What type of person does God choose to confront politicians with His word? If you were to picture in your mind that type of person who would it be? Billy Graham? Perhaps he’s held audiences with every American President for forty years. Tony Campola? Maybe, he’s one of the three pastors who supposedly advised Bill Clinton concerning his numerous ethical problems. Jesse Jackson, now that would be interesting.
Whoever you picked I’m pretty sure that along with being a strong man or woman of God it would be someone who would make a good impression. Maybe someone with Billy Graham’s integrity and hair, Tony Campola’s humor and Jesse Jackson’s taste in clothing. They would be sharp, after all they would have to be taken serious in what they do if they were going to have an impact. Right?
3000 years ago God decided to confront the King of Israel over some problems that he had with him. The king’s name was Ahab and this is what the Bible had to say about him
1 Kings 16:30-33 But Ahab did what was evil in the Lord’s sight, even more than any of the kings before him. And as though it were not enough to live like Jeroboam, he married Jezebel, the daughter of King Ethbaal of the Sidonians, and he began to worship Baal. First he built a temple and an altar for Baal in Samaria. Then he set up an Asherah pole. He did more to arouse the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, than any of the other kings of Israel before him.
Now that’s saying something because there had been some pretty awful kings before Ahab.
So whom did God use? The prophet with the biggest following in Israel? Some sharp, well spoken, well dressed, high profile guy who was known and respected in the all the right circles? Of course not, that’s what we’d do. Instead God reaches down to a little town Tishbe in Gilead and pulls out a prophet named Elijah. Kind of neat going back into the meaning that Hebrew names had, Elijah meant “God is my strength”. And in reading through the Bible we discover that Elijah was just a human as we are. Nothing special he was just regular people.
The only real description we have of him comes in 2 Kings 1:8 They replied, “He was a hairy man, and he wore a leather belt around his waist.” We also know from the scriptures that he was a survivor, so maybe he looked something like this. (Picture of Rupert from Survivor) Now I don’t know about you but when I was growing up anyone who had all kinds of hair and wore leather belts was called a hippie.
Elijah is seen by some as an Old Testament John the Baptist, but I suppose to put it into proper perspective, John the Baptist was a New Testament Elijah. The last mention we have of Elijah in the Old Testament is in 2 Kings 2:11 As they were walking along and talking, suddenly a chariot of fire appeared, drawn by horses of fire. It drove between them, separating them, and Elijah was carried by a whirlwind into heaven.
That’s kind of neat. The next time Elijah is seen is in the New Testament when Jesus went up to a mountain top with Peter James and John in Matthew 17:3 Suddenly, Moses and Elijah appeared and began talking with Jesus. say, Denn that’s impossible. For us, yes, for God well you know what the Angel Gabriel told Mary in Luke 1:37 For nothing is impossible with God.”
That’s a little back ground on Elijah, now for a little background on the book his story is found in. Like 1 and 2 Samuel 1 and 2 Kings were originally one book, however they were divided to make transportation and storage of the scrolls easier. Instead of one humongous scroll holding the book of Kings you had 1 Kings and of course 2 Kings in two scrolls.
Jewish tradition has long held that the prophet Jeremiah was the author and even though we have no evidence to confirm that we have no evidence to contradict it either. The book was written around 550 BC and covers approximately 400 years of the history of the nation of Israel.
It begins with the explanation of why Solomon who was neither the crown prince nor David’s oldest living son became King of Israel. It chronicles Solomon’s obedience and disobedience and how that disobedience resulted in personal cost to Solomon as well as a corporate cost to the people of Israel. Because that was all part of the covenant that God made with these people; obey me and you will be blessed, disobey me and you will be cursed. After the death of Solomon the book chronicles each of the Kings of Israel and evaluates them based on whether or not they followed and obeyed God’s directions for them. So why was it written? To show us that we need to obey God’s commands and believe God’s promises.
Back to the story of Elijah, the first place we read about Elijah is in the book of 1 Kings 17:1 Now Elijah, who was from Tishbe in Gilead, told King Ahab, “As surely as the Lord, the God of Israel, lives—the God whom I worship and serve—there will be no dew or rain during the next few years unless I give the word!” The first thing we need to note about our hero is that A) He Was Obedient.
Now to put this into proper perspective we need to know a little more about Ahab the king. He was the son of Omri and was the seventh King in the new Kingdom of Israel ruling between the years of 873 and 851 BC. Politically he was a strong leader, but he was a pagan. Hmmm, strong political leader but a pagan. A pagan but a strong political leader hmmm. Nah, let’s not go down that road.
Remember the scripture I read earlier? 1 Kings 16:30 But Ahab did what was evil in the Lord’s sight, even more than any of the kings before him. Religiously he was weak, married Jezebel, who was more of a pagan then he was. And it was then that he introduced Baal worship to the Israelites. Baal was considered by his followers to be the god of agriculture. It was through the influence of Jezebel that a severe persecution against the prophets of God broke out. Which is to say that all but 100 preachers in Israel were done in.
So here you are, the king. Politically things are going well, economics are doing great, and you have the world by the tail. And out of the bushes steps this strange looking hairy dude who pronounces a curse on the country and then he just disappears. Now there wouldn’t be anything wrong with the entire picture except it stops raining and a severe drought happens. Coincidence? I think not, and neither did the King because his response is recorded in 1 Kings 18:10 when one of his servants tells Elijah, and For I swear by the Lord your God that the king has searched every nation and kingdom on earth from end to end to find you. And each time when he was told, ‘Elijah isn’t here,’ King Ahab forced the king of that nation to swear to the truth of his claim.
It was when the country fell for Ahab that Elijah took a stand. And the reason he took the stand is summed up in those initial words that he said to the King, “I’m a servant of the living LORD. Elijah knew who he served and he was standing on God’s word. If God said he would do it then that was all Elijah needed, he was convinced that the resources were his. The concept and thought wasn’t original with Elijah but it was Biblical. Deuteronomy 11:16-17 “But do not let your heart turn away from the Lord to worship other gods. If you do, the Lord’s anger will burn against you. He will shut up the sky and hold back the rain, and your harvests will fail. Then you will quickly die in that good land the Lord is now giving you. So you can’t say they hadn’t been warned. Elijah lived by the word of God and he was convinced that God’s promises were real, that if God said it then God could do it.
Elijah was standing on the promises when most of us are content to simply sit on the premises. Well after 3 ½ years God sent Elijah back to Ahab and I love the words that greeted him, 1 Kings 18:17 “So it’s you, is it—Israel’s troublemaker?” Ahab asked when he saw him.
But it wasn’t Elijah who was the troublemaker. Ahab was the trouble maker, Elijah was just the messenger.
And Elijah said, “Boys it’s time for a showdown.” So he told the King to bring the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah to Mount Carmel, it was going to be super bowl 1. It looked like a pretty sure thing, 950 of the most prestigious religious leaders in the country lined up against one hairy little prophet who liked leather belts. So Ahab called all the people of Israel to watch the whopping. Now here’s a hint: never give a preacher a captive audience. 1 Kings 18:21 Then Elijah stood in front of them and said, “How long are you going to waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him! But if Baal is God, then follow him!” But the people were completely silent.
I’ve said it before but it bears repeating the only thing in the middle of the road are yellow lines and dead skunks. What Elijah was saying, was “you can’t be of the world and of the word.”
If Jesus is God then serve Him, but if the almighty dollar is god then serve it. Or if your job is god, or if tobacco is god, or that glass of wine or your refrigerator is god then serve them but don’t try to do both. Did anyone read Dilbert on Friday? Here it is. Dogbert says “Your company has become synonymous with incompetence and crime” and then he adds “Stop trying to be all things to all people. Focus on either the incompetence or the crime.”
Jesus said basically the same thing in Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
Did you catch it? You cannot serve both God and money, nor God and your work, or God and sports, or God and yourself, or God and television. You might as well set up a little porcelain god and bow down and worship it. Friend it’s time to get off the fence before you get splinters in your... We’re not going to go there either.
“If the Lord is God, follow him! But if Baal is God, then follow him!”
A) Elijah Had His Ups
So the stage is set. Elijah has gotten everybody good and ugly to start off with and he lays down the ground rules. “Here’s what we’re going to do. Get two bulls Baal’s guys get to choice first then they chop theirs up into pieces and put it on the big pile of wood over there. Ok, you got the bull and you got the wood all you need is the fire so now you get to call on your god to send down fire from heaven. Got it?” And they tried, from morning to noon they tried, but nothing happened.
Well Elijah being the type of guy he was he decided to encourage the other team and so he said things like “You’ll have to shout louder,” he said. “for surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or he is relieving himself. Or maybe he is away on a trip, or he is asleep and needs to be wakened!” Aren’t you glad your preacher doesn’t get sarcastic?
Now if’n Elijah had of been smart he would have kept his mouth shut but the Bible never said he was smart just committed and you can’t always judge someone’s commitment by their smarts.
The prophets of Baal began to get a little desperate and starting cutting themselves in an attempt to show their god how important this all was to them but in 1 Kings 18:29
They raved all afternoon until the time of the evening sacrifice, but still there was no reply, no voice, no answer. That’s gotta be discouraging. So Elijah takes center stage and says move over gust and let me show you how it’s done. Then he built an altar with 12 stones, representing each of the twelve tribes of Israel, dug a trench around it which he filled full of water, put wood on the altar along with the cut up bull. And if your gonna do it you might as well do it right so he had the altar the bull and the wood soaked with water and it was running down into the trench. He then rolled up his sleeves looked up at the sky and prayed: 1 Kings 18:36-37 “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, prove today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant. Prove that I have done all this at your command. O Lord, answer me! Answer me so these people will know that you, O Lord, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself.”
And that was it, Elijah said do it and God done did it. Why? Cause Elijah took God at his word. The offering part was easy but the bible tells us 1 Kings 18:38 Immediately the fire of the Lord flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust. It even licked up all the water in the ditch! If you’re gonna do it you might as well do it right.
Then Elijah did the same thing again, he didn’t call down fire from heaven he took God at his word. Remember there had been a drought in the country for 3 ½ years, that’s what got Elijah into trouble in the first place. And so he tells Ahab 1 Kings 18:41“Go and enjoy a good meal! For I hear a mighty rainstorm coming!” Not a bad statement to make in a country that hadn’t seen rain in 42 months and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Eight times Elijah told his servant to go and look toward the sea and it wasn’t until the eighth time that he actually spotted a cloud. Wonder what would have happened if he had of stopped at seven.
The little cloud got bigger and bigger and bigger, the little cloud that could. 1 Kings 18:45 And sure enough, the sky was soon black with clouds. A heavy wind brought a terrific rainstorm, and Ahab left quickly for Jezreel.
B. Elijah Had His Downs
Well, let me tell you, Ahab was so impressed that he rushed home to tell his wife, who was not nearly as impressed as her husband as a matter of fact she sent a message to Elijah saying, “within 24 hours pal, you’re going to be history.” Now one of the things that I love about the Bible is that it isn’t afraid to show it’s heroes as people. Here’s Elijah, the man of the hour, has just proved that His God was the God of the impossible, did what nobody else was able to do and he’s confronted with the wicked witch of the east threatening him. So what does he do? Well he really has four options.
1) “Oh yeah, just try it and my God will be all over you like white on rice. Lady it will be you who will be dead in 24 hours.” But what if God doesn’t want to strike her dead? Could happen.
2) “Who do you think you are anyway; my God will put a protective Guard around me that you will never get through.” But it may not be all that sensible.
3) Organize the guys who were converted at Mt. Carmel and stage a mini coup, storm the palace and usurp Ahab and Jezebel. But what if that guys don’t want to be organized.
4) Catch a bus and leave town. Which is what he does, (MAP) he jogs 80 miles to Jezreel, and then walks a day to Beersheba and cries out to God saying 1 Kings 19:4 Then he went on alone into the desert, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. And then he wandered right off the map to Mount Sinai.
But God isn’t going to do that. Now his little flight doesn’t do much for Elijah’s image as super prophet but maybe it helps us identify with him a little more.
Not a pretty picture though is it, he has just won the toughest game of the season and now he’s having a little sulk. He’s at Mt. Horab which is another name for Mt. Sinai, where Moses got the 10 commandments, sitting in a cave having a pity party and listen to what happens 1 Kings 19:9-10 There he came to a cave, where he spent the night.
But the Lord said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
Elijah replied, “I have zealously served the Lord God Almighty. But the people of Israel have broken their covenant with you, torn down your altars, and killed every one of your prophets. I alone am left, and now they are trying to kill me, too.”
Say Elijah would you like a little cheese with your whine?
Hey Elijah would you like a little cheese with your whine?
You ever feel like that? Like you’re the only true Christian left and no one appreciates you, nobody loves you. You feel like singing Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I’m going to eat some worms, long thin slimy ones short fat juicy ones, I’m going to eat some worms.
And yet even when Elijah was down D) Elijah Was Still Obedient God didn’t even see that worthy of an answer; instead he told Elijah Go out and stand on the mountain. And you know what happened it’s found in 1 Kings 19:11-12 “Go out and stand before me on the mountain,” the Lord told him. And as Elijah stood there, the Lord passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper.
Did you catch that, Earth Wind and Fire. And then Earth Wind and Fire and a voice.
Is that what you’re looking for today. It’s when you’re down depressed and despondent, that the small still voice of God can renew your faith and recharge your batteries.
Remember what James wrote in James 5:17 Elijah was as human as we are. Like Elijah you need the Holy Spirit to guide and direct you and give you the courage and strength that you need. You see the Christian life isn’t supposed to be a struggle it’s supposed to be a surrender. And that isn’t just a cliché. When you accept Jesus Christ as your personal saviour it isn’t just something else you add to your list of positive achievements. He’s not a spiritual supplement.
Being a Christian isn’t a matter of working on your temper or learning self control, as good as though things are you can work on those all by yourself. Being a Christian is surrendering yourself to God, it’s all about becoming a new creation, not just a repaired one.
Hope you enjoyed this message, PowerPoint is available by contacting me at denn@bccnet.ca or visiting www.powerpoint4preaching.com
