Week 21 2 Chronicles 13
Reading the Chronicles story of Abijah I come away feeling that he was a pretty good king.
For instance Abijah trusted the Lord in a key battle against Jeroboam. He publicly affirmed that he was different than the renegade Jeroboam: as for us (i.e. Judah), the Lord is our God, and we have not abandoned him. So when all was said-and-done Judah defeated Israel because they trusted in the Lord. And while Jeroboam was declining in power by contrast, Abijah of Judah grew more and more powerful. 2 Chronicles doesn’t say anything bad about Abijah. Which leads me to believe that he was good. Correct?
Not so fast! I made that mistake two years ago when I forgot about the Kings version.
That story rubs some of the Golden-Boy glow off Abijah: he committed the same sins as his father before him, and his heart was not right with the Lord his God (I remember that his father – Rehoboam: was an evil king, for he did not seek the Lord with all his heart).
So…like-father-like-son. Both of them a) practiced similar sinful actions and they b) lacked genuine personal devotedness to the Lord.
In spite of one shining example of Abijah trusting the Lord it looks like – in general – he didn’t.
At this point in the 15-Kings exercise I don’t know where this father-and-son combo will be ranked. But I think they’ll be pretty close together.
Note: quotes from 2 Chronicles 13:10 18 21 & 1 Kings 15:3 & 12:14 (NLT). And see the post from May 16/21.