Commentary - 2 Chronicles 20:31-34

Bird's-eye view

This brief concluding summary of Jehoshaphat’s reign serves as a crucial, and sobering, evaluation. After the stunning display of God’s deliverance in the main body of the chapter, where Jehoshaphat led the nation in prayer and praise, resulting in a miraculous victory without a single sword lifted, the Chronicler brings us back to the ground. The summary is overwhelmingly positive: Jehoshaphat was a good king, a righteous king, who followed in the faithful footsteps of his father Asa. And yet, there is a persistent and nagging caveat, a "however" that qualifies the whole. The high places were not removed. This was not a failure of ignorance, but a failure of will, both in the king and in the people. Their hearts were not yet fully set on the God of their fathers. This passage, then, is a textbook case of a partial reformation. It illustrates the profound difference between a revival and a reformation. Jehoshaphat experienced a great revival, but the reformation was left incomplete. It stands as a permanent warning against the kind of godliness that is sincere and zealous, but which ultimately tolerates known sin and compromises with idolatrous structures.

The Chronicler's method is important here. He gives the raw data of Jehoshaphat’s reign, his age, the length of his rule, his mother’s name, and then delivers the divine verdict on his character. He did right in the sight of Yahweh. But the lingering pollution of the high places reveals a heart problem, not just in the populace, but as a failure of leadership in the king. The final note, pointing to the chronicles of Jehu the son of Hanani, reminds us that this is a true historical record, and that God keeps meticulous books. Every king, every leader, will have their acts recorded and judged, not by the standards of their day, but by the unchanging standard of God’s law.

Outline

Context In 2 Chronicles

This passage concludes the extensive narrative of Jehoshaphat's reign, which began in chapter 17. The Chronicler has presented him as one of Judah’s great reforming kings. He established teachers of the Law throughout the land (17:7-9), fortified the nation (17:12-19), and sought the Lord with great fervor. His reign, however, is also marked by a significant and recurring weakness: disastrous alliances with the wicked northern kingdom of Israel, first with Ahab (chapter 18) and later with Ahaziah (20:35-37). The immediate context is the glorious victory over the Ammonites and Moabites, a high point of faith and deliverance in Judah's history. This summary in verses 31-34 thus functions as a final report card. It forces the reader to weigh the spectacular triumphs of faith against the persistent, nagging failures of obedience. It sets the stage for the subsequent decline, reminding us that even the best of kings can leave the kingdom vulnerable if the reformation is not thorough.

Key Issues

The Stubbornness of the High Places

To understand this passage, we have to understand the issue of the "high places." These were local shrines, often on hilltops, where sacrifices were offered. Before the Temple was built in Jerusalem, godly men like Samuel offered sacrifices at such places (1 Sam 9:12-14). But after God chose Jerusalem as the one place where His name would dwell and sacrifices were to be centralized (Deut 12), all other places of sacrifice became illegitimate. They were, by definition, centers of syncretism and idolatry. They represented a do-it-yourself, decentralized, will-worship that stood in direct defiance of God's explicit command.

For a king to "remove the high places" was therefore a key indicator of his commitment to true reformation. It was a test of whether he would enforce the First and Second Commandments without compromise. Several good kings failed this test. Jehoshaphat, for all his godliness, is one of them. The text gives a reason: "the people had not yet set their hearts to the God of their fathers." This is not an excuse for the king, but rather an explanation of the deep-seated nature of the problem he faced. The people liked their convenient, local shrines. Their hearts were not yet ready for exclusive, centralized, regulated worship of Yahweh. And Jehoshaphat, it appears, lacked the political and spiritual fortitude to force the issue. This is the anatomy of a compromised reformation. The leader is personally pious, but he tolerates institutionalized disobedience. He wins the battle against the Ammonites but loses the war against the comfortable idolatries of his own people.

Verse by Verse Commentary

31 Thus Jehoshaphat reigned over Judah. He was thirty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-five years. And his mother’s name was Azubah the daughter of Shilhi.

The Chronicler begins his summary with the standard formula for a king's reign. These are the basic, verifiable facts: his territory (Judah), his age at accession, the length of his reign, and his maternal lineage. This is not just biographical trivia. It grounds the narrative in real history. This was a real man, in a real place, for a specific time. God’s covenant dealings are not myths or legends; they are worked out in the grimy particularities of human history. The mention of his mother, Azubah, is also standard, reminding us that these great kings were sons of mothers, embedded in families and genealogies. The covenant flows through the family line.

32 And he walked in the way of his father Asa and did not turn away from it, doing what is right in the sight of Yahweh.

Here is the divine assessment, and it is overwhelmingly positive. Jehoshaphat receives the highest praise a king of Judah could get, short of being compared to David. He walked in the way of his father, Asa. This points to the principle of generational faithfulness. Asa had been a great reformer in his day (2 Chron 14-16), and Jehoshaphat continued that legacy. He didn't have to reinvent the wheel of faithfulness; he inherited a pattern and walked in it. The standard of judgment is crucial: he did what was "right in the sight of Yahweh." Not what was popular, not what was pragmatic, not what was approved by the political pundits, but what was right in God's own eyes. This is the fundamental definition of a righteous ruler.

33 The high places, however, were not taken away; the people had not yet set their hearts to the God of their fathers.

And here is the great "however," the asterisk on the whole reign. After the glowing commendation, we get the hard truth. The high places remained. This was the central failure of his administration. The Chronicler provides a reason that is also an indictment. The people's hearts were not in it. They were willing to follow Jehoshaphat into a national day of prayer when a massive army was on their doorstep. They were happy to collect the spoil after God gave them victory. But they were not willing to give up their convenient, localized, semi-pagan worship centers. Their hearts were not "set" or "prepared" for the God of their fathers. This is the difference between an emergency revival and a deep, lasting reformation. A revival is when you cry out to God in a foxhole. A reformation is when you get out of the foxhole and tear down the idols in your backyard. The people had not done the latter, and Jehoshaphat, their king, had failed to lead them in it. He did not finish the work his father Asa had started.

34 Now the rest of the acts of Jehoshaphat, first to last, behold, they are written in the chronicles of Jehu the son of Hanani, which is recorded in the Book of the Kings of Israel.

The account concludes by citing its source material. The "acts of Jehoshaphat" were recorded in a contemporary document, the chronicles of a prophet named Jehu, the son of Hanani. This is the same prophet who had rebuked Jehoshaphat for his alliance with Ahab (2 Chron 19:2). This tells us two important things. First, God's view of history is written by His prophets. The prophets were not just fortune-tellers; they were inspired historians and theologians who interpreted the events of the nation from God's covenantal perspective. Second, this prophetic record was so reliable that it was incorporated into the official state records, the "Book of the Kings." This is a testimony to the truthfulness of the biblical account. It is not propaganda; it is history, written from a divine viewpoint, citing its sources. God keeps the books, and in the end, all the records will be opened.

Application

The reign of Jehoshaphat is a picture of what we might call "90 percent Christianity." It is sincere, often zealous, and capable of great moments of faith and victory. But it is a faith that tolerates known areas of compromise. It is a reformation that goes far, but not all the way. And this is a constant temptation for us, both personally and corporately.

We are good at dealing with the big, invading armies. When crisis hits, we are often driven to our knees in prayer, and we see God do remarkable things. But what about the "high places" in our lives? What are the tolerated sins, the convenient compromises, the little idolatries that we allow to stand because rooting them out would be difficult, unpopular, or just plain uncomfortable? Perhaps it is a habit, an attitude, a relationship, or a form of entertainment that we know is not right in the sight of the Lord, but we justify it because "our hearts are not yet set" to deal with it. We are waiting for a more convenient season to be fully obedient.

Jehoshaphat's failure teaches us that incomplete obedience is still disobedience. A partial reformation leaves the seeds of future apostasy in the ground. The church today is filled with high places, theological compromises, worldly methodologies, and a tolerance for sins that God has explicitly forbidden. We praise God for the measure of faithfulness we see, just as the Chronicler praised Jehoshaphat. But we must heed the warning. We are called to do what is right in the sight of the Lord, and that means taking a sledgehammer to every last high place, until our worship is pure and our hearts are fully set on the God of our fathers, through the finished work of His Son.