Read 2 Kings 11-12, Hosea 3-4.
This devotional is about 2 Kings 11-12.
God’s covenant with David was that one of David’s descendants would always be king while Israel was a nation. That promise was why Solomon’s son Rehoboam remained king over Judah even though the rest of Israel was torn away from him and became the Northern Kingdom.
These two chapters of scripture show us a situation where the promise of God almost was broken. Athaliah married into the Davidic family when she married king Jehoram and she gave birth Judah’s next king, Ahaziah (2 Kings 8:26). But her son, King Ahaziah of Judah was killed by Jehu in his zeal to rid the earth of Ahab’s descendants (2 Kings 9:27-28). This was outside of God’s command to Jehu who was supposed to bring Ahab’s family to justice.
Here in 2 Kings 11:1, Athaliah decided to become the ruling queen. She killed every possible heir to the throne except Joash, her grandson, who was an infant at the time (vv. 2-3). The priests in the temple understood how important it was to defend Joash and to put him on Judah’s throne as soon as possible. They organized a constant guard for Joash (vv. 4-10) and then anointed him king when he was only seven years old (v. 21). Their actions were used by God to keep the promise he made to David that his house would be a dynasty.
These priests could easily have refused when they were approached to hide Joash in the temple (v. 3a) and guard him (vv. 4ff). They could have said, “That’s a political problem. It’s none of our business; we’ll just continue to do the Lord’s work.” Instead, they put themselves at risk of Athaliah’s unjust punishment in order to do the right thing.
None of us will ever find ourselves in this serious of a situation but the faith these men had in God’s promises and his protection should encourage us. It should teach us to be willing to put ourselves at risk to do the right thing because we trust God to keep his promises and to take care of us.
Are you avoiding doing the right(eous) thing somewhere in your life right now?