The Sons of Josiah (1): Jehoahaz & Jehoiakim

Scripture reading: 2 Kgs. 23:31-24:7

2 Kings 23:31–24:7 ESV

Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign, and he reigned three months in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his fathers had done. And Pharaoh Neco put him in bonds at Riblah in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Jerusalem, and laid on the land a tribute of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold. And Pharaoh Neco made Eliakim the son of Josiah king in the place of Josiah his father, and changed his name to Jehoiakim. But he took Jehoahaz away, and he came to Egypt and died there. And Jehoiakim gave the silver and the gold to Pharaoh, but he taxed the land to give the money according to the command of Pharaoh. He exacted the silver and the gold of the people of the land, from everyone according to his assessment, to give it to Pharaoh Neco. Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Zebidah the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah. And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his fathers had done. In his days, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up, and Jehoiakim became his servant for three years. Then he turned and rebelled against him. And the Lord sent against him bands of the Chaldeans and bands of the Syrians and bands of the Moabites and bands of the Ammonites, and sent them against Judah to destroy it, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by his servants the prophets. Surely this came upon Judah at the command of the Lord, to remove them out of his sight, for the sins of Manasseh, according to all that he had done, and also for the innocent blood that he had shed. For he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, and the Lord would not pardon. Now the rest of the deeds of Jehoiakim and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? So Jehoiakim slept with his fathers, and Jehoiachin his son reigned in his place. And the king of Egypt did not come again out of his land, for the king of Babylon had taken all that belonged to the king of Egypt from the Brook of Egypt to the river Euphrates.

The object of your faith

Starting today our youths will be studying the famous passage of John 3:16 and what it means for our faith. And we will cover the idea of Christ as “the object of faith”. The Bible suggests that all of us, in our spiritual brokenness, are in search of a Savior, an person or thing which justifies our lives. Something we can point to that shows we’re more, we’re greater, we’re worthy of love. And so I might point to my skill at the piano and say, “Check me out. Adore me.” We might point to our wealth, our popularity, our talents, our friends, and even our spouse: look how worthy I am. This is me. This is my worth. I am worthy of love. And so what we do is that we work harder and harder to get more and more out of it.

But what that means is that one day if my fingers are irreparably broken and I can’t play piano anymore, if the market crashes and my finances nosedive, or if my girlfriend or wife leaves me, then I’ll be mediocre again. It doesn’t matter how much faith you have in something if the object of your faith is weak or temporary. If your savior, if whatever justifies your life is weak, then it’s going to crumble, and you’re going to be crushed along with it. So the Bible promises us.

John 3:16 ESV

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

If the object of your faith is Christ, then you will never be crushed.

So the Westminster Confession of Faith states in the second half of 14.2.

“But the principal acts of saving faith are accepting, receiving, and resting upon Christ alone for justification, sanctification, and eternal life, by virtue of the covenant of grace.” - WCF 14.2b.

The confession here is making a very important point. It’s saying that the acts, the evidence, of saving faith, are accepting, receiving, and resting upon Christ for justification. And this goes totally against the ways of this world, because none of these verbs involve actions of merit. You wouldn’t be applauded for accepting, receiving, or resting. Yet this is precisely what the confession calls a saving faith. It’s saying that when it comes to salvation in this life, you bring nothing to the table. It’s all Jesus. He is enough. He is mighty, powerful, loving, and eternal. In the words of St. Augustine,

Thou has made us for Thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.

This morning we’re looking at two sons of Josiah, Jehoahaz and Jehoiakim, who took to the throne after their father died. But their rise to power led to the fall of the nation. Their objects of faith were the things of this world, and their restless hearts reached for more and more, until God brought their reigns to a miserable end.

The reign of Jehoahaz

Before King Josiah died, he had four sons.

1 Chronicles 3:15 ESV

The sons of Josiah: Johanan the firstborn, the second Jehoiakim, the third Zedekiah, the fourth Shallum.

But after his death, we see that the people placed Jehoahaz on the throne. And the prophet Jeremiah brings clarity by identifying Jehoahaz as the fourth of these sons. Shallum probably took on the name Jehoahaz after being made king of Judah.

Jeremiah 22:11 ESV

For thus says the Lord concerning Shallum the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who reigned instead of Josiah his father, and who went away from this place: “He shall return here no more,

So one thing that should jump out at us from all this is that Jehoahaz is the youngest of Josiah’s sons. He would be the fourth-in-line to the throne, and would only get to reign if all of his older brothers died without heirs. So what this tells us is that there was something special about Jehoahaz in comparison to his brothers. Perhaps he was more faithful, or more competent, or simply more popular; the bible doesn’t explain. But what we see is that Pharaoh Neco really doesn’t like him. He doesn’t like him so much that after three months he marches his troops to Hamath, which is way up north, puts him in chains, and brings him back to Egypt. The most likely reason for this is that Jehoahaz probably adopted anti-Egyptian policies. This is because we see Pharaoh Neco imposing a tribute on Judah for 100 talents of silver and 1 talent of gold immediately after this, probably as compensation for the losses he suffered as a result of Jehoahaz’s reign.

2 Kings 23:33 ESV

And Pharaoh Neco put him in bonds at Riblah in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Jerusalem, and laid on the land a tribute of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.

So the most likely scenario is that Jehoahaz was so talented that everyone wanted him to be king instead of his older brothers, and in his pride he shunned the other nations. He was a rude and crass neighbor in the game of thrones. But at this point we might ask the question, why didn’t God protect him from Egypt? Didn’t God, on multiple occasions, command His people not to depend on Egypt?

Is. 31:1 “Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many and in horsemen because they are very strong, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel or consult the Lord!”

Jehoahaz must have been more than just an unfriendly political neighbor. And it is in the words of the prophet Ezekiel that we get a window into the nature of his reign. This is how he describes Jehoahaz.

Ezek. 19:3-4 “And she brought up one of her cubs; he became a young lion, and he learned to catch prey; he devoured men. The nations heard about him; he was caught in their pit, and they brought him with hooks to the land of Egypt.”

Ezekiel wrote that, as a king, Jehoahaz devoured men. So he wasn’t only a bad neighbor to the surrounding countries, but he was a wicked king who devoured his own people. In fact, even the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus describes Jehoahaz as ‘an impious man, and impure in his course of life.’ (Ant. 10:81). Jehoahaz might have been popular before becoming king, but there’s a saying: Power magnifies character. Poverty and hardship reveals one’s character, that’s for sure, but so does power. And in this case, Jehoahaz became a human-devouring lion as soon as the crown lay on his head.

Jehoahaz trusted in his own talents, did what was evil in God’s sight, and was taken to Egypt in captivity. I reckon God might have let him return like he did Manasseh, if only Jehoahaz repented like Manasseh did. He never did, and died in Egypt, a man, full of talents, but too full of pride. What a waste. And for us this goes to show that God cares more about the depth of our obedience than the breadth of our talents. We are called to be followers of Christ, using our talents not to harvest accomplishments for ourselves, but for the glory of God in thanksgiving. So says John Calvin,

If we are proud of our talents we betray our lack of gratitude to God.

John Calvin

The reign of Jehoiakim

Now, Pharaoh Neco’s imposed a tribute of a hundred talents of silver an a talent of gold, and he’s also established Jehoiakim on the throne. Jehoiakim is Josiah’s second son, the firstborn, Johanan, probably having kicked the bucket. And what does Jehoiakim do?

2 Kgs. 23:35 “And Jehoiakim gave the silver and the gold to Pharaoh, but he taxed the land to give the money according to the command of Pharaoh. He exacted the silver and the gold of the people of the land, from everyone according to his assessment, to give it to Pharaoh Neco.”

The bible says he exacted the silver and gold of the people of the land. The word ‘exacted’ in Hebrew is נגשׂ (nagas) and means ‘to spur on,’ ‘to collect,’ and ‘to oppress.’ Now what this tells us is that Jehoiakim was a tyrant who oppressed his people, and extorted unreasonable taxes in order to pay the tribute to Egypt. But he even went beyond this and built for himself an extravagant palace with cedar wood. We know this because he was rebuked by several prophets, such as the prophet Jeremiah.

Jer. 22:13-14 ““Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms by injustice, who makes his neighbor serve him for nothing and does not give him his wages, who says, ‘I will build myself a great house with spacious upper rooms,’ who cuts out windows for it, paneling it with cedar and painting it with vermilion.”

And Jeremiah’s message was this: ‘if you keeping going down this path, the Lord’s going to destroy the city.’ Now here’s how wicked Jehoiakim was. He tried to kill Jeremiah, and when he couldn’t, he killed the prophet Uriah, who repeated the same message (Jer. 26:20-23).

Furthermore, when a scroll containing the words of Jeremiah was read to the king, he cut pieces of the scroll with a knife and tossed them into a fire.

Jeremiah 36:23 ESV

As Jehudi read three or four columns, the king would cut them off with a knife and throw them into the fire in the fire pot, until the entire scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the fire pot.

Jehoiakim, to say the least, despised God’s Word. To listen to the warnings of God and toss them in the fire. I don’t think any of us hold such spite toward anyone’s word. But what Jehoiakim here does physically, we might be doing spiritually. When God’s Word is proclaimed to us, or when we read the Bible, we need to give our utmost attention.

Heb. 3:15 “As it is said, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.””

Now, did God punish such wickedness?

Here’s a timeline of God’s judgement.

608BC: Jehoiakim becomes King

605BC: Babylon defeats Egypt and attacks Judah. Jehoiakim is made to serve him for three years.

602BC: Egypt fights off Babylon. Jehoiakim tries to free himself from Babylon, expecting Egypt to help him. Egypt doesn’t. Babylon attacks Judah with bands of Chaldeans, bands of Arameans, bands of Moabites, and bands of Amonites (2 Kgs. 24:2-4). Nebuchadnezzar binds Jehoiakim in bronze chains

2 Chronicles 36:6–7 ESV

Against him came up Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and bound him in chains to take him to Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar also carried part of the vessels of the house of the Lord to Babylon and put them in his palace in Babylon.

Jehoiakim didn’t remain captive in Babylon for a long time, and returned back to Jerusalem where he reigned until 597BC. His life was cut short and he died at the age of 36, having done evil before the Lord. Had he known the timeline God had planned for him, perhaps he would have lived differently.

Conclusion

Jehoahaz tried to prove himself by exhibiting his competence and his talents. Jehoiakim tried to prove himself by exhibiting his palace, with its boards of cedar and vermillion paint. They were at once kings and slaves, having all the means, but devoting and committing everything to a weak messiah. In the end, such objects of faith could not support their weight, and both men and their messiahs were crushed. Jehoahaz reigned for three months, and Jehoiakim for eleven years, but God considered both as wicked and tragic successors to the line of David, and their names were not so much omitted as censored from Jesus’ genealogy.

Matthew 1:11 ESV

and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.

And it isn’t something that applies to them, but to all of us.

Here’s a quote from Madonna, one of the most successful singer-songwriters of all time. This was from a Vanity Fair magazine interview in 1 April 1991.

‘I have an iron will, and all of my will has always been to conquer some horrible feeling of inadequacy. I’m always struggling with that fear. I push past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being and then I get to another stage and think I’m mediocre and uninteresting. And I find a way to get myself out of that. Again and again. My drive in life is from this horrible fear of being mediocre. And that’s always pushing me, pushing me. Because even though I’ve become Somebody. I still have to prove that Somebody. My struggle has never ended and it probably never will.’

This morning you came into the sanctuary and sat down on your chairs. Of course, you believed that the chair would support you. But whether or not you had a huge or little faith in the chair, it doesn’t change the fact that the chair can and does support you. And so it isn’t the strength but the presence of our faith that counts, so long as the object of our faith is strong and its presence eternal. In the words of the lady Julian of Norwich, writing in the 14th century,

No soul can have rest until it finds created things are empty. When the soul gives up all for love, so that it can have Him that is all, then it finds true rest.

Julian of Norwich

This morning, let us behold Him as the object of our faith, and focus on Him alone for our salvation. Let us rest in Christ, who is the author, perfector, and object of our faith.

Let us pray.