Thinking about this week's morning prayer lessons

All this week we have been reading form 2 Kings 20-24.

It always makes me think, and hope, about our own Episcopal Church.

Basically the readings this week start with a succession of Kings of Judah (the Kingdom has been divided by now and Israel dispersed). Each King is introduced by name, who his mother is, and "And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, as his father/brother _______ did. "

All apostate from the Covenant that God had laid out. Worshipping false gods, etc.

The comes Josiah. "And he did that which was RIGHT in the sight of the Lord...." In his eighteenth year Hilkiah the High Priest tells Shaphan the scribe that he has found the book of the Law. He brings it to the King. He rents his clothes in repentance and begins a great cleansing - destroying idolotrous shrines and priests, and keeps "a most solemn passover". He goes on to restore right worship and observance.

Now reading this far, I am always hopeful that at the Episcopal House of Bishops, or General Convention, someone will get up and read aloud the Gospels and Epistles; and as if they have been lost and now found, ECUSA will repent of its errors and be restored to righteousness according to His revelation.

Of course, we hear at the end of the righteous king Josiah's story, that God had already decided to remove the kingdom from the promised land as he removed the other 10 tribes, and send them into dispersion in Babylon, because of the great provocation of Josiah's grandfather, Mannasseh.

Josiah's successor sons, Jehoahaz and Eliakim (later renamed Jehoiakim) are as wicked as those before Josiah, and God routes out the Kingdom of Judah through the conquest of Nebuchadnezzar.

Heavenly Father, let us in the Episcopal Church hear clearly your Holy Word and Commandment and turn from our disobedience. Turn away thy fierce wrath - giving us not what we deserve - but have mercy on us through the merit and mediation of Jesus Christ our Saviour.
Let everyone say AMEN!
And sing a Kyrie Eleison as well!
And keep praying through our Diocesan Convention October 26-27.