When you turn to 2 Chronicles
chapter 19, we're still looking at Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat,
however you say his name. And Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles
19, And Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, returned to his house
in peace to Jerusalem. And Jehu, the son of Hanai, the
seer, went to meet him and said to King Jehoshaphat, shouldest
thou help the ungodly and love them that hate the Lord? He's
referring to him becoming one with Ahab and helping him. Therefore
is wrath upon thee from before the Lord. Nevertheless, there
are good things found in thee, in that thou hast taken away
the groves out of the land, and hast prepared thine heart to
seek God. And Jehoshaphat dwelt at Jerusalem,
and he went out again through the people from Beersheba to
Mount Ephraim, and brought them back unto the Lord God of their
fathers. And he set judges in the land
throughout all the finned cities of Judah. city by city, and said
to the judges, take heed what you do, for you judge not for
man, but for the Lord, who is with you in the judgment. Wherefore
now let the fear of the Lord be upon you. Take heed and do
it, for there's no iniquity with the Lord our God, nor respect
of persons, nor taking of gifts. Moreover, in Jerusalem did Jehoshaphat
set of the Levites and of the priests and of the chief of the
fathers of Israel for the judgment of the Lord and for controversies
when they returned to Jerusalem. And he charged them saying, thus
shall you do in the fear of the Lord and faithfully and with
a perfect heart. And what cause soever shall come
to you of your brethren that dwell in their cities, between
blood and blood, between law and commandment, statutes and
judgments, you shall even warn them that they trespass not against
the Lord. And so wrath come upon you and
upon your brethren, this do and you shall not trespass. And behold,
Amariah, the chief priest is over you in all matters of the
Lord. And Zebediah, the son of Ishmael, the ruler of the house
of Judah for all the king's matters. and the Levite should be officers
before you. Deal courageously and the Lord
shall be with the good. Let's pray. Lord, we come into your presence
in the name of our blessed son. And we ask in his name that you
would be pleased to meet with us and to speak to our hearts
from your word. Lord, enable us to see the beauty
and glory and sufficiency of your son. And enable us to rest
completely in him and give us the grace to honor him in our
lives. Give us grace to love you more
and love one another more, and Lord, forgive us of our sins
there ever before us. Forgive us and cleanse us for
Christ's sake and be with all your people wherever they meet
together. Lord, we would remember our brethren in Mexico. We ask
that you would provide the church in Mérida, a pastor after your
own heart, for your glory, according to your will. Bless us for the Lord's sake.
In his name we pray. Amen. Jehoshaphat was a special man. a special king. Look in chapter
17. And Jehoshaphat, his son, reigned
in his stead and strengthened himself against Israel, Ahab,
and Baal worship. And he placed forces in all the
thin city of Judah and set garrisons in the land of Judah and the
cities of Ephraim, which Asa, his father, had taken. And the
Lord was with Jehoshaphat. because he walked in the first
ways of his father David, and sought not unto Balaam the way
Israel had done, but he sought to the Lord God of his father,
and walked in his commandments, not after the doings of Israel.
Therefore the Lord established the kingdom in his hand, and
all Judah brought unto Jehoshaphat presents, and he had riches and
honor and abundance, and his heart was lifted up in the ways
of the Lord. Moreover, he took away the high
places and the groves out of Judah. Now what a commendation
of this man. But let me remind you about all flesh. All flesh
is sinful. And so was Jehoshaphat. And he
is rebuked in this 19th chapter for joining affinity with Ahab.
And this is a sin that he actually repeated. Look in chapter 20,
even after he was rebuked. And after this, did Jehoshaphat,
king of Judah, join himself with Ahazirah, king of Israel, who
did very wickedly. And he joined himself with him
to make ships to go to Tarshish, and they made the ships even
into Ezzen-Geber. Now, this is a sin that he repeated,
joining up becoming one with the ungodly. Now he is still
flawed, and look back in chapter 19, verses one and two. And Jehoshaphat,
the king of Judah, returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem.
After being with Ahab, the Lord delivered him. And Jehu, the
son of Hananiah the seer, went out to meet him and said to King
Jehoshaphat, shouldest thou help the ungodly? and love them that
hate the Lord. And he's talking about his relationship
with Ahab. Therefore is wrath upon thee
from before the Lord. Helping the ungodly and loving
those who hate the Lord. Now the first thing I'd like
to say about this passage of scripture, and I want us to consider
this very carefully, the natural man hates the Lord. All unbelievers hate the Lord. They despise Him. They have no
love for Him. That's where idolatry comes from.
Men hear of the true and living God, and they don't like what
they hear, and they change Him to a God they like. Turn to Exodus
chapter 20 for a moment. This is in the Ten Commandments. the commandment against idolatry. Verse four, thou shalt not make
unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that's
in heaven above or that's in the earth beneath or that's in
the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow thyself to
them, nor serve them, these false ideas of God, for I, the Lord
thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon
the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that,"
what? Hate me. Hate me. The root behind idolatry is hatred
of God, and therefore we make a different God that we think
we can be comfortable with. Here's one illustration. Men
hate the God who is sovereign, therefore they invent free will,
the God of free will. That's a God they feel comfortable
with, that's a God they can love, but they still hate the living
God. Now this is what Jehoshaphat
is being confronted with, why would you join in league with
people who hate God? And why would you want to help
the ungodly? Now, this thing of hatred to
God, I'm trying to look to my own experience. I knew the scripture
taught that men hated God. But I don't think that I really
recognized my own hatred of God at first. And what the Lord used
with me, I've thought about this, I can remember this really fairly
vividly. I remember when I was first made
to understand what election means. And it made me mad. because I
saw that there wasn't anything I could do. It could be that
God could pass me by and not save me, and there wasn't a thing
in the world I could do about it. And that made me angry, it
made me mad at God. And you know what that discovered
to me? My problem was, I hated God. That's where that came from. You know, if I would have had
the right attitude, you know, anytime somebody bristles against election,
God's absolute sovereignty and salvation, the only reason they
bristle against it is because of their own self-righteousness
and their hatred of the living God. That's bottom line. And
I found out at that time what my problem was. Yeah, I had all
kinds of sins I committed that were bad, but my root problem
was was that I hated God. And that's what scared me to
death. And it wasn't until then, really, that I cried out for
mercy. Because I saw what my problem
was. It was beyond anything I could
change. And I saw I had been guilty of
actually hating this God who is so altogether lovely. I want
you to think about how terrible this is to hate God. He's perfect. Every attribute is glorious. His justice, his love, his power,
his wisdom, his graciousness, everything about him is altogether
lovely, and yet men hate this altogether lovely God. Now that
shows how bad men are, doesn't it? They hate the Lord, and you
and I have been guilty of hating Him who is altogether lovely.
Now that's human sin, and that's seen in the cross, isn't it?
The one-time men are Allowed to do what they want to do, they
nail the Son of God to a cross. Now, the prophet confronts Jehoshaphat,
and this was some kind of problem with him because we see it was
repeated. He kept making affinity with and joining himself to the
ungodly. Romans 8, 7 says, the carnal
mind is enmity against God. Now, why would you want to be
joined together with men and women who hate the Lord? Now, let me think about that. I want and you want, we want
to be salt and light to this world, don't we? We want to preach
the gospel to them. We want to love them. enough
that we want them to know who we know. We want them to experience
the grace we've experienced. We love the world in that sense. We want to be a blessing to them. I want to preach the gospel to
them. I want to be like the Lord. I
was thinking about this this morning. The Lord, sinners, evil
people felt unthreatened and unjudged around him. This is true holiness. You know
the kind of holiness where you feel threatened and judged, you're
around somebody and you just feel like they're just, that's
not holiness. That sin is what it is, it's
not holiness. When the Lord Jesus Christ walked upon this earth,
he was called and ridiculed as the friend of publicans and sinners. I want us to be that way, don't
you? I want people to be attracted to the gospel through the way
we conduct ourselves. And I think there's something
else that's interesting about the Lord. Religious people hated the Lord.
They didn't feel comfortable around him. They didn't want
to be around him. I want to be that way too. I want to be somebody
who religious people just can't stand because of what I have
to say. I want that. I want you to want that. So when
we're talking about not making the ungodly our friends and so
on, it's not talking about not seeking to be an influence. I
want us to be witnesses in Lexington, in this world, witnesses of the
Lord Jesus Christ. But I don't want to make my personal
friend somebody that hates God. If they hate him, I don't want
them to be my friend. And that's what the prophet is
confronting him with, being friends with, loving, helping Ahab. Number one, I don't want to make
any affiliation with the religion of this world. I don't want to
be identified with it. No, no, I don't have anything
to do with what's called Christianity. I don't want to have anything
to do with it. And I don't want to make my friends, who's your
friend? Your friend is somebody you make
yourself known to. That's what friends do. You make
yourself known to that person. I don't want my friends to be
those who have no love for my redeemer, my savior. Turn with
me for a moment to 2 Corinthians chapter six. 2 Corinthians 6. Verse 14. Be ye not unequally yoked together
with unbelievers. either by way of their religion
or even them being your intimate friends, the persons you socialize
with, the persons you want to be around. Be not unequally yoked
together with unbelievers. And look at these questions he
asks. For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? What communion hath light with
darkness? And what concord, what agreement
hath Christ with Belial, the devil? Or what part hath he that
believeth with an infidel, someone who doesn't believe? And what
agreement hath the temple of God with idols? That's offensive
to think of idols being brought into the temple of God. For you
are the temple of the living God. As God hath said, I will
dwell in them and walk in them and I'll be their God and they'll
be my people. Wherefore, come out from among them. Don't join
with them. Come out from among them, and
be ye separate, saith the Lord. And touch not the unclean thing,
and I'll receive you. And I'll be a father unto you,
and you shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. Turn to 1 Corinthians 15. Verse 33. Be not deceived. You know, we
would do well to look everywhere where the Bible says don't be
deceived because we can so easily be deceived. We can deceive ourselves. Be not deceived. Don't kid yourself. Don't Evil communications, evil
relationships is what that's talking about. It's not talking
about bad speaking. Evil communications, that you communicate, corrupt
good manners. Now here's the point. Unbelievers
will always draw us down to their level. We'll never bring them
up. They'll always bring us down. Now don't be deceived. Don't
lie to yourself, don't kid yourself. Evil communications corrupt good
manners. And Jehoshaphat, this man who
was such a special man, he's somebody the Lord loved. He fell
into this over and over again, according to the scriptures.
And that's a reminder to us once again, don't you know that every
man, no matter how much the grace of God is upon him, is a flawed
man? Look at yourself, and you know
that that is so. Now, back to our text, verse
three. 2 Chronicles 19, verse three. Now, the prophet has rebuked
Jehoshaphat, and I'll guarantee you it smote his heart. He was somebody who loved the
Lord, and it troubled him that he was guilty of this. It smote
his heart, but look at the way the prophet rebuked him nevertheless.
There are good things found in thee in that thou has taken away
the groves out of the land and has prepared thine heart to seek
God. Now, nevertheless, there's good
things found in thee. Who found them? The Lord did.
You know why he found them? Because he put them there. That's
why they were there. And the Lord can always find
that which he has put within a man. And notice what he says
these good things are. Thou has taken away the groves
out of the land and has prepared thine heart to seek God. He was intolerant. of the groves,
the idolatry, the false religion. He didn't have any toleration
for that, and he prepared his heart to seek the Lord. Seek
ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Now, I look
at the way the prophet rebuked Jehoshaphat, and I wanna learn
something with regard to rebuking people. And I'm an expert of
knowing how I'm way too quick to rebuke people. I've done it
so many times. With regard to rebuking people
and correcting them, be awful careful. Be very slow to do that. Keep from it. Let every man be
swift to hear, slow to speak. slow to pop off and rebuke and
correct people. It's good advice, isn't it? Good
advice. I have so many times, you know
about every time I've corrected somebody, it's been a disaster. You put people on edge, they
feel judged, threatened, and you don't have any business rebuking
them anyway. That's so true. But notice how the prophet, when
he did rebuke him, and it was necessary, the Lord sent him
to do this, and so it was very important for him to do it. But
when he did, he gave some positives along with it. There's some good
things found in thee. So when I do, let's just don't do it. Don't
do it. The Lord can correct people.
The Lord can teach people. The Lord can. can instruct people
without me rebuking them. But if you're ever led of God
to do something like the prophet was, bring some positives with
it as well. And that's what he did. Because
I'm sure that Jehoshaphat was hurt over this. He was heartbroken. He loved the Lord. And he was
heartbroken that he was guilty of this sin. And he went ahead
and did it again after this. Flesh. Flesh. Jehoshaphat is
flesh. Look what it said of Jehoshaphat,
verse four. And Jehoshaphat dwelt at Jerusalem,
and he went out again through the people from Beersheba to
Mount Ephraim, all of Judah, and brought them back unto the
Lord God of their fathers. Now this tells what a special
man this man was. He was very desirous to bring
all of Judah back to the Lord God of their fathers. And verse
5, and he said, judges in the land, throughout all the thin
cities of Judah, city by city, and said to the judges, take
heed what you do, for you judge not for man, but for the Lord
who is with you in judgment. Wherefore now let the fear of
the Lord be upon you, take heed and do it, for there is no iniquity
with the Lord our God, nor respect of persons, nor taking of gifts.
Now, turn back to Deuteronomy 16. This was his obedience to
the law. Deuteronomy 16, beginning in verse 18. Judges
and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates, which
the Lord thy God giveth thee throughout thy tribes, and they
shall judge the people with just judgment. Thou shalt not arrest
judgment, thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift. shouldn't be bribed, for a gift
doth blind the eyes of the wise and pervert the words of the
righteous. That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, that
thou mayest live and inherit the land which the Lord thy God
giveth thee." Now, I love the way he speaks to these judges
that he set in place in obedience to the law. Set judges in the
land throughout all the fin cities of Judah, city by city, verse
six, and he said to the judges, take heed what you do, for you
judge not for man, but for the Lord. Now, take heed that you're
thinking of what the Lord says, not what men think, in everything,
in everything. I don't care whether you're talking
about what's going on in church, how you're conducting yourself
at work, in your marriage, as a parent, whatever it might be,
what does the Lord say? Doesn't matter what men say,
doesn't matter whether men are pleased. I love what Paul said
in Galatians 1.10, he said, do I seek to persuade men or God? For if I yet please men, what? I wouldn't be the servant of
Christ. Oh, I want to conduct myself,
not taking bribes, not pleasing men, but seeking what God says
in his word only. And that's what he told these
fellows to do. Verse seven, wherefore now let the fear of the Lord
be upon you. Be afraid. To look anywhere but
Christ, be afraid of sin because of your fear of him. Take heed
and do for the, I love this description of the Lord. There is no iniquity
with the Lord, our God, nor respect of persons nor taking gifts.
You can't bribe him. Moreover, verse eight, in Jerusalem
did Jehoshaphat said of the Levites and the priests and the chief
of the fathers of Israel for the judgment of the Lord and
for controversies. You know, there's always going
to be controversies, isn't there? Well, that's just the way it is. You
know, somebody said, boy, there's so many problems in the churches.
Yeah, there is. There is. I wish it wasn't like
that, but there is. You have sinful human beings
together, and you're going to have controversies. You're going
to have problems, people thinking they've been wronged and just
on and on down the line. It's going to happen. And he
charged them, verse nine, saying, thus shall you do in the fear
of the Lord faithfully and with a perfect heart. Now, what is
this perfect heart, this faithful? He said, whatever you're going
to do, do faithfully and with a perfect heart. Well, faithfully,
the Lord's faithful, isn't he? He's so faithful. And to be faithful
is to be, first it's to believe and to be able to be believed. It's to rely and you can be relied
upon. That's what faithfulness is.
Whatever you do, do faithfully and with a perfect heart, not
half-hearted. Not half-hearted. I hate half-heartedness.
Don't do anything half-hearted. Now, full-hearted, but let me
give you some scriptures that I think give some kind of description
of what a perfect heart is. Deuteronomy 25, 15 says a just
weight and a perfect balance. You find that in Proverbs as
well. Proverbs 11.1, a just weight and a perfect balance the Lord
delights in. Now what is a just weight and
a perfect balance? Well, an unjust weight and an
imperfect balance tries to make something appear to be what it's
not. It's dishonest. It's not real. It's an attempt
to appear what you really are not. It's, I love the scripture
that, that says in whose spirit is no guile or not somebody that's
honest before God. You know somebody that's honest
before God sees that in and of themselves, they're nothing but
sin. Anything else is dishonesty. Anything else is a unjust weight
and a perverted balance trying to, it's deception. It's deception. So a perfect heart is that honest
and good heart given in the new birth. The new man, the regenerate
man that's honest before God. And then we read of the altar
built with perfect stones. And those perfect stones, were
stoned that no tool had touched. If you made an altar before God,
if you put a tool to it, it was defiled. It was not allowed to
be used because that represents what saying is a perfect heart
is a heart that doesn't work. It looks to the sacrifice of
Christ, looks to him, Christ crucified only. It works not,
but believes on him that justifies the ungodly. That's the perfect
heart before God. That's the heart he gives. It's
honest. It looks to Christ only. It does
not believe in any way salvation by works. Amen. That's a perfect
heart. And then we read in First Chronicles
1238 of those who had a perfect heart and kept rank. I like that.
They had a perfect heart and they kept rank. And you know
what their rank was? Every one of them, you go on
reading in that verse, what it is, they delighted in David returning
as king. Now you're keeping rank. And
you're having a perfect heart if you are delighting in the
kingship of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's king. Are you glad about
that? You don't want any other way,
do you? He's king. And then we read in First Chronicles
29.9 of the perfect heart that gave willingly. Gave willingly. A perfect heart is a willing
heart, not a heart that's forced to do things because of peer
pressure or duty or guilt, but a willing heart, a willing heart. I love that question the Lord
gave to the impotent man, will thou be made whole? Yes, yes. I want to be, I'm willing by
the grace of God, I'm willing to be made whole in a way that
gives him all the glory and none to me. A perfect heart is a willing
heart. Verse 10, and what cause soever
shall come to you of your brethren that dwell in their cities, between
blood and blood, relatives, between law and commandments, statutes
and judgments? You shall even warn them that they trespass
not against the Lord. And so wrath come upon you and
upon your brethren, this do and you shall not trespass. Now,
behold, Amariah, the chief priest, is over you in all matters of
the Lord. And Zebediah, the son of Ishmael,
the ruler of the house of Judah, for all the king's matters. Religious
is not a good word, but spiritual matters and things with regard
to citizenship and politics and so on. He's over you, but they're
both from the Lord, deal courageously and the Lord shall be with the
good. Now, if you can, read 2 Chronicles
20 this week, because I think one of the most powerful pictures
of what faith really is, is found in 2 Chronicles 20, in Jehoshaphat's
prayer to the Lord for deliverance. It's beautiful, and Lord Willen
will look at that next week.