King Uzziah - Pride Goes Before the Fall

The Genesis of Pride

Have you ever heard the story of the fall of Satan? If you have, then you probably always think about how the 1st instance of pride goes back to this fallen angel. The story goes this way. At same point before the creation of the world, Satan was an angel serving God along with all the other created beings. That is, until he began to promote himself. The Bible only gives us 2 passages, one in Ezekiel (28:14-15) and Isaiah (14:12-15). Between those two passages we learn that he was a guardian cherub who was on the mount of God. He became wicked and wanted to become like the Most High God. As a result of his insurrection, he was cast out of Heaven into the earth and the realms of the dead.

Many people tend to think of two separate and seemingly equal worlds – good and evil. That is not the case. Evil is not a separate world where Loki or Darth Vader exists. “Evil is not a thing. There is no blob somewhere in the universe named evil…evil is a corruption of the good, and evils arise from the misuse of the will.”[1]Our first evidence was the fallen angel Satan, the archenemy of our souls, due to his sinful pride.

Pride is defined as: an unwarranted attitude of confidence. While pride can have a positive connotation of self-worth or boasting, it is often used in Scripture to refer to an unhealthy elevated view of one’s self, abilities, or possessions.[2]

Proverbs 16:18 NIV

Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

Proverbs 16:18 M:BCL

First pride, then the crash— the bigger the ego, the harder the fall.

And that is what we will see in our lesson from the Kings today – a man who rises to great success but will, in the end, fall flat due to his pride.

King Uzziah Falls to Pride

In King Uzziah’s case he goes by 2 names in the Bible. 2 Kings uses “Ahaziah” and 2 Chronicles uses “Uzziah”. I remember him best by Isaiah’s statement, “In the year King Uzziah died…” so I will use the 2 Chronicles title. Some claim the difference is simply due to the translation into English and others suggest he had both a throne name and a given name.

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We find his story in 2 Chronicles 26. [Read 2 Chron 26:1-21]

2 Chronicles 26:1–21 NIV

Then all the people of Judah took Uzziah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in place of his father Amaziah. He was the one who rebuilt Elath and restored it to Judah after Amaziah rested with his ancestors. Uzziah was sixteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem fifty-two years. His mother’s name was Jekoliah; she was from Jerusalem. He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, just as his father Amaziah had done. He sought God during the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God. As long as he sought the Lord, God gave him success. He went to war against the Philistines and broke down the walls of Gath, Jabneh and Ashdod. He then rebuilt towns near Ashdod and elsewhere among the Philistines. God helped him against the Philistines and against the Arabs who lived in Gur Baal and against the Meunites. The Ammonites brought tribute to Uzziah, and his fame spread as far as the border of Egypt, because he had become very powerful. Uzziah built towers in Jerusalem at the Corner Gate, at the Valley Gate and at the angle of the wall, and he fortified them. He also built towers in the wilderness and dug many cisterns, because he had much livestock in the foothills and in the plain. He had people working his fields and vineyards in the hills and in the fertile lands, for he loved the soil. Uzziah had a well-trained army, ready to go out by divisions according to their numbers as mustered by Jeiel the secretary and Maaseiah the officer under the direction of Hananiah, one of the royal officials. The total number of family leaders over the fighting men was 2,600. Under their command was an army of 307,500 men trained for war, a powerful force to support the king against his enemies. Uzziah provided shields, spears, helmets, coats of armor, bows and slingstones for the entire army. In Jerusalem he made devices invented for use on the towers and on the corner defenses so that soldiers could shoot arrows and hurl large stones from the walls. His fame spread far and wide, for he was greatly helped until he became powerful. But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. Azariah the priest with eighty other courageous priests of the Lord followed him in. They confronted King Uzziah and said, “It is not right for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord. That is for the priests, the descendants of Aaron, who have been consecrated to burn incense. Leave the sanctuary, for you have been unfaithful; and you will not be honored by the Lord God.” Uzziah, who had a censer in his hand ready to burn incense, became angry. While he was raging at the priests in their presence before the incense altar in the Lord’s temple, leprosy broke out on his forehead. When Azariah the chief priest and all the other priests looked at him, they saw that he had leprosy on his forehead, so they hurried him out. Indeed, he himself was eager to leave, because the Lord had afflicted him. King Uzziah had leprosy until the day he died. He lived in a separate house—leprous, and banned from the temple of the Lord. Jotham his son had charge of the palace and governed the people of the land.

By almost all the metrics of a successful king, Uzziah checked all the boxes of greatness. His reign was 52 years. Most of his life was spent serving God. He secured Judah. He established a port at Elath to the south. He was famous. He was a builder and inventor. He built up the economy, agriculture, and army.

That is …until his pride got the better of him. Then he fell and he fell hard!

2 Chronicles 26:16 NIV

But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense.

King Solomon knew what he was talking about when he identified the trap of pride – and King Uzziah fell right in.

When Success and Strength Lead to Failure

We all hope for success and strength. It is assumed that if we can simply have the keys to both success and strength that we will be in control of our lives. The life of King Uzziah shows us that this is not the case. There must be a healthy dependency on the Lord for us to have true success and true strength.

I think that what we will see today is really self-evident. It is easy to comprehend but so much harder for us to master. The “pride of life” (1 John 2:16) that we struggle with manifests in many ways. 3 of the more common ways are: pride in our youthful and natural strength, pride in our age and power, and pride in our own righteousness.

Pride in Our Youthful Strengths

Uzziah was a success. Now, the Bible indicates that his success came from God as a blessing for Uzziah’s willingness to seek the Lord. But, as is often the case, in our pride we can confuse the blessing of God with our own success.

Classic writers warn us about the temptations of pride during our youth. Queen Elizabeth 1 wrote a poem about how she became prideful of being “fair and young”. Sir Walter Scott warned that youth doesn’t last forever. In our youth we often worship our youthful strength, looks, and natural talents and ignore God. Perhaps this is why the greatest exodus of the Church happens during these years. Pride creeps in and hides the truth.

Have you heard about the two ducks and a proud frog who developed a friendship? When their pond dried up, the ducks knew they could easily fly to another location, but what of their friend the frog? Finally, they decided to fly with a stick between their two bills, and with the frog hanging onto the stick by his mouth. All went well until a man looked up and saw them in the sky. “What a brilliant idea,” said the man. “I wonder who thought of that?” “I did”, said the frog.

That strikes too close to home, and it certainly applies to King Uzziah.

Again, Don’t Leave Your Spirituality to Someone Else

I include this in youthful pride because it is often in those years that we rely on the spirituality of people older than us to guide us. We certainly need spiritual mentors but there is no substitute for your relationship with the Lord.

2 Chronicles 26:5 NIV

He sought God during the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God. As long as he sought the Lord, God gave him success.

“Like … Joash, Uzziah began well and ended badly. As ‘Joash did what was right … all the days of Jehoiada the priest’ (24:2), so Uzziah sought God ‘in the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God; and as long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper’ (26:5). But for [both] kings the day came when the help and guidance of God were rejected.”[3]

Pride in Our Age and Power

Think about this. Uzziah ruled for 52 years! He did his ‘rookie’ king years and became an accomplished king. He became a respectable veteran. All was going great! But, pride was lurking in the background.

It is interesting that when Satan tempted Adam and Eve, he didn’t do it by telling them to serve him. He simply encouraged them to serve themselves. “YOUR eyes will be opened” and “YOU will be like God”. Eve saw “that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom…”(Gen 3:6). Pride exalts self.

We’ve all been there. You and I have both been tempted by age and power to:

Be unteachable.

Get irritated when someone tries to teach you something.

Know it all.

Simply refuse to learn.

Be highly opinionated.

Get defensive when corrected or criticized.

Struggle to admit you’re wrong.

Blame shifting or gives excuses.

Pride in age and power shows up in all kinds of ways. Often it creeps in when we are not yielding ourselves to the Holy Spirit.

A friend of mine offered this advice to me many years ago. I kept it on my desk as a reminder:

No man appears in safety before the public eye unless he first relishes obscurity. No man is safe in speaking unless he loves to be silent. No man rules safely unless he is willing to be ruled. No man commands safely unless he has learned well how to obey. No man rejoices safely unless he has within him the testimony of a good conscience.- Thomas à Kempis*[4]

Pride in Our Own Righteousness

The final blow to Uzziah came when his pride manifested with unfaithfulness to God in the temple. Although Uzziah had been anointed king, he had never been consecrated as a priest. In his pride he stormed into the temple to burn incense and refuses to hear the high priest and 80 other courageous priests who tried to stop him. Uzziah became angry and began to rage against the priests. It was at that point that leprosy broke out on his forehead and he willingly was hurried out.

I suppose that there are lots of ways that spiritual pride manifests in our lives, but I’d like to point out some of the results of spiritual pride:

Loss of hearing the Spirit of God

We become cool to the Word of God

We lose our sensitivity to the lost that surround us.

We become hypocritical.

We lose the compass of the Holy Spirit

There is a fine line to walk between living in the Spirit and in the flesh. One of the things that will trip us up is pride. Pride comes when we forget the cross. Listen to this practical illustration and see how you relate to its point:

The growth chart had slipped from the playroom wall because the tape on its corners had become dry and brittle. Five-year-old Jordan hung it up again, meticulously working to get it straight. Then he stood his sister against the wall to measure her height.

“Mommy! Mommy! Anneke is forty inches tall!” he shouted as he burst into the kitchen. “I measured her.”

His mom replied, “That’s impossible, Sweetheart. She’s only 3 years old. Let’s go see.” They walked back into the playroom, where the mother’s suspicions were confirmed. Despite his efforts to hang the chart straight, Jordan had failed to set it at the proper height. It was several inches low.

We easily make Jordan’s mistake in gauging our spiritual growth or importance. Compared to a shortened scale, we may appear better than we are. Only when we stand against the Cross, that “Great leveler of men” as A. T. Robertson called it, can we not think of ourselves “… higher than we ought to think.” Christ, Himself, must be our standard.[5]

Remember, in Our Weakness, He is Strong

Pride is destroyed at the Cross.

Luke 18:9–14 NIV

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Winkie Pratney is a keen observer of history. He once stated,

Walk through the halls of time and you will see the men of God who changed history. Look at them carefully. They were not special men. You will not often find the naturally gifted among their ranks. But all had one thing in common - they knew and did the will of God in their generation, and God did a work through them to shape the course of history. Those that God used in the past were just ordinary people with an extraordinary Master. They were not all champions of great faith, but little people who saw their own need, and put their small faith in a great God. The driving force in their lives was the sure conviction that God had called them to His work - and that as long as they were faithful to that call, He would work with them and through them against impossible odds to victory. They KNEW His will! Living in His purpose, they could be natural and let Him be supernatural.[6]

The fact that you and I are weak is not a problem for God. In fact, with all that Uzziah had going for him, it was his pride that trips him up. Because of his pride he wasn’t even buried among the kings, but ‘near them’.

This is the lesson of King Uzziah to us – destroy the roots of pride and humble yourself before the Lord.

[1] Clay Jones. Why Does God Allow Evil? Harvest House Publishers. Eugene; OR 2017. 20. [2]William A. Williams, “Pride,” ed. Douglas Mangum et al., Lexham Theological Wordbook, Lexham Bible Reference Series (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2014). [3]Michael Wilcock, The Message of Chronicles: One Church, One Faith, One Lord, ed. J. A. Motyer and Derek Tidball, The Bible Speaks Today (Leicester, England: Inter-Varsity Press, 1987), 229. [4]Elliot Ritzema, ed., 300 Quotations for Preachers (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012). [5]Leadership Ministries Worldwide, Practical Illustrations: Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians(Chattanooga, TN: Leadership Ministries Worldwide, 2001), 114. [6]Winkie Pratney. “Knowing God’s Will”. Last Days Newsletter. Lastdaysministries.org: Accessed August 10, 2023.