seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
2 Chronicles 26:16 But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. 17 Azariah the priest with eighty other courageous priests of the Lord followed him in. 18 They confronted King Uzziah and said, “It is not right for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord. That is for the priests, the descendants of Aaron, who have been consecrated to burn incense. Leave the sanctuary, for you have been unfaithful; and you will not be honored by the LordGod.”
19 Uzziah, who had a censer in his hand ready to burn incense, became angry. While he was raging at the priests in their presence before the incense altar in the Lord’s temple, leprosy[c] broke out on his forehead. 20 When Azariah the chief priest and all the other priests looked at him, they saw that he had leprosy on his forehead, so they hurried him out. Indeed, he himself was eager to leave, because the Lord had afflicted him.
21 King Uzziah had leprosy until the day he died. He lived in a separate house[d]—leprous, and banned from the temple of the Lord. Jotham his son had charge of the palace and governed the people of the land.
22 The other events of Uzziah’s reign, from beginning to end, are recorded by the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz. 23 Uzziah rested with his ancestors and was buried near them in a cemetery that belonged to the kings, for people said, “He had leprosy.” And Jotham his son succeeded him as king.
c. 2 Chronicles 26:19 The Hebrew for leprosy was used for various diseases affecting the skin; also in verses 20, 21 and 23.
d. 2 Chronicles 26:21 Or in a house where he was relieved of responsibilities
I use to read my Bible in between fares when I worked as a cab driver in Virginia Beach. It was actually an American Standard Version... a paperback... that I actually covered so that it looked like a school book rather than a Bible. One of the places we had to pick up regularly was at the base of the 700 club. Those people always wanted to save my soul before I pulled into the Airport. If they knew I was reading the Bible.... they would want to have a conversation about the book.... and warped as some of them were... I sure wasn't ready to take on a real conversation about the does and don'ts of Biblical Proportion. Sometimes I would loose my place during the trip and apparently I missed reading portions of my book. I don't remember reading this before.
A king got a big head.... and then his big head started rotting!!!! I would have remembered reading that almost as much I enjoy thinking of Ehud, the Judge from Judges 3:12-30.
This is the commentary from Bible.org.
Someone has said that the human being is the only animal that you can pat on the back and his head swells up. Uzziah started believing his own press clippings and his pride led to a fall. In one hour he ruined a prosperous lifetime as a successful king. When Uzziah became strong, his heart was lifted up, and that led him to enter the holy place in the temple to offer incense to the Lord. But the Law of Moses restricted that duty to the priests, and Uzziah was not a priest (Num. 18:1-7). Only the Messiah Jesus would combine the offices of Priest and King.
Perhaps Uzziah rationalized, “Yes, I know the Law of Moses, but let’s not be legalistic! I’ve done well leading my people politically, but they also need strong religious leadership. Not being able to offer incense weakens my ability to lead and damages my public image. Besides, it’s for a spiritual cause, to enhance our worship. And, all the foreign kings do it that way.” It wasn’t gross immorality or idolatry. The only problem was, God had forbidden it. Like another man in the Bible with a similar name, Uzzah (2 Sam. 6:6-7), who was struck dead for touching the ark of the covenant, Uzziah presumed on the holiness of God. Taking upon himself a task that required holiness, Uzziah was rendered ceremonially unclean for the rest of his life by being struck with leprosy. We should learn ...
How is it that the American church has widely embraced a teaching for which there is absolutely no support in the Bible, that our emotional problems stem from low self-esteem? Pride is the root sin, at the heart of all sin.
When Uzziah arrogantly went in to offer incense, Azariah and 80 other priests courageously confronted this powerful king. We learn a second lesson about pride:
God will not share His glory with proud man. If a man honors the Lord, the Lord will honor that man (1 Sam. 2:30). But if a man thinks that he is free to disregard God’s Word and begins exalting himself, he will come under God’s discipline (if he is a believer) or God’s judgment (if he dies not trusting in Christ for salvation). The more successful we become, the more it ought to drive us to our knees with the awareness of our own weakness and sin, so that we cling to God alone as our strength and salvation.
Uzziah started out by inventing something everyone would benefit from in times of war. His towers would save lives. He was quite the hero while he was still in his own skin..... and that.... drove him insane. Now he's been smacked down.... that spoiled rotten king who thought he was in charge of everything... died, living alone.... literally rotting away.He didn't even get to continue running things.... his son got to take over for him.... check out the easy English commentary.
For the rest of Uzziah’s life, his son Jotham ruled on his behalf. Jotham had control of the royal palace. This was from about 751 BC until Uzziah’s death in about 738 BC.
The prophet Isaiah made a record of Uzziah’s rule. Isaiah saw a vision of God in the year that Uzziah died (Isaiah 6:1). Also, he did have visions about Judah during the rule of Uzziah (Isaiah 1:1). Maybe he wrote the record before he became a prophet. Perhaps he collected the information and he wrote the record later.
When Uzziah died, they buried him near the graves of his ancestors. Because of his skin disease, they could not bury him with his *ancestors. But the people gave honour to him as a good king.
He was a good king until he got a big head about himself. I've seen that happen to so many good politicians. You can't make a good pie with a rotting apple.