Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Judah's Captivity
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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Isaiah 2:6-22
Isaiah 2 provides us with a detailed overview of the immorality that existed in Judah a few years before they fell to the Babylonian armies of Nebuchadnezzar. Isaiah reports what he witnessed the people being involved in, and he also foresaw the conclusion if no repentance occurred. It was a time not far different from what we observe in America today. God is illustrating in His own picturesque way that pride (loftiness and haughtiness), emanating from within man and triggering his conduct, is heavily involved in human life—perhaps it is even the basis and foundation of all sin. He mentions the accumulation of wealth in the form of treasures, silver, gold, chariots, and horses. He speaks of manufacturing (the works of their own hands) and of religion (creating idols). He portrays things of sturdy power (oaks of Bashan) and things of grace and beauty (cedars of Lebanon). He mentions military power (high towers and fortified walls), large nations (high mountains) and small nations (hills that are lifted up), and commerce (beautiful sloops).
John W. Ritenbaugh
Living By Faith and Human Pride
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Jeremiah 2:9-26
This passage is an intense survey of Judah's behavior in that period just before they went into captivity. In the next chapter God divorces Israel. This is like the final pleading or contention, the straw that broke the camel's back. The intensity of her drive to show disrespect for God is illustrated in the comparison of the dromedary and the wild ass in heat. Nobody can hold those female animals back when they are in heat! It is as if Israel was always in heat in order to commit adultery in departing from God. We have to make the connection that we are called from a nation cut from the same cloth, and in us is the same potential for unbelieving stubbornness and fickleness, whose fruit is immature, irresponsible unfaithfulness to obligation. The wayward drive is actually in all of mankind, but Israel is more responsible than any other nation on earth because she has been given so much in the way of knowledge. Satan has succeeded in deceiving the whole world. Among these deceptions is that modern Israel is Christian. But Israel has never been truly Christian. It presents a counterfeit to the world, and it has nonetheless spread its wine over the entire world, drugging it with its poor example, and inducing much to the world to follow. This particular deception that Israel is Christian is dangerous to true church members since the vast majority of the people of God are in Israelitish nations, and it has the power to make us feel an affinity with Israel's brand of false Christianity. But that affinity might just lure us into producing the same tolerant, non-judgmental, politically correct, multi-cultural Laodiceanism commonly displayed in the Israelitish country. It hinders the separation from the world required of us by making us feel a lingering sense of oneness with Israel.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Where Is the Beast? (Part Seven)
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Jeremiah 25:3-5
Jeremiah was God's prophet at this time, when Judah was just about to suffer captivity. He was God's last major prophet—the last one He sent to appeal to the Judeans before their society, their civilization, came to an end. What was Jeremiah's complaint? "For twenty-three years I've been speaking to you, and you're not listening." And because they did not listen, by the time of Jeremiah 25, the nation had already been defeated, and a small group of refugees was on the run trying to save their lives. So Jeremiah made it very plain: "You didn't listen." This is typical of why Jesus admonishes us to listen. They heard, but they did not listen. The direct result was ultimately the pain of warfare, but also all of the disruptions in society before the war actually broke out—the kind of things that our culture is struggling with now—things similar to the drug scene, rampant murder, all kinds of disease, and so forth. God said if they would only repent, He would heal them. They did not listen. They did not repent. They did not get healed. Instead, they went through war and into captivity, and these few had to flee for their lives. God is saying what almost any parent would say to a child in a similar situation: "I told you not to do that, but you wouldn't listen." How many times have we said that to our children? Why did Judah not listen? The answer is not difficult. They did not listen because, to them, the word spoken by God's prophets carried no authority. They dismissed it as a little thing, of having no consequence. It carried no authority with them because the people had no faith in God's sovereignty. Because these people had made the covenant with God and had been taught by one of God's prophets, if asked if they believed in God, these Judeans would have replied, "Yes, I believe in God." But the practical reality is that they had no faith in God; they lived as if He were nowhere around. They did not have faith that He had the power to do what He said or that He cared enough about them to do it. In a word, they did not have living faith. Why is it so important to listen to God's message? Because it is to those who listen and believe the message that God's summons comes and through whom God's work is done.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Sovereignty of God (Part One)
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Ezekiel 2:3
The book of Ezekiel is addressed to the house of Israel, with Judah included within greater Israel. But the context of the book as a whole is primarily addressed to Israel, which was already in captivity when Ezekiel was written. Israel and Judah went into captivity at separate times; Judah went into captivity one hundred and twenty years after Israel did. However, the message in Ezekiel was written while the cause of their captivity was continuing in Judah. Ezekiel 20 exposes what caused them to go into captivity: idolatry and Sabbath breaking. What caused Israel and Judah to go into captivity at separate times was still going on! Since Judah went into captivity a hundred and twenty years after Israel, and Ezekiel was a Jew in Babylonian captivity, Ezekiel's message never reached the house of Israel! The main body of Israelites had already begun their lengthy migration toward the northwest. Therefore, what we see in the book of Ezekiel is an account by God, through the prophet of 1) past history; 2) events occuring even as Ezekiel wrote; and 3) what is prophesied to happen, things being fulfilled today.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Sabbathkeeping (Part 2)
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Ezekiel 8:12
Their sins did not slip by God, did they? God says their sins done "in the dark . . . filled the land with violence." Their lives affected the whole nation! The result was God's unsparing judgment descending upon Judah, and thousands of lives ended in death or captivity.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Little Things Count!
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