Chronicles Part III


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 God
2. 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 deeds
2. The state of the whole nation was influenced by the king
3. We each have an area of spiritual influence or control
4. 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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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?

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.