Amaziah's Two Hearts

Bill Brown ... Xiamen University

"The man of God replied, 'The Lord can give you much more than that.'" 2 Chron. 25:9b

Buddhist pilgrims at nearby Nanputuo Temple offer up endless sacrifices. They also seek answers or prosperity by tossing the joss sticks [see bottom]; if they are not satisfied with the answer, they keep tossing the sticks until the gods tire out and give them what they want. In reality this is not worship but magic, and they think that by their sacrifices and joss sticks they can manipulate the unseen to give them their desires. The Jews of the Old Testament were much the same--following the forms of worshiping God, but also engaging in daily "magic" in case God failed them. Amaziah is a good example.

Chronicles 25:2 (and 2 Kings 14) notes that Amaziah, who became king of Judah at age 25, was one of the few kings who did what was right, "though not wholeheartedly". Amaziah in fact had two hearts--serving God and the other serving the pagan gods around him, just as the Jews had done ever since they created the golden calf at the food of smoldering Mt.Sinai.

Amaziah "did what was right in the eyes of the Lord," but he lost his kingdom because he failed to remove the pagan altars on the high places. He allowed his people to worship his pagan gods because he himself did not fully trust in God, even though God had given him a great victory over the Edomites.

100,000 Hired Hands In Amaziah's first war he relied upon God because he had no choice. He was a new king, still struggling to consolidate his power. But by the second battle he had power and wealth, so he hired 100,000 soldiers to fight for him. When a man of God warned him that if he relied upon foreign troops he would fail, "for God has the power to help or to overthrow" (Chron. 25:8), Amaziah complained, "What about the 100,000 talents I paid for them!" And the man of God replied, "The Lord can give you much more than that."

Amaziah's heart was not yet totally hardened, for he dismissed the troops, and went on to win a great battle. But v. 14 records that after winning the battle, "he brought back the gods of the people of Seir. He set them up as his own gods, bowed down to them and burned sacrifices to them."

Another man of God asked Amaziah (v.15) ,"Why do you consult this people's gods, which could not save their own people from your hand?" Amaziah' heart was now hardened by his own success, and he warned the prophet to either shut up or be struck down. And Amaziah's fate was sealed. In his pride, he challenged the king of Israel and was defeated. Earlier he had moaned the loss of the 100,000 talents paid to the hired soldiers, but now he lost everything he had.

The Lessons?
1. No compromise. Amaziah failed his own people by allowing them to worship idols. The idol-worship was a poison that in the end seeped into his own heart. We must be wholehearted, not two-hearted. As Christ said, "A house divided against itself cannot stand (Luke 11:17)." Once we ally with anyone but our Father, we fall. Even the wisest of men, Solomon, in the end turned to idolatry, influenced by his foreign wives.

2. Trust, not Magic. Zechariah 4:6 says "Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit, says the Lord." God had Gideon whittle his army down to only 300 men so that all would know the victory was God's, not Gideon's. God will fight for us--but not because we make him bless us. We don't need to resort to Buddhist joss sticks, or tea towels blessed by televangelists, or Christian incantations such as the "Prayer of Jabez", or audio CD prayers that you can play in your car, and will automatically bring answers (I kid you not!).

3. Humility. We must not let blessings turn our heads. God punished Israel when David numbered his army because he looked to the size of his army as the source of his strength. And intoxicated with power and wealth, David had others fight his battles (which led to his adultery in 1 Chron. 20:1). And God initially blessed Amaziah because of his obedience, but once he grew wealthy and powerful, Amaziah began to trust in his wealth and armies rather than God. Pride does go before the fall, and the higher we go, the farther we can fall if we forget Who is behind our success.

F.B. Meyer, in "Our Daily Homily" (London, 1894) writes of 2 Chron. 25:9

AMAZIAH had many good qualities, but he did not clearly see how impossible it was for Israel to be allied with Judah without invalidating the special divine protection and care on which Judah had been taught to rely. We must understand that God cannot be in fellowship with us if we tolerate fellowship the ungodly. We must choose between the two. If we can renounce all creature aid, and trust simply in the eternal God, there is no limit to the victories He will secure; but if, turning from Him, we hold out our hand toward the world, we forfeit his aid. O child of God, let not the army of Israel go with you! Do not adopt worldly policy, methods, or partnership. However strong you make yourself for the battle in alliance with these, you will fail. Indeed, God Himself will make you fall before the enemy, that you may be driven back to Himself.

But you say that you have already entered into so close an alliance that you cannot draw back. You have invested your capital, you have gone to great expenditure. Yet it will be better to forfeit these than Him. Without these aids, and with only God beside you, you will be able to rout Edom, and smite ten thousand men. Would that men knew the absolute deliverance which God will effect for those whose hearts are perfect towards Him!

The soldiers of Israel committed depredations on their way back. This was the result of the folly and sin of Amaziah's proposal. We may be forgiven, and delivered, and yet there will be after-consequences which will follow us from some ill-considered act. Sin may be forgiven, but its secondary results are sometimes very bitter. We must expect to reap as we sow.

JOSS STICKS, recorded in Rambles in Eastern Asia: Including China and Manila, During Several Years ... By Benjamin Lincoln Ball, 1856, p. 328

Saturday, October 20th.—About noon, started, in company with Mr. Tait, Mr. Patten and Mr. Craig, to visit the White Stag Temple. Mr. T., who was well acquainted with the country, led us through the streets of the city, passing the White Heart Temple on our way.

We ascended the mountain by crooked flights of stone steps, passed over, and by corresponding flights of steps descended into a deep valley beyond. When part of the way down, we stopped a few minutes to look at an ancient tomb, built into the hill-side. ...Two women were chin-chinning Josh at tho shrine, on which, in front of the gods', the incense, or Josh-sticks, were burning and smoking. The women tried their luck with a bunch of bamboo slips, and the casting on the floor of two pieces of dice-wood. One of the women shook the bunch of slips in a bamboo box, until one gradually worked up and fell out on the ground. This, like all, having a motto engraved on it, the woman carried to the priest, who interpreted it, and gave her a corresponding response, for which she paid a number of copper cash.

These responses are small pieces of paper written on, and prepared and kept on hand by the quantity. If I mistake not, the writing is a note-of-hand running to the departed friend of tho bearer, and entitling them, after it is burned at the altar, to a certain sum of money in the next world. The two pieces of dice-wood are made from a bamboo root, cut about five inches long and split in halves, much resembling the two halves of a kidney-bean. The two parts are placed together and dropped upon the floor': if they fall opposite sides up, they are lucky ; but if they come with the same sides up, they are unlucky. One of the women took the two pieces in her hands, advanced to the idol, prostrated herself, knocking her head on the stones several times, and chin-chinning the idol, addressing petitions for its aid and favor, held up her hands with a countenance indicating entire faith in the power of the god, and let fall the two pieces of wood. These rebounded in different directions. With what anxiousness did her eye rapidly glance from one piece to the other ! and how pleased did she appear, on seeing one of the pieces with the round side up, and the other with the flat, to find herself lucky! The other, an older woman, now advanced with her half-sized feet, in a half-hobbling gait, and took her turn. She was not so lucky. She tried them over and over with alternate chin-chinnings; but either the two round sides came up, or the two flat. She went on, finally, with such desperation, that I really pitied her. She continued, however, to pick them up and let them fall as fast as she could, until she was really lucky; and then, with an air of satisfaction at having conquered, she gave the idol a look that seemed to say, "Well, you
see I did succeed, notwithstanding;" and then she left the temple.

After they had gone we all tried our fortunes, much to the amazement of the priests. Some of us were lucky, and some unlucky: I was among the unlucky ones, but, persevering, became lucky.
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