Isaiah 13:9-22

Passage:
9 Behold, the day of the LORD comes,
Cruel, with both wrath and fierce anger,
To lay the land desolate;
And He will destroy its sinners from it.
10 For the stars of heaven and their constellations
Will not give their light;
The sun will be darkened in its going forth,
And the moon will not cause its light to shine.
11 “ I will punish the world for its evil,
And the wicked for their iniquity;
I will halt the arrogance of the proud,
And will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.
12 I will make a mortal more rare than fine gold,
A man more than the golden wedge of Ophir.
13 Therefore I will shake the heavens,
And the earth will move out of her place,
In the wrath of the LORD of hosts
And in the day of His fierce anger.
14 It shall be as the hunted gazelle,
And as a sheep that no man takes up;
Every man will turn to his own people,
And everyone will flee to his own land.
15 Everyone who is found will be thrust through,
And everyone who is captured will fall by the sword.
16 Their children also will be dashed to pieces before their eyes;
Their houses will be plundered
And their wives ravished.
17 “ Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them,
Who will not regard silver;
And as for gold, they will not delight in it.
18 Also their bows will dash the young men to pieces,
And they will have no pity on the fruit of the womb;
Their eye will not spare children.
19 And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms,
The beauty of the Chaldeans’ pride,
Will be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.
20 It will never be inhabited,
Nor will it be settled from generation to generation;
Nor will the Arabian pitch tents there,
Nor will the shepherds make their sheepfolds there.
21 But wild beasts of the desert will lie there,
And their houses will be full of owls;
Ostriches will dwell there,
And wild goats will caper there.
22 The hyenas will howl in their citadels,
And jackals in their pleasant palaces.
Her time is near to come,
And her days will not be prolonged.”

Journal: Isaiah's reference to the "day of the Lord" in 13:6 appeared to be related to the immediate future for Babylon (about 150 years later). However here, in 13:9-13, it appears to relate to the very distant future and to much higher stakes. It is here that God will deal with evil via His wrath and destruction. It as is if the war against Babylon 150 years later is being laid side by side with the conquest of evil at the end of time. The telescope of prophecy brings all history into one frame of reference. This frame can be identified and labeled as follows: "The Glory of God."

We are not to fear the Babylon of our day. We are to fear our creator, for "the Judge is standing at the door" (James 5:9). The gavel is raised, and our passage today hints at the sentence for the rebellious. There will be righteous cruelty, wrath, fierce anger, desolation, destruction, descent, darkness, punishment, a halting, a fall, a shaking, movement, a hunt, fleeing, a thrusting sword, dashed pieces, plundering, ravishing, no pity, further desolation, no habitation, and a lack of safety. This would be the plight of Babylon. This will be the plight of Satan's children. This is why Christ tells us that rest is found in Him. For without Him, the unspeakable is uttered for all eternity.