In our continued RTBT readings in 2 Kings we have just read the amazing, thrilling stories of Elisha but things get complicated as we navigate from here to the end of the book. The readings follow the kings of Israel and Judah and it is a little hard to keep track of the nations.
There is a lot of crazy things going on (i.e., a mother/grandmother who killed all of the heirs-her family- so she could reign on the throne), deceit, idolatry, and total disregard for God’s temple and His Word. The divided kingdoms were not God’s intent for His people. The northern kingdom Israel had had bad king after bad king (nineteen up to their fall) and finally in 2 Kings 17 you will read that even though the prophets had preached repentance, the people would not listen. ‘The people followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves’ (v. 15). The nation of Israel fell to Assyria and only Judah remained (at this point).
(Note: The beginning of the Samaritan people is explained in 2 Kings 17:24-40. This helps us understand the conflict we find later in the New Testament during the time of Jesus’ ministry.)
From 2 Kings chapters 18-25 we follow the next kings of Judah. There were some great godly kings of Judah during this time - Hezekiah and Josiah were two outstanding leaders. Even during extraordinary circumstances and the wickedness of the land, these men took a stand for God---(a message for us today!)
As you continue to read through the passages of 2 Kings (even though it can get confusing especially in chapter 24 with all of the “J” names), we finally come to an extremely sad and heartbreaking passage as we read Jerusalem is destroyed. Just a few chapters back we read of the glory of this temple and the worship that took place there literally shook the ground! It was glorious! Now we read the Babylonians have broken and burned what had been sacred. “So Judah went into exile from its land.” (v. 21) The story of the exodus, the conquering of the land and miracles we read in Joshua and Judges, now is past and they are prisoners and captives.
A kite helped me understand this a little better. We take a kite with us to Florida each year to fly on the beach. It is an acrobatic kite in which you must use two handles to fly it. We left it on the beach one day and the wind caught it and tangled those strings into a mess. The easiest thing would have been to cut the strings off but I love to untangle things so I took it on as a project. I began the process last weekend and was pretty pleased with my progress thinking the whole time of what an amazing story this would make-i.e. ’how to not toss something aside just because it was difficult’, etc. SEVEN hours later while I had made progress and determined that I would not write off those hours as wasted time, I had to stop for the day and picked up the project the next day. Finally two hours later on this second day of the project, I looked at the string and realized it had become gnarled due to all the twisting and turning. It was apparent that it would have to be cut away. I shared this story with Kara and how I had planned to write about my idea of not giving up, etc. and she said “mom, maybe it’s a story of how some things have to be cut away”. (There’s a lot of follow up with that idea!)
The string illustrates what happened to God’s people in the divided nations of Israel and Judah. They had become so tangled up with idol worship totally disregarding the word of God. They were literally cut off and taken prisoners.
If that were the end of the story for Israel/Judah it would be horribly sad, BUT God had a plan even through their loss. Israel would again be a nation and return home repentant and grateful for God's mercy.
Our kite will soon be repaired with new string ready do do what it's supposed to do but when it becomes entangled the next time, I'll have a pair of scissors in hand.
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