2 Chronicles 18:1
Now Jehoshaphat had riches and honor in abundance, and he allied himself with Ahab by marriage.
Sermons
Temporal Advancement and Spiritual DeclineW. Clarkson 2 Chronicles 18:1
The False Steps of a Good KingT. Whitelaw 2 Chronicles 18:1-3














Writing the biography of Jehoshaphat from a purely religious standpoint, another conjunction than the one used might well have been employed. It might well be written, "Now Jehoshaphat had riches and honour in abundance, but joined affinity with Ahab." For the latter clause affirms that on which we can by no means congratulate the king. Yet such is the common course of things; such is the bent of the human mind and the way that circumstances usually take, that the simple connective "and" is perhaps the more natural of the two. This close association deliberately entered upon between the servant of Jehovah and the devotee of Baal is human enough. The man who has become strong, according to all earthly measurements, seeks to become stronger still, not considering what care he is taking or is neglecting of his deeper and his higher interests. We look at -

I. THE COMMONNESS OF THIS COURSE. How true it is that "much wants more;" that the exchequer never seems full enough to the man who is amassing wealth, nor the rank high enough to him who is pursuing honour, nor the authority great enough to him who is striving after power] Men eat of earthly food and are the hungrier for their feasting. They have "abundance of riches and honour," but they will not be satisfied without that fascinating alliance; they must "join affinity with Ahab." Let no man imagine that when he has reached a certain height of worldly advancement he will be satisfied and will crave nothing more. He will most certainly find that, when he reaches that desired point, he will long to stand on the height that will be still beyond him. And the evil of it is that this thirst for more worldly good is something which so often displaces a nobler longing, a craving for more of goodness and of fellowship with God. It even affects and injures the spirit to such a degree that it positively lessens that better longing, until it is reduced to almost nothing.

II. THE GRAVE UNWISDOM OF IT. What did Jehoshaphat gain by this alliance with the house of Ahab? A measurable, momentary gratification. What did he lose by it? An immeasurable, permanent good. The mistake he then made was one the effects of which stretched far, very far forwards, and affected for evil many hundreds of households beside his own (2 Chronicles 21:4). What do we gain by adding something more to our material prosperity - another thousand pounds to our fortune; another honour to our titles; another position to our acquirement? Something truly, but something the worth of which is quite measurable; possibly very small, as an increase to our life-happiness. But if we are neglecting our higher interests, if we are allowing those sacred obligations to be relaxed, if we are departing from God, what do we lose? Who shall estimate the value of the favour and friendship of Jesus Christ, of the integrity of our Christian character, of the excellency and blessedness of holy usefulness, of that brighter and broader sphere which would have been ours, if we had not let earthly and human interests weigh down and press out the higher and the heavenly ones?

III. ITS GUILT. As God multiplies his gifts to us, of whatever kind those gifts may be, we ought to be thereby more closely attached to him and to be more heartily devoted to his service. When we permit increase of substance or added honour to lead us away from him, we are as guilty as we are unwise; our sin is as sad as our folly. - C.

And the Lord was with Jehoshaphat.
Homiletic Review.
I. Jehoshaphat secured the great companionship BY FOLLOWING TRUE EXAMPLE. "Because he walked in the first ways of David his father." Beautiful those first ways of David. Turn to the eighteenth Psalm, which David sang in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul. These first ways of David were ways of love to God (ver. 1) of trust in God (ver. 2); of prayer to God (ver. 3); of strength in God (ver. 29) of thanks to God (vers. 49, 50). But the later ways of David — the ways concerning Bathsheba, etc., Jehoshaphat would not walk in. This matter of true example for the ways of life is a great thing. Such following will surely lead us into the great companionship of God.

II. The Lord was with Jehoshaphat; he secured the great companionship BY STANDING OUT AGAINST THE EVIL SPIRIT OF HIS TIME. "And sought not unto the Baalim." The Baalim represented the popular religious tendency.

III. And the Lord was with Jehoshaphat; he secured the great companionship BY RIGHT AFFECTION. "But sought to the God of his father." Do not imagine the set of the supreme affection a light matter And when our heart supremely sets towards God, God answers with companionship.

IV. And the Lord was with Jehoshaphat; he secured the great companionship BY RIGHT PRACTICE. "And walked in His commandments, and not after the doings of Israel." Jehoshaphat did not mean about it, and dream about it, and think about it; he vigorously did it. Do not imagine that inward and sentimental intention which never finds expression in corresponding action amounts to anything. What vigorous volition and right practise sound in that "walked"! Man is three things — intellect, affection, will. Jehoshaphat turned these three toward God. Intellectually, he recognised Jehovah as God, not the Baalim; affectionately, he sought to God; volitionally, he practised for God. What wonder he was wrapped about with the great companionship?

(Homiletic Review.)

Because he walked in the first ways of his father David
1. We have here a pattern and a warning. It is an eulogy heightened by a limitation. The merit of the copy is advanced at the expense of the pattern. It is intimated that David's first ways were his best ways. This is in contradiction of the true order of the spiritual life. A retrograde motion in it is a violation of its nature and a frustration of its intent. Deterioration in goodness is a disease and an anomaly.

2. Notice the impartiality and candour which characterise the accounts of good men in Scripture. The Bible has no human idols. Fault and virtue it sets forth with equal distinctness and prominence. Herein it shows itself Divine. The Bible in its way of dealing with the lives and characters of men, almost as much as in anything, bespeaks itself the voice of God.

3. The change in David's spiritual course was connected with an equally marked change in his outward condition.

4. See here the danger of prosperity.

5. We infer that men are not to be our patterns, but only "the man Christ Jesus." Him alone we can look up to with unqualified admiration.

6. Let us always be looking out for the symptoms and beginnings of spiritual decline.

(R. A. Hallam, D.D.)

People
Ahab, Amon, Aram, Chenaanah, Imla, Imlah, Jehoshaphat, Joash, Micah, Micaiah, Syrians, Zedekiah
Places
Jerusalem, Ramoth-gilead, Samaria, Syria
Topics
Abundance, Affinity, Ahab, Ahab's, Alliance, Allied, Daughter, Honor, Honour, Jehoshaphat, Jehosh'aphat, Joined, Joineth, Marriage, Married, Riches, Wealth
Outline
1. Jehoshaphat, joined in affinity with Ahab, is persuaded to go against Ramoth Gilead
4. Ahab, seduced by false prophets, according to the word of Micaiah, is slain there

Dictionary of Bible Themes
2 Chronicles 18:1

     5205   alliance
     5811   compromise

2 Chronicles 18:1-3

     7233   Israel, northern kingdom
     7245   Judah, kingdom of

2 Chronicles 18:1-27

     7774   prophets, false

Library
That the Employing Of, and Associating with the Malignant Party, According as is Contained in the Public Resolutions, is Sinful and Unlawful.
That The Employing Of, And Associating With The Malignant Party, According As Is Contained In The Public Resolutions, Is Sinful And Unlawful. If there be in the land a malignant party of power and policy, and the exceptions contained in the Act of Levy do comprehend but few of that party, then there need be no more difficulty to prove, that the present public resolutions and proceedings do import an association and conjunction with a malignant party, than to gather a conclusion from clear premises.
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

The Poor in Spirit are Enriched with a Kingdom
Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 5:3 Here is high preferment for the saints. They shall be advanced to a kingdom. There are some who, aspiring after earthly greatness, talk of a temporal reign here, but then God's church on earth would not be militant but triumphant. But sure it is the saints shall reign in a glorious manner: Theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.' A kingdom is held the acme and top of all worldly felicity, and this honour have all the saints'; so says our Saviour, Theirs is the
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

He Does Battle for the Faith; He Restores Peace among those who were at Variance; He Takes in Hand to Build a Stone Church.
57. (32). There was a certain clerk in Lismore whose life, as it is said, was good, but his faith not so. He was a man of some knowledge in his own eyes, and dared to say that in the Eucharist there is only a sacrament and not the fact[718] of the sacrament, that is, mere sanctification and not the truth of the Body. On this subject he was often addressed by Malachy in secret, but in vain; and finally he was called before a public assembly, the laity however being excluded, in order that if it were
H. J. Lawlor—St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh

The Assyrian Revival and the Struggle for Syria
Assur-nazir-pal (885-860) and Shalmaneser III. (860-825)--The kingdom of Urartu and its conquering princes: Menuas and Argistis. Assyria was the first to reappear on the scene of action. Less hampered by an ancient past than Egypt and Chaldaea, she was the sooner able to recover her strength after any disastrous crisis, and to assume again the offensive along the whole of her frontier line. Image Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief at Koyunjik of the time of Sennacherib. The initial cut,
G. Maspero—History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, V 7

Chronicles
The comparative indifference with which Chronicles is regarded in modern times by all but professional scholars seems to have been shared by the ancient Jewish church. Though written by the same hand as wrote Ezra-Nehemiah, and forming, together with these books, a continuous history of Judah, it is placed after them in the Hebrew Bible, of which it forms the concluding book; and this no doubt points to the fact that it attained canonical distinction later than they. Nor is this unnatural. The book
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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