Bible Reading Challenge Blog

We begin our reading with Ezra in the first person. The King of Persia, whom you can understand as the king of Babylon, gives permission to Ezra to gather people who want to voluntarily relocate to Judah, and specifically Jerusalem. He gathers them up and there are numbers that are in the hundreds, so about 2,000 people join him to head down south. Now, keep in mind there is no army among them and they are laden with silver and gold and all sorts of valuable treasures that the king of Babylon had given them to bring with them down south. He was embarrassed to ask the king for protection because he had kinda bragged that God would deliver and protect them. If that was the case then why ask for an army, so he didn’t. Guess what? God protected them.

Interestingly enough they get close to Jerusalem and Ezra declares a fast to understand and seek out the favor and the direction of the Lord. While they were praying and putting themselves before the Lord one of the people of God received a message that we have a problem. The problem is that many who are going to be serving in the temple of the Lord while they were slaves married foreign wives and either allowed them to practice, or they themselves practiced, the foreign religions with the foreign gods, along with worshipping the Lord. This caused a major crisis with Ezra grieving and tearing his clothes and tearing out his hair. A solution had to be found.

We can certainly say that they did not take the easy road on this one. The solution is found: send away the foreign wives and the children that came as a result of these marriages. There is a questionable justice issue here with not knowing what would become of these foreign wives and children, the most vulnerable of that society, but that is the solution, and it is taken and we move on from there.

We begin a new chapter in the life of the people of God, literally a new book of the Bible. We see the people of Israel were stillin captivity in Babylon when the king of Babylon, Cyrus, gave them the freedom to return to Jerusalem, and gave them instructions to rebuild the temple. They set to work right away to get the job done. Many returned to Jerusalem and the work was being done, even before the foundation of the temple was laid sacrifices were being done. But then it hits a snag.

Over time when there is a transition of power, similar to what happens in our country, there are different priorities and different policies. Once Cyrus was no longer around the Samaritans from the South, many of whom had not been sent into exile and were still in the region just north of Jerusalem this whole time, “volunteered” to help build the temple. Those who had been in exile and now returned said: “No thank you.” I mean, not exactly in that way, but there was definitely a fear that this people whose worship was probably very different from their own, should in any way corrupt the real worship which they were involved in and wanted to reestablish in Jerusalem.

Well, that didn’t make the Samaritans happy. So they got to the king and convinced him to have him send a cease and desist notice. Now the reconstruction of the temple came to a grinding halt. More time passes and King Darius is shown the error of his ways. Remember Darius, isn’t he the same king who was around when Esther was around? Actually, he was the son of the king who married Esther. That’s interesting. But as we go forward Darius says go ahead and build the temple and as the original decree said, take the money out of the royal treasury. Great story.

This section gives us a pretty good understanding of where the nation of Israel, the whole people of God, were, and where they ended up. Let me clarify that a bit, it is absolutely focused on the southern kingdom, Judah. We see if exclusively from that perspective. We begin with a great king, Hezekiah, and near the end of this reading we see an even greater king, Josiah, whose people rediscover the law. As a result of this discovery, these are some of my favorite verses in the Bible, the king grieves and tears his clothes because he recognizes how far removed he and his people are from where the Lord wants them to be. The image of the king of Judah in utter grief because they are not following the Lord as they ought is inspirational. From the top down the example is set.

We end this history lesson with the people of Judah, again the southern kingdom, being taken away into captivity into Babylon. The rule of Hezekian and then eventually the rule of Josiah, both great kings, is followed by people who turned their back on the Lord and built up the high places. As a result God sent the Babylonians to capture and make slaves the people of Judah. We end with their captivity. We know that there is more to the story, but for now that is where we end up.

Let’s start with the psalms that we have for our readings. They are both categorized as Psalms of ascent, which literally means psalms of going up. They are both pilgrim psalms with the readers, or those saying out loud the words making their way to Jerusalem and on their way up toward Jerusalem, literally, they are able to cry out that they, just like Psalm 121, lifting their eyes up to the Lord. 123 begins with to you I lift up my eyes, again, to see Jerusalem perched on its hill. 122 gives us the phrase: I was glad when they said let us go to the house of the Lord.

This then takes us to the reforms of Hezekiah who was able to do right according to what God wanted him to do in a way that hadn’t been seen since the days of David. Notice that he reinstalls the passover but since so much time had passed when they last had a passover festival not everyone knew how to do it. But he prays to God and asks for grace for their shortcomings and God grants it. Even though the worship isn’t perfect or even what was prescribed, at least they tried. I find that fascinating. Our worship is stilted and confused, and yet I think we are trying. I pray that the grace of God be extended to us like in the days of Hezekiah.

We continue along in our recounting of the kings of Judah. Remember, this is a narrative of the kings of the southern kingdom with the northern kings being mentioned as much as they overlap with the southern kings. We see Athaliah, the mother of one of the kings, who takes over the reigns and is in power for more than a handful of years. We see Joash who repairs the temple and as along as the good priest is in power with him things go well. Once the priest dies then things go poorly.

We also see the mention of a few of the prophets that we recognize like Zechariah and Isaiah. They are mentioned as keeping the kings along the straight and narrow. But that doesn’t last.

We end our readings with Psalm 121, one of the best known Psalms next to 23. The pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem would say this psalm repeatedly, and when they arrived on the Mount of Olives they could triumphantly say: I lift up mine eyes to the hills. The hills would be the hill upon which Jerusalem sat, because she clearly sits upon a hill. Powerful psalm that could be memorized and stay with us for eternity.

So for the most part the kings of Judah did what was pleasing in the sight of the Lord, unless your name is Jehoram. And the result of your unfaithfulness is a disease of the bowels that finishes with a painful death. If that isn’t incentive to obey the Lord, don’t know what is. But it is surprising to me to see king after king who pretty much obeys the Lord and does his bidding. We see that Jehoshaphat even tore down the high places which is more than what Asa or some of the other kings did. But even he couldn’t draw himself from the temptation of seeing what building ships and sailing them would feel like.

Look at Proverbs 14 where you have a long list of dos and donts. There is some real wisdom there that allows each of us to grow if we were to only listen to its advice. How can you argue with: “The talk of fools is a rod to their back and the lips of the wise preserve them.” I can’t help but notice that the more a foolish talker talks, the more trouble he gets himself in. While the more a wise person keeps silent, the more his words are valued. What a great life lesson.

Forty one years as king is a pretty good gig. Even if only 25 of them were faithful, still the reign of Asa rivaled the reign of his ancestors David and Solomon, long and peaceful. What we have here in Chronicles is a bit of a cliff notes version of the reigns of the kings and all that takes place. Right now we are only looking at the southern kingdom, Judah, with whatever history we receive from the north, Israel, as being somewhat tangential. For the most part we have good rulers who are overseeing the reign of Judah. We aren’t innundated with names.

Notice what happened to the priests who were faithful to God and yet lived in the north. They decided to come back down south and be able to live and worship and serve the one true God. That happens sometimes. When where we are seems to have lost its way it might be important to move to a place where we feel that God is more present, or at least where we are able to experience God more fully. The ficklness is ours and ours alone, but there is something to be said about emotion and how we feel about something. God was directly present in Judah because the people were faithful, period. That wasn’t an emotion.

We get to see the reign of Solomon, and boy what a reign it was. Israel is so well ruled that the queen of Sheba comes along to see if the stories that she heard were actually true. Not only were they true, but Scripture says that she was crestfallen because Solomon’s rule was even greater than what she had heard. There is one way in which she describes his rule which I think is very telling. Basically she exclaims to Solomon that everyone is happy! From the lowest servant to the highest ruling person, everyone is happy because they know what their role and what their job is. That speaks a lot to the person who is in charge, that everyone is happy.

We do not read of a single instance in Chronicles where Solomon disobeys the Lord or does anything against the will of God. Unfortuantely, once his rule is over his son doesn’t do a great job. In fact, from the very first decision that he makes: “My finger is larger than the loins of David.”, the writing is on the wall. I know David, and you are no David.

The rule of Solomon begins, and it begins well. We all know the story of how God asks him what he might want. Solomon says that God has been so faithful to him that he really has all that he needs or would want materially, but since he is given such a large responsibility, to reign over God’s people, WOW, that is a lot, that he would ask for wisdom so he doesn’t mess it up. Those are my words and not his, but it is basically what he is thinking. I remember when I began pastoring in Palatka, Florida and my predecessor was an excellent pastor and beloved. I remember stepping in as a 29 year old and thinking, just don’t mess this up.

He begins building God’s temple. Notice he begins the temple before he begins building his own house. I assume that the people noticed that too and understood that his priorities were such that he put God first before anything. That had to be respected. We see that he also won the favor and the respect of the surrounding nations as well. Basically, he was a really good guy and a really good king.

Psalm 72 is a prototypical royal psalm. It speaks about asking a blessing upon the king. We see at the end of the psalm that it was considered the last of the psalms of David. It makes sense. If he was asking for a blessing upon his succesor, then that would have been Solomon. It is very likely that this psalm was written and sung by David as a tribute to his son who was about to take on the reigns of the kingdom. That gives us a little more personal touch.

Sometimes there is too much good stuff to include it all in what I write. I learned something while reading Chronicles. I had no idea that once David figured out that God had not reserved for him the joy of building the temple, that it was going to be his son Solomon who eventually was able to do it, that he set to work to ensure that when Solomon decided to build it he would have everything he needed. David squirreled away everything that might be needed for the building of the temple. What we find in the end of Chronicles is the importance of the logistics and the details in creating a space where God is able to be glorified. It may seem as if it is second nature to just praise God, but if the setting in which you find yourself, and if the accoutrements are distracting, then worship will be hard to come by. David knew the value of detail and he had it all laid out for his son so that all he had to do was say go and everyone knew what they needed to do and they had what they needed to do it. Pretty cool, also very controlling on David’s part.

Psalm 32 is awesome. It is the one where we find a wonderful combination of lament and the realization of all the promises that God has made. All of it is wrapped up in one Psalm. We go from: “My body wasted away from all my groaning all day long…” to “You are a hiding place for me, you preserve me from trouble, you surround me with glad cries of deliverance.” A bit of a whiplash which reminds us that God is faithful, period.

Then proverbs reminds us that if we do not discipline our children they will probably not turn out the way we would want or the way that God would want. A little known secret is that even if we do discipline our children they still may not, probably will not, turn out the way that we expect. Just be faithful in following what the Lord has put before you and trust that how they turn out, whether it is what you want or what they want or neither, is the way that the Lord wants them to turn out. That’s a lot of trust, but it is necessary.