Micaiah's Prophecy

I. Introduction
A. Summary of the first part of story
1. Divided kingdom
2. War with Syria — Ramoth-Gilead
3. Jehoshaphat's visit to see his fellow king Ahab
4. Ahab asks Jehoshaphat to go to war together
5. Consulting the prophets
6. Consulting Micaiah
II. 1Kings 22:15-18, 23-28 And when he [Micaiah] had come to the king, the king said to him, “Micaiah, shall we go to Ramoth-Gilead to battle, or shall we refrain?” And he answered him, “Go up and triumph; the LORD will give it into the hand of the king.” 16 But the king said to him, “How many times shall I make you swear that you speak to me nothing but the truth in the name of the LORD?” 17 And he said, “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains, as sheep that have no shepherd. And the LORD said, ‘These have no master; let each return to his home in peace.’ ” 18 And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “Did I not tell you that he would not prophesy good concerning me, but evil?”...23 [Micaiah continues:] “Now therefore behold, the LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the LORD has declared disaster for you.” 24 Then Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah came near and struck Micaiah on the cheek and said, “How did the Spirit of the LORD go from me to speak to you?” 25 And Micaiah said, “Behold, you shall see on that day when you go into an inner chamber to hide yourself.” 26 And the king of Israel said, “Seize Micaiah, and take him back to Amon the governor of the city and to Joash the king’s son, 27 and say, ‘Thus says the king, “Put this fellow in prison and feed him meager rations of bread and water, until I come in peace.” ’ ” 28 And Micaiah said, “If you return in peace, the LORD has not spoken by me.” And he said, “Hear, all you peoples!”
A. Summarize
1. Micaiah’s initial response mimicking the false prophets
2. Micaiah's vision about Ahab’s death
3. Ahab’s “I told you so!”
4. Micaiah’s’s second vision: about how the false prophets are deceived
5. Zedekiah violent reaction
6. “So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat the king of Judah went up to Ramoth-Gilead.” -1Kgs.22:29
7. The disguise and the random arrow – 1Kings 22:34-37
III. The story
A. Request
B. Revelation
C. Reaction
D. Response & Result
IV. The application
A. Request: Ahab summons Micaiah, asking for God’s approval for going to war. And then he insisted that Micaiah tell the truth about what God had to say.
1. So did Ahab really want to hear from God? It would be easy to say no. But I think the answer is yes and no.
a. No in the sense that Ahab did not want God’s will but his own.
b. But yes in the sense that Ahab did want God to agree with and conform to his ambition.
c. You can tell that the one Ahab really hates is God. God won’t cooperate with Ahab’s will and that’s what makes Ahab mad.
d. Ahab is like most people. He wants there to be a God, but only one who approves of everything he does and cheers him on whatever it is.
2. Many times when we pray, we really do not want God's will. We want what we want, and we are just asking God to agree with us. It’s “Not thy will but mine be done.”
a. This is why so many people don’t like the Bible. It doesn’t reinforce our beliefs. It corrects them. It exposes the things that are wrong in our life and hearts.
b. “Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.” – John 3:19-20
3. And yet, what does it mean that we want God to tell us what we already believe? What does it mean that we’re offended when He says things we don’t like?
a. Tim Keller puts it this way: Do we really want a God who just agrees with us and affirms us. Could that be the true God? Isn’t it inevitable that as faulty human beings, we get some things wrong? Isn’t it obvious that if our God agrees with everything we think, that He is a God of our own imagination, and not the true God? It we have a God who cannot correct us, then we have a false God.
B. Revelation: Micaiah describes a vision from God that Ahab would die in the battle. Three lessons:
1. Sometimes God says no.
a. Many people want God’s permission to do something. All through the Bible there are stories like the story of Ahab and Micaiah, where people ask God’s permission or seek God’s blessing or approval for what they want to do.
b. Well, sometimes God says no. Not because He is a “Just say no” kind of God, but because He is an all-wise and all-knowing God. And when something is going to harm us, when something is going to lead to our demise and not to our prosperity, God says no, don’t do that.
c. Ahab, don’t go to war with Syria over Ramoth-Gilead!
d. Those who trust God will obey, and those who don’t trust Him will do what their heart tells them.
2. Sometimes God calls His people to stand up for His truth against all the rest.
a. God calls His people to receive and accept His truth no matter what others think. And sometimes it seems like everyone is against you.
b. This is something that every Christian must be concerned about. It is such an easy trap to fall into, because the displeasure of men is so hard for us to withstand. It's so hard to be disliked.
c. If you want to really succeed in this world, don’t follow Jesus.
d. In order to be faithful to God you have to be willing to look pretty ridiculous to those around you.
e. God gives us heroes like Micaiah to call us to speak the truth without fear.
f. Micaiah was faithful to God and ended up in prison with “meager rations of bread and water.”
g. But God was with Micaiah in prison. And it’s better to be with God in prison that be a free man without Him.
h. Each one of us must ask ourselves whether we would rather be in conformity to God but out of step with everyone around us or would we prefer to be in conformity to everyone around us and out of step with God.
3. Sometimes it doesn’t work, like with Micaiah in this story. Micaiah stood up for God’s word but the disaster still happened.
a. But even when men reject what you say, it does not mean that you are not doing any good. God calls His people to proclaim the truth even when is seems like it will be in vain, trusting Him for the results.
b. Take Ahab for example. Did God know that Ahab was going to ignore the words of Micaiah? Of course, God knows all things. Then why did He send Micaiah to speak His truth?
(1) It was an important lesson for us to see the consequences of not following God's word.
(2) It was a revelation to us of God's incredible love and patience even with those who persistently refuse to listen.
(3) It exposed the wickedness of Ahab’s heart, making it clearly just for God to judge him. And God’s judgment of Ahab for hardening his heart to the word of God demonstrated God’s holiness and righteousness in judging wickedness.
C. Reaction: Ahab says “I told you this would happen!” and Zedekiah slaps Micaiah.
1. Why did Ahab hate Micaiah? Because Micaiah told him that he would die as a result of doing what he wanted to do.
a. People sometimes hate God for telling them things they don’t want to hear.
b. But would it really have been more loving for Micaiah to withhold this information?
c. Wisdom loves correction. But fools like Ahab hate it. “Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury. 8 Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you..” – Proverbs 9:7–8
2. The slap
a. A Bible slap: You should be ashamed!
b. This wasn’t anger at not getting his way, as with Ahab, this is righteous indignation.
c. Was it sincere? On one level I think it was. Micaiah refused to play the game that the other false prophets were playing. But maybe Zedekiah and the other false prophets thought that the game was all there was? Whereas Micaiah knew that there was a reality.
d. And so they really were indignant! Perhaps they thought they were doing a good job and Micaiah was doing a bad job.
e. And this happens today! The people who set themselves against what God says claim the ones who believe the Bible are the immoral ones, the ones who stand up for what the Bible says are the unloving ones, the ones who declare God’s truth are the false prophets!
f. Some people will hate you if you believe in and proclaim God's truth. Before they get to know you, before they even know who you are, they hate you, because they hate the truth.
g. This is the same way Ahab responded to Micaiah. He looked at Micaiah and said that he hated him because he was always making evil pronouncements against him.
h. But Micaiah would not back down. He was loving Ahab even though Ahab hated to be loved.
i. We must do the same. We must love even those who hate to be loved.
j. “God has not given us a Spirit of fear, but a Spirit of love and power and a sound mind.” 2Tm.1:7
k. And if we suffer for it, Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek and count it as a privilege to be persecuted because of His name.
l. Jesus was not afraid. Jesus spoke the truth without compromise, He was willing to make enemies, and he had many. But who in the history of mankind can claim as many friends as Jesus Christ?
m. Ahab's yes-men prophets did not do good for Ahab. By their falsehoods they sent him to his death. In order to be loved by him they had to stop loving him. They had to do what was hurtful to him in order to get him to not do what was hurtful to them.
n. Sometimes we either have to love a person or be liked by that person, but we can't have both.
o. Ahab’s false prophets put being loved above loving. That is a great sin.
p. The American church’s allegiance to the Bible is being eroded by the idol of being loved and accepted and highly thought of by others.
D. Response & Result: Ahab & Jehoshaphat went to war in spite of Micaiah’s prophecies, but in disguise, and, just as God said, Ahab was killed. Ahab rejected God’s word and it led to his death.
1. Those who reject the truth of God reject their own lives, they reject their own welfare, they reject their best friend.
a. God’s truth is not something to be feared. The truth is our friend.
b. We should be lovers of truth, for God’s word to us is a gift of love. How gracious God is to give us His truth. Praise God that He loves us enough to speak His word to us.
c. Think about how good of God it is even to tell us such offensive truth as our sinfulness & guilt, along with the good news of Christ’s salvation. For those willing to listen it means life itself.
2. There was a collapse of a section of Interstate 95in Connecticut in 1983: a 100ft section of the bridge fell into the river 70ft. below on a dark and foggy night. The first few cars that came upon it went right over the edge into the river below. Then a very nervous driver came along. Straining too see what was in front of him in the thick fog, he noticed that the lights of the cars in front of him just disappeared. So he slowed down. And when he came upon the missing section, he was able to stop. Cncerned about the drivers behind him, he turned his car around to shine his headlights into oncoming traffic and got out to wave cars down before they went over the edge. The first car that came along did not even slow down, but as it went by the driver rolled down his window and cursed at the man in the street, just before plunging over the edge into the river.
a. That’s what happened to Ahab. Micaiah told him that he would die if he continued down his present path. But he wouldn’t listen and he died.
b. This is also what’s happening to us. God has told us in His word that we will die if we walk down our own path. And we can save our lives if we listen and go God’s way. But if we insist on dooing it our way, we will perish.
c. Out of His love, God extends His truth to us today. Will we listen? Or will we insist on believing what we want to believe, or going along with the popular thinking of the day that resists God's word?
d. Those who reject the truth of God reject their best friend.