Isaiah 31:1-9--Woe to Those Who Go Down to Egypt

Isaiah 31
English Standard Version

Woe to Those Who Go Down to Egypt
31 Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help
    and rely on horses,
who trust in chariots because they are many
    and in horsemen because they are very strong,
but do not look to the Holy One of Israel
    or consult the LORD!
2 And yet he is wise and brings disaster;
    he does not call back his words,
but will arise against the house of the evildoers
    and against the helpers of those who work iniquity.
3 The Egyptians are man, and not God,
    and their horses are flesh, and not spirit.
When the LORD stretches out his hand,
    the helper will stumble, and he who is helped will fall,
    and they will all perish together.

4 For thus the LORD said to me,
“As a lion or a young lion growls over his prey,
    and when a band of shepherds is called out against him
he is not terrified by their shouting
    or daunted at their noise,
so the LORD of hosts will come down
    to fight on Mount Zion and on its hill.
5 Like birds hovering, so the LORD of hosts
    will protect Jerusalem;
he will protect and deliver it;
    he will spare and rescue it.”

6 Turn to him from whom people have deeply revolted, O children of Israel. 7 For in that day everyone shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which your hands have sinfully made for you.

​8 “And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man;
    and a sword, not of man, shall devour him;
and he shall flee from the sword,
    and his young men shall be put to forced labor.
9 His rock shall pass away in terror,
    and his officers desert the standard in panic,”
declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion,
    and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.

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This is not a new message that the LORD is giving to His people.  He gave it to them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt, and He has been reminding them since then.  This is another reminder, but we too also need to hear the same thing over and over again.  The people of Judah trust in what they can see--the Egyptian horses that are fast and the Egyptian army that has many horsemen and chariots.  However, they look to the LORD who saved them by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.  They have forgotten that nothing is too hard for the LORD.  Even the strongest by worldly standards is seemingly without strength when they are fighting the LORD, for He is all-powerful.  If the people cast their lot with Egypt, they will perish with Egypt.

The LORD is not frightened by numbers or the so-called strength of His adversary.  Like a lion that does not fear a band of shepherds is the LORD when He stands in battle to fight.  He also compares Himself to the flocks of birds ready to dive-bomb and attack their foe.

Do Israel and Judah really want to make an enemy of the LORD?  It seems they do when they ignore all of the LORD's warnings and side with the people that He told them never to ally with, and they refuse to repent of the sin that He is warning them about.  Apparently, they are also ensnared by idolatry, but the LORD promises that one day soon, all of them will destroy their idols and see them as worthless.

Though Judah fears the Assyrians who have taken the northern tribes into captivity (or will shortly), the LORD promises that they will be defeated, but not by the armies of Israel and Judah.  In fact, no man-made sword will defeat them.  Instead, the LORD Himself and His heavenly host will wage war against them.  The Assyrians will be put into forced labor like they did with so many people of other nations.  They will experience the brutality that they showed to others.  They will be left with no fortress to hide in and no banner to rally around.  All of them will be scattered (though not completely destroyed).  The LORD will save a remnant even from Assyria (though that is not promised here).  Some of the earliest Christians are from the people known as the Assyrians, and they still exist as a persecuted people group to this day and still mostly Christian).  They are a persecuted people that we should be praying for as the LORD has plans for them in the end times to bless His people Israel and to spread the gospel to the whole world.