Azariah’s Long Reign
Today we
meet Azariah (whose other name is Uzziah – mentioned in 2 Chronicles). Azariah means “helper of the Lord” while
Uzziah means “strength of the Lord.” We
do know that so long as he pursued the Lord, God made him prosper. On the other hand, we see here evidence of
the sliding scale of performance. He
isn’t compared to David, he is compared to doing what is right as his father
did. We know that Amaziah his father had
issues; so we should think that Azariah was not without his troubles as well.
In this
passage we are told about Azariah’s leprosy, but in order to understand why he
was a leper we need to read 2 Chronicles 26:16.
This passage tells us that Azariah suffered from great pride – thinking
himself capable of burning incense as the priests (and especially the high
priest) would have done. Like we saw
with David – whose personal vices were passed on to his sons – we also see that
Azariah suffers from the same failing of pride that his father did. We must take generational sin seriously and
especially as parents and spiritual leaders we should be careful to avoid
passing along the training of our sins as much as possible.
As a complete
aside to the story, this is the king that Isaiah 6 mentions at the call of the
prophet Isaiah. Isaiah 6 reports his
great vision of the Lord, and it occurs in the year that Uzziah (Azariah) dies. We’ll talk about that when we read Isaiah –
so no worries now. It is just an
interesting historical footnote.
The Short Reign of the Kings of Israel
The next
three kings we meet are kings of Israel.
Note that here the family line of the kings is broken. Political coups lead to assassinations and
people grabbing for the seat of power that was left. All of these kings did evil. All of these kings did what was unacceptable
in the sight of the Lord. All of these
kings lived out the ways of the world. For
the record, 2 out of 3 claimed power through the world’s means and 2 out of 3
lost power through the world’s means.
The fourth king we meet, Pekahiah, also lives and dies by the way of the
world, although he assumed power when his father died rather than gaining power
through a coup. In summary, there is
nothing redeemable discussed here with these kings. When we spend our time living according to
the world, the results that we reap will also be according to the world.
With
respect to Israel, we finally meet Pekah.
This is significant because with Pekah also comes the mention of
Tiglath-pileser III, king of Assyria.
Pekah has a strong anti-Assyrian national policy, and to be quite blunt
it comes back to bite him on the hind end.
Much of Israel falls into captivity.
As was common among Assyrian and Babylonian kings – the people of those
conquered lands were deported and replaced with loyal nationals looking to
subdue a new land and make a name for themselves in the new land. At last we begin the final death spiral of
the northern kingdom of Israel.
Pekah is
ousted, largely because his anti-Assyrian policy leads to what appears to be
evil things in the land. But I’m going
to take an unusual tack in this passage.
As bad as it was for the land to begin to be devoured by the Assyrians,
it was God’s plan for redeeming His people.
Pekah resists the Assyrians (who can blame him?) but in the process he
is inherently resisting God’s plan for redemption of His people. I’m not going to say too much more about this
topic, because I think it is important that we chew on this for a while and
understand exactly what I’m getting at here.
Pekah follows his natural instincts, but that doesn’t mean that he is in
line with God. Pekah rebels against
Assyria, but that doesn’t mean he is in the spiritually right place.
Jotham of Judah
We also
meet Jotham of Judah. There isn’t much
to say about Jotham other than he is mentioned to do well in the eyes of God –
as well as his father Uzziah, at least.
We can see that while the northern kingdom is falling further from God’s
presence, there is at least an attempt in the leadership of Judah to hold onto
what they can. I understand that this
isn’t perfect, and it will eventually fail them. But it is good to note that we’ve had a good
string of kings who are reported as doing well in the sight of the Lord even
while wrestling with their own human failing.
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