After 2 Kings 16, about King Ahaz of Judah, we’re back to the Northern Kingdom…and its end.
In the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah, Hoshea son of Elah became king of Israel. He ruled in Samaria for nine years. As far as GOD was concerned, he lived a bad life, but not nearly as bad as the kings who had preceded him. Then Shalmaneser king of Assyria attacked. Hoshea was already a puppet of the Assyrian king and regularly sent him tribute, but Shalmaneser discovered that Hoshea had been operating traitorously behind his back—having worked out a deal with King So of Egypt. And, adding insult to injury, Hoshea was way behind on his annual payments of tribute to Assyria. So the king of Assyria arrested him and threw him in prison, then proceeded to invade the entire country. He attacked Samaria and threw up a siege against it. The siege lasted three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea’s reign the king of Assyria captured Samaria and took the people into exile in Assyria. He relocated them in Halah, in Gozan along the Habor River, and in the towns of the Medes. (2 Kings 17.1 – 6, MSG)
Done. Kaput. Unlike the Babylonian captivity of Judah, which we’ll come to shortly and again in 2 Chronicles, there was no return from exile for the northern tribes.
GOD was so thoroughly angry that he got rid of them, got them out of the country for good until only one tribe was left—Judah…In the end, GOD spoke a final No to Israel and turned his back on them. He had given them fair warning, and plenty of time, through the preaching of all his servants the prophets. Then he exiled Israel from her land to Assyria. And that’s where they are now. (2 Kings 18, 23, MSG)
The text makes the WHY clear:
GOD had taken a stand against Israel and Judah, speaking clearly through countless holy prophets and seers time and time again, “Turn away from your evil way of life. Do what I tell you and have been telling you in The Revelation I gave your ancestors and of which I’ve kept reminding you ever since through my servants the prophets.” But they wouldn’t listen… They threw out everything GOD, their God, had told them, and replaced him with two statue-gods shaped like bull-calves and then a phallic pole for the whore goddess Asherah. They worshiped cosmic forces—sky gods and goddesses—and frequented the sex-and-religion shrines of Baal. They even sank so low as to offer their own sons and daughters as sacrificial burnt offerings! They indulged in all the black arts of magic and sorcery. In short, they prostituted themselves to every kind of evil available to them. And GOD had had enough. (2 Kings 17.13, 14, 16, 17, MSG)
There is grace until there’s not, and if anyone thinks the United States gets a special pass, they need to read about the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. (I do not think the US is a fulfillment, or reincarnation, or whatever of God’s chosen people, but there are those who do.) There is no question that the US has been blessed…but the lesson here is that blessings aren’t permanent.
He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing. (Proverbs 29.1, ESV)
See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you today, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life… (Deuteronomy 30.15 – 19, ESV)