Please other people add notes or thoughts as well...
On the first of November, we looked at Ahab. I Kings 16:29 He started reigning in Israel in the 38th year of Asa King of Judah (who was a goodie). Ahab was the opposite, he was very evil, the worst King they'd ever had. he married Jezebel who was the daughter of the King of the Sidonians. and you can remember he's called Ethbaal King of the Sidonians, because Eth-baal: they worshipped Baal. and pretend he had a lisp. Ethbaal, see?
Ahab worshipped Baal and made an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which was built in Samaria. in the third year of Ahab's reign, Elijah shows himself to Ahab. he'd recently been in hiding - Jezebel had been cutting off the prophets of the Lord, and Obadiah whose was over the household hid 100 prophets, 50 in 2 caves, and had been feeding them bread and water. The famine was SEVERE but Obadiah still got them bread and water, he's a nice guy.
One day Obadiah and Ahab go out to find water and grass and save horses and mules before they die. they go their seperate ways, and Obadiah stops when he finds Elijah. Elijah says to tell Ahab that he's here,, but Obadiah knows he'll get killed (this is in 1 Kings 18). Eventually Obadiah goes and tells Ahab, and Ahab comes to see Elijah. they get all the prophets 'who eat at Jezebels table' on Mount Carmel - 450 prophets of Baal, 400 prophets of Asherah, and Elijah by himself. They get 2 bulls - one for Baal's prophets, and one for Elijah. They cut each bull into pieces, and lay it on wood, but don't put fire on it. Baal's prophets keep calling out to their god to get him to light the fire,but nothing happens. When Elijah does it, he first gets the prophets to fill 4 jars full of water and pour it on the offering and the wood, and this is repeated 3 times. Elijah calls to God, and (1 Kings 18:38) "Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench."
In chapter 21, Ahab wants Naboth's vineyard because it's beside his palace and would make a good vegetable garden for Ahab, but Naboth refuses v3 'but Naboth said to Ahab, "The Lord forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers"'. Naboth understood inheritance. He had sons (note - this is not included in I Kings 21 v 13 where it says 'they took him outside the city and stoned him to death with stones' - you have to look at 2 Kings 9:26 which reads 'As surely as I saw yesterday the blood of Naboth and the blood of his sons-declares the Lord- I will repay you on this plot of ground'. This is a type of Christ, Jesus understood inheritance, and the sons of Naboth (those waiting to inherit it) are like the faithful who are in Christ. That inheritance is not lost in Israel however, because God will preserve it.
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Next lesson I had (I missed Ahaziah&Jehoram) was named 'the soap opera' - Athaliah, Jehoram and Ahaziah. Athaliah was the daughter of Ahab & Jezebel,, and she was incredibly evil. Her parents obviously had an influence on her for they were both evil, but it doesn't have to be like that you can change it - Athaliah's daughter Jehosheba was good and married a priest (we only looked at that quickly at the end of the lesson - I think that's going to be looked at more next lesson).
The marriage of Jehoram and Athaliah sounds more of an arranged marriage - 2 Chronicles 21:6 'And he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, as the house of Ahab had done, for the daughter of Ahab was his wife...' (ESV) and in the King James it reads 'for he had the daughter of Ahab to wife'. Jehoram made high places in the hill country and led the inhabitants of Jerusalem 'into whoredom and made Judah go astray'. He killed all his brothers who were better than himself, who he could've learnt from. So... because of all this, the Lord brought a plague upon his people, his children, his wives and all his possessions. There was direct intervention from God - 2 Chr 21:16 'And the Lord stirred up against Jehoram the anger of the Philistines and of the Arabians who are near the Ethiopians'. You read often in Scripture of direct intervention from God to teach someone a lesson, like when God was angry with Solomon and brought adversaries against him.
God also gave Jehoram an incurable bowel disease and he died two years later when they fell out. The people of Israel seemed pretty glad he was gone, they didn't make a fire in his honour and they didn't bury him with the rest of the kings. (verses 19 & 20).
We ran out of time as usual, and didn't even get to the 'juicy' bit where Athaliah kills everyone, except her grandson Joash who is hidden away in the house of the Lord. And 7 years later, Jehoida the priest has entered a covenant with the commanders of hundreds - Azariah son of Jeroham, Ishmael, Azariah son of Obed, Masseiah and Elishaphat - and they gathered all the Levites from all the cities of Judah (this is in 2 Chr 23) and the heads of fathers' houses of Israel and they all went to Jerusalem. Joash who is only 7 years old is crowned king of Judah.. and suddenly granny Athaliah comes into the house of God and yells "TREASON!" when she sees her daughter who has gone against her, her son-in-law against her, her grandson crowned king, all these people rejoicing... the people can't kill her in the temple, but they chase her and eventually she is killed.
Nehemiah travelled between Jerusalem and Babylon,, where does he fit in all of this? I have no idea. Oh, he's not anywhere near. He's when it's the Persian empire. Hmm. Well, we started to look at Nehemiah, how Nehemiah talks about inter-marrying, and how Solomon was loved by God, but 'foreign women did make him to sin' (Neh 13: 26). The people he visited were losing their identity, he'd pulled out their hair when he saw they'd married women of Ashdod, Ammon and Moab. The Jewish people could not even speak their own language, they were going to the language of these of other people.
It's about who you're influenced by, we have to be careful who we spend a lot of our time with, not people who will lead us astray. Even though people can call themselves Christadelphians, its not calling themself a Christadelphian that makes it alright to date and then go on to marry them... it's how they are, you have to find out what sort of person they are and if they are on the same path as you. A while ago meetings would disfellowship someone who married outside the meeting, and so people in this situation - their other half would get baptised but maybe their heart wasn't true. And they'd come along to the meeting for a bit, but eventually both of them would grow away from the meeting. So we have to choose carefully who are friends are and not be influenced badly by them.
Any other thoughts...?
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