The Long Obedience in the Wrong Direction
Introduction: The Illusion of Stability
We live in a pragmatic age. We measure success by what appears to work. We look for stability, for longevity, for a steady hand at the tiller. If a company has been around for a generation, we assume it is successful. If a pastor has a long tenure, we assume his ministry is blessed. If a political dynasty remains in power, we assume it has a mandate. We equate endurance with righteousness, and survival with divine favor. But the Word of God cuts straight across this assumption with a terrible swift sword.
The history of the northern kingdom of Israel is a stark and bloody refutation of our modern pragmatism. It is a story of coups, assassinations, and apostasy. And yet, in the middle of this chaos, we find men like Baasha, who manage to seize power and hold onto it for a very long time. Twenty-four years. A whole generation. Long enough for the people to get used to him. Long enough for a sense of normalcy to set in. Long enough to think that this is just the way things are, and the way they will continue to be.
But God is not impressed by a long resume. He is not impressed by political stability built on a foundation of rebellion. He keeps the books, and His audit is the only one that matters. The story of Baasha is a solemn warning to us that it is entirely possible to be competent, successful, and long-lasting in your rebellion against God. It is possible to have a long obedience in entirely the wrong direction. And in the end, the only thing a long road to the wrong destination gets you is more lost.
The Text
In the third year of Asa king of Judah, Baasha the son of Ahijah became king over all Israel at Tirzah, and reigned twenty-four years.
And he did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh, and walked in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin which he made Israel sin.
(1 Kings 15:33-34 LSB)
A Long Reign on a Rotten Throne (v. 33)
The text begins by anchoring us in history, showing that God is the Lord of all history, not just a tribal deity concerned with one nation.
"In the third year of Asa king of Judah, Baasha the son of Ahijah became king over all Israel at Tirzah, and reigned twenty-four years." (1 Kings 15:33)
The mention of "Asa king of Judah" is important. While the northern kingdom of Israel is skidding from one disaster to another, God is maintaining His covenant line in the south. The story of redemption is proceeding, even while the story of rebellion unfolds in parallel. God is always working His purposes out, and He keeps meticulous records.
Now, how did Baasha become king? The text here is succinct, but just a few verses earlier we get the bloody details. He conspired against his predecessor, Nadab the son of Jeroboam, and assassinated him while he was besieging a Philistine city. And as soon as he took the throne, he proceeded to exterminate the entire royal line of Jeroboam, "he did not leave to Jeroboam any persons alive, until he had destroyed them" (1 Kings 15:29). This was, ironically, a direct fulfillment of the prophecy of Ahijah against the house of Jeroboam. Baasha was God's instrument of judgment. But we must never confuse being God's instrument with being God's servant. A hammer does not get the credit for building the house, and a scourge does not get a reward for being a scourge. God can use a wicked man to judge another wicked man, and then judge the first wicked man for his own wickedness. Our God is sovereign, and He is not squeamish.
So Baasha comes to the throne of Tirzah through treason and mass murder. And what does he do? He reigns for twenty-four years. This is a significant length of time. It is a generation of stability, at least on the surface. But it is the stability of a graveyard. It is the peace of a well-managed plantation. The people might have mistaken this long reign for a sign of God's blessing. "Well, he's got to be doing something right to stay in power this long." This is the lie of pragmatism. Longevity is no indicator of righteousness. A cancer can have a long life. A lie can persist for centuries. Baasha's long reign was not a sign of God's approval; it was a sign of God's patience, giving both the king and the nation ample time to repent.
The Divine Verdict (v. 34)
After noting the historical facts, the Holy Spirit gives us the divine evaluation, the only opinion that ultimately matters.
"And he did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh, and walked in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin which he made Israel sin." (1 Kings 15:34 LSB)
This is the epitaph that God writes on the tombstone of king after king in Israel. "He did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh." Notice the standard. It is not evil in the sight of the people, or evil according to the standards of the surrounding nations. It is evil in God's sight. This establishes the absolute objectivity of good and evil. God is the one who defines it. Our modern world despises this. We want to define good and evil for ourselves. We want morality to be a matter of personal preference or public consensus. But Scripture will have none of it. There is a God in heaven, and His character is the immovable standard of all righteousness.
But the text doesn't leave us with a general accusation. It gives us the specific charge. He "walked in the way of Jeroboam." This is the tragic irony. Baasha exterminated the house of Jeroboam, but he enshrined the sin of Jeroboam. He got rid of the man but kept his poison. What was this sin? It was the state-sponsored, politically-motivated, counterfeit religion that Jeroboam established to secure his kingdom. Fearing that his people would return to their allegiance to the house of David if they went to Jerusalem to worship, Jeroboam set up two golden calves, one in Bethel and one in Dan, and declared, "Behold your gods, O Israel, that brought you up from the land of Egypt!" (1 Kings 12:28).
This was the original sin of the northern kingdom. It was a fundamental rejection of God's clear command about how and where He was to be worshiped. It was a religion of convenience. It was an act of political pragmatism. It was an attempt to have the God of Israel without the terms of the God of Israel. Baasha, for all his bloody ambition, saw the political utility of this system and kept it firmly in place. He wanted to be king, and the counterfeit religion was good for business.
And notice the corporate effect: "and in his sin which he made Israel sin." A leader's sin is never a private affair. A king's apostasy becomes the nation's apostasy. He institutionalized the rebellion. He made it easy for the people to sin and hard for them to be righteous. This is the terrible burden of leadership. When you are in a position of authority, whether as a king, a pastor, a father, or a boss, your sins have a downstream effect. You have the power to make others sin, to normalize rebellion, to set a course that will lead many to destruction. Baasha did this for twenty-four years.
Conclusion: Walking in the Right Way
The story of Baasha is a solemn warning against the temptation to worship God on our own terms. The sin of Jeroboam is alive and well. It is the temptation to craft a faith that is convenient, that serves our political ends, that doesn't ask too much of us, and that affirms our autonomy. It is the temptation to build the church on marketing principles instead of the Word of God. It is the temptation to measure success by numbers and years instead of by faithfulness.
We can have churches that last for generations, with stable leadership and respectable programs, but which are fundamentally walking in the way of Jeroboam. They may have gotten rid of some old, crusty traditions, but they have kept the underlying poison of man-centered worship and pragmatic disobedience. They do what is right in their own eyes, and it is evil in the sight of Yahweh.
The only way to break this pattern is through repentance. It is not enough to swap out one leader for another, as Israel did. The idols themselves must be torn down. The foundation must be relaid on the Word of God alone. We must insist on worshiping God in the way He has commanded, not in the way we find convenient.
There is only one King who did not walk in the way of Jeroboam, but who walked perfectly in the way of His Father. The Lord Jesus Christ did not seek His own glory. He did not build a kingdom based on political convenience. He established the one true worship, not in a place, but in a person, Himself. To come to God now is to come through Him. He is the Way, the only Way. And a short life of obedience in His direction is infinitely better than a long, successful, and stable life of walking in any other.