Rachel and the Kings of the Bible

Rachel's 3rd grade reader from Rod and Staff' is based on the Bible. It started out with stories about King David and King Solomon, but we are starting to get into some of the lesser known stories of subsequent kings after Israel was split into two kingdoms. For a nine-year-old, it's some pretty heavy stuff, full of wicked kings who worshiped idols and practiced all sorts of evil. It's interesting to listen to her commentary as she reads through her lesson.

Today she was reading about one of the few good kings during that time period: Judah's good King Asa who trusted in the Lord and whose heart was perfect for almost his entire reign. Towards the end, however, he called on the Syrians to help him when Israel attacked. The Lord was displeased and sent a prophet to tell him that he had done foolishly and as a result would have wars from then on.

"I think that if a prophet gave me a message that I didn't like," commented Rachel, "that I would just tell him, 'Geez, you could have at least said it nicelier.'"

She continued reading. "'Asa did not like this message of the prophet.' She paused and gave me a 'told-you-so' look. "See? He should have said something like, 'Hey, if you listen to me and don't get mad, I'll give you a free camel or a nice wife or something.'"

"'He was so angry with him that he put him into prison.'" Rachel stopped. "Mom?" she said."What was the name of that one king with the shriveled up hand?"

"Jeroboam?" I replied.

"Yeah. At least when the prophet told him news he didn't like, he just said, 'Get out of here.' He didn't throw him into prison!"

She continued. "'The Lord caused Asa to get a very serious disease in his feet.' Have you ever gotten a serious disease in your feet, Mom?"

"No, I never have."

'"Instead of going to the Lord for help, Asa went to doctors.' Wait--they had doctors back then?"

"Yes, they had doctors."

"Oh, let me guess. They were probably the kind of doctors that didn't do any good and just used a lot of spices, right?"

"Well, they had some treatments that worked, but they didn't have all the things they do nowadays. But still, only God can truly heal. Doctors can help, too, but we should always remember to pray and ask God to heal us," I explained.

"The doctors can do things like cut bad parts out of our bodies that don't work right, but God has to heal our skin back together. So it's kind of like God and the doctors work together," Rachel added.

"Exactly!"

Rachel returned to her story. "'But the doctors could not cure his disease. Two years after Asa got the disease, he died. He had been king for nearly forty-one years.' Is that as long as David was king?"

"Well, I think David was king for forty years, actually. So they were king for just about the same amount of time."

"How come there's a whole lot of chapters about David and only one about Asa, then?"

"I don't know--I guess they thought David was more important. Keep going."

"'He was buried in the grave that he had made for himself in the city of David.' That's kind of selfish, making a grave for yourself. He should have made a grave for his father and someone else should have made his grave."

"Like who?"

"Like his wife or his kids." Rachel tried to read the next name. "'Je..Je...'"

"Jehoshaphat."

"'Jehoshaphat his son reigned as king in his place.' Who would name their kid Jehoshaphat! What a stupid name."

And it went on like this, all the way to the end of the chapter. The next chapter is about Ahab and Jezebel. That ought to be interesting. By the time she's finished 3rd grade, I think she'll have a better grasp on Bible history than most Jeopardy contestants I've seen.