Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-nine years. His mother was Jehoaddin from Jerusalem. Amaziah did what was pleasing in the Lord’s sight, but not wholeheartedly. (2 Chronicles 25:1-2)You go to church for years, decades sometimes. You sing the songs, boring as they are. You bow your head during the prayers while you go over your day’s itinerary. You throw a little dough in the plate. You listen to the guy up front blather and try your best to look interested.
And you have done this for years. Why then doesn’t the Lord bless you more? You need some stuff and you have put up with church for a long time. He owes you.
Joash, Amaziah’s father, was a king of Judah who did just enough to get by. His father was a good man who lost his focus. He listened strongly to his mentor, a prophet and a priest, and prospered while he did so. Then the older man died and his friends corrupted Joash and he ended up outside of the Lord and dead by the hand of assassins.
Amaziah started pretty good, but he was one of these people who figure they can just do the stuff and they will be fine. They have the formulas and the people to say the right words so everything is good.
In the movie Book of Eli, there was a man living in the post-apocalyptic society who was searching desperately for a Bible. he wanted it because he view it as a magical power. If he had one and could say the stuff in it, people would automatically do what he said. He would be powerful. Needless to say, when he got hold of one, he didn’t have the ability to read it.
The American Indians would wear crosses and carry Bibles into battle. They viewed them as white men’s power and wanted to be able to use them themselves. Needless to say, it was not the things that were powerful, but the God behind them. Without God, the stuff was just that: stuff.
Psalm 9:1-2 says: I will praise you, Lord, with all my heart; I will tell of all the marvelous things you have done. I will be filled with joy because of you. I will sing praises to your name, O Most High.
The joy in life and the happiness in service comes from just that: service. Service from the heart is needed for the service to matter. After all, no one likes purely obligatory service.
And neither does God.
Amaziah too, like his father, died by the hand of assassins while on the run. He disobeyed the Lord to the point that God turned from him. his son did the same thing and ended up with leprosy from the hand of God as a reward for his arrogance. Sad endings to sad lives.
No comments:
Post a Comment
To comment, post your comment and click the anonymous button. It would be nice if you signed it so I could know who you are.
You are welcome to say anything you want as long as it is nice. If I don't like it, or it is ugly, I will take it off, place it into the garbage disposal, grind it up, and allow it to be flushed into the Gulf of Mexico where it will be eaten by a fish and then excreted where it will lie on the bottom of the ocean until it is covered up by other comments.