Week 21 2 Chronicles 24
Joash started pretty well. I’ll give him that much.
He was only a little boy when he became king and he was shepherded along under the influence of his friend & protector & mentor – the priest Jehoiada.
During that time Joash did a lot of beneficial things to swing Judah back to worshipping the Lord.
But then…a kind of shocking turn-around: after Jehoiada’s death, the leaders of Judah came…and persuaded the king to listen to their advice. They decided to abandon the Temple of the Lord…and worship Asherah poles instead.
The prophet Zechariah told Joash you have abandoned the Lord, and now he has abandoned you. Joash was angry enough that he had the prophet executed.
The version of the story told in Kings says: all his life Joash did what was pleasing in the Lord’s sight because Jehoiada the priest instructed him. But Kings bafflingly redacted Joash’s whole post-Jehoiada dark-time.
I’m penciling in Joash on the lower-side of the Kings Scale. Sure…early-on he did some very good reformative work. But killing Zechariah looks like a decisive departure from the Lord.
Joash looks like his father Ahaziah – a guy heavily influenced by the people around him. A good advisor had influenced Joash toward the good. But in the end it looks like Joash was content with rejecting the Lord.
Note: quotes from 2 Chronicles 24:17-18 20 & 2 Kings 12:2-3 (NLT). Added note: Zechariah – the son of Joash’s old friend Jehoiada – was executed in 2 Chronicles 24:20-22. Joash was assassinated in 2 Chronicles 24:25-26.