As we saw last post , Israel had been taken captive because of their sin, as seen in 2 Kings 17:7-17.
The first sin mentioned in this passage is that of worshiping idols:
They worshiped other gods 8 and followed the practices of the nations the LORD had driven out before them, as well as the practices that the kings of Israel had introduced. 9 The Israelites secretly did things against the LORD their God that were not right. From watchtower to fortified city they built themselves high places in all their towns. 10 They set up sacred stones and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every spreading tree. 11 At every high place they burned incense, as the nations whom the LORD had driven out before them had done. They did wicked things that provoked the LORD to anger. 12 They worshiped idols, though the LORD had said, "You shall not do this." [a] 13 The LORD warned Israel and Judah through all his prophets and seers: "Turn from your evil ways. Observe my commands and decrees, in accordance with the entire Law that I commanded your fathers to obey and that I delivered to you through my servants the prophets."14 But they would not listen and were as stiff-necked as their fathers, who did not trust in the LORD their God. 15 They rejected his decrees and the covenant he had made with their fathers and the warnings he had given them. They followed worthless idols and themselves became worthless. They imitated the nations around them although the LORD had ordered them, "Do not do as they do," and they did the things the LORD had forbidden them to do.
"High places" were altars and structures built to worship false gods. As we see in verses 11 through 15, the Israelites began to burn incense to the very gods of the pagan peoples who had occupied the land before them. Notice that they are called "worthless idols."
I have heard a story of a family in a Hindu nation which had two wooden statues that they worhiped as gods. The son asked his father one day why they worshiped these worthless statues of wood. The father replied that they were not just wooden statues, but rather gods of immense power. Weeks later, the father came home from work to find that an expensive vase shattered in pieces on the ground. He became incensed with his son and began to scold him about breaking the vase.
When the son denied doing the deed, the father asked him, "Who, then could possibly have done it?"
The boy replied "Perhaps it was your gods who broke the vase."
The father became even angrier still, saying "They are made of wood! They couldn't possibly do it!"
The son had exposed these gods of "immense power" as worthless wooden dolls.
