June 21 Precise Warning

Ezekiel 26:3, 12-14 "Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I am against you, O Tyre, and will bring up many nations against you, as the sea brings up its waves...12 They will plunder your riches and loot your merchandise. They will break down your walls and destroy your pleasant houses. Your stones and timber and soil they will cast into the midst of the waters. 13 And I will stop the music of your songs, and the sound of your lyres shall be heard no more. 14 I will make you a bare rock. You shall be a place for the spreading of nets. You shall never be rebuilt, for I am the Lord; I have spoken, declares the Lord God."

    

ONE lesson we can learn in Ezekiel 26 is that the Lord God is very precise with his warnings. Read through the entire chapter, and you will read how God doesn't simply say, "You will be destroyed." Instead, God formed a vivid picture of Tyre's destruction at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon and later Alexander the Great of Greece.

     See the specific words, "You shall be a place for the spreading of nets." In other words God is saying, "You, Tyre, mighty and powerful, will become a small fishing village."

     To the city's inhabitants God's words would seem empty and boastful. Tyre's walls were 150-feet high! Who could destroy such a city? But in 200 years that is exactly what happened. After Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the mainland portion of the city in a 13-year siege, the island section of the city remained. In 323 BC Alexander the Great finished the work as his forces razed the city to essentially "nets cast on rocks".

     The Lord's words came true in God's time. Today Tyre has recovered from being a small village to become a small city. It is a major tourist center on the coast of Lebanon. But in an interesting affirmation of this Scripture, the first picture of Tyre on the Wikipedia website is of a fishing harbor. The nets are still there, and the fishermen ply their trade. But Tyre never again regained any sense of power or prominence.

     Heed God's words, my friends. He will do what he says. He will fulfill his words very precisely. He will do so in his time. I pray you find fear, comfort and assurance in God's sure words this day that you are prepared for the future he has promised.

Prayer: Lord God, we thank you that you are a precise God. We know we can believe you when you precisely say, "if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." (Romans 10:9)

Next post will be June 29.