2 KINGS 17 (FROM CAC'S NOTES)
2 KINGS 17 (FROM CAC’S NOTES)
This is a sorrowful chapter for it shows Israel finally carried away into Assyria because of their idolatry. They went away from everything that was their true glory and the glory of their dispensation. God had given them a knowledge of Himself such as He gave to no other people, beginning with deliverance out of Egypt and the overthrow of the nations of Canaan. But they followed vanity and became vain. We all become what we follow, so that what we are shows what we are following. If we follow Christ we become like Christ; if we follow Paul we become like him.
How soon was there a following of vanity in the christian profession! “For all seek their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ”, “All who are in Asia ... have turned away from me”. They might think they had not turned away from the Lord, but they had. “Be not ... ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner”. If the Lord was standing by Paul, to leave Paul was to leave the Lord. How soon the Lord had to say that the assembly in Ephesus had left its first love! First love is the only love that counts with the Lord, for if it is not there, and there is no repentance, He says, “I will remove thy lamp out of its place”. This would correspond with Israel being carried off to Assyria. Those who are lukewarm He will spue out of His mouth. The Gentiles who do not abide in God’s goodness will be cut away.
Idolatry takes the form now of turning away from the teaching of Christ and of the apostles. If any one turns now [p. 195] to the law as a means of righteousness it is idolatry. The Galatians were turning again to idolatry in turning to Jewish observances. “This is the eternal life, that they should know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent”, John 17: 3. John’s writings are to preserve us from idolatry. To turn from the Father and the Son now is idolatry.
Those who were brought to Samaria in the place of Israel were utterly corrupt in their worship. No wonder the Lord said to them, “Ye worship ye know not what; we worship what we know”. What transcendent grace that Jesus should go through Samaria, and that He should speak there of living water, and of the Father, and of worship in spirit and truth. He would purge Samaria of all elements of idolatry. Christendom has become like Samaria today, but the great Prophet is going through it still to set up in hearts the worship of the Father, and thus to displace every form of idolatry.
The king of Assyria in sending a priest (verse 27) to teach them the manner of the god of the land was pretty much like the way people are made christians today. They take up certain things outwardly without the slightest change inwardly, so that they go on with all their old idols. But the Lord proposes to give living water which springs up into eternal life, and when it does we seek the company of those in whom it is also springing up, and so the company of worshippers comes into evidence.
Hezekiah (chapter 18) is a beautiful example of one who hated what was idolatrous. He shows that in a very dark day God can give a gleam of wonderful light and faithfulness. There was remarkable power in Hezekiah to act for God in a dark day. The overcomers in the last days of Jewish history are very encouraging for us — Hezekiah, Josiah, Ezra and Nehemiah. They show how God can recover and restore after the greatest failure.