Friday 18th July
Read Nahum 3:11-13
“You too will become drunk;
you will go into hiding
and seek refuge from the enemy.
12 All your fortresses are like fig-trees
with their first ripe fruit;
when they are shaken,
the figs fall into the mouth of the eater.
13 Look at your troops –
they are all weaklings.
The gates of your land
are wide open to your enemies;
fire has consumed the bars of your gates.” (NIVUK)
The imagery Nahum continues to pile up has a common theme. It is incapacity. Unable to stand up, unable to hold on and unable to keep out. It is imagery of weakness. Most likely stated when Assyria was at its boastful best.
The message is clear and simple. Strength is not found in arms, walls or gates. They are as nothing to a God as powerful as Yahweh. Boasting in them is futile and foolish.
Yet how often do we do precisely the same thing. Look to our own strength to save and protect when we are limited and mortal and weak. We do well to remember Paul’s words to the Corinthian church, a church not unfamiliar with a bit of boasting…
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:9-10) (NIVUK)
