So these nations feared the Lord and also served their carved images, and their children and their children's children did likewise, as their fathers did, to this day (a paraphrase of 2 Kings 17:41).

When Israel was taken into exile by Assyria, other peoples were brought into the land to replace them. Then lions began killing them because they did not fear the Lord. So they learned a little about the Lord from an Israelite priest and added Him to their pantheon. They served the Lord along with the idols they had known in their own lands, and they taught this to their children and grandchildren. This may have brought them temporary relief from the lions, but they remained as lost as ever, for they did not keep God's covenant, in which He commanded, "You shall not fear other gods," nor bow down to them, serve them, or sacrifice to them (2 Kings 17:35).

Friends, as I read this description of those who lived in the land after the fall of the Northern Kingdom, I wondered whether I might be seeing a reflection of America today. "They feared the Lord but also served their own gods," after the manner of the nations from which they had been carried away (a paraphrase of 2 Kings 17:33).

It was not that the new inhabitants did not fear the Lord. They feared God AND their own gods. They worshiped God AND their idols. The Lord did not have their exclusive devotion.

Every day I wake up with an uneasy feeling, even when nothing in particular is going wrong in my life. It is not that I question my salvation, but I feel like someone who has just woken up in a foreign country. The more I seek God in His Word and try to apply His truth to my life, the stranger and more awkward everything around me seems.

I remember sitting in Sunday School the other day as the leader taught on Philippians 4:8–9. He encouraged everyone to meditate on these verses and shared how precious they were in guiding his thinking. Someone else encouraged everyone to have their teenage boys memorize them.

In that moment I felt emotion welling up in me. I wanted to shout, "No!" The Scriptures must not be treated like a mantra, as if merely repeating certain words and phrases could produce holiness. I know this was not the intention, but it sounded like that to me in the moment.

What is more, as the class came to a close, I realized there would be no further application than that everyone should meditate on these verses. It felt like giving someone instructions for assembling a desk without providing the materials. What good would it be to meditate on a set of instructions if there was nothing with which to build the desk? No, the point of the passage was for people to immerse themselves in the Word of God — the full counsel of Scripture — through which they could learn to think rightly about things and act in ways that please God.

Friends, is God just one among many gods we serve in our lives? If the Lord is God, does He not deserve our exclusive and total devotion? Do we not diminish the Lord when we plead with one another, "Let's try to give God at least ten minutes a day"? When we read the saying often attributed to Martin Luther — that he had so much to do he must spend "the first three hours in prayer" — we marvel, because it is so contrary to what professing Christians normally say: "I have so much to do that I barely have time to pray."

Friends, is God just one among many gods we serve? I spoke recently with a friend about leading his children in a daily devotional time. He told me he works all day and has barely an hour to play with his kids before they go to sleep. His dilemma was whether to spend that precious hour playing, as his kids would prefer, or to use it to teach them the Bible and worship God.

Friends, is God just one among many gods we serve?! When I talk like this in casual conversation, some people look at me as if I were an alien. It's as if they are silently thinking, "What's wrong with him? Who thinks like that? Who does that?" Yet I am reminded of what Joshua declared to Israel: if it is evil in their eyes to serve the Lord, they should choose this day whom they will serve, whether the gods their fathers served beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites; "But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord" (a paraphrase of Joshua 24:15).

If the Lord is God, does He require anything less than complete devotion? Should we not daily seek how to give Him that complete devotion? (cf. Matthew 6:33).

Friends, we are "sojourners and exiles" in this world (cf. 1 Peter 2:11), and our citizenship is in heaven (cf. Philippians 3:20). So let us keep learning to set our minds on things above, not on earthly things (cf. Colossians 3:2). The more we do this, the more uncomfortable we may feel in this world, but the greater peace we will find with God (cf. James 4:4; 1 John 2:15–17).

Let us, therefore, immerse ourselves daily in God's Word, and as we do, His Word will work within us to shape every thought and decision, every affection and conviction, and every act and behavior — drawing us nearer to Him and bringing Him the highest glory.

AI-Expanded Reflection

2 Kings 17 is the Bible's great theological reflection on the fall of the northern kingdom in 722 BC. Before describing the new settlers, the chapter pauses for a long explanation of why the exile happened: Israel "feared other gods," followed the customs of the nations, and rejected the prophets' warnings (17:7–23). Then comes the irony the comment notices: the new inhabitants repeated Israel's sin in a new form, adding the Lord to their gods rather than replacing their gods with Him. This mixed population became the ancestors of the Samaritans, which helps explain the tension between Jews and Samaritans in Jesus' day.

That background makes Jesus' conversation with the Samaritan woman in John 4 especially striking. She raised the old dispute about the right place to worship, and Jesus answered, "You worship what you do not know," but announced that the hour was coming when "true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth" (4:22–23). The divided worship of 2 Kings 17 met its answer in Christ, who welcomed Samaritans into wholehearted worship of the one true God. The comment's plea for undivided devotion echoes Jesus' own words: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart" (Matthew 22:37).

They rejected his decrees and the covenant he had made with their ancestors, and they despised all his warnings. They worshiped worthless idols, so they became worthless themselves. They followed the example of the nations around them, disobeying the LORD’s command not to imitate them. (2 Kings 17:15 NLT)

In our reading today the Northern Kingdom of Israel comes to an end, as their sins finally lead to their exile to Assyria. The striking statement about them is that "they worshipped worthless idols, so they became worthless themselves." They did not realize that their worth came only from the LORD, and apart from Him, they had none.

This is similar to New Testament passages describing unsalty salt. In the passage dealing with counting the cost of following Jesus, we read,

So you cannot become my disciple without giving up everything you own. “Salt is good for seasoning. But if it loses its flavor, how do you make it salty again? Flavorless salt is good neither for the soil nor for the manure pile. It is thrown away. Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand!” (Luke 14:33–35 NLT)

When we understand that becoming a disciple of Christ is equivalent to becoming a Christian, these words ought to pose a most convicting challenge to every professing Christian. It is only in surrendering everything to the LORD, even everything we call "our own," that we are able to follow Jesus, which is the post-requisite to faith in Him for our salvation. If we do not give everything up to Christ, then we are holding on to something as our own. This is equivalent to holding on to an idol. And when we do this, we are like unsalty salt, which is not even fit to throw on manure. This is equivalent to being "worthless" as in the account we read in 2 Kings above. So, Jesus concludes, if God has given you an ear to hear, then "listen and understand," that is, fulfill what God has called you to do and surrender everything to Christ and begin to follow Him. For as long as you come short of this, you cannot call yourself a disciple of Christ. You cannot rightly call yourself a Christian.

Under the Law of Moses it was forbidden to worship anyone or anything except the LORD. Yet, the people of Israel, as well as the people that came to live among them, persisted in worshipping their idols alongside the LORD. And for this, they were rejected by God:

For the LORD had made a covenant with the descendants of Jacob and commanded them: “Do not worship any other gods or bow before them or serve them or offer sacrifices to them. But worship only the LORD, who brought you out of Egypt with great strength and a powerful arm. Bow down to him alone, and offer sacrifices only to him... You must worship only the LORD your God. He is the one who will rescue you from all your enemies.” But the people would not listen and continued to follow their former practices. (2 Kings 17:35–40 NLT)

In the New Testament, you cannot do this either. We must worship only the Lord. As Jesus taught, "You cannot serve both God and mammon" (i.e. money, wealth, and the like) (Luke 16:13).

Friends, let us stop attaching ourselves to worthless things, even home, cars, and clothes, also the pursuit of wealth, attractiveness, and popularity, as well as the desire for knowledge, skills, and worldly excellence. Instead, let us give up every dollar to Christ, every priority to Christ, every interest and relationship to Christ. And when He gives these things back to us to invest for Him, let us be faithful to wisely and diligently invest them all to win new disciples for Christ.

Let us not become worthless by serving ourselves or by pursuing worthless things, but let us serve the Lord with all our hearts and pursue His will in everything. As I warned you before, the church today has inoculated most Christians from the post-requisite surrender that accompanies true faith. Let us return to the true Gospel, which is free to receive, because none of it was achieved by us but only and completely by God (Ephesians 2:8–9). But let us count the cost and understand that this free gift of eternal life will cost us everything in this life:

For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? (Mark 8:35–37 NIV)

AI-Expanded Reflection

Second Kings 17:15 uses a striking relationship between the emptiness of idols and the emptiness into which their worshippers are drawn. The Hebrew word family associated with hebel evokes vapor, futility, or insubstantiality. The point is more searching than saying that idols are ineffective tools. Worship forms people: trusting what cannot sustain life gradually distorts judgment, desire, and conduct. The surrounding account links false worship with persistent disobedience despite repeated warnings.

The original’s application to money and possessions belongs within that pattern. An object need not be carved into a religious image to become a governing loyalty. Luke’s juxtaposition of surrender and salt challenges disciples whose apparent attachment to Jesus leaves their basic allegiances unchanged. The cost is not merely a generous donation added to an otherwise autonomous life. Christ claims the authority to order the whole life, including the use of what a disciple owns.

Two qualifications help preserve the force of this claim. Calling idolatry futile does not mean that human beings lose their created dignity or become proper objects of contempt. And the created gifts named in the reflection—homes, knowledge, skill, and relationships—are not intrinsically worthless. They become destructive when treated as ultimate sources of identity or security. Scripture can both expose their inability to save and direct their grateful use in service, hospitality, provision, and love.

The original distinguishes grace received freely from the surrender that follows. That distinction must remain clear: surrender is not a second payment that completes an insufficient redemption. It is the fitting response to the Lord who has redeemed. Growth in that response may expose attachments the believer did not initially recognize. The practical task is therefore specific and ongoing. Identify the possession, ambition, or relationship that has become resistant to correction. Consider what obedience would actually require there. A declaration that everything belongs to Christ becomes credible as his authority increasingly governs the way those things are acquired, enjoyed, shared, and relinquished.

2 Kings 16 outlines Ahaz's reign as king of Judah. During his reign, the kings of Aram and Israel united against Judah, inflicting heavy casualties and taking many prisoners (2 Chronicles 28). Fearing further loss, Ahaz makes himself a vassal to Assyria's king instead.

Before these events, the LORD Himself appeared to Ahaz, reassuring him and telling him to be careful, stay calm, and not lose heart over these two threatening kings (a paraphrase of Isaiah 7:4), promising their plan wouldn't succeed at all, and that if Ahaz didn't stand firm in faith, he wouldn't stand at all (a paraphrase of Isaiah 7:7–9). God even invites Ahaz to ask for a sign, of any scale, to confirm His promise — but in a show of false humility, Ahaz refuses, saying he won't test the LORD (a paraphrase of Isaiah 7:11–12). Isaiah responds by telling him the LORD would bring on him, his people, and his father's whole house a time of trouble unlike anything since Israel's split from Judah — bringing against them the king of Assyria himself (a paraphrase of Isaiah 7:17).

Even after hearing this directly from the Lord, Ahaz still aligns himself with Assyria, trusting its king to deliver him rather than trusting the LORD. Assyria's king does indeed conquer Aram and the Northern Kingdom (2 Kings 17) — and doesn't stop there, oppressing Judah too (2 Kings 18).

I still find it remarkable that the LORD would appear to Ahaz at all, an evil king by God's own standard, engaging in detestable practices, sacrificing even his own son in the fire — yet God still appeared to him, giving him every chance to follow. We often think if only God appeared physically, or spoke audibly, someone would surely change their heart — yet here's a clear example of someone rejecting Him anyway. Even those who saw Jesus, God incarnate, face to face, still rejected and crucified Him.

In our fallen state, we can't simply choose to follow the LORD on our own — it's the Holy Spirit who regenerates us. As Ezekiel promises, God gives a new heart, putting a new spirit within, removing the heart of stone and giving a heart of flesh instead, moving us by His own Spirit to follow His decrees and keep His laws (a paraphrase of Ezekiel 36:26–27).

AI-Expanded Reflection

This comment's closing point touches the same genuinely contested question covered elsewhere in this project — how exactly divine regeneration and human choice relate to each other in coming to faith — and it's worth noting once more, briefly, that thoughtful Christians across different traditions read Ezekiel's "new heart" promise somewhat differently regarding whether it describes God unilaterally overriding resistance or graciously enabling a genuine response. What both readings would likely affirm about Ahaz's own story, though, is this comment's central observation: direct exposure to God's word and presence, however undeniable, was never by itself sufficient to produce a changed heart — whatever the precise mechanism of genuine faith turns out to be, Ahaz's story confirms it isn't simply information or proximity.

Friends, we read that the LORD struck the king, so he remained a leper until his death, living in an isolated house (a paraphrase of 2 Kings 15:5) — but we're given no further detail there. To get the full story, we need the parallel account in 2 Chronicles 26:16–23, where we learn that although generally a good king, his own pride got the better of him, and he was struck with leprosy for attempting to burn incense on the altar, a duty reserved exclusively for priests.

Notice too that 2 Kings calls this Judean king Azariah, while 2 Chronicles calls him Uzziah. To complicate things further, the priest who confronted him was also named Azariah. Careful reading is genuinely required to keep everything straight. Earlier in Kings, we saw something similar with two contemporaneous kings of Israel and Judah who shared the name Joash/Jehoash — again, easy to confuse without careful attention.

I bring this up to encourage you to follow the rabbit trails of your own curiosity, and not read too quickly through these biblical accounts. Reading too fast, you might end up on the wrong side of biblical history. There are certainly places where Scripture stays silent — but there are also many places where it explains things fully, discoverable only by actually searching them out.

Failing to read carefully has led many people into serious error. Many evangelical preachers, for example, still teach Old Testament passages as though Christians remained under the Mosaic Law — confusion arising precisely because they haven't carefully studied Scripture, comparing it with itself, to discern the truth. So all of us need to take real care ourselves, since we won't be excused simply because we were taught wrong — we're each commanded to study for ourselves and rightly interpret God's Word (2 Timothy 2:15).

AI-Expanded Reflection

The name-confusion this comment carefully untangles is worth adding one more layer to, since the underlying reason for it is itself interesting — many biblical figures carried multiple names or name variants (some incorporating different forms of the divine name, "Yah" versus "El," for instance), and different books or scribal traditions sometimes preferred different variants for the same person. That's not evidence of sloppy record-keeping so much as a genuine feature of how ancient Hebrew naming conventions worked, which is exactly why this comment's own advice — cross-referencing parallel accounts rather than assuming a name mismatch signals an error — remains such a reliable, necessary discipline throughout the historical books.