Three Kings- 1
CCCAG, September 11th, 2001
Scripture: 2 Kings 23:30-35
Today we are going to begin a short series of three messages detailing the lives of the last three kings of Judah that ruled after Josiah died.
I say 3 and not 4 because I’m not including Zedekiah as he was not a true king, but a vassal king or a governor of Babylon.
A quick background of this period in the Old Testament-
After King David died, his son Solomon rose to power. Solomon grew the kingdom far beyond the borders of the promised land that God had given the nation of Israel.
It grew to encompass most of modern Lebanon, some of Syria, Egypt all the way to the Nile River, and eastward to include what would be modern Jordan. It was by far the largest known empire in the western world at that time.
After Solomon died, there was a civil war in his family with one of his sons taking over the northern area of the empire, and one taking the southern area. The northern area became known as Israel but did not have Jerusalem as part of its territory and set up its capital in Samaria, and the southern Kingdom which had Jerusalem in it became known as Judah.
Because of this split, the two nations had difficulties ruling over their respective areas and defending them, and eventually northern Kingdom of Israel was conquered by Assyria, and about 120 years later the Southern Kingdom of Judah was conquered by Babylon.
All of Israel’s kings were evil. There was a minor spark of religious zeal in Jehu but it was mostly self-serving and they all tolerated evil and idolatry up to and including child sacrifice.
Judah’s kings were a mixed bag. You’d have a decent King who at least would try to follow God, followed by three or four wicked kings.
With one exception, the one huge stain on all of their records is that they tolerated the high places. These were areas where people could go to God’s church on the Sabbath, and go and worship other gods the rest of the week.
The last good king, and probably the best king since David was a man named Josiah. Josiah was a child when he became king, and stumbled across a copy of the Torah which was their bible and had it read to him. When Josiah heard the Word of the Lord, he repented for his nations actions and lead a full nationwide revival and purged the entire land of any pagan influence like no other king had done before him. Josiah was unique in that even the high places were removed under his rule.
Josiah then went to meet the King of Egypt in battle where he was killed. We pick up the story in -
2 Kings 23:30-35
30 Josiah's servants brought his body in a chariot from Megiddo to Jerusalem and buried him in his own tomb. And the people of the land took Jehoahaz son of Josiah and anointed him and made him king in place of his father.
31 Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. His mother's name was Hamutal daughter of Jeremiah; she was from Libnah. 32 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, just as his fathers had done. 33 Pharaoh Neco put him in chains at Riblah in the land of Hamath so that he might not reign in Jerusalem, and he imposed on Judah a levy of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. 34 Pharaoh Neco made Eliakim son of Josiah king in place of his father Josiah and changed Eliakim's name to Jehoiakim. But he took Jehoahaz and carried him off to Egypt, and there he died.
Prayer
Premise
It’s a bit ironic that I’m starting this series on September 11th, 21 years after those terrible attacks that cost this nation her soul. This doesn’t have anything to do with the message, but I’m acknowledging those attacks as the catalyst that started this nation on the path that it is currently on.
There are several things that we can learn from the last three kings of Judah that directly apply to what has happened, and will continue to happen in our country today, so these messages may be a bit prophetic in that they will expose some of the spiritual truth that led us down this path.
Saying that, I do want to make one thing very clear-
In these messages, I’m not going to call out specific people. If you are looking for me to criticize one political party over the other, you will be disappointed. I believe our current two-party system is simply two sides of the same evil coin and neither really have our best interests in heart.
I’m simply going to point out some glaring truths in the people we see in the bible. You can try and apply them to the current people in power, or the people that have been in power for the last 20 years.
But, I want you to first apply them to yourself.
In America, we have church on Sunday’s which are poorly attended and people go to their high places the rest of the week to worship at the altar of what this world has to offer in forms of entertainment, much of which is not God-honoring or God pleasing. We are really no different then the people who live in ancient Israel or Judah.
Jesus plainly taught us to remove the plank from our own eyes before we try to remove the speck in others.
Saying that, let’s look at three things from the life of Jehoahaz that we can apply to our lives and to our world today-
I. Beware rapid promotion over more seasoned or qualified people
In other scriptures, and in other extra biblical texts such as the writings of Josephus, we learn that Jehoahaz was the youngest of the sons of Josiah. In monarchy’s, generally the oldest son would be the next in line but for some reason the people chose the younger son instead.
It could be because they thought the older sons were no good. We don’t know. The bible doesn’t give a specific answer, but I suspect they chose him because he was not a religious man. Josephus, the greatest of the Jewish historians records in his book, Antiquities of the Jews, it says plainly that Jehoahaz was an impious who resented the reforms of his father.
It's very possible that the people chose him because they wanted to go back to the old ways of following Baal and Asherah or at least allow the high places again so they chose the youngest son as he would be the most easily swayed to do just that.
There is a saying I grew up with- respect the gray hair. When I was growing up, my grandfather pounded that truth into my head.
I was expected to always give honor and deference to people who were older and more experienced than I was.
There is a lot of wisdom in that because you can only gain true wisdom through experience, and the young have no experience to temper the knowledge they think they know.
I’ve been there- I remember saying and believing a lot of really dumb things when I was in my late teens and early 20’s.
Unfortunately, that is no longer there in our culture. I routinely witness young children- 6, 7, 8 years old cussing at their parents when they don’t get what they want.
Is it any wonder why the young people of today are the foot soldiers of the woke?
Now, if you are in your late teens or early 20’s listening to this, I’m not insulting your whole generation. I’m not.
I’m simply saying that experience matters. Logic and rational thinking matters.
People in power- whether that be in government or the media purposefully play on your emotions so you don’t use your God Given reason. They play the emotion card at the expense of your logic so they keep you angry and afraid so you are easily manipulated.
You really saw this in the Kenosha riots- no one knew the facts- just the false story of the police shooting down an unarmed man. The man who was on probation for rape, had children in the car, and was reaching for a knife when he was shot.
And that goes really for any age group, but it particularly affects the young in that they will actually try to do something about it, even if it’s the wrong thing to do.
The year 2020 showed that- riots, unrest, extreme violence.
Unfortunately it’s getting worse- its on hyperdrive today in our culture, and it’s tearing it and our country apart at the seams.
In his writings, Vladimir Lenin- the man who most directly formed the Soviet Union, spoke of young people as being useful idiots- at an age of being easily stirred into passionate action but lacking the wisdom to see the end result of the thing they were being stirred up for.
Lenin used that to form one of the most evil empires that ever existed. In fact, his successor Joseph Stalin killed between 6-11 million of his own people and coined the very cynical phrase that one death is a tragedy, while a million is simply a statistic.
To put that number- 6-11 million in perspective, that would be like wiping out the entire population of Minnesota and Wisconsin. All gone.
Bringing it home to our lesson for this morning
God has a process for maturity. It’s called time. Jehoahaz had older brother- brothers that might have at least maintained Josiah’s’ reforms if not improved them even more, but the people chose the one that would give them what they wanted, not what they needed.
So they chose the leader of the least maturity to give them exactly that.
The bible says “Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands”. It’s directly referring to placing a leadership mantle on the shoulders of a person until they have proven they have the character to hold that mantle- and that character is only formed through time.
We should remember that in our lives when we seek promotion. If you seek promotion for the wrong reasons- say for popularity, you fall into the trap of the enemy and he will use it to destroy not only you, but those you seek to lead.
That leads us to our next point-
II. Beware of the favor of the world or chasing popularity
We live in a very unique time in the history of the world in which a person can become famous for mastering the art of social media for their benefit. Not for artistic or creative talent, but for their ability to promote themselves to the world.
Many people in this room may not realize the power of the big three companies- Google, Facebook, and Twitter but in reality they are driving the popular opinion of this country far more than any other media outlet. A distant second to those three companies is Fox News.
What this has done in our society is create a sickness called self-promotion. It’s an endless pursuit of popularity.
Popularity means far more than character in most people’s minds. Popularity means more than truth.
Popularity is the new currency that people use to gain influence.
How many of you remember the story of the 3 little pigs?
There are three little pigs, and a big bad wolf that wants to eat them. The pigs start building shelters to protect them from the wolf.
One builds their shelter with straw
One uses twigs to build their shelters
The final pig uses brick and stone.
The wolf then arrives and says little pig, little pig, let me in.
The little pig replies –“Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin.”
The big bad wolf says- “If you don’t open up, Im gonna huff and puff and blow your house down!”
We all remember what happens next- the first two pigs get eaten because they trusted in straw and sticks to protect them, while the last pig survived because he used bricks and stones to build his house.
Pursuing popularity is the same thing as building your house with straw and sticks. The slightest breeze or bad weather will topple your house around you, and you are left defenseless before a predator.
How many people in the last five years have been “canceled” or ruined when the mob turned on them. Their entire livelihood stripped away from them because they lost their popularity when opinion shifted and blew down their houses.
The three little pigs story has a biblical source-
1 Cor 3:10b-14
But each one should be careful how he builds. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, 13 his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man's work. 14 If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward.
So I ask you- is it more important to be popular, or known as a person of character and honor? Character is the costly stone that builds a life that is not easily swayed or destroyed when the bad times come. The big bad wolf we call the devil cannot simply blow your life apart- it has to work for it.
Early in my ministry training I had an elder of the church critiquing a sermon I had preached and he asked me the question- “Are you preaching to the crowd, or to God? One will make you popular with the crowd, the other will reap eternal benefit in those people.”
Then he said this- “Beware of trying to be popular. The same crowd that was praising Jesus and yelling Hosanna one week was the same crowd that screamed crucify him a few days later.”
Sobering thought isn’t it?
The last thing I want to point out this morning-
III. Beware turning or compromising the faith that established you
Ps 11:1-3
1 In the Lord I take refuge. How then can you say to me: "Flee like a bird to your mountain.
2 For look, the wicked bend their bows; they set their arrows against the strings to shoot from the shadows at the upright in heart.
3 When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do ?"
I want to focus a bit on verse 3- the destruction of the foundations.
One of the main reasons this country is in the same kind of turmoil that the last three kings of Judah faces is because of the systematic destruction of the foundation it was built upon.
Our country was built on Christian principles, and as we watch it crumble around us, we have to realize that it’s because that foundation is being destroyed as we speak.
If there are things in your life that are crumbling right now- I ask- what foundation is under attack?
This should drive all of us to pray. Pray for our country, pray for our leaders, pray even for people in the opposite political party that Jesus gets ahold of their hearts.
Listen- the mid term elections are coming up. I encourage you to exercise your freedom to vote.
But even more so, I encourage you to exercise the incredible power God had give in and pray for the future of our country.
Because regardless on who wins an election, if God is not for us- if we are not following HIM and HIS ways, everything will continue to worsen until we see the last days of this great nation.
Prayer.
