let’s have a look at II Kings 18:4 together this morning?
II Kings 18:4 “He [Hezekiah] removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke into pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).
Wow, there is a lot in this, so we may take a couple of weeks to unpack a little of what is here if that’s ok?
The Scripture starts with “He removed the high places”. The word used for “removed” in Hebrew sounds like “sur” and it’s more forceful in meaning than perhaps we may initially understand. It has a sense of “to drag away from, to reject, to turn aside, depart, or to strip away”.
For at least the last 32 years and two King’s reigns, the high places had been left in place. Jotham, the King of Judah before Ahaz (Hezekiah’s dad) had done what was right in God’s eyes but had not removed the high places. Ahaz had added to the number and culture of “high places”.
A high place was a place where an idol was worshipped. The idea of going up high was linked to authority. So when Hezekiah at twenty-five years old comes to the throne, every single hill, rise, mountain and cliff would have had several places where people went to worship their idols and take control of the culture. There were most likely many different idols.
The main temple has been stripped of everything of value, and the alter to God has been cut in pieces and removed and an alter to foreign gods put in its place.
Hezekiah goes straight to work and starts to remove every high place in his kingdom. Counter-culture. People would have well-paid livelihoods linked to these high places, there would be people of influence in the community who would be threatened by this, I wonder if there would have been significant opposition to this?
What does this mean for me today though – 3000 plus years later?
What are the high places I have allowed to be established in my life, where I have a sense of entitlement, or where my heart has become hardened towards God’s ways?
As we remember that Hezekiah’s name means “Yahweh is my strength”. We understand that today God living in us is the strength required to do battle against any area of our life that tries to set up its own “high place” that tries to be in charge and become “like God” [Genesis 3:5].
We are set up for the win through Jesus who won the victory over every authority (high place) in heaven and on earth. How cool is that!
Proverbs 4:23 reminds us to guard our heart as from it flow the issues of life.
I love what John the Baptist says in John 3:30, “He must increase, but I must decrease”.
As Jesus increases in us we actually discover the true meaning of life and the statement of Matthew 10:39 makes sense to us.
Blessings
Allan
Principle 5 – guarding our heart is central to our life.
Strength – Deliberative: People exceptionally talented in the Deliberative theme are best described by the serious care they take in making decisions or choices. They anticipate obstacles.