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Uzziah the Leper King - 2Chron. 26 -7, 2Kings 15-16
Uzziah the Leper King - 2Chron. 26 -7, 2Kings 15-16
Uzziah reigned in Judah while Jeroboam II reigned in Israel. Politically and monetarily they reigned during the high point of Israel and Judah. Religiously, it gets a different appraisal. They both are among the longest reigning kings of these two kingdoms (Jeroboam reigned 41 years and Uzziah 52 years, cp. 2Kgs. 14:23 and 2Chron. 26:3). YET, you will perhaps notice that Uzziah gets scarcely one chapter in each of 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles, and not long chapters at that! God is NOT impressed with the power and authority of men, not even kings!
With a good counsellor to guide and advise him, Uzziah did cause Judah to prosper as a kingdom. “He continued to seek God in the days of Zechariah, who had understanding through the vision of God; and as long as he sought the Lord, God prospered him” (2 Chron. 26:5).
Yet, even he could not remove the idolatry out of the hearts of the people. THEN, such good times go to his head and he becomes puffed up with his own importance. “But when he became strong, his heart was so proud that he acted corruptly, and he was unfaithful to the Lord his God, for he entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense” (2 Chron. 26:16).
The offering of sacrifice and incense in the temple was the sole prerogative of the priests (see Ex. 30:1–10; Num. 16:40), not even a king was allowed to assume such activity. Uzziah does so anyway, and for such presumption the LORD strikes him with leprosy for the rest of his life! Such meant being ‘excluded’ from contact with people.
While we do not know the eternal end of Uzziah, we do see that God stepped into our temporal world to show that man must not go beyond the revelation of God. Not even the king can change, dismiss, or add to the revelation God apart from God Himself inspiring and revealing such.
You and I are not in the same exalted position of serving God as was Uzziah, hence we have even less of any right to think that we can change, dismiss, or add to God’s revealed instructions concerning worship.
Hugh DeLong
