June 11
Reading: Isaiah 18
1 Ah, land of whirring wings
that is beyond the rivers of Cush,
2 which sends ambassadors by the sea,
in vessels of papyrus on the waters!
Go, you swift messengers, to a nation tall and smooth,
to a people feared near and far,
a nation mighty and conquering,
whose land the rivers divide.
3 All you inhabitants of the world, you who dwell on the earth,
when a signal is raised on the mountains, look!
When a trumpet is blown, hear!
4 For thus the LORD said to me:
“I will quietly look from my dwelling
like clear heat in sunshine,
like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”
5 For before the harvest, when the blossom is over,
and the flower becomes a ripening grape,
he cuts off the shoots with pruning hooks,
and the spreading branches he lops off and clears away.
6 They shall all of them be left to the birds of prey of the mountains
and to the beasts of the earth.
And the birds of prey will summer on them,
and all the beasts of the earth will winter on them.
7 At that time tribute will be brought to the LORD of hosts
from a people tall and smooth,
from a people feared near and far,
a nation mighty and conquering,
whose land the rivers divide,
to Mount Zion, the place of the name of the LORD of hosts.
Isaiah 18 is the oracle to ancient Ethiopia. Ethiopia was not a neighbor to Israel, but a country far away to the south. In contrast to the oracles of judgment that we have been reading, this is an oracle of salvation.
This people in Cush (Ethiopia), “tall and smooth” and feared by many, will leave their land and “bring tribute” to the Lord of Hosts. (vs. 7) They will come “to Mount Zion, the place of the name of the Lord of Hosts.” This is a fulfillment of the prophesy that all nations will be drawn to the Lord and bring their gifts to Him. (Revelation 21:22-26)
The Lord is watching them, without their knowing. (vs. 4) And when the time has come for Him to act, He will bring them in.
The first fruits of this ultimate fulfillment can be found in Acts 8:26-39 when an Ethiopian eunuch who has come to worship in Jerusalem is saved on his way home while reading the prophet Isaiah.
God is going to bring people from every tribe and tongue to Himself. We find in Isaiah 18 that he finds these tall, black, fearsome people beautiful and worth saving. The Lord has made people from every ethnicity to be His. He calls to Himself Swedes and Norwegians, Ethiopians and Nigerians, Egyptians and Iranians, Chinese, Russians, Spaniards, Mexicans, and Americans. In the book of Revelation, we see people of every ethnicity and language worshipping at His throne. (Revelation 7:9)
This is why the Lord wants us to make disciples of all nations. (Matthew 28:18-20)