From His Heart

Dr. Jeff Schreve: Both Ahab and Ahaziah provoked the Lord to anger. And we're going to see in today's passage that Ahaziah, Ahab's son, really tried to tug on Superman's cape. He tried to spit into the wind. He tried to pull the mask off the Old Lone Ranger. He tried to slap God in the face. And it didn't go well for him.

Larry Nobles: Did you know that just like King Ahaziah, God often uses problems to get our attention and to show us our need for Him? But regardless of this, many amazingly continue in their unbelief. Welcome to this Wednesday broadcast on From His Heart with Pastor Jeff Schreve, as he presents the seventh message in the eight-lesson series we're in this month, Holy Boldness: Lessons from Elijah, the Prophet of Fire.

In today's lesson, he reveals the truth about the judgment to come for those who continually disregard God, refuse to believe Him, and practically speaking, slap God in the face by loving their own sin and rejecting His will. They simply will not release their control over to God under any circumstances. But if that is you, perhaps God placed you here today to give you another opportunity to hear God's heart and discover the depth of His love for you.

Today's lesson is from 2nd Kings, and Pastor Jeff is going to describe the consequences that happen when a person disrespectfully slaps God in the face.

Dr. Jeff Schreve: How many of you remember the singer-songwriter Jim Croce? He used to sing some really cool songs. And he liked to have songs about guys who were tough. He had a song that was entitled "You Don't Mess Around With Jim." Do you remember that one? He said, "You don't pull on Superman's cape. You don't spit into the wind. You don't pull the mask off the Old Lone Ranger, and you don't mess around with Jim."

That's how that song went. And for those of you who are younger and don't know that song, you need to look it up. It's a good song. Well, we are studying about Elijah, the prophet of fire. And the passage that we're going to look at today really shows why he is called and referred to as the prophet of fire, because he's going to call fire down from heaven upon his enemies. Elijah was a man who had holy boldness. He spoke boldly to King Ahab, and he spoke boldly to King Ahab's son, Ahaziah.

Both Ahab and Ahaziah provoked the Lord to anger. And we're going to see in today's passage that Ahaziah, Ahab's son, really tried to tug on Superman's cape. He tried to spit into the wind. He tried to pull the mask off the Old Lone Ranger. He tried to slap God in the face. And it didn't go well for him. First Kings, I'll begin at the end of Chapter 22 of First Kings, and we'll go into Second Kings.

The scripture says in Verse 51, Ahaziah, the son of Ahab, became king over Israel in Samaria in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, and he reigned two years over Israel. And he did evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of his father, in the way of his mother, and in the way of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and caused Israel to sin. So he served Baal and worshipped him and provoked the Lord God of Israel to anger, according to all that his father had done.

Now Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab, and Ahaziah fell through the lattice in his upper chamber, which was in Samaria, and became ill. So he sent messengers and said to them, "Go inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover from this sickness." But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, "Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria and say to them, 'Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?'"

"Now therefore, thus says the Lord, 'You shall not come down from the bed where you have gone up, but you shall surely die.'" Then Elijah departed. When the messengers returned to him, he said to them, "Why have you returned?" And they said to him, "A man came up to meet us and said to us, 'Go return to the king who sent you and say to him, 'Thus says the Lord, 'Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are sending to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed where you have gone up, but shall surely die.''"

And he said to them, "What kind of man was he who came up to meet you and spoke these words to you?" And they answered him, "He was a hairy man with a leather girdle about his loins." And he said, "It is Elijah the Tishbite." This is such an interesting story in the word of God. And it shows forth the disrespect and the insolence of this king, King Ahaziah, toward the God of Israel, toward the one true God, toward Jehovah God.

And the question is, what do we learn from this? How does this affect us? This happened in the 850s BC. How could that possibly have something to do with our lives today? It has a lot to do with our lives today, and God has a message. I want to share with you three insights from the insolence of King Ahaziah. First insight: God uses problems to get our attention.

The Lord is over all things, and He uses problems and difficulties and trials and troubles in our lives for one reason: to get our attention. Now you've got to remember as we read, Ahaziah is a wicked king. The old saying is, "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree," and it didn't fall far from the tree in his life. Ahab was the most wicked king of all, and Ahaziah was following in the footsteps of his father and his mother, Jezebel.

He's a wicked king. He's provoking the Lord to anger with his Baal worship and with his idols that he had set up in Israel for the people to worship so they didn't have to go down to Jerusalem. And God causes a problem to come into his life. See, his daddy was king for 22 years. He's only king for two years. And immediately when Ahab dies, it says that the king of Moab rebelled against Israel.

He wasn't going to pay tribute anymore. So that's a problem. But then he's got a bigger problem because he's upstairs in his bedroom at his house, and he falls through the lattice work and he falls probably from the second floor to the first floor. And he's got some internal injuries, some severe injuries. And he sends his messengers 40 miles to go to Ekron to inquire of Baal-Zebub to see whether or not he's going to get well.

God allowed him to have a problem. We don't like problems. No one likes problems. But problems are used of the Lord to help us see our need. Many of us think that if we don't have any problems, we don't have any needs. That's why people tend to do better spiritually not in times of prosperity; they do better spiritually in times of adversity. Why? Because when adversity comes, then they seek the Lord.

And there's nothing that will get your attention like a physical ailment. When you are in physical pain, that's when God can get your attention because you desperately need relief. There's nothing that gets your attention quite like pain and difficulty. Well, Ahaziah's got that. And God is trying to show him, even though he's a dirtbag king, God loves him. Even though he's a wretch, God loves him, just like He loves you and just like He loves me.

And even when we're far, far, far away from the Lord and even when we're provoking Him to anger, God still loves us. He's still trying to reach us. And He uses problems to try and help us see our need. And needs must be taken to the right place. When you have a need, where do you go? As the old song says, "Where could I go but to the Lord?" And you need to take your need to the right place.

When we're honest about things, we all know that we're just a bundle of needs. Debbie and I got a brand new puppy. She is a little Chihuahua, a long-haired Chihuahua. So that gives us three Chihuahuas. And then when Fergie comes home, Sarah has Fergie, so then when Fergie comes home, we have a Chihuahua farm because then we have four. And they're just little all running around the house.

But that little puppy, she weighs about a pound maybe, and she's just so needy. And she's not upset about being needy. We are so prideful that we don't like to let people know we're needy, but we're all needy. And in many ways we're like that little puppy. And if God doesn't meet our needs, we're sunk. And so when you have your need revealed, Lord, I'm in need here, you have to take that need to the Lord. Cast your burden on the Lord. The Bible says, "And He will sustain you."

Do you remember the woman with the issue of blood? She tried all these doctors to help her with her problem, and then she heard about Jesus and she said, "I believe if I just touch the hem of His garment, I'll be healed." And she fought her way through the crowd and touched the hem of His garment and she was healed. She had faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. She brought her need to Him.

The scripture says in Psalm 121, "I will lift up my eyes to the mountains. From where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth." This was a Psalm, this Psalm 121 is called a Psalm of Ascent. That was a Psalm that they would sing as they would come up to Jerusalem for one of the three great feasts. They were required to be in Jerusalem as Israelites, required to come up to Jerusalem three times a year for the three great feasts. And as they would come up, they would sing these Psalms of ascent.

Psalm 121 is a Psalm of ascent. And it says this, "I will lift up my eyes to the mountains. Where is my help going to come?" Now remember this, the pagans believed that the gods lived on the mountains because that's a high place. And you read in the Old Testament about the high places. There were high places on hills and mountains because you were getting closer to the heavens and so I build an altar on the high place because that's where I worship.

When Elijah defeated the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, that was considered Baal's mountain. That was home turf for Baal. He lived up on the mountain. Why? Because that's a high place. And the psalmist says, "I will lift up my eyes to the mountains. From where shall my help come? Does it come from the mountains? Does it come from the god who lives on the mountains? No, my help is from the Lord, the one who made the mountains, the maker of heaven and earth." That's where you take your difficulty. But Ahaziah didn't do that.

Larry Nobles: Pastor Jeff will return in just a moment and continue today's message, "A Slap in God's Face." It's from Pastor Jeff's eight-lesson series, Holy Boldness: Lessons from Elijah, the Prophet of Fire. If you can help us this month with a gift of any amount, we'll be thrilled to send you Pastor Jeff's Holy Boldness series on a USB flash drive, on CDs, DVDs, or an immediate MP3 download. You pick.

Just call 866-40-BIBLE, 866-40-BIBLE, or go online to fromhishart.org and click the Holy Boldness icon on the home page. God will bless you for being such a bold witness for Jesus and joining with us to share that bold truth to a lost and hurting world. Now let's get back to part one of the message, "A Slap in God's Face."

So the first insight: God uses problems to get our attention. Insight number two: God notices when we fail to call upon Him. Look at Verse 2 again. And Ahaziah fell through the lattice in his upper chamber, which was in Samaria, and became ill. So he sent messengers and said to them, "Go inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover from this sickness."

Ekron is a land in Philistia. It's one of the five cities of the Philistines. And it's about 40 miles from Samaria. And Ahaziah is sending his messengers to Ekron to inquire of Baal-Zebub if he's going to get well or not. Had he forgotten what happened on Mount Carmel? Had he forgotten that Elijah had shown them that the Lord, He is God? The Lord, He is God? Baal is not God. The Lord is God.

But Ahaziah, although he knew that, although he had lived and experienced that, he blew that off. And he said, "No, I'm not going to call upon Jehovah God. I'm going to call upon Baal-Zebub." When we don't call on the Lord, especially when we're in trouble, especially when we're hurting, and God turns up the heat to get us to come down to our knees, and when we keep saying no, there's some things that we learn about that.

First of all, if we don't call upon Him, it reveals a wicked, rebellious heart. That's what Ahaziah had. He had a wicked, rebellious heart. Why don't you call upon Jehovah God? Well, because I don't like Jehovah God. I don't want to hear from Jehovah God. I don't want to talk to Elijah, the preacher and the prophet of Jehovah God. Why? Because how is he going to help me? It's just like his daddy in First Kings, Chapter 22.

When he teamed up with Jehoshaphat, who was king in Judah, and they were going to come together to fight the Arameans, Jehoshaphat said, "Well, let's hear from the Lord, from the prophets of the Lord, to see whether we should go fight or not." And so Ahab had all these false prophets that came in and said, "Yes, you need to go. You're going to have a great victory. Thus says the Lord, you're going to have a great victory." Well, Jehoshaphat was savvy enough to know these guys aren't speaking on behalf of the Lord.

He said, "Is there not a prophet of the Lord that we can call upon?" And Ahab said, "Well, there is one, but I hate him because he never prophesies good concerning me. His name is Micaiah, the son of Imlah." Well, Jehoshaphat said, "Let not the king say so." Why are you saying you hate him? Here's the thing. When you're not right with God, you don't want to hear from God's spokesman. Why? Because you know what he's going to say.

Why did Micaiah never prophesy good concerning Ahab? Because the scripture says Ahab sold himself to do evil in the sight of the Lord. If you're going against the Lord and you hear from a prophet of God, he's going to tell you, "Hey pal, you need to turn around and get right with God." And people who are going in the wrong direction don't want to hear that. I call people quite often when I find out so and so has left the family, so and so has a girlfriend, so and so has a boyfriend, they are breaking up their family.

I'll call them, "Will you meet with me?" "No." "Why not?" "I don't want to meet with you." "Why not?" "Because I know what you're going to tell me." "What am I going to tell you?" "You're going to tell me that I don't need to do this, that I need to get back with my husband." Oh, yeah, that's what you need to do. But they don't want to hear that. They want to go in the wrong direction and they want to have somebody tell them it's okay to go in the wrong direction.

We're to speak the truth in love. We have churches now that pat people on the back as they go in the wrong direction and say, "That's right, thumbs up on you." That's terrible because that's going to lead them off a cliff. So the first thing that we see in there, when you fail to call, it reveals a wicked, rebellious heart. You don't want to call on God because you don't want to hear what God has to say.

Secondly, it's a slap in God's face when we refuse to call upon Him. Now I want you to see because the Lord is very clear. He says at the end of this chapter in Verse 17, the reason why Ahaziah died is because he called on Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, and not Jehovah God. Who is Baal-Zebub? That word Baal means Lord. Zebub means flies. Baal-Zebub was the Lord of the Flies.

And this is what the people thought in Philistia and Ekron. They said, "Well, when we see a dead carcass on the ground or some kind of road kill or some kind of decay or some kind of human dung or animal dung, it's always covered in flies. And so flies carry disease because they're in this death and filth. They carry disease from one thing to another." And Baal-Zebub is Lord of the Flies.

And so they said he brings disease or he takes disease away. So that explains why Ahaziah said we need to go consult Baal-Zebub to see if this disease is going to be taken away. Now, that's what we read in the Old Testament, Baal-Zebub. In the New Testament, the Jews had changed that a little bit. Zebub means flies. Zebul means dung. They didn't call him Baal-Zebub in the New Testament; they called him Baal-Zebul or Beelzebul.

And they said, "Your god is the lord of the dung pile." And so you put those together and that's exactly what you have because the flies are on the dung. And so this was such a slap in God's face. You're not going to call upon me, the Lord of all, the Lord of hosts, but you're going to go inquire of the Lord of the Flies, of the Lord of the dung pile? Do you remember in the New Testament when Jesus healed a man who was both deaf and dumb?

And He cast out a spirit so the man could speak and the man could hear. And the Pharisees saw a great miracle and they said, "This man casts out demons only by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons, the prince of the demons." And Jesus in response to that told them, "You guys are getting dangerously close to committing the unpardonable sin. You're getting dangerously close to committing a sin which can never be forgiven. You slap God in the face like that and you can cross a line where you can never, no never, no never, ever be forgiven."

It is such an affront to His character to say, "I'd rather consult the god of the dung pile than to call upon Your name." It's a slap in His face, and it provokes Him to anger. Why did the Lord do what He did? Because He was provoked to anger. It makes it very clear at the end of First Kings, Chapter 22, that Ahaziah served Baal and worshipped him and provoked the Lord God of Israel to anger, according to all that his father had done.

You know, we see God and it's right to see God as a God of love, a God of mercy, a God of grace, a God of compassion. That's who God is. God is a patient God, but God's patience doesn't last forever. He says in Genesis, Chapter 6, "My spirit will not strive with man forever." And you can cross a line with God, and the hammer comes because God is a holy and righteous God. As the scripture says, "A God who has indignation every single day, indignation towards sin."

The Bible says in Psalm Chapter 2, "Worship the Lord with reverence and rejoice with trembling. Do homage to the son, lest he become angry and you perish in the way, for his wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in him." In the book of Numbers, God had brought His people to Kadesh Barnea to get ready to go into the promised land, the long-awaited promised land.

And when the spies went into the land, what did they do? They saw a land flowing with milk and honey just like God said. Man, this land is great. But there're giants in the land. And we're like grasshoppers in their sight, and so we were in our sight, they said, and we can't go into the land. And so they came back out and they gave a negative report. And Joshua and Caleb, two of the 12 spies, Joshua and Caleb said, "No, no, by all means we can go take the land. God is with us. He told us to go, we can take the land."

And they said, "Let's stone them with stones." And they wanted to stone Moses and Aaron and Caleb and Joshua. And the glory of the Lord appeared, and God was ticked off. Hey, that kind of refusing to believe God, refusing to call upon the Lord, that provokes the Lord to anger.

Spurning God's word and warnings and being apathetic about God's command will always bring calamity. And there are many great warnings here for us all. The message today on From His Heart is called "A Slap in the Face of God." It's one of eight in Pastor Jeff's series, Holy Boldness: Lessons from Elijah, the Prophet of Fire. Like in Elijah's time, we live in a time of spiritual apathy.

Our world desperately needs to see some holy boldness from those who call themselves believers in Christ. Do you desire to have more courage and boldness in your witness? The series that we're in this month can really help. It's the eight-message sermon series Holy Boldness, and it's available on CDs, DVDs, a USB flash drive, or an immediate MP3 download.

Larry Nobles: Your gifts make it possible for this broadcast to be heard on this station and on hundreds of stations around the nation each and every day, not to mention always online. And for your gift today, we'll send you the series along with Pastor Jeff's booklet, Unveiling the Mystery of Prayer. Both for your gift now.

Call 866-40-BIBLE, 866-40-BIBLE, or go to fromhishart.org and click the Holy Boldness icon on the home page. God will bless you for being such a bold witness for Jesus and joining with us to share that bold truth to a lost and hurting world.

And thank you for your monthly support that makes this outreach possible. And thank you for joining us today on From His Heart. I'm Larry Nobles with a heartfelt invitation for you to return tomorrow for part two of this convicting yet encouraging message, "A Slap in the Face of God." That's on Thursday, when Pastor Jeff Schreve will share real truth, real love, and real hope from God's heart, here on From His Heart.