House Arrest

2 Kings 15:5

The Lord afflicted the king with leprosy until the day he died, and he lived in a separate house. Jotham, the king’s son had charge of the palace and governed the people of the land.

Talk of the town last weekend was former President Arroyo’s hospital arrest. Comelec charged her of electoral fraud in the 2007 polls which prevented her plan to seek medical treatment abroad.  Political and moral issues aside, it’s still a pity to see a once-esteemed person, who for almost two terms held full control of the land, now deprived of even her fundamental rights to travel. She hoped to be remembered as ‘the good president’. We’ve seen her as ‘the working president’. But in the end, with all these thrown at her, she’d probably lose all good names.

In the book of kings, King Uzziah had a different name, Azariah. We can only find seven verses allotted to his fifty-two years of service here. The verse mentioned above was his distinction: God afflicted him of leprosy. ‘Oh, I thought he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord? Why would God afflict him?’ Let’s turn to 2 Chronicles 26 for our answers. Verse 5 is one clue. He feared and sought the Lord during the days that Zechariah instructed him. You’d easily guess what happened without the prophet’s guidance.  Verse 16 summed up his career: he won wars, fortified the walls, owned so much livestock, had a well-trained army, built defense machines, became well-known. He was at the top of everything and everyone, and loving it! There’s just one place where his authority matters not: the Temple. There, he’s on equal footing with everybody else. There, he’s at the mercy of the priests’ intercession. There, the prophets can speak God’s word and it’s the final authority – not his. And so one day, he decided to burn incense at the altar. He may not be of Aaron’s line, but his blood was that of kings. ‘I’m a royal blood for nothing!’ could be his heart’s boast. And so God struck him with leprosy and was excluded from the temple, from the palace, and from all people ever since.   

With great power comes great responsibility. But it is also true that with great responsibility comes great power. Every step up that ladder opens up a bigger hold of things, and people. That faith-full centurion gave us a picture of how it is to be a man of authority: “I tell this one ‘Go’, and he goes; and that one ‘Come’ and he comes. I say to my servant ‘Do this’, and does it.” Who wouldn’t want a ‘Yes’ to all his demands? Admit it, we all do! We want to have control, to be independent, to do it our own way. And it’s everything God says we shouldn’t do. That’s why Christianity is not appealing to many. We hate surrendered lives. Why be a servant when we have that chance to be kings!  But what good is it for a man to gain the whole world yet forfeit his soul? Do take Uzziah’s life as a warning. Mrs. Arroyo’s too.  See to it that in your every climb up, God is with you. Because in Him, even if the world strips you empty without warrant, even if they deprive you of all rights and privileges, even if they confine you in the smallest of rooms, you’re life is still full.