Hills & Valleys
1/30/26 Bible Thought
Main Idea: The Almighty is not only sovereign, but He is kind.
A Look at the Text:
In today’s chapter, we see Ahab, the wicked king of Israel, in quite a pickle. Ben-hadad, the king of Syria, came with a company of thirty-two kings against Israel with an insulting threat.
Ahab was commanded to give up his riches, his wives, and his children in order to be spared (1 Kings 20:3). But then, that wasn’t enough. A second threat came, essentially the Syrians said they would come and take whatever they pleased (1 Kings 20:6). Apparently, Ahab was willing to acquiesce to their first request, but the second was too much.
War was on the horizon.
But then, God intervened on His behalf. In His grace, God sent a prophet to Ahab, pronouncing deliverance for the glory of His name (1 Kings 20:13). God kept His promise and delivered them.
But then again, the Syrians came back. They concluded that the God of Israel was only a God of the hills and not of the valleys (1 Kings 20:23,28). They might not win the battle on the hilltops, but the Syrians could handle the Israelites in the plains.
One problem—they couldn’t handle the God of Israel.
As such, once again God delivered the Israelites for the glory of His name. He proved that He is the Sovereign over heaven and earth. He is a God of the hills, the valleys, and everywhere in between.
Bringing it Home
This passage should encourage us in two significant ways. First, the Almighty is ruling and reigning on His heavenly throne over the entire creation. In the words of R.C. Sproul, “If there is one maverick molecule in all the universe, then God is not sovereign. And if God is not sovereign, He is not God.”
He is the God of the hill. He is the God of the valley. He is the God of the stars in the heavens. He is the God of the spider’s web. He’s the God of the great and small and everything in between, and He will receive the glory that is due His name.
Even more, this sovereign, Creator, the Almighty, is a God who is gracious and kind. Ahab was the most infamous king of Israel in biblical history. He served Baal in unprecedented measure and had all but forgotten about Yahweh.
Yet, when trouble came knocking on his door, a prophet came knocking too. However, the knock wasn’t from Baal. It was from Yahweh.
God, in His grace, delivered Ahab. Ahab, out of all the kings of the divided kingdom, deserved to have his kingdom wiped bare. Instead, he was spared.
God showed off not only His sovereign power, but His essential goodness.
What an absolutely confounding reality it is that the same God who is holy is also love. The same God who is just is also merciful. The same god who is Almighty is also kind. What a gift it is to find grace in the sight of the world’s true Sovereign.
Challenge:
Do I ever lose sight of the multi-faceted nature of God?
It can be easy to emphasize His sovereignty at the expense of His kindness, or to emphasize His grace at the expense of His justice.
Let us never forget that God is all these things all the time, and they must be held in a perfect, biblical tension with one another.