The Folly of a Good Finish: Asa's Feet of Clay Text: 2 Chronicles 16:11-14
Introduction: The Danger of Coasting
There is a peculiar danger that stalks the man who has known great success and faithfulness. It is the danger of the home stretch, the temptation to believe that a good start and a strong middle guarantee a triumphant finish. We admire men who start well, but God is the God of the whole story. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. And as the Chronicler is at pains to show us, a man can run the first twenty laps of the race with valor and then stumble badly on the last one, all within sight of the finish line.
King Asa is a case study in this kind of spiritual tragedy. His early reign was a marvel of reform. He purged the idols, commanded Judah to seek the Lord, and trusted God for a stunning victory over a million-man Ethiopian army. He was a good king, a righteous king. For thirty-five years, he was the kind of king you wanted. But the last few years of his life serve as a stark warning to all of us. A long track record of faithfulness is no vaccination against a final, foolish rebellion. Pride is a subtle disease, and it can fester for decades before it breaks out in a final, fatal sickness.
We come today to the obituary of King Asa. And like many obituaries, it records the basic facts of his life and death. But the Holy Spirit is not merely a court historian; He is a divine diagnostician. And in these few verses, He puts His finger on the root of Asa's final failure. It was a failure of the heart that manifested in his feet. It was a disease of unbelief that was more severe than the disease in his body. Asa's story warns us that it is possible to trust God for the million-man army, and then refuse to trust Him with your gout.
This passage is not fundamentally about medicine. It is about lordship. It is not a polemic against doctors, but rather against the idolatry of expertise. It poses a question that every one of us must answer, in big trials and in small. When affliction comes, when the body fails, when the crisis hits, who is your first resort? Who gets the first call? Is it Yahweh, or is it the physicians? Is it the Creator, or the creature? How you answer that question reveals where your ultimate trust is placed.
The Text
Now behold, the acts of Asa from first to last, behold, they are written in the Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel. And Asa became diseased in his feet in the thirty-ninth year of his reign. His disease was severe, yet even in his disease he did not seek Yahweh, but the physicians. So Asa slept with his fathers. And he died in the forty-first year of his reign. And they buried him in his own tomb which he had cut out for himself in the city of David, and they laid him in the resting place which he had filled with spices of various kinds blended by the perfumers’ art; and they made a very great fire for him.
(2 Chronicles 16:11-14 LSB)
The Unwritten Warning (v. 11)
The Chronicler begins his summary with a standard historical note.
"Now behold, the acts of Asa from first to last, behold, they are written in the Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel." (2 Chronicles 16:11)
He points us to another book for the full historical record. But the Spirit has selected this final incident for our instruction. He is not just giving us information; He is giving us a warning. The phrase "from first to last" invites us to consider the whole trajectory of the man's life. He began with such promise. When Zerah the Ethiopian came against him with a million men, Asa cried out to God, saying, "O Yahweh, there is no one besides You to help in the battle between the powerful and the powerless; so help us, O Yahweh our God, for we trust in You" (2 Chron. 14:11). That is the cry of faith. That is a man who knows where his help comes from.
But something changed. Earlier in this very chapter, when Baasha of Israel threatened him, Asa didn't cry out to God. He plundered the temple treasury and hired a pagan king from Syria to help him. He trusted in geopolitical maneuvering instead of divine intervention. A prophet named Hanani rebuked him for it, reminding him of God's past deliverance. And how did Asa respond? Not with repentance, but with rage. He threw the prophet in prison. This is the context for his final sickness. The heart that imprisons the prophet is the same heart that ignores the Lord. A man who will not receive God's Word will not seek God's help. His spiritual arteries had been hardening for years. The disease in his feet was just the final, visible symptom of a much deeper disease in his soul.
The Misplaced Trust (v. 12)
Here we come to the heart of the matter, the spiritual diagnosis of Asa's final years.
"And Asa became diseased in his feet in the thirty-ninth year of his reign. His disease was severe, yet even in his disease he did not seek Yahweh, but the physicians." (2 Chronicles 16:12 LSB)
In the thirty-ninth year of his reign, after decades of blessing and stability, affliction strikes. His feet, the very things that a king stands upon, the foundation of his posture and authority, are diseased. And the disease was "severe." This was not a minor inconvenience; it was a debilitating, painful, constant trial. And in that trial, his heart was revealed.
Now, we must be very clear here. The sin of Asa was not that he went to a doctor. The Bible is not anti-medicine. Luke, the author of the third gospel, was a "beloved physician" (Col. 4:14). Joseph commanded physicians to embalm his father. Medicine, like agriculture or engineering, is a legitimate outworking of the dominion mandate. It is the careful study and application of the created order for the good of man. The problem was not the seeking of the physicians, but the priority and the exclusivity of it. The text is precise: "he did not seek Yahweh, but the physicians."
The "but" is the key. It sets up a contrast, a replacement. Asa substituted trust in the creature for trust in the Creator. He treated God as irrelevant to his physical condition. For him, this was a medical problem, not a theological one. So he sought out the medical experts. This is the essence of practical atheism. It is the modern secular mindset in a nutshell. We have compartmentalized our lives. If we have a spiritual problem, we go to the pastor. If we have a financial problem, we go to the banker. If we have a medical problem, we go to the doctor. And in each of these cubicles, we act as though God has no jurisdiction. Asa had a severe foot problem, and he made a functional idol out of the medical guild of his day.
He forgot that Yahweh is Jehovah Rapha, "the Lord who heals you" (Ex. 15:26). He forgot that every physician's skill, every remedy, every bit of knowledge about the human body is a gift from the God who designed it. To seek the gift while ignoring the Giver is rank idolatry. It is to thank the waiter for the meal and pretend the chef doesn't exist. Jeremiah puts it this way: "Thus says Yahweh, 'Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from Yahweh'" (Jer. 17:5). That was Asa. His heart had turned away, and so he made the flesh of the physicians his strength.
The Final End (v. 13-14)
The conclusion of Asa's life is recorded with a kind of sad finality.
"So Asa slept with his fathers. And he died in the forty-first year of his reign. And they buried him in his own tomb which he had cut out for himself in the city of David, and they laid him in the resting place which he had filled with spices of various kinds blended by the perfumers’ art; and they made a very great fire for him." (2 Chronicles 16:13-14 LSB)
The physicians, in whom he placed his ultimate trust, could not save him. For two years he suffered, and then he died. He "slept with his fathers," a common euphemism for death. He was given a royal burial, with great honor. There were spices and a great fire, a sign of respect for his long and mostly successful reign. The people remembered the good years. They honored the memory of his early reforms.
But God's assessment is sharper. God remembers the final years. The people saw the great fire of honor, but God saw the cold embers of a faith that had grown dim. Asa had started the race like a champion but limped across the finish line, leaning on the wrong support. It is a sobering reminder that all the pomp and circumstance of a funeral means nothing if your heart is not right with God at the end. Men may honor you for your past accomplishments, but God demands present faith.
Conclusion: First Things First
So what is the lesson for us? It is profoundly simple, yet we are experts at getting it backward. The lesson is this: in every trial, in every sickness, in every crisis, seek Yahweh first. Before you call the doctor, before you call the financial advisor, before you call your lawyer, before you even call your pastor, your first motion should be to get on your knees. Your first consultation should be with the Great Physician.
This does not mean you don't call the doctor. It means you call the doctor under the authority of God. It means you pray, "Lord, you are my healer. You have appointed means of healing in your world. Please guide the mind and hands of this physician whom I am about to see. Give him wisdom. Bless this medicine. But my ultimate trust is not in him or in it; my trust is in You. Whether you heal me through these means, or apart from them, or not at all, you are sovereign, and you are good."
When you do this, you put the physicians in their proper place. They are no longer your savior; they are simply one of God's servants, one of His instruments. You are free to use their services without idolizing them. But when you run to them first, as your functional god, you are putting a weight on them they cannot bear, and you are insulting the God who can.
Asa's story is a tragedy because he had seen the power of God. He knew what it was to be utterly dependent on Yahweh and to see Him work wonders. But he forgot. In the comfort of his old age, he grew self-reliant. His trust shifted from the invisible God to the visible expert. He finished poorly.
By God's grace, we must determine to finish well. We must fight the good fight, finish the race, and keep the faith right up to the end. And the way we do that is by cultivating a moment-by-moment, dependent trust on God. When the diagnosis comes, when the pain flares, when the fear rises, let your first thought be a prayer. Let your first instinct be to seek Yahweh. He is the Lord. The physicians are not. Let us not be a people with feet of clay.