“Cries for Help!” – FBC Morning Light (6/9/2023)

Well, a good Friday morning to you. I hope your week has gone well, and you're looking forward to the weekend, looking forward to gathering on Sunday with God's people as we worship and serve Him together.

You're certainly welcome to attend with us at Faith Baptist as we have Bible study, Sunday school for all ages at 9 .30, morning service at 10 .30. And this week, we're doing something a little different, because next week, Monday through Friday, from 9 .30 in the morning to 11 .30 in the morning, we're having our Vacation Bible Time.

For boys and girls, that's for children age 3 through 6th grade. That is those who finished 6th grade this past school year, so age 3 through grade 6. So at Bible school, every week, every day next week, Monday through Friday, 9 .30 to 11 .30.

If you know children, have children in that age group, I encourage you to bring them. We'd be glad to serve your family in that way. And if you know children in your neighborhood, encourage them to attend Bible time at Faith Baptist next week.

Well, to prepare for that, we'll not be having a regular Sunday evening service this coming Sunday. We have a bunch of setup to do and decoration and so on and so forth. So that'll be happening Sunday in the latter part of the day.

Crisis Drives People to Seek God

Well, today we're reading in 2 Kings 3 and 4, Acts chapter 26 and Psalm 115. I want to focus on 2 Kings 3 for a few minutes this morning. I find interesting something that is illustrated in this chapter that we see in our own day and age.

Here's the story. The king of Israel is ticked because he's supposed to be receiving some tribute from Moab. The Moabites in some time past had been subjugated to the Israelites, and in that subjugation they are supposed to pay a tribute, a financial, like a taxation if you will, and supposed to do that regularly.

Well, Moabites have decided there's been a change of leadership in Israel, new king on the block. We're not going to pay that tribute. Why should we send them money? They don't do it. Moabites rebel against the Israelites, aren't going to pay that tribute.

The king of Israel, he's just really, really ticked, King Jehoram. He wants to muster his army and go out to war against these Moabites and bring them back into subjection. He calls the king of Judah and says, hey, will you go with me?

Jehoshaphat, you want to go with me and help me put these Moabites in their place? He says, well, sure, okay, we're really relatives, so yeah, I'll help you out with that. He also calls the king of Edom, says, hey, will you go with me too?

King of Edom doesn't like the king of Moab. They've had a rift for a long, long time. He says, yeah, sure, I'll go with you too. I want to stick it to those Moabites. I'll help you out with that. So off they go.

They're going to go teach the Moabites a thing or two. We read of this in verse 9. It says, the king of Israel went with the king of Judah and the king of Edom, and they marched on that roundabout route seven days.

There was no water for the army, nor for the animals that followed them. Now, that's a crisis. Animals need water, people need water, and there's no water. You've got this whole army of people ready to teach the Moabites a lesson, and they're dying of thirst.

They have nothing to drink. The king of Israel says in verse 10, alas, for the Lord has called these three kings together to deliver them into the hand of Moab. That would be a justifiable thing for the Lord to do on one level, because the king of Israel, Jehoram, and the whole Israelite tribes, on the leadership level and as a whole, have departed from the Lord.

They've gone to serve after the Baals and other gods, and they've left the Lord behind. This would be certainly a justifiable thing for the Lord to do. But that's not the plan here. Nevertheless, he doesn't know that, and he's just convinced, you know, we're all going to die.

We're all going to die. This is a crisis of great proportion. So what do we do? What do we do? Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, he says, is there no prophet of the Lord here that we may inquire of the Lord by him?

Well, it's interesting that, you know, Jehoshaphat was generally a good king, but it's interesting that he didn't ask the Lord ahead of time, you know, should I go with King Jehoram to fight this battle?

But now that the crisis has arisen, well, let's look to the Lord. And so Jehoshaphat asked this thing, and one of the servants of the king of Israel answered and said, well, Elisha, Elisha's around, and he's the one who poured waters on the hands of Elijah.

And Jehoshaphat said, well, the Lord is with him, so let's find him, let's find him. All right, here's the thing that I want to point out, and it says the king of Israel, King Jehoram, the king of Israel, and Jehoshaphat, and the king of Edom, Edom doesn't really have anything to do with the Lord, the God of Israel, he doesn't really worship him at all, but they all went down to Elisha, because the crisis drove them to seek God's help.

Crisis as an Opportunity for Prayer and Witness

Now, you get what I'm going with this, right? Haven't we seen this repeatedly, even in our lifetime? One crisis after another comes upon our nation, and how do people respond? What do people cry out? We need to pray, we need to pray.

Pray to God to help, pray to God to deliver, pray to God to defeat the foe, if you will. One of the most pronounced times in my lifetime that I've seen this was after the September 11th attacks in 2001, the World Trade Centers and the Pentagon and so forth, and it was a pretty critical time, and it was a pretty dark time, and there was a lot of uncertainty, there was a lot of angst, and the nation came together in really some dramatic ways for a short time, and you had people of all stripes saying, we need to pray, we need to call out to God to deliver us from this terror, from these terror threats.

So, the point is that I think it's fascinating that during times of great crisis, even people who normally want nothing to do with God, nothing to do with the God of the Bible, who don't pray to him at all, and especially don't pray to him in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that in those times of crisis, they will go to him and pray to him for help.

Isn't that interesting? Isn't that fascinating? Well, I'm grateful that those of us who know Christ as our Savior, we can go to the Lord at any time, times of crisis or not, and we can call upon him to come to our aid and come to our help, come to our assistance, but those are times, and I think those are times of opportunity for us to clarify who this God is to whom we're praying, and how can we go to him in prayer?

We can go through Jesus Christ. Well, Heavenly Father, I pray today that when these times of crisis come, and people seem to be sensitive and interested in calling upon you, that there would be many who would truly turn to you in repentance and faith.

Closing Prayer and Weekend Blessing

May we be a people who can point them in that correct direction, we pray. We ask this all in Jesus' name, amen. Well, listen, have a good rest of your Friday, and have a wonderful weekend, and join us on the Lord's Day if you can, and if you have children in the Bible Time age group, age three through grade six, we'd be glad to have them for vacation Bible Time next week, Monday through Friday, 9 .30 to 11 .30 every morning.

All right, have a good weekend. May the Lord bless you in it.