Sun, 30 October, 2005: Today’s Bible readings.

2 Kings 11:1-3

¹ Now when Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal family. ² But Jehosheba, the daughter of King Joram, sister of Ahaziah, took Joash the son of Ahaziah and stole him away from among the king’s sons who were being put to death, and she put him and his nurse in a bedroom. Thus they hid him from Athaliah, so that he was not put to death. ³ And he remained with her six years, hidden in the house of the LORD, while Athaliah reigned over the land.

Jehoshaphat’s alliance with Ahab comes to its disastrous conclusion in today’s passage from Second Kings. Jehosaphat had his son marry Athaliah, daughter of Ahab. But now that the curse upon Ahab has been fulfilled as Jehu has destroyed the descendants of Ahab, including Athaliah’s son and king of Judah, Ahaziah, Athaliah seizes the opportunity to take the kingdom of Judah as her own. She attempts to kill all the royal family to ensure there would be no one to claim the throne from her.

But as she was killing those who could claim the throne, Athaliah missed one of her grandsons. Jehosheba hid her nephew, Athaliah’s two year old grandson, Joash. Joash was then raised in secret for six years and came to claim the throne when he turned eight.

What do we learn from this?

God had promised that there would be a son of David on the throne, and that the Messiah would come from David’s line. Here we see that evil queen Athaliah seeks to defy God and end the line of David before the arrival of the Messiah.

Why does she do it? Athaliah is seeking power. But in doing so, Athaliah is acting in accordance with who she is: she is an enemy of God, and seeks to overthrow God’s rule. She seeks to reign herself and refuses to submit to God’s reign in her life.

Although she goes much further than most people today would ever dare to go (she murders her own offspring), Athaliah is expressing the same attitude of rebellion against God that is within the hearts of all of us, as we are born in trespasses and sins. Due to Original Sin, we all naturally hate God and are at war against Him. It is only as we are regenerated, made alive, born again, that our natures are changed, and we are no longer at war with God.

It is only because God has changed us that we submit to Him.

Where is Christ in this passage?

There is a war going on. A spiritual war. In the Old Testament, we see Satan seeking to destroy the line of the Messiah with the desire of stopping the Messiah from coming. Here we see the line get down to one person, but God is faithful. He preserved the line of the Messiah. All the evil schemes of Athaliah could not stop God from bringing His instrument of salvation into the world: Jesus Christ came through the line of Joash. Nothing could stop that, for it was God’s will and was promised beforehand.