Not always what they seem

I appreciate the recent reminder from Adrian Warnock that things are not always what they seem in the world around us. Adrian, for example, considers the Assyrian king Tiglath Pilesar, terror to the Israelites of the Old Testament:

. . . Kings like Tilgath Pileser who believed themselves to be highly powerful were in fact mere tools in the hands of God who used them to work out his purposes in the life of his people. So when God's people were in the place they should be these guys experienced defeat, but when God's people needed to be taught once more to rely on him these people experienced great victory.

God's use of pagan nations in the OT should keep us from being too quick to assign God's purposes to world events in our day. The Assyrians and Babylonians, for example, were each used as instruments of judgment against the Israelites. That certainly didn't mean they were on God's side, though, and the Lord brought wrath upon both those nations for their own sin.