Wednesday Night Service 7PM - 2 Chronicles 21-24 - Pastor Ryan Nichols

If your love surrounds me, there's nothing to fear now, for I am safe with you.

Good evening, everybody. It's good to see you guys. I'm really glad you're here. I'm glad you could make it out on this really nice evening. I invite you to stand with me. We'll pray and we'll get started. Father, we thank you for another day and thank you for allowing us to be here, Lord God. Thank you for allowing us to be in your house this evening. Lord, just prepare our hearts to receive from you this evening, Lord, and help us to lavish praise upon you.

Help us to focus on you, Lord, and to set everything else that's going on in our lives aside. To focus on you and to lavish praise upon you, Lord. We love you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.

My victory walks through the shadow. Your love surrounds me. There's nothing to fear now, for I am safe.

A thing impossible.

Thank you and we pray.

But accomplish the purpose for which you sent it. We love you, Lord. We praise you and we thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, before I get out of here, guys, I got one quick announcement.

This coming Monday, April 13th, from 4 to 9 p.m., we're going to do a... a youth group fundraiser at Pizza Ranch. Students, if your kids want to go, if they want to help, they're going to need a signed permission slip, which I have. A portion of all the sales that night are going to go to the youth group to help us with things like camp, youth group activities, things like that.

So, again, that's this coming Monday, April 13th, from 4 to 9 p.m. Come out and enjoy some good pizza, some good family time, and help support our youth group, okay? Thank you.

Good evening. If you brought a Bible with you, open it up to 2 Chronicles, chapter 21.

2 Chronicles 21.

Well, as we return to the book of 2 Chronicles, I will remind you again of why the writer of the book of Chronicles wrote this. He's writing to the Jewish people that are returning from captivity. They've been in captivity in Babylon. They've been in captivity for a long time, and they are returning to rebuild the temple, to rebuild the wall, to restore worship in Jerusalem again.

And he wrote this, first as a warning of how they ended up in captivity, but he also wrote it as a reminder of the faithfulness of God. And I've been struck over and over again throughout 1 and 2 Chronicles of this, and I gave this kind of an overarching title. I don't even know if I've ever referenced this or not. But the book, the book of 1 and 2 Chronicles is really the story of a faithful God to an unfaithful people.

And we really see this tonight in the chapters that we cover, that no matter how far Israel fell, God always continued to be faithful to his promise. God always continued to be faithful to his people. And can I just say, on a personal level, I've been watching this happen, not only in the lives of people here, but in my own personal life, I just am watching God be faithful. And it's so cool to see how God does things.

And sometimes it's little stuff, sometimes it's big stuff. Just to see how faithful God is in our lives. And so I pray that tonight's a good reminder of that for us. So it starts off like this in chapter 21, verse 1. It says, Then Jehoshaphat slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David. And Jehoram, his son, became king in his place.

Now, just to bring us all back up to speed, because it's been a couple of weeks since we've been in 2 Chronicles. Jehoshaphat was a great king. One of the greatest kings the southern kingdom had. He really only had one. Big problem. Jehoshaphat had a tendency to make friends with the wrong people. He had a tendency to make alliances with the northern kingdom, in particular Ahab.

The first time we saw this alliance was, of course, when he married off his son Jehoram that we'll talk about tonight. When he married him off to one of Ahab's daughters. And we're going to see the consequences of that in his life. But then also when he aligned with Ahab to go to battle with him. And almost was killed in battle, but cried out to the Lord. And the Lord defended him.

And ultimately Ahab was killed. In that battle. But he had this struggle. And that struggle that he had of making friends with the wrong people actually had a far-reaching effect that he probably never intended or even saw coming. And so that's really what we see in the life of Jehoram. So his son Jehoram becomes king in his place. I want you to notice what it says in verse 2.

And he had brothers. The sons of Jehoshaphat were Azariah, Jehiel, Zechariah, Azariahu, Michael, and man, why can't they all be named things like Michael? That's awesome. Shephatiah, all these were the sons of Jehoshaphat, king of Israel. And their father gave them many gifts of silver and gold and precious things with fortified cities in Judah. But he gave the kingdom to Jehoram because he was the firstborn.

When Jehoram had taken over the kingdom of his father and made himself secure, he killed all of his brothers with the sword. And some of the rulers of Israel also. And Jehoram was 32 years old when he became king. And he reigned. He reigned eight years in Jerusalem. He walked in the way of the kings of Israel just as the house of Ahab did for Ahab's daughter was his wife.

And he did evil in the sight of the Lord. Yet the Lord was not willing to destroy the house of David because of the covenant which he had made with David since he had promised to give a lamp to him and his sons forever. So Jehoram comes into the kingdom, right? Becomes king because he's the firstborn. All of the other brothers, Jehoshaphat, very wisely, spread throughout the entire kingdom

so that they would be far away from his son so that there would be no rivalry between them. But Jehoram, probably because of the evil influence of his wife and his own evil heart, I don't want to give that any discount here, and the evil in his own heart, instead of being secure in the kingdom that God had given to him, decided he would secure it himself. And so he kills all of his brothers, wipes out his entire family in order to hold on to the kingdom. And so we find that not only was he, he murderous in the way that he came into the position that he was given, but it says that he walked in all the ways of the northern kingdom because he was married to the daughter of Ahab.

Now we won't go back and spend too much time talking about Ahab and Jezebel, but remember Ahab and Jezebel were probably two of the worst rulers that the northern kingdom had. They instituted idolatry unlike anything else that had been seen within the land. And so to act like them is not good. But I find it interesting, that we are given a principle in scripture.

And the principle is this, bad company corrupts good morals. We all think that we're above that. We all think, well, it won't happen to me. I won't allow myself to be drugged down by the people that are around me. But the problem is, we all have a natural bent towards sin. That's the flesh that we all have. Even as redeemed believers in Jesus Christ, we still have a natural bent towards sin

because we wear these bodies of sin that are still subject to the sinful things around us. And so when we are continually presented with opportunity and pressure, we will naturally give in to the bent that we already have. We will naturally give in to that bent and we will end up falling to the lowest common denominator instead of rising above. Which is why, as believers in Jesus Christ, we are told to surround ourselves with the right kind of people because bad company corrupts good morals.

Jehoshaphat probably had no idea what he was going to do. He was going to do something to do not only to his son but to the kingdom of Judah by aligning himself with Ahab by him marrying off his son to the daughter of Ahab. But that worldly influence would create a ripple effect that is going to carry on to not only Jehoram but also Jehoram's son. And that tells me that the people that you surround yourself with are of vast importance.

And listen, we tell kids this a lot, right? And I've said this over and over again. We tell kids this a lot. And we should tell kids this a lot. Because they're living in a culture that is constantly surrounded by sin and constantly surrounded by sinful people. Not that you tell them you can't ever associate with people who don't believe like you, but you can't make your close associations

to people who don't believe like you. Otherwise, you will fall into the things that they do. But I think we do ourselves a great disservice to say that this is only a problem for kids. That this is only a problem for those 25 and younger. If you're over 25, you're probably not going to give in to the sin that surrounds you. I would like to tell you about politicians.

Right? And listen, this isn't a political problem. This is a people problem. We all have a bent towards sin. And the things that you are influenced by the most will guide your life. And so you need to make sure that the things that are influencing you, whether it's the people that you're around or the things that you're taking in are good and godly in your life.

Because you will end up falling into the things of the people that are around you. One thing that God delivered, and I've shared this story before, one thing that God delivered me from very early on in my walk with Jesus is He delivered me from using a lot of profanity. You know, I was a wrestler and around a whole lot of not nice talk. We'll just say that.

And so I gave in to that for a long time. And early on in my walk, I knew that that had to clean up because I could not talk like the people that were around me. And I did really good at not giving in to using bad language. Until I was on one job when I worked construction. And that one job, when I was working seven days a week, 10 hours a day, and I was around filthy talk all day long,

that was the only time in my walk I really struggled with that. And it's because that's what I took in on a daily basis. Now, I couldn't help that because I couldn't stop working with those guys. I tried. But I could not stop working with those guys, right? I mean, it was just what I was around all day, every day. And so I had to learn that the influences that I took in

that I couldn't stop working with, had to overcome the bad influences that I was constantly around. But if you have the choice, you need to choose to surround yourself with the good. Because Jehoram is married to this woman who ultimately brings him down. He gives in to his basest desires because the influence is constantly there. It says he did evil, verse 6,

in the sight of the Lord. But I want you to notice what it says in verse 7 there. If the Lord was not willing to destroy the house of David because of the covenant that he had made with David. See, this is the faithfulness of God in spite of the faithlessness of the leaders. God continued to be faithful. God would have been completely just at any point in time to say,

scrap it all. I'm starting over with a new line. You guys have screwed this up so bad. You have fallen so far from where I have intended for you to be that I'm going to start over with a new line of kings in the southern kingdom. But God had made a promise. And God is the God who keeps his promises. And I love that about God because we are told in the book of 1 John

that even when we are faithless, he remains faithful. Praise God for his grace that he continues to show us. I don't know about you, but I'm standing up here because God has remained faithless or faithful even when I'm faithless. And I bet you're sitting out there because you have the testimony of the fact that God has remained faithful even though at times you have been faithless.

And that's such a blessing. It's a beautiful thing to know about God. Can you imagine being the children of Israel returning from Babylon knowing that idolatry is what got you sent to Babylon, knowing that idolatry is what ended up landing you in captivity and you're on your way back and you're reading back through the chronicles of the kings of Judah and you're reading that God would not destroy the line of David because he had made a promise to the line of David knowing that that's the only reason you're returning to Judah. That's the only reason you get to go back to Jerusalem is because God had remained faithful even though you and your ancestors were faithless.

And so we go on from there. It says in verse 8, in his days, meaning Jehoram's days, Edom revolted against the rule of Judah and set up a king over themselves. Jehoram crossed over with his commanders and all his chariots with him and he arose by night and struck down the Edomites who were surrounding him and the commanders of the chariots. So Edom revolted against Judah to this day.

Then Libna revolted at the same time against his rule because he had forsaken the Lord God of his fathers. So two different groups of people who up to this point in time were essentially under tribute. In other words, they were under the control of Judah and they paid taxes to keep Judah from destroying them. They revolted and he put up a resistance but not so great a resistance that they once again were returned under the control of Judah.

They remained free. In other words, he was losing all of his political power because he had given in to immorality in his life. You find that when you give in to immorality, it affects your ability to stand strong in just about every other way in your life. And this is what he does. And so it says, Moreover, verse 11, he made high places in the mountains of Judah

and caused the inhabitants of Jerusalem to play the harlot and he led Judah astray. Then a letter came to him from Elijah the prophet saying, Thus says the Lord God of your father, David, because you have not walked in the ways of Jehoshaphat, your father, in the ways of Asa, king of Judah, but have walked in the ways of the kings of Israel and have caused Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to play the harlot at the house of Ahab as the house of Ahab played the harlot. And you have also killed your brothers, your own family who were better than you. Behold, the Lord is going to strike your people, your sons, your wives, and all your possessions with a great calamity.

And you will suffer severe sickness, a disease of your bowels until your bowels come out of you because of the sickness day by day. I don't know about you, but I get a letter like that and I reevaluate things in my life, right? Like, hey, listen, you're really sucking at life right now and you're doing bad things. And because of that, your bowels will exit your body.

That's the punishment that's coming for you. I go, maybe I should reevaluate what's going to happen in my life. Because I like all the body parts to be exactly where they're supposed to be. First of all, if I receive a letter from Elijah, I'm absolutely terrified by this, right? Like Elijah, right? Like the prophet that called down fire. I mean, all the things

that Elijah did, right? Just a fantastic prophet of God. There's some issues that people have with the fact that Elijah sent a letter to Jehoram. The first issue that they have is Elijah died during the reign of Jehoshaphat. And so you're kind of like, well, how did Elijah send a letter to Jehoram if he died, or didn't die, was taken up to heaven during the reign of Jehoshaphat?

How does that play out? Well, there's two logical explanations. And I actually prefer the second one on this. The first explanation is that there was about five years when Jehoshaphat and Jehoram were co-regents. In other words, they reigned together. King, assistant king, basically. And that perhaps that's the time when it was written. The other explanations

that commentators gave, and I love this, is that Elijah actually wrote the letter before he was taken up into heaven because God had given him a prophetic vision of what was coming in the life of Jehoram. And that when others saw what was happening, that that prophetic letter came true, that they then sent it to Jehoram. Is there anything more Elijah than that, right? Like, is there anything more like, yep, that's the prophet of God than that moment right there?

Can you imagine getting a letter from a dead dude that said everything that was going on in your life and what God was going to do if you didn't repent? I don't know about you. That feels like a stark moment, right? That feels like a moment where you go, I should stop and think about what's going on in my life right now. But he doesn't. This is what it says.

Then the Lord, verse 16, stirred up against Jehoram the spirit of the Philistines and the Arabs who bordered the Ethiopians. And they came against Judah and invaded the land. And they came against Judah and invaded the land. And they came against Judah and invaded it and carried away all the possessions found in the king's house together with his sons and his wives so that no one was left to him except Jehoahaz, the youngest of his sons.

So after all this, the Lord smote him in his bowels with incurable sickness. Before we get to the gruesome ending here, I would like to point out one thing about these Philistines that came against Judah. Did you notice who stirred their hearts to come against Judah? It was the Lord. The Lord stirred up the heart of the Philistines to come against Judah. And I find that interesting

because remember, God's not always picky about who he uses as his instrument of judgment. And God will use the most ungodly people to bring about judgment in the lives of those who are not obeying him. And I think in the world we live in today, we should pay attention to that. Because as the country of the United States, if God were to send an enemy against us, he would be fully justified in doing so.

Because he has given us multiple warnings about the way we are conducting ourselves as human beings. And we have continued to flip the bird to God and say, well, we're going to do what we want to do anyway. And so if God sent someone against us, he would be completely justified in doing so. Because God will always bring about judgment in whatever way he sees fit.

And that's what he does here in the life of Jehovah. And then, of course, God sends this sickness against Jehoram, this incurable sickness. Notice what it says in verse 19. Now, it came about in the course of time at the end of two years. That's a bad two years. But his bowels came out because of his sickness. And he died in great pain. I don't know what's worse,

the way he dies or the way the people respond to it. And his people made no fire for him like the fire for his fathers. He was 32 years old when he became king. He reigned in Jerusalem eight years. And he departed, listen, with no one's regret. And they buried him in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the king. You know how you know you didn't do a good job

as the king? When you die and no one's sad about it. When you die and no one regrets it. Because he had lived his life so much for ungodly things. That a people that may have had some form of godliness in them said, thank God, he's gone. What a tragic ending to a tragic life. Well, now we come to chapter 22, the life of Ahaziah. It says, then the inhabitants

of Jerusalem made Ahaziah his youngest son, king in his place. You may have noticed in verse 17 it referred to him as Jehoahaz. Both are the same person. For the bare, the land of men who came with the Arabs, verse 1 of chapter 22, to the camp had slain all the older sons. So Ahaziah, the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, began to reign. Ahaziah was 22 years old

when he became king and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Athaliah, the granddaughter of Omri. He also walked in the ways of the house of Ahab for his mother was his counselor to do wickedly. Okay, Athaliah would have been Jehoram. Jehoram's wife who was also the granddaughter of Omri, the father of Ahab. Everybody follow the line there.

She's not a good person. And because of that, because of the influence of this exact same woman in the life of now her son, he ends up becoming another one of the evil kings ruling over Judah. Friends, we have to understand something about decisions that we make. Decisions have consequences. It badgers decisions have bad consequences. God remains faithful, but decisions have consequences.

We can't do anything about the past. We can't do anything about yesterday. All we can do is put that under the blood of Jesus. But what we can do today is make decisions that are godly so that we don't deal with the consequences of those decisions later. Amen? And so, this woman Athaliah is his counselor and counsels him to do wickedly. And again, verse 4, he did evil

in the sight of the Lord like the house of Ahab for they were his, counselors after the death of his father to his destruction. He also walked according to their counsel and went with Jehoram, the son of Ahab, king of Israel, to wage war against Hazael, king of Aram in Ramoth-Gilead. But the Arameans wounded Jehoram, so he returned to be healed in Jezreel of the wounds which they had inflicted on him at Ramah. When he fought against Hazael, king of Aram, and Ahaziah, the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, went down to see and he was to see and he was to see Jehoram, the son of Ahab in Jezreel because he was sick.

Now the destruction of Ahaziah was from God in that he went to Joram for when he came he went in with Jehoram against Jehu, the son of Nimshi, whom the Lord had anointed to cut off the house of Ahab. Now, if we were to go back to, and you might write this in the margin of your Bible, 2 Kings, chapters 8 through 11, you would read the entire story of what was just referenced in a handful of verses here. Jehoram was the king in the northern kingdom and he was going to war against the Arameans and since Ahaziah was his family member, he convinced him to go to war with him. Well, during this war, Jehoram was wounded and went back to Jezreel to be healed of his sickness.

Ahaziah, being a good family member, went to go check on him. But while all of that was going on, the Lord had anointed a man by the name of Jehu, the son of Nimshi, and told him your job is to wipe out all of the line of Ahab because of all of the sins of Ahab and Jezebel. Ahaziah, because of his alignment with Jehoram in the house of Ahab, gets caught up in the judgment of God as all of this is going on. But again, I will point out to you verse 7.

Now the destruction of Ahaziah was from God. I was reading J. Vernon McGee on this and he said, I will never understand when people say God is not a God who judges sin, he's too loving for that. He goes, if you ever say that, you've clearly not read the Bible. You've clearly not read anything in it because it is over and over again throughout Scripture that God judges sin.

Now, judgment for sin was poured out on Jesus Christ, but to this day, if you don't accept the payment that Jesus made, you will still face judgment for sin. And so, this is what happens in the life of Ahaziah. This destruction came from God. Verse 8, it came about when Jehu was executing judgment on the house of Ahab. He found the princes of Judah and the sons

of Ahaziah's brother ministering to Ahaziah and he slew them. He also sought Ahaziah and they caught him while he was hiding in Samaria and brought him to Jehu and put him to death and buried him. For they said, he is the son of Jehoshaphat who sought the Lord with all of his heart. So there was no one of the house of Ahaziah to retain the power of the kingdom.

Now when Athaliah, the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal offspring of the house of Judah. Now, if you know the rest of the story, great, but let's stop right there for one second. Have you all caught what's going on right now? Everybody getting killed. Do you notice that? Everybody's getting wiped out. And then when Athaliah

realizes what's going on, she sees this as her moment to seize all of the power without putting her son to death. So she puts everybody else in the royal household to death. Now remember, the prophecy says that there always had to be someone of the house and line of David sitting on the throne, only it appears as though that just got wiped out. Athaliah now sees her moment to take over the kingdom and it feels like all hope is lost.

Can you imagine them reading this? Oh my gosh, how on earth did we wind up here if this is the case? Did God still remain faithful? Notice what it says in verse 11. But that girl, I can't pronounce that if I want to, okay? The king's daughter took Joash, the son of Ahaziah, and stole him from among the king's sons who were being put to death and placed him and his nurse

in the bedroom. So, okay, let's just try it real quick, okay? Jehoshabith. Man, it works for me. Jehoiada, the daughter of King Jehoram, the wife of Jehoiada, the priest, for she was the sister of Ahaziah, hid him from Athaliah so that she would not put him to death. He was hidden with them in the house of God for six years while Athaliah reigned over the land.

I love this moment. She sees one last son that's still alive. She knows what's going on. She knows everybody's getting wiped out. And this one woman who was the wife of Jehoiada the priest at that point in time understood the times, understood the situation, and made a bold and daring move that could have cost her her life to preserve the line. And God was faithful.

God was faithful to her. God was faithful to the line. And God was faithful to his promise. I love this because this is the only time this woman's mentioned in the entire Bible. And there's one thing that she did that is probably one of the most life-changing things in the entire kingdom of Judah in this moment in that she hid the son who would carry on the line.

I love when people understand the times, understand the gravity of the situation, and are willing to do what it takes to make sure that they obey God. What about you? Listen, there may not be something this dramatic that's going to happen where you're going to steal some child away. Listen, I'm just going to tell you right now, don't steal a child, okay? That's how our entire church

ends up on the news. And I don't want that to happen. But perhaps you know what needs to be done. And you know that it's going to be difficult. But it's the stand that you need to take in order for God to move in the way that He sees fit. And He wants you to do it. Can you be that person? You don't have to be anybody special. You don't have to be anybody educated

or any of those kinds of things. You just have to be a willing person. That's all she was. She understood the times. She understood the gravity of the situation. And she made a bold move to obey God. And so, here we are, the end of chapter 22. Athaliah, this evil, this evil queen is ruling undoubtedly in a very Disney movie sort of way where everything is, you know,

everything's evil. There's darkness over the land. And here's this child being hidden in a room in a temple in hopes that one day this one-year-old will be able to save the kingdom. Will it happen? Let's keep going. Chapter 23, verse 1. Now in the seventh year, Jehoiada strengthened himself. And he took captains of hundreds. And Azariah, the son of Jehoram,

Ishmael, the son of Johanan, Azariah, the son of Obed, Maaseah, the son of Adiah, Elishaphat, the son of Zichri, and they entered into a covenant with them. And they went throughout Judah and they gathered the Levites from all the cities of Judah and the heads of the fathers' households of Israel and they came to Jerusalem. And all the assembly made a covenant with the king in the house of God. And Jehoiada said to them, Behold, the king's son shall reign as the Lord has spoken concerning the sons of David.

This is the thing which you shall do. One-third of you of the priests and the Levites who come in on the Sabbath shall be gatekeepers. One-third shall be at the king's house and one-third at the gate of the foundation. And all the people shall be in the courts of the house of the Lord. But let no one enter the house of the Lord except the priests and the Levites

that are ministering. They may not enter for their holy. Let all the people keep the charge of the Lord. The Levites will surround the king, each man with his weapon in his hand. And whoever enters the house, let him be killed. Thus be with the king when he comes in and when he goes out. So the Levites and all Judah did according to all that Jehoiada the priest

commanded. And each one of them took his men who were to go out on the Sabbath with those, or took his men who were to come in on the Sabbath with those who were to go out on the Sabbath for Jehoiada the priest did not dismiss any of the divisions. And Jehoiada the priest gave to the captains of hundreds the spears, large and small shields which had been in King David's house which were in the house of God. And he stationed all the people, each man with his weapon in his hand from the right side to the left side of the house by the altar and by the house around the king.

Then they brought out the king's son and they put the crown on him and gave him the testimony and made him the king. And Jehoiada and his sons anointed him and said, Long live the king. Six years later, right, in the seventh year here, all of a sudden it's time. Can you imagine as he starts gathering these guys like sending out some, like this is some clandestine stuff, right, like sending out some secret messages to all these Levites and he brings all of them in, all of these leaders in, right, picture this, think like a godly game of thrones, right, brings all of these people in and you can imagine they all come in and he's like, okay guys, we gotta talk, but we gotta talk quiet.

I'm gonna show you something that I've never shown anyone before but I want you to pay attention.

The kings, son, and they're all like, this whole time? He's been here this whole time? He goes, yeah, well what are we gonna do now? I got a plan. Usually you guys are leaving and you guys are coming in. There's a shift change only this time there's not gonna be a shift change. Everybody's gonna stand here together. Did you notice who's gonna do this? It was the Levites.

These are the ministering priests that are gonna make this bold move to make this young man king while at the evil woman is ruling. He says, everybody surrounds him. Nobody lets anyone near the king. You're gonna protect him. That's exactly what they do. They bring him out. They put him in front of everybody and they say, behold, the king. And they put the crown

on his head and it says they gave him the testimony. You know what the testimony is? The testimony is the law because every king was to be given his own copy of the law. So they give this little seven-year-old kid a copy of the law. They put the crown on his head and they say, long live the king. And there's joy throughout the entire land. So much so that Athaliah

finds out what's going on. Verse 12. When Athaliah heard the noise of the people running and praising the king, she came into the house of the Lord to the people. She looked and behold, the king was standing by his pillar at the entrance. The captains and the trumpeteers were beside the king and all the people of the land rejoiced and blew their trumpets. The singers

with their musical instruments leading the praise and Athaliah tore her clothes. Treason, she said. She hoisted the priest, brought out the captains of hundreds who were appointed over the army and said, bring her out between the ranks and whoever follows her put to death with the sword. For the priest said, let her not be put to death in the house of the Lord.

So they seized her. When she arrived at the entrance of the horse gate, the king's house, they put her to death there. Man, what a great story. What a great scene. What a great picture of God's faithfulness. That God preserved this young kid. You ever thought about the fact that they had to keep a kid quiet that was three years old? Right? Some of y'all in here

got some three-year-olds. How quiet is a three-year-old? Well, neither of mine were quiet, right? Like, they were two of the loudest human beings I was ever around in my entire life. I'll never forget when Violet was born and started talking. I was like, I don't think that kid's ever going to quit talking. So we thought when we had a second child, we'd be like,

I bet she'll be really quiet. And then she started talking and we're like, oh dear God, talk to each other. Right? Like, there's loud kids that just talk all the time. Can you imagine having some kid that you got to, God protected him the whole time. God preserved him all that time so that he could be anointed king. And finally, they've dealt with the line of Ahab.

Everything's good and reforms are about to be carried out. Notice what it says in verse 16. And Jehoiada made a covenant between himself and all the people and the king that they would be the Lord's people. I don't think we can brush by that. I think we've got to stop there for just a second and talk about this. That the first thing that Jehoiada did, Jehoiada the priest,

remember, did when he anoints this young man as king is he makes a covenant with the people. And the covenant that he makes with the people is this, that they would be the Lord's people. That they would be a people who followed God with all of their heart. And I just love that this is the first step that he makes. You know why? Because what, what landed them

in the position that they were in right now is that they had not been a people who followed the Lord with all of their heart. That they had given into the idolatry, that they'd given into the world that was around them. And what a beautiful place to come to where you make a covenant with all of the people for yourself and for them to say, we're going to be people who follow the Lord. Listen, there comes points in time in our lives where we need renewal.

There comes points in time in our lives where we've got to renew the covenant that we've made with the Lord. Because that's ultimately what we came into with God when you were born again. As you came into a covenant with him where he promised to make you his child and you say, I will respond by following you with all of my heart. I will respond by pursuing you with all of my heart.

And you know as well as I do that as you go through the ebbs and flows of life that there's moments where you're walking strong and everything is great. And then there's moments where you start to drift just a little bit. Maybe you drift a lot a bit. And in those moments God reminds you of where you came from. God reminds you of where you've fallen from. And you have to say,

Lord, I'm so sorry that I've drifted from the path. Father, I'm going to follow you once again with all of my heart. Those are wonderful moments of renewal that we have. And listen, sometimes we need in our lives. And that's what he does here with the people. And so it says this, all the people, verse 17, went to the house of Baal and they tore it down. And they broke down,

they broke in pieces his altars and his house. And his images. And they killed Matan, the priest of Baal before the altar. Moreover, Jehoiada placed officers or offices of the house of the Lord under the authority of the Levitical priests whom David had assigned over the house of the Lord to offer burnt offerings of the Lord as it is written in the law of Moses with rejoicing and singing according to the order of David.

He stationed the gatekeepers of the house of the Lord so that no one would enter who was in any way unclean. And he took the captains of hundreds the nobles, the rulers of the people and all the people of the land. He brought the king down from the house of the Lord and came to the upper gate to the king's house and they placed the king upon his royal throne. So all the people of the land rejoiced and the city was quiet for they had put Athaliah to death with the sword.

I love step two here. Did you notice step two? Step one is that they renewed their covenant. They renewed their commitment. That's the easy part, right? It's easy to make a commitment. It's easy to say, yes, I'm going to follow you. That's what everybody's really good at doing. You come forward at the thing. You put your hand up at the end of the service. You hear the message

that moves you. You read the devotional that moves you, but then you got to take action, right? Everybody, I don't know who all is on social media here, but did you notice that every human being that you know posted he has risen on Sunday, right? Like he's alive. And I'm like, I don't even think you've ever met Jesus to know that he is alive. I mean, I don't mean

to be judgmental, but I'm like, look, you can't smoke pot on Saturday and then tell me that Jesus is alive on Sunday. I mean, that feels like a little bit of a contradiction in terms here. Maybe we should question this. And all I could think was, if you're going to proclaim that Jesus defeated sin and death on Sunday, you better live like you defeated sin and death on Monday, right?

It's easy to make the proclamation and the commitment, but have you started destroying the idols yet? Because that's the next thing that they do. They make a covenant that they are going to be the Lord's people, but then they chose to make decisions to show that they're the Lord's people. And they started going and they started breaking down the altars of Baal.

They started tearing down the altars to the foreign gods. Now remember, the foreign gods that they worshipped all had a purpose. They all were something. Sometimes their foreign gods had to do with the gods of the land who provided them with their finances. So essentially, they tore down all their financial gods. Some of the gods that they worshipped were the ones

who provided them with babies. Only what they did to worship those is it was very sexual in nature. So they tore down the gods of immorality. They tore down the gods that were all about their flesh. They tore all those altars down. But we're much more sophisticated than that, aren't we? We don't have a god to the land and a god to fertility and all that kind of stuff.

No. No, we have other gods. But they're the same thing. We call them different names. But they do the same thing. They're the gods that we trust in to provide for us. And they're the gods that we give in to when we want to please our flesh. And I think we all need to make sure that if we make the covenant to follow the Lord, that we tear down the idols that will keep us from it.

That we tear down the altars that keep us from following the Lord. I have a question I think we all eventually are going to have to deal with as the church, as people that want to follow the Lord, what altars are in your life? I didn't intend to make this point, but it just sort of laid itself out there and I felt like the Lord wanted me to make it. What altars do you have in your life that need torn down?

What are the altars in your house? What are the altars on your phone? What are the altars in relationships? You name it. I don't know what they are for you. What altars need torn down in your life that are going to keep you from knowing the Lord? Because I'm here to tell you right now, idolatry is not just an Old Testament thing. Idolatry is a humanity thing.

And even as believers in Jesus Christ, we can struggle with this. And I love how often this comes up in the Chronicles because remember, these people are coming back from captivity because of idolatry. And they are being reminded that every time reforms were made in the land, it started with a commitment, but it finished with an action. It started with commitment, a statement, I'm going to be your people.

You're going to be my God. And it carried on with the action of tearing down anything that stands between you and the Lord. Sometimes I think as believers in Jesus Christ, we need to get a little bit more serious about this. Sometimes I need to get a little bit more serious about that. Taking some time for self-examination to say, Lord, reveal the altars in my life

that aren't all the altars that I'm honoring to you. Lord, reveal the idolatry in my life that I can still sometimes tend to bow down to. And Lord, show me where I'm lying to myself about both of them because that action was necessary for them to continue on with the revival. And I'm going to close with this. I was planning on covering chapter 24, but I don't think

I have time to do it. I'm going to close with this in verse 21. It says, So all the people of the land rejoiced, and the city was quiet, for they had put Athaliah to death with the sword. Two things. They rejoiced, and there was quiet. In other words, there was joy, and there was peace because sin was dealt with. There was joy in the land. There was peace in the land

because they dealt with sin in the land. And I'm here to tell all of us right now as believers in Jesus Christ, if you want joy and peace in your life, make sure that you deal with the sin in your life. Because when you deal with the sin, joy and peace always follow behind. Amen? Father, we come before you. And Lord, I thank you for the truth of your word. And Lord, I know sometimes

it stings a little bit to hear these things, but God, we want to be your people. And Lord, throughout the book of Revelation, throughout those first three chapters of the book of Revelation, Lord, you deal with your church. And you deal with your church in the areas of sin in their lives because you desire a pure bride. And so, Lord, may we respond to the goodness of who you are.

May we respond to the gospel of who you are. May we respond, Lord, by not only a commitment of our lips, but Lord, a commitment of our lives. Lord, may we respond to the great gift that we celebrated last weekend of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Lord, with a commitment this week to pursue you with all of our hearts. Lord, thank you for who you are.

Thank you for what you've done. Thank you for the things that you've done. Thank you for the great love that you have for us. And so, Lord, create in us a clean heart and continue to renew a steadfast spirit within us. Father, we thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Be blessed.