Companions

Jehoshaphat turned aside and joined with Ahab. Then there is a feast and Jehoshaphat said, "I am as thou art, and my people as thy people." He joins Ahab in battle and afterward he inquires of the Lord, but evidently his inquiry was too late. His first step was taken without guidance from the Lord. In this he failed.
Let us live in the power of the fact that we are a heavenly people. Jehoshaphat had said to Ahab, "I am as thou art." It is the first step that starts the downfall. "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall." There is not one bit of safety outside of dependence upon God.
Another thing, Jehoshaphat did not stand separated to the Lord. He took up with Ahab and his ways, and soon measured things as Ahab did. To stand separated to the Lord is the only safe place. If we do this, our tempter will turn from us. Separation and testimony for the Lord go together.
In Scotland, soon after a young man had been saved, his companions sought to entice him into wrong ways. But the young man remained faithful to the Lord and began at once to speak to his companions about their souls' salvation. The result was that soon his companions left off their efforts to entice him.
Ahab was a worldly-wise man. His conduct was all apart from God, but God's judgment fell upon him. An arrow "drawn at a venture" caused his death.
My desire for you is that you will not choose as your companions those who do not love the Lord. As you meet those who are out of Christ, yearn over them and tell them about your Savior, but do not go with them as companions. Through the mercy of the Lord, Jehoshaphat was allowed to "return to his house in peace," but not without rebuke. Jehu went out to meet him and put to him the important question: "Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord? therefore is wrath upon thee from before the Lord.”
Following this experience with Ahab, Jehoshaphat did better for "he went out again through the people from Beer-sheba to mount Ephraim, and brought them back to the Lord God of their fathers." This was a time of revival.