Sermon Tone Analysis

2 Kings 18:1–8 (ESV)

“In the third year of Hoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. 2 He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem.

His mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah.

3 And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done.

4 He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah.

And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan). 5 He trusted in the Lord, the God of Israel, so that there was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him.

6 For he held fast to the Lord.

He did not depart from following him, but kept the commandments that the Lord commanded Moses.

7 And the Lord was with him; wherever he went out, he prospered.

He rebelled against the king of Assyria and would not serve him.

8 He struck down the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territory, from watchtower to fortified city.”

Hezekiah reigned for 29 years, and verse three tells us “he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.”

Hezekiah’s father was not a good king… so God tells us that Hezekiah followed in the footsteps of another faithful King, David.

David is referred to as his father, like Abraham was considered to be the Father of Israel.

By connecting the reign of Hezekiah to David, the writer of 2 Kings wants us to understand that this is a good and godly King.

Hezekiah removed the high places, broke the pillars, and cut down the Asherah.

2 Kings 18:6 says that Hezekiah kept the commandments God gave Moses.

In the 10 commandments God said first “you shall have no other God’s before me.”

Second God said, “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God.”

The Israelites have rebelled against the Lord and gone completely against the commands of God.

And, the kings before Hezekiah had done nothing about these places where false gods were worshipped.

They had tolerated and even participated in the worship of false gods and giving honor to the idols that they represented.

The Israelites had sunk so low in their worship of false gods that they had integrated the worship of false gods into their worship of Yahweh.

Then, they took it a step further and made objects God had told them to make and began worshipping them instead of God Himself.

Hezekiah destroyed the bronze serpent that Moses had made in the wilderness.

Numbers 21:1-9 describes how during a time of a plague of fiery serpents upon the whole nation, Moses made a bronze serpent for the nation to look upon and be spared death from the snake bites.

This statement in 2 Kings tells us that this particular bronze serpent had been preserved for more than 800 years and had come to be worshipped as Nehushtan.

Hezekiah, in his zeal, broke in pieces this bronze artifact and put an end to the idolatrous worship of this object.

Hezekiah trusted in the Lord in ways no King since David had followed the Lord.

Hezekiah held fast to the Lord.

Hezekiah did not depart from following the Lord.

Hezekiah kept the commandments God gave to Moses.

(Even destroying the bronze serpent that Moses made)

The Lord was with Hezekiah in the face of opposition and the sinful rebellion of Israel.

Hezekiah prospered in all that he did because of the Lord’s faithfulness.

As each nation came up against Judah, Israel was victorious because of the Lord.

For example (Angel sent to kill troops)2 Chronicles 32:21–23 (ESV), “21 And the Lord sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty warriors and commanders and officers in the camp of the king of Assyria.

So he returned with shame of face to his own land.

And when he came into the house of his god, some of his own sons struck him down there with the sword.

22 So the Lord saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib king of Assyria and from the hand of all his enemies, and he provided for them on every side.

23 And many brought gifts to the Lord to Jerusalem and precious things to Hezekiah king of Judah, so that he was exalted in the sight of all nations from that time onward.”

Lessons we can learn from Hezekiah:

I believe that there are many different ways that we can apply what we see in Hezekiah’s life to our own and to others.

You can build a great list of what to look for in a leader, and in reading and praying through this sermon I considered putting that list together.

But, because most people don’t consider themselves leaders, I would prefer to spend time focusing on what applies to the hearts and minds of each one of us.

Hezekiah was considered to be faithful, so we will look at some lessons on faithfulness that we can learn from Hezekiah.

Faithfulness is a matter of the heart.

Before we look at actions we can make that follow in the footsteps of Hezekiah, we must first acknowledge that all his actions flow from his heart.

If he was a king like David, then he was a man who had a heart for God that resulted in faithfulness.

You should always consider your heart when you consider the sin in your life.

Hezekiah’s heart was right, therefore his actions were right.

Everything that he did flowed from a desire to honor the Lord and follow His commands more than the approval of men and the satisfaction of his flesh.

Repentance requires removal and destruction

Far too many people try to repent without making any actual changes to their lives.

It happens when the Lord moves and you want to move away from your sin and in His direction.

So you commit to change… But unfortunately man have been led to say yes to God without saying no to sin… But, you cannot repent in your heart without changing your actions.

When sin has had a hold on you there are things that you must remove and destroy to follow through with repentance.

The people of Israel had been worshipping false gods.

But, you may not think you are worshipping false gods.

But, lets look at how they were worshipping…

The High Places, Pillars, and Asherah

A high place was a localized or regional worship center dedicated to a god.

Worship at these local shrines often included making sacrifices, burning incense and holding feasts or festivals (1 Kgs 3:2–3; 12:32).

Some of these high places contained altars, graven images and shrines (1 Kgs 13:1–5; 14:23; 2 Kgs 17:29; 18:4; 23:13–14).

The Canaanites, Israel’s enemy who worshiped Baal as their chief deity, also used them.

The term “high places” was translated from the ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint), not from the Hebrew.

The term conjures up images of remote hilltops, but in the biblical context, it wasn’t limited to mountaintops; Jeremiah 7:31 locates a high place in a valley and 2 Kings 23:18 at a city gate.

When the Israelites first entered the promised land, they were told to destroy the high places, idols and molten images of the Canaanite inhabitants (Num 33:52).

They were also instructed not to worship at high places that were Canaanite sites (Deut 12:2–3).

They were told Yahweh wanted to be worshiped in another way: “You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way.

But you shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all your tribes to put his name and make his habitation there” (Deut 12:4–5).

These places were supposed to be destroyed, but instead of destroying them the Israelites had kept and built idols for the purpose of worship.

These physical idols served to direct the hearts and minds of the Israelites toward sin.

In many cases the Asherah would be placed right next to the altar of Yahweh.

So, we have to think about our own hearts and lives and consider what we have placed next to the Lord in our own hearts.

Our lives are the temple, but like the Israelites many of us have also built high places in our minds and hearts… and even in our physical lives.

Work

Materialism

Money

Image/ Personal Identity

Relationships- family, romantic, Sex

Faithfulness requires admitting the difference between the traditions of men and the commands of God.

This bronze serpent was a wonderful thing – when the afflicted people of Israel looked upon it, they were saved.

It was even a representation of Jesus Christ, as Jesus Himself said in John 3:14-15.

At the same time, man could take something so good and so used by God and make a destructive idol out of it.

In the same way, sometimes good things become idols and therefore must be destroyed.

For example, if the true cross of Jesus or His actual burial cloth were to be discovered, and these objects became idolatrous distractions, then it would be better for those objects to be destroyed.

“Although it was an interesting memorial, it must be utterly destroyed, because it presented a temptation to idolatry.

Here if ever in this world was a relic of high antiquity, of undoubted authenticity, a relic which had seen its hundreds of years, about which there was no question as to its being indisputably the very serpent which Moses made; and it was moreover a relic which had formerly possessed miraculous power – for in the wilderness the looking at it had saved the dying.

Yet it must be broken in pieces, because Israel burned incense to it.”

(Spurgeon)

God’s people must likewise be on guard against idolatry today.

There are many dangers of idolatry in the modern church:

· Making leaders idols.

· Making education an idol.

· Making human eloquence an idol.

· Making customs and habits of ministry an idol.

· Making forms of worship an idol.

Faithfulness depends on prayer