A Crash Course Through The Old Testament, Part 3 (Samuel and Kings)

A CRASH COURSE THROUGH THE OLD TESTAMENT, PART 3 (Samuel & Kings

Welcome to the Something To Gnaw On podcast, a short – parable style devotional…. Usually!   Right now we’re doing a crash course through the Old Testament, designed to give a basic understanding of how it is laid out and hopefully pique your curiosity enough to take the initiative to gnaw on scripture on your own without being intimidated by such a big book.  And if you are a seasoned student of the Bible, just look at this as a refresher course, and hopefully you’ll begin to dig deeper into the Word.

This episode is Part 3 in the series (the books of 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 & 2 Kings)

Thus far in the series, we have covered the first 5 books of the bible in the first episode, and in addition to some key characters and events, we saw how the book starts pointing to Jesus as soon as Genesis 3, and that theme weaves it’s way through the entirety of the Old Testament.   Last week we looked at the books of Joshua, Judges, and Ruth which covered the children of Israel entering the Land of Promise, and takes us up to the end of the Judges and the beginning of the king era.   Additionally, we looked at the need for understanding context when reading scripture, which is a key not just in those books, but in the entirety of scripture.  So let’s get started into the era of the Jewish Kings. 

In 721 BC the king of Assyria marched south on Samaria and took the 10 Northern Tribes of Israel captive, and marched them off to be relocated into Assyrian cities and assimilated into the Assyrian culture.  These 10 tribes are referred to historically as the Lost Tribes Of Israel.

In a great population exchange, the King of Assyria sends his citizens from several different cities, with several different ethnic backgrounds and religions.  In a weird twist of circumstances, with the Israelites gone, there was no worship of Jehovah in the land, and lions were sent by the Lord to kill some of them.  (Interestingly enough, this is not the first time animals like this are used by God to mete out judgment in the book of kings.   A disobedient prophet is mauled by a lion who refuses to feast on the corps and just sits over his kill, right next to the donkey he was riding.   A truly weird account.   On another occasion God uses two bears to maul some severely disrespectful kids.  These accounts are found in the books of Kings.)  

To “appease the God of Israel”  The king of Assyria sends one priest back to re-introduce worship of Jehovah to the Land and to the new inhabitants.  This is the origin of the people group known as the Samaritans, a key group you will hear of in the Gospels and the book of Acts. 

 But at this point I have to admit two things, one is that there is much more to this story that we will get to in a few minutes, and the second is I have skipped over a few hundred years of history between the time of Judges and Ruth to this event in 721 BC.   

So lets take a look the Book of Samuel, and get caught up.

·         THE BOOKS OF SAMUEL

o   Given that I spent so much time in these books in the season 1 series “Handling Conflict King David Style”, I am going to spend considerably less time today, but simply to hit a couple of key elements as it relates to the bigger picture of Scripture.  You can check out the series from season one which goes pretty deep into the characters of several individuals, but especially of David…. from his children, to his wives, to the prophets, to King Saul, to his advisors and distant family members, to his friendship with Johnathan….. as well as his role as king, dad, husband, military man, and friend.

o   But today I want to hit just a couple of simple elements in the books.

§  A quick mention of authorship.

·         The book appears to be written almost in real time, or within a relatively short period of time thereafter.

·         Some tradition has Samuel as the author and scholars question this… either way actual authorship is best said to be unknown.  He may have written the first part, but it’s hard to write after your dead, and Samuels death is recorded at the end of 1 Samuel.   The prophets Nathan and Gad (who confronted David about his sin are two possible candidates), but again it’s uncertain.  But one thing is sure, and will contrast with a book like Chronicles, and that is that it was written in the moment, or close to it, not in 100 plus years of retrospect like Kings and Chronicles.

·         Additionally, there has always been a huge focus on the KINGS, but Samuel, and the other priests/prophets we will talk about later, provide a bit of a check’s and balance’s system.

o   While the king would take care of the operation and defense of a country, the prophet or priest would attend to the spiritual wellbeing of the country and especially the king, and the two are distinct roles not to be comingled.   This is illustrated best when Saul makes a sacrifice… a sacrifice that was supposed to only be made by Samuel, a priest… it is such an aggregious offense that Saul loses his place as king over the issue.   Of course there is a bit more to the story, but for now, just hang on to this idea that through the books of Samuel Kings and Chronicles, the prophets act in a check’s and balance’s fashion to the kings.  We’ll come back to this in Kings.

§  The books are divided pretty much in half and focus on the first two kings:

·         1 Samuel begins by bringing the time of the Judges to an end, and ushers the time of the kings into play.

o   Samuel was the last of the Judges, and additionally is both a prophet and a priest (you can find his lineage outlined in 1 Chronicles 6 and we’ll hit that next week) and  at the people’s request and God’s direction, anoints a man named Saul King.

§  I will say that there is a weird piece of context here… you have to go back to Deuteronomy 17 and I’ve mentioned it before, but when you read this story, it’s important to go back and realize that God had a plan in place before the Israelites asked for this…. even though the way they ask  for this is a bit upsetting.   

§  In Verse 14, God tells Moses of the days when people will call for a king, and he gives 7 criteria for the king, most of which are thoroughly disregarded:

·         The Lord will choose the king

·         Must be from their countrymen, NO FOREIGNERS

·         Must not acquire many horses (granted MANY is vague, but that’s the rule)

·         Must not return to Egypt, for horses 

·         Must not have multiple wives

·         Must not acquire great amounts of Gold & Silver (again, great amounts is pretty subjective).

·         And this is the interesting one to me:  The king must write a copy of the Law in his own hand, in the presence of the Levite.  For it to be with him all the days of his life. And to obey all that is written in it.

§  If you’ve got any prior knowledge of the era of the kings, you know that several of these are commonly broken, 

§  And as a result, we see absolute disaster and consequence.

o   All that said, Saul is an absolute disaster… and becomes the poster-child of what not to be!  What kind of leader not to be, what kind of father not to be, He’ll show you what bitterness and jealousy can do to you.  He’ll show you how being more concerned with what people think than what God thinks will wreck your life.

o   This mess of a life is covered in 1 Samuel and ends with Saul taking his life on the battlefield, as opposed to being killed or captured by the enemy.

o   While King David was actually anointed KING in 1 Samuel, which creates much of the conflict mentioned in the book , he doesn’t officially take the throne until 2 Samuel.

·         2 Samuel basically covers the life of David, from  the beginning of this reign to the final years of his life.

o   In the midst of this it is important to note that this is where God makes his covenant to David that he would never cease to have a descendant on the throne…  which ends up being none other than the main character in the New Testament…. Jesus.

§  God’s promise in 2 Samuel 7:16 is this.. “  And your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before [e]you. Your throne shall be established forever.” ’ ”  

·         Your house, kingdom, and throne established forever.

§  And this is the beginning of, and only one of several references in the Old Testament of the Messiah, JESUS, coming from the blood line of David.

·         And this is another reason why the books of history are so important.

·         Not only is Christs’ lineage traced back to David, it is traced back to people like Ruth and Rahab and Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham, and Noah…. And then to Adam.

·         And when you get to the New Testament, you see that these Genealogies in Matthew and Luke highlight this.

·         Before moving on to Kings, I just want to mention a little factoid about reading the Bible that you will see very clearly in this book.

§  Throughout the Bible, in the historical books you will find not only the good qualities of the saints, but the bad as well.  This is true all through Genesis, and I could just as easily have said this about Noah being drunk, Abraham lying about his wife to save his life,  Jacob deceived his father, or that Moses had quite a temper and was a murderer, and he had quite a self-esteem issue.  

§  The bible can be a bit raw sometimes, and the hero’s of the faith made some pretty bad mistakes, and those mistakes had consequences, no doubt!  And David in the book of 2 Samuel is no different.

§  At the same time it is not to completely humiliate the men who fail.   You see a combination of consequence and redemption….  A thread that you will see woven throughout scripture, from beginning to end.  

§  What you see in David is a man who responds to God’s conviction, own’s his failures, confesses his sin, repents, and does what he can to make things right.  And what we see in this record is that God Highly esteems this response.  Too many people focus on the sin, and miss the beauty of repentance, redemption, and restoration… and the fact is that Jesus chose to be a descendant of this man, a murderous adulterer.

BREAK:    Time to take a quick break like I did last season.  Feel free to hit pause and come back later, or hang tight and power on through…. Personally, I love this ending today, so whatever you do, you don’t want to miss the ending and how this all ties in to the Gospel.

Lastly, before we get back to the Books of Kings, if you would like to support the podcast, a great way to do so is to check out the Something To Gnaw On Merch store right now we have some hoodies…. They would be a unique Christmas gift for yourself or that crazy family member whose name you drew for the gift exchange…. …. You will see the link in the show notes.   Ok, back to the crash course through the books of Kings.

·         THE BOOKS OF KINGS

o   So, the books begin with a near seamless transition from King David to Solomon and it covers the whole line of Kings over what is nearly 400 years (up to the exile to Babylon), 

o   The time line in Kings and Chronicles (for that matter), can be a bit confusing.   Obviously they don’t say 900 BC, or Bob’s son Cletus became king in 632 BC.  To explain how they keep time, and how time is kept in Chronicles which we’ll catch next week, we need to chat about one other detail.  So let’s press the pause button on this time line issue.

o   You will begin to hear the term Divided Kingdom, or the Northern Kingdom, or Israel versus Judah.                  

§  After Solomon, the kingdom of Israel has a split,  A northern kingdom and a southern kingdom.  North is now called Israel, and South is called Judah.  The Capital of the Northern Kingdom is Samaria (which we’ll talk a bit more about later), and the Captial of the Southern Kingdom is Jerusalem.

§  We’ll talk more about this later, but as it relates to timeframes,…. (press the play button on the timeline part of the discussion)

o   You will often see them marking time by saying something like this ‘bob was king over Judah for 20 years, and then his son Cletus became king at the age of 17, **and the key phrase** ‘in the 12th year of Roscoe’s reign over Israel.”   The point here being that they use the years of a kings reign in another kingdom to keep time in their own kingdom. In short, Cletus became King of Judah in the 12th year of Roscoe’s reign over Israel.   

o   And consequently, the record of the book, and of time, bounces back and forth, or alternates between both kingdom’s.

§  I really hope this helps, because you really have to keep the kingdoms straight to track with the stories in Kings, and Chronicles is like this too.  It’s easy to get lost in terms of what kingdom you are reading about at any given point in time.

·         when you are reading through these books, it’s really good to have a study bible that has a timeline in the front.   I use it all the time to keep the kings, prophets, and books straight.   Take some time to familiarize yourself with the timeline, because when we get to the books of the prophets, you will find that most of them identify their time of ministry by the king who was reigning at the time.    Those books of the prophets will make better sense when you understand the stories and chronology of Kings and Chronicles.

o   Now lets get into some of the key events in the book

§  Kings could easily be called Prophets, or Kings & Prophets

·         The books list many prophets, most of whom are not even named.

·         Two key prophets in the book are named Elijah and Elisha.

o   God’s work through these two Prophets is incredibly miraculous.

o   As a point of reference for the New Testament, The prophecy regarding the coming of the messiah  was that HE  would be preceded by the return of Elijah…  and you will find that John the Baptist fulfils this role.  And if you want to read up on the life of Elijah, these are the books!  

o   While this book covers nearly 400 years, the ministry of  Elijah and Elisha, account for a little more than 1/3 of the books, 16 out of 47 chapters.

o   No king in this book comes close to the screen time Jeremiah gives these two prophets…. And yes, it is believed that the Prophet Jeremiah is the author of this book.

§  When the books were divided into two volumes, the easiest way to divide them up is to say that 2 Kings begins with the end of Elijah’s Ministry, and the beginning of Elisha’s, and both prophets have 8 chapters that highlight their ministry.

§   Throughout both books we see a similar pattern to what we saw in Judges, a cycle of madness….. living in safety, then living in sin, then living in consequence and misery, then crying out to the Lord for deliverance, being delivered by a righteous king. And then they would experience some degree of peace….  I realize this is a gross summary…. But this is a crash-course right!!>???!!!???   

§  As this happens, you see the interaction between the kings and the prophet’s.  As the  kings behave, the prophet is right there bringing confrontation or confirmation.  This is the check’s and balances system in process…. It isn’t always successful, but it is in effect.

o   This is a crash course through the book, and I have mentioned:

§  The divided kingdom at the beginning

§  The two main prophets in the middle

§  And briefly mentioned the end of Kings with the exile to Babylon (and there is more that I will say on this in other episodes.

§  But the last historic detail I want to cover is to revisit the story the Samaritans.

§  I have spoken of doing this study in terms of looking at the books, but also within the book, highlighting certain bible study techniques, or disciplines, that bring a clearer understanding to the text.

§  One of my college professors used to beat the drum on the mantra that “Scripture interprets scripture”, and that is the case here.  This story interprets so much more than just telling its own story….  It stretches into the New Testament.

·         So, let’s look at the distinctive characteristics that create a rift between Samaritans and the Jew’s.

o   In short, the priest that was sent back to teach the Samaritans how  to worship Jehovah fulfilled his mandate, and they did worship Jehovah…….. in addition to their other religions.  You see the problem here, right?  Anyone remember the 10 commandments?  “Thou shall have no other God’s before me” Exodus 20.  Additionally, He says through the Prophet Isaiah later “I am the Lord, that is My Name.  My Glory I will not give to another, nor My praise to carved Idols.”

o   It’s one thing to be a foreign country with foreign gods.   It’s quite a different issue when the immigrant population from Assyria brings their polytheistic smorgasboard of religious practice to a new country, and pretend that the monotheistic faith of the land is somehow able to be absorbed into their practices…… and what’s worse is the ignorant statement that they are “EQUAL”   I would liken a foreign country and the Samaritans  to the difference between manslaughter and premeditated murder.  

·         In short, these Samarians are not Jew’s, and their worship is an absolute abomination to God and the Jewish people… an absolute insult to say they worship the same God, a phrase they use in the book of Ezra.

o   Here is what Jeremiah say’s about them as he is writing in retrospect around 100 years after this episode with the lions, reading from the Amplified Version:  “To this day they act in accordance with their former (pagan) customs: they do not (really) fear the Lord, nor do they obey their statutes and ordinances, nor the law, nor the commandments which the Lord commanded the sons (descendants) of Jacob, whom he named Israel;….  So these nations (superficially) feared the Lord; they also served their idol’s, as did their children and their children’s children, just as their fathers did, so do they to this day (the date of this writing)  verses  34&41

o   I cannot fathom the hatred between Jew’s and Samaritans being much different than the hatred the Palestinians have for the Jews.   It is a deep seated disdain for a people group based on religious piety that devolves into a cultural norm of violent bigotry toward that group.

·         There is more detail to be given on this next week, detail that underscores the distain these two people groups have for eachother, and it run’s unchecked till the time of Christ.

o   As I wrap this up today imagine Jesus telling the parable of the Samaritan…  and it had to be a parable, because it never would have really happened, but imagine how the Jew’s would have responded to someone glorifying a person they have historically hated for 700 plus years.  There is deep seated hatred between these two, and Jesus starts chipping away at it with the parable of the Good Samaritan, visiting the woman at the well, and then making a direct command in the Great commission to take the Gospel to the Samaritans.

o   The hatred runs so deep that immature Apostles named James and John (the author of the Gospel of John) asks Jesus, on a trip through Samaria, if they could call fire down from heaven on the Samaritans.   

§  Think about that for a moment…..   John is walking day by day with Jesus, and the cultural hatred toward  the Samaritans runs so deep that he thinks he is honoring God by asking to pull the trigger for their death and destruction, he’s completely comfortable doing this.   That’s a problem!!!  That’s 700 years of culturally imbedded bigotry.

§  Now when you read the book of 1 John you hear a completely different tone, a radically different tone, I bet he’s thankful that God is patient with him, as his bigotry was purged from his world view.

o   So, this is the back story to the Samaritans, their origin if you will.   These guys will show up in the next episode as well, but hopefully this sets your understanding of Jesus’ references to, and interactions with, the Samaritans in the New Testament in a proper historical and racial and religious context.

o   And just as this story does, there are many other stories in the pages of the Old Testament that bring a better understanding on events in both testaments… It is my prayer that you would begin to dig into scripture, gnaw on it, get into the word and let the word get into you.

o   Until next week…..

o   God Bless