Nahum 3

I am against...

Nahum 3:1-19

Nahum 3:5

Behold, I am against you, declares the LORD of hosts, and will lift up your skirts over your face; and I will make nations look at your nakedness and kingdoms at your shame. (use)

The disappearance of the Assyrian people will always remain an unique and striking phenomenon in ancient history. Other, similar, kingdoms and empires have indeed passed away, but the people have lived on. Recent discoveries have, it is true, shown that poverty-stricken communities perpetuated the old Assyrian names and various places, for instance on the ruined site of Ashur, for many centuries, but the essential truth remains the same. A nation which had existed two thousand years and had ruled a wide area, lost its independent character.

Bury, J.B., 1928. The Cambridge Ancient History.
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Nahum 3:1

Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and plunder-- no end to the prey! (use)

Nahum 3:4

And all for the countless whorings of the prostitute, graceful and of deadly charms, who betrays nations with her whorings, and peoples with her charms. (use)

Generally it is thought that only uneducated people go for the practices of the sorcerer. But perhaps the most superstitious are the so-called scientific. Out of a misplaced confidence in their own theories and hypotheses they somehow convince themselves that they control the future. Economists and political scientists set themselves to determine and declare the future. They call for faith in their predictions, even though they are proven to be wrong over and over.

Robertson, O.P., 1990. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah. New International Commentaries on the Old Testament series. Pg.104
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Nineveh arraigned and indicted. It is a high charge that is here drawn up against that great city, and neither her numbers nor her grandeur shall secure her from prosecution.

Henry, M., 1896. Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible. UK. Nahum
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Note, It will help to keep us in a holy fear of the judgments of God to consider that we are not better than those that have fallen under those judgments before us. We deserve them as much, and are as little able to grapple with them.

Henry, M., 1896. Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible. UK. Nahum
mhcom-nahum~3v8

Nahum 3:5

Behold, I am against you, declares the LORD of hosts, and will lift up your skirts over your face; and I will make nations look at your nakedness and kingdoms at your shame. (use)

Nahum 3:6

I will throw filth at you and treat you with contempt and make you a spectacle. (use)

Nahum 3:7

And all who look at you will shrink from you and say, "Wasted is Nineveh; who will grieve for her?" Where shall I seek comforters for you? (use)

Nahum 3:8

Are you better than Thebes that sat by the Nile, with water around her, her rampart a sea, and water her wall? (use)

Nahum 3:10

Yet she became an exile; she went into captivity; her infants were dashed in pieces at the head of every street; for her honored men lots were cast, and all her great men were bound in chains. (use)

Nahum 3:11

You also will be drunken; you will go into hiding; you will seek a refuge from the enemy. (use)

Nahum 3:16

You increased your merchants more than the stars of the heavens. The locust spreads its wings and flies away. (use)

A lack of faith in societal institutions triggered by economic anxiety, disinformation, mass-class divide and a failure of leadership has brought us to where we are today – deeply and dangerously polarized.

Edelman, 2023. Edelman Trust Barometer.
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Business is the only institution seen as competent and ethical.

Edelman, 2023. Edelman Trust Barometer.
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I know some will take umbrage and say, "This minimizes God's care for every individual." But I've had the opposite experience. Cosmic salvation right-sizes my outsized ego. It reminds me that I can only find myself in a grand drama where I'm *not* the star.

Miller, P., 2023. Cosmic Salvation.
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Nahum 3:18

Your shepherds are asleep, O king of Assyria; your nobles slumber. Your people are scattered on the mountains with none to gather them. (use)

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

Jobs, S., 2005. Commencement Speech at Stanford.
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What God has said in this chapter concerning Assyria fits our nation like a glove. One glove fits Assyria—and that's been fulfilled. The other glove fits the United States. But are we listening to God today? No. No one to speak of is paying any attention. Certainly the leadership of our nation is not. The tragedy of the hour is our retreat from God and our rejection of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, the Savior of the world.

McGee, J., 1983. Thru the Bible with J. Vernon McGee.
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Nahum 3:19

There is no easing your hurt; your wound is grievous. All who hear the news about you clap their hands over you. For upon whom has not come your unceasing evil? (use)

Is this book only about God's judgment on Nineveh and the Assyrians, or does it have a broader message? The reasons God brought Nineveh and the Assyrian Empire down are the same reasons He will humble any similar people. Any nation or city that lusts for conquest, practices violence and brutality to dominate others, abuses its power, oppresses the weak, worships anything but Yahweh, or seeks help from the demonic world— shares in Nineveh's sins and can expect her fate.

Constable, T., 2022. Expository Notes.
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Topics and Themes

Key Verse

Nahum 3:1

Woe to the bloody city, all full of lies and plunder— no end to the prey! (use)