CHAPTER 15

(955 B.C.)

AZARIAH THE PROPHET GETS A MESSAGE FROM GOD FOR ASA

¹And the Spirit of God came upon Azariah the son of Oded (this is the only place that the Prophet Azariah is mentioned):

²And he went out to meet Asa, and said unto him, Hear you me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin; The LORD is with you, while you be with Him; and if you seek Him, He will be found of you; but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. (Three things are here said: 1. The Lord is with you while you are with Him. 2. If you seek Him, He will be found of you. 3. If you forsake Him, He will forsake you. These eternal facts are true of an individual or a nation, Jews or Gentiles, people under Law or under Grace, in one age as well as another.)

³Now for a long season Israel has been without the true God, and without a teaching Priest, and without Law (this, no doubt, refers to the last years of Solomon, the fourteen years of Rehoboams reign [11:17; 12:1], and the three years of Abijahs reign [I Ki. 15:1-4]).

⁴But when they in their trouble did turn unto the LORD God of Israel, and sought Him, He was found of them (this Promise is clear; God will not forsake those who turn to Him and seek Him; the Scripture is emphatic: He was found of them).

⁵And in those times there was no peace to him who went out, nor to him who came in, but great vexations were upon all the inhabitants of the countries.

⁶And nation was destroyed of nation, and city of city: for God did vex them with all adversity (even though they were His chosen people, called of Him and loved of Him, still, when they turned their backs on Him, spiritually speaking, He would vex them with all adversity; God desires to bless us, but, if we desire to oppose Him, He will, instead, vex us, and He does it in order to bring us to our spiritual senses).

⁷Be you strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: for your work shall be rewarded (the admonishment by the Holy Spirit was then and now, Be strong [I Cor. 16:13; Eph. 6:10; II Tim. 2:1]).

THE REFORMS UNDER ASA

⁸And when Asa heard these words, and the Prophecy of Oded the Prophet (evidently, Oded, the father of Azariah, prophesied to Asa, as well as his son), he took courage, and put away the abominable idols out of all the land of Judah and Benjamin, and out of the cities which he had taken from Mount Ephraim, and renewed the Altar of the LORD, that was before the porch of the LORD (any time there is a true Move of God, the Lord will bring the people back to the Cross, symbolized here by the Altar).

⁹And he gathered all Judah and Benjamin, and the strangers with them out of Ephraim and Manasseh, and out of Simeon: for they fell to him out of Israel in abundance, when they saw that the LORD his God was with him (tens of thousands from the northern kingdom of Israel moved to Judah when they saw that the Lord was with Asa).

¹⁰So they gathered themselves together at Jerusalem in the third month, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Asa (this was probably the Feast of Pentecost, conducted in June).

¹¹And they offered unto the LORD the same time, of the spoil which they had brought, seven hundred oxen and seven thousand sheep. (According to Num. 31:25-54, the Lords portion, concerning the spoil of war, was to be one animal out of every five hundred from the half that belonged to the men of war, and one out of every fifty of the other half of the spoils that belonged to the congregation. On this basis [eleven animals for the Lord out of every one thousand taken], the total spoil must have numbered approximately 63,000 oxen and 636,000 sheep. When the Fourteenth Verse of the last Chapter said exceeding much spoil, it meant exactly that.)

¹²And they entered into a covenant to seek the LORD God of their fathers with all their heart and with all their soul;

¹³That whosoever would not seek the LORD God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman (this probably had to do with Ex. 22:20 and Deut. 13:6-11).

¹⁴And they swore unto the LORD with a loud voice, and with shouting, and with trumpets, and with cornets (music has always accompanied Revival).

¹⁵And all Judah rejoiced at the oath: for they had sworn with all their heart, and sought Him with their whole desire; and He was found of them: and the LORD gave them rest round about (what a great statement, And He was found of them; in fact, He can be found of anyone, if, with true sincerity, He is sought!).

¹⁶And also concerning Maachah the mother of Asa the king (his grandmother), he removed her from being queen, because she had made an idol in a grove: and Asa cut down her idol, and stamped it, and burnt it at the brook Kidron (she was a worshipper of the Asherah, an idol carved in the likeness of the male reproductive organ).

¹⁷But the high places were not taken away out of Israel: nevertheless the heart of Asa was perfect all his days (the word perfect, as used here, does not mean sinless perfection, but that his heart was perfect as far as idolatry was concerned; the high places, at least in this instance, would have been used to sacrifice to Jehovah; however, still, this was not in keeping with the Commandment of God that the Sacrifices be offered only at the Temple at Jerusalem; consequently, the Holy Spirit mentions the high places for a reason).

¹⁸And he brought into the House of God the things that his father had dedicated, and that he himself had dedicated, silver, and gold, and vessels.

¹⁹And there was no more war unto the five and thirtieth year of the reign of Asa (Asa had peace the first ten years of his reign [14:1]; then came the Ethiopian invasion of Judah [14:9-15]; after that, there was peace for twenty-five years [15:19]; then came war with Baasha, king of the northern confederacy of Israel [16:1-6]; because he trusted in Syria at that time instead of God, wars were pronounced upon him for the balance of his reign six more years [16:9]).