The Only Hope For the Hamites

 

 

Good day! I’m Duane Matz and this is Today’s Living Word:

 

Isa 18:4 For so the LORD said to me, "I will take My rest, And I will look from My dwelling place Like clear heat in sunshine, Like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest." 5 For before the harvest, when the bud is perfect And the sour grape is ripening in the flower, He will both cut off the sprigs with pruning hooks And take away and cut down the branches. 6 They will be left together for the mountain birds of prey And for the beasts of the earth; The birds of prey will summer on them, And all the beasts of the earth will winter on them. 7 In that time a present will be brought to the LORD of hosts From a people tall and smooth of skin, And from a people terrible from their beginning onward, A nation powerful and treading down, Whose land the rivers divide-To the place of the name of the LORD of hosts, To Mount Zion.

Under the premise that this judgement against Ethiopia is a picture of the judgement against the rebellious offspring of Ham (Noah’s son), we see  here a hopeful sign, and a challenge.

God sends His messengers (the Great Commission)  to the people who are “tall and smooth of skin,” as it says in  Isa 18:2b, “Go, swift messengers, to a nation tall and smooth of skin, To a people terrible from their beginning onward.”

These nations have been ravaged by their sin and ignorance concerning God and the gift of His Son Jesus Christ from the days of Babel. And now God is sending His church (His messengers)  to the uttermost parts of the earth with the gospel message to bring the Hamites back into the fold.

Some will receive the gospel message and be saved, this is the “present brought to the Lord of hosts” mentioned in v7.

If we get one thing out of this portion of Scripture, let it be  a sense of urgency to send forth missionaries with the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the only hope for the Ethiopians ( not the literal Ethiopians, although they are certainly included her, but it is the only hope for all the rebellious children of Ham, before the Lord returns.

 

 I’m Duane Matz and that’s Today’s Living Word.