February Believers Magazine

OCCASIONAL LETTERS
Glimmerings in the Gloom
The final chapter of 2 Kings is not exactly a cheerful
read. Unflinchingly it records the terrible fate of
Judah, when in 586 BC the city of Jerusalem fell
to the besieging Babylonian army. For propaganda
purposes, politicians and military leaders frequently
attempt to present a resounding defeat in the best
possible light. Thus in 1940 the catastrophic retreat
of the BEF to Dunkirk was transformed into a marvel
of deliverance, because a sizeable portion of the
army, deprived of their weaponry, was ferried back
to Britain in the face of constant enemy action. But,
as some remarked at the time, wars are not won
by evacuations. And Scripture doesn’t airbrush the
tragedy of Judah’s collapse. More, the previous
chapter clearly spells out its cause: “Surely at the
commandment of the Lord came this upon Judah,
to remove them out of his sight, for the sins of
Manasseh, according to all that he did” (2 Kings
24.3). Let us take note: sin brings suffering.
In this candid narrative of Jerusalem’s overthrow,
four things should grab our attention. First is the
utter devastation of the city: “And in the fifth
month, on the seventh day of the month, which is
the nineteenth year of king Nebuchadnezzar king of
Babylon, came Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard,
a servant of the king of Babylon, unto Jerusalem:
And he burnt the house of the Lord, and the king’s
house, and all the houses of Jerusalem, and every
great man’s house burnt he with fire. And all the
army of the Chaldees, that were with the captain
of the guard, brake down the walls of Jerusalem
round about…And such things as were of gold,
in gold, and of silver, in silver, the captain of the
guard took away” (2 Kings 25.8-15). Solomon’s
magnificent temple, the royal palace, and the
houses of the nobility were all destroyed, and the
city wall razed to the ground, while the nation’s
remaining treasures were looted. Most had already
been pillaged in earlier invasions.
D Newell, Glasgow
Second, to prevent any serious resistance, the
victors ordered the extermination of the country’s
surviving leaders: “So they took the king, and
brought him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah;
and they gave judgment upon him. And they slew
the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out
the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of
brass, and carried him to Babylon…And the captain
of the guard took Seraiah the chief priest, and
Zephaniah the second priest, and the three keepers
of the door…And Nebuzaradan captain of the guard
took these, and brought them to the king of Babylon
to Riblah: And the king of Babylon smote them, and
slew them at Riblah in the land of Hamath” (2 Kings
25.6-7, 18-21).
Third, the transportation of the remaining citizens
to Babylon left only the poorer Judeans to eke out
an existence in a war-ravaged land: “Now the rest
of the people that were left in the city, and the
fugitives that fell away to the king of Babylon, with
the remnant of the multitude, did Nebuzaradan the
captain of the guard carry away. But the captain
of the guard left of the poor of the land to be
vinedressers and husbandmen” (2 Kings 25.11-
12). Babylon’s triumph was complete.
Let us take note: sin brings
suffering.
February 2014
So far all is bleak: God’s judgment upon His
apostate people has fallen as promised and, apart
from the short-lived generosity of Gedaliah, the local
governor appointed by the Chaldeans, the picture is
one of unrelieved gloom. King Zedekiah has been
blinded, the immediate royal family slaughtered,
the people scattered. Then, at the very close of
the chapter, comes an unexpected appendix which
shifts the scene to Babylon.
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OCCASIONAL LETTERS