Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 15-16.

I don’t know about you, but my perception of the kings of Israel was that they were universally Baal, some of whom gave lip service to worshiping God.  And my perception of the kings of Judah was that they were mostly idolators, with the occasional good king who tried to bring the people back to God.  However, over the last few years as I read through the books of Kings and Chronicles I have come to realize that these books tell us that most of the kings of Judah did what was right in the eyes of God.  And, while most of the kings of Israel did what was evil in the eyes of God, most of them chose to follow in the steps of Jeroboam, who attempted to worship God in the form of the golden calves which he had made.  In fact, it occurred to me today that most of the kings of Judah recognized that they were answerable to God and needed to follow the dictates of the religious practices which He had laid down, while most, if not all, of the kings of Israel felt that the religious leaders should be answerable to them.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 13-14.

So, in today’s passage we have a series of kings of Israel and kings of Judah.  The passage tells us that the kings of Israel, descendants of Jehu, did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, while the kings of Judah did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.  Further it tells us that the kings of Judah were not as righteous as David had been.  The passage tells us that the evil done by the kings of Israel was because they followed in the sins which Jeroboam had caused Israel to commit.  On the other hand, while the kings of Judah did what was right in God’s eyes, they did not get rid of the high places where people worshiped.  This leads me to conclude that the key difference between the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah in this time period was that the kings of Israel encourage the idolatry intorduced by Jerogoam, while the kings of Judah allowed, but did not encourage, idolatry.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 10-12.

I want to start by looking at two things in this passage which connect to ideas about the worship of God which I have touched upon from time to time.  The passage mentions that when Jehu came upon Jehonadab he asked if he was in accord with him.  The context suggests that Jehu was referring to worshiping God and eliminating Baal worship (and possibly worship of all other gods).  What is interesting about this is that Jehonadab was not an Israelite.  He was a Kenite, a nomadic group of people who lived among the Israelites (and possibly elsewhere in the Middle East).  This tells us that while we don’t have much of a record of the religious practices of others who worshiped God during this time, the Israelites were not the only ones who did so.  The existence of other peoples who worshiped God is consistent with what one would expect to see if the Genesis account is true.

I also want to look at what Jehu did when he called the assembly to honor Baal.  Once he had the Baal worshipers gathered, he asked the leaders of Baal worship to make sure there were no worshipers of God present.  This confirms two things which we see throughout the Old Testament: many worshipers of God were seduced into Baal worship by being convinced that Baal was just another name for God, and those who were fully into Baal worship knew this was not true.  On the first point, we also see throughout the Old Testament that while many worshipers of God were convinced that Baal was just another name for God, many saw through this deception.  This incident is probably the clearest example of the second point.  However, there is also the incident where King Ahab knows what Jehoshaphat is looking for when he asks for a prophet of the Lord after Ahab tried to pass off prophets  of Baal as such.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 8-9.

King Jehoshaphat of Judah was a good king, but he allied himself with King Ahab of Israel to the point that he allowed his son, and heir, to marry Ahab’s daughter.  When Jehoshaphat’s son took the throne he followed the example of his father-in-law rather than that of his father.  As a result, when the Jehu overthrew Ahab’s son, Jehoshaphat’s grandson was there and was killed as part of Jehu’s revolt.  Reading between the lines of these events suggests that while Ahab’s son, King Joram, was injured in battle, the wounds were relatively minor and he used them as an excuse to withdraw from battle and indulge himself.  King Ahaziah of Judah, Jehoshaphat’s grandson, joined him in doing so.  We do not exactly know the sins which Joram and Ahaziah committed during their reigns, but we do know that King Ahab and his wife Jezebel had worshiped Ashtoreth and that Ashtoreth worship involved promiscuous sexual practices.  I suspect that Joram and Ahaziah also partook in human sacrifice.  All of this led to the breakdown of social order in both kingdoms.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 5-7.

We rarely pay attention to what Naaman says to Elisha after he was cleansed of leprosy.  Well, we pay attention to the first part, where Naaman says he will no longer make burnt offerings or sacrifices to any god but the Lord.  However, Naaman begs that the Lord forgive him for those occasions when he must accompany his king into the temple of his king’s god and there bow down to that god with his king.  Elisha’s response to this request was to tell Naaman to go in peace.  Elisha’s response seems to affirm that God would indeed forgive Naaman for doing so.  This suggests that we do not always need to make it known that we disagree when those around us worship other gods.  I believe that this short exchange is very significant, but I am not sure of its full meaning.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 3-4.

I started out to write a summary of the events as described here, but realized my time would be better spent reviewing some of the meaning of these stories.  The stories in today’s passage feel like legends every time I read them.  I suspect that most of those who were present for when these stories happened would barely recognize them.  Not because the stories as told inaccurately reflect what happened, but because it would have felt much different to someone going through these experiences.  In each of these stories, tragedy seems to be about to strike when people turned to God.  In each case, God provided a seemingly miraculous deliverance (in some of the stories, the deliverance was truly a miracle, in others it may have just been revealing important information to Elisha that no one else present knew).

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Kings 1-2.

There are two accounts in this passage which at casual reading we find unsettling.  In the first account, the king sent a troop of 50 men under a commander to bring Elijah to him multiple times.  The first two times Elijah called down fire from God to consume the commander and his 50 men.  This seems rather harsh, but let us look closer at what happened.  The first two commanders called Elijah a man of God, but believed that they had the authority, based on the orders the king had given them, to command his obedience. The third commander recognized that Elijah’s authority as a man of God was greater than his authority as a man of the king.  The primary lesson here is for those who think they have authority over others.  If the first and second commanders had been polite and respectful, they would have lived, but they thought that Elijah was obligated to obey their commands because the king had given them those commands.  However, we must recognize that all people answer first to God, and we should treat them with respect and courtesy.

The second unsettling story occurs when some “boys” jeered at him and threatened him.  When we read the word “boys” in this passage, we tend to think children in the range of 5-10 years old.  However, the Hebrew makes it seem more likely that these “boys” were young men in the 14-18 year range.  The story seems more likely to have been a gang of ne’er-do-wells who got a kick out of  bullying and robbing defenseless strangers who passed near their town, which they took Elisha to be.  This story tells us that bad things happen to those who live to cause trouble for those they believe weaker than themselves.  More importantly, it teaches us that God will protect us from those who attempt to bully us.

Both of these stories teach us the importance of treating others with respect and warn us that bad things happen to those who ignore this lesson.  They also teach us that God can protect us from those who threaten us because they think they can get away with it.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Kings 19-21.

In yesterday’s passage we were told that King Hezekiah did what was pleasing in God’s sight, just as David had done.  I believe that Hezekiah is the only king of Judah about whom the writer says that.  In today’s passage we see the reason he wrote that about Hezekiah.  When Hezekiah faced trouble he turned to the Lord.  When the King of Assyria threatened Jerusalem, Hezekiah turned to God.  When his health was bad, Hezekiah turned to God.

The response which God gave to Hezekiah through Isaiah regarding the King of Assyria contains much for us to consider.  The King of Assyria was proud of his successes, and with good reason, but he credited himself with those successes and gave no credit to a higher power.  For all that he had done, the King of Assyria only had that success because it accorded with God’s plan for him to do so.  It was God’s plan that allowed the King of Assyria to rise to such heights.  The King of Assyria was convinced that no power could stop him from doing that which he chose to do.  He probably died believing that to be true.  Yet, when he chose to attack Jerusalem, something happened so that the attack never took place.  How often do we see God’s hand at work in things that do not happen?

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Kings 17-18.

Israel’s last king was less evil than his predecessors, but he still did evil in God’s sight.  Important note: being less evil is not the same as doing good.  As we read through the account of each of the kings of Israel it would be easy to miss the extent of the people’s sin.   The writer makes that extent clear here in today’s passage.  They adopted the practices of the people whom God had driven out of the land and worshiped idols, setting up pagan shrines in all of their settlements.  I want to note that the writer makes a distinction between following the practices of other peoples and idolatry.  Yes, idolatry was practiced by the people to whom the writer refers, but by listing it as a separate sin from following their practices he makes it clear that they had other practices which were detestable to God.  As the writer summarizes the various forms of idolatry they practiced, he singles out sacrificing their own children as going above and beyond other forms of idolatry.

After the conquering Samaria and taking many of the people in the Northern Kingdom into exile, the King of Assyria settled peoples from other lands in that territory.  These peoples had problems with lions attacks, which led them to conclude that they did not know the proper customs for worshiping God.  I think this suggests that there were Israelites remaining in the land, but those who had been educated (in particular about God’s laws, but also everyone who had been educated) had been exiled.  How else would the new people in the land know there were different customs for worshiping God than what they knew?  In any case, once a priest was brought back from among those who had been taken into exile, these new immigrants began to worship the Lord.  But, they did not give up their worship of other gods, the gods they had worshiped in their homeland.  From what is written here it seems likely that the compiler of this book was a post-Exile Jew.  His understanding of the worship practices of those who were in the land when the Exiles returned certainly colored his understanding of what he wrote here from the stories he collected into this document.