“Trash One, Hold on to Another” – FBC Morning Light (6/12/2023)

Well, a good Monday morning to you. Did you have a good Lord's Day yesterday? I hope so. I hope you were able to gather with God's people and listen to his word and just have a good time together in God's house.

Well, today we start off the new week reading in 2 Kings chapters 9 and 10, Acts 27, and then Psalm 116. So this morning I want to focus on 2 Kings 10 and just zero in on an interesting phenomenon that we see even in our day.

So this has to do with Jehu, who has been tasked to kind of deal with Ahab and his family. So a little historical background here. Ahab, of course, was the husband of Jezebel, introduced widespread Baal worship, exalted the prophets of Baal and the priests of Baal and so on and so forth throughout the northern kingdom of Israel.

And so Ahab was really a wicked king in terms of turning people away from the Lord and the worship of the Lord and the practices of the land. And so in judgment upon Ahab and his evil practices and paganism, the Lord said he's going to be eradicated, the Lord's going to have him taken out, and his family as well.

And that's exactly what Jehu is tasked to do, and so he does so. And then when we come to chapter 10, we read about verses 15 through 17, how Jehu saw to it that the rest of Ahab's family was executed, and then he saw to it that the worshipers of Baal would also be executed.

And he arranged this thing like a worship service for Baal and called all the people that wanted to worship Baal to come together, and we read about that in verses 18 through 27 and through 28. And so all these people come together, and the worshipers of Baal, they're all engaged in this worship service, and then Jehu orders their execution.

Now, as I recall, I didn't check before this devotional this morning, but as I recall, the Lord told him to deal with Ahab and Ahab's family, but I don't remember the Lord telling Jehu, execute everybody who's gotten caught up in the error of Ahab, that that's what he does.

And it does say in verse 26 and 27, they brought the sacred pillars out of the temple of Baal and burned them, they tore down this temple to Baal. Verse 27, they broke down the sacred pillar of Baal, tore down the temple of Baal, and made it a refuse dump to this day.

So the worship center of Baal is turned into a garbage dump, and Baal worship is effectively dealt a death blow. Now, it doesn't eventually get wiped out completely, unfortunately, but nevertheless, Jehu's been very effective at dealing a blow, serious blow, to Baal worship.

And verse 28 says, Thus Jehu destroyed Baal from Israel. Now, you would say that's absolutely commendable, and it certainly is. This is Israel, these are God's people, they're supposed to be worshiping Yahweh, the one true God, the only God, and yet they have erected all these altars to Baal, they've built a worship center for Baal, and practiced paganism.

And Jehu's been instrumental in wiping that out to a large degree. He destroyed Baal from Israel. What I want to focus on is what comes next in verse 28, or verse 29. It says, However, when you read a however, pay attention, because that tells you, ah, something's wrong here.

Yes, indeed. However, Jehu did not turn away from the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who had made Israel to sin, that is, from the golden calves that were at Bethel and Dan. Now, there's no question, but the worship of Baal was absolutely wrong.

But guess what? So was the worship that Jeroboam had instituted, the golden calves. And so, yeah, Jehu got rid of one kind of false worship, but allowed another kind of false worship to persist. He didn't turn the people back to the proper worship of Yahweh.

Instead, they continue and persist on in this false worship that Jeroboam established. All right, so what's the point? The point is that this kind of thing persists even to this day, where it's one thing to get rid of all expressions of one kind of sin and idolatry, and you can be very vigilant about eradicating one kind of sin and idolatry, but in the end, you hold on to other kinds of sin, other forms of sin, other forms of idolatry, perhaps, and the sin, therefore, remains.

Hypocrisy in Condemning One Sin While Tolerating Another

So you can apply that in a lot of different ways. I think, for example, I just saw an article this morning where there's been this whole controversy with Bud Light, and they're bringing in to endorse their product, this trans person, this guy who thinks he's a woman, and all this kind of thing, and using him to promote Bud Light.

Well, that didn't last. There was this tremendous backlash against Bud Light for this, and Budweiser's stocks have tanked, and all kinds of people have boycotted Budweiser. Well, isn't it interesting that they have no problem with drinking, and probably excessive drinking, of Bud Light, but nevertheless, that's another story.

What I want to get at is, the article is saying that these delivery guys delivering Bud Light, you know, their truck says Bud Light all over the side of it, they're getting people giving them the finger, okay?

Well, okay, is it legitimate to protest against these corporations that are promoting immorality, and gender confusion, and all of that kind of stuff? Well, yeah, I think it absolutely is appropriate to be opposed to those organizations, and corporations, but doing so while holding on to my own pet sin, on the other hand, is hypocrisy.

It's hypocritical. We can apply that in other ways. I've known people who have been, for example, very adamant teetotalers. They would be very condemning of the Bud Light protesters, and they won't drink Bud Light anymore, but they'll drink other stuff.

They'll condemn the drinking of any kind of alcohol, in any measure, whatsoever, any shape or form, okay? Fine, get the position, but then at the same time, they'll be gluttonous. They'll be obese, and grossly overweight, and yet pig out, and they don't see there's a problem with their own behavior, but they sure see a problem with somebody else's.

Jesus dealt with this as well, didn't he, when he talked about looking at the speck in another person's eye when there's a moat in your own? He said, get rid of this first, and then you can deal with that.

Yeah, you know this business of condemning somebody else's sin while holding on to another kind of sin is replete throughout this, you see it throughout the Scripture, examples of it throughout the Scripture, but we also see it in our own day.

So here's the point, here's the point. We need to be very careful about our own approach to the kinds of sins that really bother us, the kinds of sins that rankle us and make us angry, and want us to lash out against others for their sin.

As we rightly, legitimately are unhappy with that sin, we also need to stop and pause and ask ourselves, is there sin in my own heart? Am I tolerating sin in another area? Maybe not in this area, but am I tolerating sin in another area?

A Prayer for Deliverance from Hypocrisy

Let's be careful about that, lest we be hypocritical. So our Father and our God, we pray today that you would deliver us from this error of Jehu, be very diligent about protesting and getting rid of and dealing with sin in one area, but tolerating it in another.

Deliver us from that, we pray. We ask it in Jesus' name, and for His sake. Alright, well listen, have a good Monday, hope your week gets off to a great start, and God bless.