Wholly Buyable Chas Bayfield

A refined member of the Persian royal court plans a remarkable restoration project in his Jerusalem homeland.Without a building qualification to his name, Nehemiah becomes cheerleader for one of the greatest construction projects in the Bible, the rebuilding of Jerusalem's curtain wall.But before he can execute a project as near impossible as this one, he needs to pull off another near impossible task: getting Persia's king to let him go. Nehemiah's is a fabulous story, and it begi...

The embattled returnees discover that rebuilding their temple is fraught with opposition. Like modern day battles about planning permission and with much resistance from hostile locals who moved into the region while the Jews were in exile in Persia, a letter is sent to Persia's king. Jerusalem is in his jurisdiction and so Artaxerxes has the final say on whether the city gets a new temple. The bigger question for Ezra however, is whether his people are living according to God's rules. Withou...

Episode 100!I need to say that again.Episode 100!Almost two years into the journey and we're still only 15 books into the 66 book epic that is the Bible.Still, why rush. You see a lot more from a slower bus.You join us at the start of the Book of Ezra, an exiled Jew who has returned to Jerusalem to rebuild its temple, a project that is not without its obstacles.Fun fact: Ezra probably also wrote the Books of Kings and Chronicles.Chapters covered: Ezra 1-4Written and produced by Chas Bay...

Told differently to a different audience, the utter collapse of Judah's monarchy, its principal city and its temple still hits home.Its kings deposed or captured, the survivors are dragged to Babylon where they languish in exile for the next seven decades.A ragged bunch of survivors eventually makes it home to the wasteland that was once Jerusalem, and these are this book's original readers.Awful though the events were, the Jews are now in no doubt that obeying God in the new Israel is ...

The propaganda machine continues apace.In this episode, one of Judah's most virtuous kings, Hezekiah, reinstates the religious calendar and celebrates Passover. Then his son Manasseh, the nation's most wretched and evil ruler is given a moral makeover after and leaves the Bible both reformed and forgiven. The end destination of absolute destruction for Judah is still the same, but for those Jews who were the Books of Chronicles' first audience, it will have been an absolute cliffhan...

If nothing else, the account of the Kings of Judah who rule after David and Solomon shows a fascinating range of personalities, from psychopath to narcissist to saint, and pretty much everything in between.Given that rule one in Judah's monarchy, and in daily life for every Jew is to put God first, an amazing number of the nation's kings fail to do this.The question is, do Judah's godly kings do enough to pull the nation over he line and rescue it from destruction?Regular listener...