Patience is a Virtue
God is extraordinarily patient. That much is obvious from even a surface reading of 1 & 2 Kings. God puts up with king after king after king - in both Israel and Judah - who do the wrong things, who worship idols. He puts up with it for generation after generation without dramatically punishing the people.
According to the terms of the covenant - the relationship between God and the Jewish people - God would have been well within His "rights," so to speak, to completely destroy the people after just one instance of idolatry. Yet He doesn't. He gives them chance after chance. Occasionally in the process of the story, there is a king who recognizes God's great power and patience (Hezekiah & Josiah being the two most influential, but there were others, too), and the presence of these "good" kings seems to justify God's patience. Yet within a few years, the people and their kings are back to idolatry.
Even in the end, God does not completely destroy the people - He shows mercy even in this judgment, sending them to exile instead of to death. Many people read the Old Testament and see a God who is harsh and judgmental of His people. Yet as I read it, I see a God who is patient with His people, wanting to give them every opportunity to do what is right. And to be honest, I find great comfort in knowing that God is a patient God.
Because He certainly has needed that patience with me...
Revival in the Land
One of the most prominent characters in 2 Kings is King Josiah. Josiah was one of the "good" kings who did what God desired and who did not worship idols. Josiah, though, led a revival of worship of the True God that was unparalleled. During his reign, the priests discovered a copy of the Torah - the early books of Jewish law - hidden in the temple.
When he read the words, Josiah immediately realized that the people were in trouble, that they were in violation of the covenant and subject to God's judgment. So he took action. He demolished all the idols and shrines to foreign gods - not just some of them, every last one of them. He reinstated the celebration of Passover, which had not happened since the days of the judges - a period of many, many years. What Josiah did, though, that caught my eye and stood out to me the most, was to organize a public reading of the law and a public covenant renewal ceremony.
Sometimes it happens that, as years pass in our relationship with Christ, we begin to forget the "terms" of the covenant. It's not intentional necessarily, but the longer we serve Christ, the easier it is to assume that we know what's important to God and that we know exactly what it means to be in a covenant relationship with Jesus. I wonder, though, how we would react if we "rediscovered" the original terms - if we went back and examined again God's word and Jesus' life and all the promises made and judgments promised.
I can't say for sure how everyone would react, but I can confess that this Lenten Bible project is becoming, for me, a Josiah-moment. I am remembering and recapturing things that I had lost over the years. And I am hopeful that this rediscovery will lead to a renewal of commitment to the ultimate covenant of love I have with God.
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