Israel's Kingdom (2)

When God would set his program with Israel in abeyance for the ushering in an unprophecied age with us Gentiles. From the time that God sent Moses to deliver them from their Egyptian captivity, Israel was give things to see, to witness for themselves in order to visually verify God’s presence and his purpose with them, yet, for all the visual evidences that God gave to Israel, Israel would not believe God.

This isn’t the first time Israel would not believe. The fall of Jerusalem shattered the national and territorial basis of Israel’s culture and religion. The Babylonians had burned the temple to the ground, they carried away most of the people to exile, to life in exile in Babylon, leaving behind mostly members of the lower classes to eke out a living as best they could. And it was the completion of the tragedy that had begun centuries earlier, and it was interpreted as a fulfillment of the covenant curses.

It was the end of the Davidic monarchy, although the son of Jeholakim was alive and living in Babylon, kind of holding out hope that the line hadn’t actually been killed out, hadn’t been completely wiped out. But the institution seemed to have come to an end for now. It was the end of the temple, the end of the priesthood, the end of Israel as a nation; as an autonomous nation, the Israelites were confronted with a great test.

One could see in these events a signal that Yahweh had abandoned Israel to, or had been defeated by the god of the Babylonians, and Marduk would replace Yahweh, as the Israelites assimilated themselves into their new home. And certainly there were Israelites who went that route, but others who were firmly rooted in exclusive Yahwism did not.

Yahweh hadn’t been defeated, the nations’s calamities were not disproof of Yahweh’s power and covenant, they were proof of it. Yahweh’s desire for morality as expressed in the ancient covenant, the prophets had spoken truly when they had said that destruction would follow, if the people didn’t turn from their moral and religious violations of Yahweh’s law. The defeat and the exile had the potential to convince Israelites of the need to show absolute and undivided devotion to Yahweh and his commandments.

Vehement denunciation moral decay and social injustice of the period, leading up to the fall of the northern kingdom and southern kingdom of Israel. A prophet criticizes the sins of the nation, he is critical of everyone, the middle class, the government, the king, the establishment, the priesthood; they’re all plagued by a superficial kind of piety. Amos, and all the prophets, the idea of covenant prescribes a particular relationship with Yahweh, but not only with Yahweh; also with one’s fellow human beings. 

The two are interlinked. It is a sign of closeness to Yahweh that one is concerned for Israel’s poor and needy. The two are completely interlinked. Amos denounces the wealthy. He denounces the powerful and the way they treat the poor. The crimes that are denounced, are crimes that are prevalent in any society in any era. The crimes that are denounced as being utterly unacceptable to Yahweh, infuriating Yahweh to the point of destruction of the nation, are the kinds of crimes we see around us everyday, taking bribes, improper weights and balances, lack of charity to the poor, indifference to the plight of the debtor. 

Injustice is sacrilege, the ideals of the covenant are of utmost importance. These prophets are called the standard bearers of the covenant, harking back to the covenant obligations. And without these, without the ideals of the covenant, the fulfillment of ritual obligations in and of itself is a farce. Morality is not just an obligation equal in importance to the cult or religious obligations, but that morality is perhaps superior to the cult.

What Yahweh requires of Israel is morality and not cultic service. The prophets raised morality to the level of an absolute religious value, and they did so because they saw morality as essentially divine. The essence of Yahweh is his moral nature. Moral attributes are the essence of Yahweh himself, one strives to be Yahweh-like by imitating his moral actions. The prophets insisted that morality was a decisive, if not the decisive factor in the nations’ history; Israel’s acceptance of Yahweh’s covenant placed certain religious and moral demands on her. 

One sin is singled out as being historically decisive for the nation. Other sins are punished, absolutely. But only one is singled out as historically decisive for the nation, and that is the sin of idolatry, particularly the idolatry of the royal house. The tragic history of the two kingdoms as essentially a sequence of idolatrous aberrations, which were followed by punishment. And this cycle continued until finally there had to be complete destruction. 

While it is certainly true that moral sins and other religious sins in Israel were punishable, it is really only the worship of other gods that brings about national collapse, national exile. Idolatry was what provoked Yahweh to drive the nation into exile. The prophets are claiming that the nation is doomed because of commonplace wrongs, because of bribe-taking, because of false scales and false weights that are being used in the marketplace. 

For the prophets, the national catastrophes are just punishment for sin, but not just the sin of idolatry, for all sins no matter how petty, no matter how venial, because all sins violate the terms of the covenant code, which is given specially to Israel. And the terms of the covenant-being vassals to the sovereign Yahweh means treating co-vassals in a particular way, and it is breach of covenant not to do that.

The prophets were harking back to an older tradition, to ancient traditions about Israel and its covenant relationship, traditions according to which Israel’s redemption and election entailed moral obligations. The prophets warned that unless they changed, the people were going to suffer the punishment that was due them.

And, in fact, the people were very foolish to be eagerly awaiting or eagerly expecting what was popularly known as the Day of Yahweh. And so the prophets refer to the Day of Yahweh as if it were a popular conception out there in the general culture. It was a popular idea at the time that on some future occasion, Yahweh would dramatically intervene in world affairs and he would do so on Israel’s behalf.

Yahweh would lead Israel in victory over her enemies. They would be punished. Israel would be restored to her full and former glory. And that day, the Day of Yahweh, in the popular mind, was going to be a marvelous day, a day of victory for Israel, triumph for Israel and a day of vengeance on her enemies. The people are very confident that this is going to be a day of light, a day of blessing, a day of victory.

But the prophets, according to them, if there is no change, then this Day of Yahweh is not going to be some glorious thing that the people should be eagerly awaiting. It’s not going to be a day of triumph for Israel. It will not be a day of vengeance on her enemies. It’s going to be a dark day of destruction. It is going to be a day of doom, when Yahweh will finally call his own people to account. The prophets transformed the popular image of the Day of Yahweh from one of national triumph, to one of national judgment. 

Israel's Kingdom

Let’s say there is one Gospel, how would it play out. We see the “prayer of faith” Israel walked by sight, Yahweh allowed their prayer life to work in connection with sight as that earthly kingdom was on their doorstep. Yahweh worked in connection with the sign nation, the healings that were performed and the power resident in the prayer of faith.

When the kingdom program was ongoing and Jesus was ready to rule and reign right here on earth, a troubled believer could pray the prayer of faith, when presented with suffering circumstances and those circumstance would disappear. Yahweh provided that prayer of faith, because that kingdom was at hand and the time for troubling circumstances had come to an end. It was time to put an end to pain and suffering, because it was time for the King to rule and reign on this earth.

Mountain moving faith was Yahweh’s way of being glorified in the sovereign reign of the king. “It shall be done” mountain moving faith used in conjunction with the prayer of faith. Was Jesus pushing them toward faith or was he proving Israel’s lack of faith.

So an Israelite makes that confession itself would be considered a fruit of righteousness in the eyes of Yahweh. Leviticus 26, beginning with verse 40, is the confession Israel would be called upon to make. Israel would also have to accept the remainder of her punishment, that failure under the law contract would call for and that would be the seven year tribulation.

Now before that kingdom could be realized, there was a prophetic event that had to take place first. The way Jesus taught has special application to that tribulation period to those people who were being taught to pray in this manner. This will be a very heartfelt prayer during the tribulation period. During the time of Jacob’s trouble, the Israelites will be under tremendous persecution from the antichrist. He will be putting Israelites to death for their faith. The Israelites will be praying at that time, “thy kingdom come” the promised earthly kingdom to be set up right here on earth, because the only hope of deliverance for the believing Israelites at that time, will be the coming of the king and setting up of the earthly kingdom. But Israel killed their king.

You see, if Israel could have their sins remitted nationally, then Israel could indeed become that holy nation and kingdom of priests. And if Israel could become that holy nation and kingdom of priests, then the Gentiles would be able to come to Yahweh through Israel’s rise. That is why it would be important for Jesus ‘the messiah’ to be risen, so Israel could have their sins remitted, and they could arise, and the Gentiles could come to Yahweh through the nation Israel. It was only Israel having access to that eternal life that would make it possible for the Gentiles to have that eternal life through Israel’s rise, through the nation Israel. 

But you see, Israel nationally did not accept the Gospel of the Kingdom of Yahweh. They did not accept the Gospel of Yahweh; that Jesus was the son of Yahweh or that Jesus was the risen messiah. They did not accept that at all, so rather than rise, Israel fell. Yet, when it comes to Jesus being risen from among the dead, how could Israel’s promised earthly king sit on the throne of David in a promised literal, earthly kingdom, if the king Yahweh anointed for that kingdom remained a dead king.

If Jesus be not risen, there is no earthly king. If Jesus be not risen, there is no earthly kingdom. If there is no earthly kingdom and that is when Israel is supposed to be forgiven, then there is no forgiveness for the nation Israel; for the saints of the kingdom program. And if there is no forgiveness, there is no salvation. And if there is no salvation, there certainly is no bodily resurrection. And if there is no bodily resurrection, all this is a story, a fairytale.

Now the time period of the parable Jesus gave in Luke chapter 13, the one additional year given Israel until the fig tree was to be cut down, still has the majority of a year to transpire at this point. This is what Jesus meant when he said he gave Peter the “keys” to the Kingdom. Peter had the ability to “unlock” and “open the door” to the Kingdom, he proclaimed the message they had to believe. Jesus gave himself a ransom for MANY. Who are the “many” spoken of? Israel! The beginning of Israel’s last days of her program, they were being equipped for the upcoming time of tribulation right on their horizon. 

Yahweh used the physical senses in every respect in connection with his sign nation at Israel’s high holy feast day called Pentecost. Yahweh gave his sign nation things to SEE and to HEAR and to SPEAK! The physical senses were used by Yahweh that Israel might WITNESS their deliverance.

The expressions “before our eyes” and “in our sight” tell us how Yahweh worked as Israel was approaching the last days of her program, which was to culminate in an entrance to her promised earthly kingdom. In spite of all these visual manifestations that Yahweh worked in time past, Israel for the most part remained in unbelief. They were either attributing Yahweh’s work to Satan, or they were attributing Satan’s work to Yahweh.

Israel as a nation was still the focus in Acts chapter 2, as they were given a taste of their promised earthly kingdom there with Yahweh’s empowerments for The Tribulation endurance and for the earthly kingdom entrance. Focus is still that land and the attempt to get Israel’s leadership to change their minds about the source of their righteousness and accept Jesus as indeed their Messiah. Peter promises Israel that if she will change her minds, Yahweh will send Messiah back and their promised Kingdom can get back underway, just as it was promised. Peter called it the times of refreshing speaking of a direct reference there to the millennial reign of Messiah on the earth. 

The beginning of Israel’s last days of her program, they were being equipped for the upcoming time of tribulation right on their horizon. They were more abundant than ever, God used the physical senses in every respect in connection with his sign nation at Israel’s high holy feast day called Pentecost.

This was not a mystery, this was not a secret, it was exactly what the bible had foretold would take place when it came to the sign nation.

God gave his sign nation things to see and to hear and to speak, the physical senses were used through God’s power from on high, that Israel might witness their deliverance; “before our eyes” and “in our sight” tell us how God’s power from on high worked as Israel was approaching the last days of her program, which was to culminate in an entrance to her promised earthly kingdom.

The visual manifestations of God’s power from on high was directly involved in as the nation Israel was given every visual opportunity to change their thinking about the identity of their Messiah and their ability to perform up to the standard of God’s righteousness, when it came to the law contract.

Just a Thought "105"

Their are people who are extremely proud of their humility. There are those who put humility on a show for the sake of elevation self. These people want to tell people how humble they are. But the selflessness Paul has in mind does not point to itself. It does not tell others how selfless it is in order to call attention to it’s self.

The selflessness Paul is talking about does not seek a response from others. It does not have to make an appeal to the emotions of others for the purpose of calling attention to it’s self. True selflessness would point to the selflessness of someone else rather than it’s self. The Christ mindedness sitting in Philippians, Christ sacrificed self for the sake of others. Let a misunderstanding arise and no self protection will rear it’s ugly head such as to not take the first step towards reconciliation.

Joy is directly related to our thinking, this is why Paul redirects our thinking in Philippians, who’s thought had become fleshy oriented. Attitude always precedes action, Paul is giving us cause to think on common ground. How can we rejoice without giving some thought as to what we have to rejoice about. We all have worries and care, but worry never robs tomorrow of it’s sorrow, it only saps today of it’s joy.

Paul does not saying IF we do these things and IF we judge another then we are guilty. Paul is saying whenever we judge another we are automatically condemning yourself, because the truth is we do the same things, we may do them in a different way, but rest assured we do them. Anytime we condemn the coming shortnesses in others, we need to understand the reality of the fact that we are all in the same boat, we all come short in the righteousness department due to that indwelling sin nature.

We all come short of God’s measure of rightness. A person who is in the gutter, so to speak, oftentimes realizes the situation they have gotten themselves into, but a person who believes they are in a position to judge someone else; a person who has rationalized away their own short comings is one who is failing to recognize the sins of self.

Romans 2:2 - Paul begins with this statement in order to contrast God’s judgment with people’s judgment. God’s judgment is according to truth. No slanting of the facts to protect the guilty. No self-justification based on the convenience of the moment. No ethics geared to the situation at hand according to Paul, but God’s judgment is according to truth, our own moralizing standards set aside. The human race is guilty.

If we are pleading that some individuals do in fact measure up to God’s righteousness, Paul has just dispensed with that foolish notion. We all appear at different places, at different times within the list called: GUILTY. There is a short-coming of righteousness in the world, because there is a short-coming of righteousness in individuals, and that includes everyone.

Matt. 12:36 - The meaning of ‘idle word’ is careless or useless sayings. Starting in Matt. 12:22, their was a Pharisee who was guilty of everything in the context of that story. Paul is who that Pharisee was and Paul was not only first in line, when it came to dispensing the grace of God, Paul was also foremost in crime when it came to murdering the saints of Israel’s earthly kingdom program.

If Paul was at Pentecost, would Paul himself, if he took part in stoning Stephen for believing the message given at Pentecost, would he have been a blasphemer at Pentecost? In Paul’s pre-grace zealousness, he would have been a foremost rejecter of any notion whatsoever that Jesus was Israel’s messiah or that Jesus had been risen from among the dead.

First in line, first in crime are apt descriptions for the Apostle of Grace. Paul was the chosen spokesman for God to relay the information for this entire dispensation of grace. God is not dealing with Israel nationally today, he is dealing with all alike in the Age of Grace. The apostle Paul dispensed a message that the 12 apostles had not dispensed, and that message was different, and that message was geared to the Gentiles.

Paul is the chief pattern of God’s grace to all, he is the foremost example. We need to understand that even though Paul was saved, Paul still considered himself to be a sinner. Paul understood the word: Sin. And Paul understood that word meant to come short of the righteousness belonging to God himself. Paul is the foremost example of the impossibility, the total impossibility of gaining righteousness before God through the performance of the flesh. Those who are sealed in Christ, our careless or useless sayings and words are a Judgment Seat of Christ issue.

Just a Thought "104"

To many people think salvation is the end result, but salvation is the starting point. Understanding peace with God comes from understanding the accomplishment of Jesus Christ, but letting the peace of God rule in our hearts is not the same thing as understanding the reality of having peace with God. We need to understand, God had much more in mind when he designed the body of Christ than a library full of learning or a theater of theologians.

There is an element of pride today on the part of many who think God must be looking on them with special favor because they happen to belong to a particular denomination. There are people who take great pride today and elevate themselves above others because they rightly divide the Word of Truth, when rightly dividing the Word of Truth is merely a tool to use, so that you come out with a proper understanding of scripture. Who knows how many have died believing their church affiliation was sufficient to get them into heaven, that attitude is coming from what scripture calls the pride of life and nothing more.

This ministry of reconciliation is not to the saved, we know we are reconciled, but now all have access to God, a change in status for the entire world. Does this mean the entire world is save? No. There are those who mistakenly suppose that reconciliation is the same thing as justification. These people have jumped to the conclusion that Jesus Christ taking the sin issue off the table of God’s justice through his becoming sin for the human race is that which makes a person as righteous as God; they have mistaken reconciliation for justification. Being declared righteous is God’s gift to the believing sinner and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the sinner himself doing anything to deserve or merit that righteous standing.

Allow the peace of God to rule in your hearts, Paul’s really making readily apparent the fact that not everyone will do so. We do not naturally gravitate naturally towards truth, nor towards agape behavior. But we do gravitate naturally towards those dealing around us by emotion. We let emotion, our emotion rule us. Yet, love is the bond that unifies and edifies other members of the body of Christ. Love is the behavioral glue, attitudinal adhesive that God intended to keep the body of Christ functioning smoothy and operating efficiently and effectively.

Words mean things or at least they are supposed to mean things! Justification is not a process, but is a one-time act, complete and definitive. God could only declare us to be right on the bases of who and what he is, not on the bases of who and what we would be apart from him. God had to devise a way to see us that way, and the way he devised to do that was by joining us to, hiding us in our perfectly righteous savior, thus freely crediting to our account Christ righteousness.

The realization that God’s love accomplished some fantastic things on our behalf. God is anxiously awaiting his own inheritance, which happens to be us, God considers believers to be his own inheritance, he purchased us with the blood of his son, we are God’s valuable inheritance. Sin causes a debt to God so large that it can never be paid by ourselves, but the person who knows what Jesus Christ really accomplished, exist in a completely new relationship with God. Justification is a legal act, wherein God deems the sinner righteous on the basis of Christ’s righteousness.

To many people obviously have behavioral characteristics in mind when they think of that word Christian, because they think forgiveness has to be paid for on the installment plan. But according to Paul we have all our forgiveness and we have it all upfront. The only reason God could say through Paul, “Grace and Peace be unto you” is because God’s son fully paid the price. Justification by grace through faith, what a marvelous thing God has done, and who would have thought of a salvation in the sense that God’s plan would call for him to join a person to his son, therefore, what belongs to the son would now belong to believing people who have been joined to the son.

Satan and his forces know the power that emotions play, when emotions become the cement that seals the door of the mind, such that a mind remains closed and the door locked. To be open to that which  moves a person from the mental comfort zone to which that person has become accustomed, becomes not only an unsettling inconvenience, it becomes a mind-shaking threat to many people. There are multitudes who are putting faith in their feelings, emotional cravings, the minds of the vast majority of so-called Christendom today, emotion trumps doctrine.

Could it be that God is NOT giving people all these emotion tweaking experiences, because he knows that Satan and his forces will come with all manner of lying signs and wonders. People may be going by a religious belief system that is a totally false belief system, why would God refuse to give people neat little things to look at today to determine his presence, his power, his predisposition, his purpose, and his plan? Could it be that God is having people walk by faith and not by sight, because God knew that Satan will be performing the miraculous in the last days of the age of grace.

The Nicene Creed (Just some thoughts)

The conscious survival of the soul and its reattachment to the body at the resurrection. Cheating people out of being caught to meet the Savior in the air, when the Age of Grace is over.

Paul never alluded to the conscious survival of the soul and its reattachment to the body at the resurrection, that is a notion totally foreign to Paul and to Scripture as a whole. Paul did not think the question of the status of the person between death and resurrection was a question that needed to be considered. 

The reason is that for Paul, those who die in Christ, their relationship with Christ is one of immediacy, because they have not awareness of the passing of time between their death and resurrection.

As believers, we do not possess the life that Jesus got when God raised him from among the dead as an inherent quality any more than we possess God’s righteousness as a property in our own nature. Just as in the midst of our sinfulness, we are righteous, so in the midst of our self-evident mortality, we are going to get the life God gave to Jesus. 

Wholeness and meaning in life are not the products of what we have or do not have, what we have done or have not done, we are already a whole person and possess a life of infinite meaning and purpose because of who we are in Christ. 

Our understanding of the identity that Adam had before the fall, that identity has been restored to us, that restored identity is the critical foundation for our belief structure and our behavior patterns.

What an ingenious salvation plan, to take someone else that is righteous and join us to that person. Sin causes a debt to God so large that it can never be paid by ourselves, but the person who knows what Jesus Christ really accomplished, exist in a completely new relationship with God. Justification is a legal act, wherein God deems the sinner righteous on the basis of Christ’s righteousness.

Justification is not a process, but is a one-time act, complete and definitive. God could only declare us to be right on the bases of who and what he is, not on the bases of who and what we would be apart from him. God had to devise a way to see us that way, and the way he devised to do that was by joining us to, hiding us in our perfectly righteous savior, thus freely crediting to our account Christ righteousness. Reconciliation and sanctification are not one and the same, they are two different truths. A sanctified identity in Christ comes not as a result of behavior, it comes as a result of belief. 

What an identification God has given you, every believer’s sanctification comes by way of your union-identification with Christ Jesus. We find the amazing and comforting truth that God’s love for those who are joined to his son, is the same unalterable and unending love God has for his son. The judicial decree of rightness God grants to those who believe is called justification, God alters your identity by removing you judicially in God’s mind from an identification with the first Adam and now you are judicially identified with the last Adam (Christ Jesus). That joining itself is where sanctification comes into play; sanctification is not a process, it is a past tense accomplishment that can never be revised, reduced, or retracted. 

You have also been sanctified or set apart in that you were identified with Christ by God’s resurrection power, baptized into Christ at the point of your belief. You need to look at sanctification from the standpoint of who is doing the setting apart. It is entirely a work of God for the believer, not a work of the believer for God. No effort of the flesh could accomplish it, no effort of the saint can add to it.

The fact that Christ became a redeemer of the world, does not mean that the world will accept the gift the Redeemer purchased on their behalf. Christ’s faithfulness was the only faithfulness sufficient to merit God’s favor. God used our faith in Christ’s faithfulness as the means whereby he would credit Christ’s righteousness to our account.

To be justified does not mean to be perfectly righteous in performance. It also does not mean to become perfectly righteous or even more righteous in performance through time. It means having Christ’s perfect righteousness freely credited to the account of the ungodly who believe.

Our justification was something accomplished for us by God’s grace. This gift decree of righteousness comes totally apart from any and all human promise, any or all human performance, or any or all human production. God will never consider our works as a payment for God’s justifying declaration.

Justification is God’s gift! To say your works have anything at all to do with God’s gift declaration of righteousness is to slap the giver in the face. Remember, we were given our righteous standing as a free gift. 

The Nicene Creed (Box 3)

The Box

My thoughts about being disingenuous with arguments, testing doctrines against the word of God the way the Bereans did to Paul. Let’s begin with the assertion that there are “many” verses proving the Deity of Jesus Christ, showing that Jesus is God incarnate. The following references play havoc with that Doctrine. 

1. James 1:13 - Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God, for GOD CANNOT be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.
   
2. Hebrews 4:14-15 - Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin. There is already a conflict…but there is much more.
   
3. Matthew 4:1-11 - Tells how Jesus was led up of the spirit into wilderness to be tempted of the devil and it lists the temptations. If Jesus is God incarnate as the “many” verses prove, then Matthew’s account contradicts James…another conflict.
   
4. Mark 1:9-13 - Mark describes how the spirit drove him into the wilderness where he was in the wilderness 40 days, tempted of Satan. If Jesus is God incarnate as the “many” verses prove, then Mark’s account contradicts James…another conflict.
   
5. Luke 4:1-13 -  Tells how Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness, being forty days tempted of the devil. If Jesus is God incarnate as the “many” verses prove, then Luke’s account contradicts James…another conflict. Until these conflicts can be resolved, it is useless to further study the word of God. Something is bad wrong here and must be seriously considered. 

The Nicene Creed (Box 2b)

The Box

Let’s take a long look at these two historical events that took place. Point (a) “My nature will become evident from my actions,” clearly Yahweh brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, and the rest is recorded history! Yahweh was not identified with nature, Yahweh transcended nature; and Yahweh wasn’t known through nature or natural phenomena. Yahweh was known through history, events and a particular relationship with a man, which Yahweh formed from the dust of the earth. Need I say more about point (a)?

Point (b) The servant is Israel herself! The punishment that Israel suffered, even if excessive-that punishment isn’t meaningless, it will lead to redemption. Israel will be healed by her wounds. Israel’s suffering is serving a purpose in the divine plan, it’s necessary. Israel needs purification and redemption and that will prepare her for a new role in world history.

The fall of Jerusalem shattered the national and territorial basis of Israel’s culture and religion. The Babylonians had burned the temple to the ground, they carried away most of the people to exile, to life in exile in Babylon, leaving behind mostly members of the lower classes to eke out a living as best they could. And it was the completion of the tragedy that had begun centuries earlier, and it was interpreted as a fulfillment of the covenant curses. 

It was the end of the Davidic monarchy, although the son of Jeholakim was alive and living in Babylon, kind of holding out hope that the line hadn’t actually been killed out, hadn’t been completely wiped out. But the institution seemed to have come to an end for now. It was the end of the temple, the end of the priesthood, the end of Israel as a nation; as an autonomous nation, the Israelites were confronted with a great test. One could see in these events a signal that Yahweh had abandoned Israel to, or had been defeated by the god of the Babylonians, and Marduk would replace Yahweh, as the Israelites assimilated themselves into their new home. 

And certainly there were Israelites who went that route, but others who were firmly rooted in exclusive Yahwism did not. Yahweh hadn’t been defeated, the nations’s calamities were not disproof of Yahweh’s power and covenant, they were proof of it. Yahweh’s desire for morality as expressed in the ancient covenant, the prophets had spoken truly when they had said that destruction would follow, if the people didn’t turn from their moral and religious violations of Yahweh’s law. The defeat and the exile had the potential to convince Israelites of the need to show absolute and undivided devotion to Yahweh and his commandments.

The traditions of gods abandoning their cities in anger, leaving them to destruction by another god. The primary difference here is that Yahweh, rather than another god, is Yahweh himself also bringing the destruction. Yahweh doesn’t retire to heaven, nor abandons his people. Yahweh doesn’t remain behind with those left in Judah, but Yahweh moves into exile; those left behind are guilty. Yahweh does not stay with them; Yahweh moves east with the righteous exiles. Need I say more about point (b)?