6/1/2011 10:32:12 AM
SPIRIITUAL DIARY
My Worship Time Focus: Israel angered its Lord
Bible Reading
& Meditation Reference: 2Kings 17:18-33
Message of the verses: “18 So
the LORD was very angry with Israel and removed them from His sight; none was
left except the tribe of Judah. 19 Also
Judah did not keep the commandments of the LORD their God, but walked in the
customs which Israel had introduced. 20
The LORD rejected all the descendants of Israel and afflicted them and
gave them into the hand of plunderers, until He had cast them out of His sight.
21 When He had torn Israel from the
house of David, they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. Then Jeroboam drove Israel away
from following the LORD and made them commit a great sin. 22 The sons of Israel walked in all the sins of
Jeroboam which he did; they
did not depart from them 23 until the
LORD removed Israel from His sight, as He spoke through all His servants
the prophets. So Israel was carried away into exile from their own land to
Assyria until this day.
“ 24 ¶ The king of Assyria
brought men from Babylon and from Cuthah and from Avva and from Hamath and
Sephar-vaim, and settled them in the cities of Samaria in place of the sons of
Israel. So they possessed Samaria and lived in its cities. 25 At the beginning of their living there, they
did not fear the LORD; therefore the LORD sent lions among them which killed
some of them. 26 So they spoke to the
king of Assyria, saying, "The nations whom you have carried away into
exile in the cities of Samaria do not know the custom of the god of the land;
so he has sent lions among them, and behold, they kill them because they do not
know the custom of the god of the land." 27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying,
"Take there one of the priests whom you carried away into exile and let
him go and live there; and let him teach them the custom of the god of the
land." 28 So one of the priests
whom they had carried away into exile from Samaria came and lived at Bethel,
and taught them how they should fear the LORD. 29 But every nation still made gods of its own
and put them in the houses of the high places which the people of Samaria had
made, every nation in their cities in which they lived. 30 The men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the
men of Cuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, 31 and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the
Sepharvites burned their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech the
gods of Sepharvaim. 32 They also feared
the LORD and appointed from among themselves priests of the high places, who
acted for them in the houses of the high places. 33 They feared the LORD and served their own gods according to the custom
of the nations from among whom they had been carried away into exile.”
There
are a lot of things in Dr. Wiersbe’s commentary on this section that I am going
to type in my section because they help me to understand this passage. This passage is a very sad passage in that
the nation of Israel had everything that they needed when they came out of
Egypt, but few of them wanted to follow the Law of Moses and practice their
faith in the Lord who brought them out of the land of Egypt with great power
and miracles.
“The
anger of the Lord is His holy wrath; it must not be compared to a child’s
temper tantrum. God’s wrath is anger
motivated by love, which is anguish.
It’s the anguish of a father who wants the best for his children, but
they prefer to go their own way. These
verses inform us that the division of the kingdom into Judah and Israel was an
act of God as He sought to protect David’s dynasty from the idolatry in
Israel. However, King Jeroboam’s false
manmade religion infected Judah, and it was only by the grace of God that a
faithful remnant remained.
“The
phrase ‘to fear the Lord’ means to worship the Lord according to the Law of
Moses. God will not share worship with
false gods, so it is no wonder that He became angry.
“The
king of Assyria believed each god was associated with the land from which the
people came, and therefore the new residents didn’t know how to worship the
Lord of Israel.” They were not going to
find out from any of the priests of Israel and the one that came back went to
Bethel where the golden calves were located and this was the false religion the
was introduced by Jeroboam when the nation split.
“Many
people today would applaud this ‘world congress of religions,’ but the Lord
abhors it.” This statement was made to
show that the people that were put into the northern part of Israel by the king
of Assyria worshiped their own god’s along with the Lord and so each one
worshiped their own gods.
“The
people set up their own religious ceremonies and integrated with this new
system some of the beliefs of their new neighbors. There was something for everyone, and it
didn’t matter what you believed or how you worshiped, just as long as you were
religious (verses 29-33). Does this
sound familiar?”
Spiritual meaning for m life today: What is see in this passage is to stay close
to the Lord and worship only Him, remembering that an idol is anything that
comes between the Lord and me.
My Steps of
Faith for Today:
1.
Give myself to the Lord for worship and for service.
2.
Continue to learn contentment.
3.
Remember the battle that I am in and the need for
the spiritual armor.
6/1/2011 11:05:33 AM
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