Changing Tyre

About four years ago, we welcomed a kitten into our home. And after four years, a recent poll indicates that about 80% of my family really likes our cat. I am one of those 80%. I really like our cat, despite the fact that, like every cat, he thinks he's better than us. Cats are nothing if not arrogant, right?

He thinks that our house is his, and he can just walk all over us—literally—to get whatever he wants. Being proud, he's also incredibly demanding. If he wants affection, he will maul us until he gets it. If the boys are not awake when he'd like them to be up, he's figured out a way to get his paw wrapped around underneath their door so he can bang it back and forth until they wake up and let him in.

And when he finally gets what he wants, he stares at you with a satisfied look that says, "Well done, human. Your service has been accepted."

And, like every cat, every pet in fact, he's completely unaware of the fact that he is not above us—he is far below us in every conceivable way. He completely depends on us for food and care that he does nothing to contribute to. He could not survive for long in our house if we were not regularly and actively providing for him.

And with pets, this kind of thing is funny. They are animals. They have no capacity to see and understand anything more than they do.

But what about us? What about you and I who live and move and breathe in a world we did not make, given life moment-by-moment by a God so far above us, whom we receive so much from every second that we do nothing to earn?

We are not like cats, ignorant and unaware. We're people, made in God's image, able to see and recognize His power and nature in the things that have been made. We know that thankfulness is our proper response to the blessings of food and friends and family.

But so often, like cats on perch, we look around smugly as if we really have ourselves to thank for the things we enjoy. As if we did this all by ourselves.

And it does not amuse our creator. Quite the opposite. Pride brings down our creator's judgement. God is opposed to the proud. That's really the big idea behind today's passage, which is the last oracle given to one of Judah's neighbours in Isaiah.

This section of Isaiah still has four chapters in it which we'll hear from in the next four weeks, but the focus is no longer on individual nations. Next week in Isaiah 24, the Lord addresses his judgement to the whole world, and then the next three chapters are all about grace and restoration and hope on the other side of his judgement.

So today is the last stop in Isaiah for these messages against the nations. The nations addressed today are Tyre and Sidon.

About Tyre & Sidon

Tyre and Sidon were two city-states north of Israel on the cost of the Mediterranean sea, in present-day Lebanon. Sidon was a few miles up the coast from Sidon and was often under Tyrian control. Because of their access to the sea they were active in trade and were extremely wealthy (Psalm 45:12). Think of them like the New York and Boston of the ancient world. They made a highly-expensive purple dye from a local shellfish that was one of their claims to fame and sources of revenue.

Tyre and Sidon had bene promised to the tribe of Asher (Joshua 19:28-29), but the people of Asher weren't able to conquer them. Tyre and Sidon remained, and at times they had a friendly relationship with Israel. Hiram king of Tyre had a good relationship with David, and both Tyre and Sidon had a big role in helping to build David's palace and the temple in Jerusalem. Hiram experienced an even closer relationship with Solomon than with David.

But it wasn't all sunshine and roses. 1 Kings 11 says that Solomon married Sidonian women, who turned his heart after their gods, and eventually "Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians…” (1 Kings 11:1-6). Solomon's worship of false gods spread, and we read later in the chapter that the people had forsaken the Lord to worship these foreign gods including "Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians" (1 Ki 11:33).

Years later king Ahab of Israel “took for his wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went and served Baal and worshiped him” (1 Kings 16:31). By this point it looks like Baal was the god all the cool people in Sidon were worshipping, and under Jezebel's sponsorship Baal worship spread like a disease throughout the people of Israel, essentially completely replacing the worship of the one true God for a time.

So Tyre and Sidon had a really negative legacy with the people of God. Sure, they imported all that wood to build the temple, but that would have been theirs anyways if they had taken the territory of Tyre and Sidon like God had told them to. And what could undo the damage of all of the Ashtoreth and Baal worship they imported as well?

It's interesting, though, that idol worship per se is not what Tyre and Sidon are rebuked for in this final oracle from Isaiah. And I think that's because idol worship is not the basic problem. Like we find out later on in Romans 1, worshipping idols is the result of something deeper. People worship idols because they've already refused to honour God or give thanks to him (Rom 1:20-23).

And I'd suggest that's why the focus of this oracle against Tyre and Sidon is not their idols but the real problem, which is their pride.

What's Going to Happen (Vv. 1-6, 13-14)

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's start to look at the text, beginning with verses 1-7 where we find out what's going to happen to Tyre and Sidon. Then we'll find out who made this happen, and why, before we discover what's going to happen afterward.

What's going to happen is introduced to us very straightforwardly in verse 1. "Tyre is laid waste, without house or harbor" (Isa 23:1). This bustling city, centre of trade, is totally destroyed.

And as it is destroyed, the world that did trade with it mourns and grieves its loss. Isaiah starts the whole section by telling the ships of Tarshish to wail. Tarshish was way across the Mediterranean, probably some place in Spain, literally on the other end of the world. It's where Jonah fled to. Sailing there would have taken weeks at the least, maybe up to months. And whatever riches Tyre and Sidon have to offer are worth it for the ships of Tarshish to make the long and dangerous voyage to trade and buy and sell.

But now, as they get to Cyprus, almost at the very end of their journey, and the ships of Tarshish receive the news that Tyre is gone. How devastating.

Now the picture flips, as all of the inhabitants of the coastal cities are told to be still. The merchants from Sidon filled them, as we see in verse 2 and 3, trading grain all over the world, but now all of that business, all of that international trade, is done.

Countries around the world have been freaking out over the past few months because of the way the United States has been shaking up international trade with their tariffs. Imagine how the world would respond if all of a sudden the United States got wiped out and wasn't there to trade with at all. On the scale of the ancient world, that's like what's happening here.

So Tarshish wails, the coastal cities stand there in stunned silence, and next Isaiah pictures the sea itself speaking up. Tyre and Sidon may have thought of themselves as the sea's very children, and yet the sea itself says in verse 4, "I have neither laboured nor given birth." Either the sea is disowning it's children here, or Tyre and Sidon have been so thoroughly destroyed that the sea is saying "I have nothing left of my family. They're all gone."

Egypt mourns—verse 5. Tarshish wails again—verse 6. This is kind of like a news report where, instead of just showing us the burning building, we get a shot of all of the crying people standing around. It helps us understand just what's really happened here.

But in verse 13 we finally get some information about what's going to happen We haven't heard much directly about the fall itself, or how it's going to happen, or whose going to do it. We finally get some fairly mysterious information about this in verse 13. Isaiah tells us to look at the land of the Chaldeans—another name for the Babylonians. "This is the people that was not; Assyria destined it for wild beasts." We know from history that Babylon had tried to rise up against Assyria around this time, and Assyria put it down, no doubt with their typical savagery.

And so when we read the rest of verse 13—"they erected their siege towers, they stripped her palaces bare, they made her a ruin"—this could be pointing to what Assyria did to Babylon, or what Assyria did to Tyre and Sidon, or what Babylon did to Tyre and Sidon.

All of which was true. Assyria did conquer Sidon and lay siege to Tyre and eventually made both of those cities a part of their empire. And Babylon later besieged Sidon and completely destroyed mainland Tyre. Either way, verse 13 is giving a big clue of what's coming to Tyre and Sidon in the not-too-distant future.

Finally, verse 14 wraps this section up in the same say it began, calling the ships of Tarshish to wail because their stronghold was laid waste.

So, that's what's going to happen. Tyre and Sidon overthrown and destroyed, and the world mourns the loss of their best trading partner.

Who Made This Happen, and Why (vv. 7-12)

Now if you were in the ancient world, especially one of Isaiah's listeners, this kind of prophecy might be met with disbelief. Could this really happen to these powerful cities who had stood for so long?

Isaiah asks this question in verse 7, with a note of disbelief: "Is this your exultant city whose origin is from days of old, whose feet carried her to settle far away?" In verse 8, he reflects on how Tyre was the "bestower of crowns, whose merchants were princes, whose traders were the honored of the earth?_ Tyre was the king-maker. Their common merchants were treated like royalty everywhere they went.

And now it sits in the dust. Can this even be the same city? And if it is, then how could this happen? More importantly, who could make this happen? And why? Why has this happened? These are the questions Isaiah asks in the next major stop in the passage, beginning in verse 8. Who made this happen, and why?

Verse 8: “Who has purposed this against Tyre, the bestower of crowns…?” (Isaiah 23:8). Who is powerful enough to humble Tyre like this?

The answer is not the king of Assyria or the king of Babylon. The answer is in verse 9: "The Lord of hosts has purposes it."

Remember that "hosts" is a military term for hosts of armies. The God of Armies has purposed this. This happened because this was His purpose.

And why? Why did he do it? Keep reading in verse 9: "To defile the pompous pride of all glory, to dishonor all the honored of the earth." God has come for Tyre's pride. They thought they were high and lifted up, looking down at everybody else. They loved being honoured and noted and esteemed.

As if they made the island upon which they built their city. As if they filled the ocean upon which they sailed. As if they created the little shellfish that gave them their purple dye. As if they made the crops grow that they bought and sold. As if they kept themselves alive with life and breath minute by minute.

See, the problem wasn't that Tyre was successful or that Tyre was well-loved around the world or that Tyre made special purple dye or even that Tyre was super rich. The problem was that they enjoyed all of these gifts without giving credit to their creator.

They took credit for it it all, instead of giving credit ot the Lord. They used it all for their own glory, instead of giving glory to the Lord. They used it all to make themselves be honoured, instead of making the Lord be honoured.

And so the Lord has come to humble them. And this isn't because He has something particular against these two cities. We know from elsewhere in Scripture that God cannot and will not tolerate pride. “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” says Proverbs 16:18. And that happens not because of some law of the universe, but because, as 1 Peter 5:5 says, "God opposes the proud."

God opposes the proud. It's that simple. He opposes the proud, and Tyre and Sidon are proud, so He opposes them. And the time to experience His opposition has finally come.

Verse 11: “He has stretched out his hand over the sea; he has shaken the kingdoms; the Lord has given command concerning Canaan to destroy its strongholds. And he said: ‘You will no more exult, O oppressed virgin daughter of Sidon; arise, cross over to Cyprus, even there you will have no rest’” (Isaiah 23:11–12).

God is so opposed to the proud that he stretches his hand over the sea, shakes kingdoms, destroys the strongholds of a whole land, in order to silence the proud exulting of Sidon. Sidon now flees from their land, exiles who have no rest wherever they go.

God is opposed to the proud.

What's Going to Happen Afterwards (vv. 15-18)

But that's not where it ends. Verses 15-17 describe something coming that might be unexpected if we were had not heard about this kind of thing happening to Egypt or other nations for whom hope is extended after judgement.

But in order to understand what's going on in verses 15-18, there's a few moving parts we need to understand first.

First is the way that Tyre is compared to a prostitute. Verse 17 talks about Tyre prostituting herself with all the kingdoms of the world. This is a very interesting way of describing Tyre's trade and buying and selling with all of the nations of the earth, and it's a picture that's picked up by Revelation when it's applied to Babylon.

The idea here seems to be that that, just like a prostitute acts intimately with her customers, but in the end it's all about money, so Tyre and Sidon formed close relationships with all of the nations of the earth, but only for the sake of money.

The biblical view on international relationships is that trade between nations wasn't wrong but that it should flow out of a real relationship between those nations. That had been the case with Hiram, king of Tyre and king David. 1 Kings 5:1 says that "Hiram always loved David." The picture you get is that Hiram and David and then Solomon had something of a real relationship, and their trade of wood and gold and so on flowed out of that relationship.

In Isaiah's time, Tyre might have been a good fake at international relations, but really, it was all about the money. They didn't really care about people as people. The other nations were just potential customers, that's all.

We see this in the way that Amos criticizes Tyre in Amos 1:9 because "they did not remember the covenant of brotherhood." Just like a prostitute, there was no faithfulness. Only business.

And how can this not make us think about the state of international trade and relations today? Leaders of countries buttering up to each other, pretending to be friends, when really there is no loyalty at all; it's just about the money.

And yes, I'm talking about what's going on with current American administration, which has made it abundantly clear that he doesn't give a rip about loyalty to long-standing relationships—it only cares about what profits itself. And yes, I'm also talking about the leaders of our country who are willing to smile for pictures and pour on the flattery and say all kinds of things they don't mean in order to gain a beneficial financial outcome for themselves. Everybody plays the game.

And Isaiah had a word for that game: prostitution. And it might sound radical for me to say that, but it would have sounded just as radical to the people of Isaiah's and Ezekiel's and Amos' days.

And that's one part of what's going on here.

Second, there's this "song of the prostitute" going on. This seems to be a piece from the popular culture of Isaiah's day—a somewhat questionable song about a prostitute who has been forgotten by her clients, maybe because she's too old, so she has to wander around the city playing songs on her harp to get people to remember her.

It's kind of a sad picture. And Isaiah employs this song to say that, what happened to the actual prostitute in the song is going to happen to Tyre on an international level. After 70 years, Tyre, the old prostitute, will be remembered.

This may be talking about an actual 70-year period where Tyre did regain some strength in a period of Assyrian weakness. Or, as is the case of many of the numbers used by the prophets, this might be a symbolic number for a long period of time after which the humbled Tyre will receive God's grace.

Tyre will be remembered—but not because she plays some song on the harp like the song. She will be remembered because "The Lord will visit" her, like verse 17 says. God will show grace to the humbled city and allow her to resume her previous business.

Sadly, even though shown grace, Tyre doesn't change her ways. She returns to her wages and, verse 17, "will prostitute herself with all the kingdoms of the world on the face of the earth." She goes back to her old ways.

But, there is a big change this time. Verse 18 should probably open with the word "but" or "yet," which several other translations do include. But, "Her merchandise and her wages will be holy to the Lord." She gets rich by her sin, but God takes her wealth and uses it for His own purposes.

"It will not be stored or hoarded," (like it was before), "But her merchandise will supply abundant food and fine clothing for those who dwell before the Lord."

As with many prophecies, we should see a few layers here. First, we can recognize that when Israel returned from exile, Tyre and Sidon did contribute wood to the building of the second temple just like they had with the first temple (Ezra 3:7).

But just like that return from exile and second temple was just a picture of the great salvation still to come, so Tyre's contributions to the second temple just pointed to the real transformation yet to come. Isaiah's words about Tyre's future, just like his words earlier about Egypt's future, use the language of the day to point forward to a day when all of the nations will walk with the Lord. Whatever gain they have will belong to him. Instead of selfishness, there will be generosity and provision for the house of God.

Isaiah points here to a whole new world, made new by grace, where the fruit of international trade is used to worship and bring glory to God. It's a prophecy that finds its fulfillment in Revelation 22:24, which speaks of the New Jerusalem, and says that “By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it” (Revelation 21:24).

The big idea here—both in Isaiah and in Revelation—is that in the New Kingdom, the nations of the earth won't stop being the nations of the earth. Kings will rule and nations will trade with one another. But instead of hoarding up treasure for their own glory, they will bring their treasure as tribute to king Jesus that all of the glory might be his.

How We Should Respond?

So, as we ask ourselves every week, what do these ancient words mean to us? I want to suggest two lenses that we should look at this passage with in order to discern what God is saying to us.

First, consider the lens of international relations. What was God saying to His people in Isaiah's day? He's saying that He is going to judge proud Tyre and Sidon, and all their wealth and power will be as nothing.

It's no coincidence that Tyre and Sidon were frequent rebels against Assyria. They would have been easy allies for a Judean king who was looking to build a human alliance to protect themselves. But as Judah has heard again and again from Isaiah in these oracles, they must trust the Lord and not the other nations. They must not be wowed by the greatness of Tyre but be confident in the purpose of the Lord of Hosts.

And the same goes for us today. God will always judge the high and mighty and proud and arrogant. He will humble great nations and great empires.

In 1897, the British Empire was at the height of their power as they celebrated Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. And for that occasion Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem called "Recessional" which is worth reading:

God of our fathers, known of old,
   Lord of our far-flung battle-line,
Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
   Dominion over palm and pine—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!

The tumult and the shouting dies;
   The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
   An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!

Far-called, our navies melt away;
   On dune and headland sinks the fire:
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
   Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!

If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
   Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe,
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
   Or lesser breeds without the Law—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!

For heathen heart that puts her trust
   In reeking tube and iron shard,
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
   And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
For frantic boast and foolish word—
Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!¹http://poetryfoundation.org/poems/46780/recessional

People could not have imagined the British empire being anything but great. They said that the sun never set on the empire, meaning that they had so many territories around the globe that at any given moment there was always some part of the British empire experiencing daylight.

You know when that changed? This year, on March 21, 2025. After giving away the Chagos Islands back to Mauritius, there came a time when the sun literally set on the British Empire, and for the first time in perhaps two hundred years every British territory experienced night at the same time.²https://www.popsci.com/science/sun-sets-on-british-empire/ "Lo, all our pomp of yesterday is one with Nineveh and Tyre!"

And God can do it to Canada, to the United States, to China. So do not fear the great powers. Look to the Lord of Hosts whose purpose stands.

That's the first lens. The second lens is a personal lens. What does God's opposition to Tyre's pride tell us about our own hearts, as given to pride as they are?

Pride has often been called the original sin, in that it is the first sin from which all other sins flow out. That was certainly the case in the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve wanted to be like God instead of depend on God. Romans 1 tells us how the source of all sin is our refusal to acknowledge God's power and be thankful to him.

And if God is opposed to the proud, then that's bad news for us, right? If God is opposed to the proud, that's the most terrifying thing a person can hear. The maker of the universe, the namer of a trillion stars, the one who gives life to eight billion people—that person, opposed to you? There is no safe place, nowhere to hide from Him. You can't outrun the God who holds the whole world in your hands.

There is no diagnosis more terrifying to the sinful human heart than hearing that God is opposed to the proud.

But God's opposition to the proud isn't the last word, just like Tyre's destruction wasn't the last word. He also visited the humble city with grace, just like the verse says: "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble" (1 Pet 5:5).

If God's opposition to the proud is the scariest news we can hear, than God's grace to the humble is the best news we can hear. God owes no grace to the humble. A humble person is just a lowly person who knows they are lowly. A person who isn't pretending anything.

But look at the kind of person God is—the kind of person who is abounding in grace to those who simply recognize what's true. The person who simply says "I see it, Lord—I see how great you must be to have made this world, and I see how small I am, and I'm okay with that." That person can be assured of God's undeserved grace, not because their humility is so great. Their humility is just seeing things for what they are. But God gives grace to the humble because He is a wonderfully gracious God.

So, this morning, are you proud, lifting yourself high above others, going through life for your own glory? Would you repent lest you face God's opposition?

And from the dust of humility, would we all gladly gather around the table this morning where we see God's grace displayed so visibly?

How can we be proud at the foot of the cross? The son of God had to be crucified to rescue us. How can we be proud of ourselves after Calvary? And how can we be proud this morning as we once again reach out to receive grace from Jesus, the grace of Jesus, symbolized by the bread and the cup?

A proud person can't receive God's grace, because a proud person can't stand having something that they didn't work for themselves.

So this morning we get to practice humility as we reach out, needy, to take the bread and the cup, remembering that Jesus gives us a salvation he worked for, he bought and paid for, and we do nothing but receive with an open hand.

And would we pray that this humility would work itself into our hearts into our relationships with one another? How often have I heard people say that they're afraid of being vulnerable with others—at church! We don't like looking needy. We hold in our tears and hide our problems and act like we've got it all together.

But friends, just look around. This is a room full of needy people. We've all done and thought and said things this week we'd love to hide. Oh, may God help us see that we've got nothing to prove, and nothing to lose, by being humble and honest with one another.

My name is Chris, and I am a weak and a needy man. I need Jesus. I need His body, which means I need you. Can we be okay being a community that together needs Jesus, and needs one another? Could we practice that this morning as we once again say to each other, "The body of Christ was given for you?" And we're thinking, "Because you really needed it!" "The blood of Christ was shed for you—and you'd be hopeless and lost otherwise!"

Let's pray for the Lord's Table to be the fist step of humility among many that we'll take as we walk together this week.