Hope From the Word

Guest (Male): Do you walk the walk as well as talk the talk? Here's Pastor Bill Luebkemann with a challenge for you!

Bill Luebkemann: Lots of people talk about we believe this, we believe that, but where do they put their dollars? When they don't give back to the Lord something from what he's given them, it kind of cancels out all the talk.

You can say one thing, there's that old saying: put up or shut up. Are we going to carry out actions based on what we say, or do we just say stuff that sounds good, but we don't really believe it enough to really invest in what God's doing and to really acknowledge to him that he gave it to us in the first place?

Guest (Male): Many of us are blessed with precious and godly influences in our lives, whether it's a dad, friend, or even a coworker. Let's say they're suddenly taken from you. What would happen to you? Today on Hope From the Word, we'll meet a king who was easily influenced, for good or bad.

He became like whoever he was around last. Joash started off great, due in large part to the godly priest that influenced him. But then things took a turn for the worse when his influencer died. I'll let Pastor Bill Luebkemann take it from there. We're in 2 Chronicles 24.

Bill Luebkemann: This is a story here about how good can turn to bad. We saw that with Solomon, starting out so right and ending up so wrong. And we've seen that with other kings who started out right and ended up wrong, or started out good and got off the path and then came back to it.

Hey, could happen to any of us. We're walking with the Lord today, are we going to walk with the Lord tomorrow, or are we going to turn and go some other way? The choice is ours. But we see here someone who's really walking with the Lord can really wind up pretty messed up and the Lord brings judgment when that happens.

We'll get to that. Jehoiada picked two wives for him. Look, when you see polygamy mentioned in the Old Testament, it never says God approved of it. It doesn't say God wanted it that way. These were cultural practices of the day. They weren't right in God's eyes. They never were right. The Bible says at the very beginning, a husband should leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife and the two should become one flesh. It doesn't say the three or the 28 or the 1,001 in Solomon's case. It says the two shall become one flesh. Many compromises were made to the culture there, and the Bible acknowledges them, but it never says it approves of them.

Jehoiada chose two wives for him and he had sons and daughters. Sometime later, some people think this was maybe 20 years or so later, so Joash's reign began when he was seven. It ended when he was about 47. So maybe when he was in his 20s or something. Sometime later, Joash decided to restore the temple of the Lord. He called together the priests and Levites and said to them, "Go to the towns of Judah and collect the money due annually from all Israel to repair the temple of your God. Do it now." But the Levites did not act at once.

What's that all about? Well, look, they probably hadn't collected this temple tax in many years. But the fact of the matter is, the Lord had specified that some money would be set aside for these people for the upkeep of the temple. If you look in Exodus chapter 30, verse 12, it says this: "When you take a census of the Israelites to count them, each one must pay the Lord a ransom for his life at the time he is counted. Then no plague will come on them when you number them. Each one who crosses over to those already counted is to give a half-shekel according to the sanctuary shekel, which weighs 20 gerahs. This half-shekel is an offering to the Lord." Well, you can read that in Exodus there.

Joash summoned the priest and he said, "Go out and collect the money that's due annually." This is an annual tax. "Go out and collect it." Now, it doesn't look like they had collected it in a long time. And maybe these guys weren't too happy about it. Well, we're not accountants. We're not bill collectors. We're priests. We don't run a collections department. Working in a collections department, that's not a fun place to work.

I have clients that have people that work for them and all they do is sit on the phone all day and call people up and say, "When can we expect to get paid?" These are people that they sold something to. You expect if you sell something to a person they'll pay you when they get the bill, but you have to call them. And maybe this was the problem. I don't know why, it doesn't say why the Levites didn't do it, but they didn't act at once.

Therefore the king summoned Jehoiada the chief priest and said to him, "Why haven't you required the Levites to bring in from Judah and Jerusalem the tax imposed by Moses, the servant of the Lord and by the assembly of Israel for the tent of the testimony?" Now, the sons of that wicked woman Athaliah had broken into the temple of God and had used even its sacred objects for the Baals. I mentioned that earlier, and here's the verse that says it.

The reason why he had to put doorkeepers there was that people were coming in who shouldn't have been in, and Athaliah and her sons had broken in and had used even the sacred things in the temple to worship Baal. Things that had been set aside, consecrated to God, they used them in the worship of idols. So the temple needed to be repaired. It needed to be restored, updated. Things needed to be replaced that were stolen. They needed to be fixed if they were damaged.

The king summoned Jehoiada and said, "Hey, why didn't you do this? This is the tax that was imposed by Moses the servant of the Lord and by the assembly of Israel for the tent of the testimony. This was the tax that was imposed. Why haven't you done it? We have to improve our temple here." It's kind of interesting that Jehoiada, for all he did to preserve the kingdom and see that Joash became the king, you have to wonder why he - you would think he would have been really on top of fixing up the temple. "Yeah, let's go for it. Fix it up."

It seems like the king just got tired of waiting here, because if you read in verse eight it says, "At the king's command a chest was made and placed outside at the gate of the temple of the Lord." So it seems like the king got tired of waiting for the priests to do anything and he said, "Let's make up a chest and we'll put it out there and people can put their offering in it. The priests are not going to go around and collect it, so we'll have to rely on the people to do it."

A proclamation was then issued in Judah and Jerusalem that they should bring to the Lord the tax that Moses the servant of God had required of Israel in the desert. All the officials and all the people brought their contributions gladly, dropping them into the chest till it was full. Whenever the chest was brought in by the Levites to the king's officials and they saw that there was a large amount of money, the royal secretary and the officer of the chief priest would come and empty the chest and carry it back to its place.

So this thing filled up. And the way the wording is written here, it seems like it filled up a number of times. It says whenever the chest was brought in and they saw that this happened, they would empty it and put it back. So this happened over and over. The people were glad to give their offering. They wanted to give to God. And we should be giving to God today because we're glad to and we want to.

And we're giving back to God something what he gave us. We shouldn't be giving because we have to. If you give money to the Lord because you think you have to, it would be better if you just kept the money, because the Bible says the Lord loves a cheerful giver. But if God's blessed you and you have a house to live in and clothes to wear and food to eat, then you should be giving back to God some portion of what he gave you.

And if you can't do that, I think it says a lot about somebody what they do with their money. What they do with their money really, to me, really speaks about what a person really believes. Lots of people talk about we believe this, we believe that, but where do they put their dollars? When they don't give back to the Lord something from what he's given them, it kind of cancels out all the talk.

You can say one thing, there's that old saying: put up or shut up. Are we going to carry out actions based on what we say, or do we just say stuff that sounds good, but we don't really believe it enough to really invest in what God's doing and to really acknowledge to him that he gave it to us in the first place? These people were happy to give to God. They were blessed in order to be able to do that.

And they did this regularly and they collected a great amount of money. The king and Jehoiada gave it to the men who carried out the work required for the temple of the Lord. They hired masons and carpenters to restore the Lord's temple, and also workers in iron and bronze to repair the temple. So they used the money to work on the building. The men in charge of the work were diligent and the repairs progressed under them. They rebuilt the temple of God according to its original design and reinforced it.

They fixed it up where it was falling down. Anybody here who owns a house that's more than a few years old knows that as soon as you build it, it starts falling apart. And when it gets to a certain age you need a new roof and you need a new heater and a new air conditioner and you need new windows and you need to paint or you need new siding and you have all kinds of problems. And it had been a long time since the temple was maintained.

They rebuilt the temple of God according to its original design and reinforced it. When they had finished, they brought the rest of the money to the king and Jehoiada, and with it were made articles for the Lord's temple, articles for the service and for the burnt offerings, and also dishes and other objects of gold and silver. As long as Jehoiada lived, burnt offerings were presented continually in the temple of the Lord.

They served God. They made the offerings. They repaired the building. They replaced and replenished the articles that were used in the building. And as long as Jehoiada lived, the temple ministry went on properly. Now, Jehoiada was old and full of years and he died at the age of 130. Man! And if this was after the kid had been reigning for 20 or 30 years, Jehoiada must have already been 100 or 110 when this king at the beginning of chapter 23, where he declared this boy king, Jehoiada was probably already more than 100.

Jehoiada was old and full of years and he died at the age of 130. He was buried with the kings in the city of David because of the good he had done in Israel for God and his temple. He was looked up to. He was respected, honored. He got to be buried with the kings. And not every king got to be buried with the kings. Some of the kings weren't buried with the kings because they weren't very good kings.

But here - in fact, this king Joash isn't going to get buried with the kings because he turns out to be a stinker at the end. But this guy because of all the good he had done in Israel for God and his temple, he died and is buried with the kings. Now, verse 17, here we see the good become bad. After the death of Jehoiada, the officials of Judah came and paid homage to the king, and he listened to them.

They abandoned the temple of the Lord, the God of their fathers, and worshipped Asherah poles and idols. So here we have Jehoiada dies. It seems like this guy Joash is easily influenced. And when Jehoiada was alive, it seems like he was a follower, not a leader. And when Jehoiada was alive, he followed him. Now Jehoiada dies and these people come and they try to influence the king in a negative way and they're successful.

They paid homage to him. So they probably said, "Oh great king, you're so wonderful and we respect you and you're the greatest king that ever lived and nobody will ever be as good as you." And he bought into whatever they were saying. And then they must have suggested that, "Hey, let's get back to worshipping the Baals and having the Asherah poles and having idols." They abandoned the temple of the Lord, the God of their fathers, and worshipped these things.

Because of their guilt, God's anger came upon Judah and Jerusalem. Although the Lord sent prophets to the people to bring them back to him, and though they testified against them, they would not listen. So the Lord's anger was kindled. And the Lord sent prophets. It doesn't even say who they all were here, or how many there were. Not every prophet wrote a book of the Bible. Not every prophet even has his name recorded in the Bible.

No doubt there were many other prophets that spoke the word of God and it didn't make the final cut when God put the Bible together here. But God sent prophets to these people. These were his chosen people. They were doing so well. And he sent prophets to them to bring them back to him, always God's purpose. Christ didn't come to condemn the world, but to save the world.

And God is still in the saving, redeeming business now, today. He still wants to reach out to people. He wants to save people. He wants people to come to a knowledge of him. He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to everlasting life. He desires for everyone to come to everlasting life, not just the elect. He desires for everyone to come to everlasting life. God is not willing that any should perish.

And here it was with these people. Although the Lord sent prophets to the people to bring them back to him, and even though they testified, they wouldn't listen. Does that sound familiar? If you look around the world today, try to share the Lord in some places. I get into a discussion on the direction our country's going, and people talk about this issue or that issue, or whether the conservative viewpoint is right or the liberal viewpoint is right.

And of course, they often think I have one viewpoint or another, and of course I do. But I love to throw a twister into the conversation and say, "You know, the real reason America's so messed up right now is she left her founding principles." This country was founded on the principles of God and the Bible and Jesus Christ as the son of God, and our founding fathers, a large number of them were Christians.

And they did what they did because of respect for the Bible and for the word of God. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," that there's a creator, that he created everybody equal, that he has no favorites. Look, these are all principles that are clearly taught in the Bible, but we've left them behind. We've left God behind.

And when you see Christian leaders today who have the position and stature to speak out in the public square and they say this country has left its founding principles and we need to get back to God, they're ridiculed and made fun of. What you have going on in America is very similar to what went on here. Look, it's a different country, it's a different time, we're not God's chosen people the way Israel was, but we are a country that was blessed by God because we believed in him.

It used to be illegal to run a public school without teaching the Bible. The Supreme Court ruled in the early 1800s, the government may not run a public school if it doesn't teach the Bible. Somebody died, I forget who, you can find out the name, somebody died and left money to the government and said, "We want this money to be used to run a school, but it can't teach the Bible."

And the person who died, their heirs were mad that their old man had given the money to the government to run a school. They wanted the money for themselves, so they sued. And this case made it to the Supreme Court. And Daniel Webster, whichever one of the Websters was a lawyer, argued this case in the Supreme Court, I think. And their point was, you know, we want the money for ourselves that our father or grandfather left to the government.

And somebody else was arguing no, he left it to the government, the government should get it to run the school. And the Supreme Court wrote, "Look, the government can't accept a money to run a school because it's illegal for the government to run a school that doesn't teach the Bible." So he wanted to leave this money so the government could run a religion-free school, and the Supreme Court ruled the government can't do that.

And they took the money and made a private independent school for it and it still exists today, and it's in the Philadelphia area and I can't remember what it's called. Something I learned from David Barton, by the way. The Lord sent prophets to these people and they testified against them, but they would not listen. Look what happens next.

"Then the Spirit of God came upon Zechariah son of Jehoiada the priest. He stood before the temple and said, 'This is what God says: Why do you disobey the Lord's commands? You will not prosper. Because you have forsaken the Lord, he has forsaken you.'" Something similar in some ways could be said about America here. And this guy was the son of Jehoiada. Remember him? He was the guy that took care of Joash the priest, saw him through, made sure that as a baby he didn't get killed, kept him safe all those years.

Here's his son speaking out on behalf of the Lord. They don't listen to him either. But they plotted against him, and by order of the king, they stoned him to death. Here we have Jehoiada having done so much for this king, and what's he get in return? The king has the priest's son stoned to death for speaking out the word of God. By order of the king, they stoned him to death in the courtyard of the Lord's temple.

King Joash did not remember the kindness Zechariah's father Jehoiada had shown him, but killed his son who said as he lay dying, "May the Lord see this and call you to account." A little bit differently than what Jesus said, "Father, don't hold this sin against them." Here he said, "May the Lord see you, may the Lord see this and call you to account." And the Lord did. This was, in a way, this was another prophecy.

At the turn of the year, the army of Aram marched against Joash. It invaded Judah and Jerusalem and killed all the leaders of the people. They sent all the plunder to their king in Damascus. Although the Aramean army had come with only a few men, the Lord delivered into their hands a much larger army. Look, we saw time and again where the Israelites won the battle when they had less troops than the enemy because God was with them.

And the opposite also applies here. They had more troops than the enemy, but God was not with them. They had more troops and they still lost. And the Arameans came in with a very small army and wiped them all out because Judah had forsaken the Lord, the God of their fathers. Judgment was executed on Joash. When the Arameans withdrew, they left Joash severely wounded.

His officials conspired against him for murdering the son of Jehoiada the priest, and they killed him in his bed. So he died and was buried in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings. Here's a guy that started out so right and got to be so wrong at the end of his reign. Reigning at seven years old, being taught by this very excellent priest.

But it seems like Joash never really grabbed a hold of that faith for himself. Seemed more like he was a follower. I'm speculating here, but it seemed like he was more of a follower. The priest told him what to do, he did it. The priest died, someone else came on, "Okay, okay, I'll do that instead." And right on down into the abyss he went. I'm not saying he's in hell, by the way.

I don't know where he's at. I know one thing: his body was not buried with the kings, and Jehoiada's body was. Interesting here, the people that wrote the Chronicles tell us who killed him. "Those who conspired against him were Zabad, son of Shimeath, an Ammonite woman, and Jehozabad, son of Shimrith, a Moabite woman." So the chronicler seems to want to call to our attention that the two people that killed the king, one was a Moabite and the other was an Ammonite.

They weren't actually Israelites. They were foreigners. And perhaps that's because the chronicler is trying to give a better impression - remember, this was written to the refugees that are returning from the captivity. And maybe he just wants to emphasize, look, our own people didn't do this. It was done by foreigners. And by the way, they get bumped off at the beginning of the next chapter.

Oftentimes the ones that conspired to kill the king when the new king came on the scene, you know, he bumped him off. They were mad at Joash for what Joash did, so they killed him. Well, Joash has a son who becomes the king, and the first thing he does is kill the guys who killed his father, proving that you shouldn't be going out against the Lord's anointed one.

When David was running around being chased by Saul before he became king, David could have numerous times bumped off the previous king, but he said, "No, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to leave it up to God." And that's what these people should have done. What Joash did was wrong, they didn't need to kill him, God would have dealt with it in his own timing.

The account of his sons, the many prophecies about him, and the record of the restoration of the temple of God are written in the annotations on the book of the kings. And Amaziah his son succeeded him as king. So all the other things he did, there were prophecies written about him, there's records of him restoring the temple, it was written in the book of the kings that may be referring to the books of 1 and 2 Kings.

And certainly over in the book of Kings there is more written about Joash that supplements what we have written here. But he was king for 40 years. So if we had a record of everything he did, it wouldn't fit in the whole Bible here. The bottom line was, he turned out to be a very wicked king at the end of his life even though he started out strong.

And it speaks to us, I think, about not being a follower but having our own faith. Look, you know, people think they're Christians because their parents were Christians, or their neighbor's a Christian, or grandparents are Christian, their kids are Christian, so I'll be covered by God's grace because of my folks or my siblings or whatever. But we're not. We need to have our own relationship with the Lord.

I know you all know that because I know everybody that is here tonight. It just doesn't seem like this guy Joash understood that. Seemed like he was confused at the end, really got off the track. It seems like when these people came and spoke to him after Jehoiada died, he wasn't really prepared to deal with what they had to say, wasn't really secure in his own faith, wasn't firm in it.

I wonder, when they gave him that scroll, they gave him the covenant when he became king, I wonder if he really wrote out his own copy. I wonder if he really read it every day like he's supposed to. It's hard to believe somebody could be reading the scriptures every day and wind up so messed up after 40 years. If we read the scriptures every day, God works through them and speaks to us and we can't help but be changed.

It seems to me that here's a guy that put all that aside. He didn't probably read them. He didn't probably write his own copy out. He just kind of like went to church and watched the priest do his thing and then he went on his life on his own. And when Jehoiada died, it sounds like he didn't have the mooring or the foundation that he needed to have. And we should keep that in mind also.

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Hope From the Word. We're currently in a study of 2 Chronicles. You can hear this message or more Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann by going to ccmarlton.org. Pastor Bill's messages can also be found by downloading the Hope FM app on your smartphone or tablet.

If you prefer to listen via podcast, you can find Hope From the Word wherever you find your podcasts. We'd love to have you join us at Calvary Chapel of Marlton, either in person or online. Our Sunday service begins at 10:00 a.m. and there's a Wednesday evening service at seven. To catch us online, you can subscribe to our YouTube channel at Calvary Chapel of Marlton or just go to our website for the link, ccmarlton.org.

And if you'd like to take a moment to write to Pastor Bill, it would be such a blessing to us. We're thankful each and every time we hear what God is doing through our listeners' lives. And we want to pray for you, too. Either email us through the website at ccmarlton.org or call 856-983-1662. We'll continue our study in 2 Chronicles next time on Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann, a presentation of Calvary Chapel of Marlton.