Kings and Prophets: Israel's Chronology From Samuel to Exile

sin is spiritual adultery. It always has been, and it always will be. Secondly, god, though, desires he desires relationship, not just ritual. Hosea six six says, I desire steadfast love, not just sacrifice. They were going through the motions doing all the sacrifice, but their heart wasn't in it. And when you forget God, it leads to destruction. Just look at our nation right now. The falling apart of our communities and our cities, we have abandoned the word of God, and it's costing us. [01:56:03] (40 seconds)  #FaithNotRitual

But the kings are a continual testimony of the failure of human leadership that is not wholehearted, submitted to the worship of God. Nearly every king led the nation spiral downward. And the failure of the kings allows us to see the beauty and the wonder of who Jesus truly is. So this is a lesson that we must learn as well because in our day, there are many among god's people who think if we just have the right leader over us, it would fix our personal and national woes. [01:31:11] (58 seconds)  #LeadershipNeedsGod

Israel thought that they were blessed and secure because they had the temple. But underneath it all, they were actually guilty in a deep, deep nature. So he calls Amos says, he calls for genuine repentance among Israel, the Northern Kingdom. He tells them seek the Lord and live. They thought we've got the ritual. We've got the temple. Even though it's not the temple, but we've got our temple, our place of worship. And so we think that because we've got all the ritual, [01:54:05] (34 seconds)  #RepentanceOverRitual

So along the way, Elijah, is sustained by god by being fed by ravens. God can use anything to take care of his people. There's a widow of Zarephath who has just just a little bit of flour, and yet god does the straight work through the ministry of Elijah where the flour and the oil do not run out. Elijah has power over death. He raises the widow's son, and this confirms as he does this that the word of God is in the mouth of Elijah. [01:37:45] (37 seconds)  #GodProvidesMiraculously

In his sixteenth in when he's 16, he begins to seek the lord. At age 20, he begins to purge Judah of a number of just all of the idols that were there. In the eighteenth year of his reign, he's preparing the temple. This is where the high priest, Hilkiah, discovers the law has been lost. Now think about that. Nobody's been reading the scripture. The scripture is read in his presence. He rips his clothing, and he repents over all of the, really, the curses that were there that were given that we talked about last time. [02:12:56] (40 seconds)  #RediscoverGodsLaw

So Israel suffers a devastating defeat by the Philistines, and they loses the they lose the ark of the covenant, which leads to the death of Eli. He's a heavyset man, and he gets worried about this. He falls over and breaks his neck. It's kind of a tragic day. When the ark goes away, it's a symbolic departure in the in the eyes of the people that god's glory has left the nation now because the ark is seen as having and being connected with the glory of God. [00:25:13] (30 seconds)  #LossOfGodsGlory

So from the very beginning, the very first king of the North, the Northern Kingdom is built upon an intentional compromise grounded not in godliness but sin and rejection of God. Now there there are next kings two, three, four, and five. Adab, Vasha, Eilah, and Zemri. Zemri is interesting. His reign lasted seven days. He's living in the palace. It's over for him. So he just burns the palace down in the North where the kings were living [01:34:21] (36 seconds)  #CompromiseInTheNorth

God does unique things even in the midst of where sin has done. What's interesting so Omri's king and his teaching with him in August, sometime around twenty seven AD, Jesus will walk into Samaria, and he will go to a well, and he will lead a woman there. So this false worship that in the Northern Kingdom that we would go is bad, and it is bad. Jesus will use that to have a conversation with this woman about worship, and he will save her soul. [01:35:14] (37 seconds)  #GraceAtTheWell