RAGING PRIDE

2 Chronicles 26

At our men’s Bible study this week I mentioned that I had just read the story of King Uzziah in 2 Chronicles 26.  Immediately two of the men responded, “Oh yeah!  He’s the king who was struck with leprosy!”  Maybe I should not have been surprised that they remembered this fact about one of the ancient kings of Judah.  When I think of Uzziah I think of the prophet Isaiah.  He had his vision of Jehovah “in the year that King Uzziah died” (Isaiah 6:1).  Uzziah’s is a tragic story.

He became king of Judah when he was sixteen years old.  “He did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, just as his father Amaziah had done.  He sought God during the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God.  As long as he sought the LORD, God gave him success” (vs. 4, 5).  He was victorious in wars against the Philistines and the Arabs.  The Ammonites paid tribute to him.  Uzziah tore down cities and rebuilt them.  He fortified the city of Jerusalem and built war machines that could shoot arrows and sling huge stones.  He had a massive army.  And he was a farmer who “loved the soil” (v. 10).

Then we read the fateful verse…”But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall” (v. 16).  Somehow Uzziah thought it would be a good idea for him to go into the temple and burn incense on the altar.  Try and picture this!  A middle-eastern potentate entered the temple of his God intending to offer incense.  Who is going to stop him?  The priests of Jehovah were courageous.  Azariah and 80 other priests went into the temple and confronted the king!  They told him what he already knew.  The offering of incense was reserved for the priesthood alone!  They urged him to leave the temple.  What he was doing was sinful and he would face God’s anger. 

But King Uzziah would not listen.  Instead he became angry at the priests.  How angry did he become?  He was raging at the priests in the temple in front of the altar of incense!  As he was raging at the priests “leprosy broke out on his forehead” (v. 19).  The priests were horrified!  They “hurried him out.  Indeed, he himself was eager to leave, because the LORD had afflicted him” (v. 20).  The king suffered with leprosy the rest of his life!  He was separated from other people.  He could never enter the temple again.  His son governed in his absence.

How much does God hate the sin of pride?  Here was a king who served him faithfully for years!  Here was a king whom God had blessed richly!  But he took his eyes off the Lord just long enough to begin thinking he was pretty special.  Pride only needed a tiny foothold.  It led him to think more highly of himself than he should have.  It made him desire to do things he never should have attempted.  It seized his heart and he would not listen to God’s priests.  If he had only listened!  If only he had put down the censer and left the temple!  If there had been just a shred of humility remaining he would have paid heed to the counsel of the priests and he would have been spared.

But many of us know how sneaky pride is.  We don’t notice when it first enters our hearts.  The very nature of pride deceives us because we don’t notice it growing.  We just think we deserve all the things we desire.  God gives us people in our lives to lead us away from pride; our wives, our friends, brothers and sisters from church.  But if pride has gained a grip on us we resent them and don’t listen.  Pride leads to destruction.  Pride goes before a fall.  Just check out the stories of King Nebuchadnezzar and King Herod Agrippa.

Oh that God would keep us from this insidious sin!  May the Holy Spirit’s voice be heard and cause us to turn from pride!  And may we learn to listen to those around whom God has given us to coax us in the right direction!