FAME, PRIDE, FALL AND HOPE

From the start the kings of Israel and Judah had a responsibility to walk faithfully before God and rule justly; showing the people the way to obey God's commands. The human kings would fail and as a consequence God said he would cut off the his people from there land and the temple would be destroyed. It would be the Assyrians who would be God's agent who would 'sow' Israel into the other nations. In the process, God was also sowing seeds of hope, following the promise first made to Abraham - the whole earth would produce sons of God in the New Covenant to glorify the Lord.

Right in the middle of the period of the kings of Judah and Israel the reign of Uzziah (also known as Azariah) comes to typify the susceptibility of the human heart to sin in the sequence - 'Fame, Pride and Fall'. But the people are not left without hope.

It is significant that Uzziah's reign is surrounded by an array of prophets:

Jonah 778 BC - 763 BC
Amos 767 BC - 753 BC
Hosea 755 BC - 725 BC
Isaiah 745 BC - 685 BC
Micah 740 BC - 700 BC
Nahum 640 BC

Uzziah's reign (790 BC - 739 BC) begins well under the guidance of a gifted teacher, also by the name of Zechariah:

He sought God during the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear (or vision) of God. As long as he sought the Lord, God gave him success.He went to war against the Philistines and broke down the walls of Gath, Jabneh and Ashdod. He then rebuilt towns near Ashdod and elsewhere among the Philistines. God helped him against the Philistines and against the Arabs who lived in Gur Baal and against the Meunites. The Ammonites brought tribute to Uzziah, and his fame spread as far as the border of Egypt, because he had become very powerful.

2 Chronicles 26:5-8

He built up his military infrastructure and his army even inventing new weapons of defense. This was all the important because of the rise of the Assyrian empire in the north. We now start to open up to see what was happening in the outside world through the voices of the prophets and more importantly the plan of salvation that was starting to be revealed in contrast to the inability to keep the Old Covenant.

The Prophet Jonah (778 BC - 763 BC) - Repentance and Arresting the Development of Assyrian Military Ambitions

The story of Jonah has been trivialised by some as a myth or as a quaint children's story where God sends a whale to swallow and vomit out (after 3 days) a reluctant, runaway prophet, Jonah, to save the people of the Assyrian city of Nineveh, even though Jonah considered them not worth saving. It is an important true story that requires a degree of faith for those with a scientific bias to believe, but it is no more impossible to believe than intelligent life coming from the Big Bang - Did the story of Jonah really happen.

Sperm whales are known to produce a substance to protect the digestive system against irritable objects such as squid beaks. Occasionally this is vomited out and floats in the ocean until it washes up on shore. Known as ambergis, it has medical properties of and used in incense and perfume, and is sold for high prices (for example, up to 3 million dollars for 80 kg). Actually it has similar properties to myrrh; here we find another connection with Jesus - Jesus was embalmed in bandages of myrrh and perhaps Jonah in ambergis. Speculating further we could say that Jonah hadn't passed too far through the stomach chambers, unharmed by the gastric juices (may be just a bleached skin). Jonah could have died, or been unconscious, even in a coma. And when he was vomited he was revived.

Whatever actually happened, Jesus himself tells us that is was a fact. Jonah's whale experience would resemble Jesus' death, burial and resurrection. This lies in a chapter that deals with repentance and the presence of the Holy Spirit to drive out demons. The unrepentant Jews, and their blind guides, the Pharisees are condemned, whereas the repentant Jews and Gentiles are saved by the presence of the Holy Spirit.

Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.”

He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here. The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, and now something greater than Solomon is here.

Matthew 12:38-41

Jonah's bleached skin made him look like a ghost as he entered the city of Nineveh preaching repentance, add to that the omen of a solar eclipse in 763 BC and the superstitious Assyrians took Jonah's call to repentance very seriously. The Assyrian military ambitions were put to sleep for a while.

Afterwards, God grew a plant to protect Jonah from the harsh sun. As a worm at away ate the plant to make it wither and fail to provide shelter, so to bitterness ate away at Jonah's soul. Jonah was angry because God was compassionate to the Gentile who had not been taught the right way to live!

But the Lord said, “You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh,in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?”

Jonah 4:10-11

God can be turned from his planned course by repentance.

If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it.

Jeremiah 18:7-10

The Prophet Amos (767 BC - 753 BC) - Predicting 'The Day of the Lord' - The Great Earthquake

Jesus comments about the 'wicked and adulterous generation' still resound true when we listen to the Prophet Amos. Right from the start we see the consequence of God's wrath on the land, drought.

The words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa—the vision he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake, when Uzziah was king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.

He said: “The Lord roars from Zion and thunders from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds dry up, and the top of Carmel withers.”

Amos 1:1-2

His wrath is directed towards the nations. Obviously the repentance of the Assyrians in Jonah's time did not cause the other nations to turn also from their wicked ways. Even Israel's pride led to taking over the cities of Lo Debar and Karnaim "in their own strength", Amos 6:13 [3].

Amos speaks 2 years before a great earthquake that would be remembered for centuries after. The earthquake struck around 750 BC with an epicentre in the north. The judgement would hit hard against the northern kingdom of Israel, down to the the altar in Bethel. [2]

The 'Day of the Lord' will come suddenly - alongside dramatic earthquake was there also some kind of astronomical event (a gamma ray burst from space perhaps? [4]). The same will happen when Jesus comes again (1 Corinthians 15:52).

He who made the Pleiades and Orion, who turns midnight into dawn and darkens day into night,
who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land — the Lord is his name.
With a blinding flash he destroys the stronghold and brings the fortified city to ruin.

Amos 5:8-9

We have almost all the sequence of events (including the Locust in Amos 7) that usually build up to the 'Day of the Lord'. However the 'Day of the Lord' will lead to the adulterous Israel being lead away into exile seemingly for good.

Your wife will become a prostitute in the city, and your sons and daughters will fall by the sword. Your land will be measured and divided up, and you yourself will die in a pagan country. And Israel will surely go into exile, away from their native land.’”

Amos 7:17

Yet Amos 9 still talks about a future of rebuilding of David's tent, which happens after the Jews return from the Babylonian exile - note in the book of Obadiah (a different one from the one that Elijah encountered) it is prophesied with the same 'In that day' about the return of the exiles and Edom being overrun.

In that day “I will restore David’s fallen shelter— I will repair its broken walls and restore its ruins and will rebuild it as it used to be, so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that bear my name,” declares the Lord, who will do these things.

Amos 9:11-12

David's fallen tent is a reference to cities and territories restored in the enlarged Promised Land for an increased population - see 'Whom will you serve?' with reference to Isaiah 54:2-3. This immediately links to a future where God declares a time when Israel will return and remain in the land forever. Isaiah 54:4-10 continues with God having compassion and calling back a rejected and abandoned wife, and with the reference to Noah's flood - a reminder of the time Jesus will come again to save those who are his (Matthew 24:37-39). We may well be coming close to this time. Then the land will be so fruitful, that produce will be available all year around,

“The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman and the planter by the one treading grapes. New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills, and I will bring my people Israel back from exile. “They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them. They will plant vineyards and drink their wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land I have given them,” says the Lord your God.

Amos 9:13-15

If we look closely at Amos 9:7-11, we can see Israel has been mixed in with the nations, which will then be 'sieved' to removed what is bad; an image we see clearly in the New Testament in threshing and winnowing process, or in the dividing of sheep from goats. In both instances both are gathered to be sorted; wheat from chaff is divided in the confines of the threshing floor, sheep from goats in the confines of a pen.

The Prophet Hosea (755 BC - 725 BC) - From the Adulterous Wife to the Children of the Living God

Hosea's message is written in his life. God tells him:

“Go, marry a promiscuous woman and have children with her, for like an adulterous wife this land is guilty of unfaithfulness to the Lord. So he married Gomer daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. Then the Lord said to Hosea, “Call him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel. In that day I will break Israel’s bow in the Valley of Jezreel.”

Hosea 1:2-5

Leonard Jayawardena clears up the apparent contradiction between the 2 Kings 10:30 where Jehu is commended for the massacring the house of Ahab and Hosea 1:4 where the house of Jehu is punished for the massacre at Jezreel. [5]

In Hosea, God is referring to a much wider, endemic stain; because of Israel's continued sin of idolatry (which God associates with adultery; forsaking God). In the Valley of Jezreel, because the blood of the children of Israel's blood was shed by their enemies because of the sin of the house of Jehu, the Assyrians would come to ‘sow’ (Jezreel means ‘God sows’) Israel among the nations and the ‘bow’ (the might of that nation) broken.

The 'sowing' would later continue with Judah’s exile to Babylon - it was God's way of humbling both sides (Daniel was humble and Nebuchadnezzar was forced to be humble) so that together both would prosper as they acknowledged God (Jeremiah 29:7).

Only a remnant would return from exile. Like the sowing in the 'parable of the sower' in the gospels some seed grew to become a distinctive Jewish presence throughout the Persian, Greek and Roman empires but others were lost without a trace. When Jesus died, is was to signify the end of the Old Covenant, and a prediction of the destruction of the temple in AD 70 the temple which led to the Dispora; they were sowed once again. Today this Israel has been dispersed into the world.

Two Olive Trees One Root

The fate of the 'Old Israel' (people of the Old Covenant) and the 'New Israel' (people of the New Covenant) are intertwined. If they were olive trees you could imagine them out of the same root..

In this sense the two trees in Zechariah 4 that serve the Lord of all the earth, nourished by the his Spirit; in Spirit, worship flows back to the golden lampstand stand, representing the Lord who gives light. There is a similar cycle in Isaiah 55:10-11 "As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it."

In Zechariah's time, the Old Covenant tree began to flourish again, but as the Old Covenant tree withered, the promise of the New Covenant lush foliage shines through with promise. The promise realised in faith in Jesus is like the sap rising from the stem. We can trace sign of the New Covenant back to the beginning, for example, where It says Abraham believed the Lord and it was credited to him as righteousness.

The New Testament clearly shows how readily the people of the 'Old Israel' can be transformed into the 'New Israel' if they were just to believe in Jesus as their Lord (Romans 9-11).

In the end the focus returns back to the Valley of Jezreel. In Revelation 16v16 there will be a final confrontation at a place called Armageddon, the Hebrew makes more sense - ‘Har Megiddo’ or “Mount” Tell Megiddo. Here the armies will gather in the Jezreel Valley - not far from Mount Carmel where Elijah took a stand against the idolatry headed up by Jezebel, consort of king Ahab,

Yet the Israelites will be like the sand on the seashore, which cannot be measured or counted. In the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘children of the living God.’ The people of Judah and the people of Israel will come together; they will appoint one leader and will come up out of the land, for great will be the day of Jezreel.

Hosea 1:10-11

The seed that is dispersed, is planted and produces a harvest, including both Jew and Gentile, under one Lord.

There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Galatians 3:28

The Great Earthquake (~ 750 BC) Fame, Pride and Fall

The great earthquake that was predicted by Amos hit the north and left Judah in a powerful position in about 750 BC. The following verses describe the moment when pride crept into Uzziah's heart and it all began to fall apart.

His fame spread far and wide, for he was greatly helped until he became powerful. But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense.

2 Chronicles 26:15-16

The priests confronted Uzziah saying that to burn incense was the role of the priest, not the king. Uzziah became angry in front of the incense altar (a place of worship to God), and instantly contracted leprosy which meant he was not allowed in the temple again for the remainder of his life.

We wouldn't be to far off the mark to set 749 BC as the key turning point in the failure of this king. This turning point can be seen in the king's name change from the Uzziah (meaning 'my strength is God') when he had vigour, to 2 Kings 15 use of Azariah (meaning 'God has helped') when he is humbled and recognised his reliance on God.

749 BC marks a definitive 777 year division where God leaves firstly Israel and then Judah to the consequence of their sins.

The Prophet Isaiah (745 BC - 685 BC) - The End and a New Beginning

Isaiah is the first of the major prophets, followed by Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel. His commission started the time Uzziah died (739 BC) with a vision.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted,seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”

Isaiah 6:1-3

Immediately, Isaiah was struck by the gulf between himself and God.

“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King,the Lord Almighty.”

Isaiah 6:5

After his sin was atoned for and his guilt taken away, he offers be God's messenger, but the message will fall on deaf ears.

‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’ Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”

Isaiah 6:5

Isaiah asks how long? Isaiah wasn't specific with his question, but the Lord answers both questions:

How long to speak this message?
How long will this people remain in this state?

To the first question the Lord replies:

Until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged, until the Lord has sent everyone far away and the land is utterly forsaken.

Isaiah 6:11-12

Isaiah will speak this message until the northern tribes of Israel are taken away.

To the second question the Lord replies:

And though a tenth remains in the land, it will again be laid waste. But as the terebinth and oak leave stumps when they are cut down, so the holy seed will be the stump in the land.”

Isaiah 6:13

Isaiah will see a tenth remain in the land (Judah) when Assyria take the northern tribes away. Then in a time after Isaiah, the Babylonians will come and destroy Jerusalem and the temple, and take the people into exile. However Jesus, who's life was cut short, was the holy seed, in the land through whom new life springs.

The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. Scripture does not say “and to seeds,” meaning many people, but “and to your seed,”meaning one person, who is Christ...

If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

Galatians 3:16,29

Very truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.

John 12:24

The real answer to the question 'How long will the Jews remain in this state?" is until they accept Jesus as Lord, In Isaiah 7, when Ahaz is king, and the threat of Assyria is looming larger, Judah tries God's patience even more. So God gives them a real sign of a virgin giving birth - which is a sign for Jesus coming to be a light in the darkness,

The book of Isaiah has been described as the story of two Jerusalems; the wickedness brings the down fall of the physical Jerusalem, but through Jesus will come a New Jerusalem, (Zion, the Church). As Uzziah's reign stretched over many prophets, Isaiah's ministry stretched over many kings. Isaiah advised king Hezekiah to miraculously see off the threat of the Assyrian king Sennacherib and he forewarned Hezekiah about the motives of the Babylonian envoys. What Isaiah prophesies about the New Jerusalem gave the Jews hope for when they returned from the Babylonian exile in the following centuries. As often the case what they hoped for didn't quite reach their expectations, Instead God had more to show them, to create longing. With God there is more at stake than we are prepared to admit - if we trust him, he will be with us through dark vales, but he will restore our souls. Isaiah's words vividly spoke about Jesus as well as time still to come.

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.

Proverbs 13:12

In familiar language Isaiah describes the refreshing newness of life that Jesus brings.

For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.

Isaiah 44:3

Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters;

Isaiah 55:1

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

Matthew 11:28

God's purposes to restore, rebuild and revive is foretold through the remarkable story of the Jews return from exile.

I am the Lord

... who carries out the words of his servants and fulfills the predictions of his messengers, who says of Jerusalem, ‘It shall be inhabited,’ of the towns of Judah, ‘They shall be rebuilt,’ and of their ruins, ‘I will restore them,’ ...

who says of Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd and will accomplish all that I please; he will say of Jerusalem, “Let it be rebuilt,” and of the temple, “Let its foundations be laid.”’

Isaiah 44:24,26,28

The Prophet Micah (740 BC - 700 BC) - Preparation for the Future and a Hope

Micah lived at the same time as Isaiah and condenses much of Isaiah into seven short chapters. Obviously God had such an important message to put across that he required these two prophets to chime with each other, The predictions of what they will experience in coming centuries, become for us a view of the end times. The revelation of a King then, which we know now is Jesus, is the hope of salvation. A light shining, even in the darkest of times. So it is important to separate times to make true sense of this book; observing the phrases 'I will', 'In the last days', 'In that day', 'But you' and 'But now'. Sometimes the predictions of the coming centuries are overlain with messianic prophecy and the messianic future and hope gives a peace for the day. This comes to the fore in chapters 4 and 5 and goes to shows the importance of fully understanding the period of time when the exiles return from captivity.

MICAH OUTLINE

Chapter 1

Judgement to devastate Samaria (verse 6) and reach the very gates of Jerusalem (verse 9) - Assyrians, led by Sennacherib, lay siege to Jerusalem governed by king Hezekiah (Isaiah 36)

Chapter 2

False prophets deceive the people (verse 11) and scorn the notion that will bring disgrace upon them (verse 6). A remnant will be kept safe in Jerusalem, like sheep in a pen (verse 12) and the Lord, the King, will lead them out to victory (verse 13) - The angel of the Lord put to death the Assyrian camp (Isaiah 37)

Chapter 3

False prophets (verse 5), judges and priests (verse 11) are bought for a price. Visions cease (verse 6) and there is not justice (verse 9). So Jerusalem and the temple will be destroyed (verse 12) - When the Babylonians come.

Chapter 4

In the last days the temple will be establish in Jerusalem (verse 1), where the Lord will provide justice and peace for the nations (verse 3), so that they won't be displaced (verse 4, compare to Isaiah 36:16). When the remnant (verse 7) return from Babylonian exile (verse 10), in Jesus the King's protection (verse 7 & 8) and build the second temple, reflecting also in the Millennium reign of Jesus in the book of Revelation where God replaces the temple (John 2:19, Revelation 21:22).

With a 'But now' (verse 11) capturing the moment throughout time when the nations will gather and gloat at Zion's (Jerusalem's) defiled state (verse 11) - God places emphasis on this moment - this is where the true victory is found (signifying victory at the cross of Jesus). God reveals that they do not understand his plan/pattern (verse 12) that they have gathered to be judged (verse 13). In the coming centuries when the exiles return from Babylon God exemplifies this plan/pattern with the events around the second temple and the rebuilding of Jerusalem (the next pages will show this).

Chapter 5

The insult of Sennacherib, is an insult to king Hezekiah, but also to the Lord, the ruler (verse 1). Micah prophesies that Jesus as the ruler, in future to be born in Bethlehem (verse 2) adding to the revelation in Isaiah 7:14 of the virgin's birth (Consequently, Israel who has been abandoned until Jesus is born and 'the rest of Israel's brothers return' (verse 3)- the church, adopted son's of God (the result of the 'sowing' of Israel in the nations as spoken in Hosea). Jesus like a shepherd will provide security for his flock, to the ends of the earth (verse 4) - see also Acts 1:7-8. It is in this long lasting hope of a deliverer that will sustain his people when the Assyrians invade, Agents of the Lord will hold the Assyrians at bay until they are no longer a threat (verses 5 & 6) - Nineveh falls in 612 BC and the Assyrian empire is overtaken by the Chaldeans (Babylonians, Medes and Scythians) in 609 BC. The many, like dew on the grass, among the nations, referred to here as Jacob (wrestles with God for a blessing, and the former name of Israel) triumphs over it's enemies as a lion (verses 8 & 9). The detestable practices that permeated through the Assyrian reign are put to an end (verses 10 -15) - King Josiah smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles and covered the sites with human bones (2 Kings 23:14), he died when the Assyrian empire came to an end.

Chapter 6

God puts forth his case against Israel. How he rescued them from slavery in Egypt and brought them into the promised land. More than the all there offerings, he requires them to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with their God (verse 8). But they act dishonestly and the detestable of practices of King Ahab's days persist.

Chapter 7

Micah bemoans the states of affairs - unrighteousness, deceit and evil. He see now is the time to sound the alarm. But he see a time when God's people are to be rescued and rise again to the promise of God.

A selection of the verses from the end of Micah shows his attitude and praise as he waits for his saviour. We now know this saviour and at the same time look forward to his coming again,

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Micah 6:8

But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord, I wait for God my Saviour; my God will hear me. Do not gloat over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light. Because I have sinned against him, I will bear the Lord’s wrath, until he pleads my case and upholds my cause. He will bring me out into the light; I will see his righteousness.

Micah 7:7-9

The day for building your walls will come, the day for extending your boundaries.

Micah 7:11

Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy. You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea. You will be faithful to Jacob, and show love to Abraham, as you pledged on oath to our ancestors in days long ago.

Micah 7:18-20

The Prophet Nahum - 640 BC

Nahum announces the end of the Assyrian empire, and Nineveh will be no more. The news of this event brought from across the mountains is a cause of celebration and peace. The peace that sustained Micah is tied to the future hope of salvation; this is captured in Nahum 2:2 where the Lord will restore the splendour Jacob (like Micah 4:1-5), like the once splendour of Israel when it was united kingdom under king David. Nahum continues to describe the fall if Nineveh in great detail. That the comparative peace and joy for those who trust him is like the eye of a hurricane.

The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in him, but with an overwhelming flood he will make an end of Nineveh;he will pursue his foes into the realm of darkness.

Nahum 1:7-8

Nahum 2:2 requires special attention as there is a phrase often repeated which now act as a light in the darkness.

The Lord will restore the splendor of Jacob like the splendor of Israel, though destroyers have laid them waste and have ruined their vines.

Nahum 2:2

Isaiah 27 helps to give the right context to this phrase.

In days to come Jacob will take root, Israel will bud and blossom and fill all the world with fruit. Has the Lord struck her as he struck down those who struck her? Has she been killed as those were killed who killed her By warfare and exile you contend with her - with his fierce blast he drives her out, as on a day the east wind blows. By this, then, will Jacob’s guilt be atoned for, and this will be the full fruit of the removal of his sin: When he makes all the altar stones to be like limestone crushed to pieces, no Asherah poles or incense altars will be left standing.

Isaiah 27:6-9

Out of Jacob came the 12 tribes of Israel. The Lord used Assyria to contend with Jacob/Israel right up to the gates of Jerusalem (Isaiah 36) and sowed them into the nations, their sin removed - for what? For the Church, 'All Israel' (Romans 11:25-27) to fill the whole world.

When God gives a name to someone it describes who they will be. This is what God said to Jacob when the 'house of God' (Bethel) was revealed to him in a dream - here the Church would be the 'house of God'.

I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring. I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.

Genesis 28:13-15

Footnotes:

[1[ Uzziah God given success

https://www.biblestudytools.com/bible-study/topical-studies/uzziah-god-given-success-11635599.html

[2] Amos Earthquake

https://www.icr.org/article/scientific-scriptural-impact-amos-earthquake

[3] Conquest Pride

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jeroboam#ref1250322

[4] Light and Darkeness - GRB

https://quarkmag.com/what-would-happen-if-a-grb-hit-the-earth-again-b636f2e5ed54

[5] Jehu and the massacre at Jezreeel

https://infidels.org/library/modern/leonard_jayawardena/jehu.html