Good morning. Welcome to Trinity Reformed Baptist Church, Jackson, Georgia. It's October 22nd, 2017. Join us now as Pastor Brandon Smith continues our sermon series in the life of Elijah. If you'll turn your Bibles to 1 Kings, I'm going to read a couple of passages of scripture from 1 Kings 22 and then Psalm 139. Then we'll pray. And we'll begin with the preaching of the Word. 1 Kings 22, we're reminded that there is a scene here where Ahab and Jehoshaphat have come together and Ahab has asked Jehoshaphat to go with him into war to take back Ramoth Gilead. And prophets have been called forth by Jehoshaphat's word and asking for a word from the Lord. And they have all given a good report of what should take place. And Jehoshaphat asks, is there another word from the Lord that we can hear? And there's a prophet named Micaiah that's sent. And Micaiah is brought forth. And he goes through an interchange with Ahab that apparently they've had before. And Ahab presses Micaiah, tell me the truth of the word of the Lord. And so Micaiah reports this scene of the word of the Lord that there's a throne room and spirits have been called forth and one spirit is going to go forth to the mouths of the 400 prophets and cause them to deceive Ahab and Ahab will go to war and he will be killed. Well, Ahab doesn't take to this too kindly and neither does one of the main prophets, Zedekiah. He doesn't take to it too kindly and we'll pick up in verse 24 of 1 Kings chapter 22. Then Zedekiah the son of Chinnanah came near and struck Micaiah on the cheek and said, How did the Spirit of the Lord pass from me to speak to you? Micaiah said, Behold, you shall see on that day when you enter an inner room to hide yourself. Then the king of Israel said, Take Micaiah and return him to Ammon, the governor of the city, and to Joash, the king's son, and say, Thus says the king, Put this man in prison and feed him sparingly with bread and water until I return safely. Micaiah said, if you indeed return safely, the Lord has not spoken by me. And he said, listen, all you people. Now turn with me to Psalm 139. I want to read a portion of this Psalm, and then we'll pray. Psalm 139, beginning in verse one. O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up. You understand my thought from afar. You scrutinize my path and my lying down and are intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there is a word on my tongue, behold, O Lord, You know it all. You've enclosed me behind and before and laid Your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is too high. I cannot attain to it. Where can I go from your spirit or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, you are there. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there your hand will lead me and your right hand will lay hold of me. If I say, surely the darkness will overwhelm me and the light around me will be night. Even the darkness is not too dark for you. And the night is as bright as the day. Darkness and light are alike to you. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you've been merciful. and kind in your covenant grace to us as sinners, that you would send forth your word. Many have gone before to bring forth your word to your people, and you continue to use weak men, sinners themselves, to preach your word to your people, to stand in the stead of Christ. Lord, this is only a work that You can do. So we praise You. For not one of us, hearer or preacher, is perfect. We're not even close. We're not even near the standard of the measuring stick. So we come to hear Your Word, knowing that apart from the work of Your Spirit, In the hearer and the preacher, nothing will take place. So we ask that your spirit be used according to your will, that he work according to your will, to be used in the life of the preacher and the hearers, to deal with us according to your truth and your truth alone and nothing else. It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. This morning I want to finish out with just a few observations from 1 Kings 22. I have three observations. Number one, omnipresence and omniscience cancel out concealment. Omnipresence and omniscience cancel out concealment. Number two, ultimate judgment follows unambiguous forewarnings. Ultimate judgment follows unambiguous forewarnings. And number three, the veracity of God's Word never returns void. The veracity of God's Word never returns void. We're studying the Reformation in Bible study and looking at the life of Martin Luther. And as I think back about Luther's life, I often have many questions. But there's one particular question that has been brought to the forefront in my mind as I've continued to look at the life of Elijah and the prophets and Ahab, Elijah's greatest nemesis. And this one question about Luther came to my mind. Why was the law of God such an oppression to Martin Luther before his conversion? Why was the law of God such an oppression to Martin Luther before his conversion? Well, I think there was a reality in Martin Luther's life that he lived with each and every day, this great oppression of the law of God upon his mind and his heart. The fact is, Martin Luther really did believe in the omnipresence and omniscience of God. He really believed that God was everywhere at once and that God knew everything. And in a sense, as the scripture puts it in anthropomorphic language, that God sees and knows all things. For why would a law be so oppressive if nobody really knew you broke it? If you could actually hide and you could go somewhere and you could be by yourself and you could do things that nobody knew about or you could think things in your own mind that nobody ever knew that you thought, why would the law be so oppressive? It's oppressive because even in our own consciences, we truly know from Romans chapter 1, of the omnipresence of God. He is everywhere at once. And the omniscience of God that He knows all things. This fact brings us to a place to look at this scene historically of Micaiah and Ahab and brings us to a real understanding of the day and age in which Elijah and the prophets lived and worked in. And it was a day and age where they dealt with people and a king who were rebellious against the very being of God. Firstly this morning, omnipresence and omniscience cancel out concealment. Ahab, time and time again, other kings before him, his ancestors, his forefathers before him, time and time again, had heard the specific word of God given to them, spoken directly to them, and they continued to do what they wanted to do when they wanted to do it. As if somehow, God had no idea what they were doing. as if somehow God was not aware, as if somehow God did not see it. You know, in our day and age, we don't just protect ourselves in the same way that we used to. People now will put up video cameras outside their homes. They'll put them inside their homes. Even when they have maybe someone babysit a child, they'll have video cameras in certain places in the home where they're not seen, because they want to know what's going on. I've even seen a particular type device that you can put on the outside of your house, and it has floodlights, and if somebody walks up to your house, it sends a signal to your smartphone, and you can see and speak to the people that are standing outside your home. People walk up to your house thinking no one is watching, no one is seeing, no one is around to know. And then all of a sudden, a light comes on and they start to hear the voice of the homeowner speaking to them. You don't think that probably would change the activity of the people involved? But somehow sin is so awful, so rebellious against God, that it even causes us to rebel against the very being of God in His omniscience and His omnipresence. The law was so oppressive to Martin Luther because he really did see and understand that. Maybe not in its right context, maybe all the years he spent in the monastery beating himself, fasting, sleeping on a cold, dark, dingy, awful floor, night after night in the cold, thinking somehow he was getting closer to God. Why would he have done such things if he didn't think God could see it? if he didn't think God knew it. His perspective was totally wrong as far as what needed to be done to bring about his own salvation. But he had some understanding of the being of God. And yet, in the time of Elijah, in the time of these prophets, they're dealing with a king who suddenly doesn't even seem to get that. Or, and I think probably the case is at worst, he's just totally rebellious against it. He doesn't care if God sees, because he doesn't really believe in the God of Israel. It's interesting that the scripture gives us indications of these truths, even as we read Psalm 139. The psalmist is saying, where can I flee? Where can I go? Where is it that you're not there? How is it that I could go anywhere that you don't already know these things? And yet even in the life of Elijah, looking at the king that he dealt with, Ahab, we have to recognize, we see these truths being worked out in time, space, and history. How is it that God could know what Ahab was doing, and at the same time, he knew exactly where to find the prophets of the Lord. Think about it. Ahab had to send out a search party to try to find Elijah, but God knew exactly where he was. And he also knew, at the very same time, that Ahab was sending out a search party for Elijah. brings us to a place to see not only the context in which Elijah is serving God as one of his prophets, and that is in a time that's a deep darkness. The Reformation was a time of deep, deep darkness. And so here it is, we see this in the scripture being played out before us, that Elijah is prophesying God's word to the kingdom of Israel and to the very king of Israel himself and his wife, and he's doing that in a very dark, awful time. It's not that God was so far off that He could not comfort His people. It's that God was bringing His people closer to Him. Because dark is as light to Him, as the psalmist said. It brings us to a practical question. How many of us fail to remember who God is in daily living? I mean, you know your thoughts, you know your actions. If we really viewed Psalm 139 correctly, if we really viewed our understanding of what was going on in the life of Elijah and the king he was dealing with, wouldn't we want to ask ourselves a question? Do we really view God as the true living God ever, eternally present, all at once, knowing all things, each and every second of our day? He transcends time, space, and history. And yet, He is knowable to us. Sometimes I look at the kings in these stories and see more of the kings in myself than I do anything else. Do I think I can hide from God? I think sometimes I live that way, as if He does not know what I'm thinking. Is it true for you? How many times do we think and act as though God does not see our sin? I mean, one of the primary issues of the gospel is not only our salvation, but ultimately in that sanctifying work that goes on. After we are justified, declared right before God, there is a work in a Christian that continues forward because we are not perfect after we are converted. One of the Puritans wrote about fighting against sin in this way. He said, believe God's omniscience and omnipresence that the Lord is everywhere and all things are naked and open to his eye with whom you have to deal. you cannot intend to think, you cannot whisper out your thoughts, you cannot incline yourself to the most abstracted kind of secrecy in the world, but God sees you clearly and perfectly. If you think about the law of God and God is going to judge all mankind according to his law, And you are left with understanding that judgment is coming from an omnipresent, omniscient God. I say to you, if you really understand that, you'd be in despair too. No wonder Luther was in despair. The law of God being oppressive as it is enough, but the very God who gave the law is more oppressive, left to itself that that God sees and knows all things. And you can't hide one thing from him. No wonder he was in despair. But he was in a good place, a lot better than the place of Ahab. Ahab didn't even get that. Ahab was not oppressed hardly at all. kept doing whatever he wanted to do because he thought he was greater than God. Omnipresence and omniscience cancel out concealment. Ultimate judgment follows unambiguous forewarnings. Ultimate judgment follows unambiguous forewarnings. Through the prophets, God clearly warned Ahab. Elijah was God's man giving clear warning to Ahab. It was not something that was mysterious. not to make light of other situations, but I'm often amazed when I read these other great religious leaders down through history, there are some that write things that are so abstract, who in the world knows what they meant? Secularism has its own religious leaders, the men of psychology and philosophy. You can read some of those great philosophers and you wonder, what in the world are they talking about? And I even wonder sometimes if they even knew what they were talking about. But the warnings of God through His prophet, through His very word, they were not abstract. Even the very scene here where Micaiah gives Ahab some view of what was going on in this throne room, so to speak, this is just a picture for Ahab. Even that in and of itself was pretty clear. You could get the idea. Bad news, big boy. Or as the old westerner would say, there's a reckoning coming. It was clear. Not only clear from Micaiah, but it had been clear from a prophet we didn't know his name and it had been clear through Elijah himself. These clear warnings had come in multiple occasions. Through the prophets, God clearly warned Ahab, but through the prophets, God definitely warned Ahab. He began to get definite understanding, a definite picture of exactly what would take place. This shows you how defiant Ahab was among the kings and among the very king himself, the God of all the ages, that he could get such clear and definite warnings and yet he could defy all of them. If you think back about Elijah's warnings to Ahab, he told him of drought, How much more definite could it have been? It was clear and it was definite. It was outlined. It was told exactly what would take place. Even Ahab's own death was a definite warning. Through the prophets, God clearly warned Ahab. Through the prophets, God definitely warned Ahab. And through the prophets, God eternally warned Ahab. These warnings were of eternal consequence. Another reason we can look at the Reformation and see why Martin Luther was so concerned was there was eternal consequence. Not only was this God omniscient and omnipresent and He had a law and He was promising judgment according to that law, but He also understood that that judgment was eternal. Another reason the mysticism of our present day is so dangerous because it acts like we're floating souls in the bodies of these people and we do whatever we want to and it's all gonna end up okay. If we'll just float around and be decent to each other, our spirits will ascend and we'll be in a loving place together. How awful. to fill people with that garbage. And their minds and souls are filled with it. TV gives it to you, magazines, books, anything you can imagine. Oprah, whatever, they all give you this garbage. And we wonder why the world around us is so screwed up and confused. The warnings of God are not just clear and they're not just definite, they're eternal. They're eternal. That's why we should view our sin as so dangerous. Our sin is not just that we did something bad. It's true, there is forgiveness. But sin has eternal consequences. You say, well, Brandon, you've said that about this situation before. You're repeating yourself. You're reiterating things. But that's important in life. Matter of fact, if you read the scripture through and you read it time and time again, you'll notice there's lots of repetition in the scripture. God repeats a lot, lots of things about himself over and over again, and he also repeats a lot of things about man over and over and over again. There's probably a reason he does a lot of that repeating. We're prone to forgetfulness. We're prone to putting those things aside. We're prone to going astray, each to our own way. I think it would be bad if you were ever under a preaching ministry that didn't have some form of repetition to it. Scripture's full of repetition. So here we are again being reminded of clear, definite, eternal warnings. Think about Martin Luther's day. The Pope and his minions had the same problem throughout their centuries. Every time God warned them through his preachers, the Roman Catholic Church sought to murder the one who gave them the word. Think of men like Tyndale and Wycliffe, who they wanted to put the scripture into the common vernacular of the people, so they could read the scripture. What did the Roman Catholic Church want to do? Kill them. If they could have found each and every one of them as soon as they could, they would have killed them earlier than they did. We even talked last week about raising the body or exhuming the body of one from the dead so you could burn his ashes or burn his bones to ashes. It's not just the Pope and Rome that have these problems. Secularism has this problem all among the people of our day. Rome will always be Rome. It's still Rome today. It's not taking anything back that it's ever thought. And secularism will always be secularism. It will always say that men have the upper hand, that we control our destinies. The fact of the matter is, when we go to the Word of God, it's the prophets of old who are speaking clearly. It's that great and final prophet in the Lord Jesus Christ speaking eternally, sending forth His apostles to speak forth the Word to the new covenant people of God. And what are they saying? They're telling us over and over and over again the warnings of God are clear, definite, and they have eternal consequences. Thankfully, we can say this, thirdly this morning, the veracity of God's Word never returns void. The veracity of God's word never returns void. Veracity is the idea of truthfulness. John 17, 17, Jesus in his high priestly prayer, praying on behalf of his apostles, sanctify them in the truth. And then he says, your word is truth. I think Micaiah was saying the same thing in this scene here. Verse 17, Micaiah, 28, Micaiah said, if you indeed return safely, the Lord has not spoken by me. And he said, listen, all you people. Essentially, what is Micaiah saying? He's saying, wait and see. Wait and see who is wrong. Wait and see who is wrong. Micaiah is not speaking of the arrogance of his own person here. He's speaking about the truthfulness of God's Word. He's not standing and speaking this way to the king to say to everybody, look at me, I am going to be right. He's saying, no, this is the Word of the Lord. How many times in this chapter have we heard, thus saith the Lord? And we've heard it enough times that it came from some people who know nothing about the Word of the Lord, and it also came from those who did know something about the Word of the Lord. And the ones who said, thus saith the Lord, the way they were proven to be right, was what? By what was prophesied actually came it to be. Wait and see who is wrong. In one sense, I say to you this morning, this is the same exact thing we have going on in the church today that we have going on in the world today. You come here week in and week out by God's grace to worship and to give thanks and praise unto the one true living God, and yet you go out and live and work in a world that says, for the most part, you're crazy. Or don't get too caught up in that stuff. If it helps you as a coping mechanism, fine. And it helps you to be a nicer person to people around you, then fine. But don't get too caught up in all of that. You need to remember the veracity of God's Word. It never returns void. You need to be able to think in your mind, wait and see who's wrong. Because there's a building platform here that's taking place in the Old Testament. And it's building all the way through to the person and work of Jesus Christ. Would Elijah have had an understanding of Christ as we now have it today through the whole of the two Testaments? No. But he knew there was a saving God. And he knew that was the God of grace. For what did he want Elijah to turn from? Was it so bad that he wanted Elijah to turn from worshiping idols and giving sacrifices, blood sacrifices, to idols? What caused Ahab such problem was Elijah and Micaiah and these other prophets were calling him to admit he was not in control and he had to follow someone else. So Micaiah said, wait and see who is wrong. But you know what else Micaiah is saying? Wait and see who's right. Wait and see who is right. I think if we're to build upon understanding these Old Testament prophets and them dealing with the kings and Elijah's going back and forth with Ahab, we have to understand there's a building process, a covenantal process and platform. In one sense, we have to look at these texts in and of themselves as a text. The Kings, written for us to understand. But in another sense, they are a building block to give us that understanding of a coming day. Judgment is a repetitive theme of the Scripture. Now, a lot of people don't like to talk about that. It's not pleasant to talk about judgment or wrath. Who wants to talk about wrath all the time? But it is a theme of the Scripture. The wrath of God on the judgment of sin. Men will be judged. God will pour out His wrath on sinners. Anyone who fights against the coming wrath of God and God's final judgment is no different than any king that we can read about in the Old Testament that went against the Word of God. The more than comforting news is, though, is that God gives us explicit, definite, not just warnings, not just cautions, but explicit, definite, clear understandings of grace. The problem for the human, for humanity today is they don't want to see God's word as grace because they have to give up self-autonomy. See, that's really the biggest struggle we have as humans. It's really, honestly, the biggest struggle we have is that we do truly like to think, as an individual, I am in control. I'm in control of my mind, I'm in control of my soul, I'm in control of the whole of my being, I'm in control of life, and if I will do certain things, I will stay in control. But to see our sin for what it is, puts us in a place that we're out of control. And even more so, to see Christ for who He is, as spoken in the scriptures, it puts us in a place to say, I need somebody else to be in control. Ahab was not understanding of Christ as we are today, but he was understanding of some sense of Messiah. These things were being preached to him and told to him and spoken to him of God's truth outlined, this is what you do. And what Ahab was saying to the prophets was, you know what? You just tell God I'm in control. You just tell God I've got it all handled. and I'll deal with it my way. And he may not even see what I'm doing anyway. He may not even know what I'm doing anyway, so I'm just gonna do what I think I need to do. This is no different than the world we live in today, is it? What's the world today saying to all of us? You're all basically in control, and you're basically good. And if you'll just kind of love yourself, and when you do that right, you can learn to love the ones around you, and we'll just all get along. How's that worked out for us? Have we solved the Middle East problem? We solved the problems in our own country. Everybody was banking on some new administration that would make everything better. Well, I don't know what it's going to do. I know this though. Thankfully, all those sinners are involved in government all across the world. Thankfully, God is in control. And He sees and knows all. As we're leaving this portion of Elijah's life and we see the death of Ahab, exactly what Micaiah said would happen came true. If you see the life of Ahab and then say to yourself, I'll do something different. I'll still be in control, but my outcome will be different. And you've not looked at the text rightly. Although in its most explicit manner, it's not giving you the name of Jesus Christ. It is telling you that you are not in control. And there is a being more sovereign than you are, who has a will freer than your will. And he is known as the one true living God. Bad news. We are sinners. We have broken the law of God and he has seen every single bit of it and he knows it all. Good news. He sent His one and only Son to live a perfect life we could not live and to die a sinner's death. And He did it all perfectly and was raised from the dead on the third day. Good news, He's returning again one day. Bad news, He's returning again one day. And for all the people that want to be self-autonomous, live their life their way, think they can handle it all and do it all their way, they will be judged according to those thoughts and those deeds. For all those who say, you know what? All this is really messed up. And God, I truly do hate your law. And Lord, I need to seek you and I need to deal with your word and your word alone. Please, Lord, by your Spirit, you do something in me that I could not do and would not do. For all those that repent and believe and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ alone to save them from their sin, the wrath of God will have already been placed on the Son. And for those who will not trust in Him, they will endure the wrath of God eternally. Lots of bad news, but lots of good news. But it all boils down to seeing those clear, definite, eternal warnings of God. And looking at the life of Ahab and saying, you know what? I didn't think that guy was that bright. I think I need to think a little differently. But also recognizing that left to yourself, you won't. And you are in need of the grace of God. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you're merciful that we have a time of preaching. And your grace is ever shown to us by the working of your spirit according to the truth of your word. Lord, we ask According to your will, will you do a work by your spirit through your word that you alone can do? We recognize the world is always, always desiring to pull us away from you. But we are thankful that your grip on your people is always greater than the pull of the world. Keep us near your son Christ. Through your word. And by your spirit. That we would see your word as an inheritance. An eternal inheritance. that would bring joy to our minds and hearts. Give us a day today that we find more joy in the God who saved us than we do anything else. It's in the name of the Lord Jesus we pray. Amen.