Praying Psalms Chapter Twelve Part Two

Praying Psalms Chapter 12 Part Two leads us to I Kings for a brief look at chapters eleven through seventeen where we see how the corrupt leadership of the day were, leading the people astray by their evil laws and lifestyle examples, and how God responded to them. God never changes. Jesus Is Lord Over All The Earth and All That Is Contained Therein.

When the leaders over God’s people became corrupt God’s love for His people moved Him to act against the threats of their evil.

In the video I mentioned five of the kings who did great evil in the sight of the Lord and corrupted His children along with one good king named ASA. However, there were actually many kings, Solomon, Rehoboam, Jeroboam, Nadab, Ahijah, Baasha, Zimri, Ahab, Tibni and Omri were met with the judgement of God. Each were warned and given a chance to follow God in obedience to His will and laws, yet they all “did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord” and were met with the same fate, God’s judgement and wrath.

Let it be known that God in His mercy and grace always gives people a chance to repent and follow him, yet as we seen in times past and times current leaders would rather appease the world and appose and oppress God and His children. They feared people rather then God which ultimately lead to this choice: repent or be given over to judgement. In many cases judgement is swift with refusal to repent, even in the New Testament, The Lord brought swift judgement. The Promises of God are Yes and Amen.

Video Three Part Three ends the series in Acts chapter 12 and Second Peter where we see how The Lord intervened both in Spirit and flesh to remove evil when His Bride is oppressed and fervently prays to Him. The Lord’s reaction to prayer is a clear reminder to The Lord’s Bride that He wants to be involved as a very present help in every area of their lives if we, His Bride, just ask Him too.

Psalm Twelve: God, a Helper against the Treacherous.

1 Help, Lord, for the godly person has come to an end,
For the faithful have disappeared from the sons of mankind.
² They speak lies to one another;
They speak with flattering lips and a double heart.
³ May the Lord cut off all flattering lips,
The tongue that speaks great things;
⁴ Who have said, “With our tongue we will prevail;
Our lips are our own; who is lord over us?”

⁵ “Because of the devastation of the poor, because of the groaning of the needy,
Now I will arise,” says the Lord; “I will put him in the safety for which he longs.”

⁶ The words of the Lord are pure words;
Like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, filtered seven times.

⁷ You, Lord, will keep them;
You will protect him from this generation forever.

⁸ The wicked strut about on every side
When vileness is exalted among the sons of mankind.

First Kings 11 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. ² They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. ³ He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. ⁴ As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. ⁵ He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. ⁶ So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done.

⁷ On a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable god of Moab, and for Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. ⁸ He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their gods.

⁹ The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appearedto him twice. ¹⁰ Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. ¹¹ So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. ¹² Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. ¹³ Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”

The Kings Became Stumbling Blocks

One would have thought only a moron would desecrate the very place God made a covenant with Abraham with a symbol that brought God’s immediate wrath in the desert by opening the earth up and swallowing those who knelt before the golden calves would have never happened, but this is what you get when evil people rule.

^{First Kings 12:28} After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.” ²⁹ One he set up in Bethel,and the other in Dan. ³⁰ And this thing became a sin; the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other.

³¹ Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites.³² He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel he also installed priests at the high places he had made. ³³ On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel. So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.

This was the fate of the stumbling block, Jeroboam:

⁹ You have done more evil than all who lived before you. You have made for yourself other gods, idols made of metal; you have aroused my anger and turned your back on me.

¹⁰ “‘Because of this, I am going to bring disaster on the house of Jeroboam. I will cut off from Jeroboam every last male in Israel—slave or free. I will burn up the house of Jeroboam as one burns dung, until it is all gone. ¹¹ Dogs will eat those belonging to Jeroboam who die in the city, and the birds will feed on those who die in the country. The Lord has spoken!’ ¹² “As for you, go back home. When you set foot in your city, the boy will die. ¹³ All Israel will mourn for him and bury him. He is the only one belonging to Jeroboam who will be buried, because he is the only one in the house of Jeroboam in whom the Lord, the God of Israel, has found anything good.

King Abijah

First Kings 15:³He committed all the sins his father had done before him; his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his forefather had been.⁴ Nevertheless, for David’s sake the Lordhis God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem by raising up a son to succeed him and by making Jerusalem strong. ⁵ For David had done what was right in the eyes of the Lord

When The Godly Are Elected And Stay Faithful To God The People Flourish

ASA King Of Judah

15:¹¹ Asa did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, as his father David had done. ¹² He expelled the male shrine prostitutes from the land and got rid of all the idols his ancestors had made. ¹³ He even deposed his grandmother Maakah from her position as queen mother, because she had made a repulsive image for the worship of Asherah. Asa cut it down and burned it in the Kidron Valley. ¹⁴ Although he did not remove the high places, Asa’s heart was fully committed to the Lord all his life. ¹⁵ He brought into the temple of the Lord the silver and gold and the articles that he and his father had dedicated.

^15:25 Nadab son of Jeroboam became king of Israel in the second year of Asa king of Judah, and he reigned over Israel two years.²⁶ He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, following the ways of his father and committing the same sin his father had caused Israel to commit.

First Kings 16: Baasha: ² “I lifted you up from the dust and appointed you ruler over my people Israel, but you followed the ways of Jeroboam and causedmy people Israel to sin and to arouse my anger by their sins. ³ So I am about to wipe out Baasha and his house, and I will make your house like that of Jeroboam son of Nebat. ⁴ Dogs will eat those belonging to Baasha who die in the city, and birds will feed on those who die in the country.”

Ahab Becomes King of Israel

16:²⁹In the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, Ahab son of Omri became king of Israel, and he reigned in Samaria over Israel twenty-two years. ³⁰ Ahab son of Omri did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than any of those before him. ³¹ He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, but he also marriedJezebel daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship him. ³² He set up an altar for Baal in the temple of Baal that he built in Samaria.³³ Ahab also made an Asherah pole and did more to arouse the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, than did all the kings of Israel before him.

First Kings 17 God Raises Up Elijah. Elijah confronts Ahab and his evil wife Jezebel. ²¹ Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.” – But the people said nothing.

In the church today there are many who call themselves preachers and followers of the Lord Jesus Christ yet their hearts are far from Him. The appease those who call evil good and good evil or say nothing when given the opportunity to defend the ways of God by proclaiming The Lord’s words and calling evil evil and good good in every respect, especially concerning social issues. The church is the moral harbinger and the compass toward God concerning all things in society. As we have learned judgement begins in house of God. “Woe to you stumbling blocks who deceive My people says The Lord God of Host.”

“There are 7000 who have not bowed down to Baal”

17:22 Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only one of the Lord’s prophets left, but Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets. ²³ Get two bulls for us. Let Baal’s prophets choose one for themselves, and let them cut it into pieces and put it on the wood but not set fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and put it on the wood but not set fire to it. ²⁴ Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire—he is God.”

Then all the people said, “What you say is good.”

²⁵ Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose one of the bulls and prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your god, but do not light the fire.” ²⁶ So they took the bull given them and prepared it.

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. “Baal, answer us!” they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made.

²⁷ At noon Elijah began to taunt them. “Shout louder!” he said. “Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened.” ²⁸ So they shouted louder and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. ²⁹ Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention.

³⁰ Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come here to me.” They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which had been torn down. ³¹ Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, “Your name shall be Israel.” ³² With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs of seed. ³³ He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood.”

³⁴ “Do it again,” he said, and they did it again.

“Do it a third time,” he ordered, and they did it the third time. ³⁵ The water ran down around the altar and even filled the trench.

³⁶ At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. ³⁷ Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”

³⁸ Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.

³⁹ When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!”

⁴⁰ Then Elijah commanded them, “Seize the prophets of Baal. Don’t let anyone get away!” They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valleyand slaughtered there.