I love reading about best practices. Religiously I pop open my laptop and drink from the sages at MacWorld and LifeHacker to see what new tips and tricks they offer. I love to watch courses on Lynda.com and occasionally find good tutorials on YouTube. I enjoy following Dave Ramsey, Chris LoCurto and Dan Miller when it comes to career advice.
I indeed love best practices. But there’s a danger of over-realiance on them. I can easily turn a best practice into an idol, something I begin to worship. I can wake up to “serve” my best practice and think about it all day long. The best practice can become the “lord” over my life and began controlling everything I do – not in the sense that it actually has power or some spell on me – but because of my devotion to it. Best practices can become gods.
King Asa was rebuked for making a best practice his god, and not trusting in the LORD. In 2 Chronicles 16, Asa tried to eliminate the threat of an enemy by buying off one of his enemies’ allies. That was considered a “best practice” about a little under 3,000 years ago.
It worked! Asa got the relief he wanted. But then in 2 Chronicles 16:7-9, a man named Hanani warned Asa that he had over-relied on his best practice and did not trust the LORD for deliverance. He recalled for Asa a situation where he had trusted the LORD and saw success with his own eyes. Hanani then told Asa because he didn’t rely on the LORD, his “best practice” was going to prove fruitless because from now on he would have wars – the same wars he was trying to prevent.
Asa didn’t realize his error though. Instead he threw Hanani in jail and started oppressing his people. In the end, he died of some foot disease and refused to seek the LORD even his disease (2 Chronicles 16:12). Asa continued to only follow what seemed like best practices to him.
Asa’s son Jehoshaphat is mentioned as different. 2 Chronicles 17:4-5 describes him specifically not following the supposed best practices of Israel. And because of this, the LORD established the kingdom in his hand. Jehoshaphat is commended as having a heart that was courageous in the ways of the LORD. As a result, he saw steady and continuous growth (2 Chronicles 17:12).