The Stubborn Rut of Sin Text: 2 Kings 13:10-13
Introduction: The Gravity of Bad Habits
There is a kind of spiritual gravity to sin. It is not something we can trifle with, dabble in, or manage. It is a current, and if you do not actively swim against it, it will carry you downstream. And what is true for an individual is magnified when it comes to nations. A nation can get itself into a rut, a deep and well-worn groove of rebellion against God. Once that rut is established, it takes a tremendous, supernatural act of grace to jolt the wheels out of it. Most of the time, the nation just keeps rumbling along in that same destructive track, generation after generation, king after king, until the whole enterprise finally crashes into the ditch of God's judgment.
This is what we see in the history of the northern kingdom of Israel. We come here to a brief, almost forgettable, four-verse summary of the reign of a king named Jehoash. At first glance, it looks like a simple administrative record, a dry piece of data for the historians. But the Holy Spirit does not waste ink. Embedded in this short account is a profound lesson about the nature of corporate sin, the danger of compromise, and the stubborn momentum of apostasy. Jehoash is not a particularly innovative sinner. He is not a pioneer of wickedness like some of his predecessors. He is something far more common, and perhaps more dangerous. He is a man who simply keeps the ungodly status quo. He inherits a corrupt system and, rather than reform it, he perpetuates it. He walks in the well-trodden path of rebellion, and in so doing, leads his people one step further down the road to ruin.
We live in an age that loves the path of least resistance. We are told that going with the flow is a virtue. But the Bible teaches us that the broad way, the easy path, the well-worn rut, leads to destruction. The story of Jehoash is a warning to us. It warns us against the comfortable compromises that have been handed down to us. It warns us against measuring ourselves by the standards of the previous generation instead of the unchanging standard of God's Word. And it reminds us that God's evaluation of a man's life, or a king's reign, is not based on his earthly might or his political successes, but on one simple question: did he do what was right in the sight of Yahweh?
The Text
In the thirty-seventh year of Joash king of Judah, Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz became king over Israel in Samaria and reigned sixteen years.
And he did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh; he did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, with which he made Israel sin, but he walked in them.
Now the rest of the acts of Joash and all that he did and his might with which he fought against Amaziah king of Judah, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?
So Joash slept with his fathers, and Jeroboam sat on his throne; and Joash was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel.
(2 Kings 13:10-13 LSB)
God's Timetable (v. 10)
The account begins, as is typical in Kings, by synchronizing the reigns of the two kingdoms.
"In the thirty-seventh year of Joash king of Judah, Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz became king over Israel in Samaria and reigned sixteen years." (2 Kings 13:10)
The Holy Spirit is meticulous about these details. This is not mythology. This is not "once upon a time." This is history, grounded in time and space. God is the Lord of history, and He weaves the stories of Judah and Israel together, even in their division and rebellion. The southern king, Joash of Judah, had a promising start but a tragic end. The northern king, Jehoash of Israel, has a uniformly tragic record. But both of their clocks are set by God. Their reigns begin and end according to His sovereign decree.
This should remind us that no ruler is autonomous. The most powerful king and the most obscure bureaucrat both hold their office by divine appointment. God raises them up, and God puts them down (Romans 13:1). Their sixteen years or their forty years are measured out by Him. This is a great comfort for the righteous and a terrifying reality for the wicked. God is not an absentee landlord; He is the meticulous, sovereign historian, and every ruler will give an account to Him.
The Enduring Legacy of Compromise (v. 11)
Verse 11 gives us God's definitive evaluation of this sixteen-year reign. It is a damning indictment.
"And he did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh; he did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, with which he made Israel sin, but he walked in them." (2 Kings 13:11)
This is the spiritual epitaph for king after king in Israel. The phrase "the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat" becomes a technical term, a shorthand for state-sponsored idolatry. What were these sins? When the kingdom split, Jeroboam, the first king of the north, feared that his people would return their allegiance to the house of David if they continued to go to Jerusalem to worship. So, out of political expediency, he set up a counterfeit religion. He built two golden calves, one at Bethel in the south and one at Dan in the north, and declared, "Behold your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!" (1 Kings 12:28).
This was a diabolically clever compromise. It was not an outright rejection of Yahweh, but a corruption of the worship of Yahweh. It was syncretism. It mixed the worship of the true God with the idolatry of their pagan neighbors. He made worship convenient. He localized it. He made it visible and tangible. And in doing so, he violated the first and second commandments and set the entire nation on a course of apostasy from which it would never recover.
Notice the language here. Jehoash "did not depart" from these sins. He "walked in them." The rut had been dug generations before he was born. The path was well-worn. All he had to do was nothing. All he had to do was maintain the status quo. He inherited a corrupt national church, and he kept it running. He did not have to invent new evils; he just had to perpetuate the old ones. This is the insidious nature of traditional sin. It feels normal. It feels stable. To challenge it would be radical, disruptive. But faithfulness to God often requires us to be profoundly disruptive to the sinful traditions we inherit.
Common Grace and a Footnote of Might (v. 12)
Verse 12 gives us a glimpse of the rest of his reign, the part that would have interested a secular historian.
"Now the rest of the acts of Joash and all that he did and his might with which he fought against Amaziah king of Judah, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?" (2 Kings 13:12)
Here we are told that Jehoash possessed "might." He was a successful military commander. We learn later, in chapter 14, that he won a decisive victory over Amaziah, the king of Judah. He plundered Jerusalem, broke down its wall, and took hostages. From a worldly perspective, his reign was a success. He was a strong leader who projected power.
But what does God's Word do with this? It relegates it to a footnote. It says, "if you want to read about all that stuff, go check the other books." The Holy Spirit is not impressed by military might that is divorced from righteousness. God is not impressed by a strong economy or a secure border if the heart of the nation is rotten with idolatry. This is a crucial lesson. God's metrics for success are not the world's metrics. A man can be a lion on the battlefield and a spiritual coward in the temple. He can win wars against foreign kings and be utterly enslaved to the sins of his fathers.
God in His common grace allows even wicked rulers to have a measure of success. He can use a pagan king like Cyrus for His purposes. He can grant military victory to an idolatrous king like Jehoash. But this providence must never be mistaken for approval. God's left hand of providence may grant earthly success while His right hand of judgment is writing a man's condemnation.
The Final, Unremarkable End (v. 13)
The summary concludes with the stark finality of death.
"So Joash slept with his fathers, and Jeroboam sat on his throne; and Joash was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel." (2 Kings 13:13)
He "slept with his fathers." This is the great equalizer. His might, his victories, his sixteen years on the throne all end here. And where is he buried? "In Samaria with the kings of Israel." He joins the long line of his predecessors, not just in the grave, but in their legacy of rebellion. He is one more link in a chain of unfaithfulness.
His son, Jeroboam II, takes the throne. And as we will see, though Jeroboam II will preside over a period of great territorial expansion and prosperity for Israel, he too will walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat. The rut just gets deeper. The momentum of sin continues, carrying the nation ever closer to the Assyrian cliff.
The life of Jehoash is a tragedy in four verses. It is the story of a man who had an opportunity to lead, to reform, to call his people back to the covenant. But he chose the easy path. He chose the comfortable compromise. He walked in the sins that were handed to him. He did evil in the sight of the Lord, not by being spectacularly wicked, but by being ordinarily, predictably, comfortably unfaithful. And in the end, he was buried with the other failures, leaving behind a legacy of sin for his son to inherit. May God grant us the grace to be men and women who do not just walk in the ruts of our culture, but who have the courage to break the cycle and walk in righteousness, for His name's sake.