The Priests Confront the King King Uzziah (2 Chronicles 26) • The 11th King of Judah 790-739 B.C. (52 years) • He did what was right. God made him prosperous. • He built towers, cities, forts, catapults, cisterns. • He loved the soil and expanded agriculture. • He led the military of 300k armed men. • He expanded Judah and controlled/taxed major trade routes. • Archeology confirms Uzziah. His name appears in seals, Assyrian records, and on a burial inscription. 2 Chronicles 26:15 (NLT), “His fame spread far and wide, for the Lord gave him marvelous help, and he became very powerful.” • Azariah (personal name) means, “Yahweh helps.” • Uzziah (throne name) means, “Yahweh is strong.” 2 Chronicles 26:16-19 (NLT), But when he had become powerful, he also became proud, which led to his downfall. He sinned against the Lord his God by entering the sanctuary of the Lord’s Temple and personally burning incense on the incense altar. 17Azariah the high priest went in after him with eighty other priests of the Lord, all brave men. 18 They confronted King Uzziah and said, “It is not for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord. That is the work of the priests alone, the descendants of Aaron who are set apart for this work. Get out of the sanctuary, for you have sinned. The Lord God will not honor you for this!” 19 Uzziah, who was holding an incense burner, became furious. 2 Chronicles 26:17, “Azariah the high priest went in after him with eighty other priests of the Lord, all brave (valiant, courageous) men.” “It is not for you.” “Get out of the sanctuary.” “You have sinned.” “The Lord God will not honor you for this!” 2 Chronicles 26:19b-21 (NLT), But as he was standing there raging at the priests before the incense altar in the Lord’s Temple, leprosy suddenly broke out on his forehead. 20 When Azariah the high priest and all the other priests saw the leprosy, they rushed him out. And the king himself was eager to get out because the Lord had struck him. 21 So King Uzziah had leprosy until the day he died. He lived in isolation in a separate house, for he was excluded from the Temple of the Lord. His son Jotham was put in charge of the royal palace, and he governed the people of the land. Isaiah 6:1-4 (NLT), It was in the year King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. He was sitting on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the Temple. 2 Attending him were mighty seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3 They were calling out to each other, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory!” 4 Their voices shook the Temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke. 5 Then I said, “It’s all over! I am doomed, for I am a sinful man. I have filthy lips, and I live among a people with filthy lips. Yet I have seen the King, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.” Conclusion: It Takes Courage to Confront Pride Pride us. It is the essential vice that leads to every vice. Pride us from God’s blessing. Pride us think we are better than/equal to others. Pride us to our own sin, while magnifying the sin of others. Pride us to break God’s law and boundaries. Pride us to the devil. Proverbs 16:18 (NLT), “Pride goes before , and haughtiness before a fall.” Lewis, “If I am a proud man, then, as long as there is one man in the whole world more powerful, or richer, or cleverer than I, he is my rival and my enemy. The Christians are right: it is Pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. Other vices may sometimes bring people together: you may find good fellowship and jokes and friendliness among drunken people or unchaste people. But pride always means enmity—it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God.” The first step to courageously confront the sin of pride is to admit and confess when we are prideful.