Appendix C

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Israel & Babylon filled up cups

 

At the time of the Babylonian captivity, God told Israel:

 

“But you did not listen to me… and you have provoked me with what your hands have made, and you have brought harm to yourselves… Because you have not listened to my words, I will summon all the peoples of the north and my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon… and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and against all the surrounding nations. I will completely destroy them and make them an object of horror and scorn, and an everlasting ruin… This whole country will become a desolate wasteland, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years. But when the seventy years are fulfilled, I will punish the king of Babylon and his nation, the land of the Babylonians, for their guilt… and will make it desolate forever.” (Jeremiah 25:7-12)

 

Notice a critical point in these verses. Israel was to be destroyed for provoking God, and eventually, so was Babylon! This is proof that God deals with the heathen just as He deals with those who know Him! In God’s eyes, wickedness is wickedness. Each person, city nation or kingdom has a cup and when it becomes full – God breaks His silence.

 

One more brief point about ancient Babylon must be made. When the mysterious handwriting appeared on the palace wall, Belshazzar, king of Babylon, suspected that the God of heaven was sending the sword against him and He summoned the prophet Daniel to interpret the handwriting. Before interpreting the handwriting on the wall, Daniel recounted the divine judgments the Most High had sent upon his arrogant grandfather, Nebuchadnezzar. Then Daniel said: 

 

“But you his son, O Belshazzar, have not humbled yourself, though you knew all this. Instead, you have set yourself up against the Lord of heaven… But you did not honor the God who holds in his hand your life and all your ways…  This is what these words mean:

Mene: God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end. Tekel: You have been weighted on the scales and found wanting.  Peres: Your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.” (Daniel 5:22-28)

 

New Testament examples

 

The full cup principle is also found in the New Testament. Paul warned the sexually immoral Romans:

 

“… You are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God will give to each person according to what he has done… But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger.” (Romans 2:5,6,8)

 

Paul clearly understood why the wrath of God was coming. He told the believers in Colosse, “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthy nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.” (Colossians 3:5,6)

 

On the other side of the coin, Paul encouraged the believers in Thessalonica to be patient in their suffering until the enemies of Jesus had filled up their cup.

 

“… You suffered from your own countrymen the same things those churches (in Judea) suffered from the Jews, who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out.  They (the Jews) displease God and are hostile to all men in their effort to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap up their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last.”

(1 Thessalonians 2:14-16)

 

When Paul wrote this epistle, he knew that the Jews had filled up their cup of sin and that they were doomed to destruction by the Romans. The anticipated destruction occurred in 70 A.D.

 

Jesus predicts wrath

 

Jesus spoke of the full cup principle in a discourse with the Pharisees. After pronouncing 7 curses upon them for their religious bigotry and hypocrisy, Jesus said: “Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your forefathers!  You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?” (Matthew 23:32,33)

 

Again, the point is made. When a nation or individual reaches the limit of divine forbearance, God breaks his silence. His mercy with sin and sinner has a limit. Jesus concluded his denunciation of the Jews saying: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate.” (Matthew 23:37,38)

God’s four judgments

 

Israel was fully warned about the consequences of violating God’s laws at the time of the Exodus. God said: “But if you will not listen to me and carry out all these commands… then I will do this to you: I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting diseases, and fever that will destroy your sight and drain away your life… I will break down your stubborn pride and make the sky above you like iron and the ground beneath you like bronze. Your strength will be spent in vain, because your soil will not yield its crops… I will send wild animals against you… destroy your cattle and make you so few in number that your roads will be deserted… I will bring the sword upon you to avenge the breaking of the covenant… I will ay waste the land… I will scatter you among the nations…”

(Leviticus 26:14-33)

 

Look closely at this text and see if you can find God’s four deadly judgments identified.
They are specifically mentioned. In addition, notice that they come in the form of sudden terror. This is how God breaks His silence. His judgments come with sudden terror upon nations when their cup of sin and rebellion becomes full. Paul saw that God’s wrath will suddenly break out upon the world in the last days. He says, “While people are saying, ‘Peace and safety,’ destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.” (1 Thessalonians 5:3)

 

Bible history says

 

The Bible does not leave us guessing how God implements His four judgments. Notice these instances:

 

Sword: God raise up military leaders to send the sword wherever He wants it. From Jeremiah 25:9 we learn that God sent his servant, King Nebuchadnezzar, against Jerusalem. Nebuchadnezzar did not know that he was a servant of the Most High God at the time! Nevertheless, God used the pagan king to accomplish the destruction of Jerusalem. In the same way, God overthrew the empire of Babylon through Darius, another unwitting servant of God. (Daniel 5:30,31) The Bible also says that King Cyrus was a servant of God. See Ezra 1:1; Isaiah 44:28, 25:1. It is especially interesting to know what God is able to accomplish His plans without forcing His will upon any individual! The point is that God raises up military leaders to take the sword wherever He wants, even though generals choose to do what they want to do! And if human agency is not available, the Lord will send His own angels as necessary. The largest known number of people killed by the death angel was 185,000 soldiers of Sennacherib’s army, although this number may be less than the first-born killed in Egypt at the time of the Exodus. See Isaiah 37:36 and Exodus 11.

 

Famine: God sends famine at times and in places to accomplish His purposes. In Genesis 41, God sent seven years of famine to Egypt and in the process, removed Joseph from prison and put him on the throne. This amazing promotion for Joseph opened the way for the descendants of Abraham to move down into Egypt! See Genesis 15:12-16.

 

In 2 Samuel 21:1, the Bible says, “During the reign of David, there was a famine for three successive years; so David sought the face of the Lord. The Lord said, ‘It is account of Saul and his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death.’”  Clearly, the three-year famine came as a direct result of Saul’s disobedience.

 

In 2 Kings 8:1 we learn of another seven-year famine sent by the Lord, “Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he restored to life, ‘Go away with your family and stay awhile wherever you can, because the Lord has decreed a famine in the land that will last seven years.’” Perhaps one of the best-known famines recorded in the Bible happened during the days of Elijah and King Ahab. Notice what James says, “Elijah was a man like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.” (James 5:17,18) The combined evils of violence, idolatry and sexual immorality have reached epic proportions and God has not only noticed, He is about to rise up in response!

 

Plague: Plagues can come in numerous forms. We think of the bubonic plague or of cholera as a plague, but the word plague means anything troublesome or afflicting. God sent several plagues upon Pharaoh and Egypt to impress them that He wanted His people set free. These plagues included frogs, blood-water, gnats, flies, boils, hail, locusts and darkness, etc. See Exodus 7-10.l The Lord killed 10 of the 12 spies with a plague for giving a bad report about the Promised Land! See Numbers 14:37 More than 14,700 people died of a plague in the wilderness rebellion stated by Korah. See Numbers 16:49. On one occasion, God sent a plague that killed 24,000 people for sexual immorality! See Numbers 25:9 On another occasion, God sent a plague upon Israel and killed 70,000 people because King David disobeyed the Lord and took a census.

(1 Chronicles 21:14-16) The point here is that God does send plagues upon people to kill them when they continually insist on disobeying His commands.

 

 

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