Revival: Stronger Than Ever Increasing God’s Power In Your Life Series

Revival: Stronger Than Ever

Increasing God’s Power in Your Life

2 Chronicles 14-16

INTRO – One of the questions church leaders should be asking right now

What kind of encouragement does a the church or the nation need when it in or coming out of a national crisis?

That’s the question Ezra is answering for us in the book of Chronicles.

And what kind of encouragement do you need when you’re facing a personal crisis?

That’s the question Ezra is answering for us in the section of Chronicles we’ll be looking at today.

First, a little context:

The book of Chronicles covers a 400-year period of time, called “The Kingdom Period,” because from 1000 B.C. to 600 B.C., Israel was ruled by kings.

Saul was its first king. He didn’t do so well. Ezra doesn’t spend much time on him.

David comes next. David was human in his sins, and amazing in his heart. The author of Hebrews calls him, “A man after God’s own heart.” Two weeks ago, we saw God ask David to build Him and altar. So he built the altar. But first, he bought the field for the altar, and the animals for the sacrifice, and the field in which he built the altar. He said, “I will not offer to the Lord my God that which cost me nothing.”

Next in the line of kings was Solomon. Last week we learned how his gift of wisdom endowed an entire nation.

2 Chronicles 10-13 tell the story of Solomon’s son, whose name was Rehoboam. Rehoboam was not a wise king. When the people asked him to lower their taxes, he raised them instead, which split the kingdom forever.

From that time on, Israel was a divided kingdom. The ten tribes in the north were known as “Israel.” And the two tribes in the south were called “Judah.”

Throughout its history, 19 kings ruled the kingdom of Israel, and not one of them followed the Lord.

And 20 kings ruled in the kingdom of Judah, and many of them tried to follow the Lord.

PURPOSE

Ezra is looking for positive examples to teach uplifting lessons. So, Chronicles majors in the kings of the south.

After David, Solomon, and Rehoboam, come two kings. The first one is Abijah. Abijah reigned for three years, nothing significant for our discussion today, so we will go on to the second king whose name starts with A. His name is Asa.

FORECAST

Asa was not perfect, but he was one of the good kings.

Ezra is going to use the life of Asa to teach us three lessons on the power of faithfulness today.

Asa is going to show us that when we are faithful to God, God is unfailing to us.

Major Point- Asa is going to teach us that the faithful may have setbacks, but never full-on failures, because God is faithful to His faithful ones.

And all that God has is strongly available to the person who is strongly available to God.

OVERVIEW

Asa’s story spans three chapters of 2 Chronicles. Chapters 14, 15, and 16.

The first chapter is a lesson from a ROUTE.

The second chapter is a lesson from a REVIVAL.

And the third chapter is a lesson from a REBUKE.

So if you’re ready to do some learning today, take out your notes and open your Bibles to 2 Chronicles 14.…and while you’re doing that, let’s open in prayer

Prayer

“Lord Jesus, speak to me. Amen.”

Around 900 B.C., the king of “Cush,” which is modern day Ethiopia, was powerful enough to conquer the kingdom of Egypt. The country north of Egypt was Judah, which happened to be ruled by young king Asa.

2 Chronicles 14:8 tells the story:

Asa had an army of three hundred thousand from Judah bearing large shields and spears, and two hundred eighty thousand from Benjamin bearing regular shields and drawing the bow. All these were valiant warriors. 9 Then Zerah the Cushite came against them with an army of one million men and three hundred chariots.

If you do the math, Asa is outnumbered almost two to one. He does the best thing he can do: he prays. Verse 11…

11 Then Asa cried out to the Lord his God, “Lord, there is no one besides you to help the mighty and those without strength. Help us, Lord our God, for we depend on you, and in your name we have come against this large army. Lord, you are our God. Do not let a mere mortal hinder you.”

12 So the Lord routed the Cushites before Asa and before Judah, and the Cushites fled. 13 Then Asa and the people who were with him pursued them as far as Gerar. The Cushites fell until they had no survivors, for they were crushed before the Lord and his army. So the people of Judah carried off a great supply of loot. - 2 Chronicles 14:8-13