I've been reading through the bible this year, as a challenge to myself to complete it.  A guy called Dave Bish (@davebish_ on Twitter) challenged me to read through the bible from cover to cover, and I took up the challenge!

So far it's been great, and God has blessed me in it.  I've enjoyed reading from book to book, taking in the truths inside the pages and discovering more of Gods love than I imagined I would do.  Then I came upon 2 Chronicles 20:33!  

Throughout the books of Kings and Chronicles, it details a bunch of kings who ruled over Israel and Judah, most of which did 'evil' in the sight of the Lord apart from a small number who did all that was good in God's eyes.

Well, we then come to King Jehoshaphat!  The books of Kings and Chronicles talks briefly about Jehoshaphat in a very interesting way.  Scripture says the following in verse 33:

"Thus Jehoshaphat reigned over Judah.  He was thirty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-five years in Jerusalem.  His mothers' name was Azubah the daughter of Shilhi.  He walked in the way of Asa his father and did not turn aside from it, doing what was right in the sight of the Lord.  The high places, however, were not taken away; the people had not yet set their hearts upon the God of their fathers"

This passage really started getting me thinking...How could Jehoshaphat do all that was good in the sight of the Lord, yet not do the obvious thing and remove all of the high places, idols, places of worship, baals, asherim poles, etc?  How was it possible that he did ALL that was good in the sight of the Lord and somehow miss this important act?

I guess to a degree I have no answer yet (more study coming!), but what it did do is get me thinking about my own walk with the Lord.  I know that I'm only saved by grace, and I know that on my best day my greatest acts are like dung to Him.  It is only by his grace that I'm doing well at all...HE gets the glory, not me.

However, in my day to day walk with Jesus I now have to ask "Are there high places of worship in my life that I simply haven't removed?  Are there areas of my life, where I've said to Jesus "this is mine"?  If you're similar to me you dont like to think that you hold anything back from Jesus, but I'm sure there are high places in my life that I should have tore down a long time ago and just left it to 'grace' to deal with.  Could it be that I've absolved myself of the responsibility of putting these things to death, because "grace covers a multitude of sins"?

So I now wonder what these high places, or 'baals' could be?  I guess the simplest answer would be to say that anything which exalts itself highly in our lives that does not glorify Jesus, something which takes our attention away from Jesus, or something which deliberately stands against Jesus would be a high place.  These are going to be varied and different, depending on who we are.

The answer, I would argue, is that we ask the Holy Spirit to give us wisdom.  In doing so, we are better able to recognise these high places in our lives, and then get to repenting of them.  It might mean great sacrifice for some of us (especially if the high place were to be something like finances, or treasured possessions), but if that thing takes greater place in our lives than Jesus, or if Jesus is not allowed access to that area...then surely it has to go?

I leave those questions to you to ponder and pray yourselves...it's certainly got me thinking!