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How To Live Like Elijah In The Secret Place With The Power Of God - Part 1 Series
Contributed by Dr. Craig Nelson on Mar 30, 2023 (message contributor)
Summary: The world is in a very critical time right now. How are we to deal with the proliferation of perversion and pornography? Can you hear the voice of God through all of it? Are you living in divine revelation from God and the Anointing of the Holy Spirit?
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Here in the USA, we stand in the balance of righteousness and holiness before God. We are still amid a global pandemic that has crushed our constitutional and civil rights. Our Federal, City governments, and schools are on the brink of disaster because demonic principalities of deviant, perverted behavior and greed control them. There are food, oil, gas, electricity, and money shortages. We are looking at possible nuclear war. People call "evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!" (Isaiah 5:20 ESV)
Can you hear the voice of God through all this? Are you living in divine revelation from God? During times like this, when great shaking is upon our society, it is too late to say, "I wonder if I can hear God's voice." How are we to deal with the proliferation of perversion and pornography? How are we to deal with immorality? How do we deal with the enemy of God as he tears at our nation's moral fabric and constitutional liberties?
The enemy's name is 'satan,' which means 'adversary, to lie in wait,' who is also called the "tempter" (Matthew 4:3), the "evil one" (1 John 2:13), the great "deceiver" (Revelation 12:9), the father of lies, and a murderer (John 8:44). Jesus called him the "ruler of this world" and "the kingdom of the air" who is "the spirit….now at work in those who are disobedient' (John 12:31 ESV; Ephesians 2:2; 2 Corinthians 4:4 NIV).
The Greek word for "work" is " energéo," which means to energize like an electrical current energizing a wire to make a light bulb shine. The enemy energizes those who are not Born-Again, who "follow the ways of this world," and directs them to do his will (Ephesians 2:2 NIV). Born-Again Christians are not to fight against "flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6:12 NLT).
The enemy energizes people to do his bidding, opening gateways for the demonic to come in and infiltrate how we think and feel. Every area of our lives, church, education, medicine, business, and government, is being put on a dividing line. Are we willing to pay the price to stand for the righteousness of God in all areas of our life?
God is calling us to holiness so we can stand against wickedness and perversion, the likes of which we have never seen before. God desires that we love Him with 100% of our heart in deep personal intimacy. He asks if we will seek His face in the secret place.
The life of the prophet Elijah gives us the roadmap on how to confront the enemy so that "the hearts of fathers" will be turned "to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers…” (Malachi 4:6 ESV).
This study will reveal how Elijah confronted things in society and used to help change them back into following God.
The Ministry of Elijah
Elijah was a great prophet of God, perhaps the greatest. He was a model of genuine devotion and righteousness to God. His name in Hebrew is 'Eliyah' (ay-lee-yaw') and means 'God of Jehovah.' Very little is known about him. He lived far from the cities and initially wore unique and distinctive clothing known as a mantle which was a sizeable and magnificent garment or robe made of hair with a rawhide rope tied around the waist and was later shown to be the traditional clothing of a prophet (1 Kings 19:13,19; 2 Kings 1:8,2:8,13; Zechariah 13:4; Matthew 3:4).
Elijah lived during a time of great political and moral crisis. The political leader's legislated policies intended to merge Israel's beliefs with the Canaanites, who worshiped demonic idols, participated in sexual perversion, and sacrificed children to the Canaanite gods. (Sound familiar?)
The king, Ahab, was married to a strong-willed immoral woman named Jezebel, a leader in religion and politics. Her name is often used to describe an impertinent, arrogant, seductive, or shameless woman in the church who will not submit to authority. Jezebel persuaded Ahab to introduce the worship of the Tyrian nature god Baal (The god of the religion of climate change?) and Asherah, the mother goddess of fertility and the wife of the war god Asir. Interestingly, Asherah was the adversary of Baal. She deliberately tried to purge the land of the prophets of God (1 Kings 16:32, 18:19).
Elijah was a man who was formed in a secret place of hiddenness through intimacy and prayer with God, who suddenly gave him the mandate to go and stand before King Ahab and Jezebel and prophesy to them that they turn back to worshipping Yahweh, the God of Israel alone. Elijah stood in the authority God had given him.