War: God Uses, As a Judgment

You must not bow down to their gods or serve them or follow their practices. Instead, you are to demolish them and smash their sacred stones to pieces.

And I will set My face against you, so that you will be defeated by your enemies. Those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when no one pursues you.

I will reduce your cities to rubble and lay waste your sanctuaries, and I will refuse to smell the pleasing aroma of your sacrifices. …

The LORD will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You will march out against them in one direction but flee from them in seven. You will be an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth. …

How could one man pursue a thousand, or two put ten thousand to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, unless the LORD had given them up?

Then the anger of the LORD burned against Israel, and He delivered them into the hands of those who plundered them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.

(In those days the LORD began to send Rezin king of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah against Judah.)

…and many others fell slain, because the battle belonged to God. And they occupied the land until the exile.

So the God of Israel stirred up the spirit of Pul king of Assyria (that is, Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria) to take the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh into exile. And he brought them to Halah, Habor, Hara, and the river of Gozan, where they remain to this day.

…between three years of famine, three months of being swept away before your enemies and overtaken by their swords, or three days of the sword of the LORD—days of plague upon the land, with the angel of the LORD ravaging every part of Israel.’ Now then, decide how I should reply to Him who sent me.”

Nation was crushed by nation, and city by city, for God afflicted them with all kinds of adversity.

After Rehoboam had established his sovereignty and royal power, he and all Israel with him forsook the Law of the LORD. …

In the spring, the army of Aram went to war against Joash. They entered Judah and Jerusalem and destroyed all the leaders of the people, and they sent all the plunder to their king in Damascus.

Although the Aramean army had come with only a few men, the LORD delivered into their hand a very great army. Because Judah had forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers, judgment was executed on Joash.

So the LORD brought against them the military commanders of the king of Assyria, who captured Manasseh, put a hook in his nose, bound him with bronze shackles, and took him to Babylon.

Then the people of the land took Jehoahaz son of Josiah and made him king in Jerusalem in place of his father.

…then you should fear the sword yourselves, because wrath brings punishment by the sword, so that you may know there is a judgment.”

But You have rejected and humbled us; You no longer go forth with our armies. …

For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Lily of the Covenant.” A Miktam of David for instruction. When he fought Aram-naharaim and Aram-zobah, and Joab returned and struck down 12,000 Edomites in the Valley of Salt. You have rejected us, O God; You have broken us; You have been angry; restore us! …

…whose hearts He turned to hate His people, to conspire against His servants.

I will sing for my beloved a song of his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. …

Therefore the anger of the LORD burns against His people; His hand is raised against them to strike them down. The mountains quake, and the corpses lie like refuse in the streets. Despite all this, His anger is not turned away; His hand is still upraised. …

The Lord has sent a message against Jacob, and it has fallen upon Israel. …

I have commanded My sanctified ones; I have even summoned My warriors to execute My wrath and exult in My triumph.

Listen, a tumult on the mountains, like that of a great multitude! Listen, an uproar among the kingdoms, like nations gathered together! The LORD of Hosts is mobilizing an army for war.

Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming—cruel, with fury and burning anger—to make the earth a desolation and to destroy the sinners within it.

“So I will incite Egyptian against Egyptian; brother will fight against brother, neighbor against neighbor, city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.

The LORD is angry with all the nations and furious with all their armies. He will devote them to destruction; He will give them over to slaughter. …

So I will disgrace the princes of your sanctuary, and I will devote Jacob to destruction and Israel to reproach.”

I form the light and create the darkness; I bring prosperity and create calamity. I, the LORD, do all these things.

I have forsaken My house; I have abandoned My inheritance. I have given the beloved of My soul into the hands of her enemies.

Over all the barren heights in the wilderness the destroyers have come, for the sword of the LORD devours from one end of the earth to the other. No flesh has peace.

Why have your warriors been laid low? They cannot stand, for the LORD has thrust them down. …

Even the mercenaries among her are like fattened calves. They too will turn back; together they will flee, they will not stand their ground, for the day of calamity is coming upon them—the time of their punishment.

‘Alas, O sword of the LORD, how long until you rest? Return to your sheath; cease and be still!’

How can it rest when the LORD has commanded it? He has appointed it against Ashkelon and the shore of its coastland.”

Cursed is the one who is remiss in doing the work of the LORD, and cursed is he who withholds his sword from bloodshed.

Behold, I am about to bring terror upon you, declares the Lord GOD of Hosts, from all those around you. You will each be driven headlong, with no one to regather the fugitives.

The LORD has opened His armory and brought out His weapons of wrath, for this is the work of the Lord GOD of Hosts in the land of the Chaldeans.

Therefore, Oholibah, this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘I will incite your lovers against you, those from whom you turned away in disgust. And I will bring them against you from every side— …

If a ram’s horn sounds in a city, do the people not tremble? If calamity comes to a city, has not the LORD caused it?

“Some of you I overthrew as I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and you were like a firebrand snatched from a blaze, yet you did not return to Me,” declares the LORD.

Be silent in the presence of the Lord GOD, for the Day of the LORD is near. Indeed, the LORD has prepared a sacrifice; He has consecrated His guests. …

For before those days neither man nor beast received wages, nor was there safety from the enemy for anyone who came or went, for I had turned every man against his neighbor.

For I will gather all the nations for battle against Jerusalem, and the city will be captured, the houses looted, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be removed from the city.