God’s Word for You

2 Chronicles 30:6-9 Hezekiah’s letter

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Sunday, May 25, 2025

6 At the king’s command, runners went throughout Israel and Judah with letters from the hand of the king and from his princes, which read: “People of Israel, return to the LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, that he may return to you who are left, who have escaped from the hand of the kings of Assyria. 7 Do not be like your fathers and brothers, who were unfaithful to the LORD, the God of their fathers, so that he made them a desolation, as you see. 8 Do not be stiff-necked as your fathers were, but submit to the LORD. Come to the sanctuary, which he has consecrated forever. Serve the LORD your God, so that his fierce anger will turn away from you. 9 If you return to the LORD, then your brothers and your children will be shown compassion by their captors and will come back to this land, for the LORD your God is gracious and merciful. He will not turn his face away from you if you return to him.”

There are several parts to King Hezekiah’s letter. Each point is worth considering carefully:

1, Who are we, who is our God? The people listening to this letter are called “People of Israel.” The king wanted to include all of the descendants of Jacob, north or south, across the Jordan or down on the coast of the sea, all as one people. He reminded them that their God is the LORD, and he calls the Lord by his familiar name, “The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel.” No matter which of the sons of Israel, which of the twelve tribes they belonged to, they were all one family, one nation under God.

2, This is the God who can and will still return to you if you repent and turn back to him. Repentance is made up of two things. The first is terror over our sins and over their consequences. This terror is brought on by the preaching of the Law, and when we hold our lives up to the law of God we understand just how short we have fallen from what God demands of us. Then the Gospel calls us to faith, to trust in Christ, that his blood was shed for our sins and covered over our sins and removed our guilt forever. This faith is what he asks of us and which he gives to us through the power of his holy word.

3, Do not be like your stubborn fathers. That resulted in the desolation you can see now. God’s punishment on the northern kingdom meant the destruction of their cities, the burning of their villages and towns, and the deportation of many of their people into exile. The king’s letter calls for the hearers to look around with the simple phrase, “as you see” (verse 7).

4, Submit to the Lord, come to his temple. Hezekiah makes this an invitation and not a command. Jeroboam I had made it difficult, perhaps even impossible, for the people of the north to go down to Jerusalem to worship. What a very different tale there would be to tell if the two kingdoms had shared one single place of worship, their kings only friends, their people only on the best of terms? But even the best of kings mistrust their neighbors, and the worst kings only seek to possess whatever their neighbors have, and to keep their people loyal only to them. Wicked Jeroboam had been one of those, and all of his successors.

5, If you serve him, he will end his anger. He will show compassion to your families, and they will return. This is a remarkable invitation and promise from the king. He told the people of Ephraim and Manasseh that their families, neighbors, and friends could return from their exile, for with God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26).

6, He is gracious and merciful, and he will not turn away if you turn to him. More than a return of the lost people, Hezekiah promises what the Lord said many times: If the people would return to him, he would return to them and bless them. “Return to me with all your heart,” the Lord said (Joel 2:12). And again, he said: “I will restore David’s fallen tent. I will repair its broken places, restore its ruins, and build it as it used to be” (Amos 9:11). And yet again: “I will heal their waywardness and love them freely, for my anger has turned away from them” (Hosea 14:4).

Hezekiah’s letter did not force the people to do, say, or believe anything. It was a plea and an invitation, which is always what the Gospel does. The Gospel is never compelled; we can never make people into Christians by forcing them to act like Christians or to speak or look the way that we think Christians ought to speak or look like.

The term “gospel” (εὐαγγέλιον) has always only meant good news, and especially the very best of news. Aristophanes says “I wish to crown you for the good news (εὐαγγέλια) you have reported” (Plutus). Homer uses the term as a reward or gift, “May the good news (εὐαγγέλιον) be mine” (Odyssey ξ). And Circero said, “How sweet your letters are! I confess that I owe them the good news (εὐαγγέλιον, the best reward).” And Plutarch uses it as a term for the sacrifices that were made when good tidings or good news were brought, especially that some venture or military campaign had turned out well: “They sacrificed the ‘good tidings’ (εὐαγγέλιον).” Johann Gerhard shows that all three of these ancient Greek uses of the word can be found in Scripture.

When the word Gospel is used in the Scriptures and Christ is the subject, along with his benefits such as the free pardon of sins, reconciliation with our heavenly Father, our adoption as sons, and eternal life, then “Gospel” is used in its proper and narrow sense: The good news of the forgiveness of sins. This is never forced on people, but is offered through faith, giving what God also asks (that is, faith) at the same time. In this way, we see that faith is in a very small way like an oven mitt. Our Father tells us that something wonderful is there for us, but that we should only grasp it with the mitt (that is, the Gospel) and yet he himself, like a good father teaching his son to cook, hands the oven mitt to his dear son. Except that the Gospel does not burn, but only refreshes, filling us with good things and giving life and love and forgiveness. But God gives what he asks of us: righteousness, faith, and the merits of Christ. What a marvelous and giving Father we have, who gives us his own dear Son in order to make us his dear sons and daughters!

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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