Although they are two separate books in our Bibles

They were originally written as one book telling a unified story

that continues on from the book of Samuel that came before it

So David has unified the tribes of Israel into a kingdom

and God promised that from his line would come a Messianic king

who would establish God's kingdom over the nation's and fulfill the promises made to Abraham

So the Book of Kings tells the story of the long line of Kings that came after David

and none of them lived up to that promise

In fact, they run the nation of Israel right into the ground

The book is designed to have five main movements

the story begins and ends focus on Jerusalem

First with Solomon's reign in the construction of the temple

and then in this last section ending with jerusalem's destruction and Israel's exile to Babylon

and the story leading up to this tragedy is what makes up the center three sections

which explain how Israel split into two rival kingdoms

how God tried to prevent the corruption of Israel by sending the prophets

and how exile became unavoidable consequence of Israel's sins

The book opens with two chapters about the kingdom passing from the aging David to his son Solomon

and David's final words to Solomon they're very similar to those of Moses and Joshua and Samuel to the people

It's a call to remain faithful to the commands of the covenants

and to give allegiance to the God of Israel alone

but David's words bring somewhat hollow here

because David and Solomon then go on to conspire how they're going to consolidate this new kingdom

through a whole series of political assassinations

so it's not off to a great start

Solomon's brightest moment comes when he asked God for wisdom to lead Israel

and he even complete David's dream to make a temple for the God of Israel

Here the story actually stops and describes the design of this temple in detail

just like the tabernacle design in the Torah

there's all these gold and jewels and depictions of angels and fruit trees

It's all symbolism echoing back to the garden of eden

it's the place where heaven and earth meet where God's presence dwells with his people

but no sooner does Solomon finish the temple

but he makes them really horrible choices and the Kingdom falls apart

he starts marrying the daughters of other kings hundreds of them for political alliances

and then he adopts their gods and introduces the worship of those gods into Israel

Solomon then accumulates huge amounts of wealth he built a huge army

He even Institute slave labor for all of his building projects

Now if you go back to the Torah and look at God's guidelines for Israel's kings in Deuteronomy 17

Solomon is breaking every one

so by the time that he dies

Solomon resembles Pharaoh the king of Egypt more than he does his father David

the next section of the book opens with Solomon's son, Rehoboam, acting just like his father

it's a very sad story of greed and lust for power

he tries to increase taxes for slave labor

and under the leadership of Jeroboam the northern tribes reject this

they rebelled and secede and form their own rival Kingdom

and so now in the story you have the southern kingdom of Judah

centered in Jerusalem with Kings from the line of David

and now this new northern kingdom called Israel

who's capital will be Samaria eventually

Jeroboam also goes on to build two new temples to compete with Solomon's temple in the south

he put the Golden Calf in each one to represent the God of Israel

The connection to Exodus 32 and the Golden Calf It's all quite explicit

From this point on the story goes back and forth from north to south tracing the fate of both kingdoms

Each one had about 20 successive kings

and as the author introduces each king he evaluates their reign by a few criteria

did they worship the God of Israel alone or did they promote the worship other gods

did they deal with idolatry among the people

and did they remained faithful to the Covenant like David or do they become corrupt and unjust

and according to these criteria the author finds no good kings in northern Israel zero for twenty

And then in southern Judah only eight out of 20 get a positive rating

which connects to another huge purpose in this book

and that to introduce the role of the prophet key figures in israel's history

so in the Bible, prophets were not fortune tellers rather they spoke on behalf of the God of Israel

and they played the role of Covenant watchdog

which means they called out idolatry and injustice among the Kings and the people

they were constantly reminding Israel of their calling to be a light to the nations

that they should obey the commands of the Torah

and so the prophets challenged Israel to repent and follow their God

In these centres sections for each King, God then raises up prophets to hold them accountable

the most prominent prophets over the northern ones are Elijah and his disciples Elisha

right here in the center of the book

Elijah was a wild man of a prophet living out in the desert

and his arch nemesis was the northern King Ahab and his Canaanite wife Jezebel

together these two had instituted the worship of the Canaanites God Baal over Israel

and so in a famous story Elijah challenged four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal

to a contest to see which God was a real

so they both built altars and prayed to their gods

but only the God of Israel answers with fire

After this, Ahab uses his royal power to murder an Israelite farmer and then steal his family's vineyard

and the Elijah again confront Ahab's injustice and he announces the downfall of his house

Elijah eventually passes the mantle of his prophetic leadership to a young disciple named Elisha

who asks for two times the authority of Elijah

but what's fascinating here is how the author is recounted 7 miraculous feats for Elijah

and then he offers stories of 14 acts of power from Elisha

Both prophets were clearly remarkable men and they played the same role confronting Israel's Kings

for idolatry and injustice and ultimately they were unsuccessful in turning Israel back from apostasy

In the next section, the northern kingdom has rocked by a bloody revolution started by a king named Jehu

who destroys Ahab's family and although Jehu was at first commissioned by God

his violence just gets out of control

and it creates the spiral of political assassinations and rebellions from which Israel never recovered

coup follows coup after Jehu

and each King follows other gods allows horrible injustice it all leads up to second Kings chapter 17

the big bad empire of Assyria swoops down and takes out the northern kingdom altogether

and the capital city of Samaria is conquered

and the Israelites were exiled and scattered throughout the ancient world

now chapter 17 is key

the author stops the story and offers this prophetic reflection and what's just happened

he blames the downfall of the northern kingdom on the idolatry

and covenant unfaithfulness of Israel and its kings

and so God has allowed them to face the consequences of their decisions

The final movement of the book tells the story of the lone southern kingdom

In here, we meet very heroic kings like Hezekiah who trust God

when the armies of Assyria come knocking on Jerusalem's door

or Josiah who discovers this lost scroll of the Torah in the temple

So he start to reading it. He's convicted

and he institutes religious reforms to remove idolatry in Canaanite influences from the land

but Judah is just too far gone

The King right in between these two, Menassah. He's the worst by far

so he not only introduces the worship of idols statues into the Jerusalem Temple,

he also institutes child sacrifice

And so God sends prophets to say the time is up. Israel has reached the point of no return

The final chapters tell the story of the Babylonian Empire coming to invade Jerusalem destroy the temple

and carry the people and the royal line of David off into exile

and so the story ends leaving us wondering has God done with Israel

has he done with a line of David

Well, the final paragraph zooms about forty years forward into the exile

and it tells very odd story. It's about Jehoiachin, a descendant from David

who would have been king and he was back in Jerusalem

and the king of Babylon releases him from prison and invite them to eat at the Royal table for the rest of his life

and the book ends

so it's not much but it's a story that gives a glimmer of hope

that God has not abandon the line of David

so the question now is how is that going to fulfill his promises to Abraham to David

How he is going to bless the nations and bring the Messianic Kingdom

and answer those questions you have to read on into the wisdom and the prophetic books

but for now that's the Book of Kings