Bible study · 2 Kings 25:1-30
2 Kings 25: Bread before the king
Read 2 Kings 25:1-30 before you meet.
In a few lines
2 Kings doesn't end in the fire. The house is burned (25:9) and Judah is "carried away captive out of his land" (25:21), but the last verses find a king of David's line alive in Babylon, out of prison, eating bread before the king "all the days of his life" (25:29). And Matthew carries the line on from him: "After the exile to Babylon, Jechoniah became the father of Shealtiel" (Matthew 1:12).
The verse to carry
“and changed his prison garments. Jehoiachin ate bread before him continually all the days of his life;”
2 Kings 25:29
To talk about
1. Gedaliah said, "Don’t be afraid… Dwell in the land" (25:24), yet the people went to Egypt "for they were afraid" (25:26). When has fear pushed you to run, when staying was what you had been told to do?
2. The book doesn't end with the fire (25:9). It ends with a king of David's line spoken to kindly and eating bread before the king of Babylon "all the days of his life" (25:29). What does it mean to you that the story's last scene is bread and not the ruins?
3. Matthew carries Jesus' line on through Jechoniah, the king who was carried away (Matthew 1:12). What does it say to you that the line to Jesus runs through exile and prison?