Joash Kills the Prophet

Joash had been hidden in the temple as an infant.

Jehoiada the priest had kept him alive when the queen mother tried to kill all the royal children.

He raised him.

He crowned him king when he was seven years old.

All the years Jehoiada lived, Joash did what was right.

Jehoiada lived to one hundred and thirty years old.

They buried him with the kings because he had done good in Israel.

After Jehoiada died, the princes of Judah came and paid homage to Joash.

He listened to them.

They abandoned the house of the LORD.

They served the Asherim and the idols.

The Spirit of God clothed Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest.

He stood above the people and said: Because you have forsaken the LORD, he has forsaken you.

They conspired against him.

By command of the king, they stoned him to death in the court of the house of the LORD.

The court of the house of the LORD.

The same place where his father had served.

Where his father had hidden the king as a baby.

King Joash did not remember the kindness that Jehoiada had shown him.

He killed his son.

As Zechariah was dying he said: May the LORD see and avenge.

That year the army of Syria came against Judah and Jerusalem.

They destroyed the leaders.

Joash was left severely wounded.

His own servants conspired against him.

They killed him in his bed.

They did not bury him in the tombs of the kings.

The man who had been saved as a child by a priest.

Killed the priest's son in the priest's house.

And was killed by his own servants in his own bed.

The blood of Zechariah was not forgotten.

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