CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 18
It is needful to remember the position of the land of Israel. The rivers of Ethiopia (Cush) are the Nile and the Euphrates, which represent the two nations on the frontiers of Israel that had oppressed them, Egypt and Babylon.
The country here summoned, “shadowing with wings” (verse 1), is beyond those rivers. It was a country unknown at the time when the prophet lived, and was consequently in no connection as yet with Israel; but it will be so in the last days. To shadow with wings is an expression often employed in the word of the Lord for marking protection. It will be a powerful nation, outside their ordinary limits, undertaking to protect Israel.
The great nations of those days occupy themselves with the Jews (verse 2). From the time the nations begin to be the object of God’s judgment, they will be crushed (Zechariah 12: 1-3).
“All ye inhabitants of the world and dwellers on the mountains” (verse 3) God summons attention to that which He is going to do. “See ye when he lifteth up an ensign on the mountains; and when he bloweth a trumpet, hear ye.”
“For so Jehovah said unto me, I will take my rest, and I will consider in my dwelling-place like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest,” verse 4. We see what God will do when the nations, following their own policy, will have restored the Jews to their land. He lets them act, and keeps quiet; but He keeps His eye on His dwelling-place.
“For afore the harvest, when the bud is perfect, and the sour grape is ripening in the flower, he shall both cut off the springs with pruning hooks, and take away and cut down the branches,” verse 5. It is not yet judgment, so all comes to nothing, whatever the promise, as in all human things where God is concerned. Compare Isaiah 6: 10.
“They shall be left together unto the fowls of the mountains, and to the beasts of the earth: and the fowls shall summer upon them, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them,” verse 6. The people are brought back to their land to be given over as a prey to the nations, like wild beasts in winter or ravenous birds in summer. Such will be their fate when anew returned to Palestine, for God is not yet putting His hand to it. Jerusalem will again be the central object of political schemes for the world, though the world despises God’s people, and never occupies itself with them but to exalt itself. The Jew will be oppressed by the Gentiles once more in their land; but deliverance is at hand.
“[p. 205] In that time shall the present be brought unto Jehovah of hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name of Jehovah of hosts, the mount Zion,” verse 7. A present is to be brought of Israel and from Israel to Jehovah. They will bring an offering, and themselves be as it were an offering., to Jehovah, who will manifest anew His abode in Zion (after all the long sorrows and desolations), but also His hand in judgment of the nations. After this will begin His relationship with Israel for everlasting blessing under Messiah and the new covenant. The mount of Zion is the place God has chosen, in contrast with Sinai, the mountain of the nation’s responsibility and ruin. (See Hebrews 12.) At Sinai God gave, not His promises, but His law; and Israel stood afar off and fell under its curse. Zion is quite another thing. Israel failed under Moses and Aaron, the judges, Eli, Samuel and Saul, under priest, prophet and king. But David is chosen in sovereignty and places the ark of God in Zion, which becomes the display of royal grace on earth, after man in every respect had failed in his relations with God.
The mountain of Zion is for the earth the same thing in principle as heaven is (save royalty) for God’s relations with the church. The majesty of God no more requires righteousness in man. It establishes itself in grace on the earth when man broke down in everything. This will be true in all, though we shall not be there but above. Jehovah of hosts (that is, the God of government here below) will place Israel, not the church, in connection with the mount Zion. The Father will have us with the Son in His house on high as His children, instead of governing us as His subjects on the earth. It is always important to distinguish our part from that of the earthly people; if not, we necessarily lower our calling, our privileges, and our responsibility. God puts Himself in relation with the world as King by means of His people Israel.