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  2. Wed: 1 Samuel 17-20
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Friday · Week 15
The Later Prophets

Ezekiel 30-31

Week 15 · about 10 min
  1. Sat: Psalms 21-26
  2. Sun: Exodus 18-21
  3. Mon: Mark 8-9

More messages against Egypt, the power Judah kept hoping would rescue it.

The Tallest Tree in the Garden Fell

Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because thou hast lifted up thyself in height, and he hath shot up his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height;

Ezekiel 31:10 (KJV)

Judah kept looking south to Egypt for help against Babylon. God says he has broken Pharaoh’s arm, and it won’t be bandaged to hold a sword again. In chapter 31 Ezekiel tells Pharaoh to look at Assyria. Assyria was like a giant cedar. Birds nested in its branches, animals rested in its shade, and even the trees in Eden envied it. Then it got proud, and God cut it down. Nineveh, Assyria’s capital, had fallen only a few decades earlier. If that tree could fall, so could Egypt. The bigger the tree, the louder the fall.

Reflect: What person or power are you tempted to lean on instead of God?

Ezekiel 30

1The word of the LORD came again unto me, saying,

2Son of man, prophesy, and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD: Howl ye, Woe worth the day!

3For the day is near, even the day of the LORD is near, a day of clouds; it shall be the time of the heathen.

4And a sword shall come upon Egypt, and anguish shall be in Ethiopia, when the slain shall fall in Egypt; and they shall take away her multitude, and her foundations shall be broken down.

5Ethiopia, and Put, and Lud, and all the mingled people, and Cub, and the children of the land that is in league, shall fall with them by the sword.

6Thus saith the LORD: They also that uphold Egypt shall fall, and the pride of her power shall come down: from the tower of Seveneh shall they fall in it by the sword, saith the Lord GOD.

7And they shall be desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted.

8And they shall know that I am the LORD, when I have set a fire in Egypt, and all her helpers are destroyed.

9In that day shall messengers go forth from before me in ships to make the careless Ethiopians afraid; and there shall be anguish upon them, as in the day of Egypt; for, lo, it cometh.

10Thus saith the Lord GOD: I will also make the multitude of Egypt to cease, by the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon.

11He and his people with him, the terrible of the nations, shall be brought in to destroy the land; and they shall draw their swords against Egypt, and fill the land with the slain.

12And I will make the rivers dry, and will sell the land into the hand of evil men; and I will make the land desolate, and all that is therein, by the hand of strangers: I the LORD have spoken it.

13Thus saith the Lord GOD: I will also destroy the idols, and I will cause the images to cease from Noph; and there shall be no more a prince out of the land of Egypt: and I will put a fear in the land of Egypt.

14And I will make Pathros desolate, and will set a fire in Zoan, and will execute judgments in No.

15And I will pour my fury upon Sin, the strong hold of Egypt; and I will cut off the multitude of No.

16And I will set a fire in Egypt; Sin shall be in great anguish, and No shall be broken up: and Noph shall have adversaries in the day time.

17The young men of Aven and of Pi-beseth shall fall by the sword: and these cities shall go into captivity.

18At Tehaphnehes also the day shall withdraw itself, when I shall break there the yokes of Egypt, and the pride of her power shall cease in her: as for her, a cloud shall cover her, and her daughters shall go into captivity.

19Thus will I execute judgments in Egypt: and they shall know that I am the LORD.

20And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the first month, in the seventh day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

21Son of man, I have broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt; and, lo, it hath not been bound up to apply healing medicines, to put a roller to bind it, that it be strong to hold the sword.

22Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD: Behold, I am against Pharaoh king of Egypt, and will break his arms, the strong, and that which was broken; and I will cause the sword to fall out of his hand.

23And I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and will disperse them through the countries.

24And I will strengthen the arms of the king of Babylon, and put my sword in his hand: but I will break the arms of Pharaoh, and he shall groan before him with the groanings of a deadly wounded man.

25And I will hold up the arms of the king of Babylon, and the arms of Pharaoh shall fall down; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall put my sword into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall stretch it out upon the land of Egypt.

26And I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and disperse them through the countries; and they shall know that I am the LORD.

Ezekiel 31

1And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

2Son of man, say unto Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his multitude; Whom art thou like in thy greatness?

3Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon with fair branches, and with a shadowing shroud, and of an high stature; and his top was among the thick boughs.

4The waters nourished him, the deep made him to grow: her rivers ran round about her plantation; and she sent out her channels unto all the trees of the field.

5Therefore his stature was exalted above all the trees of the field: and his boughs were multiplied, and his branches became long by reason of many waters, when he shot them forth.

6All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young, and under his shadow dwelt all great nations.

7Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his branches: for his root was by many waters.

8The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the plane trees were not as his branches; nor was any tree in the garden of God like unto him in his beauty.

9I made him fair by the multitude of his branches: so that all the trees of Eden, that were in the garden of God, envied him.

10Therefore thus said the Lord GOD: Because thou art exalted in stature, and he hath set his top among the thick boughs, and his heart is lifted up in his height;

11I will even deliver him into the hand of the mighty one of the nations; he shall surely deal with him: I have driven him out for his wickedness.

12And strangers, the terrible of the nations, have cut him off, and have left him: upon the mountains and in all the valleys his branches are fallen, and his boughs are broken by all the watercourses of the land; and all the peoples of the earth are gone down from his shadow, and have left him.

13Upon his ruin all the fowls of the heaven shall dwell, and all the beasts of the field shall be upon his branches:

14to the end that none of all the trees by the waters exalt themselves in their stature, neither set their top among the thick boughs, nor that their mighty ones stand up in their height, even all that drink water: for they are all delivered unto death, to the nether parts of the earth, in the midst of the children of men, with them that go down to the pit.

15Thus saith the Lord GOD: In the day when he went down to hell I caused a mourning: I covered the deep for him, and I restrained the rivers thereof, and the great waters were stayed: and I caused Lebanon to mourn for him, and all the trees of the field fainted for him.

16I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, were comforted in the nether parts of the earth.

17They also went down into hell with him unto them that be slain by the sword; yea, they that were his arm, that dwelt under his shadow in the midst of the nations.

18To whom art thou thus like in glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? yet shalt thou be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth: thou shalt lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, with them that be slain by the sword. This is Pharaoh and all his multitude, saith the Lord GOD.

Revised Version (RV). Revised Version (RV), 1885, public domain.