Commentary - 2 Kings 14:23-27

Bird's-eye view

This brief section in 2 Kings presents us with a classic biblical paradox, a beautiful exhibition of the staggering mercy of God. We have a wicked king, Jeroboam II, who is a carbon copy of the original apostate, Jeroboam son of Nebat. He does evil, he perpetuates the idolatrous calf-cult, and yet his reign is the most prosperous and militarily successful in the history of the northern kingdom. God uses this disobedient man to grant Israel a stunning deliverance. Why? The text is explicit: it is not because of Israel's merit or Jeroboam's piety, but because God saw their bitter affliction and remembered His covenant promise not to blot out their name. This is raw, unmerited, sovereign grace. God is not a cosmic vending machine where we insert coins of righteousness and get blessings in return. He is a sovereign Lord who saves His people, sometimes by the most unlikely of instruments, for the sake of His own name and His own purposes. This passage is a historical illustration of common grace on a national scale, and a potent reminder that God's left hand of providence often works through means that His right hand of precept condemns.

Furthermore, the mention of the prophet Jonah son of Amittai is a crucial link in the redemptive story. This is the same Jonah who would later be sent to Nineveh. Here, he preaches a message of national restoration and victory, a popular message no doubt. This earlier, successful prophecy to Israel provides the necessary backdrop for his later reluctance to preach to Israel's enemies. He was a nationalist prophet before he was a missionary prophet, and God had to teach him, and through him all of us, that Yahweh's mercy is not constrained by ethnic or covenantal boundaries. God's grace to wicked Israel through a wicked king was a foreshadowing of the even more scandalous grace He would show to the pagan Ninevites.

Outline

Context In 2 Kings

This passage is situated in the long, sad decline of the northern kingdom of Israel. The book of 2 Kings chronicles a parade of mostly wicked kings, interspersed with the powerful ministries of prophets like Elijah and Elisha. By this point, the house of Jehu is on the throne, a dynasty established in blood and judgment against the house of Ahab. God had promised Jehu his dynasty would last four generations (2 Kings 10:30), and Jeroboam II is the third. His long and prosperous reign represents a final, bright flash of worldly success before the kingdom's rapid collapse and eventual exile at the hands of the Assyrians just a few decades later. This temporary reprieve, this Indian summer of Israel's history, serves to highlight the depth of their sin. God gave them breathing room, prosperity, and military security, and they used it not to repent, but to grow fat and complacent, a theme powerfully picked up by the contemporary prophets Amos and Hosea.

Key Issues

The Scandal of Unmerited Mercy

Our modern evangelical sensibilities are often conditioned to think in straight lines. If a nation is righteous, God will bless it. If a nation is wicked, God will curse it. And while that covenantal principle is broadly true, Scripture is far too rugged and realistic to be confined to our neat little formulas. The story of Jeroboam II throws a wrench in the gears of any simplistic theology of glory.

Here is a man who is explicitly defined by his sin. He is evil. He follows the arch-sinner Jeroboam son of Nebat. There is no hint of repentance or piety. And yet, God uses him as a "savior" for Israel. God blesses the nation through him. This is a profound display of God's absolute freedom. His grace is not shackled to our performance. He can, and does, show mercy for His own reasons, according to His own timetable. He saw the affliction of His people, a suffering that was, incidentally, a direct result of their own sin. And in His pity, He relented. He gave them a temporary deliverance. This is not saving grace, in the ultimate sense, but it is a powerful illustration of His common grace and His covenant faithfulness. He had promised not to blot out their name from under heaven, and He kept that promise, even when they were doing everything in their power to deserve being blotted out. This should humble us, and it should make us marvel at a God whose mercy is so much wider than our own.

Verse by Verse Commentary

23 In the fifteenth year of Amaziah the son of Joash king of Judah, Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel became king in Samaria and reigned forty-one years.

The historical markers are set with precision. The chronicler is careful to locate us in time, synchronizing the reigns of the southern and northern kings. This Jeroboam is the second to bear that name, and he is not to be confused with the first, the son of Nebat, who tore the kingdom apart. This Jeroboam's reign is notably long, forty-one years, which in the tumultuous history of Israel's kings, signifies a period of unusual stability and strength. Worldly success, as measured by longevity and power, is not always a sign of divine pleasure.

24 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, which he made Israel sin.

The divine assessment is delivered without any ambiguity. Despite his long and successful reign, his moral report card is an unequivocal F. The standard of judgment is not political success but faithfulness to the covenant. And the specific charge is that he continued the foundational sin of the northern kingdom, the idolatrous system of golden calf worship established at Dan and Bethel. This was a political religion, designed to keep the people from going to Jerusalem to worship, thereby securing the king's own power. It was a state-sponsored counterfeit, and every king of Israel, even the "better" ones, was guilty of perpetuating it. Jeroboam II was no exception; he was a faithful steward of this wicked inheritance.

25 He restored the border of Israel from Lebo-hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of Yahweh, the God of Israel, which He spoke through His servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was of Gath-hepher.

Here is the paradox in full view. The evil king is the instrument of a great national restoration. The borders are pushed back to their ideal, almost Solomonic, extent. But notice the crucial qualifier: this happened according to the word of Yahweh. Jeroboam's military victories were not his own achievement. He was simply the tool in the hand of a sovereign God, fulfilling a divine prophecy. And the prophet who delivered this word was Jonah. This is fascinating. Before Jonah was sent to preach doom to the Assyrians, he was sent to preach blessing and victory to apostate Israel. This word of God came true, establishing Jonah's credentials as a true prophet. It also establishes the pattern of God's grace preceding judgment. He gave Israel a great victory before He sent Amos and Hosea to pronounce their doom.

26 For Yahweh saw the affliction of Israel, which was very bitter; for there was neither bond nor free, nor was there any helper for Israel.

Now the writer pulls back the curtain to reveal the divine motive. Why did God do this? Not because Jeroboam was good, and not because Israel was faithful. He did it because He saw their affliction. This is the language of the Exodus, where God saw the affliction of His people in Egypt (Ex. 3:7). Their suffering was "very bitter," and their situation was utterly helpless. The phrase "neither bond nor free" is a merism, a way of saying "absolutely everyone," from the lowest slave to the highest nobleman. They were at the end of their rope, with no human "helper" in sight. And it is precisely at this point of human helplessness that God's sovereign mercy intervenes.

27 But Yahweh did not say that He would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, so He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash.

This is the ultimate ground of God's action: His own word, His own promise. Despite their sin, despite their rebellion, God had not yet given the final word of judgment. The sentence of utter destruction, of being "blotted out," had not been passed. And because the time for that final judgment had not yet come, He acted to save them. He is a God who is faithful to His own purposes and His own covenant timetable. And how did He save them? By the hand of Jeroboam. God's salvation came through a wicked man. This is a stunning demonstration of divine sovereignty. God is not limited to using sanctified instruments. He can use a Cyrus, a Nebuchadnezzar, or a Jeroboam II to accomplish His will. He can use a disobedient king to save a disobedient people, all for the sake of His own name and His own unmerited mercy.

Application

This passage should demolish any lingering self-righteousness in our hearts. It is a stark reminder that any blessing we enjoy, whether personal or national, is a result of God's grace, not our merit. Like Israel under Jeroboam II, we are often blessed far beyond what we deserve. Our natural tendency, when things are going well, is to pat ourselves on the back and assume that our prosperity is a sign of our righteousness. This passage warns us against such arrogance. Prosperity can be a form of common grace given even to the disobedient, a final opportunity for repentance before judgment falls.

We must learn to see the hand of God even in the most unlikely places. God is at work in our world, and He often uses flawed and even wicked leaders to accomplish His purposes. This does not mean we approve of their wickedness, but it does mean we trust in God's sovereignty over it. We should pray for our leaders, not because they are all godly, but because God can use them, as He used Jeroboam II, to bring about periods of peace and stability for the good of His people and the advance of His kingdom.

Finally, we must be humbled by the sheer tenacity of God's covenant love. He saw Israel's bitter affliction, an affliction they had brought upon themselves, and He had compassion. He remembered His promise. In the same way, God saw our bitter affliction in sin, our utter helplessness, and He sent a savior. But He did not send a wicked king; He sent His own righteous Son. Jesus is the ultimate fulfillment of this pattern. He is the one who saves us, not because of our goodness, but because of God's great mercy. He saves us by His own hand, for the sake of His own name, because He has promised not to blot us out, but to write our names in the Book of Life.