Make War
June 20, 2008 – 5:08 pmI’ve been reading through 1 Kings for the last few weeks. Today I came across something that struck me as odd… and then it’s oddness struck me as odd. Let me explain.
First Kings 18 is the famous story of Elijah vs. the Prophets of Baal… The prophets pray all day for fire and don’t get it. Elijah prays a very simple prayer for fire and God sends fire that incinerates everything. Pretty sweet story. If you want to read something that might get you excited about reading the OT again, read this one. First Kings 19 is Elijah running away from Ahab’s angry wife Jezebel, and ends with Elijah finding Elisha, who will eventually succeed him.
Chapter 20 is what struck me as odd. Ahab is the King of Israel. He’s fighting with the king of Syria. Ahab was a wicked king who did not love God. The king of Syria gathered together a bunch of other kings to go attack Ahab at Samaria. They threaten Ahab then do something really stupid - get drunk in their tents. So Ahab goes out after the kings, killing a bunch of people and causing the rest to flee.
Like any semi-intelligent commander, the king of Syria and his servants debrief what happened during the battle. Here’s their diagnosis - fitting with their pagan, superstitious nature and not all that odd to us:
23 And the servants of the king of Syria said to him, “Their gods are gods of the hills, and so they were stronger than we. But let us fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. 24 And do this: remove the kings, each from his post, and put commanders in their places, 25 and muster an army like the army that you have lost, horse for horse, and chariot for chariot. Then we will fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they.” And he listened to their voice and did so.
See their solution: their god is a god of the hills, so fight them next time in the plains instead. A few verses later, we see that this line of thinking leads to their destruction:
28 And a man of God came near and said to the king of Israel, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because the Syrians have said, “The Lord is a god of the hills but he is not a god of the valleys,” therefore I will give all this great multitude into your hand, and you shall know that I am the Lord.’ ”
That shocked me. It shouldn’t, but it did.
My thinking goes like, “these people are sinners. And they’re not even Israelites. They worship Pagan gods, they always have, and they probably always will. This response is their natural, default response. If I were in their position, I would probably come to the same conclusion. It make sense.”
God’s thinking goes like, “these people are sinners. With their every breath, they glorify things other than me. This may be their default, but their default is sinful and thus deserves wrath.”
The difference? God takes sin - each sin - much more seriously than we do. God takes us treasuring things other than Him seriously. Every single instance of it. He “gave over” a King and a “great multitude” because of a sin as simple as this, and it was completely just. But we reduce it to “oh, that one action isn’t that bad. I’m dealing with other sin right now.” Or worse, like the Syrians, we think “there’s nothing wrong with this. This is right and good and natural and consistent and normal,” blind to our own blindness.
2 Responses to “Make War”
this is tremendously helpful, and challenging.
By behzad on Jun 20, 2008
agreed.
By walt on Jun 22, 2008