In the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah, Hoshea the son of Elah began to reign in Samaria over Israel, and he reigned nine years. 2 And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, yet not as the kings of Israel who were before him. 3 Against him came up Shalmaneser king of Assyria. And Hoshea became his vassal and paid him tribute. 4 But the king of Assyria found treachery in Hoshea, for he had sent messengers to So, king of Egypt, and offered no tribute to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year. Therefore the king of Assyria shut him up and bound him in prison. 5 Then the king of Assyria invaded all the land and came to Samaria, and for three years he besieged it.
6 In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria, and he carried the Israelites away to Assyria and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.
7 And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods8 and walked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, and in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced. 9 And the people of Israel did secretly against the Lord their God things that were not right. (II Kings 17)
This chapter has the most succinct discription of why Israel, the northern kingdom, ended up exiled and scattered. They kept going back to Egypt, the land of many idols and the land of bondage. Here they king of Israel hoped that Egypt would help deliver him from the Assyrians. By going back to Egypt - their former land of slavery - for help, they ended up not only captives, but scattered. The chapter goes on to list all the ways these people had rebelled against God and brought judgment on themselves. It is a sobering read. Like an addict who keeps going back to his old haunts, we have this tendency to fall back into old idolatries that pull us from God and His blessings. But as always, He keeps calling: "come back to Me; trust in Me; worship only Me." May we heed His voice today.
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