The Fall of the House of Ahab

There are three rites of passage for the Saga generation – having a bus pass, a senior moment or two and researching into family trees. For some people it is a very popular and absorbing hobby. Newsagents have magazines on the subject and there is the TV programme 'Who do you think you are?' And what people discover is of some interest to themselves, and it can also be a process of self discovery. For L P Hartley 'the past is another country' and so it is, but how do we react to it? How does it impact upon us? How does it shape the faith we profess?

The Bible is rooted in history and many of its chapters are devoted to family trees, eg. Matthew 1, Luke 3 and the first nine chapters of 1 Chronicles. For the people of God their present is bound up with their past. For the Jew, the liturgy of the Passover brings the past into the present; and for the Christian, the Lord's Supper is a profound commentary on the past, the present and the future, since 'Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again'. The events of the past shape our faith and today our encounter with the crucified and risen One transforms and energises the life of the Christian believer.

In 2 Kings 10 family trees and personal history shape the gruesome narrative. Past prophetic words relate to present circumstances. And as we look together at this chapter we all need to be asking – 'How does God's word speak to me today?'

1. The past
By this I mean the past as recorded in 1 and 2 Kings. After the death of King Solomon his single kingdom was divided. Judah in the south ruled by Rehoboam, and Israel in the north ruled by Jereboam. Those in the south continued to worship the Lord in Jerusalem. Those in the north at the rival shrines set up in Bethel and Dan. In these towns golden calves were set up (harking back to the golden calf made by Aaron and destroyed by Moses). In the south, the religion came by revelation from God, and in the north it was created by man. In the south, it was God-honouring, and in the north it was God-denying. So for many centuries in the OT there were three worship centres - Jerusalem, and Bethel and Dan. These rival centres are referred to in 2 Kings 10:29. Remember that biblical geography is quite compact – going north from Jerusalem – Dan was only 100 miles away and Bethel a mere 15 miles.

The kings of the rival kingdoms of Judah and Israel were a mixed bunch. Some good, some bad, and others in between. The narrator tells us that 'such and such was a king who did right in the eyes of the Lord', and again that 'such and such was a king who did evil in the Lord's sight'. Father and son, good and bad, saint and sinner. And there were successive family dynasties. Kings and their sons who ruled and reigned. Some worshipped the Lord at Jerusalem; others worshipped at Bethel and Dan; and others still adopted the fertility worship associated with Baal.

Omri was the sixth king of Israel. The narrator of Kings said of him that 'He walked in all the ways of Jereboam and in his sin, which he had caused Israel to commit, so that they provoked the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger by their worthless idols' (1 Kings 16:26). Omri made Samaria his capital (1 Kings 16:24) and the dynasty (of which he was the head) were a nasty bunch. His son, Ahab, who reigned for 22 years, was an evil king. He married the infamous Jezebel and erected a temple at Samaria for the worship of Baal (1 Kings 16:32).

As you read 1 and 2 Kings do you see what was happening? In the foreground 15 chapters are devoted to the activities of Elijah and Elisha. And in the background the evil duo, Ahab and Jezebel, who, even after their deaths, continued to cast their evil eyes over the nation. Just like like the portraits of the ancestors in Gilbert and Sullivan's Ruddigore.

In 1 Kings 22 we read of the death of Ahab, and 2 Kings 9 ends with the death of Jezebel. For the next 20 to 30 years their four sons reigned. They were all a bad lot. Chips off the old block they carried on the evil ways of their parents. At the same time the daughters of Ahab and Jezebel married some of the kings of Judah. So the two rival royal houses were both tainted by the evil offspring of Ahab and Jezebel. Such was their family tree – godless, pagan and evil. A thoroughly bad lot! Poor role models for the believer. The dynasty might have continued but for the rise of Jehu, a ruthless soldier, who after a bloody military coup became the king of Israel. He killed two of the kings and then began a systematic purge that wiped out the rest of the family of king Ahab and of his supporters. It was a terrible massacre. With gruesome detail we are told that the heads of the princes were hacked off and stacked in two piles at the entrance gates to Jezreel. This was a common practice at the time, and a public warning against rebellion.

Though gruesome, 2 Kings 10:8 sounds like something from a Hitchcock film. On a dark stormy night, the door slowly opens and the butler solemnly announces: 'Sir, the heads you have ordered have arrived'! The pile of heads was a ghoulish reminder of the end of one evil dynasty and of the brutal justice of the next.

That is a brief summary of the state of affairs. Of an unholy regime going back to the time of Jereboam, and then of the two successive dynasties of Ahab and Jehu. Their family trees were important – obviously to themselves but also to us as we try and make sense of the setting and context of 2 Kings 10.

The times were hard, and bloody, and violent. We can't gloss over how awful it must have been, living at such a time, and in such a place, and led by such a brutal, godless gang. Imagine what it must have been like living then as a faithful believer in the one true God. Alone, isolated and afraid. Fearful of the knock on the door. Tempted to lead a quiet life and to follow the corrupt worship at Bethel or to follow the dark arts of the worship of Baal. Imagine too of a situation today when you are tempted to turn away from the faith you profess, to compromise what you believe and to go with the crowd. Dejected and fearful, isolated and alone. So much so that we can easily echo the words of Elijah – 'I have had enough, Lord' ( 1 Kings 19:4).

2. The present
By this I mean the present as recorded in 2 Kings 10.
What's your driving like? If you are a bad driver, then your patron saint might well be king Jehu, who was known as a mad driver (2 Kings 9:20). As well as his bad chariot driving we can learn much about Jehu's character. He was ruthless and determined. Outwardly he professed a zeal for the Lord (v.16), but inwardly his heart was far from him. He destroyed the worship of Baal but failed to destroy the golden calves at Bethel and Dan.

Having killed the remaining family members of Ahab and Jezebel, Jehu then set about to eradicate the worship of Baal. Once the previous dynasty had been destroyed, then their false faith could also be destroyed. Jehu did this by a clever deception. He called for a national celebration of the worship of Baal. He pretended that he was a devoted follower of Baal. He pretended that his support for the cult was even stronger than that of Ahab and Jezebel. Again, imagine how you might have felt when you heard about this. Ahab had been terrible - but this guy is far worse. Following the coup and the massacre of Ahab's family things could have got better. Instead they are going to get much worse!

Reading 2 Kings 10 we know that Jehu was playing a game. He wanted to lure the ministers of Baal into a trap so that they could be killed. 'Jehu was acting deceptively in order to destroy the worshippers of Baal' (v.19).

Invitations were sent out. There was a three line whip to attend. Everyone was expected to be present. The guests were all kitted out in special outfits. What a spectacle it was! They all processed into the temple of Baal to offer sacrifices and to make burnt offerings. Packed in like tourists in the Sistine Chapel. Outside 80 hand-picked soldiers surrounded the building and on the word of command they charged in and slaughtered all who were inside. No one escaped. They were all cut down with the sword. The blood flowed and the bodies were thrown outside. Then the sacred stones and the paraphernalia of the cult were destroyed, and the building was turned into a public lavatory! No longer a place of worship but a place to relieve oneself. Not the odour of incense but the stench of excrement! This was the ultimate degradation.

This course of action was Jehu's response to the Lord's intention to destroy the worship of Baal. When Jehu had knelt before Elisha he said, 'I anoint you king over the Lord's people Israel. You are to destroy the house of Ahab' (2 Kings 9:6-7). And having done this Jehu received the divine approval for his action. The Lord said to him, 'Because you have done well in accomplishing what is right in my eyes and have done to the house of Ahab all I had in mind to do, your descendants will sit on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation' (2 Kings 10:30).

If the narrative had ended there, Jehu might well have become one of the golden boys of the OT. But this was not to be. Though the Lord wanted Ahab to be destroyed, the brutal action of Jehu was misplaced. It was a human zeal not a godly zeal. Jehu wanted the glory for himself and not for the good name of the Lord! Not to promote true worship but to ensure the stability of his own reign and dynasty. His was a misplaced zeal. A zeal that exalted Jehu and not the Lord! Jehu's reformation was only partial. Though he had destroyed the worship of Baal he failed to destroy the worship at Bethel and Dan. In 10:31 the narrator said that: 'Jehu was not careful to keep the law of the Lord, the God of Israel, with all his heart. He did not turn away from the sins of Jereboam, which he had caused Israel to commit.' What happened was that the shrine at Bethel stood for another 200 years until it was destroyed by king Josiah (2 Kings 23:15).

What are we to make of Jehu? He is a bundle of contradictions. He claimed to be zealous for the Lord (but it was a misplaced zeal). He was successful in destroying the worship of Baal, but he failed to destroy the false worship at Bethel and Dan. He was driven by ambition, pride and self-centredness rather than by his heartfelt devotion to the Lord. Though he fought against evil, evil remained in his heart. A final comment concerning Jehu. During his reign his kingdom was reduced in size (2 Kings 10:32). And a final humiliation for him (though not recorded in the Bible, but carved in stone on an ancient obelisk) is the depiction of Jehu prostrating himself before an Assyrian king. Jehu who failed to bow the knee to the Lord, is remembered in history as the king of Israel who bowed the knee to the king of Assyria.

3. The future
By this I mean the future in terms of us today, the application of this grisly chapter of scripture. During this sermon I hope that you have you been asking yourself, 'What does 2 Kings say to us today?' 'How does God's word speak to me today?' And since this is a sermon and not a lecture, what can we each take away with us this morning and apply to our lives?

From 2 Kings 10 we can learn at least two important lessons.
One concerns revival and the other concerns the condition of the heart.

a) Revival
Earlier I asked you to imagine what it must have been like to live during the days of Ahab and Jehu. Outwardly there would have been very little to encourage your faith. You would easily have been discouraged, isolated and alone. The official religion was corrupt. You would have had no scripture to read, and probably few fellow believers to support and encourage you. And to worship the Lord you would have had to travel across the boarder before reaching the temple in Jerusalem. It would have been easy to give up, to follow the crowd, and to reject the Lord.

And in such times of discouragement and absence of true faith what are believers to do? What do you do as you reflect upon the church and nation? Throughout the history of the church the answer has been much the same. Believers have been compelled to throw themselves upon the love and the mercy of the Lord. As human beings we are powerless to act. Our efforts cannot change hearts and minds and transform the society around us. But the all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving God can alone bring revival just as he alone can brings individuals to a saving faith. It is the Lord who can renew his church and who can change hearts and transform lives He alone brings life and peace and freedom and hope in and through the Lord Jesus Christ.

Remember too that there is a profound difference between divine revival and human revivalism. As one historian put it, 'Revivals are always spurious when they are got up by man's devices, and not brought down by the Spirit of God' (quoted by Iain Murray in Revival and Revivalism, 1994, xv). Our prayer today should be that God by his grace and mercy might do a mighty work in the nation and in his church and to bring about a mighty revival like that in the 18th century.

And when you get discouraged, and want to opt out and to lead a quiet life, then you might be tempted to cry out with Elijah, 'I have had enough, Lord'. But if you want to see God at work and be used in his service, then we should all be driven to our knees and pray: 'Lord, do a new work, revive your church, renew our nation, help us to lead holy, godly lives and by your grace and mercy to bring unbelievers to a conviction of sin and to a saving faith in Christ.'

b) 'An undivided heart' (Psalm 86:11)
The second lesson we can learn from 2 Kings 10 concerns the condition of the human heart. The failure of Jehu was that his heart was not right with the Lord. In v.31 we read that he did not keep the Law of the Lord with all his heart. He did not turn away from the sins of his forebears. He was trapped by his past. Content to remain unchanged. Proud and full of self-importance.

Is that like you? Does that describe your situation? Is your heart right with God?

What a contrast there is between Jehu's absence of faith and the firm confident faith we find in the book of Psalms. Where the Psalmist prayed: 'Test me, O Lord, and try me, examine my heart and my mind' (Ps 26:2) and then 'Teach me you way, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth, give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name' (Ps 86:11). 'Examine my heart', 'give me an undivided heart'. That should be our constant prayer. A heart open before the Lord and a heart that is one with the Lord. The Prayer Book translation says: 'Teach me thy way, O Lord, and I will walk in thy truth: O knit my heart unto thee, that I may fear thy name'.

'Knit my heart', knit together, unified and united. It's a prayer to be single-minded and wholehearted, and to be devoted to the Lord. And if God in his grace and mercy is to bring revival, then his people must be wholeheartedly devoted to him, united to him and with hearts open to his scrutiny, and hearts that are undivided.

In other words, to be all that Jehu was not!

We need not be trapped by our past sins and failures, our sinfulness and lack of faith; for by the mercy of our God there can be change and transformation. May we each pray, 'Lord, give me an undivided heart' that I might be one with you.

Clearly Charles Wesley was right when he wrote:
O for a heart to praise my God
A heart from sin set free!
A heart that always feels thy blood,
So freely spilt for me!

A heart in every thought renewed,
and full of love divine,
perfect, and right, and pure and good -
a copy, Lord, of thine!