Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jahaziel son of Zechariah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jeiel, the son of Mattaniah, a Levite from Asaph's descendants, as he stood in the midst of the assembly. Sermons
I. GOD'S READINESS TO ANSWER THE PRAYER OF HIS PEOPLE. "In the midst of the congregation," while they were still before the Lord, in the very act and attitude of prayer, an answer was vouchsafed to them. While they were yet speaking, God heard (Isaiah 65:24). Though he does not constantly grant us so speedy a response, yet we may be quite sure that he always hearkens and heeds; and if there be such reverence and faith as there were on this occasion, we may be sure that God always purposes at once to send us the best kind of deliverance, even if he does not at once start the train of events or forces that will bring it to pass. II. THAT WE NEED NOT BE GREATLY AFFECTED BY MERE MAGNITUDE. "Be not afraid by reason of this great multitude" (ver. 15). We are in no little danger of overestimating the worth of numbers, whether they be on our side or against us. It is a great mistake to imagine we are safe because we are in a large majority. There is no king and there is no cause "saved by the multitude of an host" (Psalm 33:16). History has shown again and again that the presence of a vast number of people (soldiers or supporters) often begets confidence, and confidence begets carelessness and negligence, and these lead down to defeat and ruin. Besides, it is never quantity but quality, never size but spirit, never numbers but character, that decides the day. Better the small band of fearless men under Gideon's command, than the large numbers of the faint-hearted who were left behind, or even than the innumerable host of the Midianites. We may not trust in the number of our friends, and we need not fear the hosts of our enemies. If the "battle is not to the strong," it certainly is not to the multitudinous. III. THAT IT IS EVERYTHING TO HAVE GOD ON OUR SIDE. We may be sure that when the people of Judah had this assurance from Jahaziel, they were not only calmed and comforted, but they had a sense that all would be well with them. 1. That God had made their cause his own. "The battle is not yours, but God's" (ver. 15). 2. That God's presence would be granted to them. "The Lord will be with you" (ver. 17). 3. That God had promised them his salvation, and would therefore work on their behalf. "The salvation of the Lord" (ver. 17). This was enough even for the timid and the fearful-hearted. This should be enough for us. Conscious that the battle we fight is that of the Lord himself, and is not ours only or chiefly; knowing that he will be with us, and assured that he will work out a blessed issue, we may be calm, and even confident, though the enemy is advancing. IV. THAT WE MUST BE READY TO TAKE OUR PART AND TO DO OUR WORK, whatever that may be. "Go ye down against them" (ver. 16); "Set yourselves, stand ye still" (ver. 17). To do this may have been too much for the inclination of the cowardly or the indulgent; it may have been too little for the active and the militant among the people; but it was enough for the obedient and the trustful. God will have us bring our contribution of activity as well as devotion to the great spiritual campaign. But it may not be just that kind or just that measure which we should select if we had our choice. We must let him choose our service as well as our inheritance (Psalm 47:4) for us; and whether that be high or humble, greater or smaller, we should be more than content that he is calling us to the field in which Christ is our Captain. V. THAT A SPIRIT OF REVERENT GRATITUDE IS ALWAYS BECOMING. (Vers. 18, 19.) Before the shouts of victory are in the air, while we are going forth to the battle in which God is leading us, while we are serving under a Divine Saviour, while we are anticipating the issue, so long as we are trustful in him and not confident in ourselves, we do well to let our hearts be filled and to let our songs be heard with reverent joy. - C.
For we have no might against this great company. I. There are embarrassments concerning our COUNTRY.II. Many good men and women are often greatly embarrassed about the DIVINE INSPIRATION of every sentence in the Bible. III. Some of us are at times much embarrassed by THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF LIFE. Like a man who looks out of a railway carriage at night and sees nothing, so some of us often look towards to-morrow and see no light. This fear of to-morrow is the wet-blanket of the Christian's life. Act rightly now; do your duty to-day, and never mind to-morrow. (W. Birch.) Homilist. I. There are often TERRIBLE CRISES in men's lives when moral courage is required. Most men are brought at times to a crisis when they are ready to exclaim, "We know not what to do."1. In the course of secular work. A great company of worldly anxieties. 2. In the course of personal moral culture. Old habits, lusts, propensities. 3. In the process of philanthropic labour. II. THE ONLY SOURCE OF TRUE MORAL COURAGE IS TRUST IN GOD. To trust Him is to trust — 1. Love. 2. Wisdom equal to every emergency. 3. Power that can make the weakest mighty. (Homilist.) I. AN APPROPRIATION OF GOD. "O our God." II. THE ENEMY TO BE JUDGED. "Wilt Thou not judge them?" The Christian has many enemies, internal, external, and infernal, but self is the greatest enemy the people of God have. Self must be brought under judgment. III. THE SINNER'S POWERLESSNESS. "We have no might." We are spiritual insolvents. Perfect poverty: all true disciples of Christ must be brought into this state. Like Mary, we have nothing to pay, according to Christ's parable, and yet we are pardoned. That is the gospel. IV. THE CHURCH'S PERPLEXITY. "Neither know we what to do." This is often the condition of the Church. V. FAITH'S INVIGORATING LOOK. "But our eyes are upon Thee." (J. J. West, M.A.) Say we not well, that prayer is a model for presidents, princes, kings, and rulers for all time? But it has wider applications. The King of Judah is confronted by a great and startling peril; — what does he do?I. Let us rather mark WHAT HE DOES NOT DO. 1. He does not underestimate his danger. There are some men who think it wisdom to pooh-pooh a difficulty. Jehoshaphat is not one of them. He is at the farthest remove from foolhardiness or a rash contempt of the impending peril. The men who under-estimate risks are not the wise men or the safe men, morally, politically, or spiritually. There are many of this easy-going — if you please, buoyant — disposition who decline to look probable defeat or disaster in the face. They deprecate your fears, advise you to trust to luck, to go on and take the chances with a stout heart. They are willing to do it in politics, suffering the Ship of State to take her chances among the unknown shoals and rocks! They do it in religion. They discount heavily the Divine requirements, the Divine warnings, the Divine hatred of sin, the tremendous Divine penalties pronounced upon it; for them these all mean nothing or very little. 2. So neither did Jehoshaphat over-estimate them. His was no panic fright. Seen through the atmosphere of our fears, a man may become a monster. The King of Judah certainly discerned the danger and appreciated it to the full, but his brave and trustful spirit was as far as possible removed from panic, desperation, or despair. Jehoshaphat, confronted by a danger which seemed certainly to insure the ruin of his throne and kingdom, declines to regard the case as by any means hopeless, refuses to believe that the Lord's arm is shortened that it cannot save, or His ear heavy that it cannot hear. Who says Moab and Ammon are stronger than God? Any peril is over-estimated of which men cry: "There is no help for him in his God!" 3. Again, if Jehoshaphat does not underestimate or over-estimate his dangers, so neither does he place any false reliance upon human power — his resources, his aids, or himself. Some men trust God when they are bereft of every other ground of confidence, but not till then. They brave it out till ruin stares them in the face, and then run to cover. Not so Jehoshaphat. The nation had scarcely known a more prosperous and potent reign than his. He had a great army at his command, and, it would appear from the record (2 Chronicles 17:12-19), could bring upward of a million of men into the field, a drilled and organised militia capable of effective service in emergency. Many a man in his position, and with such military and national resources behind him, would have given God altogether the go-by, and chosen, like Napoleon Bonaparte, to trust in the heaviest battalions. II. Turning from this negative to a positive view, we ask, then WHAT DID HE DO? Where was his real confidence? If ever there was a man who offered effective and ample illustration of the Psalmist's words — "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord our God" — that man was Jehoshaphat of Judah. What then did he do? He turned to God! And observe how he did this. 1. It was publicly done. The King of Judah made no secret of his dependence on the King of kings. "He proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah" — "And out of all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord" — "And all Judah stood before the Lord, with their little ones, and their wives, and their children." — "And Jehoshaphat stood in the congregation of Judah and Jerusalem, and said." What announcement of national and personal need and reliance upon Jehovah could be more distinctly open and unreserved than this? 2. And it was as humble and self-renouncing as it was public in its character. National grief is an affecting spectacle. You have it here: "All Judah, their little ones, their wives, their children, stood before the Lord." While speaking in their name, Jehoshaphat exclaimed: "O our God we have no might against this great company, neither know we what to do." Lowly-mindedness and self-abasement in a whole people, as certainly as in a man, goes far to secure — as truly as it solicits — the Divine favour. 3. Jehoshaphat's plea for Judah was further marked by an unreserving trust in God. With Jehoshaphat Jehovah is all and enough. "Art not Thou God in heaven, and rulest not Thou over all the kingdoms of the heathen? and in Thine hand is there not power and might, so that none is able to withstand Thee?" Never a thought here of limitation, or weakness in Him; never a suspicion that He is unable or unwilling to rescue those that trust in Him to the uttermost. No association of His name with any other. He is not to be a helper, a partner, a contributor. He is to be all, to do all! The royal, the national reliance on Jehovah is entire. 4. This brings us to note finally that Jehoshaphat's plea is marked by the fullest recognition of the Divine Sovereignty and Providence. A writer, quoted in one of our leading weeklies, says that, "No secular history would be read in our schools to-day or in the schools of any enlightened community in which the fortunes of nations were represented as controlled by special Divine intervention." The man who wrote that sentence would, we fancy, have been treated with rather scant courtesy if he had chanced in the court of Jehoshaphat. 5. More than this, the King of Judah appeals to the Covenant. Now God loves to be plied with His own promises and reminded of the gracious relations He occupies to us. The Psalmist founded a claim to Divine help and mercy upon the ground of a godly parentage: "O Lord, I am the son of Thine handmaid." Our best resource, our true "help," is not in alliances, in circumstances, in capacities, in luck, in others, in ourselves, but ever and only "in the name of the Lord." (W. T. Sabine, D.D.) Sir Fowell Buxton, who shared with Wilberforce the labours which secured the emancipation of the slaves in the West Indies, ascribed their triumph directly to the power of prayer. Writing to his daughter when all was over, he said, "I firmly believe that prayer was the cause of that division" (vote in the House of Commons}. "You know how we waited upon God for guidance, with these words in our hearts, 'O our God, we have no might against this great company that cometh against us, neither know we what to do; but our eyes are upon Thee'; and the answer, 'Ye shall not need to fight in this battle; stand still and see the salvation of the Lord.' You will find the whole story in 2 Chronicles 20. Turn to my Bible; it will open of itself to the place. We had no preconceived plan; the course we took appeared to be the right one, and we followed it blindly."People Ahaziah, Ammonites, Aram, Asa, Asaph, Azubah, Benaiah, Berachah, Dodavah, Eliezer, Geber, Hanani, Jahaziel, Jehoshaphat, Jehu, Jeiel, Kohathites, Korahites, Korhites, Levites, Maonites, Mattaniah, Meunim, Meunites, Moabites, Seir, Shilhi, Tamar, Tarshish, ZechariahPlaces Ammon, Edom, Egypt, Engedi, Ezion-geber, Hazazon-tamar, Jeruel, Jerusalem, Mareshah, Moab, Mount Seir, Seir, Tarshish, Tekoa, ZizTopics Asaph, Assembly, Benaiah, Benai'ah, Congregation, Descendant, Family, Jahaziel, Jaha'ziel, Jehaziel, Jeiel, Je-i'el, Levite, Mattaniah, Mattani'ah, Meeting, Midst, Sons, Spirit, Stood, Zechariah, Zechari'ahOutline 1. Jehoshaphat, invaded by Moab, proclaims a fast5. His prayer 14. The prophecy of Jahaziel 20. Jehoshaphat exhorts the people, and sets singers to praise the Lord 22. The great overthrow of his enemies 26. The people, having blessed God at Berachah, return in triumph 31. Jehoshaphat's reign 35. His convoy of ships, according to the prophecy of Eliezer, unhappily perishes. Dictionary of Bible Themes 2 Chronicles 20:14 3272 Holy Spirit, in OT Library A Strange Battle'We have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do: but our eyes are upon Thee.'--2 CHRON xx. 12. A formidable combination of neighbouring nations, of which Moab and Ammon, the ancestral enemies of Judah, were the chief, was threatening Judah. Jehoshaphat, the king, was panic-stricken when he heard of the heavy war-cloud that was rolling on, ready to burst in thunder on his little kingdom. His first act was to muster the nation, not as a military levy … Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture Holding Fast and Held Fast Of the Public Fast. The Coast of the Asphaltites, the Essenes. En-Gedi. "Thou Shall Keep Him in Perfect Peace, Whose Mind is Stayed on Thee, Because He Trusteth in Thee. " That the Employing Of, and Associating with the Malignant Party, According as is Contained in the Public Resolutions, is Sinful and Unlawful. Commerce Concerning Peaceableness Chronicles Links 2 Chronicles 20:14 NIV2 Chronicles 20:14 NLT 2 Chronicles 20:14 ESV 2 Chronicles 20:14 NASB 2 Chronicles 20:14 KJV 2 Chronicles 20:14 Bible Apps 2 Chronicles 20:14 Parallel 2 Chronicles 20:14 Biblia Paralela 2 Chronicles 20:14 Chinese Bible 2 Chronicles 20:14 French Bible 2 Chronicles 20:14 German Bible 2 Chronicles 20:14 Commentaries Bible Hub |
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