ISAIAH 44: CYRUS AND JOSIAH NAMED BEFORE BEING BORN 5-25-13
These two prophecies will bless our hearts and strengthen our faith. -- be sure to mark these scriptures somewhere.
Here in Isaiah 44: is a prophecy that highlights God's omniscience, ** (His all-knowing power) it is one of the most amazing prophecies found anywhere in the Old Testament.
In verse 28 Cyrus, the King of Persia, is named as the coming deliverer of the Jewish people more than 200 years in advance, before he was ever born. --
~What purpose would there be to acknowledging a world conqueror by name after the fact?
~ He is designated as "my shepherd." This is the only instance where a pagan monarch- ruler, is given such a title.
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We'll read verses 24-28 shortly, but first let me say this;
"I am the LORD" is at the beginning of these last 4 verses, and is the subject of all that follows. ---- Nine times in this section the English word "that" is used to identify the activity of JEHOVAH GOD.
* Notice the "that's" as we read; there's a reason for it.
The over-all purpose of this prophecy is to let Israel know that when the prophecy come to pass, that is, when this man Cyrus is on the scene and their set free to return to their home land, they'll know that their deliverance is from the Lord and not from Cyrus, Cyrus is only an instrument in the hand of God.
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God who created the world and who is sovereign over history itself, that's to say, He has supreme, permanent authority, He can predict the future. -- What is nearest as well as what is most remote is equally present to him.
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* Listen as I read;
> Isaiah 44: 24 -28 Thus saith the LORD, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am the LORD that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself;
25 That frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh diviners mad; that turneth wise men backward, and maketh their knowledge foolish;
26 That confirmeth the word of his servant, and performeth the counsel of his messengers; that saith to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be inhabited; and to the cities of Judah, Ye shall be built, and I will raise up the decayed places thereof:
27 That saith to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers:
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~ Notice that GOD has told all these previous truths to Israel, and then HE speaks of Cyrus who is 200 years yet to come, showing that nothing to Him is too hard, it's all the same, He continues on with the ninth "THAT" as all the others.
>28 That saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure: even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built; and to the temple, Thy foundation shall be laid.
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~ The thought continues on in chapter 45: to do with Cyrus, let me remind us that the chapters and verses in the Bible were arranged by man, if verse 28 had been verse 1 here in chapter 45 it would have made perfect scents, nothing would have been changed in the scriptures at all.
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45:1-7 -- God now talks directly to Cyrus as if he was already there.
~ Cyrus knew about these things from reading the prophecy which Isaiah had left behind two hundred and ten years earlier.
~ Cyrus at the beginning of these things knew not God as the God of Israel; the true God was to him an unknown God.
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>1- Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, --
This title (anointed" is symbolic in the sense as a deliverer of God's people from their Babylonian bondage.
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>1-b Thus saith the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, -- whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, ** (meaning weaken their might)
"I will loose the loins of kings" this was literally fulfilled in King Belshazzar, Nebuchadnezzar's grand son, when he saw the writing on the wall--
>Dan. 5: 5-6 In the same hour came forth fingers of a man's hand, and wrote over against the candlestick upon the plaister of the wall of the king's palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.
6Then the king's countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against another.
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1-c and I will loose the loins of kings to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; --
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* God continues to talk to Cyrus;
2 I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron: --
~~~ The armies of the Medes and Persians, under Cyrus, conquered the city of Babylon in a raid described in Daniel 5:-
~ While King Belshazzar** (Nebuchadnezzar's grand son) of Babylon held a drunken party, drinking wine from the holy vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem.
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~ The night Cyrus and his armies conquered the city, they took all the treasures of Babylon, -- it was important that Cyrus know that the LORD had given it to him, and that He, JEHOVAH was the God of Israel.
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~Cyrus conquered the city by diverting the flow of the Euphrates River into a nearby swamp lowering the level of the river so that a number of his troops could walk through the water and under the river-gates and then open the gates from the inside so the rest of his army could enter. --This was while Belshazzar was King.
~But they still would not have been able to enter had not the bronze gates of the inner walls been left unlocked. God opened the gates of the city of Babylon for Cyrus just as He said He would and He put it in writing about 200 years before it happened.
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* Let me give us some back ground about this city of Babylon, it was first founded by Nimrod, it is also the 1st kingdom named in the Bible.
>>Genesis 10: 9-10---Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD. 10And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel. --
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~King Nebuchadnezzar surrounded the city with two walls; these walls were surrounded on the outside with a vast ditch filled with water, Defensive towers were built all along the outer wall which itself was surrounded by a moat filled with water.
~ The walls were Hugh, they were 87 feet thick, 350 feet tall, and 60 miles around, it was square.
~In every side of this great square were 25 gates, that is, 100 in all, which were all made of solid brass; God promised Cyrus that he would break in pieces before him the gates of brass. ---- There was in the city of Babylon eight main gate.
~From the twenty-five gates in each side of this great square were twenty-five streets in straight lines to the gates, from one side of the city to the other side, to a gate, so that the whole number of the streets was fifty, each were fifteen miles long, whereof twenty-five went one way and twenty-five the other, directly crossing each other at right angles, this way all had excess to the gates.
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* God continues to talk to Cyrus;
45: 3And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the LORD, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.
~The rich treasures of Babylon, which the kings of Babylon had taken as spoils of war from all nations they had conquered, including Jerusalem, fell to Cyrus.
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>> 4For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name:--
~~God's focus was on His people. It wasn't Cyrus that moved God to act, but the condition and outcry of His people. It was for their sake.
~NOTICE; -->> 4For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name:--
~Why does God at times refer to His people as Jacob, and also Israel in the same verse?
~~ God called His people "Jacob" when they were out of fellowship ---
--- And "Israel" when they were being obedient.
When He included both names in the same thought, it meant He was referring to everyone. -- The disobedient and the obedient.
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--4-b- I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.
~~Cyrus has been deliberately named in advance to reassure the Jews that the God of Israel truly is still in control of human events.
~ The LORD also did it so Cyrus would show kindness to the people of God, granting them permission to return to the Promised Land from the captivity by the Babylonians.
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>>2 Chronicles 36: 22-23 Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the LORD spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he (Cyrus) made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, 23Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth hath the LORD God of heaven given me; and he hath charged me to build him an house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah.
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>Isa.45: 5-7 I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:
6That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.
7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
~ The phrase "I create evil" refers to physical evil or calamities, consequences, not moral evil.
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* Before our time runs out I want to point out another man named Josiah, he was named about 340 years before the event took place. --
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>1st Kg. 13: 1-2 And, behold, there came a man of God out of Judah by the word of the LORD unto Bethel: -- this man of God's name is not made known to us.
~Apparently, there were no qualified messengers within the northern kingdom of Israel, because of the idolatry that Jeroboam had caused and allowed,
~Jeroboam was a wicked king in the northern kingdom called Israel, and some times it is referred to as Ephraim, after Jeroboam's tribe. -- Ephraim-
--10 tribes made up the northern kingdom; the 2 tribes of Benjamin and Judah were the southern kingdom, called "Judah"
~ Later ASSRYIA would take the northern kingdom into captivity, and then over 100 years later the southern kingdom of Judah would be taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.
-- 1-b- and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense.
~Jeroboam dismissed the priestly tribe of Levi and appointed his own priests; ~ Jeroboam a wicked king led Israel into gross idolatry.
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2And he cried (man of God) against the altar in the word of the LORD, and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the LORD; Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee (the altar) shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee.
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~ God graciously sent an unnamed prophet out of Judah to denounce the altar at Bethel, issuing a warning to Jeroboam who was caught in the act of burning incense there. The prophet announced that Josiah, a son of David (a king from Judah), would someday burn the bones of Jeroboam's ungodly priests on that very altar.
~ This prophecy specifically names Josiah over three hundred years before the actual event.
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* 2nd Kgs. 23:15--20 ---- it comes to pass;
15Moreover the altar that was at Bethel, and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, had made, both that altar and the high place he (Josiah) brake down, and burned the high place, and stamped it small to powder, and burned the grove.* Pagan Image of a false god--
16And as Josiah turned himself, he spied the sepulchres ** (graves) that were there in the mount, and sent, and took the bones out of the sepulchres, and burned them upon the altar, and polluted it, according to the word of the LORD which the man of God proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.
(1stKgs.13)
17Then he said, What title is that that I see? And the men of the city told him, It is the sepulchre of the man of God, which came from Judah, ** and proclaimed these things that thou hast done against the altar of Bethel.
18And he said, (Josiah said) Let him alone; let no man move his bones. So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet that came out of Samaria.
~~ Josephus the Israeli historian describes the prophet of Samaria as a wicked man, a false prophet, that wicked king Jeroboam, held in high regard.
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(The prophet that came out of Samaria, the false prophet) talked the prophet from Judah into eating some food, but the Lord had commanded the prophet from Judah not to eat or drink water there, it caused his death, the prophet from Samaria ask to be buried in the same grave with this man of God from Judah because he knew about the prophecy to do with burning the priest bones on the altar that Jeroboam had offered sacrifices on, he knew his bones would be safe buried with the unnamed prophet from Judah.
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19And all the houses also of the high places that were in the cities of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had made to provoke the LORD to anger, Josiah took away, and did to them according to all the acts that he had done in Bethel. 20And he slew all the priests of the high places that were there upon the altars, and burned men's bones upon them, and returned to Jerusalem.
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