Captivity

This is the last and final week of the series from Kings. Kings ends in melancholy. The kingdom is destroyed and the promise of David seems to be forgotten. The Davidic king is sent into exile into a foreign land along with most of the people, and the promise of Abraham also seems to be forgotten. I read the story and I see zero hope in this story.

This is a troubling story. I've heard my whole life that God's plans are perfect and in him there is hope and peace, but when I read a story like this I begin to question those things I've always heard. Even knowing the rest of the story, how the nation lived in a downward spiral of increasing sin and deprivation, I am still left with question after question on why this happened. The really troubling part of this is that I can't be too harsh on the people of Judah or their kings because time after time in this series I've seen my own story. Solomon compromised; I compromise. Rehoboam's pride; Spencer's pride....etc. It makes me wonder about my own captivity and exile. It makes me wonder how I might incur God's judgment. Very troubling.

One thing I've been trying to grow in the last few years is seeing salvation in both temporal and eternal terms. My God saves me, and I believe he saves me now. He saves me from myself now. He saves me from sin now. Eternally this salvation will be complete, but I live into it now. This is a major shift from usual evangelical thinking that limits salvation to eternity only...salvation is only concerned with the soul. I take this from Wesley, salvation begins "at the first dawning of grace until the soul is consummated in glory" (my favorite Wesley quote).

If I believe this about salvation, then I need to also believe this conversely about judgment. Judgment is not only limited to the eternal. Hell is not the only manifestation of judgment. I believe we experience judgment now, which is why the Kings story is so troubling. I don't think this means cities are destroyed. I don't think Katrina or 9/11 was judgment from God. I do though resonate with Paul's understanding in Romans, "the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness...for although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him...therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity."
Paul goes on later in Romans to talk about salvation in terms of captivity. We are held in captivity, or slavery, to sin until Christ brings us peace with God and makes us slaves to righteousness. In this light, I wonder what I may be in captivity to. I wonder if there are ways I have incurred God's judgment, the horrible judgment of being separated from him, of having my relationship with God estranged for any reason.

"But who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God- through Jesus Christ our Lord!" - Romans 7:24