I finished reading the books of Kings about a month ago and meant to write this post several weeks ago, but it’s been a little hectic. We bought a house on April 30 and it has been an exciting ride since then! We’ve done a ton of cleanup and unpacking, minor repairs, landscape touch-up, and decoration planning. Jenny will be doing the wallpaper teardown and re-painting in the next month or so (we hope) and at that point the house will be pretty much totally presentable!
But I digress….
Kings is an interesting book that tells the history of Israel and Judah through the lens of the various kings of the two countries. Kings uses a basic formula for describing the reign of each king. It begins with a chronological note specifying who was king in the other nation (either Israel or Judah) and what year of their reign the opposite king was in when the king in question began his reign. It continues with the name of the king and their lineage – specifically their father. Then it typically tells how many years they reigned. Quite often the writer then gives a summary statement of each king in terms of their relationship to God before going into a kind of summary of the king’s reign, noting highlights and/or lowlights of their kingship, and closes with a summary statement of both his death and the name of the king who followed him in succession.
So a typical intro section on a king might look like this…
“In the 5th year of the reign of Nat-Han, king of Granrapid, Ben-Hamin son of Johan, king of Clin-ton began to reign. He was 31 when he became king, and he reigned in Clin-ton for 2 years. Ben-Hamin did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, just as his father Johan had done….”
I was struck in particular by the the descriptions of each king’s relationship to God. The description is frequently black and white – either the king “did what was right in the eyes of the Lord (Asa, Joash, Jehoshaphat, etc.) or the king “did evil in the eyes of the Lord” (Jehoram, Ahaziah, Jehoahaz, etc.) Quite often there is a qualificative (my blog software, WordPress, suggests that “qualificative” is not a word but I don’t care, I think it is…) or a comparative statement – ie. “Asa did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, as his father David had done” (I Kings 15:11). Or in the negative sense – “Baasha did evil in the eyes of the LORD, walking in the ways of Jereoboam and in his sin, which he had caused Israel to commit” (I Kings 15:34).
It is the qualifier that makes II Kings 14:3 so very fascinating. Speaking of Amaziah, king of Judah, the writer says that “he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not as his father David had done” (italics mine). When I came across this statement, I had two simultaneous thoughts….
1. What a bizarre sort of description for Amaziah. How unfair the writer is to him! It makes the official in me want to blow the whistle and call “foul!” How would you like for your summary life statement to include a comparison to one of the greatest kings of Israel? It’s just not right! It’s not fair.
2. What kind of man must David have been? He must have been something very, very special. There was something otherworldly about his life that made him stick out both to Israel and to the Lord. There was something about the quality of his life or his love or his devotion or his character or his passion or maybe all of the above that separated him from everyone else. And I suppose it probably still does separate us from him. What quality of being, of existence, or perhaps of obedience is it that made David so unique? Why aren’t there more men like him?
And a third thought comes to mind in closing – what will the summary statement of YOUR life look like?
