2 Chronicles 29
29
Hezekiah rules
1Hezekiah became king when he was 25 years old, and he ruled for twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Abijah; she was Zechariah’s daughter. 2He did what was right in the LORD’s eyes, just as his ancestor David had done. 3In the very first year of his rule, during the first month, Hezekiah reopened the doors of the LORD’s temple, having repaired them. 4Then he brought in the priests and Levites and assembled them in the eastern square.
5“Listen to me, you Levites!” he said. “Make yourselves holy so you can make holy the temple of the LORD God of your ancestors by removing from the sanctuary any impure thing. 6Our ancestors were unfaithful and did what was evil in the LORD our God’s eyes. They abandoned him, they ignored the LORD’s dwelling, and they defied him. 7They even closed the doors of the entrance hall, snuffed out the lamps, and stopped burning incense and offering entirely burned offerings in the sanctuary of the God of Israel. 8This angered the LORD so much that he made Judah and Jerusalem an object of terror and horror, something people hiss at, as you can see with your own eyes. 9That’s why our ancestors died violent deaths, while our sons, daughters, and wives were taken captive. 10But now I intend to make a covenant with the LORD, Israel’s God, so God will no longer be angry with us. 11Don’t be careless, my sons! The LORD has chosen you to stand in his presence to serve him, so that you can be his servants and burn incense to him.”
12Then the following Levites got up:
from the descendants of the Kohathites: Mahath, Amasai’s son, and Joel, Azariah’s son;
from the descendants of Merari: Kish, Abdi’s son, and Azariah, Jehallelel’s son;
from the Gershonites: Joah, Zimmah’s son, and Eden, Joah’s son;
13from the descendants of Elizaphan: Shimri and Jeuel;
from the descendants of Asaph: Zechariah and Mattaniah;
14from the descendants of Heman: Jehuel and Shimei;
and from the descendants of Jeduthun: Shemaiah and Uzziel.
15These men gathered their relatives, made themselves holy, and went in to purify the LORD’s temple by obeying the king’s command as the LORD had told him. 16The priests went in to purify the inner portion of the LORD’s temple. They brought out to the courtyard of the LORD’s temple all the impurities they discovered inside. Then the Levites took them out to the Kidron Valley. 17They began to make things holy on the first day of the first month.#29.17 March–April, Nisan On the eighth day of the month they reached the LORD’s entrance hall. They made holy the LORD’s temple for eight days, finishing on the sixteenth day of the first month.
18Then they went before King Hezekiah. “We have purified the LORD’s entire temple,” they said, “and the altar for the entirely burned offering together with all its equipment, and the table for the stacks of bread together with all its equipment. 19We have also restored and made holy all the items King Ahaz threw out during his rule in his unfaithfulness. They are now before the LORD’s altar.”
Hezekiah rededicates the temple
20Early the next morning Hezekiah gathered the city leaders and went to the LORD’s temple. 21They brought seven bulls, seven rams, and seven lambs, along with seven male goats, for a purification offering on behalf of the kingdom, the sanctuary, and Judah. Hezekiah ordered the priests, Aaron’s sons, to offer them up on the LORD’s altar. 22When they slaughtered the bulls, the priests took the blood and splashed it against the altar. Next they slaughtered the rams and splashed their blood against the altar, and also slaughtered the lambs, splashing their blood against the altar as well. 23Finally, they brought the goats for the purification offering before the king and the assembly. After laying their hands on them, 24the priests slaughtered them and smeared the blood on the altar as a purification offering to take away the sin of all Israel, because the king had specifically ordered that the entirely burned sacrifice and the purification offering should be on behalf of all Israel. 25Hezekiah had the Levites stand in the LORD’s temple with cymbals, harps, and zithers, just as the LORD had ordered through David, the king’s seer Gad, and the prophet Nathan. 26While the Levites took their places holding David’s instruments, and the priests their trumpets, 27Hezekiah ordered the entirely burned offering to be offered up on the altar. As they began to offer the entirely burned offering, the LORD’s song also began, accompanied by the trumpets and the other instruments of Israel’s King David. 28The whole congregation worshipped with singing choirs and blaring trumpets until the end of the entirely burned offering. 29After the entirely burned offering was complete, the king and all who were with him bowed down in worship. 30Then King Hezekiah and the leaders ordered the Levites to praise the LORD by using the words of David and the seer Asaph. They did so joyously; then they bowed down in worship too.
31“Now that you have dedicated yourselves to the LORD,” King Hezekiah told them, “bring sacrificial thank offerings to the LORD’s temple.” So the assembly brought sacrificial thank offerings, with some people volunteering to provide entirely burned offerings. 32All in all, the congregation brought seventy bulls, a hundred rams, and two hundred lambs as entirely burned offerings for the LORD, 33as well as six hundred bulls and three thousand sheep as holy offerings. 34Unfortunately, there weren’t enough priests to skin all these entirely burned offerings. So their relatives the Levites (who had been more conscientious about preparing themselves than the priests) stepped in and helped them until the work was done or additional priests had made themselves holy. 35In addition to the wealth of entirely burned offerings, there was the fat of the well-being sacrifices and drink offerings accompanying the entirely burned offerings. In this way, the service of the LORD’s temple was restored, 36and Hezekiah and all the people rejoiced at what God had done for them, since it had happened so quickly.
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2 Chronicles 29: CEB
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2011 Common English Bible. All rights reserved.
2 Chronicles 29
29
King Hezekiah
1-2Hezekiah became king when he was twenty-five years old and was king in Jerusalem for twenty-nine years. His mother was Abijah daughter of Zechariah. In God’s opinion he was a good king; he kept to the standards of his ancestor David.
3-9In the first month of the first year of his reign, Hezekiah, having first repaired the doors of The Temple of God, threw them open to the public. He assembled the priests and Levites in the court on the east side and said, “Levites, listen! Consecrate yourselves and consecrate The Temple of God—give this much-defiled place a good housecleaning. Our ancestors went wrong and lived badly before God—they discarded him, turned away from this house where we meet with God, and walked off. They boarded up the doors, turned out the lights, and canceled all the acts of worship of the God of Israel in the holy Temple. And because of that, God’s anger flared up and he turned those people into a public exhibit of disaster, a moral history lesson—look and read! This is why our ancestors were killed, and this is why our wives and sons and daughters were taken prisoner and made slaves.
10-11“I have decided to make a covenant with the God of Israel and turn history around so that God will no longer be angry with us. Children, don’t drag your feet in this! God has chosen you to take your place before him to serve in conducting and leading worship—this is your life work; make sure you do it and do it well.”
12-17The Levites stood at attention: Mahath son of Amasai and Joel son of Azariah from the Kohathites; Kish son of Abdi and Azariah son of Jehallelel from the Merarites; Joah son of Zimmah and Eden son of Joah from the Gershonites; Shimri and Jeiel sons of Elizaphan; Zechariah and Mattaniah sons of Asaph; Jehiel and Shimei of the family of Heman; Shemaiah and Uzziel of the family of Jeduthun. They presented themselves and their brothers, consecrated themselves, and set to work cleaning up The Temple of God as the king had directed—as God directed! The priests started from the inside and worked out; they emptied the place of the accumulation of defiling junk—pagan rubbish that had no business in that holy place—and the Levites hauled it off to the Kidron Valley. They began the Temple cleaning on the first day of the first month and by the eighth day they had worked their way out to the porch—eight days it took them to clean and consecrate The Temple itself, and in eight more days they had finished with the entire Temple complex.
18-19Then they reported to Hezekiah the king, “We have cleaned up the entire Temple of God, including the Altar of Whole-Burnt-Offering and the Table of the Bread of the Presence with their furnishings. We have also cleaned up and consecrated all the vessels which King Ahaz had gotten rid of during his misrule. Take a look; we have repaired them. They’re all there in front of the Altar of God.”
20-24Then Hezekiah the king went to work: He got all the leaders of the city together and marched to The Temple of God. They brought with them seven bulls, seven rams, seven lambs, and seven he-goats to sacrifice as an Absolution-Offering for the royal family, for the Sanctuary, and for Judah as a whole; he directed the Aaronite priests to sacrifice them on the Altar of God. The priests butchered the bulls and then took the blood and sprinkled it on the Altar, and then the same with the rams and lambs. Finally they brought the goats up; the king and congregation laid their hands upon them. The priests butchered them and made an Absolution-Offering with their blood at the Altar to atone for the sin of all Israel—the king had ordered that the Whole-Burnt-Offering and the Absolution-Offering be for all Israel.
25-26The king ordered the Levites to take their places in The Temple of God with their musical instruments—cymbals, harps, zithers—following the original instructions of David, Gad the king’s seer, and Nathan the prophet; this was God’s command conveyed by his prophets. The Levites formed the orchestra of David, while the priests took up the trumpets.
27-30Then Hezekiah gave the signal to begin: The Whole-Burnt-Offering was offered on the Altar; at the same time the sacred choir began singing, backed up by the trumpets and the David orchestra while the entire congregation worshiped. The singers sang and the trumpeters played all during the sacrifice of the Whole-Burnt-Offering. When the offering of the sacrifice was completed, the king and everyone there knelt to the ground and worshiped. Then Hezekiah the king and the leaders told the Levites to finish things off with anthems of praise to God using lyrics by David and Asaph the seer. They sang their praises with joy and reverence, kneeling in worship.
31-35Hezekiah then made this response: “The dedication is complete—you’re consecrated to God. Now you’re ready: Come forward and bring your sacrifices and Thank-Offerings to The Temple of God.”
And come they did. Everyone in the congregation brought sacrifices and Thank-Offerings and some, overflowing with generosity, even brought Whole-Burnt-Offerings, a generosity expressed in seventy bulls, a hundred rams, and two hundred lambs—all for Whole-Burnt-Offerings for God! The total number of animals consecrated for sacrifice that day amounted to six hundred bulls and three thousand sheep. They ran out of priests qualified to slaughter all the Whole-Burnt-Offerings so their brother Levites stepped in and helped out while other priests consecrated themselves for the work. It turned out that the Levites had been more responsible in making sure they were properly consecrated than the priests had been. Besides the overflow of Whole-Burnt-Offerings there were also choice pieces for the Peace-Offerings and lavish libations that went with the Whole-Burnt-Offerings. The worship in The Temple of God was on a firm footing again!
36Hezekiah and the congregation celebrated: God had established a firm foundation for the lives of the people—and so quickly!
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.