Intermediate Lesson 22 - Book of 1 Kings

MESSAGE FOR PEOPLE TODAY FROM THE BOOK OF 1 KINGS

Church: Sardis                                      Lesson 27 of 39                                       Theme: Holy Spirit

Background Information:

ü  The church of Thyatira taught us how husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved and died for the church and a wife is to obey their husband as we obey with church faithfulness.

Statement of Faith to Say Amen to for the Book of 1 Kings:

I can listen to the Holy Spirit.

Essential Question

Can I call on the Holy Spirit if I am satisfying the flesh?

Book of 1 Kings:

Have students read pages 130-136 in the book, The Pattern of Sound Teaching.

After students read the information ask them, "What do you want to talk about?"

Remember the Issue:

Does the world teach us to love the family of God? How does the world get us to build our foundation of faith on sinking sand instead of The Rock of Faith?

The world is trying to separate God from His creation with a worldview that uses mental and physical persecution to proselytize believers with fear and lies to conform to the world. We need to know the truth to combat the enemy’s lies.

Remember the Truth Jesus Brought:

When the world uses the Jezebel spirit to seduce the followers of Christ, we can look at the sacrifice Jesus made and understand how we are to build our internal temple with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In John 14:15 Jesus addressed this issue, “If you love me, keep my commandments.”

Jesus’ teachings on the Holy Spirit can be misunderstood because Satan, the father of lies, wants us to tolerate the Jezebel spirit. He discussed how the world would not accept the spirit of truth. Then Jesus explained if we know the spirit of truth, He will live with you and be in you. We can read John 14:15-31 to understand how Jesus is in the Father, and we are in Jesus, and Jesus is in us. The world will not teach us that we should be building our internal temple with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Just as Queen Jezebel changed the laws and taught people to eat foods sacrificed to false gods in the past, the Jezebel spirit is in the world today teaching believers to satisfy the flesh and not the Holy Spirit.

In the book of 1 Kings, there is a comparison of two spirits: The spirit of Jezebel and the spirit of Elijah. These are examples of the fruit of the spirit. A way to decide if someone has a Jezebel spirit or an Elijah spirit is if they obey God’s commandments or if they change God’s commandments to satisfy the flesh. In the book of 1 Kings, there lived the most evil king ever: King Ahab. King Ahab married Jezebel. The Jezebel spirit will try and change laws to tolerate the flesh. The Jezebel spirit not only changes laws but slowly fades existing laws to tolerate sin. There was a prophet who opposed King Ahab and Jezebel when they were changing the laws and times: Elijah.

The Jezebel spirit bore evil fruit. The Jezebel spirit will tolerate any law to satisfy the flesh. She had sold herself into slavery for sin with (1) adultery, (2) fornication, (3) uncleanness, (4) lasciviousness, (5) idolatry, (6) witchcraft, (7) hatred, (8)variance, (9) emulations, (10) wrath, (11) strife, (12) seditions, (13) heresies, (14) envy, (15) murders, (16) drunkenness, and (17) reveling.

The spirit of Elijah bears good fruit. The spirit of Elijah will be convicted to listen to the Holy Spirit, and to have the laws in the heart and mind that reflect the laws of the Holy Spirit (1) love, (2) joy, (3) peace, (4) patience, (5) kindness, (6) gentleness, (7) faithfulness, and (8) self-control.

Remember the Rock God Established:

Before Jesus, the people who served and sacrificed to false gods would not hear the word of God because they did not like the history of how they were always punished. When Israel would sacrifice to God and ask God for forgiveness, the people serving and sacrificing to false gods would hear about how God blessed and protected the Israelites with miracles and cursed and punished the people who were serving and sacrificing to false gods. This did not encourage affection between the two groups. If anything, the people serving and sacrificing to false gods were jealous of the blessings the Israelites received. When Jesus came, He said to be baptized in the Holy Spirit, and people everywhere were able to choose to accept or deny the Holy Spirit. After Jesus' death, many people stopped serving false gods. New discussions were beginning about how to be saved by grace through faith.

However, the stories from the book of 1 Kings teach us the importance of remembering that people who were punished made the choice to blaspheme God by disobeying His commandments that were made to protect the people who were obeying God’s commandments and sacrificing to God. Now the Holy Spirit comes to comfort and abide with us. If we deny the Holy Spirit, we commit an unpardonable sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit. This is how God protects people whom He is in a covenant with from the people who are jealous of them. With the new covenant, God is not protecting and punishing people with miracles. Jesus said He had to go because the comforter would be coming after Him. The Holy Spirit will comfort us when we are in an untoward situation. Because the Jezebel spirit will create untoward situations that we cannot control, God’s servants of righteousness are to loosen the chains of injustice and break the cords of the yoke to set the oppressed free.

The next lesson in the book of Esther teaches how people were awakened to question their faith. The book of Esther is the introduction of the Holy Spirit into the world. The Holy Spirit is where people can look at how to make laws that will protect people. A Holy Spirit will make laws that reflect an Isaiah spirit, not the Jezebel spirit.

Activity:

The activity directions and student sheet are located in Appendix 1 – Step 3.

Students will take on the role of a creator in this activity to understand how difficult it would be to have the creation understand the plan of the creator.

Next Lesson:

In the next lesson, we learn that when Esther was put into an untoward situation, she was awakened to

the importance of how the laws could protect the people. In the book of Esther, the Holy Spirit convicted her as to what to do. Esther was awakened to be prepared to die for what she believed in. God’s name was not mentioned in the book of Esther; the Holy Spirit was protecting God’s family. Now we are awakened to build our internal temple by listening to the Holy Spirit and calling on the Holy Spirit to help the family of God.