The Power of Humility
This is part 3 of the fruit of humility.
Preface: These essays were originally parts of lectures that I have presented over the years through my CD Ministry, and before that, through my Tape Ministry. This particular series on the fruit of humility was given in April of 2001. Thus, in hindsight, perhaps a better title for this would be “9-11: Judgment deferred through humility.” Here now is the text from April 2001.
I am seeing more and more that our Father seems to delight in paradoxes. The way up is down. To be the greatest, He says, one must seek to be the most humble servant of all. And I would now title this little section the power of humility—doesn’t that sound paradoxical? It is the power that comes in recognizing our weakness. It is exemplified by Paul where he tells how he sought thrice for the Lord to remove his thorn in the flesh.
2 Corinthians 12: 9 And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in [your] weakness, [Paul]. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.
Paul understands the power of humility. The only way to be truly strong and powerful in spirit and soul is to recognize our impotence, our powerlessness, because that is when the power of Christ in us is made manifest. Christ and His Holy Spirit in a sense do not operate in us when we have our self in the way trying to get the glory and take the credit.
Another example of the power of humility is found in the story of the wicked Israelite King Ahab back in 1 Kings 21. As you are turning there, I will point out that immediately after the election of Bill and Hillary Clinton in 1992… (I know we didn’t elect Hillary, but I say it that way because we did seem to get a two-for-one deal there, didn’t we?—and it is pertinent to the following discussion.)
The point is that many of us saw Bill and Hillary as antitypes of Ahab and Jezebel. There were so many similarities that I devoted a two-part message to the topic at the time. I think I called it “Ahab and Jezebel Go to Washington.” A year or two later, I wondered if the whole Whitewater land development scandal was an antitype of the story of Naboth’s vineyard, which is recounted in the first part of 1 Kings 21.
Naboth’s vineyard, you will recall, was a nice piece of property near Ahab’s palace in the area of Jezreel. Jezreel was located fairly near the center of the land mass of ancient Israel. Sort of like Arkansas is near the geographic center of latter-day Israel in the United States. Anyhow, Ahab lusted for that particular parcel of real estate, and he got very angry when Naboth refused to sell it to him.
So, following his wife Jezebel’s advice, Ahab framed Naboth for a crime and had him executed, and then Ahab and Jezzie took possession of the real estate. Now, realizing that the entire United States is the land of Israel, it seems intriguing that when Bill Clinton’s palace was in Arkansas (i.e., the governor’s mansion), that he and Hillary got involved in a land deal in the same general area, sort of close to their palace, you might say.
I don’t know enough of the details to make any more connections there, except that there is a lot of information which has been floating around on videos for years about the so-called Clinton mafia, and what they call “Clinton’s body count.”
In other words, those sources have theorized that there were many people who got in the way of the Clinton’s ambitions and they ended up disappearing, or allegedly they committed suicide, or had suspicious fatal accidents or were outright murdered. I am making no accusation. I do not know those things to be facts; I am just saying there is a lot of information available along those lines which does claim that such is the case.
One could probably do about ten or twelve hours worth of messages on the Ahab & Jezebel connections if one investigated deeply enough into the dirty laundry of the Clintons. Frankly, I am not interested in pursuing such things. And of course, our focus here is on the power or rewards of humility, and here again, Bill Clinton seemed to follow the pattern of the ancient King Ahab.
We pick up the story after the Whitewash—I mean, the Whitewater —I mean, the Naboth’s vineyard scandal. God speaks to the prophet Elijah.
1 Kings 21:18 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.
19 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.
20 And Ahab said to Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? And he answered, I have found thee: because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the LORD.
I can’t help but stop and comment here about how just as the ancient Ahab sold himself to work evil, so it came to pass in the Clinton administration. I think of the huge contributions made by the communist Chinese to Clinton’s campaign.
In turn, there just happened to be a number of occasions where our highly sophisticated missile, computer, and other technology fell into the hands of the Chicoms, either through Clinton-approved sales through companies like Loral, where the Chinese obtained our missile-launching technology; or through espionage at Los Alamos Labs, where they obtained data regarding our most sophisticated warheads.
All together, they got the complete package: how to build the missiles, the warheads, and how to accurately launch them. And in all cases, there is some reporting and exposure of these things in the media, but virtually nothing is done about it. Why not?
And then, even in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, where Bill Clinton is literally caught with his pants down… he still weathers the political storm. But one of the most astonishing and little-known facts about that whole investigation was that Ken Starr, the lawyer in charge of investigating Clinton, and who was portrayed by the Leftist national media as some far right-wing conservative, that Ken Starr and his law firm had been, and perhaps still are, agents and representatives for the communist Chinese government!
Was Ken Starr’s job actually to protect Clinton from his worst crimes by focusing the public’s attention on the sex scandal? The British and French have used that smokescreen device for centuries, you know.
Anyhow, God now tells Ahab through Elijah about the curses that will come upon him and his descendants because of all his wickedness
21 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,
Alright, everyone who feels the need to giggle at the King James language here, go ahead and giggle. No, this is not a mistranslation. This phrase “him that pisseth against the wall” is what it actually says in the Hebrew.
It is a figure of speech which simply means a male person. If any of you guys have lived in the country or lived on a farm as I did as a boy, then you have probably done it yourself a few times. Interestingly, modern versions do not translate it correctly, but instead simply say “every last male.” God says he is going to wipe out Ahab’s male descendants. He goes on…
22 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.
23 And of Jezebel also spake the LORD, saying, The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.
24 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.
25 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.
26 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.
Well, this prophecy seemed to really shake up old King Ahab and so what did he do?
27 And it came to pass, when Ahab heard those words, that he rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly.
28 And the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying,
29 Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me? because he humbleth himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days: but in his son’s days will I bring the evil upon his house.
Incidentally, but very importantly, is this a case of God changing his mind because of Ahab’s freewill repentance?… Such as it was. Or did God issue this prophecy so that Ahab would humble himself, so that God would do what He intended to do all along? Is it the former or that latter. It is the latter, of course, because God tells us in…
Proverbs 21:1 The king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.
Was Ahab a king? Was Bill Clinton our king in the sense of our top national leader? Who caused Ahab to make his so-called freewill decision to humble himself?
There is a principle here which is found throughout the Bible in reference to the sovereignty of God. Anytime you see God apparently changing His mind, I can assure you it is not because He was surprised or caught off guard by somebody’s freewill decision to repent or humble himself.
In this case, it was God’s intent from the beginning of time to not bring the evil in Ahab’s day, but to delay it until his sons’ days. How do we know that? Because that is what happened. And everything that happens is because God foreordained it; no exceptions, anywhere, anytime, ever! Otherwise, he is not God; otherwise, He’s just a good guesser, most of the time.
Well, in the case of Ahab Clinton, we saw him humble himself on national television on September 11, 1998, when he admitted his affair with Monica Lewinsky, and said he was sorry….sort of….
Many of us were watching and hoping that he would break the type of Ahab at that point and actually and truly repent. Nevertheless, it was uncannily like the repentance of King Ahab, in that he only temporarily humbled himself, but then he went right on as usual, giving no evidence of being a man with a changed heart.
But as Ron has pointed out, Mr. Clinton did pray Psalm 51, thereby asking God to create in him a clean heart, and God will honor the words of his mouth …at some point…we just don’t know when.
Stephen recently did a message on Naboth’s vineyard, and he mentioned how this will be interesting to watch in terms of the curse. Will the evil which did not come to pass in Clinton’s administration, will the evil be passed to Clinton’s “sons,” in the sense of the next and current administration, Mr. Bush’s, or perhaps even further down the road to the next Democrat administration? I don’t know and we don’t make predictions, we are just observing what God is doing.
Now in the context of our subtopic, Ahab was rewarded for his humility by being able to avoid having his sons wiped out in his own day. Judgment was deferred as a reward for his humility, half-hearted though it was.
It will be also be interesting to see how the type and shadow plays out prophetically in our day, with Jezebel Clinton now a United States senator from the state of New York. New York city is often identified prophetically as the modern Babylon, or as modern Tyre and Sidon.
And of course, the Bible tells us that Ahab married the daughter of Ethbaal, the king of the Sidonians. Furthermore, we know that since leaving the White House, that Mr. Clinton has gone to the big apple and set up his offices there also. So time will tell how this is fulfilled and how the dogs will lick the blood of Ahab and how the dogs will eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel. I wonder if that might have anything to do with Wall Street? (end of this part of my lecture script from April 2001).
Addendum (composed today, May 3, 2013): And thus it was exactly three years from the date of President Bill Clinton’s repentance, September 11, 1998, that judgment fell, primarily on New York city, on the World Trade Center—literally very near to Wall Street, and wholly intertwined with it financially. God plans very long-range! (To be continued.)