2 Kings 12:9
But Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it beside the altar, on the right side as one cometh into the house of the LORD: and the priests that kept the door put therein all the money that was brought into the house of the LORD.
The verse belongs to the closing account of the beginning of the reign of Joash in Judah under the good priest Jehoiada. It follows the proclaiming of Joash, the true king hidden until old enough to be made king, and the slaying of Athaliah, in a history in which Judah had now and then good kings but Israel's kings were invariably weak or altogether bad. In the larger scope of the books it stands in 2 Kings 12-14, part of the history running from 1 Kings 22 through 2 Kings 20. In that history the books of Kings are fuller in the history of Israel than in the history of Judah, while Chronicles are fuller in the history of Judah than in that of Israel.
The repair of the temple had become necessary because Athaliah had robbed the house of the Lord of its wealth and furnishings to supply the house of Baal. The repair reflects Joash's determination from religious concern to repair the house of God in Jerusalem. He was another young king, about thirty years old, who two centuries before Josiah repaired the temple in a similar way to Josiah, using money that had been collected and brought in for repairing the house of God.
This arrangement came in the twenty-third year of King Joash, after he had grown to manhood in the king's office, when Jehoiada was an old man dependent on his assistants and had neglected the repair of the temple. Jehoiada established the collection by taking a chest, boring a hole in its lid, and setting it beside the altar on the right side near the entrance as one comes into the house of the Lord. The priests who kept or guarded the door put therein all the money brought into the house of the Lord.
The money put into the chest was the annual half shekel commanded through Moses from every man twenty years old and upward for the service of the tabernacle and later the temple. That tax had been neglected because of the backslidden condition of the people, so gathering it was a difficult and disagreeable task. The chest provided a secure, visible way to gather donations for repairing the temple after earlier funds had not been used for that work. The money for the repair was thus raised and provided before the work was undertaken.
The account teaches God's people to carry out sacred building work with funds already provided rather than by borrowing. The arrangement made giving for the temple's repair a regular part of worship. The needed funds were gathered quietly without public display of donors or amounts, as people gave according to devotion and ability.