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National Apostasy Brings National Ruin
From Jeroboam’s death to Elijah’s appearance before Ahab,
Israel experienced a steady spiritual decline. The majority of the
people rapidly lost sight of their duty to serve the living God and
adopted practices of idol worship.
Nadab, the son of Jeroboam, who occupied the throne of Israel
for a few months, was suddenly killed with all his relatives in the
line of succession, “according to the word of the Lord which He had
spoken by His servant Ahijah the Shilonite, because of the sins of
Jeroboam, which he had sinned and by which he had made Israel
sin.”
1 Kings 15:29, 30
.
The idolatrous worship that Jeroboam had introduced brought
the judgments of Heaven, and yet the rulers who followed—Baasha,
Elah, Zimri, and Omri—continued the same fatal course of evildo-
ing.
King Asa’s Good Rule
During the greater part of this time, Asa was ruling in Judah. He
“did what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord his God, for
he removed the altars of the foreign gods and ... commanded Judah
to seek the Lord God of their fathers, and to observe the law and
the commandment. ... And the kingdom was quiet under him.”
2
Chronicles 14:2-5
.
The faith of Asa was put to a severe test when “Zerah the
Ethiopian ... with an army of a million men and three hundred
chariots” invaded his kingdom.
Verse 9
. In this crisis Asa did not put
his trust in the “fortified cities in Judah” that he had built, with “walls
around them, and towers, gates, and bars,” nor in the “mighty men
of valor” in his army.
Verses 6-8
. The king’s trust was in Jehovah.
Setting his forces in battle array, he sought the help of God.
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