When the people gathered to help Nehemiah build the wall of Jerusalem, they needed to be organized, they needed to be a nation again. When they finished the hard grind of building the wall, they needed to be motivated to come alive again. There were so many Jews who had come back to Jerusalem—the...

There were three waves of Israel’s return from exile, that is when the people came back to Jerusalem from the eastern nations. The first two are recorded in the book of Ezra, and the third return is recorded in the book of Nehemiah. The first wave was 538 BC, recorded in Ezra 1-6. The second wave...

In the Bible, the Word of God, the LORD speaks to us. Yet, from the words of someone not in God’s Kingdom, Cyrus, God tells the people that the Temple is going to be rebuilt. Cyrus tells them that they will not have to pay for the rebuild, it will be paid for by the Assyrian king. This is a mirac...

One thing that we can clearly discern from looking around at creation, is that God is a God of order. It’s true that chaos and confusion now exist within that order, but a deep purpose of Genesis 1 and 2 is to show how God brought order and purpose to His creation. This principle extends out into...

King David took accounting of the military power of Israel, in 1 Chronicles 27. Because Israel was a tribal nation, meaning that it was composed of tribal family units, it made sense to count the military by tribe and clan. From our human perspective the more men of military age the stronger and ...

Temptation is a reality that we should never ignore. Even in times of victory we may be faced with opportunities to compromise on our godly convictions. Temptation will happen and it needs to be met with the strength that comes from a life surrendered to Christ. Jesus Himself faced temptations an...

Important leaders have come and gone for thousands of years, and God has seen them all. True greatness does not come through political, social, or economic power, true greatness comes from aligning yourself with God. This is a lesson that Rehoboam was forced to learn. As Solomon’s son,
Rehoboam s...

The Bible is the Word of God, it always tells the truth. In the Bible, we see many people who are not committed to the ways of the LORD, even though they had the opportunity to be. This ends up being the case with Asa king of ancient Judah. Judah began as a country after the split of ancient Isra...

The short reign of King Ahaziah of Judah was a mess. Ahaziah ruled over Judah for one year, and he was evil in the sight of God. Ahaziah was the second king of that name, so we’ll call him Ahaziah II. His uncle was the first Ahaziah and was king of northern Israel. Both Ahaziahs were
descendants ...

Uzziah was also known as Azariah (SEE 2 KINGS 1 4 : 2 1 ). When Uzziah was just sixteen the people of Judah made him king instead of his father Amaziah. The Bible says that Uzziah did what was right in the sight of the LORD, and that he pursued God in the days of Zechariah. He had a long reign of...

The nation of northern Israel that emerged after God’s kingdom split in two, fell in 722 BC to the kings of Assyria. Almost two hundred years later, the nation to the south, Judah, fell to the king of Babylon. There were four kings involved in Jerusalem leading up to its demise: (1) Jehoahaz, who...

After all Israel fell, both north and south, God’s people were humbled. They spent about seventy years in captivity. When the LORD was ready for them to return to Jerusalem, He restored the Sabbath and the land was ready to receive them. The people were called back to Jerusalem through a Persian ...