{"id":2744,"date":"2019-04-18T20:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-19T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/?p=2744"},"modified":"2019-04-19T17:45:39","modified_gmt":"2019-04-20T00:45:39","slug":"1kings_21_15-29","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/1kings_21_15-29\/","title":{"rendered":"What A True Friend Does"},"content":{"rendered":"

1 Kings 21:15-29\u00a0Click here for Bible Verses<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 21:15-29.\u00a0 Let’s go!<\/p>\n

1 Kings 21:25-29 (NIV)\u00a0<\/strong>
\n25\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>(There was never a man like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the eyes of the LORD, urged on by Jezebel his wife.
\n26\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>He behaved in the vilest manner by going after idols, like the Amorites the LORD drove out before Israel.)
\n27\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly.
\n28\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite:
\n29\u00a0<\/span><\/sup>“Have you noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day, but I will bring it on his house in the days of his son.”\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 15-24:\u00a0 Having murdered Naboth, at Jezebel’s urging Ahab takes possession of Naboth’s vineyard.\u00a0 God sends Elijah to speak a word of retribution against Ahab for the way he murdered Naboth and stole his vineyard.\u00a0 Elijah prophesies that as punishment for Ahab’s and Jezebel’s sins, God would cut off every male from Ahab’s line (v21-22) and cause the dogs to eat Jezebel’s flesh (v24).\u00a0 Having heard God’s Word, Ahab humbles himself before God, confessing and repenting of sin (v27).\u00a0 God notices the way Ahab humbles himself before Him.\u00a0 In His mercy and grace, God decides not to bring the disaster He had proclaimed against Ahab’s family during Ahab’s lifetime but reserves it for later (v28-29).<\/p>\n

What can we learn from this?<\/p>\n

1. It’s amazing that God would show such mercy to a man like Ahab, especially when verses 25-26 say “There was never anyone like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the eyes of the Lord…[and] behaved in the vilest manner”.\u00a0 It goes to show that as great as our sin can be, God’s mercy is that much greater.\u00a0\u00a0If we will humble ourselves like Ahab in response to Jesus the Word of God, we can experience incredible mercy from God\u00a0<\/strong>and can be spared the punishment we deserve for our sin.<\/p>\n

2. Ahab would call Elijah “my enemy” (v20), when actually Elijah was one of the best friends Ahab ever had.\u00a0 That’s because\u00a0a\u00a0true friend speaks the truth that you need to hear, even when you don’t want to hear it.<\/strong>\u00a0 Elijah spoke the truth that Ahab needed to hear, and this truth led Ahab to change for the better.<\/p>\n

Heavenly Father, thank You that, no matter what we’ve done, mercy and grace are available to the worst of sinners, including me.\u00a0 Thank You for friends in our lives who speak those tough truthful words we need to hear, so that we can humble ourselves before You and find You again.\u00a0 In Jesus’ name, AMEN!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 21:15-29.\u00a0 Let’s go!<\/p>\n

1 Kings 21:25-29 (NIV)\u00a0
\n25\u00a0(There was never a man like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the eyes of the LORD, urged on by Jezebel his wife.\u00a0
\n26\u00a0He behaved in the vilest manner by going after idols, like the Amorites the LORD drove out before Israel.)\u00a0
\n27\u00a0When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly.\u00a0
\n28\u00a0Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite:\u00a0
\n29\u00a0“Have you noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day, but I will bring it on his house in the days of his son.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

On verses 15-24:\u00a0 Having murdered Naboth, at Jezebel’s urging Ahab takes possession of Naboth’s vineyard.\u00a0 God sends Elijah to speak a word of retribution against Ahab for the way he murdered Naboth and stole his vineyard.\u00a0 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2745,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gametime-sharing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2744"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2863,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2744\/revisions\/2863"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}