Stories From The Hebrew Bible
THREE KINGS AND A GREAT PROPHET
Stories From The Hebrew Bible
THREE KINGS AND A GREAT PROPHET
Amaziah was the ninth of the kings of Judah, if the years of Athaliah’s rule is counted as a separate reign. Amaziah worshiped the Lord, but he did not serve the Lord with a good heart. He gathered an army of three hundred thousand men, to make war on Edom, to bring its people again under the rule of Judah. He also hired an army from Israel to help him in this war; but a prophet said to him, “O king, do not let the army of Israel go with you against Edom, for the Lord is not with the people of Israel. But go with your own men and be strong and brave; and the Lord will help you.”
“But how will I get back the money that I have paid to the army of Israel?” said Amaziah to the prophet.
“Fear not,” said the prophet; “the Lord is able to give you much more than you have lost.”
Then Amaziah obeyed the Lord and sent back the men of Israel to their own land and went against the Edomites with the men of Judah. The Lord gave him a great victory in the land of Edom; Amaziah was cruel to the people he conquered and in his anger killed many of them. And when he came back from Edom, he brought with him the idol gods of that land, and although they could not save their own people, Amaziah set them up for his own gods and burned incense to them and bowed down before them. And when a prophet of the Lord warned that God was angry with him and would surely punish him for his wickedness, Amaziah said to the prophet, “Who has asked you to give advice to the king? Keep still, or you will be put to death!”
And the prophet answered him, “I know that it is God’s will that you shall be destroyed, because you will not listen to the word of the Lord.”
Amaziah’s punishment was not delayed. Soon after this, he made war on Joash, the king of Israel, whose kingdom was greater and stronger than his own. The two armies met at Bethshemesh, northwest of Jerusalem. Amaziah was beaten in a great battle, many of his men were slain, and Amaziah himself was taken prisoner by Joash, the king of Israel. Joash took the city of Jerusalem and broke down the wall and carried away all the treasures in the palace and in the Temple of the Lord. After this Amaziah lived fifteen years but he never gained the power that he had lost. His nobles made a plan to kill him, and Amaziah fled away from the city to escape them. But they caught him and slew him and brought his body back to Jerusalem to be buried in the tombs of the kings. His reign began well, but it ended ill, because he failed to obey the Word of the Lord.
After Amaziah came his son Uzziah, who was also called Azariah. He was the tenth king of Judah. Uzziah was only sixteen years old when he began to reign. He was king for fifty-two years. He did right in the sight of the Lord during most of his reign. When Uzziah took over the kingdom it was weak and he was able to made it stronger, with the help of the Lord. He won back for Judah the land of the Philistines, the land of the Ammonites on the east of Jordan and the land of the Arabians on the south. He built cities and put strong walls around them, with towers full of weapons for defense against enemies. He loved the fields, and planted trees and vineyards and raised crops of wheat and barley.
But when Uzziah was strong and rich, his heart became proud. He no longer tried to do God’s will. He had a king’s power, but he also wanted the power of the high priest. So, he went into the Holy Place in the Temple to offer incense upon the golden altar, which was allowed to the priests only. The high priest Azariah followed Uzziah into the Holy Place with the other priests and said to him: “It is not for you to offer incense, O King Uzziah, nor to come into the Holy Place. This belongs to the priests alone. Go out of the Holy Place, for you have disobeyed the Lord’s command; and it will not bring honor on you, but trouble.”
Uzziah was standing before the golden altar with a censer of incense in his hand. Instantly the white scales of leprosy developed on his forehead. The priests saw in that moment that God had smitten Uzziah with leprosy; indeed, he felt it himself and turned to leave the Holy Place. But they would not wait for him to go out; they drove him out, because the presence of a leper made the house unholy. And from that day until he died, Uzziah was a leper. He could no longer sit as king, but his son Jotham took his place. Uzziah was also not allowed to live in the palace, but stayed in a house alone. And when he died, he was not given a place among the tombs of the kings; but was buried in a field. After his father’s death, Jotham, the eleventh king, ruled sixteen years. He served the Lord, but he did not stop the people from worshiping idols. Because of what had happened to his father, Jotham was content to be a king. He did not try to be a priest and offer incense in the Temple. God was with Jotham and gave his kingdom some success.
The next king, the twelfth, was Ahaz. He was the most wicked of all the kings of Judah. He left the service of God and worshiped the images of Baal. But, worse than any other king, he offered some of his own children as burnt offerings to false gods. In his reign the house of the Lord was shut up and its treasures taken away. Ahaz allowed the house of the Lord to fall into ruin. For his sins and the sins of his people, God brought great suffer- ing upon the land. The king of Israel, Pekah, made war against Ahaz and killed more than a hundred thousand of the men of Judah, including Ahaz’s own son. The Israelites also made captives of many more men, women, and children. But a prophet of the Lord in Israel, whose name was Oded, came out to meet the rulers, and said to them:
The Lord God was angry with Judah and gave its people into your hand. But do you now intend to keep your brothers of Judah as slaves? Have you not also sinned against the Lord? Now listen to the Word of the Lord, and set your brothers free and send them home.
Then the rulers of Israel gave clothing and food to the captives; and they sent them home to their own land. They also provided donkeys for the weak among the captives to ride upon. They brought them to Jericho, in the valley of the Jordan, and gave them to their own people.
When the Edomites came against Judah, King Ahaz sent word to the Assyrians, a great people far away, to come and help him. The Assyrians came, but did not help him. Instead, they made themselves the rulers of Judah and robbed Ahaz of all that he had and laid heavy burdens upon the land. At last Ahaz died, leaving his people worshipers of idols and under the power of the king of Assyria.
In the days of these three kings, Uzziah, Jotham, and Ahaz, God raised up a great prophet in Judah, whose name was Isaiah. The prophecies that he spoke in the name of the Lord are given in the book of Isaiah. In the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah was a young man. One day, while he was worshiping in the Temple, a wonderful vision rose suddenly before his sight. He saw the form of the Lord God upon a throne, with the angels around Him. He also saw strange creatures called seraphim, standing before the throne of the Lord. Each of these had six wings. With two wings he covered his face before the glory of the Lord, with two wings he covered his feet, and with two he flew through the air to do God’s will. And these seraphim called out to one another, “Holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!”
And the young Isaiah felt the walls and the floor of the Temple shaking at these voices; and he saw a cloud of smoke covering the house. Isaiah was filled with fear. He cried out, saying: “Woe has come to me! for I am a man of sinful lips and I live among a people of sinful lips: and now my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”
Then one of the seraphim took into his hand the tongs that were used in the sacrifices. He flew to the altar, and with the tongs took up a burning coal. He then flew to the place where Isaiah was standing and pressed the fiery coal to Isaiah’s lips; and he said, “This coal from God’s altar has touched your lips, and now your sin is taken away, and you are made clean.”
Then Isaiah heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send to this people? Who will bear the message of the Lord to them?”
And Isaiah said, “Here am I; send me!” And the Lord said to Isaiah,
You shall be My prophet and shall go to this people and shall give to them My Words. But they will not listen to you, nor understand you. Your words will do them no good, but will seem to make their hearts hard and their ears heavy and their eyes shut. For they will not hear with their ears, nor see with their eyes, nor understand with their hearts, nor will they turn to Me and be saved.
And Isaiah said, “How long must this be, O Lord?” And the Lord said:
Until the cities are left waste without people and the houses without men to live in them; and the land shall become utterly desolate; and the people shall be taken far away into another land. But out of all this there shall be a few people, a tenth part, to come back, and to rise like a new tree from the roots where the old tree has been cut down. This tenth part shall be the seed of a new people in the times to come.
By this Isaiah knew that even though his words might seem to do no good, yet, he was to go on preaching, because much later a new Judah is going to rise up out of the ruins of the old kingdom and serve the Lord.
Isaiah lived for many years and spoke the Word of the Lord to the people until he was a very old man. He preached during the reign of four kings, perhaps five. Some of these kings were friendly and listened to his words: but others were not willing to obey the prophet and do the will of God. The kingdom of Judah gradually fell away from the worship of the Lord and followed the people of the Ten Tribes in the worship of idols.
