Several weeks ago when we were told what the lessons were for this time I looked up where we would be on the Sunday before the election and uttered a little prayer, “Lord, please make it have nothing to do with the election or with political figures.” I checked out Isaiah 46 and was relieved to know it was all about idols and false gods and how there is only one God. What a relief! But then I knew there had to be some context for Chapter 46 since this is a passage where Isaiah is predicting an event, the deliverance of Judah from Babylon, that would not occur for another 100 years. We could not understand 46 without starting at Chapter 45.

It was then I realized God does not always answer our prayers the way we choose.  Chapter 45 is about Cyrus, the king of Persia who allows the Jews to return to Jerusalem after he has conquered and decimated Babylon. Ironically, he entered the defeated city on October 29, 539 BC.

Cyrus is an interesting and towering figure. We don’t know much about his origins but we do know that he rose to power through bold military strategies and the ability to incorporate various cultures into one. No Persian xenophobe he was quick to learn from the conquered peoples. He surrounded himself with great talent from loyalists as well as conquered people. While he was not an innovator, he had the ability to borrow and adapt what was imported from other cultures.  But Cyrus was not only a great conqueror and administrator; he held a place in the minds of the Persian people similar to that of Romulus and Remus in Rome or Moses for the Israelites. We treat George Washington in much the same way. Cyrus the Great was the father of an empire, a culture and a country.  Even today, his burial site is regarded as a shrine in Iran. His saga follows in many details the stories of heroes and conquerors from elsewhere in the ancient world. He became the model of the great qualities expected of a ruler in antiquity, and he assumed heroic features as a conqueror who was tolerant and magnanimous as well as brave and daring. He was open to new ideas, considered a fair and consistent ruler. A military genius, a courageous leader, a wise ruler and one who earned the title of Cyrus the Great.

So, here we are in Chapter 45 and Isaiah is speaking about the coming captivity in Babylon and the eventual release from captivity under Cyrus.

This is what the Lord says to his anointed,

to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of

to subdue nations before him

and to strip kings of their armor,

to open doors before him

so that gates will not be shut:

2 I will go before you

and will level the mountains;

I will break down gates of bronze

and cut through bars of iron.

3 I will give you hidden treasures,

riches stored in secret places,

so that you may know that I am the Lord,

the God of Israel, who summons you by name.

4 For the sake of Jacob my servant,

of Israel my chosen,

I summon you by name

and bestow on you a title of honor,

though you do not acknowledge me.

5 I am the Lord, and there is no other;

apart from me there is no God.

I will strengthen you,

though you have not acknowledged me,

6 so that from the rising of the sun

to the place of its setting

people may know there is none besides me.

I am the Lord, and there is no other.

7 I form the light and create darkness,

I bring prosperity and create disaster;

I, the Lord, do all these things.

Now skip to verse 11

“This is what the Lord says—

the Holy One of Israel, and its Maker:

Concerning things to come,

do you question me about my children,

or give me orders about the work of my hands?

12 It is I who made the earth

and created mankind on it.

My own hands stretched out the heavens;

I marshaled their starry hosts.

13 I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness:

I will make all his ways straight.

He will rebuild my city

and set my exiles free,

but not for a price or reward,

says the Lord Almighty.”

14 This is what the Lord says:

“The products of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush,

and those tall Sabeans—

they will come over to you

and will be yours;

they will trudge behind you,

coming over to you in chains.

They will bow down before you

and plead with you, saying,

‘Surely God is with you, and there is no other;

there is no other god.’”

What do we hear about Cyrus the Great from God through Isaiah?

First, he is anointed. That word is the exact same as the word for the Messiah. Cyrus will be the Lord’s Messiah. The savior and deliverer.

Second, he will have power given to him by God to subdue the nations before him and strip kings of their armor.  In other words, God will take him by his right  arm and go before him just as he went before Moses, Joshua, Gideon and so many others.  The battle is the Lord’s.

Third, for the sake of Jacob (not for his own glory) He will call him by name and bestow on him a title of honor.

Fourth, Cyrus did not acknowledge the Lord but in spite of that God will strengthen him and pave the way for his conquest of many nations.  In fact, in verse 14 we read that nations will come and bow down before Cyrus as captives in chains and plead with him acknowledging that God is with him and there is no other god.  Through a great man who does not acknowledge the Lord, the Jews in Babylon will be released and other nations will bow down before Cyrus and acknowledge that there is no other God because God is with him.  It is even stronger than that in the Hebrew. It reads “they will say that God is in you.”  You can see how many would see Cyrus almost as a Christ figure in the Old Testament – with the one small exception of his not acknowledging God. He is a pagan messiah and one who worships many gods but many believe that God is in him. He is in spite of himself a witness for God. 

Clearly, people would be confused by how Isaiah could say such a thing. How could God not only use him but say this about him?  Of course, Isaiah’s answer to them is like Paul’s concerning Pharoah or Jeremiah’s about the potter and the clay.. “How can the potter say to the clay, “What are you making?”  “Do you question me about my children or give me orders about the work of my hands? Who are you, O man, to question Jehovah. In Romans 9 Paul writes, “For the Scripture says to Pharoah, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”

He raises up Cyrus, his unbelieving Messiah and yet crushes Pharoah all for one purpose – to show his glory and his incomparable power to do what serves his purposes but in doing so he sometimes confuses us.  How can a man who worships other gods be used by God? He is not godless. He has many gods he serves. How can a tyrant be crushed not just for his own defeat but to show God’s power in him that his name might be proclaimed in all the earth?

God does not ask for credentials and he does not even ask for permission. The earth is his and all that is in it.

“I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness: I will make his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free but not for a price or reward, say the Lord Almighty”

There are moments, and this is one of them, when we take a biblical figure and impose them on our time. I am sure many in the Roman Empire saw Nero as the anti-Christ or those in Germany who suffered believed Hitler would have been that man of lies. People all through history have found Biblical characters to use as analogies. Sometimes it is casual. We call someone a Pilate who washes his hands of responsibility. We call someone a Judas who betrays us. We call someone Peter who is impetuous and compare others to David or Paul. It’s not dangerous or harmful most times.

However, there is a movement among some Christians today to see President Trump as the Cyrus for our times.  They find things in this chapter – and some have said the fact that he is the 45th President and Cyrus is in Chapter 45 of Isaiah – as signs that this is true.

They say that while there is little evidence that President Trump acknowledges God that did not keep God from taking him by the right hand and using him to set the captives free and return them to Zion.

They say that the Lord broke down gates of bronze and cut through bars of iron and cleared his path. The great thing about kings like Cyrus, as far as these supporters are concerned, is that the leaders don’t have to follow rules. They are the law. This makes them ideal leaders in paranoid times. In fact, the more rules they break the more they confirm their anointing and calling as Cyrus.  It’s a lie.  Nothing but a lie.

They read the Lord gave him hidden treasures and riches stored in secret places and see a parallel.

While there were murmurs of such a comparison even before 2016 through books, movies, social media and articles proclaiming Donald Trump as God’s anointed one, the wave did not really hit until the US Embassy was moved to Jerusalem and then when Benjamin Natanyahu said:

“We remember the proclamation of King Cyrus the Great–Persian King. Twenty-five hundred years ago, he proclaimed the Jewish exiles in Babylon can come back and rebuild our temple in Jerusalem….Mr. President, this will be remembered by our people throughout the ages.”

I realize some will think I am making a political statement just before the election. I am not. Besides, most of us have already voted.  If there were a movement to proclaim Joe Biden, George Bush, Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter or even Millard Fillmore the new Cyrus I would be saying the same thing this morning.  Be careful. Flee the people who promote these things because they are dangerous and they will lead you down the path of destruction.  Comparing any political leader (and any President is a political leader) to God’s anointed is playing with fire.  Our political leaders are not anointed. They are elected. When we make a political figure a religious figure we are in trouble but that is exactly what people are doing by calling anyone Cyrus the Great today. It is a delusion and a wolf in sheep’s clothing.  

God spoke through his prophet Isaiah to proclaim Cyrus the Great as anointed by God to deliver his people and make his name great in all the earth. While there are religious supporters for a new Cyrus there are no prophets. While there are those who have taken Scripture out of context for political and religious purposes, there are no prophets. God has not spoken. 

When politics becomes a substitute for religion then people need religious symbols to replace those that were once merely political. We knew the flaws of Lyndon Johnson, George Bush, John Kennedy, Bill Clinton, and many others but we did not use their flaws to somehow turn them into anointed religious figures. We knew there was a difference between religion and politics.

Times have changed and now we need religious figures – no matter their character – to motivate and stir us up. We have turned a sport into religious warfare.

Many years ago Alexis de Tocqueville wrote: “When authority in the matter of religion no longer exists, nor in the matter of politics, men are soon frightened at the aspect of this limitless independence. This perpetual agitation of all things makes them restive and fatigues them. As everything is moving in the world of the intellect, they want at least that all be firm and stable in the material order; and as they are no longer able to recapture their former beliefs, they give themselves a master.”

An article put it this way recently:

De Tocqueville was worried, essentially, that if we didn’t worship God, we might exercise our instinct to worship through politics or politicians themselves. If this concern resonates with you — if you fear that some of our politicians have, in the past few years, become can-do-no-wrong cult-like figures in the eyes of their supporters — then you’re not alone. As Quincy Howard — a Dominican Sister — put it to me recently, American politics is arguably “on the brink of being idolatrous at this point, and this goes for the left as well as the right.”

We all, sometimes desperately, want a king, a ruler, a Cyrus the Great in turbulent and chaotic times. It’s natural but it is also a mine field. We must vote but not with the idea that one of the candidates is the unbelieving anointed Messiah or the deeply flawed one in whom God nevertheless dwells.

Of course, if we want to follow the image of any leader as Cyrus we should go all the way to the end of his life.  How did the great ruler finish?

In the course of trying to force himself on a woman, Tomyris, the ruler of a kingdom Cyrus desired, he was frustrated because she rebuffed his first invitation so he invaded her kingdom. Not one afraid of a fight, she challenged him to meet her forces in honorable warfare, inviting him to a location in her country a day’s march from the river where his army was camped. There, the two armies would formally engage each other. He accepted her offer but then cheated. He used lies and deception to defeat a third of her army led by her son who then committed suicide out of shame.

Confident of winning over a weakened opponent he attacked but she led her troops in the battle against him where he was killed. The Greek historian Herodotus wrote an account of the battle:

“Cyrus the Great was ultimately killed, and his forces suffered massive casualties in what Herodotus referred to as the fiercest battle of his career and the ancient world. When it was over, Tomyris ordered the body of Cyrus brought to her, then decapitated him and dipped his head in a vessel of blood in a symbolic gesture of revenge for his bloodlust and the death of her son.”

How did such a great ruler end so badly? Pride, lust, deception, violence against a woman, thinking nothing of the death of others. So sad…and so predictable. So suitable, really.

Be careful about those who would have you believe in a new Cyrus. They may just end the same way and take you with them.