I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Chronicles 15-18.

    In the early years of his reign, King Asa was receptive to the words of God delivered to him through prophets. Later, he imprisoned a prophet who gave him a message from God. Of course, there was a major difference between the messages those prophets gave him. The first praised him for his trust in God, the second berated him for not doing so. The key here was that when the Southern Kingdom was attacked by the Ethiopian (Cushite) army, King Asa could see no choices but to rely on God. When he was later attacked by the Northern Kingdom, he thought he could deal with it without God. Rather than trusting in God, King Asa took treasures dedicated to God and used them to bribe a foreign king to attack the Northern Kingdom.

    I am not sure what happened to King Asa. Early in his reign he trusted in the Lord and his enthusiasm led the people of his kingdom to do the same. He caused the people to enter into a renewed covenant with God. One of the consequences of his enthusiastic faith was that people migrated from the Northern Kingdom to his kingdom to join in the worship of the Lord. It was this migration which probably led to King Baasha of the Northern Kingdom attacking him (we are told that King Baasha attacked in order to close the border). In other words, King Asa did not trust God to protect him when he was attacked for worshiping the Lord.

    Despite the fact that King Asa failed to put his trust in God in his later years, Jehoshaphat, his son, was faithful when he succeeded him. The one thing which can be held against King Jehoshaphat was his friendship with King Ahab of the Northern Kingdom. Even there, he really only made one mistake. King Jehoshaphat tried to be a good influence on King Ahab. He pointed out that prophets of Baal were not prophets of God. Then, He chided him for being petty and un-kingly because he did not want to listen to the one prophet of God because that prophet did not tell King Ahab what he wanted to hear. However, despite being aware of King Ahab’s flaws and idolatry, King Jehoshaphat arranged for his son, and heir, to marry King Ahab’s daughter. The end result being that King Jehoshaphat’s son was not faithful to God as his father had been.

    I really did not intend to spend that much time on that. What I really want to bring attention to is the fact that Jehoshaphat sent his officials throughout the kingdom to teach the people. While they took the Book of the Law with them, I do not believe that they limited themselves to teaching God’s commands. I believe that King Jehoshaphat’s officials taught the people to, at the very least, read and write so that they could read, and make copies of, the Book of the Law for themselves. The fact that his people were educated and faithful to God led the rulers of the surrounding lands to be afraid of King Jehoshaphat.