1 Kings 22:1-53, Acts 13:16-41, Psalm 138:1-8, Proverbs 17:17-18
Today is the 20th day of June, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is wonderful to be here with you today, as we gather, yet again, and take the next step forward together on the adventure through the Bible this year. Walking back out to where we left off, leads us back out into the book of First Kings, where we are continuing our journey through the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah, and some of the prophetic voices that were intermingled throughout the reigns of the different kings. So, let’s pick up the story, today, first Kings chapter 22.
Commentary:
Okay, so, in the book of First Kings today, we see the king of Israel and the king of Judah, getting together, King Ahab and King Jehoshaphat. So, they’re on friendly terms at this point. And King Ahab of Israel is just kind of musing about a city that they lost in battle, Ramoth in Gilead and about going back and maybe recovering that city. And then he turns to Jehoshaphat and asks if Judah’s armies would join Israel’s armies to retake this city, and Jehoshaphat, following God, is like, yes, we should ask God, though. So, Ahab brings in 400 prophets to inquire of the Lord about this battle and then they inquire, should we go and, and take Ramoth, will you give us victory and all of the prophets started prophesying yes, yes, yes, you will be victorious, go right ahead, God will…will give you the victory. One of prophets even fashions this kind of bowl apparatus, like you will gore the people, you will gore Ramoth in Gilead, you will take this, God will give you victory. King Jehoshaphat is not convinced; he wants a prophet that is working in the way that he would understand a prophet of the most high God. And so, Ahab’s like, there is one more, his name is Micaiah. He never says anything good about me. I hate him, but okay we can get him. And so, they do. They send for Micaiah. And when the official who is summoning the prophet Micaiah arrives at Micaiah’s place. He tells Micaiah what’s going on. It’s a question of the Lord about a battle in Ramoth Gilead and all the prophets have affirmed God’s word is to proceed, that victory is coming, that they will be victorious, go ahead without fear. You need to know what the prophets are saying Micaiah because you need to kind of say the same thing. And Micaiah is like, yeah, yeah I can only say what I hear God tell me to say. And so, that’s how Micaiah gets before these two Kings. So, here’s Micaiah, this obscure profit that we know next to nothing about, showing up here in the Bible, a prophet of the most high God. Definitely respected as that kind of a prophet because he was summoned specifically. But here he is, walking in to whatever setting that they’re walking into but it’s gotta be a large enough space so there are two Kings and 400 prophets, all kind of on the same page. Micaiah is in this precarious position, where everything is pushing him to just affirm what everybody else is saying because what does he know, like it’s such an opportunity for him to second-guess everything. All of these people are bent on this one thing and are affirming this one thing. So, he’s in this position where his easy route is what he did in sarcasm, which is just to affirm what everybody else is saying, yes of course, of course, go you, you will be victorious in battle, yes, yes. But Ahab knows that he’s being sarcastic, so he wants the truth. And that is this thing. Micaiah is in this position where he has to tell the truth, it’s just that the truth is obscured from everyone else, he’s seeing what’s gonna happen and nobody else is. So he’s got to either stand in opposition to what everyone else is saying, or simply kind of go along with it and watch what happens and keep his mouth shut, or just second-guess himself. And we kind of see the acknowledgment of that tension there when Micaiah does his sarcastic affirmation that they should go into battle, but he’s pressed for the truth, and he has to tell it and he does. And what he essentially says is that he sees an army without a leader. And indeed, indeed they went into battle and Ahab was killed in the battle. Here’s the thing though, Micaiah was summoned, and the word of the Lord came. Right, they were warned, and they did not listen. Micaiah was put in the awkward position where everybody was affirming something different, and he needed to tell the truth of what he was seeing. But he wasn’t responsible for the response of the people, he was responsible to tell the truth of the word of the Lord, that the Lord had given him to say. That’s what he did. It did not stop the destruction. Ahab still died in battle; he didn’t listen. That’s not Micaiah’s fault. Sometimes we wind ourselves into circumstances where we’re kind of in this position of Micaiah, where we’re seeing something that nobody else is seeing, maybe everyone else is affirming a different direction, but we have the sense that this is going to be like, this isn’t gonna work and we find ourselves in that difficult position of just keeping silent or just second-guessing ourselves or actually standing up in love and saying wait, there are maybe a few other things to think about here because I’m looking at this and…and what I see, isn’t gonna work out well. That is usually speaking the humble truth in love and were not responsible for what happens after that. Micaiah was asked to deliver a message which, he did. The message was not heeded, and destruction happened. But King Ahab and King Jehoshaphat were warned in advance by Micaiah. Sometimes we may find ourselves where we are the only voice, the only warning there will be and it’s not about us being right at all. It’s not about us, at all. It’s about humbly speaking the truth in love and letting it go.
Prayer:
And so, Holy Spirit, come into that. We do find ourselves in those positions sometimes and they’re tricky being around other people, interpersonal relationships. We’re wired for this, we’re made for this but it can be tricky. We’re all bringing our own stories into the relationships so we don’t always know. But, Holy Spirit, when we feel impressed from You that You are showing us something that we need to say may we humbly speak the truth in love, with no attachment to any kind of outcome, that’s not our role usually. Micaiah gave a warning that was not heeded, that happens in our lives too. We can offer insight that is not heeded but we can also receive it and not heed it and walk ourselves into a wall. So, we know how this goes. And we understand that the ingredient that so often is missing, when we have these kinds of situations, is humility. So, Holy Spirit come, when we feel impressed in some sort of way to speak truth, may we come with hands open, heart open regardless. And we pray this in Your name Jesus. Amen.
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And that’s it for today, I’m Brian, I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Prayer and Encouragements:
Good morning, this is Julie from San Diego, the Woman Kneeling at the Cross. I have a praise report about our son, Jonathan, who’s 37-years-old, had gone into the hospital with pneumonia. He was there for 4 days. During that time, they found out that he has congestive heart failure. He, a lot of it, it is because he’s neglecting his body and also abusing alcohol, marijuana and later on we found out that he was using cocaine. And that’s caused all of this damage to his heart. We are praying that God would just help him recover and just have, that his heart would be restored. There’s damage that the doctors say cannot be restored. But we know that we serve a God who heals, a God that restores, a God of miracles. And that’s what we’re praying for. I want to thank all of those who were praying. I know Duane from Wisconsin.
Hi, DAB family, this is Kristine from Oregon. And I just, first of all, want to say thank you to all the people who have prayed for me because I heard something from God in each and every one of them. Self-control, which I’ve lacked my entire life. I’m a very sporadic person. And also, that God has been doing some amazing things in my life. And truly, I’m hating things that I’ve loved. And I’m loving things that I’ve hated. And I just didn’t realize when I called last time and asked for prayer, that I was gonna be opening the flood gates of heaven. Because I am just watching God work all around me. So, thank you so much. And I am going to an AA meeting right now, it starts at 12. I’m on my way, so I’m asking for prayer for that. I know that again when, this gets aired it’ll be after the fact but I, my plan is to keep going Monday through Friday, for a while and just see where God leads me. I’ve been super resistant to go to AA. I’ve gone once. I’ve gone to a few celebrate recovery meetings in my past. And I’ve actually made it two separate times, to lawyers. But, like I said, I’ve been, had this career of drinking for so long that it never lasts. So, I made it two days, I called on June 2nd and I made it, June 3rd I was at a, my daughters bridal shower and I had mimosas and then, my first dry day was yesterday. So, thank you so much for your prayers. Oh my gosh, God is so good. And again, I love you guys. I found an amazing group.
Hello DAB fam. I have been listening for a very long time and I just wanted to come on here and just say thank you. Thank you for being such a wonderful community. Thank you to Brian and his family for all that they do at DAB. And I just want to pray for everyone on here really quick. Lord, thank You so much for Your goodness, thank You for Your wisdom. Thank You for Your sovereignty. I thank You for every single person as part of DAB, Lord. And I, I just thank You for their lives. I thank You for their families. And God, as I know many of them are going through various challenges and different things, I pray, Lord, that You would be so near and so present with them. I thank You just for this space that we have to come together every day. And I pray that You would help us to continue to grow and thrive, as we read Your word afresh. Amen.
Hi, this is Samantha from Tennessee and I’m calling cause I wanted to ask you guys for prayer. A girl that’s like a sister to me is dying. She’s been sick for a long time and we’re just at the end. And we’ve been given hours and I just want you guys to pray for comfort for my family and for her family. She has lots of younger siblings. And this is just gonna be really hard on all of them and all of us. And I’m so thankful to God that she’s going to be whole and healed in heaven for the first time in many years. But it’s still really sucks.
Good morning my beautiful DAB family. I’m calling to say thank you for your prayers. And to let you know how much has changed in my life since requesting prayer. This is Libby from Queensland, Australia. First of all, I was filled with fear, the spirit of fear. And I came to realize it was the fear of men. And that now being broken in my life, has opened, opened the doors for God to work in my heart. And my prayer at the beginning of this year was that I would have a beautiful heart and restore in me a clean heart, oh God. And you know, without the essential work of, of removing that spirit of fear, the fear of men, that would never have become a reality for me. So, I thank you so much and I praise God for this, this community. It is an absolute blessing to all of us who listen and pray and call in for help. And God moves, when you call for help. And He has moved mightily in my life. And I praise His name. And I thank you for the love you’ve shown me. And have a blessed day, dear family.