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2 Chronicles 29:1-32:33

The Passover Was Kept with Great Gladness

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The Passover Was Kept with Great Gladness

2 Chronicles 29:1-32:33

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The Passover Was Kept with Great Gladness

2 Chronicles 29:1-32:33

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About this song

This song belongs to the 2 Chronicles collection. One recording is available to play here, with the complete lyrics below.

Bible book
2 Chronicles
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2 Chronicles
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[Verse 1] Hezekiah begins reigning and opens the temple doors in his first year. The king confesses that the fathers shut doors, extinguished lamps. Named Levites arise and cleanse the house over eight days. Hezekiah gathers rulers early and brings sevenfold sin offerings. [Pre-Chorus] The long night ended, fear released its hold, And every household heard the story told. [Chorus] The Passover Was Kept with Great Gladness, let the feast begin, Joy returned where grief and fear had been. The people sang because the word held true, And every generation learned what God could do. [Verse 2] Couriers invite Israel and Judah to keep Passover in the second month. Many northern hearers mock, but some humble themselves and come. A very great congregation removes false altars from Jerusalem. Passover joy extends through a second seven-day feast. [Bridge] Sennacherib invades, and Hezekiah stops outer waters and strengthens Jerusalem's defenses. Assyrian servants and letters blaspheme God and terrify the city. Hezekiah and Isaiah pray, and an angel destroys the enemy's mighty men and leaders. After sickness, sign, pride, humbling, wealth, and testing by Babylonian envoys, Hezekiah dies in honor. [Final Chorus] The Passover Was Kept with Great Gladness, let the feast begin, Joy returned where grief and fear had been. The people sang because the word held true, And every generation learned what mercy still could do. [Outro] The feast became a memory to keep. Joy learned the name of those who once would weep.

Named in this songHezekiahJerusalemIsaiah

About the passage

2 Chronicles 29: The doors open, the house is cleansed, and the music returns

Hezekiah begins his reign at the doors his father shut. In the first month of the first year, he opens and repairs the temple, calls priests and Levites back to their responsibilities, and names the neglect of the house as part of Judah's recent disaster. The cleansing takes sixteen days and depends on named workers performing distinct tasks. Objects discarded under Ahaz are recovered and sanctified, but a clean building is only the beginning. Offerings are made for the kingdom, sanctuary, Judah, and expressly for all Israel. Then sacrifice and music begin together according to the inherited arrangements associated with David and the prophets. The restoration is orderly without pretending to be effortless. When the congregation brings offerings in abundance, too few priests are ready, so Levites help until the work is done. The chapter ends with rejoicing at something achieved suddenly, but not magically. Sixteen days of cleansing, renewed sacrifice, recovered instruments, sanctified ministers, and a people's unexpected response stand behind the open doors.

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2 Chronicles 30: A delayed Passover gathers a divided people

The reopened temple creates a new problem: Passover cannot be kept at its normal time because too few priests are prepared and the people have not yet gathered. Hezekiah, the princes, and the congregation therefore choose the second month and send invitations from Beersheba to Dan. The old political division remains, but the call imagines Israel as one people before the LORD. Some northern communities laugh the messengers to scorn, while others humble themselves and come. The gathering that results is large, joyful, and imperfect. Rival altars are cleared from Jerusalem, yet many participants are not ritually clean and eat "otherwise than it was written." Hezekiah does not pretend the requirement vanished. He asks pardon for those whose hearts are prepared to seek God, and the LORD hears. The feast then runs seven days and, by common decision, another seven. Judah, northern Israelites, priests, Levites, and resident strangers rejoice together. The chapter makes room for mercy without rewriting disobedience as compliance, and for unity without pretending the kingdoms have politically reunited.

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2 Chronicles 31: After the feast come the fields, the storehouses, and the portions

The great feast ends, but Hezekiah's reform becomes more concrete after the crowd goes home. Participants destroy rival worship sites across Judah, Benjamin, Ephraim, and Manasseh, then return to their own cities. Hezekiah turns from exceptional celebration to recurring service: priestly and Levitical courses, daily offerings, sabbaths, new moons, feasts, and the regular material support required to sustain them. The people's response creates literal heaps of grain, wine, oil, honey, animals, and consecrated goods. When the king sees the abundance, he does not merely admire it. He asks whether the ministers are being fed, and the chief priest explains that they have enough and the visible heaps are the surplus. Storehouses and named administrators then turn abundance into accountable distribution, including the priestly cities and families living away from Jerusalem. The chapter closes with genealogies, ages, wives, sons, daughters, and daily portions. Hezekiah's wholehearted seeking of God is shown here not through one dramatic prayer but through storage rooms, registers, fair portions, and the ordinary machinery that keeps worship functioning.

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