jonah or prophet Nahum, its border had extended so far, Israel became part of it. The two main gods Asur and Ishtar
Asur is the chief protector of the Assyrians. Ishtar is the god of fertility/love and also protects. Another prominent feature of the Assyrians is that they were a very violent empire.

We can read the books of Jonah and Nahum together. Interestingly, in the Septuagint, these two books are put together because they share the commonality of being messages directed to Nineveh.

One interesting feature of these two books is that they conclude with a question.
Jonah 4:11 (read)
Nahum 3:19
While these two books are similar in that they’re messages to Nineveh, they conclude in a very different manner. In Jonah, all of Nineveh from the top to bottom of society repented. When Jonah couldn’t accept God’s compassion on the people, God asked him, “Jonah 4:11”
The people who can’t tell their right from their left are children. They can’t discern. That’s why God allows them to continue being alive.

But in Nahum, the end was that the city of Nineveh was completely annihilated. The rest of the people celebrated this; none pitied their destruction. “Upon whom has your wickedness not passed continually?”

How did Nineveh end with such a plight? Nahum has 3 chapters. Chapter 1 describes how God felt towards the people.
v2 “God is jealous and the Lord avenges”
v3 He will not at all acquit the wicked
v9 Our God is a God of wrath

Yet there’s another side of God. v3 shows that God is slow to anger. v7 The Lord is good.
This shows us God’s nature is complete and perfect. Towards evil and sinners, their sins won’t be acquitted. He remembers their wicked deeds and will recompense them accordingly; with fierce judgement. But towards a person who’s humble and turns to God as a protector, God is slow to anger. In the day of trouble, God will be a stronghold to him. God recognises those who put their trust in Him.

Apart from all of that, God comforts the southern kingdom of Judah.
Nahum 1:15
Assyria had constantly oppressed Judah. After God had executed His judgement on Assyria, Judah would be able to keep its appointed feasts.

Chapter 2 describes the actual destruction of Nineveh.
v3-4 describes a coalition between Medes and Babylon as they assaulted Nineveh. It was through the armies of these two nations that God executed His judgement. Nineveh then was still a strong city. But when judgement came upon them suddenly, they didn’t have time to react.
v5 “They make haste to her walls, and the defense is prepared” They rushed to defend but they were haphazard in doing so. They stumbled, perhaps over corpses. The Bible also describes that their corpses would be piled until people would stumble over them (Nahum 3:3). Once they were very vicious in their assaults; they killed so many people that others would stumble over the corpses. Now it was their turn.

Furthermore, God helped these invaders.
Nahum 2:6
“The gates of the rivers are opened, and the place is dissolved.”
According to Greek tradition, when Nineveh was being assaulted, the tributary of the River Gosher(?) was flooded and broke through the city walls. The walls they were once so proud of now had openings for enemies to enter. They were unprepared.

Nahum 2:10 describes the fear the Ninevites felt when they saw the invaders. Their hearts melted, their knees shook and their faces drained of colour. The lion represents the city of Nineveh because they had once ripped apart many nations. v13 When the Lord God pronounces judgement, the young lions will be devoured.

Why would God proclaim such a great judgement in Nineveh? Some people cannot accept the judgement mentioned in Nahum because they can’t accept God is so cruel. The description of God’s judgement is of utter destruction. But God’s judgement is also righteous.

Chapter 3 describes why God judged the people.
v1-2 The city of Nineveh was a mighty military nation, built by violence. If we do a bit of a search, the Ninevites treat their conquered nations very cruelly. Their methods were very inhumane to the extent they skinned their captives while they were alive. They’d use spears to pierce through their bodies. These were very gruesome. Not only that, read v4. Nineveh was a city full of idol worship. Once they had conquered a nation, they would take the people of that nation captive. Then they would situate these captives within their cities. In the process, they would introduce their Assyrian gods to these places so that their own religion would have a strong influence on the captured nations. This is why the northern kingdom of Israel became an idol worshipping nation. They were affected by all the Assyrian gods that had moved into their nation. They corrupted the nations. This is why God proclaimed judgement upon Nineveh - a city full of violence and idolatry.

Nahum 3:11-12
God describes that the time of their judgement had already come like the fig trees with their ripened figs. “If they are shaken, they fall into the mouth of the eater.”

Read v13, 15, 17

What has the terrifying judgement upon the city of Nineveh got to do with us?

1. Never become an energy of God
   Rom 11:22
   God is very good and gracious to us; this is directed towards those who’ll receive mercy. But to those who have fallen, God will be severe. Which of these two groups do we belong to? The group God shows His goodness to or the group God is severe towards?

Today if we want to submit to God, our motivation will either come from our love for God or our want to repay God. Another thing that may motivate us is our fear towards His judgement, because His judgement towards those who fall is very severe.

Rev 6 describes how God will judge the other nations.
Rev 6:15-16
These verse describes the fear of the people who didn’t believe in God when judgement comes upon them. They rather have mountains and rocks fall on them than face the judgement of God.
When it comes to death, there’re different levels of fear.

In the 9/11 incident, people were trapped in the burning towers and knew they were going to die. Some chose to jump down. They preferred death from a height than death from burning. For us, if our gratitude towards God can’t motivate us to serve Him, then perhaps we can consider having the fear of judgement to motivate us.

Let us not be enemies of God, for His wrath is very fearsome.

How can we end up becoming enemies of God? How did the Assyrians/Ninevites become enemies of God?

1. We can take a look at the beginning of the city of Nineveh to understand what was going through their minds.

Gen 10:9-11
The founder of Nineveh was Nimrod. What kind of person was Nimrod? One of his accomplishments we’re familiar with is that he initiated the building of the towel of Babel (Gen 11:1-3). Nimrod and his people who has come to the land of Shinar wanted to build a very tall tower. We know after the great flood, God gave a clear commandment: to multiply and fill up the land. Yet the people here did otherwise. They congregated together and wanted to make a name for themselves lest they scatter. They expressly made known they wanted to go against the commandment of God. God wanted them to live throughout the entire face of the earth, they wanted to congregate together.

Besides being rebellious, these people were arrogant too. We can see this from how they wanted to build a tower that extended to the heavens, where God is. They wanted to compete against God.

In the garden of Eden, Eve ate the fruit because she wanted to be like God to know good and evil. It was because of her pride that all of mankind is in sin.

So we see Nineveh originated from a group of people who wanted to rebel against God.

1. They didn’t completely repented. In last week’s sermon on zhubajie, one of the points raised was a sow that has been cleaned returns to the mire. We shouldn’t find God’s judgement on Nineveh to be unreasonable. More than a century before their destruction, God forgave the people for their sins when Jonah warned them and they repented. But they returned to their violent ways.

2 Kings 18:19-20, 35
The general Rabshekah came before king Hezekiah of Judah to provoke him. They had been warned by God prior to this. They repented. And then continued in their violent ways. They provoked Judah by saying, “Who among all the gods of the lands have delivered their countries from my hand, that the Lord should deliver Jerusalem from my hand?”
This contributed to their downfall; they had turned away from their original repentance.

For us today: if we have received grace and repented of our ways, but then return to it, no matter how sincere our past repentance was, God will judge us for what we are.

Now let’s look at the small population of the kingdom of Judah. When God pronounced judgement on Nineveh, God promises to be a stronghold for Judah. In the day of trouble when they’re attacked by Assyria, God would be a stronghold.

2 Kings 19:6-7, 35
This describes how God took matters into His own hands and became a protector to Judah. Even though Assyria threatened Judah, (Hezekiah was desperate and didn’t know what to do, giving the Holy vessels to the king of Assyria thinking it’ll cause him to leave but that didn’t work. Judah was in labour pains) thank God they turned to God, and God delivered them. God killed in the camp of Assyria 85,000 people. This isn’t recorded in world history but some historians are responded. Typically the Assyrians return to their nations after they win a victory. But here they return in defeat. Some people say that if the Assyrians had won this battle, the nation of Israel would never have recovered. History would be different. There would be no nation of Israel; they would have been assimilated/separated. But God protected the kingdom of Judah.

When God becomes the protector or assurer of a person, that person can truly be at rest. Perhaps materially/physically/health-wise we aren’t facing threats, but that doesn’t mean we’ll never fall into perils or crises. In fact we are all in a great crisis.

Rev 18:6-7
Here describes Babylon the great harlot as a strong influence on us Christians today. Babylon describes the entire mindset and culture of the world today. The world propagates leading a life of sin today. Therefore even though this lifestyle doesn’t physically cause us to suffer, it has an influence on our thinking.

This harlot is drunk on the blood of the saints. It’s clear this influence is directed towards us who worship God. This persecution/attack is directed towards our spiritual lives. This is why under these circumstances, we must know how to turn to God. Just like how the people of Judah knew they could turn to God to seek His help.

In our life of faith, we have to be aware we’re living in the midst of this crisis. When we look at the sinful lifestyles of others, do we feel like we’re living in an environment that persecutes our faith? Do we know that when we turn to God for help, God will be our refuge?

Conclusion:
Exo 34:6-7 (read)
Consider: which side do we want to stand on?
If we were to become an enemy of God, just like the Ninevites, God won’t clear our sin but pursue them. But if we become people God has mercy on, He’ll be gracious and cause us to abound.

May the Lord help us all.