Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Kings 17-18.

So, I had a different perspective on today’s passage than has previously occurred to me.  The passage begins by recounting how Israel, the Northern Kingdom, was completely conquered by Assyria and the people deported to other lands.  It tells us that they were deported for their sins and gives a list of some of those sins.  Then it tells us that the Assyrians brought people from foreign lands to settle in the Israelite lands.  When those foreigners first settled there they had problems with lions, which the Assyrians attributed to these new settlers not worshiping the god of the land (which was God).  So, the Assyrians brought back one of the priests they had deported from the land to teach these new settlers how to worship the Lord.  The writer then tells us that although these new settlers began worshiping God, they also continued to worship the gods of their homelands.  As the writer describes the practices of the people whom the Assyrians settled in the land his description sounds very much like his description as to why God allowed the Israelites to be deported.  Often  I have seen people interpret the description of the practices of the people the Assyrians settled in the land as justification for the claims by the post-Exilic Jews that their descendants had no rights to the land.  What struck me today that while this passage was indeed used that way, it actually tells us that the Israelites were exiled from the land because they were no more faithful in worshiping God than these foreigners with no connection to Abraham.  And how does this apply to us today?   The Israelites claimed to worship God, but they also worshiped other gods.  The settlers whom the Assyrians settled in the land, took up to forms of worshiping God, but did not give up their worship of other gods.  Do we today who claim to worship God allow ourselves to be drawn into the practices of those around us who worship other gods?  God has repeatedly told us that if we worship other gods we are not worshiping Him.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.