Scripture Focus: 2 Kings 21.11-12, 16
11 “Manasseh king of Judah has committed these detestable sins. He has done more evil than the Amorites who preceded him and has led Judah into sin with his idols. 12 Therefore this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I am going to bring such disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle.

16 Moreover, Manasseh also shed so much innocent blood that he filled Jerusalem from end to end—besides the sin that he had caused Judah to commit, so that they did evil in the eyes of the Lord. 

Hebrews 3.5-6
5 “Moses was faithful as a servant in all God’s house,” a bearing witness to what would be spoken by God in the future. 6 But Christ is faithful as the Son over God’s house. And we are his house, if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory. 

Hebrews 11.37-38
37 They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated—38 the world was not worthy of them.

Reflection: Hidden in Christ’s Tree
By John Tillman

Israelites continued Canaanite idol worship, including child sacrifice. Manasseh sacrificed his own son. If the king did it, we can be sure that many leaders and followers did as well.

Modern readers often focus on titillating and exotic-sounding sins. Child sacrifice and idol worship involving sex grabs headlines in any era. However, focusing on these exotic sins can distance us from scripture, allowing a smug sense of superiority over ancient idolaters.

The prophets take a wider scope. It is unlikely the “innocent blood” (1 Kings 21.16) Manassah shed refers exclusively to child sacrifice. This phrase consistently highlights the oppression of the poor and the killing of God’s prophets. (Isaiah 59.3; Jeremiah 2.34; 7.6-7; 22.17; Hosea 4.2) The prophets cut to the heart of the sins of our age as well—to the oppression of the poor and misuse of power.

The non-canonical book, Ascension of Isaiah, tells us Isaiah hid in the hollow of a cedar tree while fleeing Manasseh. Manasseh found him and sawed the tree in half with Isaiah still inside it. Bible commentators believe Hebrews 11.37, “sawed in two,” may refer to this story. True or not, this symbolism is consistent with much of the scripture

Trees are symbols of God’s blessing throughout the Bible and many times kings and kingdoms are represented as trees in which birds and animals find shelter. But Israel and Judah were not trees that brought harvests of righteousness. Bloodshed and injustice bloomed.

The problem with idols is not only that they insult the one true God but also the evil that we do in their service. God wants his people to bless, not curse. It is part of the Abrahamic promise and Mosaic covenant. Christians are grafted into this covenant and included in this promise. (Romans 11.17-20)

God is holy. If we serve him faithfully, we’ll bless people with tangible and spiritual blessings. Idols are unholy, serving selfish desires. Following idols, even with the best of intentions, causes spiritual and tangible damage to people. Trees are known by fruit and orthodoxy by orthopraxy.

Isaiah may have died hidden within a tree. We have been hidden in Christ who died on a tree. (Colossians 3.3)
Like Isaiah, may we admit our own and our culture’s uncleanness (Isaiah 6.5).
We die to ourselves upon Christ’s cross: “the hope in which we glory.” (Hebrews 3.6)
United with him, we will not be abandoned to the grave but will rise with healing for the nations.


Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
“Because the needy are oppressed, and the poor cry out in misery, I will rise up,” says the Lord, “And give them the help they long for.” — Psalm 12.5

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.


Today’s Readings
2 Kings 21 (Listen – 4:06)
Hebrews 3 (Listen – 2:25)

Read more about Praying Through Ancient Hymns
It seems much of the most profound art in the church was originally intended for children. This hymn is one example…

Read more about A Hymn of the Oppressed
History might be very different if rather than idolizing the martyrs, we could study how not to become the oppressors.

Scripture Focus: 2 Kings 18.5-7, 28-32
5 Hezekiah trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel. There was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before him or after him. 6 He held fast to the Lord and did not stop following him; he kept the commands the Lord had given Moses. 7 And the Lord was with him; he was successful in whatever he undertook…

28 Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew, “Hear the word of the great king, the king of Assyria! 29 This is what the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you from my hand. 30 Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the Lord when he says, ‘The Lord will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’ 
31 “Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern, 32 until I come and take you to a land like your own—a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive trees and honey. Choose life and not death!

Reflection: False Promises and Threats
By John Tillman

Hezekiah, king of Judah, is a breath of much-needed fresh air after the repeated depravity of the kings of Israel.

Hezekiah had the benefit of the counsel of some of the great prophets of the Bible. Isaiah, Micah, Hosea, and Amos all prophesied around this time. Isaiah even recorded his own version of the events of Sennacherib’s siege.

Sennacherib’s messenger promised that if Jerusalem surrendered they would eat “from their own vine and fig tree.” He was promising to bring the “good old days” back. The “vine and fig tree” quote originally refers to the golden years of Solomon’s rule (1 Kings 4.24) and is referenced by Micah in his prophecies (Micah 4.4). 

It is no mistake that Sennacherib’s silver-tongued messenger quotes the Hebrew scriptures to the people as he threatens them and attempts to entice them to surrender. Those who seek to manipulate us will often appeal to our nostalgia and our pride. “Don’t you remember how good life used to be?” “Don’t you remember how great your country was?” “All you have to do is surrender to our ideology and our interpretation of what God wants.”

The world co-opts the term of peace. But making peace with the world too often means surrendering our faith. Hezekiah took one of these threatening messages before God in the Temple and prayed over it. The next day the army withdrew, never to return. 

Pray this weekend, this prayer based on Hezekiah’s prayer in 1 Kings 19.14-17.

Lord, we are besieged with false promises and threats
They want us to join their parties, their factions, their empires.
They offer pacification instead of peace and retribution instead of righteousness.

We spread out their words before you…
“You’ll never have peace,” they say…
“Your faith is foolish,” they say…
“Your god is no different than any other god”…

We have no answer for them except to appeal to you.
We wish only to be worthy of your kingdom, rejecting all other kings.
To worship you, rejecting all other objects of worship.
Do not let your name be slandered.
Help us to stand amidst evil days holding out peace and righteousness.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
Keep watch over my life, for I am faithful; save your servant whose trust is in you. — Psalm 86.2

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Kings 18 (Listen – 6:52)
Philemon (Listen – 2:52)

This Weekend’s Readings
2 Kings 19 (Listen – 6:11), Hebrews 1 (Listen – 2:15)
2 Kings 20 (Listen – 3:39), Hebrews 2 (Listen – 2:47)

Read more about Political Promises
Sennacherib’s commander assumes a binary choice—rely on Egypt or rely on Assyria.

Read more about A Tale of Two Kings
Petitioning for God’s help is not our last resort. It is the first one.

Scripture Focus: 2 Kings 17.22-23, 26-29, 33, 40-41
22 The Israelites persisted in all the sins of Jeroboam and did not turn away from them 23 until the Lord removed them from his presence, as he had warned through all his servants the prophets. So the people of Israel were taken from their homeland into exile in Assyria…

26 It was reported to the king of Assyria: “The people you deported and resettled in the towns of Samaria do not know what the god of that country requires. He has sent lions among them, which are killing them off, because the people do not know what he requires.” 27 Then the king of Assyria gave this order: “Have one of the priests you took captive from Samaria go back to live there and teach the people what the god of the land requires.” 28 So one of the priests who had been exiled from Samaria came to live in Bethel and taught them how to worship the Lord. 
29 Nevertheless, each national group made its own gods…

33 They worshiped the Lord, but they also served their own gods in accordance with the customs of the nations from which they had been brought. 

40 They would not listen, however, but persisted in their former practices. 41 Even while these people were worshiping the Lord, they were serving their idols. To this day their children and grandchildren continue to do as their ancestors did.

Reflection: “Everyone Is Doing It”
By John Tillman

Israel failed to bless the nations by teaching them to follow Yahweh, following their gods instead. After Israel’s exile, we see the nations literally brought into the promised land and taught, by imperial decree, to worship him.

The non-Israelite settlers were being killed by lions due to not worshiping Yahweh. So Assyria sent back an exiled priest tasked with teaching the people “what the god of the land requires.” This priest was only partially successful. “Even to this day,” the author says, the people continued mixing the worship of God with that of idols. 

It can be easy for us to shake our heads in judgment at ancient idolaters. “How simple and foolish they are,” we may think. We underestimate the impact of cultural influence.

”Everyone is doing it” only seems lame when you don’t have to live among the “everyone.” Children say “everyone is doing it” to their parents. Parents don’t live among their children’s “everyone” and so dismiss it as foolish. When children challenge their parents about adult behaviors, parents respond with the same answer, “everyone is doing it.”

We find it easy to not worship a fertility god who guarantees good crops because we aren’t farmers living in a culture in which everyone around us is doing it. (Instead, we live in a culture that believes “knowledge is power” and we are all addicted to streams of content, articles, feeds, news channels… “Everyone is doing it.”)

We underestimate the cultural influence that we are under. Those baked in the culture of western Christianity THINK that we are operating from a neutral theological and cultural position but our culture’s yeast is worked all through our dough. Our culture has a huge influence on our theology and the way we live out our faith. It is hubris to think otherwise. 

Why do we worship God? So that we may not fall prey to lions? So that our kings may not be conquered? So that we can dwell in the land in peace? Selfishness and power can’t grow faith.

Assyria conquered the land but couldn’t enforce worship. We also will fail to force others to faith. Faith cannot be crushed, no matter how powerful the government, but it can’t be forced either. It must grow on its own. All we can do is plant seeds like the priest and pray that God will make them grow.

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Jesus went on to say, “What is the kingdom of God like? What shall I compare it with? It is like a mustard seed which a man took and threw into his garden: it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air sheltered in its branches.” — Luke 13.18-19

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Kings 17 (Listen – 7:19)
Titus 3 (Listen – 2:05)

Read more about Kingdoms Breaking Bad
As Israel fractures, each dynasty hopes to be the answer. But each one, especially in the northern kingdom, “breaks bad.”

Read more about Paul’s Stance on Gentleness
May we tear down arguments and strongholds, but never people for whom Christ died.

Scripture Focus: 2 Kings 16:8, 10
8 And Ahaz took the silver and gold found in the temple of the Lord and in the treasuries of the royal palace and sent it as a gift to the king of Assyria…10 Then King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-Pileser king of Assyria. He saw an altar in Damascus and sent to Uriah the priest a sketch of the altar, with detailed plans for its construction.

Reflection: The Facade of Worship
By Erin Newton

You can’t have your cake and eat it too. The old idiom means “to have all the benefits of a situation when, in fact, having one thing means that you cannot have the other.” I want good grades without studying. I stay up late watching movies but hope to feel well-rested in the morning. I want companionship but never invest in others.  Unfortunately, I fall into this trap in small, mostly insignificant ways. There are some, however, who have gone too far.

Ahaz became king of Judah and quickly made an alliance with the Assyrians. With threats surrounding Judah, Ahaz welcomed the influence of other powers. He earnestly sought their approval by robbing the Temple and handing over the riches. He lingered with the Assyrians and was enthralled by the temples for foreign gods.

Judah already had a temple for worship. The divinely ordained Temple in Jerusalem was blessed with God’s continual presence. But Ahaz was obsessed with Assyrian power and prestige so much so that he was willing to try to hold both worlds in one hand. He kept the Temple in Jerusalem and commissioned another Assyrian-style altar to be built. He kept the divinely ordained rituals but transferred those to his new altar.

Ahaz attempted to retain the façade of worshipping God while adopting the ways of the world. He was either weak or wicked but in either case, he failed to see that worshipping God is incompatible with other worldviews. He could not have God and other deities too.  

Not everything conflicts with faith. I can be a vegetarian Christian or a pro-life Democrat or an old-earth conservative. Our faith does not stand at odds with everything. There is, however, a difference in building two houses of worship. My profession to love Jesus cannot stand alongside the desire to give my whole heart to a cause, a party, or a person.

Jesus warned that no one was able to serve two masters. “Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” (Matthew 6.24) Ahaz despised God by continuing to rob the Temple and sacrificing his own children. What pursuits consume our thoughts? What platforms are we willing to sacrifice for that compete with the sole worship of God? Some things must be secondary in life; God must be primary. 

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Concerning the commandments, Jesus taught us, saying: “This is the first: Listen Israel, the Lord our God is the One, only Lord, and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You must love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater then these.” — Mark 12.29-31

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Kings 16 (Listen – 3:46)
Titus 2 (Listen – 2:01)

Read more about Muscle Memory
Fearful and uncertain, he looked for answers. Just as he was raised, he avoided God and looked to the idols.

Read more about Solomon’s Cheating Heart
What “Temple” have you built with the time and resources of your life?
Who is that Temple dedicated to?

Scripture Focus: 2 Kings 15.8-12
8 In the thirty-eighth year of Azariah king of Judah, Zechariah son of Jeroboam became king of Israel in Samaria, and he reigned six months. 9 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, as his predecessors had done. He did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit. 
10 Shallum son of Jabesh conspired against Zechariah. He attacked him in front of the people, assassinated him and succeeded him as king. 11 The other events of Zechariah’s reign are written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel. 12 So the word of the Lord spoken to Jehu was fulfilled: “Your descendants will sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation.” 

Reflection: Unhealthy Patterns of Insurrection
By John Tillman

As promised, Jehu’s dynasty was the longest in Israel’s history but Zechariah, the fifth in the line, only lasted six months. Stability was not the norm in Israel. Previously, the dynasty of Omri (Ahab’s father) was the longest, lasting three generations. (There were four kings in Omri’s line but the last two were both sons of Ahab.)

Zechariah’s death kicked off a period of political instability and growing threats both inside and outside Israel. Six different kings ruled Israel during this time. Four of them were assassinated by their successors. Only one passed the throne on to his son.

Israel repeatedly resorted to rebellion—perhaps rebellion against David’s sons set a pattern. Insurrection was normalized. Assassination, rather than inauguration, was common.

Recently, speaking at Hutchmoot Homebound on “Faith, Fiction, and Christian Nationalism,” Dr. Russell Moore quoted Wendell Berry’s essay “Discipline and Hope,” published in 1972. Berry said, “The most destructive of ideas is that extraordinary times justify extraordinary measures.”

Many rebels think themselves just and their targets wicked. Many in power think themselves righteous and any resistance or critique equivalent to wickedness. Such moral relativism is not new to politics. What is new is how completely it has overtaken some Christians.

Many people today have come to believe that the times are extraordinary enough that any measures are justified, even civil war. When convinced that situations are dire enough, any measure, any abuse, any violence, any tactic seems justified. 

For Christians, it is always right to defend the weak. It is always right to rescue those crushed by the powerful. However, there is never a time when a just end justifies a sinful means to attain it. If the means are unjust, the ends are tainted.

God redeems evil acts after the fact but he doesn’t preemptively give “hall passes” for evil as long as something good happens. Christians shouldn’t either. Good intentions don’t lead to hell, but good intentions pursued by wicked means do.

God’s purposes for our lives do not require a “Christian” government. In fact, arguably greater kingdom work is more often done by global majority Christians living outside the cushy environment and soft-bodied sloth of the Western church.

May we pray and pursue peace. May we reject the justifications of violence by kings and those who would topple them. Our king was assassinated, yet still reigns. May he be the only king to whom we give allegiance.

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Jesus taught us, saying: “Be on your guard, stay awake because you never know when the time will come. It is like a man traveling abroad: he has gone from his home, and left his servants in charge, each with his own work to do; and he has told the doorkeeper to stay awake. So stay awake, because you do not know when the master of the house is coming, evening, midnight, cockcrow of dawn; if he comes unexpectedly, he must not find you asleep. And what I am saying to you I say to all: Stay awake!” — Mark 13.33-37

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Today’s Readings
2 Kings 15 (Listen – 6:21)
Titus 1 (Listen – 2:24)

Read more about The Hero We Need Isn’t Jehu
Jehu was an incomplete savior who delivered an incomplete and unsatisfying justice.

Read more about Tribalism and Insurrection
It is difficult to make peace with insurrectionists. They aren’t interested. In a world fluent in violence, when we speak of peace, it is “an unknown tongue.