By Jim Mettenbrink
Nations rise and fall. That is the term we use – “rise and fall.” When does a nation rise? God promised to make Abram’s descendants into a great nation – “I will make you a great nation; I will bless you And make your name great; And you shall be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2). That implies they would need a territory – land. 400 years before that nation was formed, God told them where the land was located – “ On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying: “To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates— the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites” (Gen 15:18-21).
God changed Jacob’s (Abraham’s grandson) name to Israel – Prince of God or God rules – “So He said to him, “What is your name?” He said, “Jacob.” And He said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed” (Gen 32:27-28). That nation was ancient Israel, which was formed by God as a nation beginning with the covenant at Mt Sinai – “And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel” (Exodus 19:6). And this nation promised to Abraham and in turn to Isaac and Jacob, was chosen by God – “And because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose their descendants after them; and He brought you out of Egypt with His Presence, with His mighty power, driving out from before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land as an inheritance, as it is this day” (Deuteronomy 4:37-38). The continued existence of Israel depended upon their obedience to God’s commands – the Old Covenant agreed upon at Mt Sinai – “You shall walk in all the ways which the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live and that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess” (Deut 5:33). The rise of a new nation!
Rarely is heard “the death” of a nation. This is because names and borders change but the people remain. For example, where is Yugoslavia? It was formed as a kingdom (merger of three ethnic peoples) in the aftermath of WWI (1918) and became a Soviet republic known as Yugoslavia in 1963. In 1992 it was divided into six small republics. The people are the same, but the governments and borders changed. Yugoslavia died, giving birth to six new nations. God’s reasons for the fall and rise are known only to Him. The Old Testament indicates that following His commands of ethics and morality prolongs a nation’s existence. He has a redline which when crossed spells the end – “ The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will relent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it” (Jeremiah 18:7-10). The death of a nation.
Even in the Southern Kingdom’s (Judah) last decades, God pleaded with His chosen nation. If they returned to Him (giving up their idols and committed to living according to the Covenant), they would continue to live in the land – the nation would not die. They refused and the nation died. The northern kingdom, called Israel died 135 years earlier, never to return. Only because of God’s promise to Abraham to bring the Savior through his lineage (Isaac, Jacob & King David) did God return the Jews to their land some 50 years later (536 BC) (Ezra 1-2). But it would never be known as an independent nation again but was a province of successive empires. The rise and the fall – life and death of a nation.