Daily Lesson for August 19, 2020

Today's Daily Lesson comes from Jeremiah chapter 46 verses 7 and 8:

7

Who is this, rising like the Nile,

    like rivers whose waters surge?

8

Egypt rises like the Nile,

    like rivers whose waters surge.

It said, Let me rise, let me cover the earth,

    let me destroy cities and their inhabitants.

"Who is this?"

That is the question the LORD puts upon Jeremiah's tongue as the nation of Egypt rose up in mighty arms like the raging waters of the Nile at its rise.

It is rises and rages for a while, but then it recedes, contingent not upon its own strength but by the contingencies of storm and wind and the mysterious vagary of the weather.

Egypt rose up in arms and indeed appeared mighty in battle.  But so too did Babylon.  And in the end Egypt's "swift could not flee, nor could its warriors escape".  The strength of the waters dried up.  The  flood receded in fear.

Armies reveille with might, but are then put to flight.  Nations rise with sudden strength, but then fall just as fast.  ISIS was going to take over the world five years ago.  Where is it now?

The Prophet Jeremiah knows these things.  He knows that it is God who controls the winds, and he knows that the "best laid plans of mice and men often go awry" and that the force of even a mighty army can be felled by the flapping of the wings of a single butterfly.

Be at peace, friends; God is still in control.

NOTE: We are reading the whole Bible through this year.  Tomorrow's Lesson comes from 49 and 50.