Finishing Strong
(This message was preached many years ago but it has remained ever so relevant and
impactful. You will be blessed as you read in Jesus’ name, Amen)
Title: Finishing Strong
2 Chronicles 26:1-11, 16-21
2Chron. 26:16 – But when he was strong his heart was lifted up, to his destruction,
for he transgressed against the LORD his God by entering the temple of the LORD to burn
incense on the altar of incense.
18 And they withstood King Uzziah, and said to him, “It is not for you, Uzziah,
to burn incense to the LORD, but for the priests, the sons of Aaron,
who are consecrated to burn incense. Get out of the sanctuary,
for you have trespassed! You shall have no honor from the LORD God.”
19 Then Uzziah became furious; and he had a censer in his hand to burn incense.
And while he was angry with the priests, leprosy broke out on his forehead,
before the priests in the house of the LORD, beside the incense altar.
20 And Azariah the chief priest and all the priests looked at him, and there,
on his forehead, he was leprous; so they thrust him out of that place.
Indeed he also hurried to get out, because the LORD had struck him.
21 King Uzziah was a leper until the day of his death. He dwelt in an isolated house,
because he was a leper; for he was cut off from the house of the LORD.
Then Jotham his son was over the king’s house, judging the people of the land.
If you had watched the 2000 Olympic Games held in Sydney, Australia,
you would have noticed that being able to win the short races depended on the starting,
while for the long distance races, the winner is known from how he/she runs the last laps.
Of course, it is the same with any other athletics competition.
An athlete who began a race very well might lose the race if he/she is not careful.
Someone like the great Ethiopian Haile Gabrieselassie who is very
tactful and who usually stays behind at the early part of most of his races
goes on to win in the end. Maria Mutola of Mozambique applied the same approach
when she ran the finals of the 800 meters to win the gold medal.
You can miss your mark and lose just when you are about to finish the race.
When a pilot is in the air, he can maneuver and do a lot of things with the airplane
but as he approaches the tarmac on touchdown, his freedom to do as he likes with
the machine becomes limited. At that moment he listens to instructions from the control tower.
If he chooses not to listen then he misses what all along had been a peaceful and beautiful flight.
The problem with many Pentecostals today is not in their starting but how they finish.
We have buried before their deaths many young men and women who would have been great for the Lord.
They just allowed glamour and gain to distract them and they finished badly.
From our text we see the story of the longest serving king of Judah.
King Uzziah ascended the throne when he was 16 years old. He sought the
Lord in the days of Zechariah. As long as he sought the Lord, listening to his mentor,
Zechariah, who knew the mind of God and who gave him directions, King Uzziah did so well.
God made him prosper as long as he sought the Lord. You never can do anything except
God enables you. ‘Without me’, Jesus said, ‘you can do nothing’. It is God that makes
those who prosper and who enjoy their prosperity. Uzziah was so successful that he could
have been described as the ultimate warrior. He discomfited the Philistines;
he overcame the Arabians; he destroyed the powers of the Ammonites; he subdued the
nations round about so that they ended up bringing gifts to him, and submitting to him.
Let me say however that he could do all these because he had a host of loyal
and faithful fighting men.
Uzziah was also a builder. He built towers in Jerusalem and in the desert.
A tower is a high, elevated place for the watchmen to be able to see and have a
long view of anybody approaching, including enemies. A tower signifies a lifestyle
that is elevated above mundane preoccupations. A lifestyle elevated above the petty and
unproductive but time consuming scuffles that many engage in from day to day.
A lifestyle elevated above activities motivated by the desire for vainglory and self-adulation.
A tower Christian is ahead of the pack, consumed by one and only one passion,
to please God by representing and manifesting Him in as many ways as possible.
God is described as our strong tower to whom we run and we are safe. Of course we enjoy his
protection, his elevation and his foresight. And he puts at our disposal the ability
to see and know some things before they occur.
In 1758, Robert Robinson wrote one of the most beloved hymns of the church,
“Come Thou Fount”. The words have moved Christians from the time he wrote it:
Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.
Many people do not know that, Robinson left the faith after he had written the above hymn.
Years later on a summer evening he was riding in a carriage with a lady friend.
They rode past a church and heard the strains of the hymn Robinson had written so
many years before coming from the open windows of the church. He began to cry.
His friend asked him the reason for his tears and he told her that the hymn was his.
“I would give everything I own,” he said, “to know the peace that I knew when I wrote that hymn”.
It’s not as much as how you started but how you finish.
Uzziah was also an inventor. He invented cunning machines and engines,
which he placed on the walls of Jerusalem to enable him, shoot large stones,
the bombs and missiles of those days. He was able to make spears, bows, slings,
habergeons and many other instruments of war.
He was so marvelously helped by God that he became strong but… After God had helped him,
giving him the opportunity he did not give to others, his heart became lifted up to his
own destruction. His fall and poor finishing began from the heart. That is where it all begins.
When the sensitivity to the leading of God’s Spirit becomes blurred poor finishing begins.
When self-dishonesty can be tolerated, poor finishing begins. When pride is tolerated in the heart
and actions become motivated by the desire for recognition, often to the detriment of others
(whom the mind regards as of no consequence), poor finishing begins. But we should finish strong.
We are not of them that draw back unto perdition, the writer of Hebrews says.
We have a cloud of witnesses whose triumphant finishing is a model for us to emulate and
keep before our very eyes continuously.
Many people make a big deal out of fornication, paying little or no attention to the
position of the heart. This is a wrong orientation and it should not be accepted by all
that want to finish strongly – those who want to hear the welcome call of the Saviour
when they ascend the golden stairs – those who want to meet the one who made their lives
on earth worth living. Take seriously the admonition from Proverbs that you guard your heart
with all diligence.
If you ever wondered why God seem to ignore some popular ministers who fell into
‘popular sins’ you may not need to look too far. There is this thing about the heart
and how important it is before the presence of God. Recall what Jesus said about
receiving the kingdom of God like a little child. You know something of the workings
of the heart of a child. If you have lost yours do all you can to reinvent it.
I remember a rebuke pronounced many years ago –‘… when you were little in your own eyes…’
There is a strong correlation between the state of your heart and how you finish your
race as a believer.
David and Saul were both sinners. David probably committed more sins than Saul
(he fought more battles and apparently killed more people) but seemed to have had a better
heart position than Saul. Going through the Psalms reveal the heart of a man that was never
far away from God.
A man begins to fall from the heart. Satan’s sin was committed in his heart.
A man of God begins to fall when the position of his heart changes.
A good man’s heart is on his right side, according to Solomon.
He can keep better watch over it that way.
Pride came to Uzziah. He thought he had overgrown the doing of the Word.
He thought that God could not talk to him anymore. He had become too familiar with God.
The Priests that God had placed over him couldn’t instruct him anymore.
He became the only king who was put out from being king because he contracted
leprosy from which he died.He could have stayed longer than the 52 years he spent on the throne.
After starting off so well, just when he was about to breast the tape, he finished poorly.
May that not be your experience in Jesus name. Pride caused him to stumble.
He was so successful but he had a bad finishing.
Samson’s experience is another very instructive piece in this regard.
He never needed to die with the people he came to save but he did and you might
say he finished not too well.
Solomon is yet another example. God even appeared to him twice.
Many others have been similarly called. Some made it, others missed it.
Learn from their mistakes.
In 1 Kings 11:4 we see how Solomon fell. “…when Solomon was old…”
(You could say when he got used to a spiritual position or when he got used
to being praised, etc) he was not as circumspect as he used to be.
Many preachers come to the point where they assume that even if they do not pray,
they yet can preach well. Such people are getting old. They are beginning to finish badly.
When you believe you do not need to read the bible anymore to preach well, you are getting old.
That means you have started taking God’s presence for granted.
Samson must have thought like that for it is written that he went out
thinking he would “shake himself like before…” He did not know that God had left him.
God cannot be taken for granted. We should always seek his presence
and see His call on our lives as something to be celebrated daily
and something to be thankful for.
God doesn’t want your heart taken from him. When your heart positioning is
right there are many things that God seemingly overlooks. God was not angry with
Solomon because he married many wives but because his heart was turned away from him.
