History Repeats Itself (But It Does Not Have To)

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate” (Matt 23:37-38).

When Jesus spoke these ominous words about Jerusalem's destruction, his lament was prophetic yet also eerily familiar, recalling dark epochs of earlier history. A pattern had emerged. History repeats itself. Due to Israel's unwillingness to repent, Jerusalem, the epicenter of religious life, was about to be destroyed. But this was not the first time the city would be left desolate nor was it the first time tears had been shed over her dreadful condition.

Just as people refused to hear the prophets' many calls for repentance which ultimately lead to the first temple (built under Solomon) being destroyed, many refused to hear Christ's calls for repentance. Such obstinate refusal to face one's own need to change resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple all over again in 70 AD. Israel had ample historical warning of the woes that would come upon her for forsaking the Lord of the covenant. After all, the curse of exile and desolation as a result of sinning against God was firmly embedded in the Law from the start (Lev 26:31-33). How much did they listen? How much did they learn from previous examples? The dread of desolation was once again decreed. History repeated itself.

Furthermore, we see this pattern emerge even before Solomon's temple was built, let alone destroyed. Shiloh, not Jerusalem, was originally the epicenter of cultural and religious life in Israel. Jerusalem had long remained a Canaanite stronghold, even after Israel entered the Promised Land. So it did not serve as the nation's capital until much later. Upon the (incomplete!) conquest of Canaan, the tabernacle was erected at Shiloh (Josh 18:1). At Shiloh, Joshua finished allotting lands to seven remaining tribes who had yet to receive their inheritances (Josh 18:2). People first made yearly pilgrimages to Shiloh instead of Jerusalem, a tradition which survived the period of the Judges into the transitional time of Samuel (Judges 21:19; 1 Sam 1:3). That any bit of religious life survived the period of Judges is remarkable in itself, for we see that Canaanite culture had continued to pollute the people by the time of First Samuel. Eli the priest could not distinguish prayer from drunkenness (1 Sam 1:13); his "priestly" sons were fornicating with women at the tabernacle (1 Sam 2:22); and the family fattened themselves on sacrifices meant to be wholly dedicated to God (1 Sam 2:29).

Shiloh was the religious epicenter of Israel but the contempt of the priests mirrored the people in general. Worship of Yahweh had almost totally been eclipsed by idolatry and immorality. The voice of Moses and the commands of Joshua to serve Yahweh alone had long been ignored. Repentance was far off. And a familiar tune was about to be played. The religious epicenter of God's people was about to fall into enemy hands.

Israel went out to battle the Philistines, but it did not go well. "Israel was defeated" and "four thousand" soldiers died (1 Sam 4:2). With intended irony, the author of Samuel tells us that Israel had stationed their war efforts at "Ebenezer" which means "stone of help." But Israel, instead of remembering the Lord as their only help, had completely forgotten him long ago.

The irony is further illustrated by the elders' response to the defeat: "And when the people came to the camp, the elders of Israel said, 'Why has the LORD defeated us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the covenant of the LORD here from Shiloh, that it may come among us and save us from the power of our enemies (1 Sam 4:3).'" The people remember that they had forgotten to parade the ark of the covenant into battle. But was God teaching them simply to remember to bring a piece of furniture into battle next time? Even more than forgetting the ark, they had forgotten "the LORD of hosts, who is enthroned on the cherubim (1 Sam 4:4)."

Off they went to fetch the ark. And two priests came with it from Shiloh, Eli's two sons (1 Sam 4:4). Inside the ark was the Law that the priests and the people continually broke, the very tablets Moses received on Sinai. Yet they did not see their own insidious sin when they looked in the mirror nor their need for forgiveness. They had forgotten Yahweh. But at least they had the ark! And when they brought it into battle, things went even worse than before. Israel was defeated; 30,000 troops died; the ark was captured; and Eli's sons died (1 Sam 4:10-11). Yahweh was not a genie in a bottle at the whim of the people; the ark was not a magic talisman to wave over a festering wound of faithlessness. Such thinking was, as Dale Ralph Davis says, "rabbit-foot theology."

On several occasions in the Old Testament, the debacle of Shiloh is used as a reminder and a warning. God spoke through Jeremiah of imminent desolation coming to Jerusalem just like Shiloh.

"Go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where I made my name dwell at first, and see what I did to it because of the evil of my people Israel. And now, because you have done all these things, declares the LORD, and when I spoke to you persistently you did not listen, and when I called you, you did not answer, therefore I will do to the house that is called by my name, and in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your fathers, as I did to Shiloh” (Jer 7:12-14, see Ps 78:56-64). Just like the people of Samuel's day with the ark, the people in Jeremiah's day deceived themselves with superstition, as if the temple could not fall because of its God-given prominence in religious life. The Lord warned them of such folly: "Do not trust in these deceptive words: 'This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD’” (Jer 7:4).

Agonizingly, the people did not listen and history was repeated. Jerusalem fell, and it would fall again in 70 AD just as Shiloh did at first. The stones came tumbling down.

But that was Israel. What about us? When Jesus pronounced his woes on Jerusalem and foretold its imminent destruction, he not only warned the first century but every following generation. Intertwined with the oracle against Jerusalem was Christ's promise of his imminent return for all to heed. The days preceding Christ's return will be full of apostasy and betrayal, false teachings and fake messiahs, phony converts getting drunk with the end-of-the-age versions of Hophni and Phinehas and continuing to live in hypocrisy—a religion that carries Christ around in a box but does not worship him in the heart (Matt 24:10-51).

Friends, is Christ the religious epicenter of your life? Are there words of warnings that you have been ignoring? When is the last time you looked into the mirror of God's Word and were lead to repentance? Have you descended into parading God around in superstition or are you delighting in Christ's glory?

Take heart, beloved! Remember Christ is our Stone of Help! May Christ always be before our eyes! And may we find that, in Christ, history will not repeat itself with us. When Christ comes, the righteous will go into eternal life to dwell with him forever (Matt 25:46)! Praise the Lord that he shed his blood for us and that our Father's kindness brings us to repentance!

Here I raise my Ebenezer;
hither by thy help I’m come;
and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
wandering from the fold of God;
he, to rescue me from danger,
interposed his precious blood.

- Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing -