33 Woe to you, O destroyer,
While you were not destroyed;
And he who is treacherous, while others did not deal treacherously with him.
As soon as you finish destroying, you will be destroyed;
As soon as you cease to deal treacherously, others will deal treacherously with you.
2 O Lord, be gracious to us; we have waited for You.
Be [a]their [b]strength every morning,
Our salvation also in the time of distress.
3 At the sound of the tumult peoples flee;
At the lifting up of Yourself nations disperse.
4 Your spoil is gathered as the caterpillar gathers;
As locusts rushing about men rush about on it.
5 The Lord is exalted, for He dwells on high;
He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.
6 And He will be the [c]stability of your times,
A wealth of salvation, wisdom and knowledge;
The fear of the Lord is his treasure.
7 Behold, their brave men cry in [d]the streets,
The [e]ambassadors of peace weep bitterly.
8 The highways are desolate, [f]the traveler has ceased,
He has broken the covenant, he has despised the cities,
He has no regard for man.
9 The land mourns and pines away,
Lebanon is shamed and withers;
Sharon is like a desert plain,
And Bashan and Carmel [g]lose their foliage.
10 “Now I will arise,” says the Lord,
“Now I will be exalted, now I will be lifted up.
11 “You have conceived [h]chaff, you will give birth to stubble;
[i]My breath will consume you like a fire.
12 “The peoples will be burned to lime,
Like cut thorns which are burned in the fire.
At times these passages seem so random. We start with the destroyer and the treacherous one, and God is handing down judgment. Then, just like that, we flip to waiting on God and him being our strength. He will be exalted, and He will be stability, salvation, wisdom and knowledge to those who fear the Lord. And then we flip back to men crying and weeping, desolation, mourning, shame, and pining.
Again, in the middle of that, God says “Now I will arise, now I will be exalted and lifted up.” Whether the first one intended this meaning or not, it seems the message is that when things are falling apart, then our attention is turned to God. At least, that’s the way it always seems to be. But should it? Why does it take hard times to get us to turn to God?
When life is easy, we tend to go our own way, destroying and dealing treacherously–okay, maybe you aren’t that bad, but going your own way nonetheless. So there are two sides here, one is that it seems to be our human nature to need trials to make us stronger. Perhaps that’s just the way God built us. It works that way with our physical body, so why not otherwise?
That’s all well and good, but the flip side is that when life gets too easy, we are tempted to rest on our laurels, and we lose that spiritual muscle. Instead, we ought to keep on practicing what we have learned in the fire, chasing after God through bad times and good alike. As Paul said, let us not become “weary in well-doing”, but let us “press on to the high calling of Jesus…”
Don’t wait for storms to lift up the name of Jesus, but do it every day. Workout your spiritual muscles even when life seems easy, and the hard times will likely be less hard as you walk by His side.