A Lesson in Humility (2)

Dearly Beloved, I trust this finds you well and bubbling in the Lord. We continue considering how God recognizes and rewards humility, while He resists the proud. It is humility that makes a person acknowledge when they are wrong. Take for an example, Ahab, a king of Israel, who had done so much evil and led Israel to sin. God sent a judgment to him through the prophet Elijah. Ahab humbled himself before God, and God acknowledged his humility.

1 Kings 20-29 (TLB) says “So my enemy has found me!” Ahab exclaimed to Elijah. “Yes,” Elijah answered, “I have come to place God’s curse upon you because you have sold yourself to the devil. The Lord is going to bring great harm to you and sweep you away; he will not let a single one of your male descendants survive!  He is going to destroy your family as he did the family of King Jeroboam and the family of King Baasha, for you have made him very angry and have led all of Israel into sin. The Lord has also told me that the dogs of Jezreel shall tear apart the body of your wife, Jezebel. The members of your family who die in the city shall be eaten by dogs, and those who die in the country shall be eaten by vultures.” No one else was so completely sold out to the devil as Ahab, for his wife, Jezebel, encouraged him to do every sort of evil. He was especially guilty because he worshiped idols just as the Amorites did—the people whom the Lord had chased out of the land to make room for the people of Israel. When Ahab heard these prophecies, he tore his clothing, put on rags, fasted, slept in sackcloth, and went about in deep humility. Then another message came to Elijah: “Do you see how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has done this, I will not do what I promised during his lifetime; it will happen to his sons; I will destroy his descendants.”

 

Beloved, have you done much evil or gone far from the Lord. Now is the time to humble yourself and come back to Him – He will not turn you back.  Psalm 51v16-17 (AMPC) says “For You delight not in sacrifice, or else would I give it; You find no pleasure in burnt offering. My sacrifice [the sacrifice acceptable] to God is a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart [broken down with sorrow for sin and humbly and thoroughly penitent], such, O God, You will not despise.”

Amen.

 

Prayer

Father, we thank You for Your love for us, and how You keep calling us to Yourself. In any way we have wandered away and done our own thing, we repent. We come back to You in Jesus name, amen.