Friday, October 31
Colossians 3:1-17: This second half of Paul’s epistle is characterized by the more frequent use of imperative (“Seek”—verse 1; “Set”—verse 2; “Put on”—verses 12,14; “Do”—verse 17) and optative verbs (“Let the peace of God’—verse 15; “Let the word of Christ”—verse 16).
The Christian’s new state, his being already raised with Christ, is the basis for his striving to be likewise ascended with Christ, seeking and savoring the things above (verses 1,2). These two verbs, seeking (zeteite) and savoring (phroneite), indicate the two temporal aspects of our possession of God, the “not yet” (seeking) and the “already” (savoring). As long as we are on this earth, the life in Christ involves both.
And just where, while all this is going on, is Christ to be found? “Sitting at the right hand of God,” says Paul. The Christian sense of the presence of Christ does not bring Christ to the earth again, as it were. Rather, it raises the believer up to the throne room of God (Hebrews 12:22-24; Acts 7:55-56; Revelation 5:6). The real life of the believer remains, therefore, “hidden” (verse 3).
Our present state, containing both the already and the not yet, both the seeking and the savoring, is not our final state. Indeed, our final state is not even the entrance of our souls into heaven at death. Our final state arrives, rather, when “Christ who is our life appears,” for then we too “will appear with Him in glory” (verse 4). In the Epistle to the Colossians, as in the Epistle to the Romans, full salvation is attained only when Christ returns to raise our mortal bodies from corruption.
2 Chronicle 8: Having devoted six chapters of this book to what he considered the truly significant aspect of Solomon’s reign—that is, the Temple—the Chronicler spends the next two chapters on the more secular matters of the Solomonic era, such as foreign and domestic policy, trade, and economics.
As he divides his treatment between these two aspects of Solomon’s reign, the Chronicler’s preference for the spiritual concern over the material, we observe, falls into a ratio of about three to one, the spiritual also being treated first. It is instructive to compare this ratio with his treatment of David. In that earlier story, as we have seen, the king’s relationship to the Temple was the final thing recorded of him (a sequence reasonably required the facts), but the Chronicler’s proportion of spiritual concerns (1 Chronicles 15—16 and 22—29) to material (1 Chronicles 11—13 and 17—21) is still weighted significantly on the side of the former.
Inasmuch as the previous six chapters have been devoted the theme of construction, it seems appropriate that the Chronicler begins his description of the ‘secular’ side of Solomon by speaking of his other building projects in the Holy Land (verses 1-6), a subject that leads naturally to local geography and thence to an account of the pagans who still live in the area (verses 7-8). This subject is tied to Solomon’s domestic policies (verses 9-10), which account reminds the author to mention Solomon’s wife and the palace he built for her. Though this latter building is mentioned in 1 Kings, only Chronicler explains the project as an effort of keeping this Egyptian woman and her Egyptian retinue from defiling the buildings used by Israelites (verse 11).
After eleven verses of such profane and secular concerns, the Chronicler, as though weary of the subject, reverts once again, albeit briefly, to a further account of Solomon’s liturgical interests (verses 11-16, verses particular to this author).
The chapter closes with the king’s opening of a southern trade route that will join Huram’s great mercantile enterprises to opportunities along the coasts of Arabia and Africa (verses 17-18). This great, which secular history regards as one of Solomon’s most significant achievements, serves to introduce the Queen of Sheba in the next chapter.
Saturday, November 1
2 Chronicles 9: A quick glance at the map will explain the geopolitical importance of Sheba, that ancient realm which sat on the corner of Arabia formed by the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, guarding the Straits of Bab el Mandeb that joined those two large bodies of water. Thus, all traffic coming south from either the Gulf of Suez or the Gulf of Aquaba (on the north shore of which sat Solomon’s ports of Elath and Ezion Geber—8:17) was effectively controlled by Sheba. Through the Gulf of Aden, moreover, Sheba had access to other great bodies of water, such as the Arabian Sea, the Indian Ocean, even the Bay of Bengal and beyond. To the immediate west lay the Horn of Africa.
Solomon’s new enterprise in the Gulf of Aquaba served as the link between the great mercantile power of Sheba to the south and, to the north, Phoenicia, where Huram wielded control over the Mediterranean, Aegean, and Black Seas. It seems unlikely, therefore, that the sudden appearance of the Queen of Sheba in the court of Solomon was entirely unrelated to Solomon’s new geopolitical importance.
The Bible scarcely mentions this consideration, however. What rendered Solomon famous enough to attract a visit from the Queen of Sheba was the monarch’s reputation for wisdom (verse 5). Even on its face, this explanation seems reasonable. Sheba’s mercantile dealings with Jerusalem could be handled adequately through the normal diplomatic channels that tied the world together. A more serious motive must be sought to explain why such a grand person as the Queen of Sheba would visit the king of a much less significant nation, Solomon’s reputation for wisdom provides that motive.
Nor was Her Majesty disappointed in what she found at Jerusalem (verses 6-8). Although the Temple was Solomon’s most singular accomplishment in the capital, there is no hint in the Sacred Text that the Queen of Sheba enjoyed access to it. Indeed, the Chronicler’s earlier comment about Pharaoh’s daughter (8:11) suggests that she did not.
The description of all the rich gifts exchanged by Solomon and the Queen, along with a brief reference to an exchange of gifts with Huram, brings up the subject of Jerusalem’s newfound wealth (verses 13-28). The secular historian will explain this wealth as the fruit of Solomon’s great business acumen, which certainly it was. Humanly speaking, Solomon could not have constructed his new Temple without the vast resources available to him through those enterprises.
The Chronicler, however, correctly perceives a deep significance in Solomon’s wealth. As he will later do in the cases of Hezekiah and Josiah, the Chronicler only speaks of this wealth <i>after</i> telling of the priority of the spiritual over the material in Solomon’s program. Solomon becomes an embodiment of the many other good things that are added to those who first seek the Kingdom of Heaven.
First Chronicles, leaving out the many criticisms implied against Solomon in First Kings, comes to this wise man’s death in 922 (verses 29-31).
Sunday, November 2
2 Chronicles 10: This chapter is one of several places where the Chronicler clearly presumes his readers’ familiarity with certain historical facts that he leaves unsaid. Here, for instance, he omits the detailed introduction to Jeroboam found in 1 Kings 11:23-40. If the Chronicler thinks it unimportant to relate those details, it is partly because he can rest assured that his readers already know them. That is to say, he can safely tell this story of the schism of 922 in his own way, because is he can safely presume that the facts of the case are already well known.
With respect to Rehoboam (922-913), the son and successor of Solomon (with whom he shared co-regency from 931), there is not much good to be said. He was almost the perfect example of what the Bible means by the word “fool.” Because he was the son of Solomon, Israel’s wisest king, furthermore, this foolishness was a matter of irony as well as tragedy.
After Solomon’s death, this heir to Israel’s throne traveled to Schechem, to receive the nation’s endorsement as its new ruler (verse 1). The move was especially necessary with respect to Israel’s northern tribes, a people touchy about their traditional rights and needing to be handled gently. Even David, we recall, had to be made king twice, first over Judah about the year 1000 (2 Samuel 2:4,10) and then over the north some years later (5:4-5).
Those northern tribes, for their part, seemed willing to be ruled by Rehoboam, but they craved assurance that the new king would respect their ancient traditions and customs (verse 4). This is the first time the Chronicler even hints at popular unhappiness with the reign and policies of Solomon. The plaintiffs sought from his son, therefore, a simple pledge that their grievances would be taken seriously in the future. A great deal depended on Rehoboam’s answer.
The new king apparently took the matter seriously, because he sought advice on what to say. He began by consulting the seniors of the royal court, the very men who had for forty years provided guidance for his father (verse 6). These were the elder statesmen of the realm, those qualified to give the most prudent political counsel.
Significantly, these older men urged Rehoboam in the direction of caution and moderation with respect to the northern tribes: “If you are kind to these people, and please them, and speak good words to them, they will be your servants forever” (verse 7).
Rehoboam, nonetheless, eschewing the instruction of his elders, followed the impulses of his younger companions, who encouraged him to stand tough and not let himself be pushed around (verse 8). Indeed, they urged Rehoboam to be insulting and provocative to the petitioners (verse 9-11). Pursuing this foolish counsel, then, he immediately lost the larger part of his kingdom (verses 12-19).
As I suggested above, there is great irony here, for it may be said that one of the major practical purposes of the Book of Proverbs, traditionally ascribed to Solomon, was to prevent and preclude exactly the mistake committed by Solomon’s son. According to Proverbs, the fool is the man who ignores the counsel of the old and follows the impulses of untried youth.
Many a life has been ruined-—and in this case a kingdom lost—because someone preferred the pooled stupidity of his contemporaries to the accumulated wisdom of his elders. Those whose counsel Rehoboam spurned, after all, were not just any old men. They were the very ancients who had provided sound guidance to the man whom the Chronicler regarded as Israel’s most sagacious monarch.
Monday, November 3
2 Chronicles 11: Because the stories about the northern prophets in the Books of Kings are so colorful and memorable (Michaiah, Elijah, Elisha), one may too easily suppose that the ministry of the prophets, at least until the eighth century, was concentrated mainly in the north. The present chapter of Chronicles, however, which narrates the prophetic intervention of Shemaiah (verses 2-4, paralleled in 1 Kings 12:21-24), is a first argument against that supposition. Second Chronicles goes on to tell of other active prophets in the south, prior to the eighth century, accounts not found in the Books of Kings. This list includes stories of Azariah ben Obed (15:1-7), Hanani (16:7-9), Jehu ben Hanani (19:2-3), Zechariah ben Jehoiada (24:20-22), and the anonymous prophet sent to King Amaziah (25:7-9). According to the Chronicler (21:12-15), even Elijah the Tishbite intervened in the south by way of a letter (21:1215).
Given all these accounts of southern prophets narrated only in the Chronicler, it is curious and ironical that the story of Shemaiah in this chapter is the only part of the chapter that is found in Kings. It is followed by three accounts that are not told in Kings.
First, there is a list of the cities fortified by Rehoboam on his southern flank against attack from Egypt (verses 5-12). This system of defense, well known to archeology, is sometimes called antiquity’s Maginot Line.
Second, the Chronicler tells of northern Levitical families that remained loyal to the government and Temple in Jerusalem (verses 13-17). Because of Jeroboam’s persecution of them, these families fled south for asylum, and the schismatic king of the north appointed non-Levites in their place (1 Kings 12:31-32; 13:33). One is disposed to speculate that the Chronicler himself may have been a descendent from that group, but in such a case we would expect a record of actual names here in the text.
Third, there is a detailed account of Rehoboam’s apostasy in the south (verses 18-23). This defection of Solomon’s son had to be particularly distressing to the northern Levites who had fled to the south in fidelity to the Davidic covenant and the orthodox worship in the Jerusalem Temple. Their disappointment is perhaps more readily understood if we think of certain contemporary Christians conscientiously driven from one church to another, only to find the second church just about as unfaithful as the first. In the case of these Levites, moreover, the move involved uprooting their families from lands they had cultivated for more than two centuries.
Tuesday, November 4
2 Chronicles 12: Rehoboam’s reign knew its ups and downs, the downs decidedly dominant. Five years after the new king inherited the throne of David, Pharaoh Shishak, founder of Egypt’s twenty-second dynasty, invaded the Holy Land and took pretty much whatever attracted his eye: ” And it happened in the fifth year of King Rehoboam that Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, because they had transgressed against the Lord . . . So Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem and took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house; he took everything ” (verses 2,9).
Alone to do so, the Chronicler once again introduces the prophet Shemaiah (cf. 11:2-4) to point out to Rehoboam the deep theological reason for the catastrophe that befell the kingdom (verse 5). In this instance the prophetic message brought some measure of repentance among Jerusalem’s leadership, a repentance that caused the situation to become no worse (verses 6-8).
The Sacred Text goes on to remark about Shishak’s invasion, ” He also carried away the gold shields which Solomon had made. Then King Rehoboam made bronze shields in their place and committed them to the hands of the captains of the guard” (verses 9-10). By setting bronze shields in the Temple to replace the golden shields of Solomon, Rehoboam enacted a truly wretched symbolism. Some of the ancients (Daniel, Hesiod, Ovid) spoke of an historical decline from a golden age to a silver age, and thence to a bronze age. No one disputes, of course, that Solomon’s was a golden age (9:13-17). However, the reign of Rehoboam, his heir, was not just a declension to silver, but all the way to bronze. The lunge, when it came, came at once, in a single generation.
We will find this pattern of sudden fall repeatedly throughout Chronicles, a Jehoshaphat followed by a Jehoram, a Hezekiah by a Manasseh, a Josiah by a villainous series of village idiots, all the way to Jerusalem’s downfall in 587.
As for Rehoboam, he remained, Josephus tells us, “a proud and foolish man” (<i>Antiquities</i> 8.10.4). He never recovered from the singular folly of his first political decision. After Shishak’s invasion, this thin, pathetic shadow of his father and grandfather reigned under a humiliating Egyptian suzerainty for a dozen more years. Like every fool, he had a heart problem. The final word about Rehoboam asserts, “he did evil, for he did not set his heart to seek the Lord” (verse 14).
Wednesday, November 5
2 Chronicles 13: Rehoboam’s son Abijah (913-991) succeeded to the throne of David. Although his reign was short, he receives an entire chapter here in Chronicles, which has no correspondence in 1 Kings. It is the battle between Abijah and Jeroboam. This material readily breaks into two parts.
The first part (verses 1-12) is dominated by Abijah’s religious speech at the very doorstep of the battle. Although it was St. Augustine’s view of the schism between Israel and Judah that “the division made was not religious but political” (<i>The City of God</i> 17.21), it is clear that the Chronicler did not share that view. Regarding the Lord’s covenant with David as the basis of Israel’s political order, he was unable to regard that order as anything but religious. Driven by such a conviction, the Chronicler here makes Abijah its spokesman in this speech.
Pre-battle speeches by kings and generals are normally directed to their own troops, but in the present case Jeroboam permitted his opponent to speak as long as he wanted, because meanwhile a northern party of ambuscade was moving to the rear of Abijah’s forces, planning to hit them from two sides (verse 13). The longer Abijah talked, thought Jeroboam, the better position his own men in the rear would attain.
Abijah, standing on a tall borderline hill from which he could be heard by the forces of Jeroboam, lays out his own perspective of the battle about to ensue. The fault, says Abijah, lies completely with Jeroboam, who took advantage of youth and vacillation (!) of Rehoboam in order to lead an insurrection against legitimate and even divinely covenanted authority (verses 4-7).
Then Abijah comes to the heart of the matter–at least the concern dominant in the heart of the Chronicler—Jeroboam was a worshipper of golden calves (verse 8), who drove out the legitimate sons of Levi from the north and elevated non-Levites in their place (verse 9). The merit of Judah over the Northern Kingdom lay in its fidelity to the true God, worshipped as He Himself had decreed His worship (verse 10). This is the essence of the Chronicler’s case against the schismatic tribes of the north. Unlike Judah, the Northern Kingdom had abandoned the legitimate priesthood and the orthodox form of worship.
In the historical perspective of the Chronicler, this liturgical consideration absolutely trumped every other. In his mind political power and military success said nothing of a kingdom’s final worth. In the last analysis, only the correct worship of God gave significance to a nation’s history. Writing long after the events described in this chapter, and long after each of the kingdoms warring in this chapter had disappeared, the Chronicler looked back and inquired just what, in those historical events, was of ultimate significance, and he answered—the orthodox worship of the Lord. This is the point of Abijah’s speech.
Second comes the description of the battle that ensued (and not recorded in Kings). In this battle (verses 13-22) it is significant that the priests accompanying Abijah’s army played a significant role, blowing the trumpet and raising an ovation of praise to God (verse 14). This battle, though it greatly weakened the political power of Jeroboam (verse 20), did not lead to a reunion of the two kingdoms.
Thursday, November 6
2 Chronicles 14: Abijah’s death (verse 1) after three years (13:2) was premature and unexplained, although one supposes that fourteen wives, twenty-two sons, and sixteen daughters (13:21) may have taken their toll.
Abijah was succeeded by Asa, one of Judah’s longest reigning kings (911-870), whom both historians credit with doing “what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord his God” (verse 2). Flavius Josephus expanded slightly on that description: “Now Asa, the king of Jerusalem, was of an excellent character, and had a regard to God, and neither did nor designed anything but what had relation to the observation of the laws. He made a reformation of his kingdom, and cut off whatsoever was wicked therein, and purified it from every impurity” (Antiquities 8.12.1).
The Chronicler’s brief account of Asa’s religious reforms (verses 3-5) corresponds roughly to that of 1 Kings 15:7-12), but it is immediately followed by a long section not found in Kings (14:6—15:15).
During ten years of peace (verses 1,6), Asa strengthened and fortified the kingdom (verses 7-8). And none too soon, as events would prove, for about the year 900 Zerah the Cushite, as the Hebrew text calls him, invaded Judah from the south. Still, the word “million” to describe the size of Zerah’s army is a bit misleading. The expression in biblical Hebrew, a language that doesn’t have the word “million,” is “a thousand thousands,” an idiomatic term meaning “lots and lots.” Apparently, there were Libyans also included in his force (cf. 16:8), and clearly Asa is badly outnumbered, as he indicates in his prayer (verse 11).
The biblical text gives no indication of Asa’s winning strategy, perhaps because the Chronicler felt that such information might detract from the theological truth of the day—namely, “the Lord defeated” the invaders (verse 12). The Chronicler, true to his understanding of biblical history, will ascribe nothing in this battle to human power. Indeed, Josephus says that the battle took place while Asa was making his prayer for victory (Antiquities 8.12.2). The defeat itself was total, and the Bible revels in a description of the enemy’s flight and the taking of the spoils (verses 13-15).
It was on his return from the battlefield to Jerusalem that the king and his army encountered a prophet with a thing or two on his mind.
Friday, November 7
Psalms 21 (Greek & Latin 20): The voice of the Church herself the voice of this psalm, glorifying the Father for the Son’s paschal victory over sin, death, and hell. The proper sense of Psalm 21 may be summarized as: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. . . . In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:3, 7).
The psalm begins then, “O Lord, the King will rejoice in Your strength, and greatly will He exult in Your salvation.” This is the rejoicing of “Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb. 12:2).
The paschal victory is God’s response to Christ’s own prayer: “You have given Him His heart’s desire, nor have You denied Him the request of His lips.” The Gospels themselves suggest that the passing hours of our Lord’s suffering were a period of His intense prayer, indicated by His several audible prayers that were recorded during that time (cf. Matt. 26:39, 42, 44; 27:46; Luke 23:34, 46). With respect to this prayer of Jesus during His sufferings we are told that “He was heard because of His godly fear” (Heb. 5:7).
And for what did Jesus pray during His Passion? “He asked life of You,” answers our psalm. And what sort of life? The mere survival of his earthly body? Hardly. The object of Jesus’ prayer was, rather, the total life that stands forever victorious over death, the irruption of the divine life into the world by reason of His own passage through death to glory.
The true eternal life is not a simple continuation of man’s earthly existence. It is something new altogether: “He asked life of You, and You gave Him length of days unto ages of ages.” This is the divine life given in the Resurrection, of which Jesus said: “Amen, Amen, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself” (John 5:25, 26).
This eternal life is joy forever in God’s presence, “where the forerunner has entered for us” (Heb. 6:20): “Great is His glory in Your salvation; You will bestow glory and majesty upon Him. Blessing will You give Him forever and ever; You will gladden Him with joy in Your presence.”
By reason of His Resurrection, says this psalm, Jesus reigns as King, the very title that Pilate, in God’s providential irony, affixed to the Cross itself: “O Lord, the King will rejoice in Your strength.” And because He is King, He is crowned: “For You have poured upon Him the blessings of goodness. A crown of precious stones have You placed upon His head.”
Once again, this was the glorification for which Jesus prayed as He commenced the unfolding of His Passion: “Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You. . . . And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was” (John 17:1, 5).
Many lines of this psalm (pretty much its entire second half) are devoted to the enemies of Christ, who are enemies of Christ precisely because they are the enemies of man. That enemy called sin, overcome by the atoning grace of His blood. That enemy called death, which He trampled down by His own death. That enemy called hell, which found itself unable to hold the Author of life.
Psalm 21 thus celebrates the victory of Him who proclaims: “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of death” (Rev. 1:17, 18).