Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Evening Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/ev/ev20040711.htm

1 AND 2 KINGS: ENJOYING GOD'S BLESSING IN AN APOSTATE ERA
Part LXI: Blessing By Learning From The Sinful Failure Of Our Predecessors
(2 Kings 23:31-33; 2 Chronicles 35:20-36:4 with Jeremiah 22:10-12)
  1. Introduction
    1. When believers of the past have lived lives of faith that God has blessed, we can follow their examples.
    2. However, God ALSO wants us to learn lessons from considering the failings of our predecessors!
    3. When the godly king Josiah died for failing to check the claims of Pharaoh-Necho who passed through Judah at God's leading (our last lesson), God expected Josiah's son and successor, Jehoahaz to learn that he himself should take care to learn from Josiah's failure and heed God's ways and obey them as follows:
  2. Blessing By Learning From The Sinful Failure Of Our Predecessors.
    1. As we learned in the last lesson, the good king Josiah with a great record as a godly king in Judah lost his life by attacking Pharaoh-Necho who was led of God to pass through Judah, cf. 2 Chronicles 35:20-25.
    2. When Josiah died, the people of Judah took his son, Jehoahaz and make him king in Josiah's place, 36:1.
    3. Yet, instead of learning from his father's failure, Jehoahaz turned to an evil life, 2 Kings 23:31-32.
    4. For his failure to learn from his father's error, God condemned Jehoahaz to judgment at the hand of the same Pharaoh who had slain Josiah, and that in a way that highlighted Jehoahaz's own failure to learn:
      1. God used the same Pharaoh-Necho who slew Josiah to punish Jehoahaz for sin, 2 Kings 23:32-33.
      2. The details of Pharaoh-Necho's actions reveal his intent to check future problems he might face from Judah's kings as he kept following God's leading to use Judah as a bridge to his military campaigns:
        1. When Pharaoh-Necho headed south for Egypt from a later campaign against Assyria, he sought to intimidate Judah from opposing his use of her land to return home lest Judah try to oppose him in battle as Josiah had done (Z.P.E.B., vol. Three, p. 415): he thus took Jehoahaz captive at Riblah 65 miles north of Damascus before coming south into Judah, 2 Kings 23:33a; Ryrie St. Bib., KJV, ftn.
        2. Pharoh-Necho also charged Judah tribute as a signal of his dominance over her, 2 Kings 23:33b.
        3. Further, signaling his realization that he as a pagan king nevertheless had the blessing of Judah's God in this move, Pharaoh-Necho set Jehoahaz's brother on Judah's throne in Jehoahaz's place and changed his name from that of "Eliakim" to "Jehoiakim," 2 Chronicles 36:4: (a) Pharaoh-Necho signaled his sovereignty over Judah's kings by deposing and taking captive king Jehoahaz and replacing him with his brother. (b) This pagan ruler further showed his sovereignty by changing the name of that new king from "Eliakim" to "Jehoiakim," for naming another party signaled sovereignty over him, cf. Zond. Pict. Ency. of the Bible, vol. Four, p. 363. (c) Significant in this move is the meaning of the two names, "Eliakim" and "Jehoiakim" as follows: ((1)) "Eliakim" means "Elohim raises up" and "Jehoikim" means "may Jahweh raise up," Ibid., vol. Two, p. 281 and vol. Three, p. 418. ((2)) Now, "Elohim" is the general word for the Creator-God in Hebrew where "Jahweh" is the name God used in reference for His covenant relationship to Israel as opposed to those outside of that covenant relationship, cf. Exodus 3:13-14. ((3)) So as pagan Pharaoh-Necho changed Eliakim's name to "Jehoiakim", replacing the general name for God with a name in particular association with Israel, he REPEATED the message he had first made with Jehoahaz's father, Josiah (2 Chron. 35:21): Pharaoh testified Judah's Lord supported his effort to keep her from opposing his journeying through her land, so Judah was not to oppose his doing so!
    5. Thus, this renaming of Eliakim by Pharaoh-Necho would have reminded all involved of Josiah's sin of thus errantly opposing Pharaoh-Necho in trying to fight against him for traveling through Judah!
    6. Once Jehoahaz was in Egyptian captivity, the Lord predicted Jehoahaz would STAY there never to be released, Jer. 22:10-12. Indeed, Jeremiah was to cease weeping for Josiah and start weeping for Jehoahaz; the latter had failed to heed the lesson of Josiah's failure so he would get no mercy from God!
Lesson: For failing to heed the OBVIOUS lesson to HEED God that had been portrayed in his godly FATHER'S FAILURE, Jehoahaz was DISCIPLINED by the Lord in a way that EXPOSED the INEXCUSABLE FOOLISHNESS of HIS OWN failure to LEARN that lesson!

Application: May we LEARN from the FAILURES of our PREDECESSORS that we NOT COPY their SINS and ERRORS, for GOD holds us ACCOUNTABLE to DO so!