MINISTER, Rev. Thomas
Scarborough.
2
Chronicles 14. King Asa.
Sermon Outline.
2 Chronicles 14-15.
King Asa
A. Background issues.
B. Idolatry = man
deciding how he should worship God (13:8-9)
1. Man compares religions with man, not with God2. God supernaturally reveals Himself when we seek (15:15)3. There is a massive body of evidence in favour of God's Word
C. Why 2 Chronicles
sums up kings as either good or bad (14:2)
1. Good kings were good because of their faith, not deeds2. The state of the whole nation was influenced by the king3. We each have an area of spiritual influence or control4. The importance of encouragement (15:7)
B. King Asa faces the
mighty army of Zerah (14:9-15)
1. King Asa trusts in the Lord (14:11)2. We find freedom and strength in such trust in the Lord
We
are going through the book of 2
Chronicles
at the moment -- and as we cover the first few kings of the so-called
Divided Kingdom, there are also certain background themes
and spiritual principles
that keep appearing in these stories.
So
this morning I’m not
going to look so much at King Asa
-- who is the next king in our line-up -- but I shall be looking at a
few of the background themes and spiritual principles
that come up again and again in the stories of the Biblical kings.
* * * * * * * * * *
The
first of these background features -- that keeps appearing again and
again in the book of 2 Chronicles -- is true
religion -- the religion of the God of Israel -- versus man-made
religion.
After
the reigns of Saul and David and Solomon, Israel was now entering an
age of idolatry.
In fact it already started with King Solomon,
who married foreign wives,
and built altars
for his foreign wives.
* * * * * * * * * *
Now
what we saw last week was how King Jeroboam, in particular, appointed
his own priests -- and he set up his own system of worship -- and how
he even made his own gods.
Now
what is happening here, essentially, in this book of 2 Chronicles, is
that people
are now beginning to decide how they should worship God, rather than
God.
Their religion no longer starts with God
-- it now starts with men and women.
Last
week, we read how King Jeroboam drove out the priests of the Lord,
and how they abandoned their pastures and houses in order to remain
faithful
to the Lord.
Notice
that the Bible doesn't just say that King Jeroboam drove out the
priests.
It says that he drove out the priests of the Lord.
These were the Lord's
priests -- appointed
by the Lord. You can't simply make a human
decision to replace people God
has appointed.
And
we also read last week that king Jeroboam made gods which were not
gods.
And
here we have people replacing not only God's priests -- but God
Himself. King Jeroboam replaced God Himself.
And he did it by human decision.
In
fact one of the key features of idolatry, and one of the key features
of false religion, is that it comes from
man.
False religion comes from man. True religion comes from God. True
religion starts
with
God.
* * * * * * * * *
Let
us suppose that you wanted to see the Mayor of Cape
Town.
If you wanted to communicate with her, oe even go so far as to meet
her face to face -- a simple fact of the matter is that you would
have to fulfil her conditions first.
You
would need to prove that you would have a good enough reason
for her to meet
with you -- you would then have to go through all the channels to set
up an appointment
-- and once you had the appointment, you would need to go through the
appointed security checks -- and so on.
If
you said: "No, Your Worship the Mayor, I
am going to decide when and how I am going to see you," you
would surely get nowhere at all.
And
how much greater
is Almighty God, who rules over all things!
And
what we see throughout all of the pages of the Bible is that it is
God
who decides how men and women shall approach
Him. God is an Almighty, Living God, and true religion has
to start with Him.
This
is the message that we find in the book of 2 Chronicles, again and
again. You cannot just start from
man. Human beings
cannot just decide all on their own how they are going to do
religion.
* * * * * * * * * *
One
of the problems of the religious confusion in our world is that
people simply don't think in terms of God.
What does God
decree?
And so you find people
comparing one religion with another religion, and saying that this
religion seems better, or that one has some really noble features --
or that one there is perverted.
But
they don't give a thought to what God
desires, or God
decrees.
You
also have people comparing people’s religious behaviour
-- well these people here are a lot better than those over there,
therefore they
must be more pleasing to God. It is comparing man with man,
but it is not thinking in terms of what God
requires.
God
is sovereign
-- He is the King of the universe.
* * * * * * * * * *
Now
my next
point is that it’s not just idolaters or unbelievers
who let religion start with themselves and not with God.
It is
Christians, too.
And it is not just sometimes
that that happens, but often.
Often,
Christians make up their own
mind about who God is and what He requires.
On
the day of their conversion,
they let God be God enough to save them from their sins,
but then they continue
with all sorts of their own
ideas as to who God is.
A
Christian will say, “God hasn’t heard my prayers,” or they will
say, “God is punishing me,” or they will say, “God is not in
the details,”
or, “God has to make my business succeed,” or, “God can’t
forgive my sin”
-- where none
of those things may actually be true about God.
Christians
so often make up their own
minds about who God is
-- and how God acts
-- and in this way they are maybe not that that far from the
idolaters of old.
And
what you think
about God, and what you know
about God is in fact of vital
importance to your life.
It makes a real difference
to your life what you think about God.
It’s the difference between being negative or positive -- it’s
the difference between being anxious or peaceful -- it’s the
difference between having naïve optimism, and really putting your
trust in God
-- it is the difference between all sorts of things.
So
the question is, even for the Christian
-- how much of your God have you made up?
How much of your God is what you
think He is -- and how much is what God Himself really is?
How
much do you know about the true
God -- as He has revealed Himself to us in Scripture?
* * * * * * * * * *
This
leads us to another question -- the next obvious
question we could ask
-- and that is: If religion starts with God
-- which it must
-- then how do I know
just who this Almighty God is, and wants me to worship Him and serve
Him?
If
true religion starts with God, then of course God has to communicate
with me. It stands to reason that if religion starts with God, then
God must reveal
to human beings how He wants them to worship Him.
And
this brings us into the whole area of revelation.
God is a God who reveals
Himself.
And
we believe as Christians that God has revealed Himself finally and
accurately and as completely as we need to know through His Word
-- the Bible.
I
believe that if you truly search with an open heart and mind, you
will come to know
that God has
revealed Himself through the Word -- the Bible -- and that this God
is the Lord of lords, the King of kings, and the God of gods.
The
next king we shall be looking at in 2 Chronicles is called King Asa
-- and we read in chapter 15
of 2 Chronicles that a prophet
appears to Asa -- and he says: "Asa, if you seek
the Lord, He will be found
by you."
Note:
He does not say -- "You
will find Him, Asa." He says -- "He
will be found by
you."
In
other words, it is an act of God
that He allows Himself to be found
by the person who truly seeks Him. You don’t have to get your
seeking
right -- but if you truly seek the Lord with your heart, He Himself
by a supernatural act will open Himself up to you.
Try it, and you will
see.
And
we read in chapter 15 verse 12 that indeed King Asa and the people
"sought the Lord God, the God of their fathers, with all their
heart and soul". And then in verse 15: "They sought God
eagerly, and He was
found by them."
Jesus
also said: "Seek and you will
find." (Matthew 7:7).
And
another well known example is Cornelius
in the New Testament. He was not a Christian,
and he received one of the most important revelations in the whole
New Testament. But the Bible notes: “He and all his family
were devout and God-fearing”
(Acts 10:2). They were already
seeking the Lord.
Notice
that King Asa
and the people -- in the verses I just quoted -- sought the Lord
their God with all their heart and soul.
They threw their whole heart and their whole soul into the search.
There
is also a kind of empty seeking today, that just dabbles
with the truth -- that is not really a seeking with the heart, and
soul. It is just a playing with interesting ideas out of curiosity.
That is not the kind of seeking the Lord requires. He wants you to
give everything
to the search.
* * * * * * * * * *
I
believe that if you do that, the Lord will be
found
by you.
And I believe that, at
the end of the day, God's Word will reveal itself to be true. The
more you search, the more you will find that God's Word holds up
under scrutiny.
There
has been a tremendous assault on the reputation of the Word of God --
the Bible -- in this last century especially -- but the objections
are not a patch on the arguments in favour
of the Bible being God's message to humankind.
The
curious thing is that the arguments against the Bible appear on
television, and in the newspaper, and all over the media -- but the
massive
body of evidence in favour
is hardly ever heard.
We
know that the disciples and evangelists wrote not only their gospels,
but they lived for many years, and shared their story with many
people -- and ultimately most of them laid down their lives for the
claim that they were speaking the truth.
We
have the writings of the early Church fathers,
which tell us of the times of the apostles.
The events of the Bible
appear not only in the Bible, but in many ancient texts.
The
Bible has the best manuscript evidence for any ancient text. There
are ways of checking the authenticity
of a text, and the Bible comes out tops.
For instance, there are only ten ancient copies of the story of
Julius Caesar
-- and they are not so ancient -- the best of them was copied 944
years after the original
was supposedly written.
When
it comes to the Bible,
there are more than 20 000
ancient copies, and the oldest was copied just 25
years
after the original.
When
it comes to the Qur’an, every ancient copy except one was burnt
-- because there were too many different versions
floating around. That happened under a Caliph named Uthman.
Then there is the
testimony of archaeology.
There is the strength of
the psychological dynamics within the Bible accounts.
We
have the evidence today of countless people who say they have truly
found the power and mercy and freedom of God in their lives.
The evidence is massive.
If you weigh up all
these factors, and if you truly seek the Lord with your heart and
soul, I believe you will discover that God's Word is true -- and true
in a far deeper and more glorious way than you could have imagined.
* * * * * * * * * *
Let’s
move on from that theme then -- to note a second
thing that we find throughout the book of 2 Chronicles -- and that is
the way in which the Bible passes judgement,
or opinion, on each successive king of Israel.
Nearly every time we
come across a new king, the Bible wraps up the whole of his reign in
a single verse.
Let’s
see how it does this with the king we are going to be looking at next
-- King Asa
-- in chapter 14 verse 2 -- "Asa did what was good
and right
in the eyes of the Lord."
Not
many kings did what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord. Even
King Asa strayed
from the Lord. But Asa was a king who was serious
about his relationship with the Lord.
An
example of a king who strayed
from the Lord is king Jehoram.
The Bible says about Jehoram: “He did evil
in the eyes of the Lord.”
Notice
that there seems to be no in
between.
Either a king did what was good
in the eyes of the Lord -- or he did evil.
What
makes the difference
between these kings?
and why is the Bible so extreme
about them? good or bad, but no in between?
Well
if you judge them by their works,
then they all
failed. David killed a whole lot of innocent people in a massacre,
and he committed adultery with Bathsheba, and sent Uriah to his
death. And he had any number of wives,
which was forbidden
-- and he committed a serious sin at the end
of his life, when he numbered the people.
But
David was a good
king. The Bible says he was a king after God’s own heart.
What
made the difference?
The
difference
is the same difference that makes us
please the Lord today,
even though we know very well that we are not free from sin,
and we are not free from error,
sometimes we sometimes do things that grieve
the Holy Spirit.
But
the fact is that some
of the kings of Israel had found a personal relationship with the
Lord, and it is those kings whom God looked upon with favour.
The
same applies to you today. You might be a good person -- but that is
not why God looks upon you with favour.
He will only look upon you with favour
if you have come into a personal relationship with Him through Jesus
Christ -- if you have trusted in His mercy through Jesus Christ, and
have invited Him to be the King of your whole life.
Then
you will serve Him as your personal
God -- and not just God.
* * * * * * * * *
But let us notice
something else about this judgement that the Bible passes on each
successive king.
We
notice that the fate of the whole nation is inextricably bound up
with its kings. You have a bad king,
and you have a bad nation.
You have a good
king, and you have a good nation.
Sometimes,
of course, you had a good king, but the nation
didn't entirely go along with him -- but even then, we find that the
nation was blessed
because of the king.
At
the end of the day, what is really important in each successive
period in the Bible is how matters stood with the king.
Now
there is another important spiritual principle
here -- and that is that leadership also means spiritual influence.
And the spiritual condition of a person who has an area of influence
in life is vital to everyone who falls under that influence.
Every one of us here
this morning has an area of influence.
We
don't have a whole kingdom under us -- but you might have a business
under you -- or a department
under you -- or children
under you. You might have an important influence on a home -- don't
underestimate your influence as a domestic worker -- the whole home
is touched by what you do, and say.
What we see very plainly
in these accounts of the kings is that the spiritual condition of a
person in a position of influence has a tremendous effect on their
whole area of influence.
We
see it in a picture
in this book of 2
Chronicles.
What happens when there is a good king?
There is an obvious
positive effect on the whole nation.
What happens when there is a bad
king? It is a disaster
for everyone concerned.
This is a Biblical
principle that we come across again and again in the pages of
Scripture.
For
example
-- the Bible says that if you associate with a person who has a bad
spirit,
then (quote) "you may learn his ways and get yourself ensnared".
(Proverbs 22:23-24).
It
also says the reverse.
It says, for instance, that if a Christian wife
is the only Christian in her home
-- or if a Christian husband
is the only Christian in his home -- then the whole home
will be (quote) "sanctified"
by the influence of the Christian believer. (1 Corinthians 7:14).
It will become a holy
place because of a holy influence.
It will be a home that is blessed,
because there is someone there who loves the Lord.
That
is the influence you will
have -- it’s not something you need to manufacture.
* * * * * * * * *
Let
us notice lastly the influence of special
encouragements that we give to others. And I’ll take an example
again from the next king we are going to look at in 2 Chronicles.
King Asa was a king who
trusted in the Lord, and he brought about great reforms, and in
chapter 14 he wins a great battle. But Asa must have been becoming
tired. Spiritual battles can be very wearying to the spirit.
And
then along comes a prophet -- and he says to King Asa in chapter 15
verse 7: "Be strong, Asa, and do not give up, for your work will
be rewarded." "The Lord is with you." "The Lord
is pleased with what you have done, O King."
And
we read in verse 8: "When Asa heard these words, and the
prophecy of Azariah... he took courage.
He removed the detestable idols from the whole land..." and so
on.
We
see in this passage what the influence of some timely spiritual
encouragement can be. It can be a tremendous influence for the
kingdom of God.
So when you see
Christians being faithful to the Lord, or when you see a Christian
doing something or saying something that is a credit to the Kingdom
of God, then build them up. Encourage them.
In
fact Christian encouragement is a Biblical command
-- and it is a command precisely because it has such a powerful
effect for good in the lives of God's people. (Ephesians 4:29).
And
with that, my time is definitely up, and so I shall close. In two
weeks’ time, we shall look at some of the incidents
of King Asa’s
reign.
AMEN.