I believe with all my heart that God is calling our church to be a church that seeks the face of God. So often people seek the hand of God, or just His blessing, but what we must understand, if we have the favor of God, then we have His blessings.
In order to seek the face of God, we must know where to look for Him. I want to share with you this morning “Looking for God in all the wrong places.”
One of my favorite prophets in the bible is Elijah. He seemed to always know where to find God. When you think about his life, being carried away in a fiery chariot, being mightily used by God, sometimes we think that we could never be like him. There’s no way that I could ever arrive at the same level as Elijah.
But when you read the book of James, it tells us that Elijah was a man of like passions as we are. Elijah knew what it was to have victory. He knew what it was to have the anointing on his life. He knew what it was to feel discouraged and wanting to give up. He knew what it’s like to look for God in all the wrong places. This is where we pick up this morning.
Elijah had just had his show down on Mt. Carmel. He had challenged the prophets of Baal to see who served the only true and living God. The challenge was for them to construct and altar and place a sacrifice on it. The god that answered by fire was the true and living God.
The prophets of Ball went first. They danced around the altar they had made. Nothing was happening, they danced and they cried, and yet their god did not answer.
To add insult to injury Elijah began to taunt them. He said maybe your god is in deep thought, or maybe he’s busy or traveling. Maybe he’s just sleeping. This made the prophets cut them selves until the blood flowed to try to get their god to answer by fire. They shouted louder and still nothing happened. It was around mid-day when Elijah decided they had more than an opportunity to show that their God was true.
Elijah said come here to me. And the people gathered around.
They went over to Elijah and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which was in ruins.
What a sad state of affairs. Israel had strayed so far from God. They had latched on to false Gods that couldn’t do a thing for them. They had become comfortable with religion, not a relationship with God. They had allowed the altar to the true and living God to lie in ruins.
(Let me tell you church, if you want God to visit you, if you want God to show up, you’ve got to repair the altar of God. It lies in ruins in a lot of homes. It lies in ruins in a lot of churches. Pastors are afraid to proclaim the truth of God’s word because of who they might loose.
Let me tell you church. We’re committed to repairing the altar of the Lord in our church. I want to have a place where God knows He’s welcome and wanted. I want God to come down. I want God to inhabit this place.)
Elijah repaired the altar of God and dug a trench around it. He arranged the wood and cut the bull into pieces and placed it on the altar. He told them to gather 4 large jars of water.
Water was a precious commodity at that time since there was a drought going on.
He had them pour the 4 jars of water over the sacrifice 3 times. The water drenched the sacrifice and filled the trench around the altar.
Elijah prayed a 63-word prayer and the fire fell. The people when they saw this fell prostrate and begin to cry, “The Lord – He is God”. Elijah had them seize the false prophets and had them killed.
What a tremendous victory, what a demonstration of the power of God, but see Elijah in the next chapter.
Jezebel is upset over the killing of her prophets and she sent word that she was going to do the same to him.
Verse three says that Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. He fell into a pity party and crawled up under a tree and said, I’ve had enough, I’m no better than my ancestors, Lord just take my life.
I think most of us can relate to what Elijah was feeling. We’ve tried our best to live for God and we don’t seem to get anywhere.
We’ve had enough, we’re tired of fighting our children. We’re tired of fighting our spouse. We’re tired of fighting the devil. We’re tired of being tired. We can’t seem to find God anywhere and we fall into a pity party. One moment we can be on the mountaintop and the next moment we’re in the valley. But I want you to know something this morning, whether you’re on the mountaintop or in the valley, He knows exactly where you are.
The devil will try to crawl on our shoulder and tell us that God doesn’t care about us, that He’s forsaken you; and you would be better off dead.
But you hear me this morning. God’s never lost sight of you. He knows exactly where you’re at and what you need. God knows every hiding place and nook and cranny. He knows exactly where you’re at, at all times.
Look what happened to Elijah. All at once an angel appeared to him and said, “get up and eat”.
I believe that God’s trying to say to you this morning, you may feel like you’re at a low point, you may feel like quitting. You may be discouraged about the church or your circumstances, but God is saying to you this morning. Get up and eat! I want to refresh you, I want to restore to you your joy of salvation. I want to give you hope, when there seems to be no hope. I want to revive you if you will just look for me. Not my just my blessings, not just my gifts, but I want you to seek my face and when you do you will find me.
Prov 8:17 “I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me.”
God’s calling us to seek His face. He’s calling us to search for Him with all our heart. God has been moving in an awesome way in our church. Brother Heard came in here and picked up where I had left off and he had no idea of what I’ve been preaching.
But there’s a spirit of unbelief in this place. Some of you are refusing to believe that what’s happening around here is from God. You think people have left because they are dissatisfied with the church. I’m here to tell you this morning God’s got everything under control at the Maranatha Church of God. He’s already told us that there’s going to be a shaking and judgment is going to come on those who refuse to repent. I don’t want you to be discouraged, God has everything under control.
What you must be doing as a member is seeking the face of God. What we must be doing as a church is seeking the face of God.
God’s plowing up the ground. Getting this church ready for the harvest that’s about to come in.
Back to Elijah. A second time an angel woke him up and told him to eat. The angel knew he was going to need strength for the journey he was about to take. I want you to see something, God didn’t tell Elijah to take this trip. Elijah was taking this trip because He was operating out of fear.
If Elijah would have taken time to ask God what He wanted him to do, Elijah would have been a lot better off. God was just waiting to see what Elijah would do, but see God provided nourishment to Elijah to make the journey.
God has plans for you this morning and He knows you need His strength to carry them through. Philippians proclaims “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”.
God’s going to strengthen you for the journey He has for you. He’s going to strengthen this church. His grace and power and presence will strengthen you for what God has called you to do.
Elijah traveled 40 days to Mt. Horeb, which is the mountain of God, and he found a cave and spent the night. Elijah was so moved with fear that he hadn’t asked God what he wanted him to do. Because of his fear he traveled 40 days.
Let me tell you something, God could have protected Elijah right where he was. But fear made Elijah go through more than he needed too.
That’s how we get sometimes. We get worried about a situation and fear and doubt begins to grip our minds and we start to act on our own without seeking God and we go through more than what we need too.
Now God asked Elijah an interesting question. He said “What are you doing here?”
God didn’t ask because He needed to know, God knows everything. God asked because Elijah needed to understand something.
There are times that God asks us, “what are you doing here?” God asks us those questions to get us to stand back and begin to see we didn’t have to run every direction trying to find God. Sometimes we get ourselves in the biggest messes. We start wandering away from God, and God asks you “what are you doing here?”
Elijah came up with his excuses for being there. He actually was giving excuses for the reason he got into the condition he did.
That’s exactly what we do. We try to rationalize why we don’t read the word like we should or why we don’t pray like we should.
He said I’m the only one left that is trying to do what’s right. Everyone else has forgotten about you God. They’ve killed your prophets and now they’re going to kill me.
Listen to what God told him to do.
1 Kings 19:11-12 “And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.”
Elijah was looking for God in all the wrong places. Many times we do that too. We think God’s only in the shout or God’s only showed up if someone is running the aisles or doing something else.
There’s a lot of Christians who are looking for God in all the wrong places. There’s Christians who look at their horoscope to see what’s going to happen. There’s people in Fort Wayne Indiana that is looking for answers, looking for God in the bars, at the fortune teller, calling 900 numbers to have a tarot reading. The sad part is there’s too many “so called Christians” who are consulting familiar spirits to get answers.
It seems like many are looking for a shortcut to get to God’s glory and blessings. They want someone else to impart a gift or a blessing on them, instead of their seeking the face of God.
If you really want to seek the face of God, there’s no short cuts, no one else can impart to you the anointing. There’s a price to be paid.
How do we find God in the right place?
First of all, you’ll find Him in the Word. This bible is not just the Word of God, it’s the Word from God. We don’t spend enough time in the word like we should.
But if you really want to find God, then place a premium on His Word. Study His Word on a regular basis. Spend time in His word, read it often. Show me a weak Christian and I’ll show you someone who doesn’t put a premium on God’s word.
I’ve seen too many Christians who are not in the Word, and they come up with some of the crazies things. The Bible says that God’s people will perish for the lack of knowledge.
Next if you’re looking for God, you’ll find Him on your knees. There’s a prayer problem in many of our churches. Satan has systematically shut down the church prayer meeting, because he knows that a church that prays is a church that’s a threat to his kingdom. Our prayer services are probably the most important service that we have and there’s too few of you that take advantage of these services.
Someone might say, well, I can pray at home. The truth is, you’re probably. Our prayer services are not to take the place of your personal prayer time. It’s a time that we have together in focused and directed prayer as a body of believers. There’s something about corporate prayer. Everyone coming together and lifting our voices to God.
Finally, you’ll find God in your praise and worship. I watch the congregation sometimes when we’re worshiping the Lord. Some of you seem detached from what’s going on. You just stand there instead of lifting up your hands and your voice to God. Listen to what Psalms 22 says…
Ps 22:3 But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.
It’s not enough just to love the Word. It’s not enough just to pray. You must be a person of praise too.
A praying person, a Word person and a praising person will always have the ability of finding God.
Do you need to find God this morning? Do you need for God to come on the scene in your life?
