The Crooked Stick and the Straight Line: Text: 2 Kings 14:23-27
Introduction: The Perplexing Providence of God
We live in an age that wants God to be tidy. We want Him to be predictable, manageable, and, above all, to operate according to our political sensibilities. We want the good guys to win, and we want them to win because they are good. We want the bad guys to lose, and we want them to lose because they are bad. And when God's moves on the great chessboard of history do not align with our neat and tidy categories, we are tempted to either trim the biblical text to fit our expectations or, what is worse, to accuse God of some sort of inconsistency.
The passage before us this morning is one of those glorious, perplexing texts that shatters our tidy boxes. It presents us with a wicked king, a rebellious nation, and a surprising, almost scandalous, display of divine mercy. Here we have Jeroboam the Second, a man who is explicitly evil, a man who perpetuates the state-sponsored idolatry that was rotting Israel from the inside out. And what does God do? He uses this wicked man to grant Israel its greatest military and territorial expansion since the days of Solomon. He blesses the nation with immense prosperity and success, not through a righteous reformer, but through a corrupt and idolatrous king.
This is the kind of thing that makes the modern evangelical mind short-circuit. We want to draw a straight line from national righteousness to national blessing. And while that is a general biblical principle, it is not an iron-clad, mathematical formula that we can use to put God in our debt. God is sovereign. This means He is utterly free. He can draw a straight line with a crooked stick if He wants to. And here, in the life of Jeroboam II, we see Him doing just that. He uses a bad man to do a good thing for a bad nation, all because of a promise He made and a pity He felt.
This passage forces us to grapple with the complexities of God's providence. It teaches us about the difference between common grace and saving grace. It reminds us that God's covenant faithfulness is not ultimately dependent on our faithfulness. And it shows us that God's purposes will stand, even when He has to use the most unlikely and unworthy of instruments to bring them about.
The Text
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
(2 Kings 14:23-27 LSB)
A Long and Wicked Reign (v. 23-24)
We begin with the basic facts of the reign of Jeroboam II.
"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. 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." (2 Kings 14:23-24)
First, notice the length of his reign: forty-one years. This was one of the longest and most stable reigns in the history of the northern kingdom. From a purely secular perspective, this was a golden age. There was peace, there was prosperity, there was power. But the divine assessment cuts through all the external glitter. The first and most important thing the Holy Spirit wants us to know about this man is that "he did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh."
His evil is not described in terms of personal vices, though he likely had many. It is defined by his public, official policy. He did not depart from "the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat." This phrase is a recurring indictment throughout the books of Kings. It refers to the political and religious system set up by the first Jeroboam to secure his throne. He feared that if the people went to Jerusalem to worship, their hearts would return to the Davidic king. So, as a matter of political expediency, he established a counterfeit religion. He set up golden calves in Dan and Bethel, established a new priesthood, and created a new religious calendar. It was state-sanctioned, state-controlled idolatry. It was a fundamental rejection of the First Commandment, cleverly disguised as religious convenience.
This was not just a personal failing; it was institutionalized rebellion. Jeroboam II inherited this system and perpetuated it. He was the custodian of a corrupt state church. He was successful, he was powerful, and he was long-reigning, but in God's economy, he was an evil man leading a nation in sin. This is a crucial reminder for us. A nation can be experiencing immense material prosperity and military success and still be spiritually rotten to the core. God's evaluation is not based on the Gross National Product, but on faithfulness to His Word.
A Surprising Success (v. 25)
Now, given the spiritual bankruptcy of the king and the nation, what follows is jarring.
"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." (2 Kings 14:25)
This evil king presides over a massive military victory. He restores the borders of Israel to a size not seen since the glory days of David and Solomon. This was a significant achievement, reclaiming land that had been lost to enemies for generations. But notice the source of this victory. It was not due to Jeroboam's military genius or his political savvy. It happened "according to the word of Yahweh." God decreed it.
And who was the messenger of this divine decree? None other than Jonah, the son of Amittai. This is the same Jonah who would later be sent to Nineveh, the capital of Israel's most feared enemy. It is fascinating to consider this. Before Jonah was sent to preach repentance to the Assyrians, he was sent to his own people to prophesy national blessing and expansion under a wicked king. Jonah was a prophet of both judgment and grace, both to Israel and to the Gentiles. This earlier prophecy, a prophecy of earthly blessing, came to pass exactly as God said. This establishes Jonah's credentials. The God who could accurately predict the restoration of Israel's borders is the same God who could accurately predict the overthrow of Nineveh.
But the central point is this: God is the one who gives this victory. He speaks it through His prophet, and He accomplishes it through a wicked king. God is not held hostage by the character of the instruments He uses. He can use a Cyrus, a pagan king, to restore His people. He can use a Nebuchadnezzar, His "servant," to judge them. And He can use a Jeroboam II to save them. This is a profound display of divine sovereignty. God's plans are not contingent on finding a perfect human partner.
The Reason for the Reprieve (v. 26-27)
The final verses give us the divine rationale behind this unexpected mercy. Why would God do this? Why bless a sinful nation under a sinful king?
"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. 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." (2 Kings 14:26-27)
The reason is twofold, and it has everything to do with God's character and nothing to do with Israel's merit. First, God saw their affliction. The word "saw" here is not a passive observation. It is the same active, compassionate seeing that God demonstrated in Egypt: "I have surely seen the affliction of My people" (Exodus 3:7). Israel was in a desperate state, oppressed by enemies, and utterly helpless. The phrase "neither bond nor free" is a way of saying everyone, from the highest to the lowest, was suffering. There was no human "helper." They had reached the end of their rope.
And in their helplessness, God had compassion. This was not a reward for their righteousness. It was a gift prompted by their misery. This is common grace. It is the rain that falls on the just and the unjust. It is the sun that shines on the evil and the good. God, in His kindness, grants temporal blessings, moments of reprieve, and national prosperity even to those who are in rebellion against Him. He does this out of sheer pity and to lead them to repentance (Romans 2:4). This prosperity was a mercy, but it was a mercy that Israel, as the prophet Amos makes clear, would squander on luxury and injustice.
The second reason is even more profound: God's covenant promise. "But Yahweh did not say that He would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven." God had made an unconditional promise to Abraham. He had sworn an oath. Despite Israel's relentless covenant-breaking, God would not break His covenant. He had not yet reached the point of final judgment. The time for the Assyrian exile was coming, but it was not yet. And so, to preserve His people and to be faithful to His own name, He acted.
And how did He act? "He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash." The word "saved" here is the Hebrew word yasha, from which we get the name Joshua, or Jesus. This is a temporal, political salvation, a deliverance from their enemies. But it is a salvation nonetheless, and it comes from God. God used a corrupt politician to deliver a temporary salvation to an unfaithful people because He is a compassionate and covenant-keeping God. This is a staggering thought. God's mercy is so stubborn that He will use the very instruments of rebellion to display His grace.
Conclusion: The Greater Jeroboam and the True Salvation
So what are we to do with this strange account? We must see it as a pointer to a much greater reality. This story is a shadow, and the substance is found in Jesus Christ.
Like Israel, we were afflicted. Our affliction was not at the hands of the Syrians, but at the hands of sin, death, and the devil. Our condition was "very bitter." There was "neither bond nor free," for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And there was "no helper" for us. We were utterly helpless, without strength, unable to save ourselves.
And God saw our affliction. In the fullness of time, His compassion was not just a feeling; it became flesh and dwelt among us. He did not send a flawed human king to grant a temporary reprieve. He sent His only Son, the perfect King, to accomplish an eternal salvation.
And God did this because of His covenant promise. He had promised a Seed to the woman who would crush the serpent's head. He had promised Abraham that in his Seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. He would not "blot out the name" of humanity from under heaven. And so, just as He saved Israel by the hand of Jeroboam, "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).
God used a crooked stick, Jeroboam, to accomplish a temporal salvation. But for our eternal salvation, He used the straightest stick there ever was, the sinless Son of God. And He did it in the most perplexing way imaginable. He saved us by the hand of a cross. He took the most wicked act in human history, the murder of the Son of God, and used it to accomplish the greatest good, the redemption of the world. If God can use the evil of Jeroboam II to bring about a temporary blessing, how much more can He take the ultimate evil of the crucifixion and turn it into our everlasting salvation?
This passage should humble us. It should crush our political pride and our self-righteous calculations. It should cause us to marvel at the sovereignty of a God who is not constrained by our categories. And above all, it should drive us to worship the God who, seeing our bitter affliction and remembering His promise, saved us not by the hand of a wicked king, but by the precious hand of His own beloved Son, Jesus Christ.