2 Kings 16

When Pekah had been ruling Israel for almost 17 years, Ahaz son of Jotham became the king of Judah.

Ahaz was 20 years old when he became the king of Judah. He ruled from Jerusalem for 16 years. He did not do things that pleased God, the God he should have worshiped, the way his ancestor King David had done. \*

Instead, he behaved in the same sinful way that the kings of Israel behaved. He even burned up his son as an offering to an idol. That was one of the disgusting things that the people groups who had previously lived in the land of Canaan had done. God drove those people out so that the Israelites could settle in the land.

He offered sacrifices and burned incense on hilltop shrines, on the tops of many other hills, and under many big trees. \*

Then King Rezin of Aram and King Pekah of Israel led their armies to attack Jerusalem. Those armies surrounded the city, but they could not defeat the army of Ahaz and conquer it.

(When King Rezin of Aram led his army to invade Judah, he forced the Judeans who were occupying and defending the city of Elath to leave. He made that city part of his own kingdom. Arameans went to live in Elath, and they have continued to live there.) \*

King Ahaz sent messengers to King Tiglath Pileser of Assyria to tell him, “I promise that I will become your subject king if you come and rescue me from the armies of Aram and Israel that are attacking me.”

Ahaz took the silver and gold that was in God’s temple and that he was keeping in the royal palace and sent it as tribute to the king of Assyria.

Tiglath Pileser agreed to do what Ahaz asked. He led his army to attack Damascus, and they captured the city. He executed Rezin. Then his army forced the people who lived in Damascus to leave and go to live in the city of Kir. \*

Then King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet King Tiglath Pileser. He saw the altar that was there. He sent Uriah, the high priest in Jerusalem, a drawing of the altar and a detailed description of how to build one like it.

So Uriah followed the directions that King Ahaz had sent him, and he built an altar {in Jerusalem} like the one in Damascus. Uriah worked hard to finish the altar before Ahaz returned from Damascus.

When King Ahaz returned from Damascus, he inspected the altar {and approved of how Uriah had built it}. Then he brought sacrifices and offered them on the altar. \*

He burned a sacrificial animal and a grain offering on it. He also poured a wine offering onto it. He also scattered on it the blood from his fellowship sacrifices.

There was a bronze altar {in the temple courtyard} where the Israelites considered God to be especially present. {Uriah had positioned the new altar so that the bronze altar} was between the new altar and the temple. Ahaz had Uriah move the bronze altar away from the temple and put it on the right side of his new altar. \*

Then King Ahaz ordered Uriah, “I want you to use this new altar for the sacrifices that the priests burn completely each morning and for the grain offering that they offer each evening. I also want you to use it for the burnt offerings and grain offerings that I bring. I also want you to use it for the burnt offerings, grain offerings, and wine offerings that the people bring. When the priests offer animals as burnt sacrifices or fellowship sacrifices, scatter the blood of those animals against the sides of the altar. The old bronze altar will be only for me to use when I pray.”

So Uriah did what the king commanded him to do. \*

King Ahaz told his workers to take off the panels of the bronze carts that were outside the temple. He also told them to take off the water basins that were on them. He also had them take the giant water basin that people called a sea off the backs of the bronze statues of oxen that it rested on. He had them put it on stones they spread on the ground {so the basin would not sink into the earth}.

Earlier one of the kings had had his workers build a covered walkway that people could use to get to the temple courtyard on the Sabbath day. Another king had made a private entrance into the temple courtyard for the kings of Judah. Ahaz had his workers take down that walkway and close up that entrance. Ahaz did all these things in order to please the king of Assyria. \*

The book in which the kings of Judah recorded what happened during their reigns describes further things that Ahaz did.

When Ahaz died, the Judeans buried him in the part of Jerusalem that people called the City of David. That is where people had buried his ancestors. Ahaz’s son Hezekiah became the next king. \*