Obadiah
Who was Obadiah, and when did he write?
No one knows! His name means “servant of the Lord.” But the best of the scholarly guesses is that Obadiah prophesied at the same time as Jeremiah; when Babylon was attacking Judah and Jerusalem just before the exile and the destruction of Jerusalem (from 605 – 586 BC). Obadiah 1-9 is very similar to Jeremiah 49:7-22; maybe they prayed together; perhaps they prophesied together, too!
Obadiah writes about Edom. What does Edom have to do with the Babylonian attack?
Imagine yourself in an ancient besieged city. As the invading army breaks in and begins to kill indiscriminately, you see a cavalry of your cousins riding in. Thank God, you think, they’ve come to defend us! But to your horror, they stop, dismount, line the streets and cheer the invaders on! When some from your city attempt an escape, these wicked cousins point them out to the invaders. That they are treacherous enemies is plain to see; that they are cousins, as well, makes their treachery even worse!
This is how Edom, the descendants of Jacob’s brother Esau, Judah’s “cousins,” reacted to the attacks of the Babylonians. The prophecies of Jeremiah and Obadiah not only scold Edom, but pronounce the Lord’s judgments upon them. “As you have done, it will be done so to you,” Obadiah says (v. 15)
Judah, however, the nation whose destruction Edom cheered, will one day be restored. Not so, for the wicked cousins.
This weekend, we read a big fish story!
Your fellow pilgrim through the Prophets,
Pastor Gary
No comments:
Post a Comment