Isaiah 17:12 - Meaning and Application

These verses describe the doom of those who plunder and rob God’s people. If the Assyrians and Israelites invade Judah and strip it bare, if the Assyrian army takes God’s people captive and leaves their land ruined, they should know that destruction will be their own share and reward.

The enemy is first shown bragging against God’s people. They trusted in their numbers. The Assyrian army was made up of many nations, a great crowd of people (Isaiah 17:12), and they thought their size would win the day. They were loud and threatening, like the roar of the sea. They boasted, blustered, and tried to frighten God’s people out of resisting them, and to keep their allies from coming to help.

Sennacherib and Rabshakeh, the Assyrian king and his officer, spoke and wrote in ways meant to terrify Hezekiah and the people of Judah. The nations that followed them made a rushing sound like many waters. These are the mighty ones who seem ready to roll over everything in their path. The floods lift up their voice and their waves, and so do the peoples and nations when they rage against God (Psalm 2:1; Psalm 93:3).

But then they are shown being overcome by God’s judgment. They thought they would succeed by noise and force, but woe to them (Isaiah 17:12). God will rebuke them. He is the One they do not think about and do not fear, yet He will stop them with an unseen hand, and then they will run far away.

Sennacherib, Rabshakeh, and the rest of their army will flee in fear, chased by their own terror. They will be like chaff on a mountain, blown about by the wind, or like something light and loose that the whirlwind carries away. They make themselves like chaff before the wind (Psalm 35:5), and then the angel of the Lord, the same angel who struck down many of them, will drive off the rest. God will make them like a rolling thing, then pursue them with His storm and frighten them with His tempest (Psalm 83:13, Psalm 83:15).

This shows that God can take courage away from His enemies when they seem strongest, and scatter them when they seem most united. He does this suddenly (Isaiah 17:14). In the evening they are a trouble to God’s people and seem likely to cause more harm, but before morning they are gone. At sleep time they fall into a deep sleep (Psalm 26:5, Psalm 26:6). It was in the night that the angel defeated the Assyrian army.

God can break the power of His church’s enemies in a moment, even when they look most dangerous. This was written to encourage God’s people in every age, when they feel too weak to face their enemies. This is what happens to those who plunder us, they end up being plundered themselves. God will defend His church, and anyone who attacks it harms only himself.