Immerse: Kingdoms Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 102
90
IMMERSE
•
KINGDOMS
future thus comes to be tied up with the destiny of King David and his
descendants.
The second half of Samuel–Kings returns to a focus on the earlier covenant God made with Israel through Moses. That covenant promised
them blessings or curses based on whether or not they were faithful
to his instructions. The stories of Israel’s successive kings demonstrate
an increasing failure of the monarchy to lead the people into wholehearted allegiance to God. So the prophets build an extended “covenant lawsuit”—an indictment of the kings and people—because the
people haven’t kept their part of the covenant. The nation first splits
in two, then the territory of each remaining kingdom diminishes. Both
kingdoms—now called Israel and J udah—are eventually conquered by
foreign empires. Jerusalem itself is sacked, its walls torn down, and the
Temple burned to the ground. The people are carried away from the
land. In other words, the second half of Samuel–Kings is a defense of
the exile.
Samuel–Kings seemingly ends on this note of failure—the failure of
Israel, of God’s plans for Israel, and indeed, of God’s plans for the
world through Israel. But at the end of the whole work, Jehoiachin, the
surviving heir to David’s throne, is released from prison and treated as
an honored vassal by the king of the Babylonian Empire. A thin sliver
of hope remains.
The Bible portrays the Lord as the Creator of the earth, the true King
of all nations. With Israel now in shambles, the question returns to God
himself. How will he keep his promise to redeem and restore the world
now that his chosen instrument has fallen?