Well, good morning. Thankful that the Lord gives us this brand new day, new opportunity to come back to his word and grateful for what he gives us in his word. As we study our way through Second Kings, we are picking up speed and we have no break. Things are going to crash at the bottom of the hill and The Lord is giving us the authoritative interpretation of why that crash happened. Temptation for us as human beings is to question and doubt God. God said before the people went into the land, here are the rules of our relationship. That's what a covenant was. He's the sovereign ruler. They were dependent upon him, their whole existence was because of him. And here's how things will be. I will bless you abundantly. And we saw that through David and Solomon, Solomon's early years. There was so much abundance and blessing, silver had no value. But that's all contingent on you being my people and being obedient to me, submissive, follow my commands, walk with me. And for David in the early part of Solomon, the leaders were leading in that. From that point forward, Solomon's latter years, there were always good reasons We need to make peace treaties, and this will expand our influence, and this will keep us away from the Temple in Jerusalem as the nation is divided and the Northern Kingdom has its own approach to worship God. It's still worshiping the Lord, and then to intermarry with Baal, pagan Baal worshipers, and then to intermarry with the Northern King, I mean, all the way along. What God had said, if you do this, you don't obey, then the end result will be judgment. And the people in the exile ended up in the exile because exactly what God had said would happen, would happen. But the temptation is to think, will God abandon us? We walk away from him and then get angry that he abandon us. No, he didn't abandon us. He just said, here's what happens when you walk away from me. Walk back towards me. And so as he writes to the righteous living in the exile, he's encouraging them. See this clearly. I'm faithful to you. I'm patient. I'm long suffering. I'm gentle. I'm kind. Keep trusting me. For those that were the rebels, he's saying, Your rebellion got you in that trouble. Continue on in it, it will totally destroy you. And to those trying to walk in a foot in each world, he's particularly here at the end, showing what it looks like when we walk a foot in each world. Both feet end up in the world of rebellion. In reality, a foot isn't in both worlds. And so, as we saw yesterday, the Northern Kingdom was speeding ever, I mean, they're close to the tree line at the bottom of the hill. There's no way that they can stop. There were signs, signs in the Southern Kingdom, indications. subtly mentioned in chapter 15. Leprosy for a king that had 50 plus years of rule and reign. Signs of attacks from Israel and Syria. And the Lord does the Monday morning quarterback routine for us. to hopefully help us see, as our expression says, hindsight is 20-20. Well, here's the hindsight. Here's looking at it after the perspective, but just because hindsight is 20-20 doesn't mean that, using a different one of our expressions, if you don't learn from history, you're bound to repeat it. And so, here's the hindsight, here's the interpretation, Here is how things look after the fact. Will you learn from it? Will you learn what it means that disobedience never pleases God? Half-hearted obedience is just disobedience, and it never ends up in blessing. You are not going to outsmart God. What he calls for us to do is the simplest thing, but it's for us the hardest thing. Just trust him and do the very next step of obedience today. Today's obedience. Just take it up. So, as this chapter unfolds, chapter 16, we see in the southern kingdom a king who is further down the hill. Uzziah and Jotham, in chapter 16, there were signs that there were cracks. in their faithfulness. Their compromises were not as great on display. Well, Ahaz, he's picked up speed already. I mean, he's just carrying the Southern Kingdom as far, as fast as he can away from obedience as is possible with all that he intends to do. Now, mind you, he's not atheist, he's not godless, he's just not obedient. In the 17th year of Pekah, the son of Remaliah, Ahaz the son of Jotham, king of Judah, became king. Ahaz was 20 years old when he became king, and he reigned 16 years in Jerusalem, and he did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord his God, as his father David had done. But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and he even made his son pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the Lord had driven out from before the sons of Israel. He sacrificed and burned incense on high places, and on hills, and under every green tree. Then Rezin, king of Aram, and Pekah, son of Ramaliah, king of Israel, came up to Jerusalem to wage war, and they besieged Ahaz, but could not overcome him. At that time, the resident king of Aram recovered Eilath for Aram and cleared the Judeans out of Eilath entirely. And the Arameans came to Eilath and live there to this day. So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath Pileser, king of Assyria, saying, I am your servant and your son. Come up and deliver me from the hand of the king of Aram and from the hand of the king of Israel who are rising against me. Ahaz took the silver and the gold that was found in the house of the Lord, and in the treasuries of the king's house, and sent a present to the king of Assyria. So the king of Assyria listened to him, and the king of Assyria went up against Damascus, and captured it, and carried the people of it away into exile to Kir, and put resin to death." Now, King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath-Pileser, king of Assyria, and saw the altar which was at Damascus. And King Ahaz went to Uriah the priest to pattern the altar, excuse me, Uriah the priest, the pattern of the altar and its model according to all its workmanship. So Uriah the priest built an altar according to all that Ahaz sent from Damascus. Thus Uriah the priest made it before the coming of King Ahaz from Damascus. When the king came from Damascus, the king saw the altar. Then the king approached the altar and went up to it and burnt his burnt offering and his meal offering and poured his drink offering and sprinkled the blood of his peace offerings on the altar, the bronze altar. which was before the Lord, he brought from the front of the house, from between his altar and the house of the Lord, and he put it on the north side of his altar. Then King Ahaz commanded Uriah the priest, saying, Upon the great altar burn the morning burnt offering, and the evening meal offering, and the king's burnt offering, and his meal offering, and the burnt offering of all the people of the land, and their meal offerings. and their drink offerings, and sprinkle on it all the blood of the burnt offering and all the blood of the sacrifice. But the bronze altar shall be for me to inquire by." So Uriah the priest did according all that King Ahaz commanded. Then King Ahaz cut off the borders of the stands and removed the labor from them. And he also took down the sea from the bronze oxen which were under it and put it on a pavement of stone. The covered way for the Sabbath, which they had built in the house and the outer entry of the king, he removed from the house of the Lord because of the king of Assyria. Now the rest of the acts of Ahaz, which he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? So Ahaz slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David. And his son Hezekiah reigned in his place. We've, as I mentioned, seen little chinks in the obedience. Uzziah, at the end, leprosy, unrepentant, because he disobeyed God, wanted to be a sacrificer, fought against God's will, Jotham having areas attacked by Syria with Israel. Now Jotham's dead. We find Ahaz. Ahaz's description is the first of the descriptions that we find from a Davidic king that shows, first of all, Ahaz is not mentioned who his mother is. Why is that significant? Well, that's been one of the markers of the Davidic Kings. No mention of who his mother was. But for the first time, or not but, and in addition, the summary was not, he was good, he did righteousness. The summary is, he did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord as his father David had done. But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel. He's the first king of Judah to receive a negative evaluation. What did he do? He updated worship. He changed a few things around the temple. He updated worship to the point where he embraced at least concepts. It doesn't plainly say that he worshipped the Canaanite god Shemash, but he at least embraced ideas from the Canaanite god Shemash. And that is child sacrifice. He offers up his son as a burnt offering to God. He made his son die to try and get from God a good gift. The pagan idea is if you're going to get something valuable from God, you have to offer God something valuable. You have to negotiate with God. You and God, in some regards, are equals. He needs something. You have. You need something he has. Cut your best deal. Well, here's my best deal. My most precious possession is my own son. So he offers up his son, this is prohibited in Leviticus 18, 21. In Leviticus 20, 2-5, Deuteronomy 12, verse 31. This is not the last time that it'll happen for the people of God. The Northern Kingdom, chapter 17, we'll see it in verse 17 tomorrow, Lord willing. Again for Judah, in chapter 21, verse 6, and in chapter 23, in verse 10. Why was he doing that? Well, because he had no respect for God, ultimately. He didn't burn the temple down and destroy the worship of the Lord. No, he had embraced what the previous kings were unwilling to denounce and remove. Again, I've just tried to make the sense along the way, where there is Baal worship, it seems as if God makes it plain, offering sacrifices and incense on high places, hills, every green tree. That seems to be, I'm not trying to be too dogmatic on it, but it seems to be just an expression of, we want to worship God how we want to worship God, in a simple command. Worship isn't to be easy and convenient. I mean, the whole temple was built, remember? David had caused the census of the people, and God's gonna judge him. And David pleads for mercy, and the Lord says, offer me a sacrifice. And the sacrifice was on this Mount Moriah. And the king asks the owner of it, what can I pay you for this? And the owner says, you can just have it. And David says, I cannot offer to God that which costs me nothing. I have to pay for this because my worship has to come from my life. Call it a biotic principle there. God expects our worship to come from us. Not that God needs us. He wants us. He doesn't just want our stuff. Well, Judah didn't want to make any costly obedience. I still want God, I just don't want costly obedience. So, I mean, we'll just worship here. So, Ahaz, he didn't want to treasure God, obey God, prize God's word, do what God wants done, in the simple things of removing the high places. The previous kings didn't worship there, now he, like them, worships. Like the people, that is. He's not leading them in obedience, he's joining them in disobedience. And that gets down to the place where his mind is so different from God's mind that he's offering up his son. What were the circumstances behind that? Well, does verses five to seven show us? There's an attack from Syria and Israel as a joint force threatening his life. wanting to remove him from being king, put their own puppet king in, we get some information on that from Isaiah. Isaiah chapter seven, remember the promise of the virgin birth? Isaiah goes to the king and says, God will take care of you. The king's like, no, I don't want to test God, no. So what does Ahaz do? Well, Ahaz, I've got a better plan. I'll buy out my freedom. I'll deal with this. I don't need God. I don't need to trust in God. I've got money. It's God's money. I'd steal it from Him. And that's more true than just everything is God's. But it's literally from the temple. I'll pay off Tiglath-Pileser. He's a mighty power. I'll just, I'll let his power protect me. How foolish. Omnipotence promised to do anything in heaven and earth. Turn back the sun. Cause an eclipse. Whatever. No, no, I can't. I can't trust God's power. I can trust myself to negotiate and to control. I mean, to be under, but you know, I'm in control. So at least I feel better about that. That's our sinful folly. Our pride. Now, here's the sad thing. Remember, when David wanted to build a temple, and then Solomon did build a temple, the reminder of the temple is not just a religious place, it was a theocracy. God is king over Israel. God's kings were supposed to be God's son, God's servant, God's chosen one to serve God's purposes. Hence, in Isaiah, the suffering servant is serving God's purposes as God's king. Ahaz was supposed to be God's king. What Ahaz says to Tiglath-Pileser is, I'll be your son. I'm your servant. Verse seven. Solve my problem myself by serving another king who's got great power. Problem solved. I don't need God. I don't need God to get involved. I can take care of it myself. But what he actually did was make the problem worse. He led the Assyrians to begin to defeat the Northern Kingdom, his brothers. Well, they were threatening him, so that's okay. No. And furthermore, he's going to lead Israel into punishment, judgment. Assyria is not going to help. Assyria is not going to be the ultimate removal of the nation, in God's mercy, Hezekiah will face a terrible problem, but he'll have a different response. So, what are you putting your hope in? In my money, my ability to figure it out, all of this when God promises, I won't leave you, I won't forsake you, I have all of authority, right to rule, I'm using that authority for my church, Trust me. I know. I know you're in your weakness. You want it all to make sense and to figure out what I'm doing. Just trust me. Well, trusting you in this day and age, the church is getting smaller. It's dwindling. Its influence is weaker. And we need to make God acceptable to culture. If people are going to hear the gospel, we've got to help them not be offended by God. So we'll capitulate here, and we'll capitulate about this, and we'll give in here. And that doesn't, ironically, that doesn't grow anything. So. What's the remainder of 2 Kings 16? After Ahaz gets his deliverance from Tiglath, he goes to Damascus, to Syria. And he sees there a huge altar that he thinks is really, this is the way to do it. So he gets a model drawn, he gets the plans for it, and he sends message back. And the high priest is to build this altar in God's temple. And when the king comes, he offers the sacrifices of the law, burnt offerings, meal offerings, drink offerings, peace offerings, to the Lord in the Lord's house on an altar the Lord never asked for, and instead, verse 14, he moves the very altar that God had asked for, moves it to the side, insignificant, demands that everything be offered up on this new, cool, great offering, sacrifice altar, makes a few other adjustments, the big huge C, the laver. It doesn't need to be on this cart thingy. I mean, let's take that off of that. Let's put it on stones. Let's take this covered walkway that had been built and let's take this entrance gate to the king. Why is all this? Well, the end of verse 18 tells us why. So, don't miss verses 10 to 18. He's gone to his new king. Yeah, this is supposed to be God's king. He's gone to his new king, sees the altar of the new king, sends plans back. This is how we do it now. And let's make some changes here and here and here and all of it. Verse 18 is he removed these things from the house of the Lord because of the king of Assyria. Why did he do that? Because he's a, he's a servant. He's a slave, not to God, not to the greatest power ever, because he has all power, the omnipotent one, not to a good God who would bless him. No, he is a humbled slave to another man. He's receiving orders. He's doing this because he's under... Now, there's nothing wrong with authority. That's not the point. Being under authority is not bad. But he's a slave now to a different master. Now, there are other things that Ahaz did, didn't do, you know, but for the Lord's purpose, for your edification and exhortation, the Lord wants you to know this. Ahaz didn't trust God. The doubts of his forefathers became his denials. in his practice. Oh, he was still nominally a Yahweh worshipper. But he was not worshipping God. One, because he didn't trust God. And because he didn't trust God, he wasn't faithful to God. He wasn't obedient to God. And that didn't make him free. That made him more a slave of a cruel, unjust, power-hungry Assyrian nation. He was somebody else's slave if he wasn't going to be the Lord's slave. And that's still true. Oh, it can be people. The boss at work tells me I can't do this or do that. Or it could be, you know, this Ahaz was to find freedom in being God's king in God's place and serving God's purposes, God's son. But instead he offers himself to be a slave and a son to an evil, wicked world power. And he's humiliated and humble, but he can't see it. He thinks he's outsmarted God and he's doing better off. Israel has less power. Land is taken from them, Ila, by the Edomites living there until this day. So, I don't mean our day, but the day of the writing of kings. Ahaz was under, he was only now just a puppet, a puppet king. The strings were moving. He's not, he's not free. So what about it, exile or Christian? It may seem like the steps of disobedience aren't that significant. What God calls for, coming out from Egypt, going into the promised land, taking over the promised land, Having kings. What God called for is still what he calls for. It's what he called for for the remnant in the exile. Trust me, prize my word, obey what I tell you to do. God has not abandoned those who are faithful. Trust him. Understand your sin has made your life hard. It's not God. When we choose death, then what do we expect? And if we don't choose faith in God, we should expect that our lives would be pain-filled. Oh, not constant. The Lord is gracious to give simple pleasures. Choose life. I don't want to be God's slave. You're, you're slave to sin when you're not God's slave. I mean, there's no freedom. You are, are only truly free when you're serving God. But there'll be plenty of nominal Christians. I'm not just talking about the Christers, Christmas Easter's, showing up to church. No, I'm talking about people who just live without God in their life. Practically. Oh, they may bow their head before a meal. Who will not? They'll be like Ahas. They'll offer up what's valuable to get something more valuable in their own estimation. They won't obey God. They won't trust his word. Let's not have that be us. Hindsight is 20-20. Those sitting in exile, faithful and unfaithful, people trying to be in between, learn the lesson. That's the perspective. The perspective is this. Disobedience never pleases God. It never goes anywhere good. It never ends up in blessing. Pursue with all of your joy and all of your strength and all of your heart, faith in God. And it would be hard to be in the exile and it's hard to walk in faith. But don't be a has. God offers you to help. He offers you himself by his spirit. So, trust Him. Well, we'll move to the Northern Kingdom and Hoshia in chapter 17, Lord willing, tomorrow. But I trust the Lord will encourage you with those thoughts here this morning. All right, bye-bye.