By Jay T. Robertson, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Systematic Theology, University of Mobile
GOD JUDGES
2 Kings 17:7–20
This passage is an illustration of the old maxim stated by preachers: Sin will take you further than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay and cost you more than you want to pay. The northern kingdom of Israel came to an end in 722 B.C. when the Assyrians under Shalmaneser V captured Samaria. He then deported the Israelites to Assyria and resettled them.
Five-sixths of God’s people were essentially wiped out. The area of the promised land was drastically reduced. The curses of the covenant were poured out, and the blessings were seemingly lost. The disastrous end to the nation highlighted the issues that had plagued the Israelites from their rebellious beginning at the time of Rehoboam.
Warned (7–13)
Israel’s fundamental error had been breaking God’s covenant, with idolatry as the most obvious manifestation. The people forgot the exodus and what it meant: God’s grace and power exhibited on their behalf and their responsibility to reciprocate God’s goodness with faith, undivided allegiance and God-honoring worship.
The Israelites had come to think like, talk like and act like the people around them. The basic crime of Israel was breaking the first commandment, which was rapidly followed by adopting the practices of the Canaanites and the earlier kings of Israel. Despite the grace God showed His people in the exodus, Israel had become a nation of serial idolaters, each generation building on the sin of the one before it.
Verses 9–12 outline the offenses the Israelites committed as they worshipped other gods. The claim they did these things secretly is surprising since these offenses were very public acts. The Hebrew word secretly is only used here in the Old Testament and can have the meaning of doing something hypocritically. They did all these things while claiming to be the Lord’s people. The Israelites built high places, erected sacred pillars and Asherah poles and burned incense on all the high places just like the nations the Lord had driven out before them.
Assyrian captivity should not have been a surprise. God had warned both Israel and Judah for more than 200 years. Every prophet and seer God had sent them had warned them of the urgent need for repentance. God also had warned them through Solomon (1 Kings 8:46), Jeroboam (1 Kings 14:9–15) and the example of the nations He had dispossessed. God had warned His people verbally and visually.
Rejected (14–17)
The people of Israel were stubborn and did not heed God’s warnings. They rejected God’s statutes and covenant. They turned their backs on God’s laws. They had broken His covenant by not loving God supremely. Having rejected God’s laws and their covenantal relationship with Him, they closed their ears to the prophetic warnings God faithfully sent them. They followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves.
The final stage of the indictment added more specifics, all of which violated God’s laws. The making of two idols cast in the shape of calves was forbidden in the Ten Commandments (Ex. 20:4–6). The worship of the starry hosts was forbidden in Deuteronomy 4:19. The worship of Baal shattered the first commandment, and sacrificing their children in the fire was detestable and forbidden (Lev. 18:21). Neither did their practice of divination and interpretation of omens have a place among God’s people.
The Israelites had devoted themselves to doing what was evil in the eyes of the Lord. They did not sin out of ignorance. Their sin was the product of their aggressive, active, persistent rebellion against their covenant Lord.
Removed (18–20)
God removed His people from His presence, literally “from before His face.” We cannot take this in physical terms, since God is omnipresent. The term is used here relationally, describing punishment, specifically deportation and dispersion. The Lord is slow to anger, but He is sure to anger when He is consistently defamed.
Sadly Judah did not learn from the demise of Israel. The people of Judah followed in Israel’s footsteps and embraced the customs Israel had practiced. Just as judgment had fallen on Israel, it would also fall on Judah unless the nation repented.
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