I love historical narrative. I love a particular Christian history. Yesterday morning, I was out on the porch reading the biography of Charles Spurgeon. I learn so much and it ministers to me. And I spent a good portion of the afternoon reading historical narrative in the Scriptures. We have to be careful that we don't think of the Bible as verses that are disconnected here and there and everywhere. There are verses that we know, like John 3.16 or any number of verses that are familiar to us. And if you're not careful as a preacher, you end up always gravitating toward those verses. And before long, there are vast, vast sections of Scripture that you never study yourself and you never really preach to your people. I was thinking this morning, I wonder how many churches have ever had an exposition of Exodus chapter 1. It's not something that, at least in the context in which I grew up, it's not something that was normal. And it may not be flashy, and it may not be exciting, and it may not have the marquee of many of the more familiar texts or many of the more familiar verses, but I'm convinced that the verse-by-verse expositionary or text-by-text preaching will grow strong Christians. It will grow strong believers. And so that's why I'm committed as much as I possibly can to that kind of preaching. So what we've been doing on Sunday night for a couple of Sunday nights is we've been looking at the historical narratives of some of the lesser-known kings of the Old Testament. We all know of David. We spent a good while here with a Sunday morning study on the life of David. We all know of Solomon. They are the two most well-known kings. If I were to ask you, I'm sure you could name some others. Surely you could name Jehoshaphat. How could you forget someone like him? But over the last few weeks we've looked at some of the kings who are lesser known and what the Bible tells us about the period of time in which they reigned. Now so far we've only looked at the southern kingdom of Judah. Remember, after Solomon the kingdom was divided. It was divided because of Solomon's idolatry, because of Solomon's sin. It was divided in the days of his son, Rehoboam, And in those days, Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, began to reign over the northern tribe, the northern ten tribes, which became known as Israel or Ephraim. If you're reading through the Bible or reading through these parts of the Bible and you come across Israel or Ephraim, it's talking about that northern kingdom, the northern ten tribes, and the southern kingdom became known as Judah. But what we've been looking at are two of the kings that succeeded Solomon, his son Rehoboam, the king under which the kingdom was divided and civil war broke out, and his son, or Solomon's grandson, Abijah. We looked at his life and his reign last time. Now tonight we're going to look at Solomon's great-grandson, a man by the name of Asa. And he is spoken about in the book of Kings, but the greatest detail is given to his story in 2 Chronicles chapter 14, chapter 15, and chapter 16. So what we're going to do, and really I've been reading this much of the late afternoon. It doesn't take long to read it, so we're going to read these three chapters, and then we'll go back real quickly and look at some things from this man's life. Verse 1 of 2 Chronicles 14, Abijah slept with his fathers, and they buried him in the city of David, and Asa his son reigned in his place. In his days the land had rest for ten years, and Asa did what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord his God, He took away the foreign altars and the high places, and broke down the pillars, and cut down the ashram, and commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, and to keep the law and the commandment. He also took out of all the cities of Judah the high places and the incense altars, and the kingdom had rest under him. He built fortified cities in Judah, for the land had rest. He had no war in those years, for the Lord gave him peace. And he said to Judah, let us build these cities and surround them with walls of towers and gates and bars. The land is still ours because we have sought the Lord our God. We have sought him and he has given us peace on every side. So they built and prospered. And Asa had an army of 300,000 from Judah, armed with large shields and spears, and 280,000 men from Benjamin that carried shields and drew bows. All these were mighty men of valor. Zerah the Ethiopian came out against them with an army of a million men and 300 chariots and came as far as Maresha. And Asa went out to meet him and they drew up their lines of battle in the valley of Zephathah at Maresha. And Asa cried to the Lord his God, O Lord there is none like you to help. between the mighty and the weak. Help us, O Lord our God, for we rely on you, and in your name we have come against this multitude. O Lord, you are our God. Let not man prevail against you." So the Lord defeated the Ethiopians before Asa and before Judah, and the Ethiopians fled. Asa and the people who were with him pursued them as far as Gerar, and the Ethiopians fell until none remained alive, for they were broken before the Lord, and his army. The men of Judah carried away very much spoil, and they attacked all the cities around Gerar. For the fear of the Lord was upon them, they plundered all the cities, for there was much plunder in them. And they struck down the tents of those who had livestock, and carried away sheep in abundance and camels. Then they returned to Jerusalem. The Spirit of God came upon Azariah, the son of Obed, and he went out to meet Asa and said to him, Hear me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin. The Lord is with you while you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you. For a long time Israel was without the true God and without a teaching priest and without law. But when in their distress they turned to the Lord, the God of Israel, and sought him, he was found by them. In those times there was no peace to him who went out or to him who came in, for great disturbances afflicted all the inhabitants of the lands. They were broken in pieces, nation was crushed by nation and city by city, for God troubled them with every sort of distress. But you take courage, do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded. As soon as Asa heard these words, the prophecy of Azariah the son of Obed, he took courage and put away the detestable idols from all the land of Judah and Benjamin and from the cities that he had taken in the hill country of Ephraim. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that was in front of the vestibule of the house of the Lord. And he gathered all Judah, and Benjamin, and those from Ephraim, Manasseh, and Simeon, who were residing with him for great numbers, had deserted to him from Israel when they saw that the Lord his God was with him. They were gathered at Jerusalem in the third month of the fifteenth year of the reign of Asa. They sacrificed to the Lord on that day from the spoil that they had brought, 700 oxen and 7,000 sheep. And they entered into a covenant to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, with all their heart and with all their soul. But that whoever would not seek the Lord, the God of Israel, should be put to death, whether young or old, man or woman. And they swore an oath to the Lord with a loud voice, and with shouting, and with trumpets, and with horns. And all Judah rejoiced over the oath, for they had sworn with all their heart, and had sought him with their whole desire. And he was found by them, and the Lord gave them rest all around. Even Maaca, his mother, King Asa, removed from being Queen Mother because she had made a detestable image for Asherah. Asa cut down her image, crushed it, and burned it at the Brook Kidron. But the high places were not taken out of Israel. Nevertheless, the heart of Asa was wholly true all his days. And he brought into the house of God the sacred gifts of his father and his own sacred gifts, silver and gold and vessels, and there was no more war until the thirty-fifth year of the reign of Asa. In the thirty-sixth year of the reign of Asa, Baasha, king of Israel, went up against Judah and built Ramah, that he might permit no one to go out or come in to Asa, king of Judah. Then Asa took silver and gold from the treasures of the house of the LORD and the king's house, and sent them to Ben-Hadad king of Syria, who lived in Damascus, saying, There is a covenant between me and you, as there was between my father and your father. Behold, I am sending to you silver and gold. Go, break your covenant with Baasha king of Israel, that he may withdraw from me. And Ben-Hadad listened to King Asa, and sent the commanders of his armies against the cities of Israel, and they conquered Ajon, and Dan, and Abel-Mayim, and all the store cities of Naphtali. And when Baashah heard of it, he stopped building Ramah, and let his work cease. Then King Asa took all Judah, and they carried away the stones of Ramah and its timber with which Baashah had been building, and with them he built Geba and Mizpah. At that time Hanani, the seer, came to Asa, king of Judah, and said to him, Because you relied on the king of Syria and did not rely on the Lord your God, the army of the king of Syria has escaped you. Were not the Ethiopians and the Libyans a huge army with very many chariots and horsemen? Yet because you relied on the Lord, he gave them into your hand." This is a very important verse here. For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him. You have done foolishly in this, from now on you will have wars. Then Asa was angry with the seer and put him in the stocks in prison, for he was in a rage with him because of this. And Asa inflicted cruelties upon some of the people at the same time. The acts of Asa from the first to last are written in the books of the kings of Judah and Israel. In the 39th year of his reign Asa was diseased in his feet and his disease became severe. Yet even in his disease he did not seek the Lord but sought help from the physicians. Asa slept with his fathers dying in the 41st year of his reign. They buried him in the tomb that he had cut for himself in the city of David They laid him on a beer that had been filled with various kinds of spices prepared by the perfumer's art, and they made a very great fire in his honor. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your mercy to us, and we thank you for the light and the instruction that is given to us in the Scriptures. Lord, we at times are thrilled by the lives of those that you have put before us in the Scripture, and at times we are puzzled by the lives of those that you have put before us in the Scripture, and at times we are saddened by the lives of those that you have put before us in Scripture. But nearly always we see ourselves, our failures, our sins, our needs, in the lives of those that you have put before us in the scripture. Help us tonight as we look at the life of this King of Judah. I pray that you would give us instruction. I pray that you would give us help. And may we learn from this inspired narrative of this man's life. And may you be glorified and grant to us tonight the presence of your Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen and Amen. Especially when you go back, as I did this afternoon and began to read about some of the reigns of the kings of Israel, the northern kingdom, one man only reigned seven days. He killed his predecessor and then within seven days, he was killed. So when you think of those kings who are so idolatrous and so rebellious in the northern kingdom, it's amazing that we see during this same period of time a man in the southern kingdom who reigns for 42 years. So he had a long reign And there were long periods of peace and prosperity and blessing, but there were also periods of struggles and periods of battles. And there are some lessons to be learned by considering these three chapters and the life of King Asa. Now the first thing I want us to think about is what's told to us in chapter 14 in the first eight verses about the early years of his reign. We're told there that after he begins to reign, there's a period of 10 years of peace and rest. A period of 10 years where they have no wars, no opposing enemies on the horizon, and it is 10 years of peace and rest and blessing and prosperity. And we don't have to wonder why God in His grace and mercy allowed him to enjoy such a season as he did at the beginning of his reign. In verse 2 of chapter 14, we're told that he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord his God. So as a leader of the people of God, he began by doing what was right in the eyes of the Lord his God in verse 3 in chapter 14 we're told that he begins a program to remove idolatry in verse 3 the Bible said that he took away the foreign altars and the high places, and broke down the pillars, and cut down the asherim." So the first thing that he does, or the first thing that we're told that he does, is number one, he did what was right in the eyes of God, and part of doing what was right in the eyes of God was that he began a process in which he was removing idolatry from the land of Judah. The Bible tells us in verse 4 of chapter 14 that he led the people in this period and season of spiritual renewal and spiritual reform. In verse 4 of chapter 14, it said, He commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, and to keep the law and the commandment. You understand? This is a time when the northern kingdom has given itself wholesale to idolatry. Whenever Jeroboam in the northern kingdom became king, he was afraid. that if the people obeyed God and went back down to Jerusalem for the yearly services, for the yearly feast, that they would eventually want a reunification of the kingdom and that that would be the end of his reign, even though when God told him through the prophet that his house would be made sure if he would obey God, he did exactly the opposite. And what he done was he made two golden calves. He set one up in the north in Dan, and he set one in the south in Beersheba. And he said, these are your gods, Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt. It's too much trouble for you to go down to Jerusalem. These are your gods. And he led the people into idolatry and into sin. The whole nation, even the southern kingdom, had been affected by the idolatry of the Canaanites. It's an interesting study when you read Joshua and when you read Judges, that God told them to completely obliterate all the idolatry and all of the peoples of the land. And when you begin to read those books, you begin to see that slowly, They seem to lose their heart for war. Slowly, they seem to lose their heart for obedience to God, and before long, there's all these foreign peoples with their foreign gods living among them, and they begin to lead the people of God away from God and into idolatry. So one of the things that he does is he begins to lead the people in spiritual reform and spiritual renewal, and he begins to try to wipe out much of the idolatry that was in the land of Judah. And the Bible makes it plain when you read the first few verses of chapter 14, that there was a connection between his desire to obey and this ten years of peace and blessing and prosperity that they enjoyed. He was freed to the point that he could fortify cities, that he could build fortifications, that he could build cities that would be for defense, and that's what we see in the first ten years of the reign of Asa. Undoubtedly, when you read it, there's a connection between his early desire to obey God and to lead the people in spiritual renewal, and the blessing and the peace that God gave to him, and the prosperity that they enjoyed during those first ten years of his reign. But after the first ten years of his reign comes the first great crisis of his reign. We're told there in the verses that tell us about this first ten year period of his reign that he has an army of 580,000 men. The only problem is that the very next thing we're told is that the Ethiopians and the Libyans come with an army of a million men. So immediately he's confronted after ten years of peace and blessing and prosperity, after ten years of seeking God, after ten years of spiritual reform and renewal, all of a sudden he is confronted with a terrible crisis. He is put in an impossible situation, impossible to man. His army is outnumbered nearly two to one. Now, what's interesting about this, if you remember two weeks ago when we looked at his father, his father's army was outnumbered two to one. His father had an army of 400,000, and he faced an Israelite army of 800,000, and God gave him victory with half the men. But here we have Asa with 580,000 men and an army of a million Ethiopians and a million Libyans, or a million in total, the two Ethiopians and Libyans come out against him and he's outnumbered nearly two to one. And he's in an impossible situation. He's in a situation that no king would ever want to be put in, no military commander would ever want to be put in, But in this first great crisis of his reign over the southern kingdom, he does exactly what he should do. The Bible tells us in chapter 14, verse 11, that he cried to the Lord his God. I mean, that's not Sunday morning praying, that's I'm in trouble praying, isn't it? He cried to the Lord his God. And notice what he prayed. In verse 11 of chapter 14, Oh Lord, there is none like you to help between the mighty and the weak. Lord, they're mighty, we're weak. But there's none like you. You can help the weak against the mighty. So he's crying out to God in desperation. He's crying out to God in dependence. He's crying out to God with passion. And he says, help us, O Lord our God, for we rely on you, and in your name we have come against this multitude. O Lord, you are our God, let not man prevail against you. Notice, he basically does what David does when he goes out to fight Goliath. David says, the battle is not my battle, it's the Lord's battle. David was essentially saying, I am in an impossible situation, I do not have the strength or the skill or the ability to defeat Goliath, but this is not my battle. I go against Goliath in the name of the Lord. And here, Asa does the same thing. Essentially, I think what Asa is doing is saying, Lord, we have sought You, sought to rid our land of idolatry. We have sought to do what is pleasing in your eyes. We find ourselves in this impossible situation, but we know that this situation is not impossible to you because you are able to help the weak against the mighty, and we rely on you in this battle. We commit this to you, and we're going to go fight this battle in your name, knowing that the victory depends upon your intervention. And an amazing thing happened. Something that I wonder sometimes if we ever really think that God actually still does. With your back against the wall in absolute desperation, when you have no one and nowhere else to turn, and you come to Him in simple childlike faith and commit the situation to Him, God steps in and gives the victory. And the Bible makes it plain that it is God that gave the victory. In verse 12 of chapter 14, the Lord defeated the Ethiopians before Asa and Judah, and the Ethiopians fled. Now who was doing the fighting? Well, the people of Judah were doing the fighting and the people of Benjamin were doing the fighting, but who was ensuring the victory? It was God. God was intervening. And God heard the prayer of a man who desperately turned to Him and depended upon Him. The Lord defeated the Ethiopians. And the Bible said in verse 13, they pursued them. And the Ethiopians fell until none remained alive. They were broken before the Lord and His army. In other words, it was the Lord that was giving the victory. His army was doing the fighting, but it was the Lord that was giving the victory. over this million-man army. The Bible said they carried away much spoil. It's evident God intervened at this first great crisis of His reign. After ten years of peace and prosperity, in absolute desperation, He comes to God and says, Oh God, You alone can help. And God helps. God intervenes. And God moves in a miraculous way. Now, after the victory and after the taking of the spoil, at the end of chapter 14, they return to Jerusalem. And when they return to Jerusalem, Asa is met by a prophet who has a message for him from God. The Bible says in verse 1 of chapter 15, the Spirit of God came upon Azariah, the son of Obed, and he went out to meet Asa, And he said to him, Hear me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin. And the prophet comes under the direction of God to communicate a message from God to King Asa, but not only to King Asa, but to the whole southern kingdom. Now the message that it communicates is first of all a message of warning. Look at verse 2. The Lord is with you, while you were with Him. If you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you." Now that's a warning message, isn't it? The Lord is with you while you're with Him. Now what's he just, they just experienced this, haven't they? They've been seeking God, they've been obeying God, they've been seeking to live in obedience to God's will and turning away from idolatry, and they found out at the greatest crisis they had known yet as a nation, God was with them. But the prophet gives a warning, He's with you as long as you're with Him. It's kind of like, what's it say in James? Draw nigh to God and He'll draw nigh to you. The Lord is with you while you're with Him. If you seek Him, He'll be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. The whole history. This one verse pretty much sums up the history of the Jews, doesn't it? As long as they surrendered themselves and obeyed God, God was with them and God blessed them. When they seek God, God is found by them, but when they forsake God, God forsakes. Then even this southern kingdom of Judah will eventually be carried away captive into the land of Babylon because of their rebellion and because of their sin. So first of all, it's a message of warning. Next of all, it's a message of reminder. Look at verse 3, chapter 15. For a long time Israel was without the true God and without a teaching priest and without law. But when in their distress they turned to the Lord, the God of Israel, and saw Him, He was found by them. In those times there was no peace to him who went out or to him who came in, for great disturbances afflicted all the inhabitants of the lands. They were broken in pieces, nation was crushed by nation, city by city, for God troubled them with every sort of distress." If you want a good commentary on that, read the book of Judges. It's absolute chaos. I mean, it's just absolute chaos. And the key verse in the book of Judges is, in those days there was no king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes. It was an absolute, moral, spiritual time of chaos. And this is what the prophet is communicating to Asa. Remember how it was before you sought God. Remember what it was like before you humbled yourself before God. Remember the consequences of rebellion against God. Not only is it a message of warning and a message of reminder, but it's also a message of promise. Verse 7 of chapter 15, But you take courage Do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded." So the prophet is moved upon by the Spirit of God. He comes to Asa. He communicates God's message to Asa and to the whole nation, the southern kingdom. And he says, first of all, I want you to first of all take warning that God is with you as long as you're with Him. Next of all, I want you to remember what it used to be like before you were seeking God, but I also want you to know that God has promised that He will meet you and your work will be rewarded if you will seek Him. Now after that begins a period of 20 years of prosperity and blessing because again, you know what He does? He recommits Himself again to seek the Lord and to make war on idolatry. Asa responded, look at chapter 15 verse 8, as soon as Asa heard these words, The prophecy of Azariah the son of Obed, he took courage and put away the detestable idols from all the land of Judah and Benjamin and the cities that he had taken in the hill country of Ephraim. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that was in front of the vestibule of the house of the Lord. And he gathered all Judah and Benjamin and those from Ephraim and Manasseh and Simeon who were residing with him, for great numbers had deserted to him from Israel when they saw that the Lord his God was with him. And they gathered at Jerusalem, they made a covenant with God, and they recommitted themselves to seek God and to turn away from the idols that were corrupting their nation. I love what it says in verse 15, All Judah rejoiced over the oath, for they had sworn with all their heart, and had sought Him with their whole desire. And He was found by them, and the Lord gave them rest. all around. And again, 20 years. From this time, 20 years of blessing and prosperity because they humble themselves before God and they seek God. Now, if you wonder how serious Asa was about this, we have a little paragraph at the end of chapter 15 that tells us that he even deposed his own mother because she had an idol. He took her idol, burned it, and destroyed it, and deposed her from being the Queen Mother because of her idolatry. Now I'm going to tell you what, so far, I'm really liking this man. So far, I'm thinking, now he's a man I can follow. He's a man I'd like to be like. leads the people in 20 years of reform and renewal, and God meets them again and blesses them and gives them 20 years of peace and rest. But then, after 20 years, isn't it true, listen, let me ask you this, isn't it true that our devotion to God will always be put to the test time and time again? After 20 years of peace and prosperity and blessing, there comes another crisis. The amazing thing is, this crisis that comes 20 years after the first crisis was not nearly as big. Not nearly as big. Baasha had become king of the northern kingdom of Israel. We're told that all the days of Baasha and Asa, they were at war. Baasha, the king of Israel, comes to build a fortress named Ramah to isolate him. A fortress where he could control who could come in and who could go out and do commerce or have communication with the southern kingdom all throughout history. In our own land, you can still, if you go out down south or anywhere you want to go, you'll find forts in America because that was what they done. They would place forts in different areas to control different areas and there would be soldiers in those fortresses and this is what Bayasha attempts to do. Now the amazing thing about this second great crisis, twenty years after the first great crisis, is number one, that it was not nearly as desperate a situation as the first one was, because the number of soldiers that Bayashi would have had at his disposal wouldn't even compare to the number of soldiers that had come up out of Africa. But the other thing is, But in the other crisis, we're told in verse 11 of chapter 14, he cried to the Lord his God. In this crisis, in chapter 16, we're told that he took silver and gold. I mean, we're all sitting here probably thinking his mind and heart would revert back to what God had done for him 20 years before. And he would have said, you know, man, that million man army had us down for the count. But when I cried to God and looked to God, God intervened and God gave the victory. That's the way I'll approach this crisis. But we're not told that he prayed. We're not told that he sought God. We're not told that he humbled himself before God. All we're told is that he comes up with a plan, a scheme, a carnal scheme. And the scheme went like this, I'll take all the silver and gold out of God's house, I'll take the silver and gold out of my house, I'll send it to the king of Syria, and I'll hire his army like a mercenary army, I'll make a league with him, he will come down and attack Bayasha, they'll have to go fight him, and I'll be relieved of this great crisis. And you know the sad thing about it is, it worked to perfection. It worked. The only problem is, it displeased God. Don't ever believe, and we need a reminder, and I have to remind myself of this, don't ever believe because you're successful in your schemes, that that is an evidence of God's pleasure. He was successful in his scheme, but he displeased God. So what God does is He sends another prophet, Hanani. Chapter 16, verse 7, At that time, Hanani, the seer, came to Asa, king of Judah, and said to him, Because you relied on who? King of Syria. and did not rely on the Lord your God, the army of the king of Syria has escaped you." Now notice what he's saying. He's saying, listen, not only would I have given you victory over Bayasha, I would have also given the king of Syria and his army into your hand if you would have just trusted me. We're not the Ethiopians. He reminds him of what had happened 20 years ago. Were not the Ethiopians and the Libyans a huge army with very many chariots and horsemen? Yet because you relied on the Lord, He gave them into your hand." And this is a key verse of the whole story of Asa. For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward Him. You understand that God is searching for the man or woman or the boy or the girl whose heart is blameless toward Him, and that man, that woman, that boy, or that girl, God will step in and show His mighty power in their lives. And what he's saying is, when you were in that impossible situation 20 years ago, and you humbled your heart before me, and you depended on me, didn't I not show you my strong support? And here, all these years later, after all of this record of my care and my provision and my blessing and my power, now, all these years later, you try to do it on your own, in your own strength, by your own scheme. And it cost Him dearly. Isn't it sad that we forget lessons that we learned 20 years before? Isn't it sad that we forget to commit our circumstances to God. to rely upon God. Isn't it sad that we have to learn the same things over and over again? And isn't it sad that there are so many victories in our past that should inform us in our present, and yet we do not remember them or do not take the lesson from them, and in a new situation, a new battle, a new struggle, a new trial, again we rely upon our carnal scheming instead of our God. This is a great lesson. God hasn't changed. He's still the God that gave the victory over the Ethiopians and the Libyans. But somewhere along the way, Asa forgot to remember. He forgot to remember that God is the only one that gives real security. And God is the only one that gives real victory. Asa had relied upon men A foreign heathen king instead of his God. And it cost him dearly. Now, if Asa were the President of the United States, we'd all be voting him into office again. Because we'd say, man, did you see how that worked? And not only would we be voting him into office, he'd be standing up telling us how wonderful he was. Because of his superior But God says no. God says in chapter 16 verse 9, you have done foolishly in this. From now on you'll have wars. I would have given you total victory, but now you're going to have wars and battles and struggles because you relied upon the king of Syria and you did not rely upon me. Now another interesting thing happens here, a couple of them. First of all, remember when the prophet, he came to him 20 years ago? What'd he done? He listened, he received it, and he obeyed it. This time, he gets mad. And we're told in verse 10 of chapter 16, Asa was angry. with the seer. He didn't like the message, so he didn't like the messenger. He was angry with the seer and put him in the stocks in prison, for he was in a rage with him because of this. Who do you think you are to come and tell me such things? Who do you think you are? Listen, it worked. It worked. It may have cost us a little bit of gold and a little bit of silver, but it worked. But you've got to understand too, he had been supposedly leading the people in turning away from idolatry for all these years. And then what did he do? He placed his confidence in an idol, a man. And it only seemed to work. And when God confronts him through the prophet with his rebellion, he just gets mad. He gets in a rage. And he puts, I'm going to tell you, being an Old Testament prophet was a thankless business, buddy. Yeah, if I ever feel sorry for myself, I just go read Ezekiel or Jeremiah. It was a thankless business. I mean, I can't imagine God appearing to me and saying, I want you to go preach to Glasgow, Kentucky, but I want you to know before you go they're not going to listen to a word you say, but you go preach anyway. That's what he told Ezekiel. Jeremiah got so discouraged, he said, you know, may the man that told my parents, may the man who announced the news that a man-child had been born, may his name be obliterated from the earth. So this prophet, he obeys God. He goes and gives Asa the message only to find himself in prison for obeying God. Verse 11, The acts of Asa from the first to the last are written in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel. In the 39th year of his reign, Asa was diseased in his feet and his disease became severe. Yet even in his disease, he did not seek the Lord, but sought help from the physicians. And the lesson is, that it became the bent of his heart. A heart that at one time knew what it was to trust God and depend on God and obey God and commit his circumstances to God. That heart became hard, cold, unpliable, unteachable, unbroken, unrepentant. And even at the end of his life when he grew so sick and he was diseased in his feet, when you would think he would have been driven to cry out to God and say, you know, God, if you can destroy an army of a million Ethiopians, you can help me with my physical weakness. I know I blew it with Bayasha, but here I am again. Lord, you're a God of mercy. But that became the bent of his heart. And even in his last days, he didn't seek the Lord, but he sought the help of the physicians. The lesson is not that it's wrong to seek the help of the physicians, but the lesson is that he looked to the physicians exclusively and did not seek the Lord. His life is a great warning. Just because you run well today does not mean you will finish well. It's a great warning. It's also a great promise. The great promise is that the Lord's eyes run to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward Him. I was talking about reading the stories of Christians. And what little I've read of the stories of great Christians, you know, to me there's only one conclusion you can come to. about those that God has greatly used and greatly blessed. It was not external giftedness, and it was not that they were a product necessarily of the times that they lived in, but it's the degree to which their heart was given over to God that made them so unique. and so blessed and so used of God. It's true of Spurgeon. It's true of Whitfield. It's true of Edwards. It's true of McShane. Anybody that has shaped the world and been used by God in the conversion of sinners When you read a little bit about their life, you think, man, God had all of them. God had their heart. And sadly, Asa did not end as well as he began. So his life is a warning to us, but it also holds great promise. A preacher in this community that threw away his ministry and his family, when I heard that he died, early one morning, before anybody else was there, I went to the funeral home, and I went and stood over his body, And as I stood there, I said, Lord, please, don't let this happen to me. Please don't let this ever happen to me. I'd rather die than dishonor Your name. I want to finish well. I want to please You. I don't want to be a broken old man relying on myself and not trusting God. A great lesson to us, isn't it? Let's pray. Father, thank You for Your Word. We commit this to You and we pray that You would teach us from this man's life. We see ourselves in him. Sadly, we don't see ourselves as much in his early days as we do sometimes in his latter days. I have had seasons where I trusted you and you gave strong support, miraculous support. But it's so easy to drift from that trust. It's so easy to try to handle things on our own. Please deliver us from such unbelief. May we finish well. In Jesus' name, Amen.