2 Chronicles 17 | Wayfarer

The Lord was with Jehoshaphat because he followed the ways of his father David before him.
2 Chronicles 17:3 (NIV)

Confession: This morning as I read the first chapter of Jehoshaphat’s story the only thing I could think about was Daffy Duck. I grew up watching Looney Tunes every day, twice a day on television. “Jumping’ Jehoshaphat!” was one of Daffy Duck’s favorite exclamations of shock and surprise.

Jehoshaphat was more than a funny name made for humorous exclamations, however. King Jehoshaphat reigned in Judah for nearly a quarter century during a period of continued conflict and civil war with the northern tribes in the Kingdom of Israel. The Chronicler, writing to inspire and educate the returning Hebrew exiles from Babylon, spends far more time on Jehoshaphat’s story than the author of 1 Kings. Once again, we can see the Chronicler’s motivations at work behind the writing. There are three patterns of story emerging in the Chronicler’s writing:

Kings were “good” or “bad” depending on whether they followed God and shunned the local pagan dieties.
Immediate retribution is a continued theme. If the King obeyed God good things immediately happened. If the King disobeyed God bad things immediately happened.
“Good” Kings had their flaws and made their mistakes, but the Chronicler chooses to emphasize the good in his introductory summation and mention the negative later.

In today’s chapter, I couldn’t help notice that the Chronicler was careful to link Jehoshaphat with “his father David.” David was, in fact, Jehoshaphat’s great-great-great-grandfather. David was the undisputed greatest ruler. God said He would establish David’s throne forever. Linking Jehoshaphat to Davis is the Chronicler’s way of telling his readers that Jehoshaphat was all that.

In the quiet this morning I’m thinking about the way the Chronicler goes about reducing lives, reigns, and historical events into succinct summaries. It’s not strange, we do it all the time in obituaries, funeral eulogies, personal stories, and even 140 character tweets. We don’t, however, have to wait for someone to die to do it. I’m sure each one of us have experienced being labeled or reduced in another person’s mind into the summation of being a “bad” or “good” person based on one or two isolated facts, rumors, or interactions.

I’m once again reminded this morning that each person, each life, is far more than those few known facts. The Chronicler was doing his job using the available, meager resources of quill and papyrus to share succinct stories of royal lives and events. But there was far more to these individuals, “good” or “bad,” than the Chronicler’s bullet points. Those things are lost to history, but the people I live with and interact with each day are not. Just as I would hope someone would not stick me with a label and instead would choose to try to know me and be known by me, so I need to do a better job catching myself when I’m mentally reducing another person into some singularly labeled entity to be thrown on the scale of “good” or “bad” in my mind.

Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat! I need to get started with my day.

Have a good one, my friends.

[Jehoshaphat] was single-minded in following God. 2 Chronicles 17:6a (MSG)

When reading 2 Chronicles, it’s important to remember that the nation of Israel was divided in two parts. While we are reading about the kings of Judah (the southern part), the events we read about in the books of the Kings is happening simultaneously in the northern kingdom. Sometimes the parallel events have light to shed on our reading.

Reading about Jehoshaphat’s single-minded devotion to God is a stark contrast to King Ahab, who was on the throne of the northern kingdom of Israel during that time. While Jehoshaphat led the people in devotion to God alone, the prophet Elijah gathered the people of the northern kingdom together and called them to account for their double mindedness:

Elijah challenged the people: “How long are you going to sit on the fence? If God is the real God, follow him; if it’s Baal, follow him. Make up your minds!” 1Kings 18:21 (MSG)

The human eye cannot see darkness unless it is contrasted by light. In the light of Jehospaphat’s devotion, the darkness of Ahab and Jezebel came into greater focus. When we are single-minded in following God, we become the “light of the world” and the darkness stands in stark contrast to our thoughts, words, and love in action.

Today, I’m thinking about my own life. How single-minded am I? Is my life the light that God intends? Do my thoughts, words, and actions stand in contrast to the darkness – or does it all just sort of blend together in a shade of gray?

Creative Commons photo courtesy of Flickr and WTLphotos