“Jumpin' Jehoshophat”

The Appomattox Court House Presbyterian Church Pulpit
By The Rev. Woody Fisher, Good News Jail & Prison Ministries
The Lord’s Day, May 8, 2005
2 Chronicles 20:1-12

      I was raised in a small town in central Illinois. My hometown is actually smaller than Appomattox, if you can believe that. At that time there were two grocery stores, now there are none. There was a hardware store that also closed some years ago. We do have a bank and a post office.

      It was a busy little town when I was a kid. On Saturday nights all of the farmers came to town to do their "tradin'." They brought the whole family and the kids ran loose while the parents bought the weeks groceries. The town fathers decided that it was not good to have all those kids running the town with nothing to do, so they put up a large wooden frame for a screen by the railroad tracks, built some bleachers for seating and every Saturday night we had free shows.

      Most of the time they were westerns. We watched Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Hopalong Cassidy and some lesser known cowpokes like Johnny McBrown, Lash LaRue, Whip Wilson and a host of others. I dearly loved those cowboy movies. I had some favorites, but what I really liked were their sidekicks. Almost every one of them had a sidekick who usually provided some comic relief to relieve the tension of fighting Indians, bandits and horse rustlers. I remember Wild Bill Hickok had jingles; Roy Rogers had Pat Brady and his rattletrap jeep, Nellie Belle; Gene Autry had Smiley Burnette. My very favorite was Gabby Hayes. Just to look at him made me laugh, and when he opened his mouth with that gravelly, twangy voice I lost it altogether. There is a website for Gabby Hayes. If you go to that website you will find several of the epithets Gabby used so often are listed there and if you click on them you can actually hear him say them. When Gabby really got excited, one of the most frequently used expressions was, "jumpin' Jehoshophat." I don't know if that phrase had its origin in chapter 20 of 2nd Chronicles or not, but it very well could have. As we progress through the message this morning we will see at the end of this chapter that Jehoshophat was jumping for joy, but in the passage before us right now he was bowed in despair. It is often the case. Frequently before we can jump for joy we have to be brought to our knees. Let's see how this worked in the life of Jehoshophat.

      Take a look at what it says. Notice what it says in verse 1. It happened after this. After what? Look at the last verse of chapter 19. "Act with courage and the lord will be with those who do well." At the end of 19, Jehoshophat makes a little speech. In order to ensure fair handling of matters, he set up judges in the land and he advises the people regarding how the priests are to have the leadership over the people. He was doing what was good and right. Notice what it says in 19:4. He led the people back to the god of their fathers. Look back to 17:3-6.

      He had made one mistake by compromising in making an alliance with Ahab, but for the most part Jehoshophat was a man of God. Jehoshophat was a good man doing what God wanted him to do. Now let's pick up again at 20:1. After this-after he had led his people back to God and had set up an orderly leadership of his people, his enemies gathered to do battle against him.

      Have you ever been in a similar position? You have the right motivation-you strive to do the right thing and it seems that the bottom falls out right out from under you. In these days, people often have to pay the price for firm convictions. There are issues all of us have to deal with, and it often seems that the right thing to do is just the opposite of what is politically correct and socially acceptable. Because of human progress and the development of sophisticated technology we are faced with decisions about the moral acceptability of matters like abortion and euthanasia. It is my conviction that God's word speaks to those kinds of issues. God is presented in his word as the author and originator of life, and I stand firm on that. I'm not going to blow up an abortion clinic or demonstrate in the streets, but I am going to allow those convictions to dictate my personal decisions and I am going to teach it as truth whenever I have the opportunity, and let the chips fall where they may. I believe that if we do not have the absolute authority of the word of god as the basis for our moral convictions, we will find ourselves in moral chaos. When god's people rejected his authority, the book of Judges says, "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes." When everyone in a society determines right by their own standards, there is moral chaos.

      So Jehoshophat determined that he would do right based on the authority of God himself, and look what happened. Look at verse 2-a vast multitude was coming against him. There is often a price to pay for standing firm for your convictions. Notice his reaction in verse 3-he was afraid. Some people say it is wrong for a child of God to be afraid, but I don't think so. As I read this verse, I am reminded of Psalm 56:3, "What time I am afraid, I will trust in you." Our fear ought to drive us to trust in God. Often times when we are in a spot where we absolutely don't know what to do and we are scared out of our wits, that's the time we learn more about God and his care than at any other.

      What was Jehoshophat's response to his fear? He set himself to seek the Lord and in verse 4 it says he gathered Judah together to pray. In verses 6-12 we have Jehoshophat's prayer. I've thought that maybe I should write a book about this. We have "The Prayer of Jabez." Well my book would be called "The Prayer of Jehoshophat!"

      This prayer is built around 3 questions. The first question is found in verse 6-Are you not? The second is found in verse 7-Did you not? The third is found in verse 12-Will you not? As Jehoshophat prayed he questioned God. It's ok to do that-God can handle it. Do you ever question God when you pray? I think God would rather have honest questions than insincere platitudes. So let's take a look at this prayer built around these questions.

1. Are you not?-verse 6
      The question, "Are you not God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven and do you not rule over all the nations?" is a rhetorical question. The answer is obvious, "of course." So, this question is an acknowledgement of the sovereignty of God. He is the ruler of all people as well as the heavens. Since God controls the nations, and these nations have conspired against Jehoshophat, the obvious conclusion is that if God wanted to do something about this he could. By posing this question, Jehoshophat acknowledges that God is in control.

      One of the questions that I am asked most frequently in one jail after another is, "Why did God do this to me and why doesn't he do something about it?" These questions are in the opposite of Jehoshophat's. His question implies that god is at work in these circumstances. Their questions imply that he is not. Does God work in awful circumstances? Yes indeed. What about Joseph? Did God cause his brothers to mistreat him? I don't think so. Did God use their mistreatment to accomplish his purpose? Yes he did. Can God use your circumstances? In this case Jehoshophat acknowledges God's ability to work, in spite of these nations bent on evil and destruction.

2. Did you not?-verse 7
      Did you not? Past tense. After acknowledging God's ability to work in this present time, Jehoshophat acknowledges how God has worked in the past. Now this prayer begins to turn a corner. There is a change of tone here. It moves from an acknowledgement of God's ability to work to a reminder of God's obligation to work. He says, "Lord you gave us this land. As a matter of fact, you drove out the people who used to live here in order for us to have it. We even built you a sanctuary here. Come on Lord, what gives?

      Not only that, but these people who are preparing to attack-we had a chance to destroy them and you told us not to--vs. 10. What kind of a deal is this? We obey you by treating them nice and now they turn around and try to wipe us out. Isn't that a great way to reward obedience?

      What is Jehoshophat actually doing here? He's saying to God, "Lord this looming battle is not about me, it's about you. We are your people and we have done what you have told us to do. Therefore, your reputation is on the line.

      I have heard a lot of people demand that God intervene, but not because his name is on the line. Rather because they want something for their own sake. They somehow feel that God is obligated to move on their behalf. One of the ways I judge whether an inmate is really sincere in his faith is when he gets to the point of not demanding or even begging God to get him out of his trouble, but acknowledging his own responsibility in his problems and accepting what comes as God's work. Here in 2 Chronicles, Jehoshophat pleads with God to act, not so that he can be spared, but so that God can be honored.

3. Will you not?-verse 12
      Look at the picture here. Jehoshophat is the king-the leader of God's people. He bears the full responsibility for his nation. He admits in verse 12 that he has no means for meeting the challenge before him. As a matter of fact, he says, "We don't even know what to do." We are at a total loss, but our eyes are on you. Can you imagine the weight of responsibility on this man? It says in verse 13 that standing before him was all Judah with their little ones, their wives and their children. They were looking to Jehoshophat for protection and leadership, but he didn't know what to do. He was at the end of his rope. Have you ever been there? When we're at our end, that's when god really begins.

      Not long ago I began meeting with a man who had lost everything. He has a PH.D in education and for a number of years had been the headmaster of a large Christian school. He spent his summers traveling to universities around the country where he taught classes and did seminars. He was respected and sought after, and then the bottom fell out. He had gone to work one morning and at about 10:00 AM, he received a phone call. It was his wife and she informed him that she had collected her things and was in the process of leaving him. He rushed home, they had a confrontation and he snapped. He found a gun and was preparing to kill himself as she called his pastor. She distracted him until the pastor arrived and his suicide was aborted. She did indeed leave him, and two weeks later he was arrested for attempted abduction. She told police that he had held her at gunpoint and threatened her life.

      I began meeting with him while he was out on bond. I first met with him in his home, but I couldn't get him to stop sobbing long enough to really talk. The next time I met with him I suggested that we meet in a public place thinking that he might be able to control himself better there. Not so, he sobbed his heart out in the café section of a Ukrop's grocery store. It took over a month of meeting on a weekly basis before he could gain any control over his emotions. He lost his wife, but he also lost his position, his reputation and his self respect. He lost everything that mattered to him and he didn't know what to do.

Conclusion:
      Jehoshophat saw God work in a miraculous way. We won't take the time to look at all of that other than to say that God destroyed the enemies in a way that confounded human wisdom. Verse 24 says that when Judah looked over the battlefield, there were dead bodies everywhere. Not a single member of the opposition army escaped. Now look at verses 27-29-Jumpin Jehoshophat! If you just look at the end of the story you see Jehoshophat jumping for joy. You have to read the rest of the story to see that before he could jump for joy he had to fall to his knees. Are you not? speaks of the sovereignty of god; Did you not? speaks of the faithfulness of god; Will you not? speaks of the integrity of god. What are your circumstances? How do you view them? Do you see them through in light of God's sovereign purpose, his absolute faithfulness and his unswerving integrity?