Day 200 (2 Kings 18, 2 Chronicles 29-31, Psalm 48) - Year 4
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Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for The Bible Recap. We just finished day 200 of our reading plan. I'm blown away by all God is teaching us through this. So let's jump in.

Hezekiah, the son of King Ahaz, reigned in Judah after Ahaz died. While Ahaz was terrible, one of his sons who survived his child sacrifices, Hezekiah, turned out to be one of Judah's two best kings. And we know this because he's one of the only two kings Scripture says lived up to the level of David.

We'll get to the other really great kings soon, but in the meantime, if you're a parent and you feel that you're setting a bad example for your kids, take heart because Ahaz the Wicked was father to Hezekiah the Great, so there's still hope for your kids.

So what did Hezekiah do that was so awesome? Lots of stuff. Right out of the gate, in year one of his reign, he starts making aggressive religious reforms. First, he restores the temple and reinstates the sacrificial system. The people bring so many animals to sacrifice that the priests have to call for backup to handle it all.

Hezekiah also reinstates the festivals, like Passover, which they hadn't really celebrated regularly in a long time. And this is important because remember how God had told them to do that every year as a reminder of what he had done? When they stopped celebrating God's goodness, their hearts disengaged from worshiping God. Celebration is important, especially when it's worship-adjacent.

Hezekiah, who is king in Judah, also invites the people of Israel to celebrate Passover with them in Jerusalem. And while some of them mock and shame him, people from about half the tribes come. This is the first time since Solomon was king that both kingdoms have celebrated together as one.

The people are singing and praising God, and most importantly, they're finally beginning to repent. These aren't empty sacrifices and vain words. Their hearts are in it. And we see in 30.12, who's behind it all? It says, "...the hand of God was on Judah to give them one heart, to do what the king and the princes commanded by the word of the Lord."

We see that God is at work in them, to will and to work according to his good pleasure, like we talked about yesterday from Philippians 2.13. He's changing hearts. After Passover, we see another bold move from Hezekiah. He tears down the high places, and he even destroys the bronze serpent Moses used back in 2 Kings 18, because the people had started to worship it.

It's funny how people want to worship objects and relics and icons, and by funny, I mean tragic and idolatrous. One really great thing about this demolition project is that all the people participated, not just the leaders, people from both kingdoms, and the high places were torn down in both kingdoms. True worship will prompt us to destroy our idols. It also prompted all the people to give generously to the Lord's work. The priests had more than what they needed to live on.

One year, the Assyrians decide to come out against Judah. They take over cities and demand payment from Judah. King Hezekiah has a moment where he acts less than faithfully, which just lets us know he's human, and he basically says, go ahead, take whatever you need from us. What's mine is yours. So they take all the stuff from the temple, all the valuables. Then the Assyrian leaders want to know exactly what makes Judah so confident that they think they can withstand Assyria.

Throughout the conversation, it's clear that Assyria's leaders misunderstand who Yahweh is and they're perplexed as to why Hezekiah trusts him. Assyria thinks Judah must be trusting in Egypt because Judah has destroyed a bunch of high places and weren't those places for worshiping Yahweh? See, they don't get it.

By the way, they were having this conversation in Hebrew, and all the commoners are overhearing it. So Eliakim, who is basically King Hezekiah's chief of staff, says, hey, let's have this conversation in Aramaic, please. No need for the people to panic. But Assyria is like, actually, we think they do need to hear this because they need to know they're about to be destroyed. Then the Assyrian leaders make an announcement to all the people, telling them not to trust Yahweh because it's all a sham. Ancient trash talk.

They even promised to bless the people of Judah with wealth and prosperity if they'll follow them instead. But the people don't respond because King Hezekiah had told them to block the haters. We wrapped up today with Psalm 48. My favorite line from this song of praise is, tell the next generation that this is our God. Our God forever and ever. Yes, I want to tell the next generation, the prior generation, the current generation, you won't be able to shut me up.

My God shot today came from their celebration of the Passover. Hezekiah knows they're ritually unclean and that Passover isn't going off exactly as God prescribed. Think about this for a second. If we hadn't already read about God's response and we didn't know how this went, and if you thought all these people showed up and did things the wrong way, what would you expect from God? Honestly, I'd probably expect judgment.

But Hezekiah knew better. He knew God's heart for mercy. So in his letter of invitation, he promises the people, The Lord your God is gracious and merciful and will not turn away his face from you if you return to him. And in 30, 18 through 19, Hezekiah appeals to God on the basis of God's character, praying, May the good Lord pardon everyone who sets his heart to seek God, the Lord, the God of his fathers, even though not according to the sanctuary's rules of cleanness.

Then verse 20 tells us, the Lord heard Hezekiah and healed the people. Hezekiah knew God's character and God knew the people's hearts. And remember how God despised all those ritually perfect sacrifices they'd made with unrepentant hearts? He's always after the heart. So we see him focused on the heart here too. These imperfect practices done with hearts of repentance are received with heavy doses of God's mercy. He is eager to forgive.

30 26 says, so there was great joy in Jerusalem. And do you know why? They were seeking God, finally. And he's where the joy is. Tomorrow we'll be starting the book of Hosea. It's 14 chapters long. We're linking to a short video overview in the show notes that will really help set you up for success with this new book. So check that out if you've got seven minutes to spare.

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