1:22 Kings 1:2

Ahaziah king of Israel fell through a lattice in his upper chamber at Samaria and was seriously injured and sick, and he sent messengers to inquire of Baal-zebub the god of Ekron whether he would recover.5T 191.2–3+2 His inquiry was a turning from the God of Israel to a false god and to powers of darkness for help and knowledge, showing distrust of God and greater confidence in a heathen idol than in the Creator and Source of strength and wisdom.5T 191.2–3+4 Instead of an answer from the idol he received through Elijah a denunciation from the God of Israel that he would not come down from his bed but would surely die.5T 195.3+1 The oracle at Ekron has its counterpart today in spiritualistic mediums, clairvoyants and fortune-tellers, whose information comes from Satan to mislead men and divert minds from God.ST Mar 24, 1887+4 The verse warns against turning to a forbidden spiritual power or human agent for healing, help or knowledge in sickness and trouble instead of trusting the living God.ST Mar 24, 1887+2 It presents the test facing God's commandment-keeping people whether to obtain wisdom from Christ or to seek to the god of Ekron by uniting with the world and depending on worldly wisdom and institutions.CT 255.3+2

Ahaziah was king of Israel, occupying his upper chamber or upper room at Samaria when he fell down through its lattice.5T 191.2–3+4 The fall left him seriously injured and sick, fearing he might die and afraid of what might follow.5T 191.2–3+4 His sickness after the injury raised the question whether he would recover from the disease.5T 191.2–3+4

He sent messengers, also described as servants, to make inquiry of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron.5T 191.2–3+4 The inquiry he charged them with was whether he would recover from this disease, whether he would live through the illness that threatened his life.5T 191.2–3+4

The event belongs after Ahab's death to the fall of the house of Ahab.PK 204.1+1 That fall carried the shame and violence that came from the evil influence Jezebel exercised over Ahab, who at her stirring sold himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord.PK 204.1 The history recorded in 2 Kings 1, together with 1 Kings 21, leads toward Jehu hastening to Jezreel.PK 204 Elijah answered Ahaziah's turning from the living God to Baal-zebub with earnest protest.PK 224.1–2

Ahaziah's sending to Ekron was a turning from the God of Israel to a false god, to idols and to the powers of darkness and Satanic agencies, seeking help, counsel, knowledge and guidance from a forbidden source instead of from God.5T 191.2–3+4 The appeal to Baal-zebub for knowledge about recovery when illness threatened his life was a sinful resort to a Satanic agency and a warning against turning from God to occult sources for knowledge or help.5T 191.2–3+2 It was a turning aside from the greatest Teacher, whose voice and commandments should guide decisions, to seek wisdom from a false source instead of from God.Ms 41, 1894, par. 40–44+2 By turning from the God of his people, the Creator of the heavens and the earth, the Source of strength and wisdom, to ask help or counsel from idols and the powers of darkness, he dishonored God.5T 191.2–3+2

By seeking the idol instead of God he showed distrust of God and declared greater confidence in a heathen idol and pagan powers than in the true God, the Creator of heaven and earth and Source of strength and wisdom.CH 487.1–3+4 His appeal to a pagan oracle rather than to the God of Israel was impious and dishonored the Creator, showing greater confidence in pagan powers than in the true God.CH 487.1–3+3 By seeking help from a foreign idol instead of God he showed greater confidence in the heathen god than in the God of heaven.CH 487.1–3+2

The act was daring impiety, revolt and rebellion that dishonored God, kindled His wrath, and drew His judgment.5T 191.2–3+4 The accident and the judgment that followed attest God's wrath against rebellion, with his injury and his appeal to a foreign god coming amid judgments against his rebellion and idolatry.5T 191.2–3+2 Instead of a message from the idol he received an awful denunciation from the God of Israel that he would not come down from his bed but would surely die, for turning for help to the Lord's worst enemy in revolt from God.5T 191.2–3+2 He had cause to be greatly displeased at such impiety after for ages visiting His people with condescending kindness and unexampled love, delighting with men, being a very present help to all who sincerely sought Him, being afflicted in their afflictions and saving them by the angel of His presence in love and pity.5T 195.3+1

His guilt was aggravated because he knew God's mighty works and judgments against Israel and his father's fearful end, yet treated them as idle tales and, instead of humbling himself before the Lord, sought an answer from an idol.5T 192.1+1 He had witnessed God's mighty works and judgments against those who rejected His law, and knew of his father's fearful end, yet his choice to follow Baal and seek its counsel was a daring act of impiety.5T 192.1+1 As king of the only nation favored with knowledge of the true God, his turning proclaimed to the heathen that he had more confidence in their idols than in God.5T 196.1 His course as a wicked, idolatrous king kindled God's wrath, and it condemns a similar course when those who profess to have a knowledge of God's word and to be His servants turn from Him to the powers of darkness.5T 196.1

Instead of an answer from the idol, the sick king received through Elijah an awful denunciation from the God of Israel that he would not come down from his bed but would surely die.5T 195.3+1 It was Christ, Jehovah Immanuel, who commanded Elijah to speak those words.5T 195.3+1

He had cause for great displeasure at such impiety after for ages visiting His people with condescending kindness and unexampled love.5T 195.3+1 Through those ages He delighted with the sons of men, showing Himself a very present help to all who sincerely sought Him.5T 195.3+1 He was afflicted in all their afflictions and in love and pity saved and redeemed them by the angel of His presence.5T 195.3+1

The fall that injured him, his appeal to a foreign god, and the fatal message that followed attest God's wrath against rebellion and stand as signs of His judgment on the rebellious king.5T 191.2–3+3 That sin and its punishment warn against turning from God to Satanic agencies and false spiritual powers to seek help or counsel.5T 191.2–3+3 They show how God regards such turning from Him to agents of darkness and reveal its harmful results.5T 192.3+2

The god at Ekron was widely believed to reveal future events through its priests, so that people came from far away to inquire of it.ST Mar 24, 1887+2 The predictions and information given there came from Satan, the prince of darkness.ST Mar 24, 1887+2 Its mystic voice spoke lying words to mislead men.5T 193.1 That worship supported idolatry that diverted minds from God and turned them away from Him.ST Mar 24, 1887+1

That heathen oracle has its counterpart today in spiritualistic mediums, clairvoyants and fortune-tellers.ST Mar 24, 1887+1 It is linked with the deceptive voices of Endor, and Ahaziah's resort to it was a sinful turning to a Satanic agency for knowledge and help instead of God.ST Mar 24, 1887+1 The prince of darkness has only appeared under a new guise.5T 193.1 The mysteries of heathen worship are replaced by secret associations and seances, and by the obscurities and wonders of the sorcerers of this time.5T 193.1 Their disclosures are eagerly received by thousands who refuse to accept light from God's word and from His Spirit, while men speak with scorn of the magicians of old yet the great deceiver triumphs as they yield to his arts under a different form, and the same spirit is shown by those who turn to mediums or other human agents instead of trusting God in trouble.5T 193.1+1

The same idolatry can take a more refined and attractive form in later times.5T 192.3+1 It includes superstition and satanic deception, while faith in the sure word of prophecy declines.PK 210.1 Those who neglect Scripture and prayer, rather than testing their choices by God's word and seeking His will, are vulnerable to deception, and Ahaziah's sin and punishment warn against turning from God to false spiritual powers.5T 192.3+1

Ahaziah's sending to Baal-zebub when his injury threatened his life warns against turning from God to a forbidden spiritual power for knowledge, help, or healing in sickness and trouble instead of trusting the living God.ST Mar 24, 1887+3 The path to Ekron leads away from God and brings danger, while deliverance for the oppressed is found with God.CH 490.2+1 The same spirit is shown when people in trouble turn to mediums or other human agents instead of trusting God.ST Mar 24, 1887+1 The burdened are to go to Jesus for rest rather than to an idol or occult source.ST Mar 24, 1887+1

The picture applies to those who disregard the laws of health and life and refuse the self-denial needed to obey them, despising wholesome food and indulging morbid appetite while professing temperance yet disregarding its foundation principles, and then eagerly spending time and money on healing power that comes through witchcraft.5T 196.3–197.1+2 Seeking health counsel that leads away from the light given about how to live and eat puts a person on the enemy's ground and forfeits God's blessing, and the harmful result to Ahaziah shows how God regards turning to sources opposed to Him for help in disease.CTBH 114.1+2 Such trust in a sorcerer is idolatry that honors Satan's power and dishonors the God of Israel while revering and exalting Satan.5T 196.3–197.1+2

It is worship at the shrine of perverted appetite, weakening the powers for honoring God and bringing irritable temper, confused brain, unstrung nerves, inefficiency and unreliability.5T 196.3–197.1 It resents honest warning, deceives and infatuates the sick one, makes the sorcerer's power the theme of praise, and leads others to seek his aid.5T 196.3–197.1 The same spirit is seen when the sick plead with an infidel physician to save life while turning away with impatience from the call to seek help from the Great Physician, who is able to save to the uttermost all who come to Him in faith.5T 194.2 Trusting the world's help and forsaking God brings His power and wrath against those who do so.5T 194.2+1

In want and necessity, wants are to be brought to Christ in living faith instead of inquiring of Ekron, which means failing to rely fully on Christ and depending on another source.Lt 32, 1906, par. 2 Christ is in the midst of His churches as their source of light and efficiency, taking pleasure in them to help them and be their efficiency, to do them good, to comfort and support them, and to supply them with spiritual efficiency and power.Lt 32, 1906, par. 2

The inquiry at Ekron is the test now facing God's commandment-keeping people, whether to obtain wisdom from Christ, the greatest Teacher the world ever knew, or to seek to the god of Ekron.CT 255.3+3 To seek to that god is to unite with the world and carry the work according to worldly plans and worldly wisdom.RH Mar 6, 1913+2 It is to tie themselves by so much as a thread to the educational policies of those who do not discern the voice of God and will not hearken to His commandments.RH Mar 6, 1913+1 Looking to a power other than the God of Israel for help or advantage repeats Ahaziah's turning from the Lord God of Israel to learn whether he would recover, and seeking wisdom from a false source instead of from God.CT 255.3+3

Seeking the finishing touches of education and higher medical education from unbelievers in worldly colleges and institutions that transgress God's law gives to Ekron's god the credit, dependence and influence belonging to God.LLWP 3.5–4.3+3 It puts physicians and people in a position of dependence on men and on transgressors of God's law for finishing touches, recognition, influence and success.LLWP 3.5–4.3+2 Physicians and people must depend wholly on the true God for healing, education, help and influence, for God gives influence and advantages far beyond and far above what can be received from worldlings or by uniting with those who do not recognize His law.LLWP 3.5–4.3+2 God designs His people to stand as a distinct, sanctified, holy, commandment-keeping people, separated from the world by observance of the Sabbath and so connected with Him that He can work with them.Ms 72, 1909, par. 1–3+2

For those whom God has made repositories of sacred truth, sanctified and made holy as His chosen people, diverting minds from God to man repeats that turning aside from God to inquire of the gods of Ekron for knowledge and guidance.Lt 85a, 1899, par. 4–5+1 Advising the study of books written by men disloyal to the God of heaven is that same turning, and those entrusted with sacred truth must not follow Ahaziah's example of turning from God to a false god.Lt 85a, 1899, par. 4–5+1 The Lord is not pleased by it, He is not honored by it, and His name is not glorified by it.Lt 85a, 1899, par. 4–5

Putting a false god's counsel in place of God's means seeking direction from those who do not know God and His work instead of obeying orders from above.Ms 40a, 1890, par. 40–42 For workers in God's cause it is accepting suggestions from unbelievers about what to do and how to carry on His instrumentalities, which weakens the power of those instrumentalities, sets the counsel of Christ at naught, and exalts the counsel of the gods of Ekron.Ms 40a, 1890, par. 40–42 Binding up with worldlings in secret societies is like that inquiry of Ekron, looking to a false source for help in manifest distrust of God rather than trusting the mercies and blessings He has prepared for those who trust Him.Lt 180, 1902, par. 18–20 Consulting lawyers instead of seeking harmony with the church and relying on God is the same turning to Ekron for an answer.Ms 190, 1901, par. 7–8