Year 6, Day 322: 2 Chronicles 23

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Appetite

• Appetite: We all have needs that need to be filled.  When we allow ourselves to be filled with the people and things that God brings into our life, we will be satisfied because our In will be in proper focus.  But when we try to fill ourselves with our own desires we end up frustrated by an insatiable hunger.

Human lust always amazes me.  When I use the word lust, there, I’m not talking about just in a sexuality sense.  Lust is an uncontrollable urge for anything about which we are passionate.  Usually we use it in terms of sexuality because that is one of our most uncontrollable urges.  But it can apply to anything, especially when we are focusing on human appetite.

As we read through this chapter, we hear about how Athaliah is deposed.  It’s a pretty good coup.  The priests respect the temple and its purity.  They people get behind the coup.  All in all, it’s really well done.

However, notice what the people do once the coup is over.  In fact, the Bible gives us the idea that this is done immediately after the coup is over.  They go to the temple of Ba’al and tear it down.  Oh yeah.  The temple of Ba’al was in Jerusalem - in God’s holy city!

Kudos to the people for tearing it down.  I can only imagine how offensive that must have been to God.  He hand-picked that city to be His domain on the earth.  Then someone, probably the leaders in the city, think it is a good idea to put up a false temple to an illegitimate god in God’s holy city.  Only human appetite – uncontrollable lust – could lead to a decision of that magnitude.

The problem is that this actually hits home quite well.  Am I not a priest in God’s kingdom under Christ?  Is not my body God’s temple?  How often do my sinful lusts, my sinful human passions and my sinful human appetite, corrupt God’s temple within me?

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