Lessons from the story of Jehu the King

[Ernie]

This morning I read the story of King Jehu in II Kings 9 and 10.

Jehu was anointed by a prophet of Elisha to be the next king of Israel. His assignment was to “destroy the house of Ahab and avenge the blood of my servants the prophets and the blood of all the Lord’s servants shed by Jezebel.”
Jehu basically did a coup and put the officials in Samaria into a situation where they needed to kill all the family of Ahab if they wanted to survive. It was one of the more gruesome takeovers in history.

Jehu also killed the Ahaziah, king of Judah, and 42 royal relatives. It doesn’t seem like he was commanded to do this, however Ahaziah was a grandson of Jezebel. Did he go overboard in his zeal?

At one point the ultra-conservative, Jonadab the son of Rechab joined up with Jehu in his chariot, to whom Jehu said, “Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord.”

They went on and Jehu deceived the Baal prophets by getting them altogether and then killing them. He then returned the nation to worshipping Jeroboam’s calves as the “state religion.”

But Jehu was not a godly man. So God used Jehu and commended him for what he did, but Jehu did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam and continued to worship the calves Jeroboam had set up in Dan and Bethel. (Possibly so that the Israelites would not go to Judah to worship.)

But later, God tells Hosea to name his son Jezreel. "Call him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel."

I’m not sure if Isreal was a theocracy at this point or not. Judah still seemed to be, at least when it had good kings.

I’m wondering if there are some parallels to today.
1. Does God appoint leaders today to bring judgment on other leaders in the same way as the OT? Or is it different because the church is now the only Theocracy.

2. I find it interesting that godly people like Jonadab get caught up with and supportive of evil leaders who are carrying out the will of God even if the leaders were not godly people. It seems hard for people to distinguish between the two.

Maybe you can think of more parallels?