Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble, and I'm your host for the Bible Recap.

Today, we covered a lot of the same territory as yesterday, but Chronicles did provide us a few new

details, so I'm going to focus mainly on those. During the time of the divided kingdom,

the ten tribes of the northern kingdom reject the Levites as priests. So not only do the Levites

get fired from their jobs, but they're also evicted from their homes. So all the Levites leave

the tribal lands that had been appointed to serve, and they moved to Judah in the southern

kingdom. These priests have served under the relatively good leadership of David and Solomon, and that

sticks with them for a while. They have set their hearts to seek God, and for three years,

they help keep the Southern Kingdom on the straight and narrow, but it eventually starts to fall

apart, as we saw yesterday. It's unclear whether the hearts of the Levites also turn away from

God, or whether King Ray just stops carrying and disregards God's laws and purposes for the Levites.

King Ray has a lot of wives and concubines, and as his family grows, he distributes his sons

throughout the regions, making sure to provide for them and find them wives. They seem to serve

sort of like governors in the region, helping to make sure his power and influence take root in

every part of the southern kingdom. But as his power grows, his heart turns away from God.

Weakness has a way of reminding us of our needs, whereas strength has a way of prompting us to

lean into autonomy and

foolish forgetfulness. And as the king goes, so goes the kingdom. The people follow Ray's lead and

turn away from God. Then the armies of Egypt come after the southern kingdom. The text doesn't

attribute this act to God here, but it leaves it open to interpretation.

12.2 says, because they had been unfaithful to the Lord, Shishak, king of Egypt, came up against Jerusalem.

So there seems to be a direct correlation between Judah's unfaithfulness and Egypt's attack.

...