Call on the King

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDx26GEcCOg&feature=youtu.be

If I am being totally honest when I first read this passage, I wondered why God got so upset with Asa. Yes, I see He is saying he didn’t rely on Him, but it didn’t seem that bad. Yet, at the same time, I knew. My heart knew why God did what He did, but my mind, obviously, tried to reason it out. You see, the situation God is referencing, happens just a few verses earlier in vs 1 when “Baasha king of Israel came up against Judah and fortified Ramah in order to prevent anyone from going out or coming in to [meet with] Asa king of Judah.” Asa, instead of turning to God, reaches out to his buddy Ben-hadad king of Aram, and offers him silver and gold from, wait for it...,the Lord’s house (now that one is an obvious no-no!), to come bail him out of the situation. Ben does it, Baasha leaves and all, seemingly, works out perfectly. Until Hanani, the seer, shows up with a word from God for Asa. And now we are back to where we started.  

Why did I question God’s reaction? Why do I think people today would question God’s reaction? Here Asa had a problem and he looked around and he saw a solution. He realized he could use God’s money (without asking, mind you), use the resources around him and pick the “call a friend” option and he could make the problem go away. Unlike how he responded in Chapter 14 when Zerah, an Ethiopian, came out with his army of a million, against Judah’s 580,000, and “Asa called out to the LORD his God, saying, “O LORD, there is no one besides You to help in the battle between the powerful and the weak; so help us, O LORD our God, for we trust in and rely on You, and in Your name we have come against this multitude. O LORD, You are our God; let not man prevail against You” (vs. 11).  See the difference? Asa relied on Asa the second time around. He looked at what he had and trusted in that more than he trusted in God.

So, to finally answer why I had a problem and think others that read that passage today would have a problem with God’s reaction! Because I do the exact. same. thing. We, as a society, do the exact. same. thing. And, to be blunt, we don’t like that this passage calls us out on it. We, when faced with a difficult situation or just a normal Friday, use technology, money, other people, our own ways, you name it, before we go to God. Why would we fully surrender ourselves to the King, and give up control, when we can find a solution much quicker on our own? Why look to God when His help comes slower than my want? Because, God has more. Just like the Lord wanted to provide for Asa, He wants to do the same for us. Look at what happened in Chapter 14, after Asa called out to the Lord, in full surrender, “So the LORD struck the Ethiopians [with defeat] before Asa and Judah, and the Ethiopians fled” (Vs 12). God provided that victory. God kept Asa and Judah from harm. God provided them with all the spoils from His defeat. God did. Asa’s mistake, our mistake, is that we go into situations, big or small, the life altering or the very simplistic, without even talking to God.

We have watched Him save us from an army of a million time and again, yet we continue to prefer to call a friend over calling the King. God makes it clear to Asa what He is looking for when he is told “For the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth so that He may support those whose heart is completely His.” He wants to support us. He wants to be there for us no matter the size of the moment. BUT, our hearts must be COMPLETELY His. Not His with a little technology. Not His with a little “call a friend”. His. Period. Don’t get me wrong, we can use those things. But God must remain first. John Piper talks about it best in his sermon entitled “Asa’s Folly”, when he shares how he prepares and prays over his sermons. “I know the text is good, the idea is good, my mind and fingers and computer and health and energy and freedom are good. But I renounce reliance on them and look to you, and ask that in and under and over and around and through all those good things you would work so deeply and so decisively and so graciously that what I say on Sunday would not be the work of a mere man, but the work and the word of God.” We must “renounce reliance” on all things, yes good things, and look to God and God alone, so that HE is what comes through in all that we do.