Theological Commentary: Click Here
2 Chronicles
18 contains one of my favorite descriptions of human motivation in the entire Bible. Jehoshaphat wants to inquire of a prophet of
the Lord, and Ahab, the king of Israel, wants nothing to do with Micaiah, the
prophet. What does Ahab have against Micaiah?
Micaiah never says anything good about
Ahab. If this isn’t the epitome of human
self-centeredness! This is classic “what
have you done for me lately” mentality.
What doe
Micaiah earn for his trouble? He gets
slapped and threatened with prison. It
also goes to show us that people are fickle.
We reward and celebrate not that which is good, but that which is good to
us and pleasing to us.
I love the
ending of this chapter, though. The
kings go out to battle. Ahab convinces
Jehoshaphat to stay dressed up as a king so he can go into battle
disguised. Ahab knows the target that
this puts on Jehoshaphat’s chest. God,
however, has other plans. God spares
Jehoshaphat from his trouble. God also
finds a completely random arrow to pierce and kill Ahab.
In the end, human
beings are fickle. We are always at the
mercy of the whims of the human beings around us. But we are not without hope. God can always find a way. His plan can override the schemes of the
humans around us. God is even capable of
working through the randomness of the world around us to be free from those who
intend to harm us.
<><
No comments:
Post a Comment