The Coming of the King

Pt 13 of the series

Text: 2 Kings 9-11, Malachi 4:4-6, Luke 1:17

What Do You Think?

Jehu was what we call an imperfect type of Jesus. As king of Israel, he did overthrow the wickedness of the Omrides (Ahab, his wife Jezebel and their son Jehoram) and he did rid the kingdom of the worship of Ba’al. But Jehu failed to call the kingdom back to worship at Jerusalem. He failed to walk in the way of YHWH (Jehovah), the God of Israel.

By contrast, Jesus was the perfection of the coming king. His Elijah (John the Baptist) predicted his coming with a call to repentance – to turn from sin and to Jesus. He did not physically overthrow the Romans or get rid of the corrupted priesthood of the Sadducees; but he did something completely different. He made a new covenant with mankind through his own death, burial and resurrection. He made it possible for those of who accept him to be free of the oppression of this world.

• Why do you think God uses the imperfect types of the Old Testament to show us part of the truth about Jesus?
• If you had lived under the Omride rule, would you have viewed Jehu as a liberator? A tyrant? A good king? Bad king?