Jehoiada
Ahaziah of Israel, the son of Jehoram (son of good king Jehoshaphat of Judah) and Athaliah (Ahab and Jezebel’s daughter), reigned only one year. But this was sufficient for the Bible to tell us in 2 Kings 8:27 that he “walked in the way of the house of Ahab, and did evil in the sight of the Lord.” This king was killed in battle by Jehu, the only “good” king of Israel, who fought against idolatry. So Athaliah, mother of Ahaziah, determined to seize power. To do this she had to kill all of Ahaziah’s children in order to cut off any remaining descendants of David, even though they were her grandchildren. As she was a faithful worshipper of Baal, she did not want anyone in the line of David, who might again be obedient to God, to ascend the throne of Judah.
So were all her grandchildren killed? No, because we are told in 2 Chronicles 22:11, 12:
“But Jehoshabeath, the daughter of the king, took Joash the son of Ahaziah, and stole him from among the king’s sons that were slain, and put him and his nurse in a bedchamber. So Jehoshabeath, the daughter of king Jehoram, the wife of Jehoiada the priest (for she was the sister of Ahaziah), hid him from Athaliah, so that she slew him not. And he was with them hid in the house of God six years.”
Here we are introduced to two people who will play a key role in what follows. Jehoshabeath was the daughter of Jehoram. Was she also the daughter of Athaliah? The Bible is not precise on this, but we will assume that she was because she was the wife of the key person in this study: Jehoiada. Jehoiada was the high priest in the temple at Jerusalem. His name means Jehovah-knows. He held second place in importance in the kingdom after the sovereign. We are reminded, for example, that the one who was closest to David was the high priest Zadok.
Here, however, the most important religious person was Mattan, high priest of Baal. As for Jehoiada, the Bible tells us that he was a man deeply committed to Jehovah. It is not surprising that his righteous influence aroused similar sentiments in his wife Jehoshabeath, even though she was the daughter of idolatrous Athaliah. Let us note that Jehoiada and Jehoshabeath had a son, Zechariah, who will also play a part in this lesson.
JEHOIADA’S CONSPIRACY
Joash was thus raised in secret, in a room adjoining the temple. This is because the temple of Jehovah was probably poorly attended, even abandoned in preference to that of Baal. But when Joash reached the age of seven, Jehoiada decided to take action and put an end to the idolatrous Athaliah. The account in 2 Kings 11 and 2 Chronicles 23 gives us the details of the high priest’s conspiracy.
We notice that jehoiada began by telling his scheme to five captains who brought faithful Levites from throughout the land into the temple. He gave them arms which were stored in the temple. Then he crowned Joash as king, with protection from the armed Levites. The shouts raised by the people, who recognized a descendant of David, attracted Athaliah to the temple, where she dared not enter with her armed guards. This was precisely what Jehoiada had hoped she would do. Isolated and without protection, she was arrested, brought outside the temple, and finally executed, while the high priest completed winning the people to support their new, legitimate king. After the death of Athaliah, it was said that “Jehoiada made a covenant between himself, the people, and the king, that they should all be the LORD’S people.” (2 Chronicles 23:16)
FIRST LESSON: THE CHARACTER OF JEHOIADA
Before going further into this lesson, we can already appreciate several character traits of Jehoiada. He was, according to the evidence, a courageous man who did not hesitate to risk his life for his faith in God, although surrounded by leaders of the kingdom who worshipped Baal. He took into his confidence and his conspiracy the captains of the kingdom without knowing whether one of them might reveal everything to Athaliah, which would have resulted in the death of both himself and of young Joash.
We should also emphasize that he waited until a favorable time to implement his plan, a time when the new king would be old enough to speak and to have enough reasoning to understand that henceforth he must represent royalty even though he was not yet reigning.
Such behavior represents many of the qualities God wants to find in us: loyalty for His cause, courage in the face of adversity and, at the same time, keen insight regarding everything that pertains to His service. God asks that our consecration to Him be complete. He does not want us to compromise with the defilements of the world, the flesh, and the devil, although it is not always so easy to do this. May we be filled with similar zeal for our Heavenly Father.
JEHOIADA AND THE REIGN OF JOASH
The fact that Jehoiada established a covenant between himself, the people, and the king shows that he committed himself, as well as young king Joash, to serve God and God alone. This young king could not reign alone at this age and needed someone to act as regent until he was of age. Jehoiada was well suited to become counselor and mentor to the young king. Additionally, it was he and his wife, Jehoshabeath, who had raised Joash in the temple. Joash was like a son to him.
Perhaps some strain might have occurred when the young king became an adult and wished to “fly with his own wings,” no more to be under the guardianship of the high priest, whose job, after all, was not to be governor but to be occupied with the service of the Lord. How did Joash transition from youth to maturity proceed? We don’t know exactly, but the Bible assures us that Jehoiada did everything he could to influence the young king to serve God. We read in 2 Chronicles 24:2, 3 a statement which magnificently sums up the work of this high priest:
“Joash did that which was right in the sight of the Lord all the days of Jehoiada the priest. And Jehoiada took for him two wives; and he begat sons and daughters.”
Although this scripture is a simple statement, how eloquently it speaks of the actions of the high priest. May we all merit such approval from God when our life is appraised.
JEHOIADA REPAIRS THE TEMPLE
The long period of idolatry under Jehoram and Athaliah had led the people to profane the Lord’s temple. The state of the temple, preserved under the good king of Judah, was in disrepair. There is even a strong possibility that stones from the temple were used to build the temple of Baal, because in 2 Chronicles 24:7 we read that Athaliah had “broken up” the house of God, and used all the sacred things for Baal. It became necessary to find funds for the needed repairs.
“And it came to pass after this that Joash was minded to repair the house of the LORD.” (2 Chronicles 24:4)
The Bible is precise in saying it was King Joash who gave the order to repair the temple. This demonstrates what great zeal he had for the Lord at this stage of his life (he was then undoubtedly an adult). The fact that he himself initiated this step shows how assertive he had become.
Let’s look at how this repair work was done. The main problem was money At the start, Joash directed the Levites to collect money from different cities in Judah and “see that ye hasten the matter,” he told them. But the Levites did not show the necessary zeal. The king, in fact, reproached Jehoiada in 2 Chronicles 24:6,
“Why hast thou not required of the Levites to bring in out of Judah and out of Jerusalem the collection, according to the commandment of Moses the servant of the Lord, and of the congregation of Israel, for the tabernacle of witness?”
It seems that the people during all this period of idolatry had doubts about how the money they contributed was being used, which might have resulted in meager collections by the Levites. So Joash had another idea: he placed a box at the entrance of the temple forcing everyone to pay when he entered. It is one thing to give money when one is in a distant province, and another thing to give when seeing, with one’s own eyes, the temple of the Lord in disrepair. This time there were good results from the collection, and the donated money went to pay the workers who repaired the utensils, structure, and walls of the temple.
The theme of repairing the temple has often been used to illustrate the edification of our New Creature: sometimes speedy, full of zeal and enthusiasm; sometimes indifferent, troubled by the worries of the world impairing our growth.
The lack of zeal on the part of the Levites would have proven fatal to the renovation of the temple, so a reminder by means of an edict of the king was necessary to make the repairs possible. From time to time, through signs and experiences, God similarly admonishes us to serve him better; it is up to us to understand and to renew the edification of our New Creature.
JEHOIADA’S WORK ILLUSTRATES THE GOSPEL AGE
Jehoiada has been mentioned in Biblical commentaries as a type of our Lord. Let’s see how his action, when placed in a wider yet limited context, pictures the Gospel Age.
The divine objective of the Gospel Age is to select an elect class who will reign with Christ. “God at the first did visit the Gentiles to take out of them a people for his name.” (Acts 15:14) But the “taking out” of this people is done amidst difficulties, and many of these come from the scheming persecutions of the Apostate Church -Antichrist.
This Apostate Church was to rise after the apostles fell asleep. It would increase in power, renounce the true faith, take over the worship of God, wage war on the true saints, and finally collapse at the coming of the Lord. “And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming.” (2 Thess. 2:8) We find precisely in our lesson an illustration of these events.
The reign of Jehoshaphat, a pious king, can represent for us the beginning of the apostolic era when the pure gospel was being dispensed. When he died, the idolatry of Athaliah underhandedly gained the upper hand. Likewise, apostasy after the death of the apostles turned Christianity away from the true faith. Athaliah not only reverenced Baal, but she exterminated the entire royal family. Likewise we are told that the apostasy “made war with the saints and prevailed against them” (Daniel 7:21) The true, persecuted Church is symbolically exiled “into the wilderness” (Revelation 12:6), to the same condition as young king Joash who was raised secretly in the temple. Joash can here represent the true Church.
During the time Athaliah sacrificed to idols, symbolically the apostate church promoted itself to God’s place in Christian worship. jehoiada did not supplant Athaliah immediately; he waited until Joash had attained semi-maturity. In the same way Christ does not destroy Antichrist before the appointed time, but, as we previously read, “with the brightness of his coming’ “ (2 Thess. 2:8) Then Jehoiada crowned Joash, the only remaining member of the royal family. In the same way Christ accepts the Church as an associate in his glorious reign. But will this king rule as a high priest? Will the Church be above Christ? Surely not, and in the picture we note that Joash was too young to really reign. It was Jehoiada who was the true head of the kingdom, the regent, so to speak. And if the Bible assures us that Joash did that which was right in the sight of God during the lifetime of Jehoiada, it was Jehoiada who exercised real spiritual authority over Joash.
Finally, the fact that Jehoiada made a covenant “between himself, the king, and all the people” admirably illustrates for us the New Covenant that Christ and his Church will establish with humanity during the Millennial Age.
Here we stop making parallels between Jehoiada and Christ because in all Biblical types or illustrations, we can never include all the historical details in an extended application to the Gospel Age. But we can rejoice in that even in this apparently insignificant episode of history, God gave us a shadow of good things to come. We rejoice also that Christ with his church will reign with wisdom and strength for the good of humanity, just like Jehoiada.
FAITHFULNESS POORLY REWARDED
We previously mentioned that King joash did that which was right in the sight of God during the life of the priest Jehoiada. But after his death -the death of the one who had raised him privately, taught him to obey God, and counseled him as a father -King Joash turned to idolatry. The Bible tells us in 2 Chronicles 24:17, 18:
‘After the death of Jehoiada came the princes of Judah, and made obeisance to the king. Then the king hearkened unto them. And they left the house of the LORD God of their fathers, and served groves and idols.”
We can judge the beneficial and important influence Jehoiada had over King joash, counseling him wisely to walk in the ways of God. When Jehoiada died, King Joash gave himself over to practicing evil, influenced this time by the chiefs in his kingdom. Why was there such an inexorable tendency to worship idols? We know that idols attract, that the unbridled morals which are tolerated, even encouraged, by the pagan religions were an ever present temptation for Judah. It was so easy for them to turn away from God!
But, in fact, can we really say this risk is gone today, when on every side unbridled temptations assail us to lead us far from serving God, to whom we have already consecrated our all?
JOASH STONES JEHOIADA’S SON IN THE TEMPLE!
But the worst was yet to come in the kingdom of Judah. We read in 2 Chronicles 24:19-22,
“Yet he sent prophets to them, to bring them again unto the LORD … but they would not give ear. And the Spirit of God came upon Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest, which stood above the people, and said unto them, Thus saith God, Why transgress ye the commandments of the LORD, that ye cannot prosper? because ye have forsaken the LORD, he hath also forsaken you. And they conspired against him, and stoned him with stones at the commandment of the king in the court of the house of the LORD. Thus Joash the king remembered not the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him, but slew his son. And when he died, he said, The LORD look upon it, and require it.”
Zechariah, who may have been raised with Joash, is stoned by order of the king because he wanted to bring the people back to God; and he was even stoned in the temple! Zechariah was the one to whom our Lord, long afterward, paid homage by saying that his blood was shed “between the altar and the temple” (Luke 11:51), and he compared the generation of his time with that of Joash, which killed the prophets who wanted to turn them from idols! “Woe be unto you,” said he to the Pharisees whose hearts were not right in the sight of God, just as Joash’s “Pharisees” assassinated the son of his teacher. For us it stands as an additional warning not to allow ourselves to be entrapped by sin.
God did not permit the crime of Joash to remain unpunished. He caused him to meet with a severe defeat at the hands of a small force of Syrians who, after killing his advisors, tortured Joash before leaving. Finally he was assassinated by two of his servants. Because of the transgressions at the end of his life, he was not buried in the sepulchers of the kings. God “looked upon it, and required it.”
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
What can we say about Jehoiada, a man after God’s own heart, considered an equal to the kings of Judah? He walked with integrity in obedience to the divine law without deviating, without compromising. He used his position to influence his king in God’s ways; he taught and preached by his own conduct. As we have seen, he is a type of Christ. He thus sets an example for us to follow. Our French playwright Racine devoted a tragedy to him which he titled Athaliah. I’ll only quote a few lines of the full poetic declaration that Jehoiada addresses to Joash prior to crowning him king, to motivate him to embrace justice, goodness, and piety toward God, remembering that he had been orphaned and raised humbly while hidden in the temple.
Promise on this book and before these witnesses,
You shall be hard on the wicked, but a refuge for the righteous.
Between the poor and you, you shall let God be the judge,
Remembering, my son, that hidden beneath this linen,
Like them you were once poor and like them, an orphan.
May we always, in following the example of this character from the Old Testament, walk in God’s ways and not turn aside, and have faith and unshakable zeal for our Creator.
– Regis Liberda, France