2 Kings
Chapter 17
The Collapse
of a Nation
People
have often wondered where
A) There are some vague passages that
could possibly be
B) But really the Bible is really vague
about our nation.
C) But as we come to
1) The text gives us some insight into
the reasons for their collapse
D) What we are going to see tonight in
this passage bears a remarkable resemblance to where
Set the scene: RD V.1, 2
Move back to the North
Hoshea will be the final king
Assyrians invade to take them captive and POSSESS THEIR LAND
RDV.3-5
When Shalmaneser
takes over for Tiglath Pileser Hoshea is thinking that maybe
Hoshea turns to SO the King of
What
transpires is that God is going to tell us now that
A)
724 yrs after they were released from
B) Here is the irony in all of this
1) And they are turning for help to the
nation that God had delivered them from
C) What they needed to do is turn to the
Lord. Humble themselves and pray and seek his face
That is
what we need to do! -
A) I get aggravated when I hear
Christians says Well that was a promise for them doesnt apply to us.
B) God is the same yesterday today and
forever= you dont think that if we as a nation did that God would respond in
the same way
C) The person who would make such a
statement obviously has no idea of the History of Revival
How they always Start} Small pockets
of Prayer
D)
I am in one I encourage you to get into one as well. {God would be merciful} Revival
starts in you.
1) Hoshea should have turned to the Lord
instead he turned to
RD V.6-7
So
here we see that the nation of
A)What happened to Israel I think is a
warning of what can happen to America if we are not careful.
B) Consider the Characteristics of their
decline:
1. They
forgot their origins V.7
A) They forgot that God had brought them out of
B) SO they turned to other gods!
C) America has the same problem: She has
forgotten her origins.
1)
forgot The Great prayers that were prayed.
D)
Forgot that George
Whitefield was here preaching.
1)
He was one of the Preachers of the Great awakening that took place between
1730s & the 1770s/ 30 plus
E) At Harvard they said that 97-out 100
students were converted.
Some
of those men were the very ones that shaped our constitution Godly beginnings
A) Tour
B) Forgotten our Origins:
1)
Forgotten the fact that we have -Always been a leader in support for
C)
Nations that Blessed
Sent out
more missionaries
A) More religious literature than any
nation
B) These are the things that have made
1)
These are the reasons God has blessed this country, it is not our technology
not our ingenuity
C) When we stop doing these things we
are in trouble the day that stops. What purpose does this nation have in God's
design?
1)
Interesting that other countries are now sending missionaries here.
2) There was
a growing increase in Sexual immorality connected to idolatry RD V.8-12
This
is describing the Worship of Asheram this is some of the most Idolatrous
Immoral pornographic sexual worship imaginable
A)
It was Glorifying of Sexual sin and Pornography Very immoral Worship Temple
Prostitutes
B) We struggle today because that is
freedom of speech and freedom of expression
1)
the artistic World gets mad
C) If we talk about what is Decent they
don't went to hear those things
D) Did you know that Back- in the 1950s
1960s
E)
They wanted to know if the content was going to be morally offensive
1)
There was a time when
Now
that they have so much Money. They dont Care at all
A) Now they would rather push the
envelope with the most illicit sex possible.
B) They are more concerned about being
respected amongst their peers.
1)
Because they have more Money than they know what to do with
Stats on Sexual content on TV
In
sampling more than 1,000 hours of programming including all genres from the
major net works.
Here
is what they found:
70% of all shows have sexual content, up from 56% in 1998 and 64%
in 2002.
The number of sex scenes per hour is up compared with 1998, with an average of
5.0 scenes an hour now, up from 3.2 in 1998 and 4.4 in 2002. In top teen shows,
including The O.C. and Desperate Housewives, there are 6.7 scenes
an hour.
The total number of sexual
scenes in the program sample rose to 3,783 scenes from 1,930 scenes in 1998.
During prime-time hours, sex is even more common; 77% of shows include sexual
content, averaging 5.9 sexual scenes an hour.
3) There
was a disregard for Children. V.17
In
And they caused their sons
and daughters to pass through the fire,
They placed their children on the arms
of Molech
A)
Whenever a nation is preoccupied with sexual immorality the result is going to
be that of unwanted pregnancies {Molech was one way they dealt w/ that
B)
Archeologist have also found proof that in this region another practice
that took place was placing live babies in Jars
1) Burying them alive in the walls of
their homes in these Jar Plaster over it
C) A way to appease the gods Skeletons
in the Jars
It was old fashioned
abortion: Today we do it before they are born
A) The greatest danger to kids in the
womb today is from their own parents
B) Most dangerous time to be a child in
D) In the last 30 yrs there have been over
43 million abortions performed in the
Abortion
in contrast to casualties of war.
Let me put that in perspective for you:
Revolutionary war
. 25,324 American
casualties
Civil War
.498,332 American casualties
WWI
116,708 American
casualties
WWII
.. 407,316 American casualties
Desert Storm
. 292 American casualties
Desert Shield
. 2,318 American casualties
Total
1 million 163,191 American casualties
Now
the number of abortions in the last 30 yrs is 36 times the number of casualties
from all the American wars combined.
That is 1 million 163,191 X
36
That is shocking I hope
it is shocking
If you have had an abortion not trying
to condemn you Forgiveness in Jesus
A) But as a nation we must wake up.
This was one of the things that led God to say concerning
B) I think that because of the Church
God is being merciful to us.
4) There was
a deafness to the word of God. RD V. 13-14a
Think of the Prophets that God sent to
A) Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Abijah,
Micah, Jeremiah, Joel, Amos, Ezekiel
B) But
they would not listen.
1) Amos said there was a famine for the
hearing of the Word of God in that day.
C) There wasnt as famine of the Word
but a famine concerning the hearing of it.
They
forced God and His word out of their lives
A)
B) Take out God {No praying in Schools
1) Dont mention God or Jesus in
graduations ceremonies
2) One
School God Bless You!!!!!
C) Age of Tolerance there is deafness to
the word of God
1) Dont lay your religious trips on me
D) People who preach tolerance will
tolerate anything but Christians
1) Some Christians embracing it
Bible literally you are narrow
5) Their
unwillingness to hear led to an all out rejection of the Word of God. RDV. 14-18
Hosea declared My people
are destroyed for lack of Knowledge because they have rejected Knowledge.
Guys could this happen to us?
What the writer reveals next is how
These Assyrian officials seemed to know what the recently-conquered
Yet, any faith in God among these resettled people was
founded in simple fear of the lions leading to an inadequate relationship
with God.
RDV.28-41