Sometimes....

ATTACK! King Hezekiah had done some great things for the Lord as king of Judah. We begin today's reading with a miraculous story of victory, and you know how I feel about miracles! The king of Syria was threatening God's people and mocking God, Himself (could you believe the audacity this guy had, and the things he said?!??!!). Judah's king echoed the words of Joshua when he said, "Be strong and courageous, do not be terrified or discouraged, for the Lord is with us..." reminding them that all the enemy had was their own muscle, but they had God on their side! Hezekiah and Isaiah cried out to the Lord in prayer, and God defeated the enemy army for them with only one angel....annihilating all the fighting men, officers and commanders!

PRIDE! We guessed at the cause of Hezekiah's fall the last time we read about him together, but here in verse twenty-five we see God telling us clearly that pride was the reason Hezekiah fell. He was sick unto death, and God spared him granting him the additional years he begged for....only the king forgot to say thank-you and instead made himself believe he was deserving of this favor. I'm not trying to make light OF his situation, I'm trying to shine light ON his situation! How many times do we forget to thank Him when the storm ceases, or the wound heals, or the money comes, or we arrive at our destination safely, or the car cranks, or the children are well......need we go on? Thankfully, Hezekiah did humble himself once more before the God of Israel....before the One he knew personally took him to be with his ancestors. But, what blessings he must have missed during those years!

HUMBLED! Oh, my goodness....what will it take? It seems to me that very few men take their ancestors' word about The God of Israel. Some have to learn the hard way, some have to see God move first-hand, and some end up with a ring through their nose in an Assyrian prison before the light comes on! Manasseh was this man. He was about the worst king on record!! But, he did come around and he did do some good for the kingdom. His humble prayer to the Lord was surely earnest. One little problem.....he didn't convince his son, and the evil reign started all over again with Amon....

WANTED! A king who will follow God from beginning to end and never waver from the right to left. A king who will humbly follow the LORD GOD of Israel, and lead his people to do the same. Enter, Josiah. Israel had 20 evil kings, Judah also had 20 kings (one crazy queen) before captivity, 12 were evil and 8 were good. Of the good kings, only two, Hezekiah and his son, Josiah, tore down the high places where other gods were worshiped. You'll remember that Josiah was just 8 years old when he became king. On that note, he must have been mentored by the same guys that did away with that king before him, Amon, they seemed to have a good eye for heresy and didn't tolerate him for very long choosing Josiah instead. Personal opinion, only.

DISCOVERED! How many times have we heard of wonderful things being discovered by accident? ...Coke, post-it notes, bubble gum, affects of penicillin, silly putty, potato chips, fireworks, and even the microwave oven. But, none among those are so valuable as what was discovered in the temple during the reign of King Josiah....the lost Book of the Law! Now, we've already discussed a few weeks ago about how suspicious it actually is that the book was "lost" in the first place, but aside from that whole conspiracy-theory-thing.....what a cause for celebration! Let's consider the effects this discovery had on God's people. It began a personal revival in Josiah's life which sparked a nation-wide revival for all of Judah! The Word of God transforms lives!!!

Sometimes God allows us what we ask for, knowing it's not His perfect will. He gave Israel the kingship they wanted, He gave Hezekiah the extra time (which he abused), He gave His people over into captivity because they all but begged for it. But, sometimes our prayers are in line with His will and He moves in miraculous ways like in the battle Hezekiah faced against Syria. Still, other times, God's mercy is so great that He doesn't allow us what we ask for. I'm so very thankful for these times, aren't you?

The Good, The Bad, and the Invitation

The Bad: How can brothers turn against brothers - Israel fighting against Judah? Hard to understand, yet in these chapters we have the story. Under the extremely wicked reign of King Ahaz, Judah had strayed from the Lord, and God used Israel to "bring them back." Over 120 men from Judah were killed in one day - and as the captives were brought as prisoners into Israel, we see Obed, a prophet, stand up and remind the men of Israel that they too had sinned. Don't treat our brothers like this - don't bring them into our town as captives. Four men bravely stood up and stopped this horror - they bound up their wounds, gave them water, helped the weak, and let them return to Jericho in Judah.

I am reminded of stories from The Civil War - brother fighting against brother, fathers against sons. A sad time in our history - and a sad time in the history told in II Chronicles.

The Good: Hezekiah comes to the throne in Judah at the age of 25 and walked in the way of the Lord. A good king. He reigned for 29 years in which he undertook religious reforms, removed the idols, cleansed the Temple (which took 16 days), and brought the Levites back to their duties in the Temple.

The Invitation: One of the most intriguing things I read was about the "posts" Hezekiah sent across Judah and Israel inviting all the people to attend a Passover celebration. I'm not talking mailing letters, putting up billboards, announcements on the radio, or sending e-mails here - think about it - he had to have sent actual men on horses (or camels) with written invitations (wonder who hand wrote them and how many invitations there were, and how far they had to ride to deliver each one) to come to Jerusalem to observe the Passover. This had not been done in over 200 years. Even after the battles and killings between armies of Judah and Israel described in Chapter 28, King Hezekiah reached out to invite all the people to come.

Is that not what we must do? Reach across barriers, resentments, anger, disappointments, lifestyle disapproval, and invite our "brothers" to come. Open our eyes and see the lost and hurt in our everyday paths and show them the way to Christ? As we walk our daily walk, there are those all around us who just might need an invitation or one word of encouragement to "come and see." Was Hezekiah successful in this? Yes. Where all invitations accepted? No. Some of the couriers were mocked and scorned. Yet, a great number of people did accept the invitation and came to Jerusalem to the Temple to worship. We are not responsible for who comes, but we are responsible for issuing the invitation.

And what were the results? There was great joy in Jerusalem and a celebration that had not been seen since the time of King Solomon, says II Chronicles 30:26. A wonderful Passover - offerings, sacrifices, worshiping, singing, praising. After the celebration, the people went throughout the towns in Judah and smashed the idols and destroyed the high places. Sounds like a revival to me.

The priests were reorganized and returned to the work in the Temple. The tithes from the people were reinstated by Hezekiah to uphold this work, and the people gave willingly and generously of their first fruits - oil, new wine, honey, and all that their fields produced for offerings to the Lord. In fact, they gave so generously that there were "heaps" left over, and storehouses in the temple had to be built to contain them. Wouldn't it be wonderful if Oak Hill had"heaps" left over?

What is that old hymn?

Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse,

All your money, talents, time, and love.

Consecrate them all upon the altar,

While your Savior from above speaks sweetly.

Trust Me, try Me, prove Me, saith the Lord of hosts,

And see if a blessing, unmeasured blessing, I will not pour out on thee.

Perseverance

To me, one of the hardest things about the Christian life is that you have to do it every day. As Solomon so wisely pointed out in Ecclesiastes, "there is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven." Our lives go through seasons. Some good, some bad. Our spiritual walks also go through seasons. There are times where I feel closer to God than others. There are times where following God seems easy and great, and times where I have to grit my teeth and press on, or spend my time crying before a heavenly father. We are challenged in Hebrews to "run with perseverance the race marked out for us."

per·se·ver·ance/ˌpərsəˈvi(ə)rəns/Noun

1. Steadfastness in doing something despite difficulty or delay in achieving success.

I think we can determine by the definition of perseverance that we should expect some difficulty in this life we live. Jesus said, "in this world you will have trouble." Sometimes our troubles come from external sources- coworkers, family members, friends, money, job stress, loss- of people or things. But sometimes, our troubles come from inside ourselves and from our own hearts. "For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do, this I keep on doing." Romans 7:19

In our passage today, we saw three kings of Judah. Two of them struggled to persevere against their own sinful hearts. One of them appeared to have gotten it right. What can we learn from them about how to persevere ourselves?

Amaziah

We learn right off the bat that Amaziah "did what was right in they eyes of the Lord, but not wholeheartedly." (25:2) Early in his reign he was obedient. Based on the fact that we are told he was half-hearted in his obedience, and how he acts later on in his reign, I have to wonder if he was obedient for the right reasons. Obedience is good. But wholehearted obedience is obviously what we need to persevere.

Perhaps because he was only half-heartedly devoted to the Lord, Amaziah soon started worshipping the idols of the the people he has just conquered with the Lord's help. As Beth Moore has stated many times, we were made to worship- and we are going to worship something. If even a tiny portion of our heart is left open for worship, we are going to find something to worship with it. Amaziah may have preferred these idols because they supported his pursuits of money, power, and recognition. It so easy to let idols creep into our lives. What parts of your heart are attached to something other than God? Quick recognition of the things that steal our devotion from God and turning that devotion back to God is key to persevering. To be able to do that though, we have to be obeying God for the right reasons to begin with.

Uzziah

Uzziah also started out strong. Then in chapter 26 verse 16 we see, "But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall." He thought he could live above God's law. We see that obviously, he couldn't. God judgement this time was swift in coming, giving him leprosy as the priests watched. I can't think of anything more humbling. Obviously, a key to persevering is to remain humble. How do we do that? Pride is sneaky and often comes upon us without us even realizing it. One easy thing to do to keep it in check is to count your blessings. Pride often follows on the heels of success, popularity, influence and power. Rest assured, if we have any of those things, God gave them to us. Lord, help us to remember to credit you with our blessings.

Jotham

Finally, we see a king appear to get it right. Jotham followed what his dad did right, but also learned from his mistakes. We're told in Chapter 27 verse 8 that Jotham "walked steadfastly before the Lord his God." That to me, speaks of perseverance. And he shows us that it is possible...

The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially those who belong to the family of believers. Galatians 6:8-10

As New Testament believers, we have one advantage none of these kings did, the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is there to convict us, guide us and teach us. Our responsibility is to keep fanning that flame in our hearts and not throw water on it to quench it. Sow to please the Spirit. Do good. If only we could all the time...

Persevere.

per·se·ver·ance/ˌpərsəˈvi(ə)rəns/Noun

2. Continuance in a state of grace leading finally to a state of glory.

Father, thank you for the grace to make it to glory. Don't let us depend on ourselves.

Amen.