When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, "I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless." – Genesis 17:1

Today's Scripture Reading (September 28, 2024): Genesis 17

There is a song we used to sing in church once in a while. Admittedly, it was always during a youth service. We don't sing it anymore, but every once in a while, when I am somewhere and everything gets quiet, I can be found gently singing the words of the chorus. Michael Card and John Thompson wrote the song, but Amy Grant made it famous.

               El Shaddai, El Shaddai,

               El-elyon na Adonia,

               Age to age you're still the same,

               By the power of the name.

               El Shaddai, El Shaddai,

               Erkamka na Adonai,

               We will praise and lift you high,

               El Shaddai.

Maybe we need a little Hebrew lesson to understand the song. So, "El-Shaddai" means "God-Almighty." "El-elyon na Adonai" roughly translates to "God in the highest, Oh, Lord." And "ErKamka na Adonai" means "We will love you, Oh, Lord." And there is something comforting about this God who is El-Shaddai. But again, maybe in our contemporary world, we are tempted to ask if this is really true. For the Jews, the answer was definitely yes. And there were moments when this El-Shaddai stepped up for the nation.

Late in the eighth century B.C.E., Samaria, the capital of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, fell to the invading Assyrian Empire. In modern times, we often miss the importance of the land on which Israel sat. Israel existed at a crossroads. The nation existed on a portion of the fertile crescent that went around the Syrian desert and connected Babylon and Rome with Egypt and Africa. The easiest way to get to Africa was through Israel. So, when Egypt wanted to attack Assyria or Babylon or move into Europe and Asia, they attacked through Israel. When the empires of the North wanted to subdue Egypt, they would attack through Israel and Judah.

Depending on the historian, somewhere between 723–721 B.C.E., Assyria attacked Israel, and the Kingdom of Israel fell. This is the origin of the idea of the ten lost tribes of Israel. It was the end of Israel and all of the tribes except for Judah, Benjamin, and Levi. However, the attack on Israel by the Assyrians was part of a much larger plan. Assyria wanted to get to Egypt, and even after the fall of Israel, Judah and Jerusalem still stood in the way. Twenty years later, Assyria returned to continue their assault, this time on King Hezekiah and Jerusalem.

Sennacherib surrounded the city of Jerusalem and began what was essentially a psychological campaign against the Jewish capital. Egypt was propping up Jerusalem because Judah provided a cushion between the Egyptians and the Assyrian Empire. But Sennacherib was confident that that would not be enough to save Hezekiah and his kingdom. He surrounded the city with 185,000 men and then waited for the city to surrender.

Hezekiah received a message from Sennacherib and turned to El-Shaddai for help.

Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it. Then he went up to the temple of the Lord and spread it out before the Lord. And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord: "Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, you alone are God over all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth. Give ear, Lord, and hear; open your eyes, Lord, and see; listen to the words Sennacherib has sent to ridicule the living God.

"It is true, Lord, that the Assyrian kings have laid waste these nations and their lands. They have thrown their gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not gods but only wood and stone, fashioned by human hands. Now, Lord our God, deliver us from his hand, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone, Lord, are God" (2 Kings 19:14-19).

You are El-Shaddai, aren't you? The one who came to Abram?

The answer to Hezekiah's prayer did not come in a miraculous military victory by Hezekiah. God's answer arrived during the night, people died, and the army left. The events of that night have been a mystery that has been talked about ever since. Some argue that mice, attracted by the garbage that the siege had created, infected the soldiers, killing them. And Sennacherib fled. Others have pointed to an emergency back in Nineveh that brought Sennacherib home. The truth might be somewhere in the middle, but for the Jews, there was only one answer. No matter the outer circumstances, El-Shaddai had moved, Sennacherib had left, and he never came back. As a result, Assyria would never take Judah or Egypt, making them part of the Empire.

El-Shaddai still moves among his people. He is still the one that we need.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Genesis 18