Week 30 Nahum
I read Jonah to start the week and Nahum to finish it. A nice coincidence since Jonah & Nahum are book-end prophets – both spoke to Nineveh, Assyria.
Jonah hated having to tell the Assyrians that the Lord would give them a second chance. A chance at repentance. A chance at survival.
My guess is Jonah would have loved to have given a message like this: all who see you will shrink back in terror and say, “Nineveh lies in utter ruin.” Yet no one anywhere will regret your destruction…The enemy will consume you like locusts, devouring everything they see…O Assyrian king, your princes lie dead in the dust…All who hear of your destruction will clap their hands for joy. Jonah didn’t get to say that…Nahum did.
I think that Nahum is the most martial of the short-prophets. He’s a talented battle-scene writer – you see-feel-smell-hear the destruction. If you’re Assyria it’s awesomely scary. And Nahum describes the Lord in military terms. Anger revenge power rage destruction conquest. But he also knows that: the Lord is good. When trouble comes, he is a strong refuge. So a Lord who is both…and. Fluidly interactive. Jonah explained one side. Nahum the other.
Note: quotes from Nahum 3:7, 15, 18-19 and 1:7-8 (NLT).
Added end-of-month numbers: I’m roughly 70% through the bible (and roughly 60% through the year). To finish the OT I’ve got seven short-prophets plus Esther Ecclesiastes and Job – maybe a hundred chapters – that I’m aiming to read in August.