耶洗別和希特勒
在公義的上帝手中
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When Jehu came to Jezreel, Jezebel heard about it, powdered her hair, combed her hair, and looked out of the windows. When Jehu came in, Jezebel said, "How is it, O Zimri, who killed his master?" Jehu looked up at the window and said, "Who will obey me?" Two or three eunuchs looked out at him from the window. Jehu said, "Throw her down!" and they threw her down. Her blood splattered on the wall and on the horse; she was trampled underfoot. Jehu went in, ate and drank, and said, "Bury this cursed woman, for she is the king's daughter." So they went to bury her, but found only her skull, feet, and palms. . They returned and told Jehu, who said, “This is in fulfillment of what the LORD had spoken through his servant Elijah the Tishbite, saying, ‘The dogs will eat the flesh of Jezebel in the fields of Jezreel; Her carcass will be like dung in the fields of Jezreel, and no one will be able to say that it is Jezebel." (2 Kings 9:30-37)
You are your own judge
John Owen, a 17th-century British Puritan theologian, said: "In this world, God's greatest judgment on man is to harden his heart." If a person sins, God will judge him. It is not that the God who exercises judgment has not done anything, but the time has not yet come. His righteousness is bound to be revealed in His timetable - this can be clearly seen from the location of Jezreel alone.
Naboth, a righteous man in Jezreel, was murdered by Ahab and Jezebel. At that time, Elijah warned Ahab: "The dogs will eat the flesh of Jezebel in the gates of Jezreel. Everyone who belongs to Ahab will die." Those who are in the city will be eaten by dogs, and those who die in the field will be eaten by the birds of the air." It was in the field of Naboth the Jezreelite that Jehu killed Joram, who succeeded King Ahab, and the same fate happened to Jezebel. The prophet predicted that he would die in Jezreel, the capital city where he prospered.
Just like Hitler who promoted World War II in Berlin and finally died in Berlin, Berlin witnessed God’s execution of justice and judgment! At the end of World War II, the Third Reich was rapidly disintegrating, and Berlin was under siege. Hitler, the murderer of 6 million Jews, committed suicide with a pistol in the Führerbunker in Berlin, and his wife also took poison.
When the wicked are in power, can God's children have the spiritual vision and attitude to look forward to the salvation of the righteous King? (Pictured is the Jewish Museum in Berlin.)
The two evil men, Jezebel and Hitler, both had the same premonition when death came - they knew they were going to die, and they both wanted a good death, so they ended their lives by forcing a smile. When the Allied forces surrounded Berlin, Hitler held a small wedding in the map room of the Führer's bunker; Jezebel, who knew she was going to die, heard that Jehu had arrived in Jezreel, "she powdered her hair, combed her hair, and looked out of the window." Perhaps she had extravagant hopes: If you want to die, you must die beautifully.
Jezebel and Hitler died in different ways: Hitler ended his dramatic and brutal life with a "suicide" with a pistol and poison; Jezebel died of "homicide", with her blood trampled and her flesh eaten by dogs. But both of them were so arrogant: the Nazis trampled all Western European countries and even marched on Russia; Jezebel issued a killing order, causing Elijah, who had defeated the prophet of Baal, to run for his life in panic. Have they ever thought about their own ending?
In Kings 9, verses 17-22, the author uses repetition and slow-motion realistic rhetorical question "Is it peace?", accompanied by the murderous Jehu galloping on horseback, laying out a tense irony:
A watchman who was standing on the upper floor of Jezreel saw Jehu coming with a group of people. He said, "I see a group of people." Jehoram said, "Send a man on horseback to meet them and ask, 'How is it?' "Is it not peace?" The horseman went to meet Jehu and said, "The king asked, "Is it peace?" Jehu said, "What does it matter to you whether it is peace or not? Get behind me."
⋯⋯The king sent another rider on horseback. When the man came to them, he said, "The king asked, 'Is there peace or not?'" Jehu said, "What does it matter to you whether there is peace or not? Get behind me."
⋯⋯Joram king of Israel and Ahaziah king of Judah each went out in his own chariot to meet Jehu, and found him in the field of Naboth the Jezreelite. When Joram saw Jehu, he asked, "How can you be at peace, Jehu?" Jehu said to him, "How can you be at peace when your mother Jezebel practices so many whores and sorcery?"
When she asked Jehu, "Is it safe for you to kill your master?" Jezebel said the last words of her life, "Is it safe?" and was waiting for Jehu to execute the death sentence that she was completely unable to resist. It is reminiscent of the song "Strength" The world is overwhelming, the times are unfavorable, what can be done if the good things are not gone, what can be done if the evil is not gone!" Xiang Yu, who had no choice but to commit suicide by the Wujiang River!
Jehu, who heard the words "It's safe to kill your master," saw how arrogant Jezebel was before her death. He couldn't help but want to deal with her immediately and called on the people in the palace to carry out this evil. The woman was sentenced to death and said: "Who supports me?" At this time, the eunuchs in the forbidden palace listened to Jehu's words: "Throw her down!" A generation of evil queens were full of evil. Gregory of Nyssa was right when he said: "Your attitude towards others is your own sentence, and you are your own judgment."
The ending of Jezebel and Hitler reminds people of the poet’s lament:
Warrior, why do you boast in your evil deeds? God's love endures. Your tongue is evil and deceitful, like a razor that cuts quickly. You love evil more than good, and you love lying rather than speaking righteousness. O deceitful tongue, you love to speak words of destruction! God will also destroy you forever; He will take you away, tear you out of your tent, and pluck you out of the land of the living. (Psalm 52:1-5)
Who can escape God’s judgment
The fate of Jehoram and Jezebel fulfilled Elijah's prophecy to Ahab. However, Jehu, who "acted for heaven", had brutal methods that exceeded Elijah's prophecy. He even used borrowed swords to kill people and wiped out Ahab's family. .
Jehu sent a letter to Samaria, informing the leaders of the northern kingdom who had helped Ahab kill Naboth in Jezreel, to elect a son of Ahab to take over the throne so that they could fight for the dynasty (against the new king Jehu). How dare the leaders? ! All surrender to Jehu. Jehu wrote to them again: "If you will obey me and obey my voice, then tomorrow at this time you will bring the heads of your master's sons to me in Jezreel." As soon as this letter arrived, the leaders They killed all 70 of Ahab's royal family, put their heads in baskets, and sent them to Jehu in Jezreel.
Jehu piled the heads of the royal family at the city gate and asked the people: "You are all innocent/guilty. It was I who betrayed my master and killed him; but who killed these people?" Jehu removed them The royal queen did not stop there and killed all the remaining members of Ahab's family in Jezreel, as well as his ministers, close friends, priests, etc., completely eradicating the power of Ahab's family. This revealed Jehu's insidiousness and scheming, and also fulfilled the destiny spoken by Jehovah through His servant Elijah concerning the house of Ahab.
The extremely vicious Jehu got up and went to Samaria. At the place where shepherds were shearing sheep, he also killed 42 brothers of King Ahaziah of Judah, leaving no one alive. This way he was able to temporarily eliminate the foundation of the Baal religion's invasion of the southern kingdom! (Refer to 2 Kings 10:1-14)
Even a person with bloody hands and evil deeds, can he still feel guilty when he looks back? However, what is certain is that there is no way to escape God’s judgment. Whether it is Ahab’s family or Jehu who acts as judge, they must face God. Calvin said: "When God wants to judge a nation, He gives them wicked rulers." God cleans out evil through Jehu, the "rebellion leader" The family of Ahab, together with them, destroyed Baal in Israel and attacked the Northern Kingdom, which started from idolatry. But Jehu, who had not completely freed himself from the contamination of Jeroboam's faith, could not escape God's judgment. God declared through the prophet Hosea: "In a little while, I will punish the house of Jehu for the bloodshed in Jezreel, and I will also destroy the nation of Israel." (Refer to Hosea 1:4)
Can the children of God who stand on the watchtower also pray for the wicked while they await their trial?
Do something and don't do something
During World War II, the anti-Nazi German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer decided to return to his country and join the resistance movement in order to prevent the massacre of Jews. Four years later, he was arrested because of his companions' failed plan to assassinate Hitler, and was hanged 21 days before Hitler committed suicide.
Bonhoeffer's courage and determination are touching, especially his perseverance in accompanying the prisoners in prison and his classic works "Following Christ" and "Prison Letters". But when he first decided to become an assassin, he had three self-examinations in his mind: 1) He had become a murderer; 2) His role changed from a young priest to a spy; 3) How to not reveal his identity in front of the jury. Telling "white lies" about an assassination plan?
How should God’s children walk in the present when evil people like Jezebel and Hitler are in power? Should he shoulder Jehu's assassination mission, or should he shoulder Bonhoeffer's rescue plan without hesitation? Or choose Einstein's thinking: flee to the United States to find President Roosevelt to build an atomic bomb to prevent the atomic bomb from falling into Hitler's hands, only to regret its terrible destructive power after the fact?
In a world where the world is constantly in turmoil and powerful, children of God should think carefully and face it bravely.
1. Maintain a spiritual perspective and take a high view of the outcome of the wicked:
Wicked people such as Ahab, Jezebel, Hitler, etc. will eventually be judged, and the time and progress of the judgment are in the hands of God. Before they receive the judgment they deserve, God's children should be careful not to fall into the trap of "seeing the wicked and the arrogant enjoying peace and feeling unjust." Just as the poet lamented that he almost lost his faith because he saw evil people in power. It wasn't until we entered the sanctuary of God that we saw clearly that God actually placed the wicked on slippery ground and caused them to fall into destruction. How desolate they became in the blink of an eye - they were destroyed by fear. (Refer to Psalm 73:1-20)
2. Avoid falling into the trap of "victim becomes perpetrator":
God can use any person or method to bring judgment on the evildoer. However, the victim must be careful not to become the perpetrator, lest he be as insidious and cunning as Jehu was in the process of getting rid of Jezebel, so as to deceive himself, unable to obey God's law with all his heart, and ultimately unable to escape God's judgment! After World War I, the Allies forced Germany to assume all war responsibilities in the Treaty of Versailles, which was one of the main reasons for the rise of Nazism and the triggering of World War II. At the end of World War II, the victorious Allies carved up Germany. Wasn't the political calculation and ambition behind this also the modern version of Jehu?
3. Hold a long-term perspective and watch God turn and update history:
God destroyed the northern kingdom through Assyria, and destroyed the southern kingdom through Babylon. Through the suffering of the heart, He healed Israel’s chronic idolatry, and made the exiled foreign people yearn to return to God, return to their homeland, and extend to return. His plan of salvation carried out through His Son, Jesus. As John Milton said: "God can bury the pain of the previous generation and become spiritual fertile ground for the next generation." The Cultural Revolution brought much pain, but it washed away the imprint of China's thousands of years of faith; God Redeemed man-made suffering and gave birth to tens of millions of Chinese believers after the Cultural Revolution! History (the renewal of) is in the hands of God, History is His story.
4. Do your best to fulfill the prophetic and admonishing role of God’s children:
Augustine said in "City of God": "God causes sinners to be destroyed through two channels: 1) The people of Sodom are judged by their sins; 2) The sins of the people of Nineveh are covered by repentance. "It is true that the northern kingdom (especially after the Ahab family came to power) was very bad (such as the city of Sodom), but God still used Elijah, Micaiah and Elisha to rebuke and exhort the Ahab family of the northern kingdom. The purpose is to hope that before God’s judgment, the Northern Kingdom will repent because of the prophet’s message, and their sins will be covered and forgiven. Just as Daniel exhorted King Nebuchadnezzar to "do justice and have mercy on the poor," the church established by God plays the role of social conscience and is the light and salt of a dark and fallen world!
5. Never let the cross become a crusade when you are humiliated:
Playing the role of "a shining light in a crooked and perverse generation" must come with a price: Elijah was accused by Ahab of being the culprit of the famine in the northern kingdom; Micaiah was slapped in the face and imprisoned for preaching disloyalty; Jeremiah preached for decades Opposed by kings, princes, priests, and the whole earth. The taste of the cross is something that Jesus, who is like a hen guarding his chicks, can best understand. However, the children of God are careful not to let the cross mutate into a crusade. Let Jesus be the example for Christians in humiliation and suffering, as the scripture says:"He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not retaliate in return; when he was harmed, he did not threaten others, but committed himself to him who judges righteously." (1 Peter 2:22-23)
Let watchfulness and prayer become weapons in the face of persecution.
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6. Let watching and praying become weapons in the face of persecution:
The prophet Habakkuk brought the theological confusion and injustice that "God actually called a worse Babylon to judge the corrupt southern kingdom" to the watchtower to pray. He gained the perspective of "justification by faith" and saw that God foretells the judgment of the wicked through five woes, so he buried his previous confusion with prayer and praise. (Refer to Habakkuk Chapters 1-3) In addition to learning "Vengeance belongs to God, and He will repay", we must also pray for evil kings like Jezebel or Hitler, and obey "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome by good." In addition to the teaching of "evil", let us be like Habakkuk, using prayer and watch as weapons to respond to the persecutors, and wait for the day of God's redemption!
Wu Xianzhang, received a master's degree from the Institute of Civil Engineering at National Taiwan University and a doctorate in theoretical and applied mechanics from the University of Illinois. He later switched to studying theology and received a master of divinity and a doctorate in Old Testament theology from Trinity Theological Seminary in Chicago. Currently, he is professor of Old Testament, director of the Doctoral Department of Pastoral Affairs, director of the Doctoral Department of Mission, and CEO of the Pastoral and Mission Research Center at China Evangelical Theological Seminary.
Professor Wu has written numerous books, whether they are commentaries, sermons, character studies, or reflections on important issues. He always keeps the church and believers in mind, and presents the essence of biblical theology with a caring eye. His words contain theologians, The playwright and novelist's timeless insights, passion and earnestness penetrate the back of the page, and reading his writing is like seeing the person himself.