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July 6, 2021
What in the World is Going On? (Walk Thru the Bible Week 23)
The story of the northern Kingdom of Israel and the southern Kingdom of Judah is more easily understood with this week’s overview of events and their political and geographical context. The actions of Elijah take on new meaning once we understand what the people believed about the god Ba’al he was confronting. We also learn his ministry is patterned after that of Moses which explains why the two later appear together with Jesus on the Mt. of Transfiguration.
This episode complements the daily readings from our Walk Thru the Bible reading plan for July 5-11, covering 1 Kings 17-22; 2 Kings 1-8; Obadiah.
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Transcript
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Welcome to Walk Through the Bible, Susan Michael's 12-month journey through the most exciting
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book on the planet.
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It will transform your life one page at a time.
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Be sure to subscribe for future episodes that will ignite your faith and bring your Bible
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to life.
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Now, let's join our host, Susan Michael.
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Well, hey there and welcome back.
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This is Walk Through the Bible and we are on week 23.
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I have entitled this week, What in the World is Going On?
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So if you felt that way when you started doing the reading this week, just know you're in
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the right place.
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So this week we are reading out of the Daily Bible pages 704 to 734 or the dates in the
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Daily Bible of June 4th through the 10th.
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Now let's review for just a minute.
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We read last week about the death of Solomon and the division of the kingdom.
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Just as God had judged Solomon in the reign of his son, his son lost the ten tribes.
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They went off, they proclaimed Jeroboam to be their king, and Jeroboam went and then
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he disobeyed the Lord and set up alternative worship sites in the northern kingdom and
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perverted the worship actually of the God of Israel and introduced idolatry into it.
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So this week now we pick up and we begin now the story of over a 335 year period of the
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history of the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom.
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And I'll tell you, last week we thought it was confusing having a king Jeroboam and a
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Jeroboam and we were trying to figure out which was which.
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Just wait.
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This week we began a period over 200 years of the history of the northern kingdom.
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They have some 20 kings and during the 335 years of the southern kingdom they also have
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about 20 kings.
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So getting this straight as we follow the story simultaneously of the northern kingdom
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and the southern kingdom at the same time and jumping back and back, back and forth,
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it is really confusing.
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The names are hard.
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The chronology is very difficult to figuring out where we are in the story.
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But I do want to say this, that we're moving into a period of history that's closer to
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the modern age and so there's much more archaeological evidence that is being uncovered that actually
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supports the stories here of the kingdom of Israel and the kingdom of Judah.
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In the earlier time periods, archaeological evidence was scant only because there wasn't
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that much of it.
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But in this period of history we're in what's known as the Iron Age and there's just a
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lot more there being uncovered that's proving this story.
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Now in this week's story we are following these two kingdoms and what I want to do before
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we get into any of the stories is back up and take a little bit of a 30,000 foot view
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and in a way that's what the book of 1st and 2nd Kings does anyway.
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It doesn't go into a lot of detail and it's giving you that overall viewpoint of these
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various kings and where they were bad, where they were weak or whatever, if somebody did
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good but they don't give you a whole lot of detail.
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And then it's augmented by portions out of 1st and 2nd Chronicles.
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And 1st and 2nd Chronicles repeats some of what we have in Kings but it also elaborates
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some but it's written from a priestly perspective.
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And so that means it's written from a perspective of Jerusalem which is in Judea, the southern
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kingdom.
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And the priests are much more concerned with what happened in the southern kingdom than
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that idolatrous northern kingdom because the southern kingdom has the lineage of David.
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And so Chronicles gives us a lot more detail about what happened in the southern kingdom.
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So now we have our two kingdoms and as I said, we began at around 930 BC and so the northern
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kingdom lasts for about 200 years.
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It falls in 722.
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During that time they have nine different dynasties made up of about 20 kings and so that means
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there was a lot of instability in the northern kingdom.
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They would have a dynasty may have lasted for two, three, four generations and then somebody
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would come along, assassinate everybody, kill them all, start a whole new dynasty.
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And then two, three generations later the same thing would happen there.
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And so that leads to a lot of instability and a story that's kind of hard to follow.
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The southern kingdom beginning at the same point, 930 BC, it lasts longer.
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It lasts until 586 BC when they fall to the Babylonians.
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During that time the southern kingdom only has one dynasty.
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Guess which one it is?
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Yep, the dynasty of King David.
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And so it lasts throughout the whole time but there are generations and so they have roughly
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about 20 different kings in that dynasty.
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There is one story of about six years where the dynasty is broken but we'll get to that
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in the detail.
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All in all it was only the dynasty of the kingdom of David.
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Why?
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Because God promised David that he would have an everlasting kingdom and he would always
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have a lamp burning there in the city of Jerusalem and he was true to his word.
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And until the dynasty, until the kingdom fell and the city was destroyed.
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So now what are the lessons, I want to talk first about what are the lessons that we can
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glean from all this history that we're going to go through.
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And first is the grace of God.
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There's a lot of talk in America these days about the judgment of God.
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And I have to say, I believe America is really deserving of judgment.
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And I see what's happening in our country, in our society, in our government.
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We're deserving of judgment.
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But God's judgment doesn't come overnight.
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That would make him a tit for tat kind of God where you say one thing wrong and so you're
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hit with something and that's not the way it works.
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God takes his time.
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And so here we have, he gave the Northern Kingdom 200 years to get their act together.
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That's a lot of grace.
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And in the Southern Kingdom, they did have ups and downs.
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They did have a couple of kings that really led them in the right direction and reform
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and worship of the one true God.
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But there were also kings in between that kept the idolatry alive and yet God in his
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grace did not just judge overnight, he gave them ample opportunity to repent.
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Another thing he did is he provided prophets to speak into the nation and speak into the
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lives of the rulers, which was another form of his grace.
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So we have seeing here in the book of 1st and 2nd Kings and Chronicles, a movement of
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prophets.
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And we didn't really have that before.
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We had the prophet Moses and he led his people.
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And then when his time was up, Joshua led them.
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I don't think Joshua was ever considered a prophet, but he led them as a leader.
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And then in the period of the judges, we had a couple of prophets and at the end we had
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the great prophet Samuel and he led the kingdom or he led the country from a tribal confederacy
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to a monarchy and he chose the 1st and 2nd Kings.
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He was a great prophet.
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But now we see that there are prophets and we have a number of what we call writing prophets
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and we have books by them in our Bible and we're going to be talking about some of those.
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But then we have these prophets.
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It's like a king might have a couple hundred prophets that he'd call upon and they'd prophesy
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to him what he should do.
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And somehow they always prophesied in unison.
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And you have to understand, they were probably paid by the king to be the prophets for the
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court.
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So there was a little bit of an influence maybe there as to what they should tell the
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king.
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And somehow they'd all get together and they'd agree to what they were going to say, but
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that's not the case with the writing prophets and these national prophets that we are going
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to be talking about in the next several weeks.
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They went sometimes in opposition to the band of prophets and they spoke the truth to the
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king.
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Another lesson that we're going to see in all of these stories is how that the real
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thing that brought down these kingdoms was when the king married pagan wives and they
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did it all the time and they did it continually and these pagan women brought pagan worship
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not just into the kingdom, into the territory, but actually into the home of the king.
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It influenced the king before you know it.
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They are supporting the idolatry and it is idolatry that brought down these kingdoms.
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God took idolatry very, very personally.
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They were no longer worshiping him, the one that they had married in the wilderness, the
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one that loved them and had promised all these wonderful things to them.
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No, they were turning their back on him and kneeling to some other god, a false god after
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all of that.
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So it is idolatry that brought down the kingdoms.
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So now let's take an overview of the northern kingdom, the story that we're going to be
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reading.
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As I said, there were nine different dynasties, a lot of instability and the highlight of the
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northern kingdom is in a couple of weeks when we get to Jeroboam II.
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Yes, not the Jeroboam I.
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God judges Jeroboam I.
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He and his whole house end up being killed.
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But later on there is another Jeroboam, Jeroboam II, and he's really the highlight for the
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northern kingdom.
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The northern kingdom was larger than the southern kingdom.
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It had 10 tribes.
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Instead of two, it had more territory.
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But it was also more vulnerable to outside attack.
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And why is that?
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Because it was bigger, it wasn't like secluded geographically.
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It had more wide open borders.
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And the international trade route went right through the northern kingdom.
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And so this means there were a lot of other countries, some bigger than the northern kingdom,
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going back and forth there in trade.
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It also meant that this highway was easily used by one of these larger empires who wanted
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to come in and just take over this little empire.
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So it made them very, very vulnerable.
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They also, they needed alliances.
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When we had the kingdom of David and Solomon, it was so big and so wealthy and so strong.
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But also, I want you to understand a concept, what we call it on the playground, the seesaw.
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So when one side of the seesaw goes up, the other one's down.
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And then when you, side goes up, the other side has gone down.
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And this is what we're going to see in these kingdoms in this history.
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So during the kingdom of David and Solomon, they were very big and very strong.
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But it just so happens that Egypt and Mesopotamia were small or weaker.
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And that in a way allowed for the kingdom of Israel to become so big and so strong.
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At the same time, now we have this divided kingdom.
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And so it's weakening because they're divided, number one.
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Number two, they just don't have the strength of that united monarchy.
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And it just so happens at the same time, we have Egypt getting a little bit stronger and
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later on we have Assyria getting stronger.
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And before you know it, the seesaw has tilted.
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They're big and strong and therefore our little Israel and Judah are getting weaker and weaker.
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And in a way, one plays off the other.
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They can't be big and strong when they have these large neighbors around them that are
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bigger and stronger.
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So the kingdom of Israel and Judah needed alliances with the other countries around them.
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And for the northern kingdom, this was really a very weak point and made them very, very
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vulnerable.
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They needed Phoenicia on the north.
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Phoenicia was very wealthy.
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They were maritime traders.
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And they needed Phoenicia and they needed Aram, which is in the area of Syria today.
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It would be in between Israel and where Assyria was based or headquartered.
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In the middle there was the Arameans or Aram of Damascus.
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So they needed these alliances.
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So how did they get them?
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They exchanged wives and they would marry the pagan wives of Phoenicia and of the Arameans
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and brought in these influences.
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Also in the northern kingdom of Israel, something you don't, you need to understand because
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it's not going to just come out and say this.
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There were a lot of Canaanite pagans in the territory of the northern kingdom of Israel.
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So they were already worshiping the idols.
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It was all throughout the northern part, the northern kingdom.
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And this was another influence later on.
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Now looking at the southern kingdom of Judah, as I said, there was only one dynasty.
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So there was a lot more stability in the government in the southern kingdom.
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It was smaller, so it was more compact, and it was geographically protected.
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It was a little bit more secure.
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It was a little bit off that international trade route.
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Up in the hills, there was some geographic boundaries there that helped keep Judah protected.
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Also in Judah, remember, was Jerusalem and the temple.
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And this means that the priests there in the temple and the house of David made sure that
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the worship of the God of Israel in the temple was the foremost worship, was the national
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God of Judah.
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Now I will say there were times that idolatry became quite strong.
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And even from the very beginning, so we have Rehoboam in the south, Jeroboam in the north,
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Rehoboam goes and starts this idolatrous perverted worship.
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And Rehoboam is down here.
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He's got the temple.
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He's got Jerusalem.
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But remember, Rehoboam's mother was a pagan wife of Solomon.
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And so where you know it, Rehoboam is keeping these cult centers alive and the worship in
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his kingdom.
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And then after him, he had pagan wives.
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So that means his son who ruled had a pagan mother.
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And it went on for several generations.
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And we have one story where the mother actually usurps the throne and she tries to make the
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worship of her God the main national God for Judah.
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And there was rebellion by the priests.
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They got her out of there and they rethrowned the one person that remained from the house
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of David.
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But this just goes to show you that these pagan women were a real thorn in the side.
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Now I want to talk about the geographic setting for our stories that we're going to be reading
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because this is going to help you also.
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So remember Solomon's kingdom was very large and very wealthy.
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And he had all of these vassal states at the edge of his kingdom.
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And then he had alliances even beyond the vassal states.
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And what we see in our stories we're going to be reading is these vassal states began
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to break off and they began to usurp their freedom and their independence.
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So but let's first I want to take a big circle around the Solomonic kingdom and talk about
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what we have going on here.
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We have Egypt down in the south and Egypt as soon as you remember Jeroboam had fled
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to Egypt for safety until Solomon died.
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And then Jeroboam came back and sure enough he was made king of the new northern kingdom.
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Well when he went to Egypt it was under a she-shack of Egypt.
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And as soon as Solomon died she-shack knew about it and what does he do?
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He comes up against the southern kingdom of Judah and he actually comes and does damage
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to Jerusalem.
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So that shows you Egypt was beginning to strengthen.
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Thankfully after she-shack it weakened again so we don't hear about Egypt for quite a while.
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Moving up the coast we have the Philistine territory.
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Well the Philistines never ever regained their strength that they had before David.
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David really did defeat the Philistines but there still was some Philistine presence there
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and some cities.
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We read them about them again.
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Then farther up the coast we get above the kingdom of Israel and we find Phoenicia.
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Phoenicia was along the coast as I said very wealthy.
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They were maritime traders.
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They had ships.
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They were known all throughout the Mediterranean area for their trade.
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So they were a very important ally to have.
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Moving inland from Phoenicia we have the Arameans of what is today Syria.
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The Arameans sometimes they were weak, sometimes they were strong, sometimes their king was
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named Ben-Hedad, other times it was somebody else and then it was Ben-Hedad again and then
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it was somebody else and then it was Ben-Hedad again.
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So we're not sure if that was a name or a title.
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But it can be a little confusing trying to follow that history.
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On the other side of the Arameans we have Assyria.
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It was very weak during Solomon but we're going to see by the end of our period here
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it has become a major, major empire.
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Let's come back now below Aram.
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We have the, we have Amon and Moab right below it.
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They were a part of Solomon's kingdom but they now began to shake loose.
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They are cousins of the Israelites.
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They are descendants of Lot if you'll remember the story in Genesis.
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And so they're cousins but yet they aren't really friendly all the time and below them
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is Edom.
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And Edom are also cousins.
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They're the descendants of Esau and they really do the southern kingdom of Judah in.
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They really do some dirty things and so this week we actually read or will read a whole
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prophecy, a whole book, the book of Ovidiah is against the Edomites.
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So this is what we have going on around us.
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Okay, I hope that that helps give you a little bit of context as you're reading through the
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stories.
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I will say that if you get lost in the reading, don't worry about it.
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I got so lost at times.
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I literally had to go get a textbook off my shelf from when I was in college 40 years
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ago and it's called The History of Israel and it tells the story of the Old Testament
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as a history book.
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And I got it out and I read this whole section of history out of that book and it helped
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me so much and I realized you don't have that aid.
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So if you get confused, if you get a little lost, don't worry.
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I'm going to help you each week.
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Let's focus on the majors here.
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Just take the lessons from what we have to learn on our very quick walk through the Bible
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and walk through 335 years of history in the next, I think, four weeks.
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So now we get to our story.
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Now that you know this background, you're going to understand a lot more about the story
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of Ahab and Jezebel.
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We all know about Jezebel.
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It's made her name infamous, right?
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Around the world, Jezebel.
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Who was Jezebel?
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Jezebel was the daughter of the king of Sidon, which is a Phoenician city.
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So she was Phoenician and her god, the god of Phoenicia, was a bale of Tyre.
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It was a specific type of bale and this is something you need to know.
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There were many different bales.
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A bale in a way meant Lord and there were different expressions of this.
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So her bale was her god from Tyre, Phoenicia, and she brought it with her to marry Ahab
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in a political alliance between the house of Ahab and the house there of Phoenicia.
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Now so she brings with her this worship.
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Now Ahab is very wealthy and he's a strong king and he's even mentioned in the writings
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of one of the Assyrian kings, Shamaneser III.
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He mentions him and his palace was full of ivory, which is a real sign of wealth at the
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time and which by the way, I learned something this week.
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Can I share this with you?
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They keep talking about ivory and in fact the prophet Amos complains about the ivory
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palaces, all the ivory in the palace of the kingdom of the king of the north.
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And where did this ivory come from?
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Well, I learned that at this time in history, there were elephants in Syria.
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Of course, today there are no elephants in Syria, but at that time there were still elephants
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and that's where they got a lot of this ivory and so his palace was full of it.
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So he marries Jezebel and she brings this worship of Baal and Ahab goes and Ahab's father
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had built a city called Samaria and he made it the capital of the northern kingdom of
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Israel and so Ahab now goes to the capital city of Samaria where he has his palace full
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of ivory and what does he do?
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He builds a temple to the Baal of Tyre.
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Now this means that he is making this Baal by all purposes, you know, the national god
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of the north.
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There were still the worship centers going on that Jeroboam set up in Danon and Bethel
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where it was a mixture of worship of the god of Israel and these cabs, whatever they meant
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and this Baal that may have been represented there, but he sets up in the capital city,
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the temple to the Baal that his wife worshiped, Jezebel.
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And so this is why in 1 Kings 21 it says that Ahab was the most evil king of the north and
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Jezebel we know was just notoriously treacherous and she went and killed all the prophets
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of the god of Israel and she was feeding and supporting and paying 850 prophets.
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450 of them were to Baal and I think 400 of them were to the fertility goddess Ashtara
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and so she was very evil and so what I want you to understand is at this point the northern
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kingdom of Israel don't think of it as being Jewish because it wasn't, it was such a mix
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of the Canaanite pagans that lived there, of the Israelites that had started worshiping
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all these false gods, excuse me, and there would only been a small core of those that
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still really worship the god of Israel.
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And I would say that even a lot of them over the years probably left and went down to the
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southern and lived in Judah where they had the temple there and purity of worship.
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So the northern kingdom of Israel was in a very, very bad situation and the people were
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thinking that they're of Israel and they're of this heritage and they've got these worship
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places in Dan and Bethel but there's also all this worship of Baal and the king is worshiping
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Baal and his wife is bringing Baal so the people were totally of two different opinions
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here in turn total confusion on who they were to worship and in this context we have the
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story of the prophet Elijah.
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Now the prophet Elijah goes to King Ahab, this powerful, wealthy, evil king and he tells
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him you're going to have drought for three years.
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I mean he pronounced it, this was speaking from God himself telling Ahab you're going
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to have drought.
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Now why is this significant?
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Baal was known as the weather god.
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It's Baal that's supposed to bring rain.
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So when Elijah announces and pronounces drought and drought actually begins, Ahab is very mad
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at him because this is a total affront to Baal and it's showing that Baal is impotent.
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He's not bringing the rain that he is supposed to bring.
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So this is a real confrontation of Baal that Elijah does.
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Elijah knows what he's doing.
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So Elijah now he's in trouble, Ahab wants to kill him, he stays away for three years
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and you have these stories of him, he's staying out of the area and then at the end of the
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three years he knows it's time to go to Ahab and so he goes to him and he says bring all
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the prophets to me.
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So he gathers all the prophets of Baal and of Ashtara and he brings them there to the
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area called Mount Carmel.
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Now Mount Carmel is a range of hills, you could call them mountains.
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It's about a 30 mile long range of mountains and it bridges Phoenicia with Israel.
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So here in the mountains of this Mount Carmel range they're worshiping the Baal of Phoenicia.
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All makes perfect sense.
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And they always worship on these high places.
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Now some people say they didn't go up on the high place, they'd have the worship down
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below but whatever, these high places were very, very critical in the worship of these
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gods.
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So what does Elijah do?
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He tells the pagan prophets, you know, prepare your altar and everything but do not light
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the fire.
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And then they have to call down fire from Baal.
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Well, you have to understand once again, it's known that these pagan prophets of Baal used
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to rig the altar so that fire would start, so it would make it look like Baal had done
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this.
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But Elijah tells them, don't do that, you got to call it down.
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And so they're doing everything they can to bring down this fire from Baal and prove
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that Baal is great and they can't do it.
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There's no fire.
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And yet Baal is known as the weather god, he's the god of lightning.
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He's supposed to be able to strike with lightning and bring fire.
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He's known as the Lord of the fire.
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So Elijah then soaked his altar full of water just to make the point and he calls down and
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the god of Israel sends the fire.
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Now one little point here in this story, Elijah is taunting the prophets of Baal and he's
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saying, where's your god?
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Where's Baal?
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Is he out on a trip?
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Is he waiting?
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Is he this or that?
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Everything he mentioned is actually a part of the mythology of Baal.
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He knew exactly what he was talking about.
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This is what they said Baal did.
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And he's saying, what is he?
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He's off traveling, he's off this or that, he's not answering you.
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So when you understand this whole context of Baal, this story takes on a whole new level
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of meaning.
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Of course, God brings down the fire and then all of the prophets of Baal are killed.
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And of course, remember, just a Baal's already killed all the prophets of the god of Israel.
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So now Elijah kills the prophets of Baal.
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It says that he then runs ahead of Ahab.
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And more than likely what this is saying, it doesn't mean that he was running away from
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Ahab.
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It means he was running before the royal chariot.
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And it's known that the king would always have men and carriers running ahead of the
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chariot.
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00:31:55,000 --> 00:32:00,000
And so it could be that what this means is Elijah was running ahead of the chariot to
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announce what had just happened and Ahab's change of heart.
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This could be it.
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Then of course, Elijah then keeps running away from Jezebel and he ends up going all the
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way down for 40 days.
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He goes down to Mount Horib.
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And this is very, very interesting.
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Don't miss this because Elijah is the only other person other than Moses that went up
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Mount Horib and interacted with God.
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He's the only other person.
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And it's very interesting to see this because later on in the New Testament, we have Moses
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and Elijah appear on the mountain with Jesus and what's known as the Mount of Transfiguration.
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So, let me keep going though.
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So after he leaves Mount Horib, he comes and Elijah is following him now, wants to replace
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him because God's already told Elijah, you are to anoint Elijah to carry on.
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Elijah knows his time is limited and what does he do?
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He goes down to the Jordan River, the very place that the Israelites crossed the Jordan
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River to come in and take the land.
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He goes down there and he parts the Jordan River and walks across on dry ground.
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Once again, like Moses, he'd been up on Mount Horib.
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Now he parts the water.
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He crosses on dry ground and now he's going to be taken up to heaven and where is he?
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But in the general vicinity of Mount Nebo where Moses died and went to heaven.
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If Moses died, we don't know that.
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Nobody witnessed him dying.
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So in this area, we have this phenomenal story and as I said, it's Moses and Elijah who
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then reappear with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration.
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And of course, because Elijah didn't die, the Jewish people believe in his return and
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see him as a forerunner.
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And Jesus actually, when Jesus was questioned about this, his disciples said, isn't Elijah
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supposed to come?
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And he said, yeah, Elijah came, referring to John the Baptist.
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And yes, Elijah will come and restore all things.
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So there seems to be an ongoing purpose in the spirit of Elijah, although we see a shadow
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of fulfillment in John the Baptist.
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So then Elijah has gone up to heaven.
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Elijah then takes over and we have all of these miracle stories.
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It's interesting because we have twice as many miracle stories by Elijah as we did by
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Elijah and of course, Elijah asked for the double anointing.
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So we have twice as many miracles.
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I don't know if that's on purpose or not.
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We have an interesting story I'm going to end today on.
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And this is where Naaman, who was the commander of the army of the Arameans.
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Now remember at this point, we have somewhat friendly relations.
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00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:34,440
There's a back and forth between Aram, the Arameans and Israel.
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So the head of the army, Naaman, here he's got some kind of skin disease.
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00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:43,440
It's translated as leprosy.
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00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:48,640
We don't know that it was actually leprosy, but some kind of skin disease.
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And he hears about this prophet in Israel that might be able to heal him.
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And so the king of Aram says, yeah, go.
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So Naaman comes down and he comes to Elisha and Elisha says, go down to the Jordan River.
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And Naaman's kind of put out by this.
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He's like, aren't you at least going to pray over me?
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I mean, I thought you'd do something and heal me.
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But he goes down to the Jordan River.
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He takes one look at it and he says, this is where I'm going to be healed.
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00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:24,240
I mean, we have better rivers in Damascus.
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00:36:24,240 --> 00:36:27,560
And it's like this little punky, po-dunky thing.
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And so I bring that up.
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00:36:28,680 --> 00:36:30,880
I always laugh at this story.
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When you go with me to Israel, one of the most common reactions that everyone has when
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they see the Jordan River is this is the Jordan River because we have in our mind the Mississippi
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River or the Ohio River.
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00:36:46,400 --> 00:36:54,160
We think it's some huge main tributary with flowing, clean, pure water and all these amazing
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00:36:54,160 --> 00:36:55,840
things that took place in it.
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00:36:55,840 --> 00:37:02,800
And it did used to be bigger than it is now, but now it is pretty muddy and small.
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00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:08,720
And so even though it was bigger when Naaman was there, I can, I still laugh that he says,
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this is the river I'm supposed to be healed in.
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Of course, he obeyed the instructions.
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He's desperate.
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He gets in and he is healed from the waters of the Jordan River.
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So I hope that you're going to be able to go with me, see the Jordan River, see Mount
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Carmel and the amazing view from there.
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00:37:29,600 --> 00:37:32,040
So down in today's show notes, we have a link.
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I invite you to sign up for our tour interest list.
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And as soon as we have another tour with dates and a package, we'll come let you know about
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it.
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We'd love to have you go with us to Israel.
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See these places.
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When you see the geography, these stories even come more live than they do when we're
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discussing them here today and understanding that geographical and historical context.
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So I hope today helps you as you're reading through this week's reading and into next
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week.
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And remember, hang in there.
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We're going to get through this together.
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I'm going to help you.
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And so I'll see you back here next week.
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And until then, God bless.
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,180
Welcome to Walk Through the Bible, Susan Michael's 12-month journey through the most exciting
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00:00:06,180 --> 00:00:07,680
book on the planet.
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00:00:07,680 --> 00:00:10,680
It will transform your life one page at a time.
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Be sure to subscribe for future episodes that will ignite your faith and bring your Bible
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00:00:15,140 --> 00:00:16,140
to life.
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Now, let's join our host, Susan Michael.
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Well, hey there and welcome back.
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This is Walk Through the Bible and we are on week 23.
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I have entitled this week, What in the World is Going On?
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So if you felt that way when you started doing the reading this week, just know you're in
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the right place.
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So this week we are reading out of the Daily Bible pages 704 to 734 or the dates in the
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Daily Bible of June 4th through the 10th.
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Now let's review for just a minute.
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We read last week about the death of Solomon and the division of the kingdom.
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Just as God had judged Solomon in the reign of his son, his son lost the ten tribes.
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They went off, they proclaimed Jeroboam to be their king, and Jeroboam went and then
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he disobeyed the Lord and set up alternative worship sites in the northern kingdom and
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perverted the worship actually of the God of Israel and introduced idolatry into it.
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So this week now we pick up and we begin now the story of over a 335 year period of the
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history of the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom.
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And I'll tell you, last week we thought it was confusing having a king Jeroboam and a
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Jeroboam and we were trying to figure out which was which.
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Just wait.
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This week we began a period over 200 years of the history of the northern kingdom.
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They have some 20 kings and during the 335 years of the southern kingdom they also have
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about 20 kings.
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So getting this straight as we follow the story simultaneously of the northern kingdom
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and the southern kingdom at the same time and jumping back and back, back and forth,
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it is really confusing.
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The names are hard.
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The chronology is very difficult to figuring out where we are in the story.
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But I do want to say this, that we're moving into a period of history that's closer to
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the modern age and so there's much more archaeological evidence that is being uncovered that actually
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supports the stories here of the kingdom of Israel and the kingdom of Judah.
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In the earlier time periods, archaeological evidence was scant only because there wasn't
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that much of it.
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But in this period of history we're in what's known as the Iron Age and there's just a
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lot more there being uncovered that's proving this story.
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Now in this week's story we are following these two kingdoms and what I want to do before
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we get into any of the stories is back up and take a little bit of a 30,000 foot view
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and in a way that's what the book of 1st and 2nd Kings does anyway.
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It doesn't go into a lot of detail and it's giving you that overall viewpoint of these
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various kings and where they were bad, where they were weak or whatever, if somebody did
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good but they don't give you a whole lot of detail.
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And then it's augmented by portions out of 1st and 2nd Chronicles.
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And 1st and 2nd Chronicles repeats some of what we have in Kings but it also elaborates
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some but it's written from a priestly perspective.
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And so that means it's written from a perspective of Jerusalem which is in Judea, the southern
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kingdom.
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And the priests are much more concerned with what happened in the southern kingdom than
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that idolatrous northern kingdom because the southern kingdom has the lineage of David.
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And so Chronicles gives us a lot more detail about what happened in the southern kingdom.
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So now we have our two kingdoms and as I said, we began at around 930 BC and so the northern
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kingdom lasts for about 200 years.
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It falls in 722.
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During that time they have nine different dynasties made up of about 20 kings and so that means
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there was a lot of instability in the northern kingdom.
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They would have a dynasty may have lasted for two, three, four generations and then somebody
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would come along, assassinate everybody, kill them all, start a whole new dynasty.
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And then two, three generations later the same thing would happen there.
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And so that leads to a lot of instability and a story that's kind of hard to follow.
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The southern kingdom beginning at the same point, 930 BC, it lasts longer.
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It lasts until 586 BC when they fall to the Babylonians.
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During that time the southern kingdom only has one dynasty.
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Guess which one it is?
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Yep, the dynasty of King David.
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And so it lasts throughout the whole time but there are generations and so they have roughly
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about 20 different kings in that dynasty.
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There is one story of about six years where the dynasty is broken but we'll get to that
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in the detail.
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All in all it was only the dynasty of the kingdom of David.
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Why?
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Because God promised David that he would have an everlasting kingdom and he would always
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have a lamp burning there in the city of Jerusalem and he was true to his word.
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And until the dynasty, until the kingdom fell and the city was destroyed.
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So now what are the lessons, I want to talk first about what are the lessons that we can
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glean from all this history that we're going to go through.
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And first is the grace of God.
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There's a lot of talk in America these days about the judgment of God.
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And I have to say, I believe America is really deserving of judgment.
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And I see what's happening in our country, in our society, in our government.
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We're deserving of judgment.
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But God's judgment doesn't come overnight.
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That would make him a tit for tat kind of God where you say one thing wrong and so you're
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hit with something and that's not the way it works.
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God takes his time.
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And so here we have, he gave the Northern Kingdom 200 years to get their act together.
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That's a lot of grace.
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And in the Southern Kingdom, they did have ups and downs.
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They did have a couple of kings that really led them in the right direction and reform
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and worship of the one true God.
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But there were also kings in between that kept the idolatry alive and yet God in his
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grace did not just judge overnight, he gave them ample opportunity to repent.
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Another thing he did is he provided prophets to speak into the nation and speak into the
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lives of the rulers, which was another form of his grace.
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So we have seeing here in the book of 1st and 2nd Kings and Chronicles, a movement of
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prophets.
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And we didn't really have that before.
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We had the prophet Moses and he led his people.
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And then when his time was up, Joshua led them.
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I don't think Joshua was ever considered a prophet, but he led them as a leader.
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And then in the period of the judges, we had a couple of prophets and at the end we had
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the great prophet Samuel and he led the kingdom or he led the country from a tribal confederacy
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to a monarchy and he chose the 1st and 2nd Kings.
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He was a great prophet.
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But now we see that there are prophets and we have a number of what we call writing prophets
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and we have books by them in our Bible and we're going to be talking about some of those.
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But then we have these prophets.
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It's like a king might have a couple hundred prophets that he'd call upon and they'd prophesy
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to him what he should do.
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And somehow they always prophesied in unison.
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And you have to understand, they were probably paid by the king to be the prophets for the
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court.
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So there was a little bit of an influence maybe there as to what they should tell the
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king.
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And somehow they'd all get together and they'd agree to what they were going to say, but
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that's not the case with the writing prophets and these national prophets that we are going
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to be talking about in the next several weeks.
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They went sometimes in opposition to the band of prophets and they spoke the truth to the
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king.
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Another lesson that we're going to see in all of these stories is how that the real
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thing that brought down these kingdoms was when the king married pagan wives and they
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did it all the time and they did it continually and these pagan women brought pagan worship
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not just into the kingdom, into the territory, but actually into the home of the king.
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It influenced the king before you know it.
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They are supporting the idolatry and it is idolatry that brought down these kingdoms.
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God took idolatry very, very personally.
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They were no longer worshiping him, the one that they had married in the wilderness, the
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one that loved them and had promised all these wonderful things to them.
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No, they were turning their back on him and kneeling to some other god, a false god after
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all of that.
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So it is idolatry that brought down the kingdoms.
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So now let's take an overview of the northern kingdom, the story that we're going to be
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reading.
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As I said, there were nine different dynasties, a lot of instability and the highlight of the
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northern kingdom is in a couple of weeks when we get to Jeroboam II.
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Yes, not the Jeroboam I.
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God judges Jeroboam I.
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He and his whole house end up being killed.
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But later on there is another Jeroboam, Jeroboam II, and he's really the highlight for the
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northern kingdom.
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The northern kingdom was larger than the southern kingdom.
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It had 10 tribes.
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Instead of two, it had more territory.
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But it was also more vulnerable to outside attack.
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And why is that?
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Because it was bigger, it wasn't like secluded geographically.
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It had more wide open borders.
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And the international trade route went right through the northern kingdom.
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And so this means there were a lot of other countries, some bigger than the northern kingdom,
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going back and forth there in trade.
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It also meant that this highway was easily used by one of these larger empires who wanted
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to come in and just take over this little empire.
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So it made them very, very vulnerable.
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They also, they needed alliances.
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When we had the kingdom of David and Solomon, it was so big and so wealthy and so strong.
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But also, I want you to understand a concept, what we call it on the playground, the seesaw.
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So when one side of the seesaw goes up, the other one's down.
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And then when you, side goes up, the other side has gone down.
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And this is what we're going to see in these kingdoms in this history.
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So during the kingdom of David and Solomon, they were very big and very strong.
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But it just so happens that Egypt and Mesopotamia were small or weaker.
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And that in a way allowed for the kingdom of Israel to become so big and so strong.
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At the same time, now we have this divided kingdom.
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And so it's weakening because they're divided, number one.
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Number two, they just don't have the strength of that united monarchy.
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And it just so happens at the same time, we have Egypt getting a little bit stronger and
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later on we have Assyria getting stronger.
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And before you know it, the seesaw has tilted.
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They're big and strong and therefore our little Israel and Judah are getting weaker and weaker.
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And in a way, one plays off the other.
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They can't be big and strong when they have these large neighbors around them that are
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bigger and stronger.
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So the kingdom of Israel and Judah needed alliances with the other countries around them.
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And for the northern kingdom, this was really a very weak point and made them very, very
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vulnerable.
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They needed Phoenicia on the north.
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Phoenicia was very wealthy.
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They were maritime traders.
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And they needed Phoenicia and they needed Aram, which is in the area of Syria today.
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It would be in between Israel and where Assyria was based or headquartered.
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In the middle there was the Arameans or Aram of Damascus.
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So they needed these alliances.
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So how did they get them?
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They exchanged wives and they would marry the pagan wives of Phoenicia and of the Arameans
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and brought in these influences.
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Also in the northern kingdom of Israel, something you don't, you need to understand because
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it's not going to just come out and say this.
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There were a lot of Canaanite pagans in the territory of the northern kingdom of Israel.
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So they were already worshiping the idols.
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It was all throughout the northern part, the northern kingdom.
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And this was another influence later on.
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Now looking at the southern kingdom of Judah, as I said, there was only one dynasty.
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So there was a lot more stability in the government in the southern kingdom.
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It was smaller, so it was more compact, and it was geographically protected.
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It was a little bit more secure.
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It was a little bit off that international trade route.
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Up in the hills, there was some geographic boundaries there that helped keep Judah protected.
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Also in Judah, remember, was Jerusalem and the temple.
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And this means that the priests there in the temple and the house of David made sure that
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the worship of the God of Israel in the temple was the foremost worship, was the national
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God of Judah.
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Now I will say there were times that idolatry became quite strong.
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And even from the very beginning, so we have Rehoboam in the south, Jeroboam in the north,
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Rehoboam goes and starts this idolatrous perverted worship.
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And Rehoboam is down here.
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He's got the temple.
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He's got Jerusalem.
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But remember, Rehoboam's mother was a pagan wife of Solomon.
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And so where you know it, Rehoboam is keeping these cult centers alive and the worship in
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his kingdom.
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And then after him, he had pagan wives.
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So that means his son who ruled had a pagan mother.
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And it went on for several generations.
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And we have one story where the mother actually usurps the throne and she tries to make the
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worship of her God the main national God for Judah.
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And there was rebellion by the priests.
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They got her out of there and they rethrowned the one person that remained from the house
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of David.
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But this just goes to show you that these pagan women were a real thorn in the side.
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Now I want to talk about the geographic setting for our stories that we're going to be reading
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because this is going to help you also.
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So remember Solomon's kingdom was very large and very wealthy.
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And he had all of these vassal states at the edge of his kingdom.
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And then he had alliances even beyond the vassal states.
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And what we see in our stories we're going to be reading is these vassal states began
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to break off and they began to usurp their freedom and their independence.
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So but let's first I want to take a big circle around the Solomonic kingdom and talk about
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what we have going on here.
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We have Egypt down in the south and Egypt as soon as you remember Jeroboam had fled
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to Egypt for safety until Solomon died.
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And then Jeroboam came back and sure enough he was made king of the new northern kingdom.
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Well when he went to Egypt it was under a she-shack of Egypt.
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And as soon as Solomon died she-shack knew about it and what does he do?
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He comes up against the southern kingdom of Judah and he actually comes and does damage
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to Jerusalem.
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So that shows you Egypt was beginning to strengthen.
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Thankfully after she-shack it weakened again so we don't hear about Egypt for quite a while.
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Moving up the coast we have the Philistine territory.
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Well the Philistines never ever regained their strength that they had before David.
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David really did defeat the Philistines but there still was some Philistine presence there
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and some cities.
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We read them about them again.
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Then farther up the coast we get above the kingdom of Israel and we find Phoenicia.
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Phoenicia was along the coast as I said very wealthy.
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They were maritime traders.
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They had ships.
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They were known all throughout the Mediterranean area for their trade.
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So they were a very important ally to have.
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Moving inland from Phoenicia we have the Arameans of what is today Syria.
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The Arameans sometimes they were weak, sometimes they were strong, sometimes their king was
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named Ben-Hedad, other times it was somebody else and then it was Ben-Hedad again and then
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it was somebody else and then it was Ben-Hedad again.
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So we're not sure if that was a name or a title.
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But it can be a little confusing trying to follow that history.
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On the other side of the Arameans we have Assyria.
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It was very weak during Solomon but we're going to see by the end of our period here
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it has become a major, major empire.
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Let's come back now below Aram.
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We have the, we have Amon and Moab right below it.
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They were a part of Solomon's kingdom but they now began to shake loose.
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They are cousins of the Israelites.
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They are descendants of Lot if you'll remember the story in Genesis.
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And so they're cousins but yet they aren't really friendly all the time and below them
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is Edom.
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And Edom are also cousins.
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They're the descendants of Esau and they really do the southern kingdom of Judah in.
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They really do some dirty things and so this week we actually read or will read a whole
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prophecy, a whole book, the book of Ovidiah is against the Edomites.
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So this is what we have going on around us.
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Okay, I hope that that helps give you a little bit of context as you're reading through the
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stories.
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I will say that if you get lost in the reading, don't worry about it.
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I got so lost at times.
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I literally had to go get a textbook off my shelf from when I was in college 40 years
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ago and it's called The History of Israel and it tells the story of the Old Testament
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as a history book.
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And I got it out and I read this whole section of history out of that book and it helped
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me so much and I realized you don't have that aid.
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So if you get confused, if you get a little lost, don't worry.
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I'm going to help you each week.
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Let's focus on the majors here.
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Just take the lessons from what we have to learn on our very quick walk through the Bible
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and walk through 335 years of history in the next, I think, four weeks.
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So now we get to our story.
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Now that you know this background, you're going to understand a lot more about the story
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of Ahab and Jezebel.
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We all know about Jezebel.
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It's made her name infamous, right?
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Around the world, Jezebel.
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Who was Jezebel?
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Jezebel was the daughter of the king of Sidon, which is a Phoenician city.
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So she was Phoenician and her god, the god of Phoenicia, was a bale of Tyre.
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It was a specific type of bale and this is something you need to know.
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There were many different bales.
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A bale in a way meant Lord and there were different expressions of this.
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So her bale was her god from Tyre, Phoenicia, and she brought it with her to marry Ahab
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in a political alliance between the house of Ahab and the house there of Phoenicia.
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Now so she brings with her this worship.
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Now Ahab is very wealthy and he's a strong king and he's even mentioned in the writings
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of one of the Assyrian kings, Shamaneser III.
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He mentions him and his palace was full of ivory, which is a real sign of wealth at the
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time and which by the way, I learned something this week.
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Can I share this with you?
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They keep talking about ivory and in fact the prophet Amos complains about the ivory
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palaces, all the ivory in the palace of the kingdom of the king of the north.
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And where did this ivory come from?
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Well, I learned that at this time in history, there were elephants in Syria.
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Of course, today there are no elephants in Syria, but at that time there were still elephants
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and that's where they got a lot of this ivory and so his palace was full of it.
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So he marries Jezebel and she brings this worship of Baal and Ahab goes and Ahab's father
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had built a city called Samaria and he made it the capital of the northern kingdom of
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Israel and so Ahab now goes to the capital city of Samaria where he has his palace full
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of ivory and what does he do?
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He builds a temple to the Baal of Tyre.
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Now this means that he is making this Baal by all purposes, you know, the national god
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of the north.
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There were still the worship centers going on that Jeroboam set up in Danon and Bethel
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where it was a mixture of worship of the god of Israel and these cabs, whatever they meant
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and this Baal that may have been represented there, but he sets up in the capital city,
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the temple to the Baal that his wife worshiped, Jezebel.
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And so this is why in 1 Kings 21 it says that Ahab was the most evil king of the north and
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Jezebel we know was just notoriously treacherous and she went and killed all the prophets
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of the god of Israel and she was feeding and supporting and paying 850 prophets.
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450 of them were to Baal and I think 400 of them were to the fertility goddess Ashtara
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and so she was very evil and so what I want you to understand is at this point the northern
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kingdom of Israel don't think of it as being Jewish because it wasn't, it was such a mix
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of the Canaanite pagans that lived there, of the Israelites that had started worshiping
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all these false gods, excuse me, and there would only been a small core of those that
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still really worship the god of Israel.
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And I would say that even a lot of them over the years probably left and went down to the
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southern and lived in Judah where they had the temple there and purity of worship.
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So the northern kingdom of Israel was in a very, very bad situation and the people were
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thinking that they're of Israel and they're of this heritage and they've got these worship
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places in Dan and Bethel but there's also all this worship of Baal and the king is worshiping
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Baal and his wife is bringing Baal so the people were totally of two different opinions
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here in turn total confusion on who they were to worship and in this context we have the
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story of the prophet Elijah.
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Now the prophet Elijah goes to King Ahab, this powerful, wealthy, evil king and he tells
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him you're going to have drought for three years.
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I mean he pronounced it, this was speaking from God himself telling Ahab you're going
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to have drought.
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Now why is this significant?
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Baal was known as the weather god.
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It's Baal that's supposed to bring rain.
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So when Elijah announces and pronounces drought and drought actually begins, Ahab is very mad
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at him because this is a total affront to Baal and it's showing that Baal is impotent.
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He's not bringing the rain that he is supposed to bring.
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So this is a real confrontation of Baal that Elijah does.
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Elijah knows what he's doing.
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So Elijah now he's in trouble, Ahab wants to kill him, he stays away for three years
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and you have these stories of him, he's staying out of the area and then at the end of the
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three years he knows it's time to go to Ahab and so he goes to him and he says bring all
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the prophets to me.
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So he gathers all the prophets of Baal and of Ashtara and he brings them there to the
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area called Mount Carmel.
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Now Mount Carmel is a range of hills, you could call them mountains.
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It's about a 30 mile long range of mountains and it bridges Phoenicia with Israel.
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So here in the mountains of this Mount Carmel range they're worshiping the Baal of Phoenicia.
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All makes perfect sense.
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And they always worship on these high places.
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Now some people say they didn't go up on the high place, they'd have the worship down
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below but whatever, these high places were very, very critical in the worship of these
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gods.
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So what does Elijah do?
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He tells the pagan prophets, you know, prepare your altar and everything but do not light
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the fire.
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And then they have to call down fire from Baal.
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Well, you have to understand once again, it's known that these pagan prophets of Baal used
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to rig the altar so that fire would start, so it would make it look like Baal had done
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this.
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But Elijah tells them, don't do that, you got to call it down.
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And so they're doing everything they can to bring down this fire from Baal and prove
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that Baal is great and they can't do it.
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There's no fire.
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And yet Baal is known as the weather god, he's the god of lightning.
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He's supposed to be able to strike with lightning and bring fire.
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He's known as the Lord of the fire.
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So Elijah then soaked his altar full of water just to make the point and he calls down and
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the god of Israel sends the fire.
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Now one little point here in this story, Elijah is taunting the prophets of Baal and he's
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saying, where's your god?
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Where's Baal?
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Is he out on a trip?
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Is he waiting?
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Is he this or that?
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Everything he mentioned is actually a part of the mythology of Baal.
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He knew exactly what he was talking about.
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This is what they said Baal did.
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And he's saying, what is he?
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He's off traveling, he's off this or that, he's not answering you.
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So when you understand this whole context of Baal, this story takes on a whole new level
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of meaning.
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Of course, God brings down the fire and then all of the prophets of Baal are killed.
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And of course, remember, just a Baal's already killed all the prophets of the god of Israel.
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So now Elijah kills the prophets of Baal.
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It says that he then runs ahead of Ahab.
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And more than likely what this is saying, it doesn't mean that he was running away from
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Ahab.
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It means he was running before the royal chariot.
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And it's known that the king would always have men and carriers running ahead of the
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chariot.
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00:31:55,000 --> 00:32:00,000
And so it could be that what this means is Elijah was running ahead of the chariot to
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announce what had just happened and Ahab's change of heart.
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This could be it.
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Then of course, Elijah then keeps running away from Jezebel and he ends up going all the
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way down for 40 days.
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He goes down to Mount Horib.
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And this is very, very interesting.
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Don't miss this because Elijah is the only other person other than Moses that went up
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Mount Horib and interacted with God.
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He's the only other person.
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And it's very interesting to see this because later on in the New Testament, we have Moses
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and Elijah appear on the mountain with Jesus and what's known as the Mount of Transfiguration.
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So, let me keep going though.
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So after he leaves Mount Horib, he comes and Elijah is following him now, wants to replace
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him because God's already told Elijah, you are to anoint Elijah to carry on.
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Elijah knows his time is limited and what does he do?
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He goes down to the Jordan River, the very place that the Israelites crossed the Jordan
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River to come in and take the land.
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He goes down there and he parts the Jordan River and walks across on dry ground.
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Once again, like Moses, he'd been up on Mount Horib.
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Now he parts the water.
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He crosses on dry ground and now he's going to be taken up to heaven and where is he?
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00:33:42,520 --> 00:33:50,520
But in the general vicinity of Mount Nebo where Moses died and went to heaven.
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If Moses died, we don't know that.
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Nobody witnessed him dying.
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So in this area, we have this phenomenal story and as I said, it's Moses and Elijah who
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then reappear with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration.
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00:34:10,080 --> 00:34:15,840
And of course, because Elijah didn't die, the Jewish people believe in his return and
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see him as a forerunner.
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And Jesus actually, when Jesus was questioned about this, his disciples said, isn't Elijah
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supposed to come?
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And he said, yeah, Elijah came, referring to John the Baptist.
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And yes, Elijah will come and restore all things.
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00:34:33,440 --> 00:34:42,200
So there seems to be an ongoing purpose in the spirit of Elijah, although we see a shadow
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of fulfillment in John the Baptist.
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00:34:46,280 --> 00:34:49,920
So then Elijah has gone up to heaven.
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Elijah then takes over and we have all of these miracle stories.
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It's interesting because we have twice as many miracle stories by Elijah as we did by
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00:35:01,880 --> 00:35:06,880
Elijah and of course, Elijah asked for the double anointing.
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00:35:06,880 --> 00:35:09,080
So we have twice as many miracles.
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00:35:09,080 --> 00:35:12,360
I don't know if that's on purpose or not.
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00:35:12,360 --> 00:35:16,160
We have an interesting story I'm going to end today on.
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And this is where Naaman, who was the commander of the army of the Arameans.
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Now remember at this point, we have somewhat friendly relations.
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00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:34,440
There's a back and forth between Aram, the Arameans and Israel.
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00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:41,480
So the head of the army, Naaman, here he's got some kind of skin disease.
450
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:43,440
It's translated as leprosy.
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00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:48,640
We don't know that it was actually leprosy, but some kind of skin disease.
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00:35:48,640 --> 00:35:53,760
And he hears about this prophet in Israel that might be able to heal him.
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And so the king of Aram says, yeah, go.
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So Naaman comes down and he comes to Elisha and Elisha says, go down to the Jordan River.
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And Naaman's kind of put out by this.
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00:36:05,560 --> 00:36:07,680
He's like, aren't you at least going to pray over me?
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I mean, I thought you'd do something and heal me.
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00:36:10,800 --> 00:36:12,640
But he goes down to the Jordan River.
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00:36:12,640 --> 00:36:18,800
He takes one look at it and he says, this is where I'm going to be healed.
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00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:24,240
I mean, we have better rivers in Damascus.
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00:36:24,240 --> 00:36:27,560
And it's like this little punky, po-dunky thing.
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And so I bring that up.
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00:36:28,680 --> 00:36:30,880
I always laugh at this story.
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00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:37,800
When you go with me to Israel, one of the most common reactions that everyone has when
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they see the Jordan River is this is the Jordan River because we have in our mind the Mississippi
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00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:46,400
River or the Ohio River.
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00:36:46,400 --> 00:36:54,160
We think it's some huge main tributary with flowing, clean, pure water and all these amazing
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00:36:54,160 --> 00:36:55,840
things that took place in it.
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00:36:55,840 --> 00:37:02,800
And it did used to be bigger than it is now, but now it is pretty muddy and small.
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00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:08,720
And so even though it was bigger when Naaman was there, I can, I still laugh that he says,
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this is the river I'm supposed to be healed in.
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00:37:11,480 --> 00:37:14,200
Of course, he obeyed the instructions.
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He's desperate.
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He gets in and he is healed from the waters of the Jordan River.
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00:37:21,560 --> 00:37:26,360
So I hope that you're going to be able to go with me, see the Jordan River, see Mount
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Carmel and the amazing view from there.
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00:37:29,600 --> 00:37:32,040
So down in today's show notes, we have a link.
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I invite you to sign up for our tour interest list.
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And as soon as we have another tour with dates and a package, we'll come let you know about
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00:37:42,320 --> 00:37:43,320
it.
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00:37:43,320 --> 00:37:45,080
We'd love to have you go with us to Israel.
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00:37:45,080 --> 00:37:46,800
See these places.
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00:37:46,800 --> 00:37:52,120
When you see the geography, these stories even come more live than they do when we're
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00:37:52,120 --> 00:37:59,000
discussing them here today and understanding that geographical and historical context.
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00:37:59,000 --> 00:38:03,800
So I hope today helps you as you're reading through this week's reading and into next
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00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:05,200
week.
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And remember, hang in there.
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We're going to get through this together.
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I'm going to help you.
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And so I'll see you back here next week.
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And until then, God bless.
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