2 Chronicles 25-27: Goodness without Devotion

Three kings from Judah reveal how pride grows after victory and how contentment keeps a legacy intact. We trace Amaziah’s partial devotion, Uzziah’s presumption, and Jotham’s steady faith to draw out a simple test: will success make us humble or make us overreach?

• Judah’s split history and the king-by-king lens
• Amaziah’s early obedience and costly trust
• The raid, idolatry, and a prophet’s silenced warning
• Challenge to Israel and Judah’s defeat
• Uzziah’s innovations, reforms, and fame
• Boundary crossing in the temple and judgment
• Jotham’s restraint, building projects, and resolve
• Sunk-cost thinking versus trusting God’s provision
• Pride in prosperity and the practice of contentment
• Legacy shaped by obedience more than outcomes

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Chapters

• 0:22 Setting The Stage: Judah’s Kings
• 2:12 Amaziah: Obedience, Victory, Then Idols
• 6:56 Israel’s Warning And Judah’s Defeat
• 10:08 Uzziah’s Rise, Power, And Pride
• 13:46 Priests Confront The King

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:11

Welcome back to the Out Loud Bible Project Podcast. This is Mike. We're going through the book of 2 Chronicles here, and uh this is the book that chronicles the line of kings, specifically the southern kingdom of Judah. Now, Solomon was the last king of a united kingdom of the nation of Israel, and because of his downfall at the tail end of his life, God ripped the kingdom away from him. Not entirely, because he did promise his father David that he would keep a king on the throne for his sake, but uh the rest of the kingdom, the ten other tribes of Israel, got ripped away, given to another line of kings of the north, and they were almost always wicked kings. They did not follow the Lord, and the southern kingdom had generally better kings. As we've seen, there are some bad eggs, and there are some that are just meh. And today we see uh we're gonna start with a king who is just meh, uh, but we'll go on from there. So, as always, when we go through Chronicles reading about the kings, just keep in mind a little bit of uh preview that the book offers. Every time it mentions a king, it's how old he was when he began to reign and how long he reigned, maybe who his mother or father was, and then a little recap of what his life was like, what his walking with the Lord was or was not like, all condensed into one sentence. And then it'll go into more detail from there, but that one little sentence, man. Oh man, if a sentence was to sum up your relationship with God, what would that sentence be? Hopefully it's not like what we're gonna read today. Let's check out Second Chronicles twenty-five, and we'll go through twenty-seven today in the New English translation. Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jehoadon, who was from Jerusalem, and he did what the Lord approved, but not with wholehearted devotion. Well, when he had secured control of the kingdom, he executed the servants who had assassinated his father, the king. However, he didn't execute their sons. He obeyed the Lord's commandment, as recorded in the law scroll of Moses. Fathers must not be executed for what their sons do, and sons must not be executed for what their fathers do. A man must be executed only for his own sin. Well, Amaziah assembled the people of Judah and assigned them by families to the commanders of units of a thousand and the commanders of units of a hundred for all Judah and Benjamin. He counted those twenty years old and up, and discovered there were three hundred thousand young men of fighting age equipped with spears and shields, and he hired one hundred thousand Israelite warriors for a hundred talents of silver. But a prophet visited him and said, O king, the Israelite troops must not go with you, for the Lord is not with Israel or any of the Ephraimites. Even if you go and fight bravely in battle, God will defeat you before the enemy. God is capable of helping or defeating. Amaziah asked the prophet, but what should I do about the one hundred talents of silver I paid the Israelite troops? The prophet replied, the Lord is capable of giving you more than that. So Amaziah dismissed the troops that had come to him from Ephraim and sent them home. They were very angry with Judah and went home incensed. Amaziah boldly led his army to the valley of Salt, where he defeated ten thousand Edomites. The men of Judah captured ten thousand men alive, and they took them to the top of the cliff and threw them over. All the captives fell to their deaths. Now the troops Amaziah had dismissed and had not allowed to fight in the battle raided the cities of Judah, from Samaria to Beth Horon. They killed three thousand people and carried off a large amount of plunder. When Amaziah returned from defeating the Edomites, he brought back the gods of the people of Seir and made them his personal gods. He bowed down before them and offered them sacrifices. Well the Lord was angry with Amaziah and sent a prophet to him who said, Why are you following these gods that couldn't deliver their own people from your power? While he was speaking, Amaziah said to him, Did we appoint you to be a royal counselor? Stop prophesying, or else you'll be killed. So the prophet stopped but added, I know that God has decided to destroy you because you've done this thing and refuse to listen to my advice. After King Amaziah of Judah consulted with his advisors, he sent this message to the king of Israel, Joash, son of Jehoahaz, the son of Jehu, come, face me on the battlefield. Well King Joash of Israel sent this message back to King Amaziah of Judah. A thorn bush in Lebanon sent this message to a cedar in Lebanon. Give your daughter to my son as a wife. And then a wild animal of Lebanon came by and trampled down the thorn bush. You defeated Edom and it's gone to your head. Gloat over your success, but stay in your palace. Why bring calamity on yourself? Why bring yourself down and Judah along with you? But Amaziah did not heed the warning, for God wanted to hand them over to Joash because they followed the gods of Edom. So King Joash of Israel attacked. He and King Amaziah of Judah faced each other on the battlefield in Beth Shemesh of Judah. Judah was defeated by Israel, and each man ran back home. King Joash of Israel captured King Amaziah of Judah, son of Joash, son of Jehoaz, in Beth Shemesh and brought him to Jerusalem. He broke down the wall of Jerusalem from the gate of Ephraim to the corner gate, a distance of about six hundred feet. He took away all the gold and silver and all the items found in God's temple that were in the care of Obed Edom, the riches in the royal palace, and some hostages, and then he went back to Samaria. King Amaziah son of Joash of Judah lived for fifteen years after the death of King Joash son of Jehoahaz of Israel. The rest of the events of Amaziah's reign from start to finish are recorded in the scroll of the kings of Judah and Israel. From the time Amaziah turned from following the Lord, conspirators plotted against him in Jerusalem, so that he fled to Lachish, but they sent assassins after him, and they killed him there. His body was carried back by horses, and he was buried with his ancestors in the city of David. All the people of Judah took Uzziah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in his father Amaziah's place. Uzziah built up Elat and restored it to Judah after King Amaziah had passed away. Uzziah was sixteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for fifty-two years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Jehiah, who was from Jerusalem, and he did what the Lord approved, just as his father Amaziah had done. He followed God during the lifetime of Zechariah, who taught him how to honor God. And as long as he followed the Lord, God caused him to succeed. Uzziah attacked the Philistines and broke down the walls of Gath, Jabna, and Ashdod, and he built cities in the region of Ashdod and throughout Philistine territory. God helped him in his campaigns against the Philistines, the Arabs living in Gorbal, and the Munites. The Ammonites paid tribute to Uzziah, and his fame reached the border of Egypt, for he grew in power. Uzziah built and fortified towers in Jerusalem at the corner gate, valley gate, and at the angle. He built towers in the wilderness and dug many cisterns, for he owned many herds in the foothills and on the plains. And he had workers in the field and vineyards, in the hills and in Carmel, for he loved agriculture. Uzziah had an army of skilled warriors trained for battle. They were organized by divisions according to the muster rolls made by JL, the scribe, and Masaya, the officer under the authority of Hananiah, a royal official. The total number of family leaders who led warriors was 2,600. They commanded an army of 307,500 skilled and capable warriors who were ready to defend the king against his enemies. Uzziah supplied shields, spears, helmets, breastplates, bows, and sling stones for the entire army. In Jerusalem he made war machines carefully designed to shoot arrows and large stones from the towers and corners of the walls. He became very famous, for he received tremendous support and became powerful. But once he became powerful, his pride destroyed him. He disobeyed the Lord his God. He entered the Lord's temple to offer incense on the incense altar. Azariah the priest and eighty other brave priests of the Lord followed him in. They confronted King Uzziah and said to him, It's not proper for you, Uzziah, to offer incense to the Lord. The descendants of Aaron who are consecrated to offer incense, leave the sanctuary for you've disobeyed, and the Lord God will not honor you. And Uzziah, who had an incense censor in his hand, became angry. And while he was ranting and raving at the priests, a skin disease appeared on his forehead right there in front of the priests in the Lord's temple near the incense altar. When Azariah the high priest and the other priests looked at him, there was a skin disease on his forehead, and they hurried him out of there. Even the king himself wanted to leave quickly because the Lord had afflicted him. King Uzziah suffered from a skin disease until the day he died. He lived in separate quarters, afflicted by a skin disease and banned from the Lord's temple. His son Jotham was in charge of the palace and ruled over the people of the land. The rest of the events of Uzziah's reign from start to finish were recorded by the prophet Isaiah, son of Amos. By the way, that is the Isaiah who wrote the book of Isaiah. In fact, we know that they overlap, not only is it mentioned here, but Isaiah chapter six, Isaiah's really famous vision of seeing the Lord in the throne room and the his robe filled the temple. That, as Isaiah says in that verse, was the year that King Uzziah died. So right around here. Uzziah passed away, verse 23, and was buried near his ancestors in a cemetery belonging to the kings. This was because he had a skin disease. His son Jotham replaced him as king. Now Jotham was twenty five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother was Jerusha, the daughter of Zadok. He did what the Lord approved, just as his father Uzziah had done. He did not, however, have the audacity to enter the temple. I like that note. He didn't, by the way, do the bad thing that his father did. Yet the people were still sinning. He built the upper gate to the Lord's temple and did a lot of work on the wall in the area known as Ofel. He built cities in the hill country of Judah, and fortresses and towers in the forests. He launched a military campaign against the king of the Ammonites and defeated them. That year the Ammonites paid him one hundred talents of silver, ten thousand cores of wheat, and ten thousand cores of barley. The Ammonites also paid this same amount of annual tribute the next two years. Jotham grew powerful because he was determined to please the Lord his God. The rest of the events of Jotham's reign, including all his military campaigns and his accomplishments, are recorded in the scroll of the kings of Israel in Judah. He was twenty five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for sixteen years in Jerusalem. Jotham passed away and was buried in the city of David. His son Ahaz replaced him as king. And we'll stop there and read more about Ahaz next time. But for now, did you catch a little theme here? Now, fortunately, that last king, Jotham, was exempt from this, which is good, but the other two kings we read about, Amaziah and Uzziah, shared a similar trait. They both grew proud. And this happened after a time of success. Amaziah started off well and he yielded to the Lord. When the Lord told him, No, no, don't involve Israel in your battle. You go without them. The Lord's not with them. And when naturally he was like, Well, what about the money I paid him? God, I really like that response of the prophet who said, Well, the Lord is capable of giving you more than that, which is a great mini lesson here, by the way. If God calls you to give up something to be able to actually obey him, then you can give it up and trust that he's able to provide more than what you've lost. He is more than capable of reimbursing you and beyond, if that's what he wants to do. So don't let, oh, I've already invested time in this, I've already invested money in this, I'm already neck deep in this. Don't let that stop you from obeying God. Give it up. And he can more than reimburse you if that's what he chooses to do. But more important than getting a reimbursement is just obeying him for the sake of obeying him. That could be your thinking out loud thought for the day, but that was just a mini point. That one's free. Um But Amaziah, after this great victory, grew proud. He thought he could take everybody on. He even challenged the king of Israel, and God used that as a means of his downfall. Now, Uzziah similarly had a great reign. He reigned for a long time, and a lot of that time was spent just doing a lot of good things and enjoying peace and prosperity. But what happens when we experience peace and prosperity for a length of time is it's very easy to get proud and to feel like we are the reason that we are where we are. Uzziah was king and a pretty good one, pretty successful one. Why not be priest also? Why do I have to hear from God through the priests? Why can't I go serve the Lord and hear from the Lord myself like this? It's a lack of contentment. Amaziah was not content defeating the external enemies. He also wanted to defeat the enemies in the civil war. Uzziah was not content being a successful king. He wanted to be a successful priest, too. Discontent will be your downfall. Learn to be content with what God has given you and recognize that everything you have comes from him in the first place. Hopefully, your legacy can be more like Jotham's than his father and grandfather. That's the thinking out loud thought for the day.