“What Are You Doing Here”
1Kings 19:1-18 1 Peter 4:12-19 1/13/2020
Have you ever given someone an assignment to go and do something, and you thought they had left to do it. But then you turn around later and they are in the same spot, and you ask the question, “what are you doing here?” Or have you met someone who has been saying that one day they were going to do such and such and, you run into them five years later, and they are still in the same place. You look at them and you think to yourself, “what are you doing here.”
We are in the second full week of 2020. One of the phrases I heard after the countdown of 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Happy New Year was, “We made it here.” How many of you know a lot of people that were with us in 2019 didn’t make it to 2020? On average 55.3 million people die each year.
For some of us even, there were times we were ill, and we weren’t quite sure we were going to make it, or we found in ourselves in accidents or situations that could have easily ended our lives. Some of us are here by the miraculous grace of God but we never saw what God did to keep something from happening to us.
The real issue before us in 2020 is not whether or not we made it, because all of us have made it, but if the year 2020 could talk, I think it might ask the question, “What are you doing here.” In other words, what’s God’s purpose for having you alive in 2020. What assignment is there for you to do? How we came out of 2019 can cloud our judgement for how God wants to use us in 2020. God’s plans for us, may be far different than what we have in mind. We enter 2020 still under Jesus’ call, “Come follow me.”
In our Old Testament reading we ran into the prophet Elijah. Elijah had come off a banner year in terms of his being used by God. He had confronted the powerful king of Ahab who had turned his back on God. Elijah told him, “there will not be dew nor rain in the next few years until I say it’s going to rain.” He had birds bringing him food to eat. He had fed a widow and her family with just a tiny bit of oil and flour that kept multiplying day after day. He had raised the widow’s son from the dead.
Elijah had dueled with the 400 prophets of the false god Baal and won by calling down fire from heaven. He had the false prophets executed. He had said it was time for it to rain again, and the biggest rain storm you can imagine hit the land bringing relief to the severe famine that was devastating the country. The power of God came upon him making him one of the fastest distance runners in the world in that he was able to outrun the king who was riding in a chariot from Mount Carmel to Jezreel which was about 17 miles. He had done everything the Lord told him to do.
When King Ahab went and told Queen Jezebel that Elijah had killed her 400 prophets of Baal, she got as angry as angry could get. She put out a contract on Elijah’s life and promised that either he would be dead by the next day or may the gods take her life.
We are under the false impression, that if God uses us in a mighty way, we’ll never doubt what God can do again. But that’s just not true. Our faith can not simply rest upon how can has dealt with us in the past. Our faith is to always rest in the fact that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead and because of that event, our hope and confidence remains in God.
For we have the promise that because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, God will one day raise us up as well. We have the promise from the risen Christ, “I will be with you always.” That includes our moments of fear, our moments of doubts, our moments of discouragement, and our moments of wondering, “God don’t you see what’s going on in my life, don’t you care.”
What would you have done, if someone came running to you and said, “the government has a contract out on your life to bring you in dead or alive. No questions asked, show the body and get your reward.” Elijah did what most of us would do. He got scared, packed his bags and ran for his life. But his being afraid didn’t cause God to cast him to the side or to rebuke him for his lack of faith.
Elijah though made the mistake of trying to handle it all alone in his own way. He left the country traveling a hundred miles south. He had a servant traveling with him. When he reached Beersheba he told the servant to stay behind. He then walked into the wilderness for a day thinking he could get away from it all. He saw a broom bush, sat down under it, and tried to commit suicide by prayer.
His prayer was Lord, when I fall asleep, don’t let me wake back up. I have had enough. I’m no better than my ancestors. After all the preaching he had done on Mt. Carmel and the people shouting the “The Lord He Is God”, those same people were willing to turn him over to Jezebel for a reward. It looked like he wasn’t making a difference at all. He was down outright discouraged and depressed.
If he had made it to the new year and had been asked, “Elijah, what are you doing here.” He would have said, “I am quitting. I am giving up. I am not doing another thing for the Lord. I’m sick and tired of dealing with these people and my situation. So I’m going to sleep so that the Lord can take me straight to heaven. I am soon going to be out of here.”
I want you to know, if you are faithful in serving the Lord in 2020, not only will God have some tremendous blessings waiting for you, you are also going to wonder if what you’re doing is really making a difference because looking at others is going to be depressing. You have to remember the words of Jesus when he said in John 16:33 (NIV2011) 33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
Think about this, if Elijah really had wanted to die, he did not have to travel a 100 miles south on foot, then travel a day in the wilderness alone to lie down under a bush. If he had stayed where he was, Jezebel would have seen to it that he went home to be with the Lord.
There he was sleeping as soundly as he could waiting to die. Instead of sending the death angel as requested, God sends an angel of life. The angel touches him and says “Get up and eat.” He smells the best baking bread in his life with some cool water to help wash it down. He gets up to eat and drink, and then he lies back down to continue his journey to heaven.
The angel woke up him a second time and told him, “you didn’t eat enough the first time and you have a long journey ahead of you.” Aren’t you glad that even when we are not somewhere God wants us to be, God is still looking out for us? When we think things are over, and there’s not much of a reason to try to keep moving forward, God is thinking five steps ahead of us.
God has supplied what we need, if we would make the decision to get up and eat. God has what we need, but we may be lying down in our pity party. God is asking us, “what are you doing here” when my provision is right over there waiting for you to go get it. I don’t know what’s holding you back, but I want you to know that God is not finished with you yet.
Elijah made the decision to get up and eat and he travelled in the strength of that food forty days and forty night until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. Horeb was 250 miles away from Beersheba. Horeb is also called Mt. Sinai where Moses had received the 10 commandments. It was the mountain the people saw the presence of God descend up in it in thunder, lightning and a thick cloud.
When He got to Horeb, Elijah went into a cave and spent the night in a cave. So here he is all alone upon this mountain. Who knows what was going through his mind. The word of the Lord came to him and asked, “What are you doing here Elijah.”
Was Elijah trying to hide from the world and his responsibilities in it? Was he continuing to feel sorry for himself? Was he trying to resign from being a prophet? Was he reporting for duty for a new assignment.
It’s the year 2020. God is asking each of us, “What are you doing here.” Do we just want to be left alone? Do we plan to just do our own thing this year? Are we reporting to God for new assignment to do for the year? Is this the year we stop talking about it and just go ahead and do it.
God is asking us as a church, “New Life At Calvary” what are you doing here? Are you discouraged that you’re off track to see 50 souls saved and 50 new covenant partners? Will you just want to sit back and take it easy just caring about yourself for a while? Will you rise up and increase what you want Me to do through you? Will you report for duty and ask, “and Lord what else do you want us to do?”
Elijah basically answered, “I did all that you told me to do and it didn’t seem to matter. The people didn’t change their ways, and they have killed the prophets. I am the only one left to serve you and they want to kill me. In other words, I’m here because I just want to give up doing. I still want you in my life, but I’m tired of doing ministry.
God tells him to go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by. God shows Elijah the power of a wind gust that tore apart the mountains and shattered the rocks. It was like an explosion from a bomb, but God was not in it.
God showed him the power of an earthquake as the lord split open the ground and the mountain he was on was shaken, but God was not in it. God showed him a raging fire like the wildfires we are witnessing in Australia, but God was not in the fire. Afterwards there was a gentle whisper, that caused Elijah to pull his cloak over his face and to go to the mouth of the cave.
We often look for God to do some spectacular event hoping that we are going to really find God when that thing happens. Yet God often comes to us in small voice, during our devotions, or during moment of silence in worship, or in a message in a song or sermon. Jesus as the Good Shepherd said, “my sheep know my voice and a stranger they will not follow.” Is one of your new year’s resolution the ability to recognize and hear the voice of Jesus?
People followed after Jesus not because of who he was as the Son of God, nor because of what He came to do, which was to pay the penalty for our sins. They followed him to see one more miracle like the free buffet meal so they could eat. If miracles means more to us than knowing the voice of God, we’re in the wrong place spiritually.
The voice come to him again “What are you doing here Elijah.” God had called Elijah to do ministry over 350 miles to the north. That’s like God calling to you to do something in Cleveland and you are hiding out in Chicago. Sometimes the situations we put ourselves in spiritually are as far apart from what God is calling us to be as Cleveland is from Chicago.
We need to examine our hearts and see, where are we making compromises with the temptations that are put before us. Where are we being called to deny that Jesus has the right to be Lord over that area of our life? Are we even aware when the values of this world are seeking to win over our hearts? Are we aware of when our actions are grieving God’s Holy Spirit?
When Elijah was asked the question again, he repeated his same story to justify why he was so far away from what God had called him to do. He tried real hard, it didn’t work, all the people who believe like him had been killed, now they want to kill him, and he is the only one left trying to serve God. That was his final assessment of the situation.
There’s was nothing left for him to do but to stay in the Holy Spot on Mt Sinai with just Him and God. Jesus never calls us to think that our relationship to Him is just about Him and us. We have been called into a plan of God that is much bigger than ourselves, and it has eternal consequences for the lives of people.
We are where we are to be used by God to reach someone. God’s word to Elijah was not all what he was expecting and certainly not what he was hoping for. We may think we want a clear word from God, but it may not be what we want to hear.
God told Elijah to go back the way he came and do three assignments; anoint Hazeal king of Aram, Jehu king of Israel, and anoint Elisha to be your successor. None of the these three people seemed that important at the time Elijah got the assignment. But God was using Elijah to prepare for the next generation of leaders. God has us here in 2020 to raise up the next generation of leaders to make a difference for Christ in our world.
Elijah thought he was doing God a tremendous favor by standing when everyone else had left or been killed. God lets him know, I’m working in far more people than you think. I have seven thousand in Israel who have never bowed down to Baal and who have not kissed his feet. Our society wants us to believe we are the only ones in our school, on our jobs, or in our community who still whole to the truth taught in the Scriptures. God says there are a lot more.
Elijah obeyed God and traveled 150 miles to find Elisha to anoint him as his successor. Elijah has one final confrontation with King Ahab, which leads to this most wicked kings, humbling himself, tearing his clothes and spending time praying and fasting. Had Elijah died when he wanted to die, Ahab may have never repented. Elisha may have never did all the miracles he did.
As followers of Christ, we are always about the business of passing the baton of the power of Jesus Christ into the life of someone else. What are we doing here in 2020, we should be passing, receiving, or carrying the baton about a Savior who came into the world to save sinners. A Savior who will change the life of all who put their faith and trust in Him. A Savior who calls everyone to a life of repentance so that they can understand what life is really all about.
What are we doing here in 2020? We are opening our lives to new possibilities of how God wants to mold us into the image of Jesus Christ. We are saying yes to God rebuilding our character, willingly allowing God to cut out things so that we can become free.
We are we doing here in 2020? We are allowing the Holy Spirit to reinvent us as a church. Seeking to love and serve people in the ways of God, rather than in our own limited understanding. Seeking to put the needs of the body of Christ ahead of our own personal desires and agendas.
What are we doing here in 2020. We are seeking to know the voice of God so that when God speaks, there will be wave after wave of voices crying out, “Here I am Lord, use me.”
