Hey, you're listening to A Year in the Bible with Daily Grace.

We are walking you through the book of Second Kings, just a couple more days left in this book.

Today we're going to talk about chapters 16 through 18.

So Judah finally had some positive momentum going. It seemed in the last few chapters,

but then we come across King Ahaz in these chapters. What exactly goes wrong here, Paul?

So he's just going his own way is the best way I can say it know, we even see early on it describes that he sacrificed his own son.

And that's one of the pagan rituals that lots of nations around Israel would do further.

And, you know, this is a pretty big deal.

He appeals to foreign help for aid and battle rather than going to God.

And this is something that seems small

in the moment that he's, oh yeah, he's just making a treaty, but he's actually preferring human

help rather than the God who said that he would protect him if he leaned upon him and obeyed him.

And, you know, when he's in Damascus to meet with the Assyrian king to ask for that aid, he sees this altar.

And he's like, hey, we need one of those in Jerusalem.

So he gets the schematics and he sends them back and they build this altar from this foreign nation in Jerusalem.

And if that weren't enough, he starts taking items from inside the temple to give

to the Assyrian king to appease him. And as we're getting closer and closer to the end of the book

and Judah's exile, I want to call our minds back to First Kings 8 when Solomon consecrated the temple and prayed

that beautiful prayer about what this temple represented.

And look where we're at now.

We're selling these holy items just for what political power, right?

So it's kind of sad where we're headed.

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