Christmas presents for the Bible student...

The Word for today:
2 Kings 15, 16

mark this: 2 Kings 15:1-5
and this: 2 Chronicles 26:16-21

A few challenges for the dedicated Bible student present themselves in the opening verses of today's reading:
1. Bible characters often have multiple names.
2. Information that we must have in order to understand a section of scripture is often found somewhere else in scripture.

1. Bible characters often have multiple names.
'King Azariah,' whom we meet in the opening verses of chapter fifteen, is 'King Uzziah'--best known from the awe-inspiring vision of the Lord which Isaiah sees in Isaiah 6:
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple (Isaiah 6:1).

But he is called 'Azariah' in our reading today. Get used to it. Paul, Peter, Gideon, Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, Benjamin, Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego...each are called something different at some point in the Bible. Only experience and a good Bible dictionary will help us to recognize a character by his alternative name.

2. Information that we must have in order to understand a section of scripture is often found somewhere else in scripture.

We read that King Azariah did what was right in the eyes of the LORD. Then, a verse later, we read that the LORD afflicted the king with leprosy until the day he died. What's going on here? Why is he smitten with leprosy?

We find the answer over in 2 Chronicles 26:16-21, where King Uzziah (King Azariah) had made a tragic error. He went in to the temple and offered sacrifices. The priests warned him not to do it. But he felt God would bless him. So he overstepped his parameters.

There is only one who is qualified to be both priest and king—Jesus Christ. Thus, Uzziah had distorted the picture of Jesus, so God punished him.

These Old Testament pictures of Jesus are called "types" of Christ. We've seen God carefully guard these pictures of Jesus before. The water-gushing rock in Exodus was a type of Christ (1 Cor. 10:4). It had already, by God’s command, been smitten (Exodus 17:6). Later on in Numbers 20:8-12, God tells Moses to speak to the rock and water would gush forth once again. But when Moses struck it, he was not being careful to preserve the rock as a type of Christ--because Christ the Rock is smitten only once, at his death on the cross for our sins. This picture was so important to God that Moses was unable to enter the Promised Land because, like Uzziah, he altered the picture.

When two or more passage of scripture deal with the same event--often supplementing our understanding--we call these "parallel" passages. Only experience and a good reference Bible will alert us to these parallel scriptures.

If you know a budding Bible student who is without a good Bible dictionary and a real reference Bible, then it would behoove you to think of ways to alter his/her limitations.

Christmas is coming. Hint, hint.

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