The Power of Grace

OT: 2 Kings 25
NT: Matthew 3

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2 Kings 25:27-30 — In the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the year Evil-Merodach became king of Babylon, he released Jehoiachin from prison on the twenty-seventh day of the twelfth month. He spoke kindly to him and gave him a seat of honor higher than those of the other kings who were with him in Babylon. So Jehoiachin put aside his prison clothes and for the rest of his life ate regularly at the king’s table. Day by day the king gave Jehoiachin a regular allowance as long as he lived.


Many Christians have chosen to largely ignore the Old Testament in favor of studying the New because they see two different sides of God in the two volumes. In the New Testament, they see a God of grace and love, who sent His one and only Son to die on the cross for the world. But in the Old Testament, these same Christians see a wrathful, unkind God who is hardly loving and graceful. This view is very sad, for the same God exists in both testaments and His grace and love are lined up side-by-side with His justice and wrath in both places. As I study the Scriptures, the more I am convinced that God has not changed. His grace is just as powerful in the time of Christ as it was in the time of Zedekiah, the last official king of Judah.

Judah was a nation under God's judgment and Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, saw to it that the judgment of God was exacted on the Jewish country. The temple was burned, the walls knocked down, the people carried into exile, and the land bullied by foreign leaders and armies. But God did not stop with wrath. He continued with grace towards the line of David, to whom He had made an unconditional promise hundreds of years earlier. God preserved Jehoiachin, son of Josiah, in exile and, through the new king of Babylon, blessed him the rest of his life. How marvelous is the power of God's grace to the undeserving! Even in the midst of horrid sin, His grace exists. And His promises never fail. Have you experienced this?

Be God's.