The Killing Fields (Part B)

The Syrians are still out there to take land, and he should have stopped them. And he would have stopped them had he remained loyal to Yahweh.

And so there's another lesson for all of us. God can use us. He can use us in spite of ourselves. He can use us in fellowship or outside of fellowship.

And of course, it falls on the individual to decide how it's going to be. You're either going to love the Lord or you're not. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of 2 Kings.

Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. And now here's Pastor Rick with his continuing message called The Killing Fields in 2 Kings Chapter 10. Verse 7, so it was when the letter came to them that they took the king's sons and slaughtered 70 persons, put their heads in baskets, and sent them to Jezreel.

Well, as ghoulish as it is, palace life offered a good and happy life if you were a male, which these were, until there was a regime change, and this is what could befall you. Verse 8, then a messenger came and told him, saying, they have brought the heads of the king's sons, and he said, lay them in two heaps at the entrance of the gate until morning. This is just gross. Now he knows what he's doing. Remember I said he wants to distance himself from this execution? You're going to see that when he calls a press conference, and he's going to do this. But decapitation is always shock and awe, no matter how it happens.

It's not supposed to happen. This, of course, would reduce the chance of opposition. There would be those if they were thinking about an uprising. They saw the pile of heads of royalty, no less. They would have a second thought. Throughout history, there have been openings for executioners.

Want ads used to be full of them. I don't know want ads for, you know, job opening, great hours, pension, need to have no problems killing people. You know, that was how it would go. But anyway, whose ghoulish job was it to collect the heads, cart them up to Jezreel, stack them in front of the city? What a sick sin world this really is.

Anyway, verse 9, So it was in the morning that he went out and stood and said to all the people, You are righteous. Indeed, I conspired against my master and killed him. But who killed all these? So again, he is benefiting from his violent reputation as a killing machine. He, as I mentioned, actually spared more lives than had he not taken these steps. But still, he doesn't want to be known as a mass murderer.

So he calls this news conference for his public relations. He says, But who killed all these? Yeah, I did kill Joe Rem.

I shot him with an arrow. But who killed these people? And by doing this, he's washing his hands of the crime.

But he's the one that sent that letter up there to get this in motion. He is also saying clearly there are others that are not loyal to the House of Ahab. Otherwise, they would not have slaughtered Ahab's descendants like this.

I'm not the only one part of this uprising. Yeah, I killed Joe Rem. But who killed these? So he shields himself from the gruesome deed. We would think that the tutors, those caregivers for these princes, would have fought for their pupils.

But honor does not seem to have been widespread in the Northern Kingdom. Verse 10, Know now that nothing shall fall on the earth of the word of Yahweh, which Yahweh spoke concerning the house of Ahab. For Yahweh has done what he spoke by his servant Elijah. Well, this is mock faith on his part.

It was convenient for him. It's true what he is saying. And there's an example of an unbeliever preaching the truth of God's word. You have a big problem with that.

And that's why Jesus, when the demon said, We know who you are, the Son of God. He said, He said, Be muzzled. Shut up. The Greek is be muzzled. And the coming from you is it's not permitted. There's a conflict of interests that has to be upheld. And this is an interesting point, because if the devil can get to tell the truth about God, then he's going to open up the door to tell the lies that he's really after doing.

And he gets away with this. Thus, cults are born. But he makes it clear that the killing field that he is associated with was by God's scourge on the wicked. And this is prophesied by Elijah. That was way back in 1 Kings chapter 21. So he names, he says, his servant Elijah.

Call this long time ago and it went through Elijah. And then finally the servant and now Jehu is there to announce it. It's odd that he honors God here, but dishonors him with the rest of his life with the idolatry. His disloyalty to Yahweh would later render him unable to protect the land from the Syrians. We'll get that in verses 32-33. But the Syrians, where this all started, the two kings before he killed them, Ahaziah and Jo-ram, north and south, they were, you know, against Syria. Syria coming into the promised land. Jehu was the general there. Jo-ram gets wounded and goes back to Samaria. And then Jehu, of course, his anointed king, goes there and kills those two kings.

But the Syrians are still out there to take land. And he should have stopped them. And he would have stopped them had he remained loyal to Yahweh. And so there's another lesson for all of us that God can use us. He can use us in spite of ourselves. He can use us in fellowship or outside of fellowship.

And of course, it falls on the individual to decide how it's going to be. You're either going to love the Lord or you're not. And the great difference between David and Hezekiah versus Jehu is God used all of them. David and Hezekiah, they loved the Lord Yahweh in spite of their faults. Whereas Jehu, he had faults too, but he didn't love the Lord. We have no mention of him. It's sort of like Esau.

We never read of the God of Esau, the God of Jacob we hear about. How come we don't hear about Esau? Well, he made his choices. He was a man's man. He felt he could do good. If you said Esau, do you believe in God? He probably would have said, yes, I do.

And then gone on to do other things. Are you going to, you know, we're going to go worship the Lord. Esau, you come?

No, not right now. I got to, you know, do this, whatever it is he's doing. Those distinctions, they mean something because they confront us with a choice. When we don't feel in the mood, where is your heart?

Do you want to be in the mood? Because God counts that. If it's in your heart, the desire, that goes somewhere with God.

Versus the one that just says, I'm not interested at all. We who believe and love the Lord, we all have met people like that. They claim that they believe in God, but they really have no interest in the things that God is interested in. Verse 11, So Jehu killed all who remained of the house of Ahab and Jezreel, and all his great men, and his close acquaintances, and his priest, until he left him, none remaining. A very thorough, but again, he goes beyond the mandate to execute all of Ahab's officials. It would have been acceptable to execute the priests of Baal, that was the promised land.

They were imported by Jezebel and Ahab, they didn't belong there. For this crime, killing the acquaintances and the great men, God holds him accountable. We don't get it until you get to Hosea chapter 1. Then Yahweh said to him, call his name, speaking to Hosea the prophet, Jezreel, where this event is taking place, for in a little while I will avenge the blood shed of Jezreel on the house of Jehu and bring an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. And so later, God brings this up to the prophet Hosea. I've not forgotten what Jehu did, and I want everybody to understand I've not forgotten what Jehu has done.

I've let things run on, I've even rewarded the name of Jehu because he was my instrument, and yet he did wrong, and you're going to pay for that too. By the time Hosea the prophet comes along, Jehu's grandson, Jeroboam II, is king, and he's king for 41 years. Jehu gets to have four, including himself, three of his descendants, his dynasty, who's the longest in the north as far as years go. After that son, that grandson reigned for 41 years, then his son comes to the throne, Zechariah. He is assassinated within six months, fulfilling the prophecies here found in Hosea, the judgment on Jehu. So the whole point of this is Jehu was a man given an opportunity, he was very thorough executing his orders and commandments by God through the prophets, but his heart wasn't with God, and his descendants were allowed to rule, you would assume because, well, if God could find somebody better, he would have raised them up, but then judgment fell on them also.

Now verse 12, And he arose and departed and went to Samaria on the way at Beth Eked of the shepherds, some landmark. Verse 13, Jehu met with the brothers of Ahaziah king of Judah, and said, Who are you? And they answered, We are the brothers of Ahaziah.

We have come down to greet the sons of the king and the sons of the queen mother. They should have said, We're tourists. They should have said anything.

Everything they said was wrong. And there's going to be a fresh killing. Well, you know, what's another bloodletting on the way to the theater, I guess? He could tell by their garb that they were, you know, somebody. They weren't just, you know, a farmer's convention. They would have been wearing their version of coveralls.

But they gave the wrong answers. They're relatives of the king of Judah, whom he slew, and they don't know this yet, and they're allies with the house of Ahab. And they're boasting about it.

They're very comfortable with this. And they mentioned the queen mother, which is either Joram's wife or Jezebel herself. More likely Jezebel, because her character was such she's not going to share the attention with anybody.

I'd like to be in that house. All of these men are going to die. These are family and uncles and brothers of Ahaziah, Judah's king, who's dead, and they don't know it yet. We've come down to greet the sons of the king and the sons of the queen mother, ignorant again of the revolution that is taking place. But this shows that they are guilty by association, and that's how Jehu's going to take this, because they are.

And we as individuals have to watch that in our own lives, that we do not become guilty through association. Verse 14, and he said, take them alive for a moment. So they took them alive and killed them at the well of Beth Eked, 42 men, and left none of them. Again, the thoroughness of Jehu comes out. As you read the story about Jehu, you just, you know, you sort of just suck your teeth and just sigh that, man, he could have been such a dynamo for God in the north, and not happening. These men were not related to Ahab. I know you say I'm confusing Ahab, Joe Rabacam. Why can't they give them American names?

Well, we now call American names, but I don't know. How else do you teach this without making these references? They do count. You have to expose the congregation to them.

They've got to start somewhere. But anyway, when I say they were not related by blood to Ahab, and yet he kills them, that means he's exceeding his orders. We covered this briefly when a servant goes beyond what they are told. When the prophet went to anoint Jehu, the servant of the prophet, he was told, anoint him and get out of there. And that's what he did, and he went no further. And then we cited Moses when he was told to speak to the rock, but Moses angry with the people.

He strikes the rock, you know, in anger twice. And we have to watch that we do not go beyond. God may say to you, I want you to go minister to this person. And just by going over and saying, hi, how are you, talking to them, and then you invite them home. And God says, I didn't tell you to do that. I told you to say hi to the guy.

And now you go and you have a confrontation. So just to be sensitive to the leading of the Lord. Get that confirmation.

Try not to move until you get it. It takes discipline to feel like you want to do something, but you're not sure God wants you to do it. And many times we can just wait it out.

God knows how to make his confirmations. And I have, I go through this often. Sometimes I even ask for, I need a second one. And sometimes I now understand the value of on the strength of two or three. See that third witness is when it's really a big deal. So okay, I got two like Gideon with the fleece. I got the two confirmations, but this is a big deal, Lord. Can I have one more? Not to be pushy. I don't do this all the time.

It has to be genuine. So anyway, he is exceeding his orders. His motivation is fear, not faith. Are you associated with Jezebel and Ahab and those guys?

I'm killing you because I'm not taking any chances. Yeah, but where's the trust in God in believing what the prophet said? Too common a practice is to act on some stimulus that lay outside the scripture. And you know, we're susceptible to it. So whole churches do it and they become what we call apostate or watered down.

They're stimulated by things that are actually even prohibited in the scripture sometime. Well, everyone he executed outside of his house, Ahab's house, was not a commissioned execution. Verse 15, now when he departed from there, he met Jonadab. You don't want to meet this guy. Jehu is like, you know, the grim reaper.

Anyway, but that's not going to happen here. Jonadab, the son of Rechab, coming to meet him. And he greeted him and said to him, is your heart right? As my heart is toward your heart. And Jonadab answered, it is. Jehu said, if it is, give me your hand. And he gave him his hand and he took him up into the chariot. The language in the English could have, you know, double entendres.

Give me your hand. Well, with Jehu, cut it off is what he meant. That's not what happened. I'm just playing with the English here. So here he is, Jehu, fresh from another kill, and he checks with, he sees Jonadab coming and he checks to see, have you heard about what's going on?

Where are you? Are you my friend? I'm friendly towards you.

I have no right with you. He is the patriarch, Jonadab, to the Rechabites that we read about in Jeremiah 35. We only read about them and their lifestyle in Jeremiah 35.

They show up earlier. They're descendants of Moses' father-in-law and then the son-in-law, the Kenites. They were devout. They were somewhat like our Amish in that they did not want to live in the cities. They did not want to farm unlike the Amish. They were nomadic Bedouins.

They lived in tents and traveled around. In Jeremiah 35, as Nebuchadnezzar is bringing his armies into Judah, the Rechabites, the descendants of this man, Jonadab, they come to the city for refuge. And God sends Jeremiah to them and says, Jeremiah, I want you to test them. They abstain from wine and they just want to be separate from, like the Nazarites. They want to be separated to God.

I want you to test them. And Jeremiah offers them wine, kind of gets you something to drink. You know, must be thirsty. And they refuse. And then Jeremiah holds them up and says, how come God's people cannot be like these Rechabites? They abstain. They stick to what they claim they believe.

But my people, they claim to believe me and then they go burn incense to idols. And so this is the beginning of this group of people living in Israel. Today there's another group of people that are sort of a small culture loyal to the Jews. They're not Jewish. The Druze, they fight with Israel's army and they're respected by the Jewish people.

You don't hear about them too much. I'm sure some of you will Google it or look it up after service. So coming back to this, this Jonadab, the patriarch of the Rechabites that come along later. He was the kind of man that Jehu needed to help his public relations. So if they saw him in the chariot with Jehu, well Jehu must be a righteous guy. Because these guys don't play around. You know, Jonadab, he's just a straight arrow. So this worked for Jehu. We don't read again about what happened.

Well, we do. There's a little bit more coming, so we'll get to that. Verse 16. Then he said, come with me and see my zeal for Yahweh. So they had him ride in his chariot. And Jehonadab, we know how Jehu drove the chariot, so he's just bouncing around. In verse 16 he says, come see my zeal for the Lord.

So Jehu picks up an endorsement and then he endorses himself. This is very important, I think, for us because it is very dangerous to be proud of one's own zeal. Look how zealous I am. Look how I do it. Look at my Bible. Look at my church. Look at my path.

No, no, that one might be good if you go here. But you know, you get it. So we Christians, again, it is very dangerous to be proud of your own zeal for the Lord. Don't let your left hand know what the right hand is doing. That's what Jesus meant by that. You show kindness to somebody. After you do that, don't remember it. Don't build a little monument.

Here's where I gave Lenny, you know, helped him with his flat tire. Don't do that kind of stuff. That's the lesson that comes out of it. Isn't it good that God does not say, before you can preach the Bible, you've got to be able to do everything in it. Oh man, that would count us all out. Well, the whole walking on water thing would just eliminate us right away.

Anyhow, coming back to this, talk is cheap. He's saying his zeal for the Lord, but it is really for himself. In verse 29, I won't read it now, but we'll come to this. He does purge the kingdom of Ahab and Baal worship, but he does not serve Yahweh. Verse 17, And when he came to Samaria, he killed all who remained to Ahab in Samaria, till he had destroyed them according to the word of Yahweh, which he spoke to Elijah. So he is, again, finding his spies are out there. He has a few more relatives you missed, and I'll be right there.

So the more killing. Outside of his chariot driving, there's not much that remains attractive from a Christian perspective of Jehu. Now, last we talked about when Jehu first encountered King Joram of the north, that he started talking about his mama. And some of the lads had suggested that, and playfully so, I'm sure, that the Bible sanctions talking about the mama jokes.

Now, they didn't mean it, but it was funny. But it is a good stopping point to just mention Jehu. There's nothing about him that is spiritually attractive to us. He is a bad guy, even though he's a bad guy in two senses. So in both senses of the word, another double entendre, right? He's a double entendre. He's a bad guy before the Lord. He's evil.

And then he's a bad guy. I don't know. Again, maybe I'm in the wrong neighborhood using this one. Let's go back to verse 19.

Some neighborhoods would get it like that. That dude is bad. But here is. Anyway, verse 19. Now, therefore, call to me and all the prophets of Baal, and all his servants, and all his priests. Let no one be missing, for I have a great sacrifice for Baal. According to the new, Nelson's new Bible dictionary, the pronunciation of the Baal is ba-al.

And so it's just hard to just repeat these names and not feel a little goofy doing it all the time. I don't like saying Baal like a bale of hay or something. I try to go with Baal, but it's hard. Anyway, whoever is missing, here in verse 19, shall not live. But Jehu acted deceptively with the intent of destroying the worshipers of Baal. Verse 20, And Jehu said, Proclaim a solemn assembly for Baal, so they proclaimed it. And Jehu sent throughout all Israel and all the worshipers of that fake god, so that there was not a man left who did not come. So they came into the temple of Baal, and the temple of him again was full from one end to the other.

See, you know, you can hear yourself singing, so this is not pleasant. So just to recap, Jehu says to the Rachabite leader, I want you to see how zealous I am for Yahweh. Thanks for joining us for today's edition on Cross-Reference Radio. This is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia.

We trust that what you've heard today in the book of 2 Kings has been something to remember. If you'd like to listen to more teachings from this series, go to crossreferenceradio.com. Once more, that's crossreferenceradio.com. We encourage you to subscribe to our podcast too, so you'll never miss another edition. Just go to your favorite podcast app to subscribe. Our time is about up, but we hope you'll tune in again next time as we continue on in the book of 2 Kings. We look forward to that time with you, so make a note in your calendar to join Pastor Rick as he teaches from the Bible right here on Cross-Reference Radio.