2 Kings 24 And we're in the year 605 B.C. You remember King Josiah. He was a good, good king. He died at the age of 39. He went to Megiddo. fought Pharaoh Neko and he died-o. Got killed at a young age. Then his son took the throne, Jehoahaz. And then he got deposed, they got rid of him. Then his next son took the throne, Jehoahim. Now in that time frame when Jehoahim was king, That's when Babylon come to power and Assyria really declined. So, what you find in verse 1 in chapter 24, it says, "...in his days Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up, and Jehoiakim became his servant three years. Then he turned and rebelled against him." Now, this is a very significant point as far as time and history because right here in this verse is right when Babylon started coming to power. King Nebuchadnezzar was his dad. Nebuchadnezzar the son took power after Nebuchadnezzar died and so what you've got is earlier that year before he became king he headed up the army of his dad. And he defeated Pharaoh Necho at Carchemish, which was a major historical battle back in history. And so, in that same year, he became king. Later in that year, what he did, he invaded Judah. And that's all in 605 B.C. So when he invaded Judah in 605 B.C., what he did, he carried some people off as captives from Jerusalem. One of them, very notable figure, let me get real quickly in my Bible, one was by the name of Daniel. Do you remember Daniel? Daniel had three friends, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. or you might better know them as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They went off into captivity in 605 with Nebuchadnezzar, that first group. He takes them away. Jehoiakim, as it says in verse 1, became his servant. In other words, Jehoiakim pretty much submitted to Nebuchadnezzar. And he submitted to his rule for three years, and then he revolted against Nebuchadnezzar, and what he did, he sought Egypt's help. Now, Egypt had done been whooped, but Jehoiakim's thinking that if he gets Egypt behind him, he can rebel against Nebuchadnezzar. That doesn't work. That help failed. Whenever the Word of God talks about going down to Egypt or relying upon Egypt, it's using kind of like an analogy almost, like you're trusting in the world, and you're going back to the ways of the world, and you're leaning upon the arm of flesh, and God warns against that. So, here's what we find. He leans upon Egypt, and Egypt doesn't come through for him. Over in 2 Chronicles 36, and verse 6, it says, "...against him," that's against Jehoiakim, "...came up Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and bound him in fetters," in other words, he put bands around his arms and his legs and chains, And the Word of God said to carry him to Babylon. He went off into captivity. Now, eventually Jehoiakim comes back. to Jerusalem, and that's where he dies. Now, what we read about is God's purpose in all this happening. Now, I want you to notice in verse 2 in chapter 24, in 2 Kings, it says, And the Lord sent against him bands of the Chaldees, or groups of the Babylonians. and bands of the Syrians, and bands of the Moabites, and bands of the children of Ammon, and sent them against Judah to destroy it." Listen what happened. Babylon, in their fight against Egypt, they needed to kind of heal up and build the army back up. And so in the meantime, what Babylon did, they hired out these groups and they went and they attacked Judah. And you've got Babylonian groups attacking Judah. Then you've got some from the Syrians and some from the Moabites, some from the Ammonites, and they keep attacking Judah. So they're making Judah even more and more and more vulnerable. But if you notice the text, though Babylon did that, it is the Lord who sent them. It was God who was fighting against his own people. And notice what the Word of God says. It says in the middle or toward the latter part of verse 2, it says, "...to destroy it." Now, that's a very interesting word. The word destroy is the word, see if this sounds familiar, sheol, abaddon. In other words, what that translates as, that Hebrew word, the realm of the dead. God had purpose to put Judah in the realm of the dead. Which he spake by his servants, the prophets, is what the word of God says. And those prophets, they'd been warned by Isaiah, they were warned by Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Micah, and other prophets. They were constantly being warned. Jehoiakim I want you to notice, I think I went over these verses last week, but listen to what it says once again in Jeremiah 22. Jeremiah 22 and down in verse 18 and 19. Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, they shall not lament for him, saying, Ah, my brother, or Ah, my sister. They shall not lament for him, saying, Ah, Lord, or Ah, his glory. He shall be buried with the burial of an ass." He's going to be buried like a donkey gets buried. And drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem is what the Word of God says. There ain't going to be any weeping for him because he was a wicked king. In Jeremiah 26 and verse 20, you remember he killed the prophet Uriah. And then over in chapter 36 of Jeremiah, you remember how Jeremiah had copied the Word of God down and sent Baruch to Jehoiakim, and he started reading what God said, and what he would do, he'd take a penknife and he'd cut it and he'd put it in the fireplace. He burnt the Word of God. In contempt for God, He didn't want to hear it, so he burnt the Word of God. So Jehoiakim dies in 598 BC. Get the time frame here. There's 605, that's when Nebuchadnezzar comes to power. Then there is 598 BC, he dies, Jehoiakim dies in Jerusalem. So notice what the Word of God goes on to say. Surely at the commandment of the Lord, in verse 3, came this upon Judah to remove them out of his sight for the sins of Manasseh according to all that he did. Now, Manasseh did great wickedness. Though he repented at the end of his life, the wickedness that he had caused, God had pronounced judgment on it and his judgment was not turning back. So here it says, according to all he did, also for the innocent blood that he shed, for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood which the Lord would not pardon. Now the rest of the acts of Jehoiakim and all he did are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Judah? Jehoiakim slept with his fathers. He died. Jehoiachin, his son, reigned in his stead. So what we find in verse 7, the king of Egypt came not again anymore out of his land, for the king of Babylon had taken the river of Egypt unto the river Euphrates, all that pertained to the king of Egypt. The king of Babylon took all that land, all the Middle East, and it's a change of world powers. Egypt is not the world power no more. God raises up, God also puts down. He raised up Egypt, He put down Egypt, He's raised up Babylon. and he eventually puts down Babylon. But notice it's Jehoiachin, his son, that comes to power. Jehoiachin is known by three different names. There's Jehoiachin, Jeconiah, and Coniah. Now, when we were in the book of Jeremiah, we read about that. What we read about Jehoiachin and his life, it talks about in verses 8 through 17. And notice Jehoiachin, He only reigned for three months, 90 days. I mean, he wasn't on the throne too long. But notice first his wickedness in verses 8 and 9. Jehoiachin, he was 18 years old when he began to reign. Reigned in Jerusalem three months, and his mother's name was Nahushtah, the daughter of Elnathan of Jerusalem. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his father had done. In other words, he starts reigning just like his wicked father Jehoiakim did. He is wicked, evil in the sight of the Lord. And then in verse 10, what you read, here comes the second deportation. Nebuchadnezzar is going to go in, he's going to take some captives, he's going to take them off to Babylon. Now, the first one, he took some off, and he took more of the wise men, like Daniel and his friends, and he took them to Babylon. So, in verse 10, at that time, the servants, or those that were in the military, they came up that belonged to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, against Jerusalem, and the city was besieged. Do you remember how they laid siege around the city? They surrounded, wouldn't let anybody in, anybody out, wouldn't let any food in, water in. They would starve you to death, and sometimes that thing would take up 3, 4, 5, 6 years. And people were, you know, they just survived best they could. And later on what you find out is they would eat their children, eat all kinds of whatever they could because they were starving to death. Here, Nebuchadnezzar's army surrounds the city. And the Word of God says in verse 12, Jehoiachin, the king of Judah, went out to the king of Babylon. He and his mother and his servants and his princes and his offers, and the king of Babylon took him in the eighth year of his reign. So Nebuchadnezzar joined his army. He comes to Jerusalem. This is 597 BC. And here Jehoiachin, he surrenders. And he takes all the king, his mother, his household, his princes, his officers, all the military, he takes all them with him. This second captivity, Ezekiel the prophet was carried off to Babylon. So notice what it says in verse 13. He carried out from there all the treasures of the house of the Lord. Now, a lot of it had already been ransacked, but what treasures he started taking were like gold-plated things, and it would take a lot of work, but they pried stuff off, off certain areas of the temple, and they ransacked the temple even worse. All this gold that they took this time would have been from Solomon's reign that dated way back. He carried out, hence, all the treasures of the house of the Lord, all the treasures of the king's house, cut in pieces all the vessels of gold which Solomon the king of Israel had made in the temple of the Lord as the Lord had said. Now, look back in 1 Kings 9. In 1 Kings 9, look down in verse 6. I Kings 9 verse 6 says this, "'But if you shall at all turn from following me, you or your children will not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them. Then will I cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them and this house.'" which I have hallowed for my name. I will cast out of my sight, and Israel shall be a proverb and a byword by all people. And at this house which is high, every one that passes by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss and shall say, Why hath the Lord done this unto this land and to this house? And it is simply because they pursued the Lord their God, who brought forth their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and they started worshiping and serving other gods. What we find in this carrying off in this second deportation, down in verse... notice what it says down in verse 14. He carried away all Jerusalem. all the princes, all the mighty men of valor, and even 10,000 captives, and all the craftsmen and the smiths." In other words, anybody that seemed like they could build up a potential resistance against the king of Babylon, anybody that showed like they might get a following to resist the king, they took them off into captivity. And there was Ten thousand captives is what the Word of God says. None remained save the poorest sort of the people of the land. He left the poor. He took everyone of any kind of rank, any kind of wealth, and any kind of power, and only the poor remained. And the Word of God says he carried away Jehoiachin, the Babylon, and the king's mother, and the king's wives, and the officers and the mighty of the land. Those carried he into captivity from Jerusalem to Babylon. And all the men of might, even seven thousand, craftsmen and smiths a thousand, all that were strong and apt for war, even them the king of Babylon brought captive to Babylon. So, he's taking captive all these. Now, Jeremiah, over in Jeremiah chapter 22, he had prophesied that Jehoiachin would not have any children. There would not be anybody coming to the throne after Jehoiachin as far as any of his kids. So, notice what Nebuchadnezzar does in verse 17. The king of Babylon made Mathaniah, his father's brother, king in his stead, and changed his name to Zedekiah. So, Nebuchadnezzar puts his uncle, Jehoiachin's uncle, on the throne, which this would be, I think it's Josiah's or Josiah's youngest son. This would be the third son of Josiah's that takes the throne. He would be the youngest one out of all of them. The king of Babylon changes his name from Mattaniah to Zedekiah. Now, Zedekiah is the last one on the throne in Judah before all Judah is just ransacked and taken into captivity, nothing left. Zedekiah is the last king, Josiah's youngest son. Zedekiah, what he did, he patterned his wicked life after his brother. He did the same thing that his brother did. He was a weak man and he was influenced by the crowd. Whichever way the crowd went, that's the way he went. Whichever way the wind's blowing, that's how he made his decision. Whatever was favorable with everybody else, that's the way he'd go. He'd make a modern-day politician, wouldn't he? Notice what it says in verse 18, Zedekiah was 21. 21 years old when he began to reign. He reigned 11 years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Hamutal, the daughter of Jeremiah of Libna. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord according to all that Jehoiakim had done. Everything wicked he did, he did it also. So what Zedekiah did, he joined the group of people and let the people that were swayed toward Egypt, the Egyptian faction, he followed them. There was the group that wanted to follow the Babylonian faction, and that's what Jeremiah told everybody they needed to do. They needed to surrender or they'd lose their life. Zedekiah didn't believe, so what he did, he joined that Egyptian faction and he followed the crowd. Jeremiah chapter 38 is where Jeremiah warns Zedekiah, don't do it. Zedekiah did not listen. He just couldn't resist the temptation of going with the flow, going with the majority. You know what? There's a lot of people like that. They go with the mob rule, so to speak. They go with the majority of people. Zedekiah rebelled. Zedekiah is responsible for his rebellion. No matter how many people might have influenced Zedekiah, you know what, it's the same way with our young people today. A lot of people influence our young people. A lot of people influence even our older young people. But you know what? No matter what influence is in your life, if you follow that influence, you're accountable for that. Everybody is individually accountable for their own choices in life. If you follow wickedness, you might say, well, they made me do it. Well, you know what? You're responsible for making that decision. Listen to what it says over in Psalm 49. The 49th Psalm and down in verse 7. Psalm 49 verse 7 says this, None of them can by any means redeem his brother. Nobody can redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him. You know what? Each individual is responsible unto God and accountable unto God for the choices they make in this life. And they've got to give an account to God for that. Now, what Zedekiah does, he sees Babylon coming in on him. And what he does, he seeks God's help. Now, does this not sound like people in our day and time? Look over in Jeremiah. I want you to look in Jeremiah chapter 21. In Jeremiah 21, down in verse 1, the Word of God says this, The Word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, when King Zedekiah sent unto him Pashur, the son of Melchiah, Zephaniah, the son of Messiah, the priests, saying, Inquire, pray thee of the Lord for us. For Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, makes war against us. If so be that the Lord would deal with us according to all his wondrous works, that he may go up from us. Zedekiah asked Jeremiah to seek God's face, that maybe God would help him and drive Nebuchadnezzar away. Zedekiah didn't want to worship the Lord. He didn't want to follow the Lord, but he wanted the Lord's help. You ever have somebody ask you to pray for me? I remember one time, this has been years ago, I was in a church van and I was down on Pine Street downtown, if you know where Pine Street is, and this was back in rougher times. And as I'm coming up to a stop sign, this young African-American comes up to me and he was asking me if I wanted some pot. And I couldn't understand what he was saying. So he kept getting closer to the van and he finally got up to the window and he says, do you want some? I said, no, I've got a different kind of high. He looked back at the van and he saw the name of the church written on the van. And he started like this, he said, excuse me, excuse me, pray for me, pray for me. I said, you don't want me to pray for you. God a-whippin'. You know, a lot of people want God to help them, but they don't want to worship the Lord. You run into that in life. I pray God works in people's lives when they ask for help, that they will bow before Him and acknowledge Him as Lord and start worshiping Him. If you have lost people and want you to pray for them, pray for them. I encourage you to pray for them. But make sure you pray for them in a way that it would be God-glorifying. Not just so they can be better off, but that God's name would be magnified through the whole process. Zedekiah didn't worship the Lord. He was double-minded. He was unstable in all his ways. Listen to what it says in Jeremiah 27. Jeremiah 27, down in verse 1, in the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, came this word unto Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, Thus saith the Lord to me, Make the bonds and yokes, put them upon your neck, send them to the king of Edom, the king of Moab, the king of Ammonites, Tyrus, Zidon, the hand of the messengers, which came to Jerusalem under Zedekiah, king of Judah. and command them to say unto their masters, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, God of Israel, Thus shall you say to your masters, I have made the earth, the man, the beast, that are upon the ground, by my great power, by my outstretched arm, and have given it unto whom it seemed meet unto me. And now I've given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon." God did this. God's saying he did it. God's saying he's put Nebuchadnezzar over all these nations. And he calls Nebuchadnezzar, my servant. And the beast of the field have I given him also to serve him. And all the nations shall serve him and his son and his sons' sons until the very time of this land come. Then many nations, great kings, shall serve themselves of him. It shall come to pass that the nation and kingdom which will not serve the same Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, and that will not put their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, that nation will I punish, saith the Lord, with sword, with famine, pestilence, until I have consumed them by his hand. Therefore hearken not to your prophets, nor to your diviners, nor to your dreamers, nor to your enchanters or sorcerers which speak unto you. You shall not serve the king of Babylon, for they prophesy a lie unto you, to remove you far from your land, and that I should drive you out, and you should perish. But the nations that bring their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, serve him. Those will I let remain still in their land, saith the Lord, and they shall till it and dwell therein." Zedekiah rebelled against that. He rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, and he paid for it. He was a double-minded man that made him unstable in all of his ways. And let me tell you, when you have a king or a president or a ruler who's double-minded, you know what? That's what happens often to the people that follow along with that. Let me give you an example even closer to that. When you have a change of pastors in churches, And you have a pastor comes in, and he's more liberal and more not lining up with the Word of God. Do you know what happens? A church will drift with that pastor. That's a smaller scale than a nation, but you know what's true on that smaller scale? It's true on the bigger scale, too. So here's King Zedekiah, and you know what? He's gone beyond the limit. He's gone way past, and God's judgment is coming. False prophets had told him, God's going to give you the victory, but it didn't happen. You know what? God showed mercy to Zedekiah by sending Jeremiah, the prophet, to him. And what Jeremiah told him to do was surrender. And if you surrender, everything will be fine. Zedekiah didn't want to hear it, and therefore, they all went off into captivity, and Jerusalem was wiped out. Take heed to the Word of God. Listen to what God says. God's not going to be mocked. Let's have a word of prayer. Father, we thank You for Your Word. And as we see the nation of Israel in the Old Testament coming to an end, Lord, we pray that we see how Your mighty hand worked in all that. to bring glory to your name. Because your people would not honor you, they went into captivity. Lord, we pray that you give us ears to hear and a heart to do your will. Guide us by your Spirit into all truth, for Christ's sake. Amen. You're dismissed.