2 Kings 15 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Kings%2015&version=ESV

While Uzziah (also known as Azariah) was reigning for 52 years in Jerusalem, Israel went through a parade of Kings. And as you read through the chapter you’ll see why I entitled this “a broken record.” One King after another “does what is evil in the sight of the Lord.” Even the goods kings in Judah (4 of them in a row – Joash, Amaziah, Uzziah, Jotham) don’t get rid of the high places. They are good but none of them go far enough. One after another, the kings of Israel are killed, often brutally and bloodily. Finally that nation will be conquered and taken captive by Assyria. See, after a while, God destroys broken records.

Are you a broken record? Do you keep committing the same sins day in and day out – lust, pride, selfishness, carelessness for the Word of God – not walking in the ways of the Lord – worshiping the idols of the day – money, popularity, tv, music, sex? Do you put these things above Christ and His Word? Do you allow them to compromise your beliefs, to change and cajole you into abandoning what Christ says? What will God do with a broken record like you?

He will forgive you. We are all broken records – playing again and again the same old sins of yesterday. And we should indeed be warned by the example of Israel not to take God’s grace for granted, not to think that His forgiveness means we can go on living however we want – that’s not faith. But we recall during lent that when we repent of our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins – He cleanses us from all unrighteousness! And that’s because of Jesus. Jesus who, with his last gasps, was still speaking forgiveness and love to all. Jesus, who by His last gasps was atoning for all sins. Jesus, who by His first breath of resurrected air assures us of forgiveness and eternal life. Now He lives in us in order to keep us in faith, assure us of eternal life and change us from broken records to beautiful instruments for His glory.

Prayer – Jesus, call us to repent.Forgive us. Change our hearts, change our lives. Let us be for you.

In Christ
Pastor Ude

2 Chronicles 26 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Chronicles%2026&version=ESV

Uzziah’s story is, in some respects, very similar to his father’s. He was a good king, he followed the Lord, the Lord blessed Him, then he got proud and the Lord punished him. We don’t know what Uzziah’s spiritual situation was like at the end of his life, we’d like to believe that the Lord’s discipline led to Uzziah’s repentance, we don’t know. However, there is a very important lesson to learn from Uzziah.

We live in a world that operates on pride. The world has always been this way. Ever since Satan convinced Eve that she should be the one in charge (“you will be like God”), people have always wanted to be the highest, the leader, the most honorable. In fact, this idea is so ingrained in us in our sinful natures that the second I say “submission” you think I’m talking about someone being less, unequal with someone else. That’s a lie. It’s Satan’s lie. One which he has been very successful at implementing. He did it with Uzziah who wanted to be the one offering those sacrifices. He’s done it in our culture today destroying the roles for men and women that Christ appointed in the church (1 Timothy 2:12, 1 Corinthians 14:34) and in the home (Ephesians 5:20-26). This idea is so stuck in our heads that we probably have a hard time swallowing these words too: 1 Corinthians 15:28, “When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.” Yes that does say that Christ’s relationship to the Father will be one of submission. Yes that is speaking about Christ according to both His divinity and His humanity. Yes that is the Son’s relationship with the Father from eternity and NO that does not mean that they are not equal. See, this idea that submission and leadership means inequality is a complete lie. One that causes much damage in relationships and in society. It makes people feel badly about the role that God has given them. It makes others feel superior and arrogant about theirs. It’s a leprosy destroying and ruining what God made to be good.

Only Jesus can stop it. Jesus who forgives. Jesus who serves. Jesus who submits. Jesus who dies and now lives for us. Jesus whose love causes love. Jesus whose Word shows the right way – not pride but place. Find your place in God’s church, your role according to what His Word says, use your gifts in that place to serve Him. Don’t be deceived by this world’s arrogant, prideful ideals – submission and love are the way. They were the way Christ forgave your sins and they are the way for you to serve your neighbor. Place, not pride.

In Christ
Pastor Ude

2 Chronicles 25 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Chronicles%2025&version=ESV

“Don’t get cocky” is always good advice (Han Solo knew it!). When we become proud of our success to the point where we forget what brought us that success, it’s pretty easy to come tumbling down. You become a great baseball player by repetition, hard work, practice! If you stop working, you can lose all that you gained. You won your spouse’s heart with romance, how easy it is to get cocky, to forget to do the things you used to do together! It’s especially applicable with God. Amaziah got cocky, It was God who had given him the victory over Edom. The true God only! Yet, in his pride, Amaziah not only brought home the gods of the defeated Edomites (how crazy is that!) but then scorned and refused to listen to God’s prophet. He taunted the king of Israel, dared him to fight, all the while trusting no in God but in himself. Things didn’t turn out well.

Paul warned the Galatians about something very similar – “Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Galatians 3:3). He was talking about their salvation. They had been brought to faith by the Spirit alone, it was God’s work to bring them to new life through the message of Christ crucified. They had nothing to do with it! But now they were being told that they needed to do certain things in order to make it the rest of the way – that it was up to them! What foolish pride. They were forgetting what had got them there. Perhaps at times, so do we. Christ is what got us to where we are. Christ died for us, rose for us, lives for us, lives in us! Christ forgives us and strengthens us. And it must be Christ who still keeps us and helps us. It is not now (nor ever will be) the time to say to Jesus, “You’ve done a good job so far, let me take it from here.” Such an approach will leave us with Amaziah, turned away from God, refusing to hear His word and finally destroyed. God grant us hearts to trust in Him only for salvation – not our works, not our feelings, not our understanding – Jesus only. Amen.

In Christ

2 Chronicles 24:15-27 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Chronicles+24%3A15-27&version=ESV

There are very few things in this world that can drive a decent person to kill – very few things that mean enough to someone for them to do that. But, even when this is the case, the killing is usually still selfish. Imagine that your child was captured by ISIS and they told you that you had to plant a bomb at such and such a place or else they would kill your child. That would, of course, be a terrible thing. Many people would probably do it. It would still be the wrong thing to do. And it would probably, truly, be a selfish kind of love that would do that. What most people identify as love isn’t love at all but “the way that person makes me feel” and what my life would be like without them.

We see something different from God. He killed for the sake of His Word but it was good in His case and it wasn’t selfish. When Joash and the people turned away from Him, God sent His prophets, He sent Zechariah and Zechariah was willing to do die for the proclamation of God’s Word. When Joash refused to listen, God allowed him to be defeated and assassinated. Why? Judgment certainly but also compassion. He wanted His Word to be preserved. And not because He just wanted us all to know how great He was but because His Word is the only thing that can save us! That’s why it’s so important. That’s why God will kill for it, because He would kill for you. And He did. He killed His Son. The Son who volunteered to be the sacrifice for all the sins of all the ages of mankind.

You are not called to kill for God’s Word. Leave such things up to God. But you might be called to give your life for it. And you should treasure it more highly than anything else – even children. Because God’s Word alone saves. His Word alone tells you that your sins are forgiven and heaven is opened. Because God was willing to kill for you.

In Christ
Pastor Ude

Mining Treasures From God’s House

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/…

Here we get an overview of the first part of Joash’s reign. He sets out to restore the temple of the Lord, he gathers money, he sticks with it, he makes repairs, he remakes the utensils of silver and gold etc. What he did was good! He was remaking what God had commanded Solomon to make. He was setting apart the house of God, the place where He would come to His people in His promises as the most important thing in the kingdom – in the world! But Joash does not stick to his guns. As soon as he hears that Hazael, King of Syria, is going to come and attack Jerusalem, he abandons all that he had been doing before and takes all the riches of the temple of the Lord and sends them to Hazael to appease him.

2 Kings 10 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Kings+10

I think perhaps this phrase perfectly sums up Jehu’s dedication the Lord. He talks a big game while he is killing and slaughtering and making morbid public displays – that’s all stuff he likes to do. Jehu is clearly a blood man. He could talk about performing all the the Lord had promised and fulfilling His Word as long as it was that thing which he enjoyed. But that was the end of His obedience to the Lord.

The chapter before us shows to things in glaring contradiction – Jehu’s energetic dedication to the destruction of Ahab’s house and his total apathy towards restoring the true religion. He followed in the sins of Jeroboam – that is, he didn’t call the people back to the Lord but had them “worship the Lord” at the golden calves which Jeroboam had set up. Why would he do this? Either because he didn’t care, or more likely, because he like Jeroboam didn’t want his people leaving Israel to go to Jerusalem as they had been commanded and then move down there. It was self-interest. Either way, it is clear that while he spends tremendous energy killing Ahab’s house and the prophets of Baal, he spends nothing on teaching the true Word of God for forgiveness and salvation. Why? Because while he liked killing, he didn’t care about God. He didn’t have faith. And so he didn’t love God nor did he love the things God loved.

When you and I find ourselves only obeying God’s Word “as far as it suits me,” the answer is not just to do it anyway but first to receive Christ’s forgiveness for that sin and then to have a change of heart – to desire those things which God desires. The latter is only caused by the former. “We love Him because He first loved us.” Christ’s death and resurrection set us free from the penalty that our sins deserve (the same penalty that Ahab’s house received) and strengthen us to love all God’s Word – Psalm 119:97 – Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day.

In Christ
Pastor Ude

2 Chronicles 22 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Chronicles%2022&version=ESV

We take a brief foray south now into the Kingdom of Judah. For the evil of Ahab’s house has spread there. You may remember that Jehoram had been king after Jehoshaphat and Jehoram was a terrible king. He did not walk in the ways of his fathers David and Jehoshaphat. He undid the good which Jehoshaphat had done. And the main reason was who he got into bed with. You’ve probably heard that phrase before in reference to a business deal with a shady character or making a “deal with the devil” and the like. With Jehoram, we are talking about who her married – the daughter of Ahab Athaliah. She would pervert Jehoram to her ungodly ways. Only it would be much worse than that, the destruction that this ungodly woman would bring to Judah and to David’s royal line was nearly entirely catastrophic. After Jehoram died, she essentially ruled through her son Ahaziah whom she perverted and manipulated and he killed all his brothers! Then when Ahaziah died, Athaliah thought she should be queen, so she killed every single member of the royal family of the house of David – her own family! But she missed one daughter and her child. Joash was whisked away, unknown to Athaliah and hidden.

See what destruction can come from choosing an ungodly spouse! This does not mean that it is a sin to marry someone who is an unbeliever. God can and certainly has changed hearts before and of course most unbelievers are not going to murder their family like Athaliah did. But it serves as a reminder to value godliness and faith as the most important characteristics in those we seek to entrust our lives and our children to. Perhaps one great question to ask is – if I have children with this person, would I want them to believe what he/she believes? What kind of an influence would he/she have on my faith? On my children’s?

Of course, no matter what happens – whether we make a decision for good reasons and it doesn’t turn out the way we expect, whether we make a decision for a bad reason, even if your spouse were to murder your whole family, God loves. God works all things for good. The most important aspect of this account is that little child of hope – Joash. He was rescued and kept safe. He would later blossom into a godly king. But far more importantly, in him the line of the savior was continued. Even in the most terrible situations, God is faithful. Because of Jesus, even for the greatest troubles and in the greatest sins, there is forgiveness and there is peace and there is hope because our God works wondrous blessings in all situations. Trust Him!

In Christ
Pastor Ude

2 Kings 8:1-15 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Kings+8%3A1-15&version=ESV

God is not a God of evil. He did not make it. He does not want it. He hates it. He weeps at it just as Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus and as Elisha wept at what Hazael would do. Many then ask why he doesn’t just stop it? He could, it would mean the destruction of all things – including you because you too are evil in your sinful nature. We all have evil inside. God, in His mercy instead planned to save us, to forgive our sins and to destroy all evil on the last day. That means that in the meantime, He allows evil as He would through Hazael. But He does so only to work good things. Good things, peaceful things, things to correct, instruct, rebuke, relieve and comfort – those are the things that God is always doing. And as if just to remind us of that, the Holy Spirit includes in the first half of this chapter a reminder of the resurrection: Elisha raised the shunamite woman’s son because that is the kind of God our God is. He who died and rose again will raise you too on the last day. He will take you to glory where the evil will be gone and there will be no more weeping or sorrow. He will do this because He, rather than destroying you and all things for your sin, has forgiven you. That’s the kind of God our God is. He allows evil because He is loving and patient and forgiving.

In Christ

2 Kings 7 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Kings%207&version=ESV

Despite all that Israel and it’s king had done to God, despite the blame that they had laid at His feet for their sins, He chose to deliver them from the hand of the Syrians and from the terrible famine they faced. He did so in an incredible, nearly unbelievable way. In fact, it was apparently unbelievable to the King of Israel and his messenger. The messenger’s response when he heard was basically “Not even God could do that!” And the King’s extreme caution when hearing that the camp of the Syrians was abandoned shows that he too did not believe the word of the Lord. Why? God’s Word had always come to pass before and this word was a great promise of deliverance – yet they were so slow to believe – that’s unbelief for you. Martin Luther said that believing the promises of good news that Christ makes to us is the hardest thing for we sinners to do. And he was right. In fact, it’s impossible for us to do. Only Christ can give us that faith. Otherwise it’s a complete mystery to us (1 Corinthians 2:7-9).

But this account warns reminds us of the urgency to believe in Christ, to turn to His Word and believe it. The man who didn’t – the king’s messenger found out that a “wait-and-see” approach to God’s Word won’t work. By the next day it was too late – he saw the deliverance that God brought but he himself did not enjoy it, he was trampled to death. So it will be for any who take a “wait-and-see” approach to God’s promises on the last day. God’s promise is offered to you now. Full and wonderful forgiveness is given to you in Jesus Christ. Believe this and you will live. If you do not, if you reject, if you scorn it, or even if you simply wait to see – you may find yourself seeing God’s great deliverance, seeing Him taking the saints with Him to eternal bliss and you cast into the outer darkness. As the hymn says “Delay not, delay not, 0 sinner, to come, For mercy still lingers and calls thee today. Her voice is not heard in the vale of the tomb; Her message, unheeded, will soon pass away.” Link to that hymn is here: http://www.lutheran-hymnal.com/lyrics/tlh278.htm

In Christ

2 Kings 6:24-33 – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Kings+6%3A24-33&version=ESV

Those have to be some of the most sickening words in all of scripture. That a mother would boil her baby to eat it to survive a famine is something so horrifying…it’s beyond words. Imagine that was you and your child. What could possess someone to do something so heinous? That was a question which the king of Israel didn’t sufficiently ponder. He was outraged and disgusted by what happened but he blamed God and God’s prophet Elisha! He claimed it was God’s fault for allowing such a famine to happen. As kids say – when you point the finger at someone else, three fingers are pointing back at you!

The king showed his unbelief here. He put the blame in the wrong place. He should have blamed many things – his own sinful, unbelieving heart, continually rejecting a God who was so patient with him; the horrible selfish disgusting actions of those women; the terrible, destructive malice of the Syrians. All these, the sins of man, were properly to blame. But God? God is never to blame for the evils that men do. He may allow them but that does not mean He approves and the only way for Him to stop such evil altogether would be to destroy this whole sinful, blame-worthy world. No, God is not to blame for our sins or their consequences.

Nevertheless, he did take the blame. That’s what Jesus was doing on the cross. He paid the penalty deserved for all sins – for a mother who ate her baby, for a king who rebelled against God, for the murdering Syrians. He paid the price for you no matter what you have done. He did it willingly and lovingly because He didn’t want to destroy the world. He wanted to recreate it – a new heavens and a new earth for you to live in in righteousness and holiness. People in this world including us at times will continue to blame God for the way things are. They will continue to say “Why God? Why would you allow this?” But that’s the wrong question. The right question is “Why God? How could you be so loving, so gracious as to take my place, to take my blame? Why did I ever do to deserve it?” The answer is nothing. The answer is love. Place the blame for sin and death where it belongs – on mankind. Place the credit for God’s love where it belongs – on Jesus and praise Him for it. Thanks to Him, you have forever to do just that.

Hymn – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aowdjLeaCYs

In Christ
Pastor Ude