Seven-hundred years before Christ came to earth, the nation of Assyria threatened to swallow Judah.  The Assyrians were notorious for their merciless cruelty, and the mere threat of their invasion was enough to intimidate some nations into submission. This fearsome nation was conquering the lands all around Judah, and it had already captured the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 B.C..  As Assyria closed in around closer and closer to Jerusalem, the people of Judah became desperate.  What could they do to survive?

At last, Judah sought for deliverance from the least likely source -- Egypt. The people who had been their slave-masters were now to be their saviors.  Judah would form an alliance with Egypt and depend on them to resist the coming onslaught of Assyria's armies.  This plan was hatched in the minds of the foremost political leaders of the day, and there is no doubt that they thought it was brilliant.

Far from brilliant, this plan was a massive failure for one clear reason: it was not of God.  Through the prophet Isaiah, God exposed the folly of Judah's new alliance with Egypt.  Notice God's words in Isaiah 30:1-3:

¹"Woe to the rebellious children," declares the LORD, "who execute a plan, but not Mine, and make an alliance, but not of My Spirit, in order to add sin to sin; ²who proceed down to Egypt without consulting Me, to take refuge in the safety of Pharaoh and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!  ³Therefore the safety of Pharaoh will be your shame and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt, your humiliation."

The oracle against Judah and the Egyptian alliance goes on in Isaiah 31:1-3:

¹Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help and rely on horses, and trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek the LORD!  ²Yet He also is wise and will bring disaster and does not retract His words, but will arise against the house of evildoers and against the help of the workers of iniquity.  ³Now the Egyptians are men and not God, and their horses are flesh and not spirit; so the LORD will stretch out His hand, and he who helps will stumble and he who is helped will fall, and all of them will come to an end together.

The political solution sought by Judah was a failure, but there was still an opportunity for them to survive.  The right solution offered once again by God is given in Isaiah 31:6-9:

⁶Return to Him from whom you have deeply defected, O sons of Israel.  ⁷For in that day every man will cast away his silver idols and his gold idols, which your sinful hands have made for you as a sin.  ⁸And the Assyrian will fall by a sword not of man, and a sword not of man will devour him.  So he will not escape the sword, and his young men will become forced laborers.  ⁹"His rock will pass away because of panic, and his princes will be terrified at the standard," declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.

The solution was simple: "In repentance and rest you will be saved, in quietness and trust is your strength" (Isa. 30:15).  Rather than panicked flights to Egypt, Judah merely needed to cease from sin and trust in God.  (God's plan resulted in 185,000 Assyrian soldiers dying in one night and the army retreating.  See Isaiah 37.)

What does this have to do with our nation?  It is that the solution for our nation's problems is the same as it was for Judah.  As a nation, we also need to repent and trust in God.  This means that the people of our nation must cease from the practice of sin and commence the practice of righteousness.  In other words, we must trade immorality, homosexuality, violence, abortion, greed, and corruption for purity, holiness, sacrifice, love, mercy, responsibility, and honesty.  If our nation will do this, then our problems will be solved.  The principle of Proverbs 14:34 still abides over all nations: "Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people."  It is that simple.

This is the only solution to our nation's problems, and it cannot be implemented politically.  The only way to implement it is by individuals, families, and churches who will prayerfully learn, teach, and practice the statues of God (Ezra 7:10). For those who reject this, let them know that there is no political solution to our problems.  Talking heads on TV and the radio envision nothing but political solutions, but their ideas will not work.  Only when the people of our nation turn to God in righteousness will we see improvement.  Hopefully, God will offer our nation the same opportunity He offered to Judah when He said that if they would "humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land" (2Chron. 7:14).  Unless and until that happens, our nation's problems will continue to get worse.

Stacey E. Durham