Ahaz Refuses the Lord

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“Later, the Lord sent this message to King Ahaz: “Ask the Lord your God for a sign of confirmation, Ahaz. Make it as difficult as you want—as high as heaven or as deep as the place of the dead.” But the king refused. “No,” he said, “I will not test the Lord like that.” Then Isaiah said, “Listen well, you royal family of David! Isn’t it enough to exhaust human patience? Must you exhaust the patience of my God as well?”
Isaiah 7:10-13 NLT

Ahaz was a bad king in Judah. In 2 Chronicles 28 we read, “… he followed the example of the kings of Israel. He cast metal images for the worship of Baal. He offered sacrifices in the valley of Ben-Hinnom, even sacrificing his own sons in the fire. In this way, he followed the detestable practices of the pagan nations the Lord had driven from the land ahead of the Israelites. He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the pagan shrines and on the hills and under every green tree”. The same chapter records that the Lord “… allowed the king of Aram to defeat Ahaz and to exile large numbers of his people to Damascus. The armies of the king of Israel also defeated Ahaz and inflicted many casualties on his army”. In Isaiah 7, we now find that the armies of Syria and Israel are now advancing on Jerusalem itself, causing alarm and terror. The goal was to remove Ahaz from the throne and install their own king, “the son of Tabeel”. 

Isaiah brought the Lord’s message to Ahaz, telling him to “stop worrying” and not to fear, and later he followed it up with an extraordinarily gracious offer from the Lord. “Ask the Lord your God for a sign of confirmation, Ahaz. Make it as difficult as you want—as high as heaven or as deep as the place of the dead.” Why should God have been so kind and gracious to a king and his people, yet who were so deeply involved in sin and idolatry, and who had rejected God Himself? Why not let the pagan hordes (yes, Israel was a “pagan” nation at this time as well) overrun the whole of Judah, and assign the people to death or exile? After all, they had broken their side of the Covenant that God had made with His people through Moses. But God offered Ahaz a deal to bolster his faith and show him how stupid he was being with his idolatry and evil ways. Ahaz was told to ask for a miraculous sign to prove to him that God was who He said He was, and would protect him and his (remaining) people. 

But Ahaz refused. He said that he “[would] not test the Lord like that”. What was he afraid of? Probably because if he had asked for an impossible sign, he would have faced the reality that God is real and that he would have to change his ways. How could he continue in idolatry, knowing that the lumps of metal that he worshipped had no power like the Lord? Surely he could remember the story of the time when the Ark of God was captured by the Philistines, and they placed it in the temple of their own god, a statue called Dagon. We can read the story in 1 Samuel 5, “But when the citizens of Ashdod went to see it the next morning, Dagon had fallen with his face to the ground in front of the Ark of the Lord! So they took Dagon and put him in his place again. But the next morning the same thing happened—Dagon had fallen face down before the Ark of the Lord again. This time his head and hands had broken off and were lying in the doorway. Only the trunk of his body was left intact”. What a farce! What followed was enough to terrify the inhabitants of Ashdod, and they couldn’t wait to send the ark back to its rightful people. That is the power of the Lord, and even today, denial of the Lord in pursuit of other “gods” will have consequences, either in this life or the life to come. 

Perhaps Ahaz was frightened about testing God, because the test might be accompanied by something unpleasant. There was the account of Elisha, on his deathbed, in conversation with King Jehoash of Israel. We read in 2 Kings 13:18-19, “Then [Elisha] said, “Now pick up the other arrows and strike them against the ground.” So the king picked them up and struck the ground three times. But the man of God was angry with him. “You should have struck the ground five or six times!” he exclaimed. “Then you would have beaten Aram until it was entirely destroyed. Now you will be victorious only three times””. Fear instead of faith ruled the day as far as Ahaz was concerned, and he refused a life-changing offer from God. God’s offer to Ahaz was startlingly gracious. He told Ahaz that the sky could be the limit. He can ask for any supernatural act to show that God was with him and His power was real and effective. It seemed that Ahaz wasn’t expressing faith, but stubbornness. What’s implied in Ahaz’s refusal to test God was that the king’s mind was already made up. He didn’t want to be distracted by supernatural displays of God’s power through the prophet Isaiah. He wanted to produce the answer himself. And in the process he would end up putting the fate of his nation in the hands of the powerful Assyrian king.

For us pilgrims, there will come times of testing, when God will check out our faith. In Hebrews 11:6, we read, “And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him”. There will be times in life when we have to appeal to God in prayer, perhaps for a miraculous healing, relief from debt, or some other human catastrophe. In faith, we know that God will have an answer, and we pray and keep praying until we receive His answer. Nothing delights God more than to see His children faithfully look to Him in times of need. He may not offer us a miraculous sign to prove His presence, because through Jesus, He was the miracle that we need. So we keep praying, day by day, bringing our petitions to the throne of grace. And, as we know, His peace will flood over us. Faith, not fear, will overcome in the end.

Dear Heavenly Father. Thank You that You are real and able to forgive all our sins. We love You and worship You. Amen.

A Message of Hope: God has a Way

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“The news had come to the royal court of Judah: “Syria is allied with Israel against us!” So the hearts of the king and his people trembled with fear, like trees shaking in a storm. Then the Lord said to Isaiah, “Take your son Shear-jashub and go out to meet King Ahaz. You will find him at the end of the aqueduct that feeds water into the upper pool, near the road leading to the field where cloth is washed. Tell him to stop worrying. Tell him he doesn’t need to fear the fierce anger of those two burned-out embers, King Rezin of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah. Yes, the kings of Syria and Israel are plotting against him, saying, ‘We will attack Judah and capture it for ourselves. Then we will install the son of Tabeel as Judah’s king.’”
Isaiah 7:2-6 NLT

The news that Syria and Israel had formed an alliance and were heading to Jerusalem filled the hearts of king Ahaz and the people there with fear. We read the extent of the fear, because we are told that the people “trembled … like trees shaking in a storm”. We get more of a background from 2 Chronicles 28, where we find a good reason for the Judeans’ fear. We read, “Because of all this, the Lord his God allowed the king of Aram to defeat Ahaz and to exile large numbers of his people to Damascus. The armies of the king of Israel also defeated Ahaz and inflicted many casualties on his army. In a single day Pekah son of Remaliah, Israel’s king, killed 120,000 of Judah’s troops, all of them experienced warriors, because they had abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors. … The armies of Israel captured 200,000 women and children from Judah and seized tremendous amounts of plunder, which they took back to Samaria” (2 Chronicles 28:5-6, 8). 

But all was not lost, because the Lord gave Isaiah a message of hope to take to Ahaz. He was to take his son, Shear-jashub, to meet the king and deliver a message that he must stop worrying. A strange name for a son, I think we agree, but in those days it was the customary to name a child after some event or message from God. Shear-jashub means, “A remnant will return”, a reminder that God would ensure that a small number of people will return from exile to rebuild the nation of Israel. We find some strange names as well in Hosea, with the children of Gober named Jezreel (God will scatter), Lo-ruhamah (Not loved) and Lo-ammi (Not my people), all names to send a prophetic message to the people of Israel because they had rejected God. But at least “A remnant will return” conveys a message of hope.

The account in Isaiah continues with the Lord providing specific instructions to Ahaz regarding the invading armies of Israel and Syria. Ahaz was outside Jerusalem, presumably inspecting Jerusalem’s water supply, when Isaiah caught up with him. There, Isaiah received a message from the Lord telling him not to fear and he delivered it to Ahaz. Although the intent of the invading armies was to capture the whole of Judah and replace the king with their own, we read more detail in Isaiah 7:7-9, “But this is what the Sovereign Lord says: “This invasion will never happen; it will never take place; for Syria is no stronger than its capital, Damascus, and Damascus is no stronger than its king, Rezin. As for Israel, within sixty-five years it will be crushed and completely destroyed. Israel is no stronger than its capital, Samaria, and Samaria is no stronger than its king, Pekah son of Remaliah. Unless your faith is firm, I cannot make you stand firm””.

The Lord referred to the invading kings as being “burned-out embers”. In other words, they may look scary, but they are like dying fires that will soon burn out. The Lord promised that their plan to conquer Jerusalem “will never take place”. God points out that the enemies are just human kings, but the Lord is in total control of history. But there was a warning in Isaiah’s message, “… Unless your faith is firm, I cannot make you stand firm” (Isaiah 7:9b). This was a stark warning to Ahaz that unless he trusted God to protect his kingdom, then he would fall, taking Judah with him. Ahaz received a message of hope, but there was a condition – unless He had faith in God and changed his evil ways, there would be consequences. 

Have any of us pilgrims ever had a panic attack? At a time, perhaps, when something in our lives was so big and so threatening that we lapsed into fear, shaking “like trees in a storm”? At a time when there seemed to be no way out from a financial crisis or bad news from the doctor? At such a time, it is important to stay calm, trusting that God will take care of us. Peter wrote, “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you” (1 Peter 5:7). Paul wrote, “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7).

In God, there is always a way out of a crisis. He brings hope to the hopeless and succour to the needy. Our cares and worries are as nothing to a child of God, because He has all the resources that we will ever need. And one day He will bring us home, to live in His house forever. We pilgrims are children of God, a people of faith, and we know that “… the Spirit who lives in [us] is greater than the spirit who lives in the world” (1 John 4:4b). 

Dear Father God. Thank You for Your care and concern for us, your children. Whatever we are facing today, we give it to You, in faith that You will bring about the solution we need. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Ahaz, the Bad King

Posted on by Adrian Clark

“When Ahaz, son of Jotham and grandson of Uzziah, was king of Judah, King Rezin of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah, the king of Israel, set out to attack Jerusalem. However, they were unable to carry out their plan. The news had come to the royal court of Judah: “Syria is allied with Israel against us!” So the hearts of the king and his people trembled with fear, like trees shaking in a storm.”
Isaiah 7:1-2 NLT

Ahaz was the king in Judah for 16 years around 735 BC. In 2 Kings 16:2, we read, “Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years. He did not do what was pleasing in the sight of the Lord his God, as his ancestor David had done”. His list of misdemeanours can be found in the next two verses, “Instead, he followed the example of the kings of Israel, even sacrificing his own son in the fire. In this way, he followed the detestable practices of the pagan nations the Lord had driven from the land ahead of the Israelites. He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the pagan shrines and on the hills and under every green tree”. Faced with an invasion by an Israel-Syria coalition, he forged an alliance with Assyria, which cost Judah much gold from the Temple and made it a vassal state of Assyria. 

Well, that is the background to the next phase in the life of the nation of Judah, and as we read on, we find a series of alliances and wars that bring political volatility and instability that was never in God’s plan for His people. A bad king, and rampant idolatry and sin permeated throughout the nation regardless of God’s appeals and warnings. Was God supposed to turn His back on His people and let them get on with it? Perhaps another option was to destroy them all, as He did in Noah’s day, and start again, but the Noahic Covenant He made at the time meant that this was never going to be a divine option. And so, the decline of Judah commenced in line with Isaiah’s previous prophesies. It wouldn’t end until all the inhabitants had been cleansed by death, destruction or exile. So sad, when all the time God was reaching out to His people with unlimited love and grace.

Israel and Judah were surrounded by belligerent nations that they were supposed to have driven out when they entered their promised land. That would have enabled them to occupy the land and live in accordance with God’s plan, and to be protected from any nations outside their territory. But time and again, they rebelled against God and adopted the sinful practices of the nations that they were instructed to destroy. Yes, there were bright spots when they rose up and did what they were supposed to do, and we can read about some of them in Judges and elsewhere, but overall, there was a downward spiral of evil that they were unable to overcome, having rejected God’s help in it all. They were given a choice between blessings and curses, and chose, for much of the time, a way of life that brought upon themselves the curses God warned them about.

The same choices that were before the Jews in the BC centuries and ever since are before mankind today. The UK and US have their roots in Christian principles and morals, founded on a faith in Jesus. Laws have been based on Jewish precepts, such as the Ten Commandments, and Western nations have, in the main, flourished and prospered. But today, secularism and humanism is on the increase, and laws are being passed that are at variance with what God desires. The outcome will be the same as it was for the Jews. Blessings and curses are still before us today, because God is the same, yesterday, today and forever. 

So what do we pilgrims do? We pray, of course, and keep on praying, that our leaders in government will turn from their wicked paths and embrace the one true God and His ways. We pray for a new awakening in our countries and revival in our churches and denominations. We remember that we are salt and light in our communities, telling people everywhere that there is a God in Heaven, and that Jesus, His Son, came to bring salvation from the consequences of sin. Many Christians are also called to get involved in the politics of our nations and, by doing so, bring a Godly perspective to largely godless assemblies. 

Ahaz failed to do “what was pleasing in the sight of the Lord his God”, and he ultimately paid the price. He was twenty when he became king and reigned for sixteen years, which meant he died in his thirties, although we do not know for sure how or when. Did God cut his reign short because of his evil? Perhaps, but there is a warning for the leaders in our days that God may intervene when necessary and when the time is right. 

Heavenly Father. It was a depressing period in Israel’s history when Your people abandoned Your ways and lapsed into sin and idolatry. We too live in a depressed world, with evil leaders causing so much mayhem. And so we pray for peace and for Your Kingdom to come, as Jesus taught us to pray. And we echo the words at the end of the Bible, “Come Lord Jesus”. Amen.