His burden is light, his burden is heavy

I should love my neighbor. But the Assyrian invaders were not “neighbors.” Similarly, Judaizers were not Paul’s neighbors, and the Pharisees (mostly) were not Jesus’s neighbors. There is such a thing as a (cosmic) enemy. Considering the Parable of the Good Samaritan, not all we meet are neighbors who should be loved. This seems to be the case for the Rabshakeh.

Matthew 1:21 ESV

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Matt

1 Thessalonians 1:10 ESV

and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

Wrath and Christ

Isaiah 30:27–33 ESV

Behold, the name of the Lord comes from afar, burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke; his lips are full of fury, and his tongue is like a devouring fire; his breath is like an overflowing stream that reaches up to the neck; to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction, and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads astray. You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel. And the Lord will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones. The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, when he strikes with his rod. And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them. For a burning place has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.

I should love my neighbor. But the Assyrian invaders were not “neighbors.” Similarly, Judaizers were not Paul’s neighbors, and the Pharisees (mostly) were not Jesus’s neighbors. There is such a thing as a (cosmic) enemy. (I figured this out in the shower on Dec. 18, 2017.)

Jesus came to deliver us from the wrath to come

I should love my neighbor. But the Assyrian invaders were not “neighbors.” Similarly, Judaizers were not Paul’s neighbors, and the Pharisees (mostly) were not Jesus’s neighbors. There is such a thing as a (cosmic) enemy. (I figured this out in the shower on Dec. 18, 2017.)

Wrath and Christmas

Matthew 1:21 ESV

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Why did Jesus come? To save us from what?

1 Thessalonians 1:10 ESV

and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

To save us from “the wrath to come,” God’s wrath.

But what is God’s wrath?

Wrath and a Christophany

Isaiah 30:27–33 ESV

The Face of Wrath

lips full of fury

tongue like a devouring fire

breath like an overflowing stream

Isaiah 30:27 AV 1873

Behold, the name of the Lord cometh from far, Burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: His lips are full of indignation, And his tongue as a devouring fire:

“His burden is easy” vs. “His burden is heavy”

Isaiah 37:21–38 ESV

Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Because you have prayed to me concerning Sennacherib king of Assyria, this is the word that the Lord has spoken concerning him: “ ‘She despises you, she scorns you— the virgin daughter of Zion; she wags her head behind you— the daughter of Jerusalem. “ ‘Whom have you mocked and reviled? Against whom have you raised your voice and lifted your eyes to the heights? Against the Holy One of Israel! By your servants you have mocked the Lord, and you have said, With my many chariots I have gone up the heights of the mountains, to the far recesses of Lebanon, to cut down its tallest cedars, its choicest cypresses, to come to its remotest height, its most fruitful forest. I dug wells and drank waters, to dry up with the sole of my foot all the streams of Egypt. “ ‘Have you not heard that I determined it long ago? I planned from days of old what now I bring to pass, that you should make fortified cities crash into heaps of ruins, while their inhabitants, shorn of strength, are dismayed and confounded, and have become like plants of the field and like tender grass, like grass on the housetops, blighted before it is grown. “ ‘I know your sitting down and your going out and coming in, and your raging against me. Because you have raged against me and your complacency has come to my ears, I will put my hook in your nose and my bit in your mouth, and I will turn you back on the way by which you came.’ “And this shall be the sign for you: this year you shall eat what grows of itself, and in the second year what springs from that. Then in the third year sow and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit. And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward. For out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. “Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria: He shall not come into this city or shoot an arrow there or come before it with a shield or cast up a siege mound against it. By the way that he came, by the same he shall return, and he shall not come into this city, declares the Lord. For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David.” And the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. And when people arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies. Then Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and returned home and lived at Nineveh. And as he was worshiping in the house of Nisroch his god, Adrammelech and Sharezer, his sons, struck him down with the sword. And after they escaped into the land of Ararat, Esarhaddon his son reigned in his place.

Isaiah 37:

The angel of the LORD strikes down 185,000 Assyrians: this angel of the LORD is worshiped as is God. And it likely is a pre-incarnate Christ. The meek and gentle Jesus slew tens of thousands in the Assyrian army.

Wrath and the Christian

Did Jesus come to save us money

Isaiah 30:29 ESV

You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the Lord, to the Rock of Israel.

Isaiah 30:29

During this onslaught, Judah behaved (or was to behave) as if it were in the middle of a holy feast (“song in the night”), or on the way to a feast (“sound of the flute”).

Sennacherib

The Defeat of Sennacherib (Peter Paul Rubens)

Isaiah 30:31–32 ESV

The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the Lord, when he strikes with his rod. And every stroke of the appointed staff that the Lord lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them.

Isaiah 30:31-

The LORD strikes the Assyrians with his staff, resulting in terror for the Assyrians, but resulting in tambourines and lyres in Judah (or dancing!).

James 3:10 ESV

From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so.