Exile and

Anticipating
God's Restoration
2 Chronicles 36:17-23
Israel’s Decline in the Old Testament
Marriage to
Canaanites (love life)

Idolatry (spiritual life)

Forsaking of Sabbath
(worship & family life)
Forgetting the
Torah and Temple
(community life)

Moral and spiritual

bankruptcy (whole life)
1. Listen to God’s reminders
before it is late
Some signs that we’ve been ignoring God
• You’re being insensitive to His Word even if you’re
drifting away from Him already
• You’re in the habit of sinning even when God is
convicting you thru His Spirit
• You’re already defensive of your lifestyle and have
rejected any rebuke and correction
• You’re not seeking and longing for God anymore
2 Chronicles 36:17 (ESV)

Therefore, he brought up against them the king of

the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with
the sword in the house of their sanctuary and
had no compassion on young man or virgin, old
man or aged. He gave them all into his hand.
A. Your life and the people around you will be
affected if you do not change your course from sin
2 Kings 25:2-3 (ESV)
2 Sothe city was besieged till the eleventh year of
King Zedekiah. 3 On the ninth day of the fourth
month the famine was so severe in the city that
there was no food for the people of the land.
2 Kings 25:4 (ESV)

Then a breach was made in the city, and all the

men of war fled by night by the way of the gate
between the two walls, by the king’s garden, and
the Chaldeans were around the city. And they
went in the direction of the Arabah.
2 Kings 25:5 (ESV)

But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king

and overtook him in the plains of Jericho, and all
his army was scattered from him.
2 Kings 25:6 (ESV)

Then they captured the king band brought him up

to the king of Babylon at Riblah, and they passed
sentence on him.
2 Kings 25:7 (ESV)

They slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his

eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah and
bound him in chains and took him to Babylon.
B. Your own relationship with God and you
community will be greatly damaged.
2 Kings 25:8 (ESV)

In the fifth month, on the seventh day of the

month—that was the nineteenth year of King
Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon—Nebuzaradan,
the captain of the bodyguard, a servant of the
king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem.
The Babylonian
Exile - 586 BC
(2 Kings 25:1-21;
2 Chron 36:17-21)
2 Kings 25:9-10 (ESV)

And he burned the house of the LORD and the

king’s house and all the houses of Jerusalem;
every great house he burned down. And all the
army of the Chaldeans, who were with the
captain of the guard, broke down the walls
around Jerusalem.
2 Chronicles 36:18 (ESV)

And all the vessels of the house of God, great

and small, and the treasures of the house of the
LORD, and the treasures of the king and of his
princes, all these he brought to Babylon.
2 Chronicles 36:19 (ESV)

And they burned the house of God and broke

down the wall of Jerusalem and burned all its
palaces with fire and destroyed all its precious
vessels.
2 Kings 25:11 (ESV)

And the rest of the people who were left in the

city and the deserters who had deserted to the
king of Babylon, together with the rest of the
multitude, Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard
carried into exile.
2 Kings 25:12 (ESV)

But the captain of the guard left some of the

poorest of the land to be vinedressers and
plowmen.
2. Yield to God’s discipline
to correct you
Hebreo 12:5-6 (MBB)
5Anak ko, huwag mong baliwalain ang
pagtutuwid ng Panginoon, at huwag kang
panghihinaan ng loob kapag ikaw ay dinidisiplina
niya. 6 Sapagkat dinidisiplina ng Panginoon ang
mga minamahal niya, at pinapalo ang itinuturing
niyang anak.”
A. God’s discipline is for the purpose of restoration
2 Chronicles 36:20-21 (ESV)

He took into exile in Babylon those who had

escaped from the sword, and they became
servants to him and to his sons until the
establishment of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill
the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah,
until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. All the
days that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill
seventy years.
John D. Currid, ESV Bible Atlas, Crossway, 2010.
B. God’s discipline is a means to reveal Himself
Jeremiah 29:10-11 (ESV)

“For thus says the LORD: When seventy years are

completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will
fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to
this place. For I know the plans I have for you,
declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for
evil, to give you a future and a hope.
Jeremiah 25:11-12 (ESV)

This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste,

and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon
seventy years. Then after seventy years are
completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and
that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their
iniquity, declares the LORD, making the land an
everlasting waste.
Awit 137:1-3 (MBB)
1 Sa pampang ng mga ilog nitong bansang Babilonia,
kami'y nakaupong tumatangis,
sa tuwing Zion, aming naaalala.
2 Sa sanga ng mga kahoy, sa tabi ng ilog nila,

isinabit namin doon, yaong dala naming lira.

3 Sa amin ay iniutos ng sa amin ay lumupig,

na aliwin namin sila, ng matamis naming tinig,

tungkol sa Zion, yaong paksa, niyong nais nilang awit.
Awit 137:4-6 (MBB)
4 Ang awit para kay Yahweh, pa'no namin aawitin,
samantalang kami'y bihag sa lupaing hindi amin?
5 Ayaw ko nang ang lira ko'y hawakan pa at tugtugin,

kung ang bunga sa pagtugtog, limutin ang Jerusalem;

6 di na ako aawit pa, kung ang aking sasapitin

sa isip ko't alaala, ika'y ganap na limutin,

kung ang kaligayahan ko ay sa iba ko hahanapin.
Jeremiah 29:12-14 (ESV)

Then you will call upon me and come and pray to

me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and
find me, when you seek me with all your heart.
Jeremiah 29:14 (ESV)

I will be found by you, declares the LORD, band I

will restore your fortunes and gather you from all
the nations and all the places where I have driven
you, declares the LORD, and I will bring you back
to the place from which I sent you into exile.
3. Trust in God’s process
to restore and transform you
2 Chronicles 36:22 (ESV)

Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that

the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah
might be fulfilled, the LORD stirred up the spirit
of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a
proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also
put it in writing:
2 Chronicles 36:23 (ESV)

Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, ‘The LORD, the

God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of
the earth, and he has charged me to build him a
house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is
among you of all his people, may the LORD his
God be with him. Let him go up.’
Isaiah 40:1-2 (ESV)
1 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that her warfare is ended,
that her iniquity is pardoned,
that she has received from the LORD’S hand
double for all her sins.
Isaiah 40:3 (ESV)
3 A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Isaiah 40:4-5 (ESV)
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5 And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,

and all flesh shall see it together,

for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
When you are being disciplined...
• Repent of any identified sin and make amends with
those you have wronged or offended
• Identify and focus on the root problems that make
you weak and exposed to temptation and sin
• Grow intentionally and reinforce the areas in you life
where you are weak and have been negligible (e.g.
spiritual life, thought life, family life, character)
• Grow in humility, being teachable, and being sensitive
to God's Word and His Spirit's work
When you are being disciplined...
• Make a stand against any wrong influence in your life,
and commit to God your every thought, every action,
and every decision that He would consecrate it.
• Grow with a stronger and more passionate love for
God so that you will be keen to keep His commands
and live in His truth.
We may want to avoid pain and suffering,
But as we go through them, God is preparing
us for a future hope: a city (heaven/new
Jerusalem), a citizenship (as God’s people), and a
King (Jesus) that will last for eternity.
Discussion
1. Anong pangyayari sa buhay mo ang maihahalintulad
mo sa pagkawasak ng Jerusalem at ng Templo, at ano
ang itinuro o ipinaalala sa iyo ng Diyos sa pamamagitan
nito?
2. Ano ang mahalagang nangyari sa mga Hudyo sa
kanilang 70 years na exile sa Babylon? Ano ang
puwedeng mangyari kung saglit lang nangyari ito?
3. Papaano mahuhubog ang iyong puso at buhay na
magkaroon ng tapat at lumalalim na pag-ibig para sa
Diyos at sa Kanyang Salita?