If you return to the LORD, then your fellow Israelites and your children will be shown compassion by their captors and will return to this land, for the LORD your God is gracious and compassionate. He will not turn his face from you if you return to him.” – 2 Chronicles 30:9

Today’s Scripture Reading (November 9, 2013): 2 Chronicles 30

Winston Churchill is thought to have said that “History is written by the victors.” It is something that sounds very much like something that Churchill would say, but what no one seems to be sure about what the circumstances were surrounding the quote. But no matter when it was that Churchill said the words, history tells us that he lived the words. Before World War II, Churchill’s political career was in serious decline. By the time that Churchill made an ill-fated decision to back King Edward VIII during the abdication crisis of 1936, his political career was almost over. Churchill was seen as a pawn of the royal family and was even shouted down by parliament.

But in 1939, World War II broke out, and with it came the restoration of Winston Churchill. Churchill seemed to be a man who had been created for this moment in time. Churchill had been a vocal critic of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement policy regarding Hitler and Germany. When Chamberlain was forced to step down as Prime Minister in 1940, the formerly disgraced Churchill was ready to step up and take control and lead Britain into victory – and he rewrote the history books in the process. For most, the early disgrace had been erased and a strong and very different Winston Churchill is remembered.

This passage in Chronicles is a little confusing. Experts read into it a comment about the defeat and exile of the Northern Kingdom to the Assyrian empire, but it would also seem to be able read into these words a more personal prediction of Judah’s exile in Babylon. The author of Chronicles seems to mention two groups – your fellow Israelites and your children; your sons and your daughters. The fellow Israelites could very well be the now exiled northern kingdom of Israel, but the sons and daughters sounds much more like a foreshadowing of the Babylonian exile.  

Did Hezekiah know of the impending exile of his nation and his children? With God, that can never be considered to be out of the range of possibilities. But there might be an easier answer. We know that this history was written from the other side of exile. Whether or not Hezekiah actually understood the reality of the Babylonian Exile, the author knew firsthand about the exile. And he was able to interpret the prayer of Hezekiah in a very personal way. He understood the very character of God, He knew that God would never turn away from the ones who had turned to him.

Israel never came back from the Assyrian exile. But the author of Chronicles was part of Judah’s compassionate return from Babylon – a return that was only made possible by the grace of the God of Hezekiah. He also knew firsthand of the compassion of his captors making Hezekiah’s prayer for the future an accurate description of this author’s present reality.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Chronicles 31