The Book of Asa

The Book of Asa

A Study of Leadership

Part One

“And Asa cried unto the Lord his God…”
2 Chronicles 14:11

Within the life of true disciples, there are experiences and unveilings of our God which leave His indelible mark on them. There are mountain-top experiences, revelations undiscernible to the human eye, and visitations to His own. As precious as these experiences are, it is in the valleys, in the darkest times of the night, where the God of all gods becomes our God. It is in the valley of the shadows; in the lonely and desolate places we discover “thou art with me”. (Ps. 23:4) In the tapestry of our own personal life, it is the dark threads that accentuate the bright colors of His own weavings. His “curious work” (Ps. 139:15-16) wrought within the “secret” places of our being are full of wisdom and understanding far beyond our own ability to comprehend.

Asa was raised in a religious environment where idolatry and compromise infiltrated the land of Judah. But the word declares:

“And Asa did that which was good and right
in the eyes of the Lord his God”
2 Chronicles 14:2

He stood up against the heathen ways which mingled with the worship of God. He stood for truth and became an instrument of Light in his day. The contemptible ways of human reasoning, the groves, and the false and defiling things which were of his own house, made Asa rise up in passion and love for his God.

“And Asa did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, as did David his father. And he took away the sodomites out of the land and removed all the idols that his fathers had made. And also Maachah his mother, even her he removed from being queen, because she had made an idol in a grove; and Asa destroyed her idol, and burnt it by the brook Kidron.”
1 Kings 15:11-13

Truth, to be truth, must first find expression in our own personal lives, then in our families, before it can bear fruit in the world around us. Asa’s passion for God began in his own sphere of life. God’s ways change not and our love of truth must also bear testimony of its power within our own lives.

“Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church?”
1 Timothy 3:2-5

See: Leadership

May we consider the testimony of those who have gone on before us; men and women who walked in the truth of their day, who stood for righteousness and by such OBTAINED a “good report” (Heb. 11:2) in the eyes of God! Let us arise out of the mediocrity of our day as we feel the coming storm. As Asa, let us walk in the Light of God, proclaiming His truth to all within the sphere of our lives – beginning with our own self. We must awake from the slumber and the obscurity of soothing words and a gospel void of the fire and intensity of spirit that leaves us barren and numb to His “voice”.

He is calling out to us TODAY, if we will HEAR what the Spirit is saying.

“And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us, therefore, cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.”
Romans 13:11-14

Brian Troxel