READ: 1 Kin. 22:51– 2 Kin. 1:1–18: … you shall surely die …
While King Jehoshaphat of Judah, despite his serious sins (see also 2 Chr. 20:35), loves the LORD (see 2 Chr. 20:32), this is not true of Ahab’s son Ahaziah, who becomes king of Israel.
Ahaziah does evil and walks in the same way as his ungodly father and mother in serving Baal. In this he follows Jeroboam, who as the first king caused Israel to sin. All the prophetic work has not brought them to repentance.
Ahaziah cannot hide behind his predecessors; he himself is guilty of his ungodliness. Ezek. 18:20 says: “The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son … the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.”
In addition, Ahaziah is very seriously warned of the LORD’s punishment (vv.4–6).
Such warning is also required among the people of God, even when it concerns the king. Office-bearers must not spare those who sin publicly from admonition and discipline. Otherwise the LORD’s punishment will also come upon the office-bearer.
The LORD also points this out in the book of Ezekiel. In Ezek. 33:8,9 the LORD speaks to the office-bearer as watchman over Israel: “When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you shall surely die,’ and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand. Nevertheless if you warn the wicked to turn from his way, and he does not turn, he shall die in his iniquity; but you have delivered your soul.”
Ahaziah even shows his ungodliness on his sickbed by having consulted an idol. Therefore God’s urgent warning comes through His prophet Elijah (2 Kin. 1:3,4).
But Ahaziah only makes matters worse by trying to arrest Elijah. He is so blinded that—even after consuming fire from heaven has fallen twice upon his soldiers—he does not repent at the final warning.
Why does the king not allow himself to be warned?
Singing: Ps. 119:66