BE WARY OF PRIDE’S HOOK: Even a king can mess up. We’re all vulnerable. Notice the signposts.
Kings or paupers, it doesn’t matter. Some enter the danger zone willfully, some by forgetting, and others by letting their gaze drift to the wrong things. Such was the case for King Hezekiah. He started strong by following God’s ways and choosing to do what was right. Then the bottom dropped out.
Illness hit hard. The end was near. Bitterness assailed him. He wanted to live out his life. Dying in middle age didn’t seem fair to him; after all, he had served the Lord and sought to bring the nation back to the ways of God. Hezekiah reminded God that he had been faithful to Him. God listened to Hezekiah’s plea and then responded by granting him more years. His wealth increased. Then he showed off what God had given him. God was not pleased.
When we stray from God’s will in our lives, we invite trouble to come visiting. When things are going well, we may become braggarts, arrogant or overly self-satisfied with our lives. It can become “our” ministry instead of God’s ministry. It’s a subtle change, going from clear to murky waters.
Initially, King Hezekiah followed the Lord. “He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.” The opposite of many of the kings who “Did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord. ” He chose to do the hard things that went against cultural mores of the day by destroying the high places, the Asherah pole, and the Snake-on-a-pole (from Moses’ day) to which the people gave offerings. He was determined to be faithful to God and centered on pleasing God.
Hezekiah opened himself up to pride after God extended his life. He’d passed the test. That must have felt good. He felt God’s pleasure. The sickness of pride was making headway into his life. He shared what was not to be shared, showed off what was to be held in honor by God’s people and failed to remain humble before his God .
There is a warning sounded in this story. I do not believe King Hezekiah realized that what he was doing was wrong when he showed off the grandeur and splendor of the holy things and kingly treasures. I say this because he seems surprised when confronted about his error. Apparently he had changed his focus. There was an attitude shift. He had become more self-focused and less God-focused. In reality, the storehouse was filled with God’s treasure, not his treasure.
I can see how easy it would be to do that very thing. Our attitudes can easily shift. We may not realize that we’re drifting away from giving God the glory and His due. It doesn’t take much to become full of self and wanting to show off the greatness of it all. We can take credit for that which is God-given. We can get sloppy in our way of thinking. We can stop honoring what God calls us to honor.
God has given each of us many gifts. We must use them wisely and for His glory. Give credit to God for the gifts you have in your life. This pleases God. Be wary of self-satisfied self-importance. All we have and possess has been given to us. We are most fortunate to be children of the King.
Reference –
2 Kings 20 (NIV)
20 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz went to him and said, “This is what the Lord says: Put your house in order, because you are going to die; you will not recover.”
2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, 3 “Remember, Lord, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
4 Before Isaiah had left the middle court, the word of the Lord came to him: 5 “Go back and tell Hezekiah, the ruler of my people, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of your father David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears; I will heal you. On the third day from now you will go up to the temple of the Lord. 6 I will add fifteen years to your life. And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my sake and for the sake of my servant David.’”
7 Then Isaiah said, “Prepare a poultice of figs.” They did so and applied it to the boil, and he recovered.
8 Hezekiah had asked Isaiah, “What will be the sign that the Lord will heal me and that I will go up to the temple of the Lord on the third day from now?”
9 Isaiah answered, “This is the Lord’s sign to you that the Lord will do what he has promised: Shall the shadow go forward ten steps, or shall it go back ten steps?”
10 “It is a simple matter for the shadow to go forward ten steps,” said Hezekiah. “Rather, have it go back ten steps.”
11 Then the prophet Isaiah called on the Lord, and the Lord made the shadow go back the ten steps it had gone down on the stairway of Ahaz.
12 At that time Marduk-Baladan son of Baladan king of Babylon sent Hezekiah letters and a gift, because he had heard of Hezekiah’s illness. 13 Hezekiah received the envoys and showed them all that was in his storehouses—the silver, the gold, the spices and the fine olive oil—his armory and everything found among his treasures. There was nothing in his palace or in all his kingdom that Hezekiah did not show them.
14 Then Isaiah the prophet went to King Hezekiah and asked, “What did those men say, and where did they come from?”
“From a distant land,” Hezekiah replied. “They came from Babylon.”
15 The prophet asked, “What did they see in your palace?”
“They saw everything in my palace,” Hezekiah said. “There is nothing among my treasures that I did not show them.”
16 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord: 17 The time will surely come when everything in your palace, and all that your predecessors have stored up until this day, will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord. 18 And some of your descendants, your own flesh and blood who will be born to you, will be taken away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.”
19 “The word of the Lord you have spoken is good,” Hezekiah replied. For he thought, “Will there not be peace and security in my lifetime?”
20 As for the other events of Hezekiah’s reign, all his achievements and how he made the pool and the tunnel by which he brought water into the city, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Judah? 21 Hezekiah rested with his ancestors. And Manasseh his son succeeded him as king.
~based on a journal writing
