One Million two hundred thousand men, ready to fight. Today we begin by reading 2 Chronicles 13-17.
We will talk about soldiers, salt serenity, and salvation.
Soldiers
The size of this battle is staggering. The current US Active Duty Military, as of September 203, with all branches combined, has one million two hundred and ninety thousand active members.
Therefore, this one battle was almost equal to our entire armed forces.
In those days, men approached each other with swords, spears, and bows and arrows. They help shields, but as we have seen depicted in movies, a battlefield was a bloodbath.
Now scale that up and imagine the amount of blood flowing from a battle of this magnitude.
Abijah, though not devout, worshiped the God of Israel. He would only reign for three years.
On the other side, with twice the personnel, was Jeroboam. He had driven out the Levites and replaced them with his own priests. This made him an idolater, and God was against him.
Abijah knew this and trusted in God for deliverance.
Salt
He reminds Jeroboam that God has “a covenant of salt” with the family of David.
Salt is a preservative. They used salt to prepare the sacrifices they offered God.
They considered a “covenant of salt” a permanent, sacred, unbreakable agreement. Because of it, Abijah was not worried that the odds against him were two to one.
He knows that “God is with us; He is our leader” (see 2 Chron 13:12).
This was correct, as verse 13:16 says, “God delivered them in their hands.” (NIV)
Over five hundred thousand casualties happen in this one battle (see v17). The sorrow had to have been oppressive.
Serenity
Among the dead was Jeroboam, the evil king (v20).
As often happens, a cataclysmic moment precedes peace. The storm before the calm. The tipping point.
Just a few verses later, in 14:1, Abijah dies too.
Asa, his son, follows him. Historians consider him a great king.
First, he removed the foreign altars and high places (v14:2).
Then, he commanded Judah to seek the Lord (v14:3).
Because of this, there is a rare event: the country was at peace for ten years (v14:1).
By driving out foreign idols and returning to God, they had lasting peace. God favored them and gave them rest (v14:6). This enabled them to prosper.
They built up the towns and fortified their walls. The troops continued their training and improved their weapons’ supply.
But the Spirit of God was with them. It came on their prophet, Azariah, son of Obed, who went to meet Aza. His name means, “Yahweh has helped”.
He tells Asa, “The Lord is with you when you are with Him. If you seek Him, you will find him. But, if you forsake Him, He will forsake you (v15:2).”
This is what we must take from this storyline.
Salvation
Christian principles formed America. All thirteen of the colonies which formed the United States required their governors to be religious, with nine specifying they must believe in Jesus.
When we were with God, He was with us. He blessed us beyond measure. Our nation prospered.
We would seek Him, and we would find Him. God does not hide from people. He wants His children to be around Him always.
But God warned Asa, just as He had warned Israel under Jeroboam. If Judah were to forsake God, He would forsake them.
We have been forsaking God in our country since the middle of the 1960s. People have removed him from our schools, our courts, and even our public consciousness.
Before we found our home in our current church, we attended services at four others. We left without hearing about Jesus. That is why we didn’t return. If they removed Jesus from their message, they weren’t His church. Ours either.
Asa drove out all the idols, even the one his grandmother made (v15:16).
Because they sought God, they found Him. And “There was no more war until the thirty-fifth year of Asa’s reign.” (2 Chron 2:19, NIV)
Sin
Then Asa messes up. He seeks help from Aram instead of God.
We do this today. We know who God is and how He is helping us. But we want something we know is outside of His will for us.
So we seek it through another means.
Illness comes to Asa, and instead of seeking help from God, he looks for other cures. He looked for the physicians to treat him instead of repenting and letting God heal him.
From that point on, they were always at war.
Opportunity only presents itself for small windows of time. We seize them, or we lose them.
Time is short. We must not continue to forsake Him.
Repent now and seek God. He is waiting for you to come home.
