1 Kings 22:29-40 (CLICK HERE FOR BIBLE VERSES)
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 1 Kings 22:29-40. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
1 Kings 22:29-40 (NIV)
29 So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat king of Judah went up to Ramoth Gilead.
30 The king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “I will enter the battle in disguise, but you wear your royal robes.” So the king of Israel disguised himself and went into battle.
31 Now the king of Aram had ordered his thirty-two chariot commanders, “Do not fight with anyone, small or great, except the king of Israel.”
32 When the chariot commanders saw Jehoshaphat, they thought, “Surely this is the king of Israel.” So they turned to attack him, but when Jehoshaphat cried out,
33 the chariot commanders saw that he was not the king of Israel and stopped pursuing him.
34 But someone drew his bow at random and hit the king of Israel between the sections of his armor. The king told his chariot driver, “Wheel around and get me out of the fighting. I’ve been wounded.”
35 All day long the battle raged, and the king was propped up in his chariot facing the Arameans. The blood from his wound ran onto the floor of the chariot, and that evening he died.
36 As the sun was setting, a cry spread through the army: “Every man to his town; everyone to his land!”
37 So the king died and was brought to Samaria, and they buried him there.
38 They washed the chariot at a pool in Samaria (where the prostitutes bathed), and the dogs licked up his blood, as the word of the LORD had declared.
39 As for the other events of Ahab’s reign, including all he did, the palace he built and inlaid with ivory, and the cities he fortified, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel?
40 Ahab rested with his fathers. And Ahaziah his son succeeded him as king.
On verses 29-40: King Ahab of Israel and King Jehoshaphat of Judah get ready to fight the King of Aram at Ramoth Gilead. Knowing that the Lord’s prophets had prophesied that he would die instead of the King of Aram (e.g. 1 Kings 20:42 and 22:20), King Ahab thinks he can outsmart God’s Word by disguising himself. That way no one can readily recognize him as the king. Despite that, “someone” (we don’t know who — it could have been an Aramean, and it also could have been a newbie Israelite soldier) draws his bow at random and ends up hitting King Ahab, wounding him fatally. The king dies and dogs lick up his blood, just as the prophet Elijah had predicted (1 Kings 21:19).
What can we learn from this? You can try to run from God, but you can’t hide from Him. You can try to pretend to be someone you’re not, but God sees right through you. You can try to outsmart God’s Word, but it never works. God will always have the last word.
Father, You are Sovereign and You will have Your way no matter how hard I try to fight. So rather than fighting against You and running away from You, may I always default to surrendering to You and running to You. In Jesus’ name, AMEN!
copyright © 2022 Justin Lim. All rights reserved.
