How Do You Want To Be Remembered?

Day two hundred seventy-four

Last night we listened to a talk on cd called 'The Devil Made Me Do It."  It was about our agency and the need to understand that we are meant to act and not to be acted upon.  I prayed this morning that I will use my agency to act in the best way possible. May my words and actions reflect my love for the Lord.  I asked the Lord to give me the ability to recognize when I am letting myself be acted upon and the wisdom to know how to deal with it. This does not always come easy for me, so I am counting on some help today!

1 Kings 14-16
At this point in the scriptures we are being given the history of the two kingdoms; Israel in the North and Judah in the South. The author will talk about what is happening in Israel and then part way through a chapter he will turn his attention to what is going on with Judah.  There is a lot going on in these chapters, the leadership in the kingdoms will change often and each will face its own challenges.  The one constant throughout these chapters is that the two kingdoms will always be at war.  So let's look at some of the more interesting parts of these chapters.

Chapter 14
Israel
During the same time frame of chapter 13, Jeroboam's son is sick. So he sends his wife, undercover, to Ahijah the prophet, to see what will happen to his son. For some reason, Jeroboam isn’t asking for his son to be healed, he just wants to know what will happen.  As a person who has seen the power of God to heal (remember his hand was healed), you would think that he would want the same for his son. Why would he not ask?  Do you think he knew that he was not worthy to receive such blessings because he had not repented of his sins and  idolatry?

I find it interesting that Jeroboam doesn’t send his wife to one of the priests of his own false religion. He knows it’s bogus! He sends his wife to the real deal. Hmmm.

Jeroboam is told that his descendants that die in the city will be eaten by dog's. And the ones that die outside the city will be eaten by the birds. The only one who will be buried properly is his son who will die as his mom's feet enter the gates of the city.  What a sad legacy for a man that was chosen by God to lead these people. 

Judah
The focus now is the Southern Kingdom, Judah, and the reign of Rehoboam. And the Southern Kingdom was doing just as bad. They too were into idolatry.  In verse 24, we learn that things were so bad that the "sodomites" were back to their perverse ways.  We also learn that all the wealth that was acquired in Solomon's kingdom, is now being slowly taken away. Judah has also turned away from God.  What a sad time for God's chosen people.

Chapter 15
Judah
After having wicked rulers, Judah has some hope in the leadership of Asa.  Even though Asa will do some bad things at the end of his life, his overall reign fell into the category of “good”. 

He will work hard to turn the nation closer to obeying the pure Mosaic Law.  He will remove the Sodomites and he will tear down the idols built by his forefathers.  He will even have his grandmother removed as queen because of her idolatrous ways. He knew that he needed to stop her influence on the nation.  So he fired her!  I think we we need to be careful about the effect that some people have on our lives, including our family members.

Israel
None of the kings of Israel were ever called “good”, though some were definitely more evil than others. 

Nadab will continue the big sin that his father started, the worship of the golden calves (1Kings 12:26-33).  Apparently Nadab had taken on a campaign to conquer the Philistine city of Gibbethon.  While this is going on, Baasha takes advantage of the situation and kills Nadab.  Then Baasha has everybody in the family of Jeroboam killed, removing all threat to his reign.  This man rules a nation for twenty-four years, and all we have a record of is how evil he was.  Tragic.

Chapter 16
Israel
Jehu prophesies the destruction of the posterity of Baasha much like that of Jeroboam's family. You would think that since Baasha has just had a hand in seeing the prophecy of Jeroboam fulfilled, this would strike a little fear into his heart.  But it doesn’t change any of Baasha’s actions.  He never repents.

Next Elah reigns in Israel.  Another tragedy.  He had been given the throne of the kingdom of Israel, and all he was known for was getting drunk and being murdered.

Zimri is next in line and he destroys everyone who might challenge him in his reign.  He ends up fulfilling the prophecy by Jehu.  The people apparently didn’t like Zimri.  So they decided to take things into their own hands and make Omri king.  Omri had been the chief general of the army.  Zimri kills himself when he realizes that he’s going to lose the battle.  He burns down the palace.

Things are going to go downhill for the northern kingdom under the leadership of Omri. He was going to be the strongest leader of the Northern kingdom up to this time.  Assyrian records dating from over a century later refer to Israel as “the land of Omri”. During his reign, he was able to keep off the threat of attack from the Syrians in Damascus as well as the slowly building Assyrian empire.  He was able to also defeat the Moabites, and the victory is recorded in the famous archaeological find, the Moabite Stone.  Yet despite all these things, the scriptures only record that he was evil, and he was more evil than all before him.

With Omri's death comes the reign of Ahab, who will be the worst of the kings of Israel.  Ahab goes way beyond Jeroboam.  He now adds the worship of Baal to the worship of God.  He does more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him (v 33).

I imagine that these chapters could be looked at as sad commentary on these leaders, but for me it made me stop and think about how I am living my life.  What is the legacy that I want to leave behind?  Are my actions reflecting my love for God?  Am I doing all that I should be doing to ensure that my posterity will carry on a love of God or am I setting up a chain reaction for generations of failed family relations? 

These are tough questions and require some deep reflection on how I am living my life.  I am not always comfortable with that.  I know it is important, but finding the balance between positive analysis of yourself and not dwelling on your mistakes is hard. I don't think any of us can afford to ignore or push such self-reflection to the side, there is too much at stake.  It is time to say to ourselves, "How do you want to be remembered?"