There is a point of
evil, once crossed over, which spells damnation.
Ahab crossed over in
the following example:
I Kings 21
And it came to pass
after these things, that Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard, which was
in Jezreel, hard by the palace of Ahab king of Samaria.
And Ahab spake unto
Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I may have
it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will give
thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seem good to thee, I will give
thee the worth of it in money.
And Naboth said to
Ahab, The LORD forbid it me, that I should give the
inheritance of my fathers unto thee.
And Ahab came into
his house heavy and displeased because of the word which Naboth the Jezreelite
had spoken to him: for he had said, I will not give thee the inheritance of my
fathers.
And he laid him down
upon his bed, and turned away his face, and would eat no bread.
But Jezebel his wife
came to him, and said unto him, Why is thy spirit so
sad, that thou eatest no bread?
And he said unto her,
Because I spake unto Naboth the Jezreelite, and said
unto him, Give me thy vineyard for money; or else, if it please thee, I will
give thee another vineyard for it: and he answered, I will not give thee my
vineyard.
And Jezebel his wife
said unto him, Dost thou now govern the kingdom of
Israel? arise, and eat bread, and let thine
heart be merry: I will give thee the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.
So she wrote letters
in Ahab's name, and sealed them with his seal, and sent the letters unto the
elders and to the nobles that were in his city, dwelling with Naboth.
And she wrote in the
letters, saying, Proclaim a fast, and set Naboth on high among the people:
And set two men, sons of Belial, before
him, to bear witness against him, saying, Thou
didst blaspheme God and the king.
And then
carry him out, and stone him, that he may die.
And the men of his
city, even the elders and the nobles who were the inhabitants in his city, did
as Jezebel had sent unto them, and as it was written in the letters which she
had sent unto them.
They proclaimed a
fast, and set Naboth on high among the people.
And there came in two
men, children of Belial, and sat before him: and the men of Belial witnessed
against him, even against Naboth, in the presence of the people, saying, Naboth
did blaspheme God and the king. Then they carried him
forth out of the city, and stoned him with stones, that he died.
Then they sent to
Jezebel, saying, Naboth is stoned, and is dead.
And it came to pass,
when Jezebel heard that Naboth was stoned, and was dead, that Jezebel said to
Ahab, Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth
the Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for money: for Naboth is not alive, but dead.
And it came to pass,
when Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, that Ahab rose up to go down to the
vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it.
*****
But God
sees the evil done by man and God prepares a suitable "reward" for
the evil done by man on this earth.
God sends HIS message
to Ahab by Elijah, God's prophet.
I Kings 21
And the word of the
LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying,
Arise, go
down to meet Ahab king of Israel, which is in Samaria: behold, he is in the
vineyard of Naboth, whither he is gone down to possess it.
And thou shalt speak
unto him, saying, Thus saith the LORD, Hast thou killed,
and also taken possession?
And thou shalt speak
unto him, saying, Thus saith the LORD, In the place
where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine.
*****
And Ahab said to
Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?
And he (Elijah)
answered, I have found thee: because thou hast sold
thyself to work evil in the sight of the LORD.
(God says)
Behold, I will bring evil
upon thee, and will take away thy posterity, and will cut off from Ahab him
that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel,
And will
make thine house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the
house of Baasha the son of Ahijah, for the provocation wherewith thou hast
provoked ME to anger, and made Israel to sin.
And of Jezebel also
spake the LORD, saying,
The dogs
shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.
Him that
dieth of Ahab in the city the dogs shall eat; and him that dieth in the field
shall the fowls of the air eat.
*** But there was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of the LORD, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up.
And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all things as did the Amorites, whom the LORD cast out before the children of Israel.
*****
When Ahab
heard the sentence of God delivered to him by Elijah
the prophet, he did humble himself and God recognized Ahab
for this. But God did
arrange the death of Ahab by putting a lying spirit into the
mouth of Ahab's prophets that would cause Ahab to
go into battle and be killed.
I Kings 22:1-8 (Ahab is still king of Israel) And they continued three years without war
between Syria and Israel. And it came to
pass in the third year, that Jehoshaphat the king of Judah came down to the
king of Israel. (to Ahab)
And the king of
Israel said unto his servants, Know ye that Ramoth in Gilead is ours, and we be
still, and take it not out of the hand of the king of Syria?
And he said unto
Jehoshaphat, Wilt thou go with me to battle to
Ramothgilead?
And Jehoshaphat said
to the king of Israel, I am as thou art, my people as
thy people, my horses as thy horses.
And Jehoshaphat said
unto the king of Israel, Enquire, I pray thee, at the
word of the LORD to day.
Then the king of
Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said unto
them, Shall I go against Ramothgilead to battle, or
shall I forbear?
And they said, Go up; for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the
king.
And Jehoshaphat said,
Is there not here a prophet of the LORD besides, that
we might enquire of him?
And the king of
Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, There is yet one man,
Micaiah the son of Imlah, by whom we may enquire of the LORD: but I hate him;
for he doth not prophesy good concerning me, but evil.
*****
But they sent for the
prophet of the Lord to enquire of God ...
In the meantime, the
false prophets were speaking, putting on a show for the kings ...
I Kings 22:10-12 and all the prophets prophesied before
them. And Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah
made him horns of iron: and he said, Thus saith the
LORD, With these shalt thou push the Syrians, until thou have consumed them.
And all the prophets
prophesied so, saying, Go up to Ramothgilead, and
prosper: for the LORD shall deliver it into the king's hand.
*****
When the prophet of
God came in, he said:
17-23
I saw all
Israel scattered upon the hills, as sheep that have not a shepherd: and the
LORD said, These have no master: let them return every man to his house in
peace.
And the king of
Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, Did I not tell thee that
he would prophesy no good concerning me, but evil?
And he (the prophet of God)
said, Hear thou therefore the word of the LORD: I saw the LORD sitting
on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on his right hand and
on His left.
And the LORD said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at
Ramothgilead? And one said on this manner, and another said on that
manner.
And there came forth
a spirit, and stood before the LORD, and said, I will persuade him.
And the LORD said
unto him, Wherewith?
And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the
mouth of all his prophets.
And HE (God) said, Thou shalt persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do
so.
Now therefore,
behold, the LORD hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy
prophets, and the LORD hath spoken evil concerning thee.
*****
I Kings 22:26-28 And the king of Israel said, Take Micaiah (the prophet of God), and carry him back unto Amon the governor of the city, and to
Joash the king's son; And say, Thus
saith the king, Put this fellow in the prison, and feed him with bread of affliction and with water of
affliction, until I come in peace.
And Micaiah said, If thou return at all in peace, the LORD hath not spoken by
me.
For God was going to
kill Ahab at this battle.
*****
29
So the king of Israel and
Jehoshaphat the king of Judah went up to Ramothgilead. (to battle)
34-38
And a certain man drew a bow at a
venture, and smote the king of Israel between the joints of the harness:
wherefore he said unto the driver of his chariot, Turn thine hand, and carry me
out of the host; for I am wounded.
And the battle
increased that day: and the king was stayed up in his chariot against the
Syrians, and died at even: and the blood ran out of
the wound into the midst of the chariot.
(This is going to
later be used to fulfill the prophecy God gave by Elijah, the prophet, against
Ahab because he took the possession of Nahob's vineyard.)
And there went a
proclamation throughout the host about the going down of the sun, saying, Every man to his city, and every man to his own country.
(fulfilling
the prophet Micaiah words against Ahab)
So the king died, and
was brought to Samaria; and they buried the king in Samaria.
And one washed the
chariot in the pool of Samaria; and the dogs licked
up his blood; and they washed his
armour; according unto the word of the LORD which HE spake.
(As they washed the
chariot, the blood of Ahab washed onto the ground at the vineyard where Jezebel
killed Naboth.)
Remember how God
prophesied that Ahab's blood would be licked up by dogs at Naboth's
vineyard which Ahab had taken as his own possession after Jezebel
arranged to have Naboth stoned to death?
*****
God uses
prophets to send sentences of death and destruction to the evil doers.
From 1980-82,
I attended a church in Dallas. Word of Faith ... Robert
Tilton, pastor
Tilton started a TV talk
show during that period.
He invited a prophet
from our church, Ava Pickard, to be a guest on his TV
show.
Just before they
stepped on stage, Bob said to Ava, "Just one
thing. Don't mention anything about
being a prophet. It's not popular."
After the
show, Ava called me in tears.
I was
furious over that which Bob had done.
I knew
Bob killed a prophet by stopping Ava this way.
At that time, I made
a tape recording and had it delivered to Tilton.
On the tape, I told
him he had killed a prophet by that which he did to Ava and because of this his
house would be left to him desolate. Matthew
23:37-39
I received a report
from Tilton's office staff. They (Tilton
& staff) gathered with Marte, Tilton's first wife, in the office and
listened to the tape. Bob was
apparently furious. They took the
tape and cut it in little pieces and threw it in waste basket and sort of
danced around waste basket quoting scriptures against the judgment. (I'm sure they thought the scripture they
quoted would negate the judgment.)
I asked, "But did Tilton hear the tape?"
"Yes!" it was reported. He did hear it.
I said, "That is all that matters. He will not be able to destroy
the message he heard."
*****
By the
mid-1980's, Robert Tilton was reportedly taking 80-million-dollars in
"offerings". (ACB Primetime
Live report on Wikipedia.)
On the TV
shows, Bob was asking people to send money to him along with their "prayer
requests."
ABC
Primetime Live, traced these prayer-request-letters to a bank in Tulsa,
Oklahoma, where bank staff opened the letters and took the money out of
the letters and threw the prayer requests into the garbage to be carried to the
dumpster.
When ABC did
the television show, they showed this as part of their investigative report.
As the time this was
happening, Tilton had built an 8,000 seat auditorium at his
church.
The ABC News investigative
report concerning Robert Tilton "blew
the lid off" concerning what Robert Tilton was
doing.
One of
Tilton's church members filed a law suit against Tilton charging him with fraud
for promising them 100-fold return on the offerings he gave.
To promise this would
be extortion for 100-fold return in Bible has nothing to do with
offerings.
Jesus said: And every one that
hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife,
or children, or lands, for MY name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall
inherit everlasting life. Matthew 19:29
God said
the following about a man who is a brother and commits extortion.
I Corinthians 5:11 ... But now I have written unto you not to
keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous,
or an idolator, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat ... 13
Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked brother.
*****
Robert Tilton ended up in divorce
with his wife, Marte, and he remarried and divorced a second
time, and remarried a third time, with law suits from second wife.
He lost his 8,000
seat church building. (Eventually the building was torn down and a
youth hockey center built on that land. There is no evidence now that a church ever
met at that location.)
He lost the bulk of
his followers.
He moved to Florida
where he tried another TV ministry and at last report, he had sold his TV
ministry and bought a hotel in California. (Wikipedia report)
At last report,
Robert Tilton's net worth was approximately 100-million-dollars. Though his offerings decreased from 80-million
per year to 2-million per year, that is still a lot of money.
This shows many very
deceived people, just as Jesus said would happen.
In the end time,
Jesus says:
Matthew 24:4-5 Take heed that no
man deceive you. For many shall come in
MY name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.
*****
Jezebel, Ahab's wife, was a
very evil woman ... killing the prophets of the Lord and doing all manner of
evil.
Her
"reward" from God:
II Kings 9:30-37 And
when Jehu was come to Jezreel, Jezebel heard of it; and she painted her face, and tired her
head, and looked out at a window.
And as Jehu entered
in at the gate, she said, Had Zimri peace, who slew his master?
And he lifted up his
face to the window, and said, Who is on my side? who?
And
there looked out to him two or three eunuchs.
And he said, Throw her down.
So they
threw her (Jezebel) down: and some of her blood was sprinkled on the wall,
and on the horses: and he trode her under foot.
And when he was come
in, he did eat and drink, and said, Go, see now this
cursed woman, and bury her: for she is a king's daughter.
And they went to bury
her: but they found no more of her than the skull, and the feet, and the palms of her hands.
Wherefore they came
again, and told him. And he said, This is the word of the Lord, which he spake
by his servant Elijah the Tishbite, saying, In the
portion of Jezreel shall dogs eat the flesh of Jezebel:
(As God
prophesied: The dogs ate Jezebel.)
37
And the carcase of Jezebel shall be
as dung upon the face of the field in the portion of Jezreel; so that they
shall not say, This is Jezebel.
Fulfilled:
Concerning Ahab: In the place where
dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine.
Concerning
Jezebel: The dogs
shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.
*****
Galatians 6:7-9 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for
whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the
flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit
reap life everlasting.
And let us not be
weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.
*****
God spoke the
following against Ahab's descendants:
II Kings 9:8 For the whole house of Ahab shall perish: and
I will cut off from Ahab him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is
shut up and left in Israel:
God brought this word
to pass in the following:
II Kings 10
1 And Ahab had seventy
sons in Samaria. And Jehu wrote
letters, and sent to Samaria, unto the rulers of Jezreel, to the elders, and to
them that brought up Ahab's children
6-7
If ye be mine, and if ye will hearken
unto my voice, take ye the heads of the men your
master's sons, and come to me to Jezreel by to morrow this time. Now the
king's sons, being seventy persons, were with the great men of the city, which
brought them up.
And it came to pass,
when the letter came to them, that they took the king's sons, and slew seventy persons, and put their heads in baskets, and
sent him them to Jezreel.
*** Then Jehu said:
II Kings 10:10-11 Know now that there shall fall unto the earth nothing of the word of the Lord, which the Lord spake concerning the house of Ahab: for the Lord hath done that which he spake by his servant Elijah.
So Jehu slew all that remained of the house of Ahab in Jezreel, and all his great men, and his kinsfolks, and his priests, until he left him none remaining.
*****
Numbers 23:19 God is not a man,
that HE should lie; neither the son of man, that HE should repent: hath HE
said, and shall HE not do it? or hath HE spoken, and shall HE not make it good?
*****