Isaiah 14 makes it clear that “the Assyrian” and the King of Babylon are one and the same spiritual entity. Within this passage of Scripture we even find a direct reference to what many believe to be God’s indictment against Lucifer, or Satan, for attempting to usurp God’s authority. This bears witness to the fact, then, that the King of Assyria and the later in time King of Babylon both manifest the same spiritual principality which rules the earth. God’s new testament prophets, including Jesus, all make it clear that Satan rules the world in this present age. He simply appears to mankind in different forms. Satan always animates the particular head that rules whatever beast government controls the world at any particular time. For this reason we can say that prophecies concerning the King of Assyria, the prophecies concerning the King of Babylon, and prophecies in the Book of Revelation all concern God’s development and dealing with his chosen people through his unwilling subject, Satan.
God uses Satan in this world as his rod of anger, his scourge to discipline his sons. God, for example, did not remove the “thorn” in Paul’s flesh. He allowed Satan to buffet Paul in some peculiar way which, in God’s wisdom, Paul needed. God also uses Satan and his spiritual kingdom, which appear as the natural reality to our carnal eyes, to persecute his people in these days. We now live in the time when Satan’s kingdom has reached to the very necks of God’s holy people and threatens to destroy the memory of Christ from the earth. Our natural leaders, of course, continue to give lip service to “god,” but who is their god? Examine their actions and you instantly see their god to be Satan, not the God Yeshua of the Bible, for all men’s laws now contradict the written laws of God and no leader publicly acts towards or even speaks of implementing righteous laws.
As you read the Isaiah 14 prophecy remember that the terms “the remnant” and the faithful of Jacob and Israel all refer to the end time overcomers and those who overcame throughout history. These people make up the daughter of Zion and New Jerusalem. Here is the prophecy from Isaiah 14:
14 For the Lord will have compassion on Jacob and will again choose Israel, and will set them in their own land, and sojourners will join them and will attach themselves to the house of Jacob. 2 And the peoples will take them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel will possess them in the Lord’s land as male and female slaves.[a] They will take captive those who were their captors, and rule over those who oppressed them.
Israel’s Remnant Taunts Babylon
3 When the Lord has given you rest from your pain and turmoil and the hard service with which you were made to serve, 4 you will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon:
“How the oppressor has ceased,
the insolent fury[b] ceased!
5 The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked,
the scepter of rulers,
6 that struck the peoples in wrath
with unceasing blows,
that ruled the nations in anger
with unrelenting persecution.
7 The whole earth is at rest and quiet;
they break forth into singing.
8 The cypresses rejoice at you,
the cedars of Lebanon, saying,
‘Since you were laid low,
no woodcutter comes up against us.’
9 Sheol beneath is stirred up
to meet you when you come;
it rouses the shades to greet you,
all who were leaders of the earth;
it raises from their thrones
all who were kings of the nations.
10 All of them will answer
and say to you:
‘You too have become as weak as we!
You have become like us!’
11 Your pomp is brought down to Sheol,
the sound of your harps;
maggots are laid as a bed beneath you,
and worms are your covers.
12 “How you are fallen from heaven,
O Day Star, son of Dawn!
How you are cut down to the ground,
you who laid the nations low!
13 You said in your heart,
‘I will ascend to heaven;
above the stars of God
I will set my throne on high;
I will sit on the mount of assembly
in the far reaches of the north;[c]
14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.’
15 But you are brought down to Sheol,
to the far reaches of the pit.
16 Those who see you will stare at you
and ponder over you:
‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble,
who shook kingdoms,
17 who made the world like a desert
and overthrew its cities,
who did not let his prisoners go home?’
18 All the kings of the nations lie in glory,
each in his own tomb;[d]
19 but you are cast out, away from your grave,
like a loathed branch,
clothed with the slain, those pierced by the sword,
who go down to the stones of the pit,
like a dead body trampled underfoot.
20 You will not be joined with them in burial,
because you have destroyed your land,
you have slain your people.
“May the offspring of evildoers
nevermore be named!
21 Prepare slaughter for his sons
because of the guilt of their fathers,
lest they rise and possess the earth,
and fill the face of the world with cities.”
22 “I will rise up against them,” declares the Lord of hosts, “and will cut off from Babylon name and remnant, descendants and posterity,” declares theLord. 23 “And I will make it a possession of the hedgehog,[e] and pools of water, and I will sweep it with the broom of destruction,” declares the Lord of hosts.
24 The Lord of hosts has sworn:
“As I have planned,
so shall it be,
and as I have purposed,
so shall it stand,
25 that I will break the Assyrian in my land,
and on my mountains trample him underfoot;
and his yoke shall depart from them,
and his burden from their shoulder.”
26 This is the purpose that is purposed
concerning the whole earth,
and this is the hand that is stretched out
over all the nations.
27 For the Lord of hosts has purposed,
and who will annul it?
His hand is stretched out,
and who will turn it back? (Isaiah 14:1-27)
Although it does not look like it now, as God’s people like to say, “I have read the end of the Book (and everything that comes before it), and we win!”
… to be continued.
