Concerned About Nineveh

27 Apr

Nahum 1:1-8

The Young Man From TikTok

I was talking recently to my friend Tom, a pastor who’s recently planted a church in South East England. One weekend, some young people came to visit his church. By that stage, about 15 had come of their own volition, all with the same story.

One said: "I've been reading about Jesus on TikTok. I've been hearing what Jesus teaches on TikTok." Tom was bemused, he didn't know if TikTok could really get across everything Jesus said and did and who He is.

But this young person said: "I became a Christian. I went to a Christian bookshop. I bought myself a Bible. But I don't understand it. Could you help me?"

What a wonderful insight into someone seeking God, answering His call, even through TikTok.

That is the attitude of working out your salvation with fear and trembling. Not sitting back waiting for God to reveal Himself somehow. Actually being interested in finding out who God is. Interested in getting to know the God who is there, not the God I want to create in my imagination.

Because the God who is there has a wonderful character. And He is complex beyond our knowing. There's no way finite people like us can understand the infinite God.

Paul on the Road to Damascus

It is a fearful thing to turn our backs on someone so magnificent, majestic, and powerful as God.

Despite how impressive the stars and planets are, He also made us—as the pinnacle of His creation, to have a relationship with us.

Yet we turned our backs on Him.

Paul made a step toward God, not through TikTok, but by meeting the Living Jesus on the road to Damascus. When he met Jesus, whom he was persecuting, he fell on his knees and was blinded by His glory. He realised he'd been persecuting God Himself. He was struck to the heart.

If Jesus hadn't revealed Himself to Paul that day, Paul was destined to an eternity away from God in hell, to be punished for his sins committed in rebellion against God's good plan.

Yet in His love, mercy, and graciousness, Jesus appeared to Paul on that road.

That fearful moment of recognition, his need to accept the sacrifice of Jesus for him and his sins, his realisation that when Jesus died on the cross it wasn't just as a victim of Jews and Romans, but that Jesus went to the cross to take away the only barrier between us and God so we can have a restored relationship, led Paul to repent and become one of the greatest evangelists the world's ever seen.

The fear and trembling that led him to that decision did not end after his conversion. He continued to work out his salvation with fear and trembling because he knows God has the power to cast him into hell.

He is worshipping the most powerful God.

In context in Philippians, this verse doesn't mean work out your salvation by earning it through good deeds. It means nothing but accepting grace given through faith in Jesus Christ.

Instead, it means to be actively living out, cultivating, pursuing spiritual maturity in your daily life. We don't play with God. We don't play with holiness. We don't play with sanctification. We pursue spiritual maturity, not paying lip service, but exercising spiritual devotion by developing something that's been given to us.

"Fear and trembling" refers to humble reverence and awe, respect toward God, not terror or anxiety, but serious caution against sin. To look on sin as something to be feared, not allowing it to take a foothold.

Understanding Nahum: The Assyrian Empire

About a hundred years before the prophet Nahum, God sent another prophet, Jonah, to Nineveh, the capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire.

God said to Jonah: "The people of Nineveh, the Neo-Assyrians, are vile. They're really, really bad.

So I want you to go tell them I'll forgive them if they repent."

Jonah said: "I think they're vile. I'm getting as far away as I can."

Cut a long story short: there’s a storm, sailors throw Jonah overboard, big fish swallows him, swims back toward Nineveh for three days, spits him out on a beach. Jonah says, "Okay God, I'll go."

An unwilling prophet who doesn't want God to show mercy on the Assyrian Empire. Against all expectations, when he tells them God is angry with their sin, they repented. They decided, like Paul on the road to Damascus, to stop living life their way and start trying to serve the Living God.

Even though Nineveh were awful people, God gave them a chance to repent. He loved them because He'd made them in His image. Yes, they'd rebelled. Yes, they'd made an awful empire serving out injustice like Pizza Hut serves pizzas. But God is compassionate. He's slow to anger.

Then we get to Nahum, a hundred years later. And we find out what happens when mercy is ignored.

The Assyrian Empire

The Assyrian Empire rose in northern Mesopotamia around 900 BC, becoming the dominant power of the ancient world. It expanded aggressively, developing one of the most advanced military systems of its time, inventing terror through their army. It ruled through fear, violence, and psychological terror.

Nineveh became a vast, impressive city—fortified, wealthy, seemingly untouchable.

Assyria conquered nations including the northern kingdom of Israel in 722 BC, deporting entire populations. In 631 BC, cracks appeared, internal instability, overextension, rebellion from subject nations.

An alliance formed between Babylon and the Medes. In 612 BC, they besieged Nineveh. After months of fighting, the city fell. It was destroyed, burned, and never recovered. Assyria never rose again. Within a few years, the empire was gone.

Nahum speaks into this exact historical moment.

Three Truths From Nahum 1:1-8

1. God Is Just and Patient (vv. 2-3)

"The Lord is a jealous and avenging God... The Lord is slow to anger but great in power. The Lord will not leave the guilty unpunished."

Two truths held together: God is just and will act against evil AND God is patient and delays judgment.

God's jealousy isn't a character flaw. He's jealous for His glory and honour. He's jealous for His creation being used properly. He's jealous when people use the lives He's gifted them to hurt others and take lives.

God is avenging—a very strong word. God is terrifying in His judgment. But unlike the Assyrians. God judges those who enact injustice on others.

The second truth: God is patient and delays judgment, but that doesn't mean He's not going to exact judgment. He's the same God of Jonah. The mercy was real. But the justice remained.

Don't mistake God's patience for permission. Delayed judgment is not cancelled judgment.

If you don't accept Christ and His work on the cross, you and I have to accept the consequences of our sin ourselves. But if we ask for forgiveness in the name of Jesus, He is punished in our place. He takes on God's wrath. There's a technical word for this: propitiation. Jesus' propitiation on the cross turns God's wrath away from us onto Jesus.

2. God Is Powerful Over Creation and Nations (vv. 3b-6)

"His way is in the whirlwind and the storm."

Nahum shows us a God who can actually act in judgment. He has the power. He's not just morally right, He's cosmically powerful.

Seas dry up. Rivers fail. Mountains quake. Earth trembles. "Who can withstand his indignation?" (v. 6). The answer: No one. Even the greatest empire.

Empires boast when they think they've got the biggest military. Queen Victoria once said when a colony revolted: "We'll send a gunboat." They did. She said: "We'll send another one." The British Empire, where the sun never set, a quarter of the world under its dominion—seemed like it would never fall. Where is it now?

It's best not to boast about how powerful we are. In contrast to God, we are nothing.

It's not just the God of the Old Testament with this quality. Remember Jesus in Mark 4:39? Asleep in the front of a boat during a storm that looked like it would sink them. He got up, rebuked the wind, said to the waves: "Quiet! Be still!" Wind died down. Completely calm.

The disciples asked: "Who is this? Even the wind and waves obey him."

The answer: The Lord of Nahum. The terrifying God of the universe whose way is the whirlwind now stands in a boat and the storm obeys Him.

The danger in modern Australia: we think too lightly of Jesus. He's not just a good mate. He's not just someone for when we come to church. He's the Lord of Nahum. He's the Lord of all.

3. God Is Our Refuge (v. 7)

"The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in him."

All that anger toward sin is toward those who oppose Him. He crushes those who oppose Him. He gives them time, waits patiently for them to respond and repent. There's no better example than the Assyrians, saved at Nineveh the first time, then judged after a hundred years.

But those who turn to Christ find refuge.

If you haven't already thought about committing your life to Jesus, maybe this is a good time. If you're a Christian, can I re-encourage you to take refuge in Jesus—not in money, success, power, performance, what people think of you, pleasure, hedonism, or all the things of this world that look so good on the surface but offer nothing.

Judgment isn't random. It's part of God's commitment to protect what is His.

4. God's Judgment Means the End of Nineveh (v. 8)

"With an overwhelming flood, he will make an end of Nineveh."

During the siege of Nineveh in 612 BC, floodwaters from the Tigris River weakened or broke part of the city walls, allowing attacking forces to enter.

What God declares through Nahum, God brings about. This isn't theory. This isn't just what I think. This isn't just what the church teaches. God always does what He says He's going to do.

The great city fell. The empire collapsed. It never recovered.

Not Just History

In Matthew 24:37-39, Jesus gives a similar warning: "As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be with the coming of the Son of Man. They knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them away."

Just like Nineveh, God dealt with the sin of the world through a flood. While He promised never to flood the whole earth again, there's an eerie similarity between what God did with Noah and what God did through Nahum.

This is not just history. This is prophesying our future.

One day God will enact justice on this world. People will be just as unprepared as they were at Nineveh and during Noah's time. In Noah's time, they were getting married, having parties, building barns—then the waters rose.

Mercy is real. Just as real as judgment. But it's not to be presumed upon.

The message is clear: Don't ignore God's justice. Don't underestimate His power. Don't miss His invitation. Let the Lord be your refuge and trust in Him.