2 Kings 16

The stubbornness and disobedience of man towards God’s commandments can indeed cause a lot of unwanted happenings and even disasters.

Before kings ever existed in Israel, the people thought that having a king to rule over them and to protect them from the neighboring nations’ invasion was perfect for them, but through the records of the kings, we could see that this idea was absolutely a failure.

And before kings ever existed in Israel, God had already warned them that this was a wrong way to go, for it was an outright rejection of God’s sovereignty and the kings would be an oppressor rather than a deliverer of the people of Israel. (ref. 1 Samuel 8)

When man is given authority and power to rule over others, most often than not, will tend to abuse it. So in today’s Bible reading, let’s look at this king, whom I see as a total failure, to learn some warnings and to reflect on our dealings with both our social and spiritual lives.

Bible Passage: 2 Kings 16

Ahaz, the 13^th king from David began to sit on the throne of Judah at the age of 20. Then, the very familiar words came right after the intro, “… and he did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord his God, as his father David had done.”

I think sometimes when we come to these familiar words, most of us may exclaim in our hearts, “What’s wrong with these people? What is so difficult to do right in the sight of the Lord God!?”

Before him, the throne was occupied by a consecutive of 4 good kings, Joash, Amaziah, Azariah, and Jotham, but Ahaz’s appearance broke this good chain. I think one of the very detestable things he did in the sight of God and man was that he burned his son as an offering according to the abominations of the pagan nations’ religion!

Let’s ask ourselves some questions of reflection while we examine what other things he did wrong in the sight of God.

1. Do we trust in the protection of God? Do we misuse the things of God and regard them as common, lowly and expendable?When being besieged by the armies of Syria and Israel, instead of seeking God’s protection, he went to seek help from the king of Assyria.

   The king of Assyria might not have agreed to help Ahaz if he had not seen the gift Ahaz had sent to him.

   Ahaz took the silver and gold from the Temple of God to give the Assyrian king as gifts! The objects in the Temple were consecrated for the Lord, so did he even have to right to give them away?

2. Do we feel that our worship of God needs to be spiced up a little to make worshipping God more enjoyable like what the secular churches are doing? (“Every time eat Manna, its so boring, I want durians also!” Remember who said this? :P)When Ahaz went to Damascus to visit his new overlord, king of Assyria, and something caught his eyes and he loved it very much.

   The altar that the king of Assyria had built for his pagan gods must have mesmerized Ahaz so much that he quickly sent words back to Uriah to priest to build and altar similar to it.

   Wow! It seemed that Ahaz loved the Lord so much that he wanted to build a beautiful altar for the Lord! Was that so? His intention seemed noble to man, but what did the Lord command way before this kind of heart/intention surfaced?

   These are the statutes and rules that you shall be careful to do in the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess, all the days that you live on the earth. You shall surely destroy all the places where the nations whom you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree. You shall tear down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and burn their Asherim with fire. You shall chop down the carved images of their gods and destroy their name out of that place. You shall not worship the LORD your God in that way. But you shall seek the place that the LORD your God will choose out of all your tribes to put his name and make his habitation there. There you shall go, and there you shall bring your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution that you present, your vow offerings, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock.

   Deuteronomy 12:1-6 (ESV)

   It was understandable that Ahaz could not destroy the idols that the king of Assyria worshiped, but he went on to even duplicate a pagan altar for his own use in worshipping the Lord…. in his own way/method.

3. Do we esteem the word of God? Do we interpret the word of God to our likings and advantage? And when we are being challenged in the truths of the Bible, do we stand firm in the standards of the will of God, or do we try to please man by compromising the truth in order to have a more pleasant life with others?King Solomon constructed the Temple structure and the furnishings in it according to the plan that God had personally instructed King David (ref. 1 Chronicles 28: 9 – 19), thus no one had the right to alter it except God Himself.

   But in v 14, Ahaz removed the bronze altar away from its original position! And to make things worse, he commanded Uriah his priest to burn the offerings on the new altar he had copied from Damascus instead of the original, God commanded bronze altar.

   The next disappointment Ahaz displayed was he desecrated the architectural structure of the Temple just to please, or not to offend the king of Assyria. (ref. vv 17 & 18)

With all these negative/wrong things that Ahaz had done, let us be warned that we may fall into such actions if we are not mindful of our relationship with our Father in Heaven. Because we not only have like nature as Elijah the prophet, but we are also of like nature as any of the kings recorded in this book, for we are all humans.

We who are washed in the Name of Jesus are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, and His own special people. Therefore we must draw closer to God and to keep His teachings, for doing so is eternal life to us.

May God help and guide us all. Shalom!