1 Kings 22

¹For three years Syria and Israel continued without war.

The THREE YEARS would have begun with the treaty made between Ahab and Ben-Hadad following the battle of Aphek in 1 Kings 20:34. In that treaty the King of Syria promised to return certain cities to Israel in exchange for leniency after defeat in battle. Even after such a crushing defeat, the king of Syria was able to hold on to the strategically important city of Ramoth-gilead.

²But in the third year Jehoshaphat the king of Judah came down to the king of Israel.

How can he COME DOWN from Judah to Israel? ANY place is DOWN from Jerusalem because of its elevation.

³And the king of Israel said to his servants, “Do you know that Ramoth-gilead belongs to us, and we keep quiet and do not take it out of the hand of the king of Syria?”

Ramoth-Gilead was a valuable piece of real estate on the East bank of the Jordan River — situated on a major trade route running from the Red Sea to Damascus.

⁴And he said to Jehoshaphat, “Will you go with me to battle at Ramoth-gilead?”

Ahab was willing to form a confederacy with the rival southern kingdom for self-serving reasons. He wanted Ramoth-Gilead just like he wanted Naboth’s vineyard and was willing to do what was necessary to get it! As Ramoth-Gilead was only 40 miles from Jerusalem he appealed to the potential political and military concerns of the Southern kingdom in having a Syrian occupation so close to Jerusalem.

REMEMBER — Jehoshaphat was involved in the long war with the Northern kingdom under and it’s king Rehoboam (1 Kings 14:30; 15:6-7 and 15:16-22).

And Jehoshaphat said to the king of Israel, “I am as you are, my people as your people, my horses as your horses.”

Jehoshaphat was a godly guy (1 Kings 22:43; 46) but he was at this time in an alliance with Ahab that did not please the Lord. He is an object lesson in how we can have a heart for the Lord and yet have flawed hearts! It appears that Jehoshaphat’s relationship with Ahab was based on a political marriage between the two families

2 Chronicles 18:1 Now Jehoshaphat had great riches and honor, and he made a marriage alliance with Ahab.

The Lord wasn’t pleased with the alliance.

2 Chronicles 19:2-3 Now Jehoshaphat had great riches and honor, and he made a marriage alliance with Ahab. ²But Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him and said to King Jehoshaphat, “Should you help the wicked and love those who hate the Lord? Because of this, wrath has gone out against you from the Lord. ³Nevertheless, some good is found in you, for you destroyed the Asherahs out of the land, and have set your heart to seek God.”

Every believer is indeed a work in progress!

Philippians 1:6-7 ⁶And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. ⁷It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace,

A PROOF OF WHAT WAS RIGHT IN HIS HEART —  Jehoshaphat would go with Ahab to battle at Ramoth-gilead — on ONE CONDITION!

⁵And Jehoshaphat said to the king of Israel, “Inquire first for the word of the Lord.”

It was SO IMPORTANT to Jehoshaphat to seek the Lord before acting that he didn’t hesitate to tell Ahab that he wouldn’t go to battle UNLESS he heard from the Lord! That’s bold considering the adversarial relationship that Ahab had with the prophets of Yahweh (Especially Elijah and as we will see, a guy named Micaiah.)

Ahab says — That’s cool — let me call my boys together!

⁶Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said to them, “Shall I go to battle against Ramoth-gilead, or shall I refrain?”

These were probably the prophets of Asherah maintained by Jezebel, who were not present at the great contest between the prophets of Baal and Elijah on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:19). These were PAGAN men who had NO RELATIONSHIP with the True and Living God of Israel. They spoke from their own imagination with one goal in mind — Please the king and queen who fed them by telling them whatever he or she wants to hear.

Listen to what God would say one day in the future about so-called prophets in Judah leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon.

Jeremiah 14:13-14 Then I said: “Ah, Lord God, behold, the prophets say to them, ‘You shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine, but I will give you assured peace in this place.’” ¹⁴And the Lord said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds.

And they said, “Go up, for the Lord will give it into the hand of the king.”

for the Lord will give it — The false prophets essentially said —whatever you want Ahab — and tacked the name of the Lord on it all! So many things are done in the Name of the Lord that have nothing to do with the Lord at all! That is a perfect example of what it means to “take the name of the Lord in vain.” Exodus 20:7

⁷But Jehoshaphat said, “Is there not here another prophet of the Lord of whom we may inquire?”

prophet of the Lord — Jehoshaphat didn’t want just a guy with the title “prophet.” He wanted to hear from a prophet of the Lord — a prophet who KNEW and HEARD FROM the True and Living God. Remember Elijah before Ahab in Ch. 17 — “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand…”

So Jehoshaphat essentially says — Uh, ya…. I’d like a second opinion. He discerned that that the answer from the 400 prophets did not have its origin from the True and Living God.

1 Th 5:19-21 Do not quench the Spirit. ²⁰Do not despise prophecies, ²¹but test everything; hold fast what is good. ²²Abstain from every form of evil.

⁸And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “There is yet one man by whom we may inquire of the Lord, Micaiah the son of Imlah, but I hate him (literally — have learned to hate him), for he never prophesies good concerning me, but evil.”

Ahab had learned to hate. Josephus — the Jewish historian — and other Jewish writers —say that Micaiah is the nameless prophet of 1 Kings 20:42 and that Ahab had actually thrown Micaiah into prison because he had prophesied against Ahab. Verse 27 can be read — “put him in the prison again.”

QUESTION: Whose fault was it that Micaiah had to speak against Ahab so often? If Ahab had been living for and trusting in the God of Israel —Micaiah would not have been called upon to prophecy against him.

DON’T MISS THIS — Ahab hated the messenger because of the message. His real conflict was with God, but he focused his hatred against the prophet Micaiah. You are in the same condition as Ahab if you HATE the ministers of God because they deal directly and honestly with you.

DON’T MISS THIS — Jehoshaphat was once again bold! He told Ahab, the man who hated to hear the truth from God — who only and always wanted to have the answer that best gratified his own selfish desires —He told Ahab to listen to Micaiah.

¹⁰Now the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat the king of Judah were sitting on their thrones, arrayed in their robes, at the threshing floor at the entrance of the gate of Samaria, and all the prophets were prophesying before them.

The city gate was the seat of Government. Court was held there. Government decisions and policies were made there. Battle strategies were hatched there. There were even thrones for high officials to sit on at the gates of the city of Samaria.

¹And Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah made for himself horns of iron and said, “Thus says the Lord, ‘With these you shall push the Syrians until they are destroyed.’” ¹²And all the prophets prophesied so and said, “Go up to Ramoth-gilead and triumph; the Lord will give it into the hand of the king.”

This was a captivating and entertaining presentation. No doubt every eye was on Zedekiah when he used the horns of iron to powerfully illustrate the point. The cherry on top was to have 400 prophets speak in agreement. THIS IS HUGE — No matter how powerful and persuasive the presentation, their message was unfaithful. We live in the age of powerful media! We need to be so careful as to never have media with NO CONTENT or media with false content!

¹³And the messenger who went to summon Micaiah said to him, “Behold, the words of the prophets with one accord are favorable to the king. Let your word be like the word of one of them, and speak favorably.”  ¹⁴But Micaiah said, “As the Lord lives, what the Lord says to me, that I will speak.”

A COUPLE OF THINGS HERE —

1.) There is more here than just trying to get another “please Ahab” voice. What we are seeing here in this messenger — and also in the attitude of Ahab — is the same mentality of a guy named Balak when he recruited a guy named Balaam to prophecy against the Nation of Israel back in the Book of Numbers (Num. 22). Balak and Ahab saw the prophet as someone who could say whatever pleased the prophet. Instead of regarding the prophet as being the mouthpiece of God, the prophet was thought to be able to influence God by his declaration — the prophet could SHAPE the future as well as foretell it. He we have the Old Testament version of the Word of Faith / Positive Confession heresy.

2.) The Heart of the True Prophet  — “As the Lord lives, what the Lord says to me, that I will speak.”

There can be no compromise! There is nothing else worth saying save that that which the Lord says! There is nothing else TO say save that which the Lord says.

2 Peter 1:20-21 knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. ²¹For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

1 Corinthians 4:1-2 This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. ²Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy.

1 Thessalonians 2:4-5 For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, ⁴but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — Micaiah’s message was unwelcome, and was punished by imprisonment (1 Kings 22:27); but better a thousand times to be Micaiah, in prison and hated, yet bearing uncompromising witness against stiff-necked iniquity, than to sit beside it without rebuking it as Jehoshaphat did. In the judgment of the ages and of God, the prophets who dare to stand alone, and to endure any suffering rather than yield their countenance to the sin of high places, are they who shine like stars. The ivory house of Ahab and the cities that he built have perished, but this simple noble protest is a fountain of life and blessing. O my soul, dare to stand and live alone with God!

¹⁵And when he had come to the king,

WOW — What an amazing scene we have here! A prophet in rags and chains stand before two kings, ready to speak on behalf of the LORD.

How is it that this one man could stand his ground before kings?

QUOTE: John Trapp (England 1601-1669) — “This might have daunted the good prophet, but that he had lately seen the Lord sitting upon His throne with all the host of heaven standing by Him, and hence he so boldly looked in the face these two kings in their majesty; for he beheld them as so many mice.”

the king said to him, “Micaiah, shall we go to Ramoth-gilead to battle, or shall we refrain?” And he answered him, “Go up and triumph; the Lord will give it into the hand of the king.”

This was sarcasm — He said similar essentially the same words as the 400 unfaithful prophets — but delivered a completely different message. King Ahab recognized the mocking tone of Micaiah’s prophecy and knew it contradicted the message of the 400 prophets.

¹⁶But the king said to him, “How many times shall I make you swear that you speak to me nothing but the truth in the name of the Lord?” ¹⁷And he said, “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains, as sheep that have no shepherd. And the Lord said, ‘These have no master; let each return to his home in peace.’”

Now Micaiah changes his tone from mocking to serious. He says that not only would Israel be defeated — He says that their leader (shepherd) — Ahab — would perish.

¹⁸And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “Did I not tell you that he would not prophesy good concerning me, but evil?”

HUGE — Ahab said that he wanted the truth  — but as Jack Nicholson said in “A Few Good Men” — he couldn’t handle the truth.

HUGE — What he didn’t consider was that though Micaiah prophesied evil towards Ahab, he prophesied truth. We live in a world that wants nice outcomes — not truth!

QUOTE: G. Campbell-Morgan — “Ahab knew in his heart that Micaiah would not fear or flatter him, but only declare the word of Jehovah. This he construed into personal hatred . . . Hatred of the messenger of God is clear evidence of willful wickedness.”

HUGE — Ahab and the sycophants in his court found it hard to explain how Micaiah could be right and 400 prophets could be wrong.

Micaiah is going to reveal the inspiration behind the 400 prophets.

¹⁹And Micaiah said, “Therefore hear the word of the Lord: I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right hand and on his left; ²⁰and the Lord said, ‘Who will entice Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?’ And one said one thing, and another said another. ²¹Then a spirit came forward and stood before the Lord, saying, ‘I will entice him.’ ²²And the Lord said to him, ‘By what means?’ And he said, ‘I will go out, and will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ And he said, ‘You are to entice him, and you shall succeed; go out and do so.’ ²³Now therefore behold, the Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the Lord has declared disaster for you.”

It is possible that this was just a parable — but it is more likely that Micaiah was actually given an accurate and prophetic glimpse into the heavenly drama behind these events.

and all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right hand and on his left — In the Bible the term right hand refers to the place of favor — strength — and righteousness!

Benjamin = Son of my right hand.

Isaiah 41:10 The right hand of my righteousness

Luke 22:69 But from now on the Son of Man shall be seated at the right hand of the power of God.”

Matthew 25:41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Thus all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right hand and on his left — tells us that God spoke to the combined host of heaven — both faithful and fallen angelic beings.

There is a well-intentioned — but mistaken belief that God can allow no evil in His presence — that Satan and other fallen angels could not be in His presence. That position fails to take into account the fact that Satan and his fellow fallen angels have access to heaven (Job 1:6, Revelation 12:10).

These passages show that God can allow evil in His presence. The question is — HOW can that be?

Hab 1:13 KJV — Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity:

behold = approve   look on = Regard with favor

God wanted to bring judgment against Ahab, so He asked this group of the host of heaven for a volunteer to lead Ahab into battle. Apparently, one of the fallen angels volunteered for this task.

HUGE — Since Ahab wanted to be deceived, God would give him what He wanted — by way of a willing fallen angel who worked through willing unfaithful prophets.

Planet earth will see this played out on a global scale in the not distant future.

2 Thessalonians 2:7-12 For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. ⁸And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. ⁹The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, ¹⁰and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. ¹¹Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, ¹²in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

REMEMBER — Satan can ONLY do that which God permits him to do — so that in the end Satan is merely an agent by which the PERFECT and RIGHTEOUS will of God is accomplished.

QUESTION: Why would the demons seek to see Ahab wiped out? Because Satan has NO other plan for man than to destroy him

²⁴Then Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah came near and struck Micaiah on the cheek and said, “How did the Spirit of the Lord go from me to speak to you?” ²⁵And Micaiah said, “Behold, you shall see on that day when you go into an inner chamber to hide yourself.” ²⁶And the king of Israel said, “Seize Micaiah, and take him back to Amon the governor of the city and to Joash the king’s son, ²⁷and say, ‘Thus says the king, “Put this fellow in prison and feed him meager rations of bread and water, until I come in peace.”’”

Zedekiah responded the way many do when they are defeated in argument – he responded with violence.

Ahab responded the way many tyrants do when they are confronted with the truth — he wanted Micaiah imprisoned and deprived.

²⁸And Micaiah said, “If you return in peace, the Lord has not spoken by me.” And he said, “Hear, all you peoples!”

The prophet Micaiah made one final and ultimate appeal. He was willing to be judged by whether his prophecy came to pass or not.

²⁹So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat the king of Judah went up to Ramoth-gilead. ³⁰And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “I will disguise myself and go into battle, but you wear your robes.” And the king of Israel disguised himself and went into battle.

Ahab remembered the prophecy —  “The leader will be killed” so he decided to NOT wear his leader clothes. Ahab’s disguise is evidence of a mind darkened by disobedience and idoaltry!

If Micaiah was lying, why disguise yourself? There’s no danger. If Micaiah has been telling the truth — why disguise yourself? You are gonna die no matter what you do! It is foolish to think that a mere disguise will hide someone from the Lord’s purposes.

³¹Now the king of Syria had commanded the thirty-two captains of his chariots, “Fight with neither small nor great, but only with the king of Israel.” ³²And when the captains of the chariots saw Jehoshaphat, they said, “It is surely the king of Israel.” So they turned to fight against him. And Jehoshaphat cried out. ³³And when the captains of the chariots saw that it was not the king of Israel, they turned back from pursuing him. ³⁴But a certain man drew his bow at random and struck the king of Israel between the scale armor and the breastplate. Therefore he said to the driver of his chariot, “Turn around and carry me out of the battle, for I am wounded.”

You can NEVER outsmart God. First they mistakenly went after Jehoshaphat — then some UNKNOWN guy shoots a RANDOM arrow at NOBODY — and it found it’s way right in the place of vulnerability in Ahab’s armor.

³⁵And the battle continued that day, and the king was propped up in his chariot facing the Syrians, until at evening he died. And the blood of the wound flowed into the bottom of the chariot. ³⁶And about sunset a cry went through the army, “Every man to his city, and every man to his country!”

Just as Micaiah prophesied in VERSE 17

³⁷So the king died, and was brought to Samaria. And they buried the king in Samaria. ³⁸And they washed the chariot by the pool of Samaria, and the dogs licked up his blood, and the prostitutes washed themselves in it, according to the word of the Lord that he had spoken. ³⁹Now the rest of the acts of Ahab and all that he did, and the ivory house that he built and all the cities that he built, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? ⁴⁰So Ahab slept with his fathers, and Ahaziah his son reigned in his place.

⁴¹Jehoshaphat the son of Asa began to reign over Judah in the fourth year of Ahab king of Israel. ⁴²Jehoshaphat was thirty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Azubah the daughter of Shilhi. ⁴³He walked in all the way of Asa his father. He did not turn aside from it, doing what was right in the sight of the Lord. Yet the high places were not taken away, and the people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places. ⁴⁴Jehoshaphat also made peace with the king of Israel. ⁴⁵Now the rest of the acts of Jehoshaphat, and his might that he showed, and how he warred, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

We will see in the Book of Chronicles that Jehoshaphat was one of the greatest kings in Israel’s history

⁴⁶And from the land he exterminated the remnant of the male cult prostitutes who remained in the days of his father Asa. ⁴⁷There was no king in Edom; a deputy was king. ⁴⁸Jehoshaphat made ships of Tarshish to go to Ophir for gold, but they did not go, for the ships were wrecked at Ezion-geber. ⁴⁹Then Ahaziah the son of Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, “Let my servants go with your servants in the ships,” but Jehoshaphat was not willing. ⁵⁰And Jehoshaphat slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his father, and Jehoram his son reigned in his place.

Jehoshaphat lost a everything in this shipping venture. The reason for the failure was that he was joined with the wicked son of Ahab, Ahaziah. THE LESSON — Any venture that is based upon an unequally yoked situation is headed for the rocks

⁵¹Ahaziah the son of Ahab began to reign over Israel in Samaria in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and he reigned two years over Israel. ⁵²He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of his father and in the way of his mother and in the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin. ⁵³He served Baal and worshiped him and provoked the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger in every way that his father had done.

1 Kings 21

Related Topics: Ahab; Jezebel; Naboth; Vineyards; Covetousness; Idolatry; Grace; Confession = Agreement With God; Repentance; Worldly Sorrow; Godly Sorrow

CHAPTER 21

This chapter of 1 Kings sets the background against which we can BEGIN to understand what the Bible calls GRACE.

AGAIN — The Old Testament is a picture book of New Testament truth.

Ephesians 2:1-5 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins ²in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— ³among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

There is the BLACK BACKROUND of man’s condition. We know NOTHING of what the Bible calls “grace” if we don’t understand the condition of man! It is ONLY against this black backdrop that we can begin to understand the beauty and glory of the grace of God. Like a jeweler setting a diamond on a piece of black velvet — every facet glistens and shines against that black backdrop.

⁴But God,

⁴But — a conjunction — a word that introduces a contrast

⁴But God,

God is going to act in a way that stands in absolute contrast to man’s behavior and what that behavior deserves

⁴But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

Every Man and Woman DESERVED judgment — BUT GOD acted to SAVE

If anyone here DOUBTS that the grace of God is available to them, THEN this chapter of 1 Kings is radically important to you.

In 1 Kings 21 we meet once again a man whose IDOLATRY and WICKEDNESS exceeded that of every other king before him. YET in this chapter we will see that the longsuffering of God towards him. The Lord invested 10 years tracking this guy down to bring him to a point of brokenness and repentance.

¹Now Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard in Jezreel, beside the palace of Ahab king of Samaria. ²And after this

That would be AFTER the battles of Chapter 20. Ahab DESERVED to be wiped out by the Syrian forces, BUT GOD sent a prophet to Ahab

1 Kings 20:13 And behold, a prophet came near to Ahab king of Israel and said, “Thus says the Lord, Have you seen all this great multitude? Behold, I will give it into your hand this day, and you shall know that I am the Lord.”

So what we are about to read happened AFTER God had so graciously defeated the Syrians so that Ahab would TURN to the true and living God.

¹Now Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard in Jezreel, beside the palace of Ahab king of Samaria.

The KJV says that it was HARD AGAINST Ahab’s palace. In today’s real estate vernacular we would say there was a zero lot line.

²And after this Ahab said to Naboth, “Give me your vineyard, that I may have it for a vegetable garden, because it is near my house, and I will give you a better vineyard for it; or, if it seems good to you, I will give you its value in money.”

THIS IS BIG — Ahab did NOT need Naboth’s vineyard — he just wanted it. It was a CONVENIENCE for him to have a vineyard close to his dwelling place. At first Ahab’s response seems FAIR and HONORABLE

³But Naboth said to Ahab, “The Lord forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers.”

Naboth was NOT trying to be obstinate. His rejection of Ahab’s reasonable offer was rooted in Israel’s idea of the land.

Leviticus 25:23 “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me.

Numbers 36:7 The inheritance of the people of Israel shall not be transferred from one tribe to another, for every one of the people of Israel shall hold on to the inheritance of the tribe of his fathers.

As the children of Israel came into the Promised Land, the land was divided between the 12 tribes of Israel. IMPORTANT — It is called the Promised Land because God had promised to give it to a man named Abraham

Genesis 13:14 The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, “Lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward, ¹⁵for all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever.

The descendants of Abraham became the nation of Israel. When the Israelites were delivered from slavery in Egypt, God brought them into that land. God then allotted to each of the tribes of Israel their portion of land. Then each tribe divided the land to its families. Their land was never to be sold because ultimately they were — in a sense —leasing it from the Lord.  It was His land and they were living on it. In the Law God made provision for an Israelite to sell the land if they came into desperate times — but within the Law God also established the Year of Jubilee — every 50th year — in which debts were cancelled and the land reverted back to the original owner.

HUGE — Naboth is giving Ahab a godly answer.  Naboth told Ahab that he couldn’t sell the land even if he wanted — the sale of the land was impossible.  Naboth orders his life and actions on God’s Word. Naboth would rather obey God than man. In contrast to Naboth —Ahab wants to set aside the Word of God for his own desires!

⁴And Ahab went into his house vexed and sullen because of what Naboth the Jezreelite had said to him, for he had said, “I will not give you the inheritance of my fathers.” And he lay down on his bed and turned away his face and would eat no food.

WOW! Naboth has as small vineyard, a piece of ground.  No doubt his father was buried there, his grandfather was buried there.  No doubt it’s filled with sweet memories.  It’s nothing spectacular.  It’s a vineyard.  It’s a small piece of ground but it’s been in the family for centuries —so it’s filled with many memories that are sweet.  But more than that it’s a symbol of a Divine inheritance — the blessing of God on his life.

Ahab has everything — literally has an ivory palace (1 Kings 22:39).  The phrase — They live in an ivory palace — comes from Ahab and Jezebel.  He has an ivory palace.  He has all of the land one could imagine, all of the money, all of the wealth.  He’s just had tremendous victories by God’s hand.  But ALL of that is NOT ENOUGH! He has ALL of that but he is MISERABLE.  He sees one little piece of ground that he doesn’t have — and he goes into his ivory palace and pouts. Here is the fallacy of materialism. IF you are materially minded you NEVER have quite enough.

HUGE — Ahab’s behavior is another expression of his idolatry.

Colossians 3:5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

As he’s laying there pouting maybe he’s thinking — wait ‘till Jez hears, you know, she’ll know what to do.

So here she comes — his worse half.  She wears the pants in the home.  She’s the head of the house. There’s always trouble when Jezebel comes on the scene.

⁵But Jezebel his wife came to him and said to him, “Why is your spirit so vexed that you eat no food?” ⁶And he said to her, “Because I spoke to Naboth the Jezreelite and said to him, ‘Give me your vineyard for money, or else, if it please you, I will give you another vineyard for it.’ And he answered, ‘I will not give you my vineyard.’”

That’s not what he said.  Naboth said — “The Lord forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers.” All Ahab heard was — no, you can’t have my vineyard — because Ahab could only think in terms of what he wanted and what he denied.

⁷And Jezebel his wife said to him, “Do you now govern Israel? Arise and eat bread and let your heart be cheerful; I will give you the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.”

Step aside little man! Let me handle this. That’s the kind of wife she is. Domineering, stepping over the line — because she has no lines.

INTERESTING — Jezebel was the daughter of a Zidonian king.  In the Zidonian dialect Jezebel means pure one. But in Hebrew it means dung hill. You can imagine some smirks in Israel when they introduced queen dung hill.

Here’s her plan.

⁸ So she wrote letters in Ahab’s name and sealed them with his seal,

She had neither the right nor the authority — yet she makes these proclamations AS IF she did! Imagine that — people exercising political authority that doesn’t belong to them!

⁸ …. and she sent the letters to the elders and the leaders who lived with Naboth in his city. ⁹And she wrote in the letters, “Proclaim a fast, and set Naboth at the head of the people.

Here is the most godless woman proclaiming a fast. She is willing to TWIST the things of God for sinful purposes. Often times in the Old Testament the purpose of the fast was to find out why God was angry and had let great evil come upon the land. It’s all fixed — under the pretense of religion she wants to blame Naboth for any problems in the kingdom.

¹⁰And set two worthless men opposite him, and let them bring a charge against him, saying, ‘You have cursed God and the king.’ Then take him out and stone him to death.” ¹¹And the men of his city, the elders and the leaders who lived in his city, did as Jezebel had sent word to them. As it was written in the letters that she had sent to them, ¹²they proclaimed a fast and set Naboth at the head of the people. ¹³And the two worthless men came in and sat opposite him. And the worthless men brought a charge against Naboth in the presence of the people, saying, “Naboth cursed God and the king.” So they took him outside the city and stoned him to death with stones. ¹⁴Then they sent to Jezebel, saying, “Naboth has been stoned; he is dead.”

¹⁵As soon as Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned and was dead, Jezebel said to Ahab, “Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, which he refused to give you for money, for Naboth is not alive, but dead.” ¹⁶And as soon as Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, Ahab arose to go down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it.

Ahab doesn’t waste a minute to take possession of the vineyard.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff — Elijah: The Prophet of Fire

The bones of the murdered were heaped out of sight in some forgotten grave; and what was perhaps more than anything else to Ahab, Elijah was now, as he imagined, out of the way. He had heard nothing lately of his old troubler and tormentor. [237]

It was five to seven years before this since Elijah saw Ahab during those epic events on Mt. Carmel. Ahab hasn’t seen Elijah since.  As far as Ahab’s concerned Elijah was dead or somewhere in the Sinai wilderness.

BUT — At THAT moment the Word of the Lord came to Elijah

¹⁷Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite,

The powerful prophet, the man of miracles, has gone through a season of silence.

APPLICATION: Maybe YOU have been going through a season of silence and YOU are wondering WHY the Lord hasn’t spoken to you or used you for such a long time. The Lord takes His men and women through different seasons.

1 Corinthians 12:11 All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.

He works through them WHEN and HOW HE desires to work. Our responsibility is to be FILLED and to be AVAILABLE — Filled with the Word and the Holy Spirit and available to Jesus. If the Lord chooses to call on you or me every 6 minutes; or every 6 months; or every 6 years; that is HIS prerogative.

¹⁷Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, ¹⁸“Arise, go down to meet Ahab king of Israel, who is in Samaria; behold, he is in the vineyard of Naboth, where he has gone to take possession. ¹⁹And you shall say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Have you killed and also taken possession?”’

It was DUNGHILL that did the dirty work — But God clearly held Ahab responsible for this sin as husband, as king, and as beneficiary of this crime.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — Jezebel was the king’s evil genius, and Ahab must have known that she could only give him the vineyard by foul means; therefore he was as guilty as she was in her use of the power which he delegated to her. We cannot invest others with our power without being responsible for their use of it. We cannot shut our eyes to what is being done by our employees and at the same time open our hands for the gains of their misdeeds.

QUOTE: Alexander Maclaren — Naboth; weak and worse than womanly, turning his face to the wall and weeping when he cannot get it; weakly desiring to have it, and yet not knowing how to set about accomplishing his wish; and then—as is always the case, for there are always tempters everywhere for weak people — that beautiful fiend by his side

Ahab knew that Jezebel couldn’t pass up an opportunity to do evil!

And you shall say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord: “In the place where dogs licked up the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick your own blood.”’”

This prophecy has troubled some because Ahab died in battle and was buried in Samaria (22:34–37), not outside Jezreel “in the place” where Naboth was stoned (21:19; cf. v. 13); and yet, when dogs in Samaria lick up his blood washed from his chariot, the authors declare that to be according to these words (22:38).

There are a few ways to explain how the prophecy was fulfilled:

1.) the prophecy was fulfilled in stages, first by Ahab’s death and then it was completely fulfilled in the blood of Ahab that ran in the veins of Ahab’s son Joram (2 Kings 9:25) — whose body was in fact thrown into Naboth’s vineyard (2 Kings 9:25–26, which also is “according to the word of the Lord”);

2.) it could be taken to mean that Ahab will suffer a similar fate to Naboth.

3.) because of Ahab’s response to Elijah at the end of the chapter, God relented from this judgment and instead brought it upon Ahab’s son (in 2 Kings 9:24-26) as the LORD said He would in 1 Kings 21:29.

²⁰Ahab said to Elijah, “Have you found me, O my enemy?”

Have you found me is literally you have found me out — or — you’ve caught me red-handed.

Ahab walks into Naboth’s vineyard and thinks — ah, Jezebel took care of this just like she said she would! It’s finally MINE! He turns around and the first thing he sees is the last guy on earth he wants to see —hairy Elijah!  And Ahab says— ahhhhhh, you caught me red-handed.

WOW! The Bible says

Jeremiah 23:24 Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares the Lord.

Hebrews 4:13 And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Elijah says — I have found you.  And it’s because you sold yourself to do evil or wickedly in the sight of the Lord.

O my enemy —

REALITY — Elijah was Ahab’s BEST friend because he was speaking the truth to Ahab. Sometimes we can view people as enemies when they are really the best friends that you can have

Prov 27:6 KJV Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.

When on staff in So.Cal.  there was a pastor named Romaine. He was fearless in his love for people. Never flinched in telling the truth to you. One of the assistants said to Romaine — “I don’t want to hear anything from you.”

He answered, “I have found you, because you have sold yourself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord.

This deals with his will — his volition — his choice.  This same word is sometimes translated as “to marry.” The idea is when you come to the altar and you make a vow there’s a decision involved. He says — you have married yourself to do sin, to do wickedness.

²¹Behold, I will bring disaster upon you. I will utterly burn you up, and will cut off from Ahab every male, bond or free, in Israel. ²²And I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah, for the anger to which you have provoked me, and because you have made Israel to sin. ²³And of Jezebel the Lord also said, ‘The dogs shall eat Jezebel within the walls of Jezreel.’

This was literally fulfilled after she was thrown out of a window by a couple of eunuchs

2 Ki 9:32-33; 35-36 And he (Jehu) lifted up his face to the window and said, “Who is on my side? Who?” Two or three eunuchs looked out at him. ³³He said, “Throw her down.” So they threw her down. And some of her blood spattered on the wall and on the horses, and they trampled on her…. ³⁵But when they went to bury her, they found no more of her than the skull and the feet and the palms of her hands. ³⁶When they came back and told him, he said, “This is the word of the Lord, which he spoke by his servant Elijah the Tishbite, ‘In the territory of Jezreel the dogs shall eat the flesh of Jezebel, ³⁷and the corpse of Jezebel shall be as dung on the face of the field in the territory of Jezreel, so that no one can say, This is Jezebel.’”

²⁴Anyone belonging to Ahab who dies in the city the dogs shall eat, and anyone of his who dies in the open country the birds of the heavens shall eat.”

FOLLOW ME HERE — Elijah walked in front of Ahab for close to 10 years. Ahab heard Elijah make the declaration that it would not rain for 3 1/3 years — and then he witnessed the judgment of God in the 3 ½ year draught. He has witnessed the fire fall from heaven on Carmel and the slaying of the 450 prophets of Baal. He has seen the rain return. He has seen God graciously give two miraculous victories for the expressed purpose that Ahab would know that the God of Israel is the One, True and Living God. And in all of these things Ahab had not been moved at all.  He’s still sold out to sin — even the sin of covetousness and murder to gratify that covetousness.

In John 3 Jesus said that men don’t come to the light — don’t respond to the Gospel — because they love darkness more than light.  Jesus used the word agape to describe their love for the darkness. They are devoted to it — they don’t want to be told that they are devoted to moral and spiritual darkness. They don’t come to the light because the light exposes.

Ahab — of his own will — has been making these decisions to live in sin.  Not only has he conspired to have Naboth killed — but we are told in 2 Kings 8:26 that Naboth’s sons were also killed.

WHAT IS THE RESPONSE OF GOD TO AHAB’S CHOICES AND ACTIONS?

God’s response to all of this is to send Elijah. I am convinced that Elijah was heartbroken.  If Elijah had the heart of God there was no joy in this at all.

Ezekiel 33:11 Say to them, As I live, declares the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways, for why will you die, O house of Israel?

God is brokenhearted about any who would perish, and here he sends Elijah to Ahab to challenge him. You have sold out to do evil. Surely, there was none more sold out to sin than Ahab

²⁵There was none who sold himself to do what was evil in the sight of the Lord like Ahab, whom Jezebel his wife incited. ²⁶He acted very abominably in going after idols, as the Amorites had done, whom the Lord cast out before the people of Israel.

God had been dealing with this man for 10 years — And after 10 years Ahab was more sold out to sin than anyone else! BUT GOD — once again reveals to Ahab his sin — God once again sends the truth to this man!

²⁷And when Ahab heard those words, he tore his clothes and put sackcloth on his flesh and fasted and lay in sackcloth and went about dejectedly. ²⁸And the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, ²⁹“Have you seen how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the disaster in his days; but in his son’s days I will bring the disaster upon his house.”

Here we are in the 21^st Century — What are the big lessons for us in this account?

First of all — what are the lessons from this man Naboth.

I think we learn from Naboth that if you don’t have something that’s worth dying for — you don’t have something that’s worth living for. A wife, a husband, children, your faith, your brothers and sisters.  If you don’t have something worth laying down your life for — you don’t have anything worth living for.

Naboth said — I’m not going to sell out the Word of God and the Inheritance of God for anything or anyone — not even the king!

As Christians — we have an inheritance.

1 Peter 1:3-4 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,

We have that inheritance at the cost of the blood of Jesus. At what cost will we sell out that inheritance?  We hear from wives who have found their husbands involved in internet pornography. We hear from husbands who tell us their wife has got involved with somebody else on the Internet.

What’s your price?  Naboth would not sell out.  He would not sell out the Word of God or the blessings of God because they were precious to him.  Naboth was willing to lay down his life, not willing to yield, not willing to sell out.

In America Christians have come to view lukewarm as normal Christianity.  No, no, Biblical Christianity is to be on fire, to take up your cross and follow Christ and to give your life and not to sell out.  That’s Biblical Christianity.

SECOND — We have Elijah

Elijah comes to Ahab with the truth. If you’re going to come and speak the truth you are most likely NOT going to be comfortable — and more often than not — you won’t be welcomed.  That can be with your family or with your friends

The pastors and those in leadership at Metro can’t know everything that’s going on.  Sometimes the Lord calls on YOU to speak the truth in love — Sometimes it falls on you to say, Hey, why are you living in sin?  Why are you gossiping and backbiting?

That’s not a comfortable position to be in. Elijah knew that very thing — He had even failed because of it — when he ran from Jezebel rather than confront her. Failing yesterday to speak the truth in love doesn’t mean that God can’t use you today. Elijah blew it before but now he’s not afraid to step into that place and speak the truth.

LASTLY — There is Ahab

In Ahab we see that God knows the thoughts and intents of our hearts. He knew that Ahab wanted Naboth’s vineyard at any cost — even if he had to murder Naboth and his sons.

Numbers 32:23 …. behold, you have sinned against the Lord, and be sure your sin will find you out.

We also see in Ahab the truth of Proverbs 29:1

He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.

KJV — He, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.

In grace beyond comprehension God warns. Like a road sign — caution — curve ahead.  If you persist in sin there comes a day when you will run out of room. If you persist in sin there comes a day when you are beyond fixing — without remedy — and judgment comes.

Ahab was a man who had misunderstood the longsuffering of God.

It tell us in the New Testament that God is longsuffering — desiring that His goodness and longsuffering of God will bring people to repentance. But there are men and women who say — God knows I’m living in sin, but my business is still doing good — my life isn’t off the tracks. God knows my heart. No God knows your heart — You want to know what God knows about your heart — my heart? Look at the cross! He knows your heart.  Your heart — my heart — so desperately wicked — that Jesus had to die for us.

Now the interesting thing is that when Ahab heard those words, he tore his clothes and put sackcloth on his flesh and fasted and lay in sackcloth and went about dejectedly. God said to Elijah — Look at that.  He’s humbling himself in my presence.  I’m not going to execute this judgment now.  It will come in his son’s lives. His sons were Godless wicked men too.

But it doesn’t say he repented.  He doesn’t restored the vineyard to Naboth’s family.

Joel 2:13 and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.

Ahab tore his garments, he fell down, God gave a reprieve.  God gave space.  But for all of the longsuffering of God we NEVER witness a CHANGE in his life.

Proverbs 28:13 Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper,

but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.

In the New Testament the word confess is from the Greek homologeō

hom-ol-og-eh’-o to say the same thing — I will call this what God calls it.

When we agree with God on our action AND forsake it (turn from/repent) — we obtain mercy.

Two kings — David and Ahab. Both committed murder to have something that didn’t belong to them.

2 Corinthians 7:9-10 NLT For the kind of sorrow God wants us to experience leads us away from sin and results in salvation. There’s no regret for that kind of sorrow. But worldly sorrow, which lacks repentance, results in spiritual death.

2 Corinthians 7: 10 ¹⁰For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.

Ahab tore his clothes — because of the predicted end of his kingdom and household.  Worldly sorrow!

David truly confessed! He saw his behavior as sinning against God!

Psalm 51:1-4; 6-17 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. ² Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! ³For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.⁴Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment….⁶ Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. ⁷ Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. ⁸ Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have broken rejoice. ⁹ Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. ¹⁰ Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. ¹¹Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. ¹²Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. ¹³ Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you.¹⁴ Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.¹⁵ O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.¹⁶ For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. ¹⁷ The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

Be a Naboth — You have something that’s unimaginable in regards to inheritance that’s given you by divine appointment.  Don’t have a price.  Don’t put a price on it, never let go of it, stand your ground, stand on the Word.

Be an Elijah — take the initiative to tell someone the truth because you love them.  Be salt and to be light.

Don’t be an Ahab — Be warned as we look at this man’s life, his covetousness, his sin.

Some here tonight are prodigals — you’ve been away.  God is patient, but there comes a point when he says that’s enough.  I don’t know who you are.  You do. If God is cutting you with his Word it is surgery to remove a deadly cancer. It is painful now but it will heal you!

If you’re convicted it’s the evidence of God’s love. The very fact that He is shining the light of His truth on you tonight is PROOF that He loves you and wants you to deal with.

WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH THE GRACE OF GOD?

1 Kings 20

Related Topics: Northern kingdom; Ahab; Ben-hadad; Syria; Grace of God; Mercy of God; Longsuffering of God; Faith and Obedience; Ongoing Warfare;

¹Ben-hadad the king of Syria gathered all his army together.

SYRIA was — and still is the major enemy of Israel.

QUOTE: Dilday — “Ben-Hadad may be the same king Asa enlisted against Baasha in Chapter 15:18; or he may be that king’s son or grandson by the same name.”

Thirty-two kings were with him,

QUOTE: Wiseman — “The thirty-two kings would include minor tribal chiefs.”

and horses and chariots. And he went up and closed in on Samaria and fought against it. ²And he sent messengers into the city to Ahab king of Israel and said to him, “Thus says Ben-hadad: ³‘Your silver and your gold are mine; your best wives and children also are mine.’”

“Ahab, your silver, gold, wives and kids are as good as gone.. I OWN them.”

⁴And the king of Israel answered, “As you say, my lord, O king, I am yours, and all that I have.”

Without a doubt the Northern kingdom of Israel was devastated on every level by the three and a half year drought and famine that had just ended — including it’s ability to defend itself because the army would be comprised of undernourished or malnourished men and horses.

But Ahab was essentially a spineless man. On the lowest level — he was a man concerned with himself and his personal luxuries and comforts with zero regard for anyone else. On the most critical level —he had no relationship with the God of Israel — and as a result he had ZERO confidence in the God of Israel to fight on their behalf. Possessing neither the faith nor the character to stand in the face of such a threat — Ahab surrendered unconditionally to Ben-hadad.

Ahab’s immediate surrender — flowing from his lack of faith and character  — speaks volumes to us TODAY!

Romans 15:4 For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.

Throughout history the people of God have faced conflicts and overwhelming odds. Time and again the Living God has showed up to defend His people and fight on their behalf. Time and again VERY ORDINARY men and women have had the courage to STAND in the face of danger because they KNEW and had CONFIDENCE in the Lord!

Daniel 11:32b ….but the people who know their God shall stand firm and take action.

Daniel 11:32b KJV ….but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits.

Daniel 11:32b NLT …. But the people who know their God will be strong and will resist him.

Those words are powerful — but especially so when we understand their prophetic and historical context. Those words were prophetic — they looked forward to a time in the history of the Jews when they would face violent persecution at the hands of a man named Antiochus Epiphanes. The Jews would call this Syrian king Antiouchus Epimanes — The mad man.  He ruled in Syria from 175-164 BC..

He was a great orator and a great deceiver (Daniel 11:21). Daniel’s descriptions of this man make him very much a foreshadowing of the anti-Christ. At one point in his 11 year rule he was greatly humiliated by the Romans — so humiliated that he returned to the land of Israel “with great indignation” (Daniel 11:30). He was raving mad and blood thirsty. Upon his return to Jerusalem he killed 40,000 Jews in the first few days. He would kill 60,000 more in a short time afterwards. He placed an idol in the Holy of holies — sacrificed pigs and forced the priests to get drunk — participate in a sexual orgy — drink the blood of the pigs.

This action was for sure a foreshadowing of an event YET TO COME —

(Mat 24:15 NLT) “The time will come when you will see what Daniel the prophet spoke about: the sacrilegious object that causes desecration standing in the holy place”–reader, pay attention!”

THAT is the context of Daniel 11:32. But the people who know their God will be strong and will resist him (Antiochus Epiphanes).

The people who did know their God in that moment of Jewish history were Judah Maccabee and his brothers — who led a revolt against Antiochus. That revolt is now referred to as the Maccabean Revolt. They drove the Syrians out of the land — cleansed the temple and restored worship in 165 BC. — That is what is commemorated in the feast of Hanukkah would be part of the Jewish calendar.

THESE were men who KNEW their God — and stood on His behalf.

We live in a time and a culture that places a high value on personal comfort and luxury — a time when men and women feel ENTITLED to it. If we do not know God we will not have the wherewithal to STAND for and with Jesus. Today in America we are not threatened with the loss of life because of our faith in Jesus. Faith in Jesus might lead to the threat of the loss of comfort and lifestyle!  Yet today — when challenged concerning professed faith in Jesus —Men and women are as quick as Ahab to surrender for the sake of their personal comfort in the workplace or the classroom — for the sake of a bigger paycheck or a bigger tax return. Then they come to church on Sunday and sing songs.

GUYS — There is coming a time when it is going to be much larger stakes! Depending upon your relationship with the Lord we will look like Ahab or the Maccabees.

⁵The messengers came again and said, “Thus says Ben-hadad: ‘I sent to you, saying, “Deliver to me your silver and your gold, your wives and your children.” ⁶Nevertheless I will send my servants to you tomorrow about this time, and they shall search your house and the houses of your servants and lay hands on whatever pleases you and take it away.’”

⁷Then the king of Israel called all the elders of the land and said, “Mark, now, and see how this man is seeking trouble, for he sent to me for my wives and my children, and for my silver and my gold, and I did not refuse him.”

Ahab should have sought the counsel of the elders of the land before he surrendered to the Syrians. Now — in the brief time between the message of surrender and the actual abduction of his women and the plundering of his goods — he sought counsel.

⁸And all the elders and all the people said to him, “Do not listen or consent.” ⁹So he said to the messengers of Ben-hadad, “Tell my lord the king, ‘All that you first demanded of your servant I will do, but this thing I cannot do.’” And the messengers departed and brought him word again.

Ahab told Ben-Hadad that he would do most of what he requested, but not all.

To deny a tyrant on one point is to deny him on every point. Ahab could only expect a harsh reaction.

¹⁰Ben-hadad sent to him and said, “The gods do so to me and more also,

REMEMBER — Jezebel swore a similar oath of vengeance against Elijah (1 Kings 19:2).

“The gods do so to me and more also, if the dust of Samaria shall suffice for handfuls for all the people who follow me.”

“If you guys won’t let us come down and take what we want, then you are dust.”

¹¹And the king of Israel answered, “Tell him, ‘Let not him who straps on his armor boast himself like he who takes it off.’”

Ahab was one of those guys who was a coward but a had a smart mouth! “You can suit up for the game, but it doesn’t mean that you’re going to win it.” The idea is that you should do your boasting after the battle, not before.

¹²When Ben-hadad heard this message as he was drinking with the kings in the booths, he said to his men, “Take your positions.” And they took their positions against the city.

Syria and its allies readied, and the city of Samaria braced for a furious attack.

¹³And behold, a prophet came near to Ahab king of Israel

We have no Biblical grounds to believe that this is either Elijah or Elisha. We are on good Biblical grounds to say he was one of the 7,000 in Israel that were quietly faithful to Yahweh.

and said, “Thus says the Lord, Have you seen all this great multitude? Behold, I will give it into your hand this day, and you shall know that I am the Lord.”

Ahab was extremely WICKED — His wife was even more wicked. The inhabitants of his kingdom were at best compliant in that wickedness. Their hardened hearts — their idolatry and rejection of God — deserved divine abandonment. God had every right to just leave them alone and let them perish without His help. Yet God extends to Ahab GRACE and MERCY.

GRACE = getting what you don’t deserve.

MERCY = NOT getting what you DO deserve.

We have said on a number of occasions that the Old Testament is the illustration book of New Testament truth.

Ephesians 2:4-7 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, ⁷so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

HOW rich in mercy is God? SO rich in mercy that He showed mercy to Ahab and the Northern kingdom of Israel. Ahab is a picture of YOU and ME!

Romans 2:4 NLT Don’t you see how wonderfully kind, tolerant, and patient God is with you? Does this mean nothing to you? Can’t you see that his kindness is intended to turn you from your sin?

2 Peter 3:9 KJV The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

HOW longsuffering is God? God says — I’m going to do this for you Ahab so that you shall know that I am the Lord.” Ahab had already seen with his own eyes the fire falling from heaven on Mount Carmel – yet he didn’t turn his heart to the Lord. God suffers long with this guy — and after suffering long with him is willing to give him even more evidence so that Ahab can know the Lord!

AGAIN — Ahab is a picture of YOU and ME! Everyone in this building tonight is here because God has suffered long with us. Some of you are with us tonight because God wants to show you one more time that Her is real — that He loves you — that you need Him.

The GRACE and PATIENCE of our Lord is amazing. So amazing that God would let Ahab be God’s instrument of defeating the Syrians.

BY THE WAY — GRACE always PRECEEDS MERCY and PEACE. In the New Testament the order of these words is always Grace and Peace —Grace and Peace — Grace and Mercy and Peace. Grace ALWAYS precedes peace and mercy. Why that order? That order was very deliberate and purposeful on the part of the Holy Spirit. You see —before we can have PEACE with God — Before God can extend mercy (not give us what we deserve) — He FIRST gives us what we don’t deserve. “For God so loved the World that He GAVE His only begotten Son.” The sending of His only begotten Son is what we DON’T DESERVE. The very thing we don’t deserve saves us from what we do deserve.

¹⁴And Ahab said, “By whom?” He said, “Thus says the Lord, By the servants of the governors of the districts.” Then he said, “Who shall begin the battle?” He answered, “You.”

Ahab looked around at his crippled army and military leaders and wondered (reasonable from a human point of view) HOW God could bring a victory against a mighty enemy with them

WHO would fight?  God said — “Your weak and overmatched men.”

WHO would lead? God said — ”You.”

So often — when a work for God is to be done we ask the same questions — ”Who’s gonna do this / lead this? The answer is the same one given to Ahab— “You.”

AGAIN — The Old Testament is the Picture Book of New Testament Truth

1 Corinthians 1:26-29 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. ²⁷But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; ²⁸God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, ²⁹so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

THAT is how God works!

¹⁵Then he mustered the servants of the governors of the districts, and they were 232. And after them he mustered all the people of Israel, seven thousand. ¹⁶And they went out at noon, while Ben-hadad was drinking himself drunk in the booths, he and the thirty-two kings who helped him. ¹⁷The servants of the governors of the districts went out first. And Ben-hadad sent out scouts, and they reported to him, “Men are coming out from Samaria.” ¹⁸He said, “If they have come out for peace, take them alive. Or if they have come out for war, take them alive.” ¹⁹So these went out of the city, the servants of the governors of the districts and the army that followed them. ²⁰And each struck down his man. The Syrians fled, and Israel pursued them, but Ben-hadad king of Syria escaped on a horse with horsemen. ²¹And the king of Israel went out and struck the horses and chariots, and struck the Syrians with a great blow. ²²Then the prophet came near to the king of Israel and said to him, “Come, strengthen yourself, and consider well what you have to do, for in the spring the king of Syria will come up against you.”

The victory over Ben-Hadad did not end the conflict between Israel and Syria. God said — You had victory — but go and strengthen yourself because there is going to be another war — “Syria: The Sequal.”

KEY APPLICATION: Many of us have experienced a certain degree of victory in the past days/weeks/months. Satan always has a Sequal in mind. Even in his dealings with Jesus!

Luke 4:13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.

There WILL be another attack.

By the way — Syria still desires to crush Israel! Lebanon is Syria’s puppet state to house Hezbollah. Just last week in the news — Syria transferred SCUD rockets to Hezbollah in Syria. Scud B missiles have a range of up to 300 kilometers, which means they can reach most of Israel. Scud C and D missiles can reach as far south as Eilat.

²³And the servants of the king of Syria said to him, “Their gods are gods of the hills, and so they were stronger than we. But let us fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they. ²⁴And do this: remove the kings, each from his post, and put commanders in their places, ²⁵and muster an army like the army that you have lost, horse for horse, and chariot for chariot. Then we will fight against them in the plain, and surely we shall be stronger than they.” And he listened to their voice and did so.

²⁶In the spring, Ben-hadad mustered the Syrians and went up to Aphek to fight against Israel. ²⁷And the people of Israel were mustered and were provisioned and went against them. The people of Israel encamped before them like two little flocks of goats, but the Syrians filled the country. ²⁸And a man of God came near and said to the king of Israel, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because the Syrians have said, “The Lord is a god of the hills but he is not a god of the valleys,”

In the days of the Old Testament — and even in some areas of the world today — pagans thought of their gods as localized. They felt that particular gods had authority over particular areas. Because the recent victory was won on hilly terrain, the servants of the king of Syria believed that the God of Israel was a localized deity with power over the hills, not the plains. The action they recommended was logical, given their theology.

Their theology dictated their strategy and activity! HOW TRUE that is!

therefore I will give all this great multitude into your hand, and you shall know that I am the Lord.’” ²⁹And they encamped opposite one another seven days. Then on the seventh day the battle was joined. And the people of Israel struck down of the Syrians 100,000 foot soldiers in one day.

KEY QUESTION: WHY did the Israelites win? Because the Syrians thought that the Lord was only the God of the hills. God was proving that He is not like any pagan deity — that He rules over ALL of His creation. There is NO PLACE that He is not. There is NO PLACE where He cannot fight for His people.

Satan still makes that claim — “Christians are happy as long as there are on top of their world — But get them in the valley and they’ll become defeated, embittered, just like anyone else.”

The SAME spirit that directed the strategies of Ben-Haddad is alive and well in the world today.

God says — “I’ll show him. I will let my people go through the valleys of life to PROVE that I am the God of the valley as well — that I can give them joy and peace even when they are in dark times and deep waters.”

KEY APPLICATION: Is YOUR God the God of the valleys as well as the God of the hills? Or do you only acknowledge Him as God when you are on the mountain top?

IF God has given you the PRIVILEGE of being in a valley experience —it is to show demonic entities and a watching world that YOU are NOT a mercenary — That you do NOT serve the Lord for your own welfare and well-being — But that you are a lover of the Lord regardless — that He is the Lord of lords, whether in the hills or in the valleys.

³⁰a And the rest fled into the city of Aphek, and the wall fell upon 27,000 men who were left. Ben-hadad also fled and entered an inner chamber in the city. ³¹And his servants said to him, “Behold now, we have heard that the kings of the house of Israel are merciful kings. Let us put sackcloth around our waists and ropes on our heads and go out to the king of Israel. Perhaps he will spare your life.” ³²So they tied sackcloth around their waists and put ropes on their heads

“The rope around the head was a sign of supplication , the figure being that of the porter at the wheel of the victor’s chariot.” The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Volume 4: 1 Kings-Job By: R.D. Patterson, H.J. Austel

and went to the king of Israel and said, “Your servant Ben-hadad says, ‘Please, let me live.’”

Oh how things have changed for Ben-Hadad! The chapter begins with him sending threats against Ahab and the Kingdom of Israel. Now he has to humble himself to win mercy and favor from the unexpectedly triumphant King of Israel.

And he said, “Does he still live? He is my brother.”

Ben-Hadad was NOT his brother in a biological or ethnic sense — he was his brother in the sense that they were both kings.

A couple of thoughts here —

1.) Here we see the priority of Ahab —He prided himself on his royalty.

2.) Perhaps Ahab wanted Syria’s friendship as protection against the powerful and threatening Assyrian Empire. Ahab is looking for looked for friends and help in the wrong places.

QUOTE: John Trapp — Brother Ben-Hadad will ere long fight against Ahab with that life which he had given him (chapter 22:31).

³³Now the men were watching for a sign, and they quickly took it up from him and said, “Yes, your brother Ben-hadad.” Then he said, “Go and bring him.” Then Ben-hadad came out to him, and he caused him to come up into the chariot. ³⁴And Ben-hadad said to him, “The cities that my father took from your father I will restore, and you may establish bazaars for yourself in Damascus, as my father did in Samaria.” And Ahab said, “I will let you go on these terms.” So he made a covenant with him and let him go. ³⁵And a certain man of the sons of the prophets

Josephus believed the anonymous prophet was Micaiah — who is a prominent figure in the next story. Josephus suggested that the king put him in prison in retaliation for Micaiah’s prophetic condemnation. (Dilday)

³⁵And a certain man of the sons of the prophets said to his fellow at the command of the Lord, “Strike me, please.”

Directed by God, the prophet needed to appear injured to King Ahab.

But the man refused to strike him. ³⁶Then he said to him, “Because you have not obeyed the voice of the Lord, behold, as soon as you have gone from me, a lion shall strike you down.” And as soon as he had departed from him, a lion met him and struck him down.

This word of the Lord did NOT make sense to this guy. Since it made no sense to him, he refused to act in obedience to it. So he ended up slain by a lion

1 Pet 5:8 ⁸Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. ⁹Resist him, firm in your faith,

Satan preys upon the man or woman who says — “I don’t understand the Word so I won’t obey it.” The world says, Show me and I’ll believe. God says, “believe and I’ll show you.”

³⁷Then he found another man and said, “Strike me, please.” And the man struck him—struck him and wounded him. ³⁸So the prophet departed and waited for the king by the way, disguising himself with a bandage over his eyes.

Now we see why the Lord gave this Word — It was for special effect

³⁹And as the king passed, he cried to the king and said, “Your servant went out into the midst of the battle, and behold, a soldier turned and brought a man to me and said, ‘Guard this man; if by any means he is missing, your life shall be for his life, or else you shall pay a talent of silver.’ ⁴⁰And as your servant was busy here and there, he was gone.” The king of Israel said to him, “So shall your judgment be; you yourself have decided it.”

VERSE 40 - BUSY HERE AND THERE

That happens to many of us. We miss out on what we should be doing because we are BUSY HERE AND THERE

BUSY HERE AND THERE was no excuse at all. He should have paid attention to the job he had to do.

QUOTE: G. Campbell Morgan — The prophet’s made-up story with the fictional excuse becomes real in the life of many, especially many ministers of the Gospel. “If a man is called to preach the Word, and becomes busy over a hundred things other than that of his central work, and so loses the opportunity to preach, his failure is complete. That which is our God-appointed work, we must do. If we fail in that, the fact that we have been ‘busy here and there,’ doing all sorts of other things, is of no avail.”

QUOTE: Spurgeon — He was gone: Even as the fictional prisoner escaped, so many opportunities escape us in the Christian life. “I want you all to remember this morning that if any portion of life has not been spent in God’s service it is gone. Time past is gone. You can never have it back again, not even the last moment which just now glided by.”

The king showed NO mercy!

⁴¹Then he hurried to take the bandage away from his eyes, and the king of Israel recognized him as one of the prophets. ⁴²And he said to him, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have let go out of your hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore your life shall be for his life, and your people for his people.’” ⁴³And the king of Israel went to his house vexed and sullen and came to Samaria.

Ahab blew it again — He followed his own logic instead of the Lord’s leading.

1 KINGS 19:9-20, 43

1 Kings 19:15-18 And the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Syria. ¹⁶And Jehu the son of Nimshi You shall anoint to be king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your place. ¹⁷And the one who escapes from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu put to death, and the one who escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha put to death. ¹⁸Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.”

Tonight we are given the account of calling of Elisha — at least the visible part of it.  No doubt’s there’s a great deal that’s been going on in the heart of Elisha that we aren’t told. Elisha is by nature different from Elijah. We’ll see that as we get into his ministry.  Elijah means God is my Lord.  Elisha means God is my salvation.

Elisha is going to be prophet for a little over 50 years — his prophetic ministry will span the reigns of four wicked kings.  He will perform more miracles than anyone in the Bible except Jesus Christ himself.

He’ll be with Elijah for 10 years before his prophetic ministry begins. If he’s going to have 10 years with Elijah, then 50 years as prophet, that’s 60 years.  So we are looking at a teenage boy somewhere between 14-16 years old, when God calls Elisha.

¹⁹So he departed from there and found Elisha the son of Shaphat,

It doesn’t tell us about the 160, 180 miles he traveled.  It just says so he departed and found Elisha, Elijah did what the still small voice of God told him to do.

He happened to do it in reverse order than God described to him in the previous passage.

I’m not sure what Elijah knows of Elisha by this time before he meets him.  Perhaps in that 160-180 mile journey God had spoken to Elijah about this teenage boy. Does he know of the scope of the ministry that Elisha will have?  I’m not sure of that.  Does he know the length of the ministry that Elisha will have?  I’m not sure of that.

It is important to note that God told Elijah EXACTLY where to find Elisha. Could it be that if God hadn’t told him that he was at Abel Meholah Elijah probably would have looked for him at the school of the prophets — or at the temple in Jerusalem — places where you would think: THAT’s where I will find a prophet.

who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen in front of him, and he was with the twelfth.

Something really struck me here while I was preparing this morning.

The radical difference in the settings in which Elijah found himself by the will of God. We just saw him in the overwhelming desolation of the Sinai desert that the still small voice of God that thundered in Elijah’ heart.

NOW — BY the Will of God and IN the Will of God, Elijah finds himself in a radically different setting — one that is the extreme opposite from His previous encounter with God —

Abel-meholah — “the meadow of dancing,” in the valley of the Jordan.

The Jordan Valley stands out like a belt of lush farmland on both sides of the river. Not only is the topography radically different from Sinai —But Elijah goes from utter loneliness and total solitude of the cave to a busy family farm. He is going to go from ministering by himself to having a friend and co-laborer in the person of Elisha.

THAT is the Christian life. Psalm 23 – Still waters, green pastures, the valley of the shadow of death. At the bottom of the Mount of Transfiguration was a dad whose little boy’s life was being trashed by a demon. From the glassy waters on the Sea of Galilee to a storm that made fisherman fear for their lives — WHILE Jesus was in the boat.

HUGE — Elijah finds Elisha — not at the temple, but at the plow — not praying, but plowing. The guy whose ministry would be marked by more miracles than anyone in the Bible except for Jesus, is in a field plowing. A lot of people have the idea that to be really spiritual and really usable you have to separate yourself from work, from the duties of life. When Elijah finds Elisha — Elisha is earning a living and living with integrity in this world.  That kind of work is no less sacred than the work of the prophet. Such things are as much our duty before the Lord as anything else.

who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen in front of him, and he was with the twelfth.

Elisha was rich man — In that day if you had ONE team of oxen you were considered to be very prosperous — Elisha had TWELVE. That would be like having 12 BMW’s or 12 Range Rovers

He was also HUMBLE and HARD WORKING — Though he owned 12 teams of oxen, he was NOT working the lead team. He was back with the 12th team. THAT was not a very appealing place to be – Following in the dust of 11 other teams of oxen. He was eating dust. This is humility that we will see come out more as we study further in 1-2 Kings.

Again — Elisha — a teenager — is working HARD — driving a yoke of oxen when he probably doesn’t have to work for the rest of his life in some ways.

HUGE — God calls workers. Ministry is WORK — and because of that He doesn’t call sluggards.  Some people want to get into ministry because they think it’s easy.  God calls workers.

BIG OBSERVATION — Elisha is plowing in Abel-meholah — “the meadow of dancing.” God had all along planned on Elisha plowing a different field — which will be Israel.  Plowing in his father’s fields was training for plowing and planting the Word of God in Israel.

Moses — was called while he was tending the flock of his father-in-law.  He learned more in 40 years tending Jethro’s flock than he had in Egypt. God called him while he’s tending a flock of sheep and he would tend God’s flock for 40 years after that.

Gideon — was called while he’s threshing grain in a wine vat.  God’s judgment is often pictured in the Bible in terms of grapes and the wine vat. And Gideon will be the one who will thresh the Amalekites in the Valley of Armageddon.

David — was called as a teenager while he was keeping his father’s flock — playing his guitar out in the field — killing a bear and a lion. In all of that, David was being prepared to lead God’s flock. That ministry  would begin when David stood up against Goliath and said — God protected me when killed a bear and a lion.  All that time God was preparing him.

Peter — was called by Jesus while fishing — making a living as a fisherman on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus said — drop your nets and follow Me — I’ll make you fishers of men. Peter becomes the great fisherman, the day of Pentecost.  One sermon, three thousand people come to Christ.

VERY INTERESTING — John was called — not while he’s fishing — but while he’s mending his nets. John will become the great mender.  Even at the end of his life after Patmos, so old he couldn’t walk, The Church Historian Eusebius said that they would carry John from church to church in Asia Minor. The people would applaud when he arrived because he was the last living eyewitness of Christ — the last of the apostles.  And John would only say to the congregations — little children, love one another. He was the great mender.

Even Jesus — 30 years in the obscurity of Nazareth and a carpenter shop —  had only 3 ½ years of public ministry.  When Jesus came out of the water after being baptized by John, the Holy Spirit descends from Heaven on Him like a dove.  A voice from heaven says — this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased — literally — all ready pleased! Jesus hadn’t preached a sermon — hadn’t performed a miracle — hadn’t done anything.  But the Father said — Every every door jam was perfect — never ripped anybody off.  This is my beloved son in whom I am already pleased.

SO HERE IS ELISHA — he’s called while plowing.  It hadn’t rained in 3-1/2 years.  He’s plowing up the fallow ground. They’re getting ready to sow seed for the first time in 3-1/2 years.  And God will call him to plow up the fallow ground of the Nation of Israel and to sow his incorruptible seed of truth into the nation again.

HUGE APPLICATION — Don’t be frustrated by where you are TODAY. It is a HUGE thing to God how you live in that place!

Ephesians 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God.

Put our name in the place of Paul and put what you are doing in the place of “apostle,” — How does that verse read? _________ a ________  by the will of God. As far as the Holy Spirit shows us — Elisha had no idea that one day he would be called to be a prophet. Elisha would have written — Elisha, a teenager plowing a field, by the will of the Lord. For Elisha — THIS was serving the Lord!

For those who have a desire to be in “ministry”  — Don’t live with frustration saying,  Oh Lord, if I could only serve you! You’re learning now.  He’s doing things in your life now.  And there will come a day when he confirms in a particular way His calling on your life.

If you’re an electrician — He might call you because this world needs to get shocked.  Just pay attention.

If you’re a plumber — He might call you because this world needs some Drano.

If you’re a carpenter — He might call you because there are a lot of things that need to be built and nailed down in this world.

If you’re a doctor — He might call you because we live in a sick world.

Wherever you are — if God has called you — the day will come. Your job is to keep your hand to the plow.  God’s calling is what matters. It may be in church.  It may be in Bible school.  But we don’t have to strive and we don’t have to separate ourselves from the normal duties of life to be called of God.

Elijah passed by him and cast his cloak upon him.

This cloak — in the KJV mantle — was a garment worn by prophets

In Zechariah 13:4-5 we read

On that day every prophet will be ashamed of his vision when he prophesies. He will not put on a hairy cloak in order to deceive, ⁵but he will say, ‘I am no prophet

Elijah threw his mantle on Elisha to signify to him that he was called to the prophetic office.

²⁰And he left the oxen and ran after Elijah and said, “Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.”

This was an amazing response from Elisha. I like how John Ross Macduff paints the backdrop to Elijah’s response.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff — Elijah: The Prophet of Fire p.215

With elastic step, must these eleven ploughmen, with their young master, have gone forth to the fields. For three years and a half had the oxen been “pining in empty stalls,” – the implements of husbandry unused — and the sickles of harvest rusting in the desolate barns. But the sky had at last opened its windows. Man and beast, emancipated…. go forth to their appointed task. The furrows, once more moist with genial rain and dew, invite the seed.

A FEW HUGE POINTS

1.) Elisha was not an unemployed, discontented guy, waiting for anyone to come along and take him anywhere to do anything, something!  For Elisha — serving the Lord — being in ministry — was not a plan B or a last resort.

He answered the call of God when everything was going his way —everything was right at work and at home. Here’s a KID whose dad is wealthy — he’s got a great inheritance coming — he’s in the prime of life in that culture. He has servants.  Some hairy prophet comes by and throws a piece of leather on him and Elisha says — hey, I’ll follow you; forget about all this other stuff.

2.) That decision was birthed long before that moment!

This teenager made up his mind a long time ago that he wanted whatever God wanted. And God saw that heart because the Scriptures tell us that the eyes of the Lord go to and fro throughout the earth looking for someone whose heart is perfect towards Him so that He might show himself strong on his behalf (2 Chronicles 16:9). God saw that heart in Elisha.

Elisha is not at all like the young man in Luke 9, where Jesus calls the young man and he says, Lord, let me first go bury my mother, my father, and then I’ll come and follow you. That young man was saying to Jesus — let me go home and live with my mother and father, stay with them until they die, then I’ll no longer have any ties at home and then I’ll come follow you. That’s not what Elisha is saying at all.  He’s saying let me run and say goodbye.  He’s already made up his mind by the response.

Elisha’s obedience to the call of God was costly! He was going to leave wealth and security to go with a man he had never met  to who knows where — to a work he had never done.

HUGE — We can never live a life like Elisha’s without making choices like Elisha made.  We can never live a life like Elisha unless we’re willing to say no to some things and say yes to other things.

3.) God is not dealing with Elisha on the grounds of what he doesn’t know.  A lot of people say — well I don’t know what God’s calling is.  I don’t know what it is either.  I know I’m supposed to be here this evening doing this.  I don’t feel like I’m done.  I feel like there’s more to do.  He never gives me the five-year plan and the 10-year plan. If you give every day of your life to Jesus you will find that He progressively unfolds His plan for your life — You’ll find yourself in the middle of what you’re supposed to be doing.  He’s the shepherd, we’re the sheep, he leads.  He’s looking for a heart that’s willing.

And he said to him, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?”

Elijah is saying — That’s fine with me — I’m just the mantle thrower.  It’s God Who told me come up here, find you and hit you with my mantle.  That’s my part.  The rest is between you and God.  It has nothing to do with me.  I’ve done my job.  Go say goodbye.  I mean the scripture says honor your mother and father.  That’s God’s heart.  Go on, say goodbye.

Elijah is saying — Elisha, you don’t need to ask my permission.  You’re not called to follow me.  You’re called to follow the Living God.

THIS IS HUGE — Because if you follow man — you’re never going to stand when end up in a hard place. Your calling is to the Living God.

²¹And he returned from following him and took the yoke of oxen and sacrificed them and boiled their flesh with the yokes of the oxen and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he arose and went after Elijah and assisted him.

THREE HUGE THINGS HERE

1.) WORSHIP — THIS IS THE ESSENCE OF WORSHIP! Elisha is taking everything that is, everything that he does, everything he hopes to be — and he sacrificed it all to the Lord!

2.) CONSECRATION — He gathers together his community, his family, and he cuts all ties! He is willing to separate himself from everyone and everything to serve the Lord.

THOUGHT FOR PARENTS — We have no sense in the text of his mom and dad saying — but son, what do you mean, we built the whole farm for you — this is our life’s work. No, no, no.  They have no doubt had a significant influence upon this young guy for him to have it in his heart to so immediately and so fully obey the call of God. So when he comes to them saying — I’m answer the high and holy calling of God — they’re saying GO! No doubt there were tears. But there had to be an acknowledging of Lord — He’s yours Lord; he’s only on loan to us.  This is higher than holier and anything that we could give to him to do.

QUOTE: Joe Focht — Parents, if the only thing you leave your kid is something that you need a lawyer to settle, you haven’t left him anything.

3.) TOTAL COMMITMENT — Elijah said: “God is calling you — I want to disciple you — I want to work with you.” Elisha said: “Let me go kiss my mother and father good-bye”. Then Elisha came back and took the instruments of his livelihood and sacrificed. He burned the yokes. He made the decision — he burned his bridges behind him. I am NOT trying this out… I am going for it. I am stepping out in obedience to what the Lord has for my life and I am not looking back.

In Elisha we have a living illustration of the truth taught by Jesus.

Luke 9:62 Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

You can’t plow a straight furrow looking back over your shoulder. FIRST — Your posture makes it impossible to walk a straight line.  SECOND — You MUST keep your eyes forward looking at a fixed on a point of reference on the horizon.

Spiritual Posture — We can’t walk straight as a Christian if we are constantly looking back at the life that we walked away from.

Fixed Point — Our fixed point is Jesus — His Cross.

Hebrews 12:1-2 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, ²looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

KEY APPLICATION: When Jesus called YOU to be His disciple, His servant, it is a commitment that means NO turning back. You BURN your bridges; you SACRIFICE your oxen, you KEEP GOING. THAT is what Elisha did.

QUOTE: Jim Elliot — the famous missionary to the Auca Indians said — No man is a fool to give up that which he can not keep, in order to gain that which he can not lose.

²¹…. Then he arose and went after Elijah and assisted him.

KJV = ministered to him. Elisha the prophet spent the next 6 years ministering to Elijah the prophet.

2 Ki 3:11 ¹¹And Jehoshaphat said, “Is there no prophet of the Lord here, through whom we may inquire of the Lord?” Then one of the king of Israel’s servants answered, “Elisha the son of Shaphat is here, who poured water on the hands of Elijah.”

HUGE POINT — Elisha could have said — “Hey, I’m rich, I’m humble, I’m committed — don’t I get something important to do… When do I get to prophesy?” But he didn’t. Instead — for 6 years he was content to pour water in the hands of Elijah. Most don’t see ministry in that light. If some are willing to pour water they want to pour water on THAT guy — on THAT platform.

CRUCIAL INSIGHT: Here is an IMPORTANT INSIGHT into why the Lord used Elijah so mightily. Anyone who has TRULY been a servant OF THE LORD has been a person who was willing to simply serve —willing to pour water on the hands of others.

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Elisha is plowing in his dads field after 3 ½ years drought. Out of the blue this man comes and throws a leather cloak on him. Elisha is READY and WILLING. His entire life is going to be lived like that. ON the day Elijah was going to be taken up into heaven —  Elijah turned to Elisha and said — What do you want?  What can I do for you before I go? Elisha replied — I want to a double portion of your Spirit on me. Elisha doesn’t have to say — oh, I didn’t expect this question.  You know I’ve got to sift through some things, a big decision.  Let me pray for a couple of days. Maybe Elijah thinks he’s going to say I want your keychain, I want some memorabilia. In a heartbeat Elisha said — I want to a double portion of your Spirit on me — It was on the tip of his tongue.

This is how Elisha lived his life.  He’s ready, willing and able. That was the attitude of his heart.  He was ready to seize every opportunity that God put in front of him and to set aside every single thing that would get on the way of it.

What a great challenge to us.

What a great night to come to the Lord’s Table.

1 KINGS 19:9-18

Related Topics: Elijah; Bread of the Word; Water of the Spirit; The Greatness of Our Journey; Horeb; Jesus – The Word of God; “What Are You Doing Here?”; Self-Pity; Wounded Pride; Unbelief; God Speaks; The Still Small Voice of God; Elisha; The Call of Elisha;

Last week we left off with the words of Verses 7-8

⁷And the angel of the Lord came again a second time and touched him and said, “Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.”

And it is, isn’t it? We need the Bread of the Word and the Water of the Spirit. We need to have an abiding living relationship with Jesus Himself — the bread of life — for He has told us that apart from Him we can do NOTHING!

⁸And he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God.

WOW! We think — that can’t be true. This has to be an exaggeration. NO ONE can go forty days and forty nights on just some bread and water. I would agree. This is a supernatural accomplishment. Elijah is not making this journey drawing on mere human resources. He is moving in the strength of food that was provided from heaven.

The same is true of the Christian life. It is IMPOSSIBLE to live the Christian life on mere human resources. The Christian life is a supernatural experience. The most frustrating existence is that of trying to live the Christian life in the energy of the flesh. We need to go in the strength that comes from God.

Ephesians 3:14-21 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, ¹⁵from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, ¹⁶that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, ¹⁸may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, ¹⁹and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. ²⁰Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, ²¹to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

⁹There he came to a cave and lodged in it.

a cave — Best reading is THE cave as the definite article is used here.

[Heb. the cave. LXX. τὸ σπήλαιον. The Pulpit Commentary: 1 Kings. 2004 (H. D. M. Spence-Jones, Ed.) (460). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.]

God knew where Elijah was going. God knew where He would meet Elijah. Many believe that this is the very place where Moses was concealed while the Lord “passed by”

Exod. 33:20-22 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” ²¹And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, ²²and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. ²³Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him,

This is HUGE! Mark that word BEHOLD —

The Word of the Lord has come to Elijah on a number of occasions.

1 Kings 17:2-3 ²And the word of the Lord came to him, ³“Depart from here and turn eastward and hide yourself by the brook Cherith,

1 Kings 17:8 Then the word of the Lord came to him, ⁹“Arise, go to Zarephath,

1 Kings 18:1 After many days the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain upon the earth.”

This is the FIRST time in the life of this man that we are reading the word BEHOLD, the word of the Lord came to him. WHY does the Holy Spirit suddenly use the word BEHOLD? Take note of this —

and he said to him,

HE — the masculine personal pronoun — the grammar makes the word HE refer back to the Word of the Lord! We look down to verse 11 and we read And he said. Let’s think about the amazing prologue of the Gospel according to John.

John 1:1-2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Is this a THEOPHANY — a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus? We don’t know. It doesn’t say that Elijah SAW a person. But we can say that Elijah is experiencing a RADICAL and a REMARKABLE sense of the presence of Jesus! And this moment with Jesus — the Word of God — CHANGES the life of this servant of the Lord! I can’t say this with absolute certainty here —  but I would venture that when we meet Elijah in heaven — and we ask him what was the most remarkable moment in his life — he is not going to say Zarephath when he raised the widow’s son from the dead; nor the fire falling on Carmel; not even the chariot of fire that took him out of this world. I think he’s going to say — HOREB — when Jesus, the Word of God, came to me.

Notice what HE — the Word of the Lord — JESUS — has to say to Elijah.

“What are you doing here, Elijah?”

This is our Jesus — John tells us in his prologue

John 1:1; 14 ¹In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…. ¹⁴And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

Here is what the Gracious Jesus speaks to Elijah — AND us!

“What are you doing here, Elijah?”

This is a rhetorical question — The word of the Lord — HE — is asking — Elijah, why are you sitting here DOING NOTHING!

QUOTE: J. R. MacDuff, D.D., Elijah, The Prophet of Fire p. 170 Copyright © 1864

Every syllable was pregnant with meaning and rebuke.

“What doest thou here?” Life (and none should know better than thee) is a great doing; not hermit inaction, inglorious repose, guilty idolatry.

“What doest thou” – thou my vice-regent in these degenerate days,- thou whom I have honoured above thy fellows, and who hast had proof upon proof of my faithfulness?

“What doest thou here” – here in this desolate spot – away from duty;

- the Baal-altars rebuilding – my own altar in ruins;- the sword of persecution unsheathed, and the bleating flock left by thee (coward Shepherd!) to the ravening wolf?

“What doest thou here, Elijah?” Thy very name (Yahweh is God) rebukes thee! Where is GOD, thy strength?’

These are HARD words! They CRUSHED me this morning. But guys, we have to be real, they could never be more true or applicable than today for those who profess to know Jesus! The Christian life is a life of ACTION! The blue print/model for the Church is titled The Book of ACTS, not The Book of Inaction. The question of Jesus to Elijah is relevant to us tonight because a lot of Christians are DOING nothing.

I want to be careful so as to not make a gross generalization. I pray that God will help to say it with all of the GRACE that is in Jesus. I pray that you will understand that what I’m about to say is not to be applicable to everyone here, but it is a painful reality in a broad sense amongst professing Christians.

Young Christians (30 and under) are on the go, always going somewhere, meeting someone, meeting for a coffee or an espresso. Don’t get me wrong, I like a great Café Americano as much as the next guy. I like to sit with a great book and a great cup of coffee with Valerie or Sean or Danny. I see a lot of you or your peers at Bloom or Peets with college text books and lap tops. But a lot of high school and young adult aged Christians spend a lot of time at those places doing NOTHING. I think a lot of Christians in that age group believe that they are participating in the Great Commission and doing the Lord’s work by just taking up space with some friends in a café. I’m not saying don’t ever sit at Bloom or Peets or wherever. But I think there is a time when the question of Jesus in Verse 9 is relevant — What are you DOING here?  And in many cases the answer would have to be — Nothing. Or the same question with the emphasis on HERE. What are you doing HERE — away from duty — while the altars of Baal are rebuilding – and the altars to the living God — the hearts of men and women — are in ruins — and the flock of God needs to be tended, loved on and defended.

Those same questions are what provoked me and Valerie to move to Roseville and open our home on Monday nights to teach the Word.

What are you DOING on Monday nights? You have  gigabytes of Bible Studies on your hard drive and they’re just sitting there.  What are you doing HERE in Grass Valley while there are people hungry for the Word in Roseville, Rocklin and Granite Bay, Citrus Heights?

You guys KNOW that I’m all about you guys coming here on Monday night and Sunday Morning; Youth or Women’s or Men’s study; or Open.  And it is a given that we come to GIVE to the Lord worship and adoration; and RECEIVE from the Lord Bread and Water for our journey! As well as that, there are a those men and women, young and old, that really aren’t in any condition to be DOING anything at all at this moment in their Christian lives because they are malnourished or wounded, they need to just lie down in green pastures and sit by still waters. But there are a lot of people who are not in that state of heart. They come week in and week out; they participate in worship in song; they want to receive from the Bible, but the question of Jesus in Verse 9 is relevant to them today — What are you DOING here? And the honest response would be — NOTHING. I sit, I receive, but I DO nothing — I BRING nothing and I GIVE nothing.

And PLEASE remember that I qualify this by saying again — I KNOW that isn’t true of everyone in every local church — everyone in Metro. But may the Lord search EACH of our hearts with this question — even as He did the heart of ELIJAH!

So — the stinging rebuke is offered by way of the question — What are you doing here? Why are you HIDING OUT and HOLDING BACK

¹⁰He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.”

WOW! Elijah’s answer is a tapestry of self-pity, wounded pride and unbelief! Elijah was holed up in a cave of self-pity!

Self-pity is really saying to the Lord –“I don’t like what You are doing TO my life and WITH my life… It is NOT satisfactory, it is NOT agreeable”

The TRUE answer should have been — I’m doing NOTHING — I’m HERE in this cave because I’m afraid for my life; and I’m doing NOTHING because I’m mad at You God, for not doing WHAT I thought You should do, WHEN I thought You should do it. I’m in this cave doing nothing because I’m discouraged and disappointed!

This passage is for US — for the Elijah that SHOULD be in us.

We should be troubled over the state of the generation that WE live in.  We should be troubled over those who are LIMPING between two opinions!

QUOTE: Sacramento Bee, Saturday, April 3, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO — When Darian Ahler leaves for church, he walks from his bedroom to his living room.

The congregation – San Francisco hipsters in their 20s and 30s – comes to him. No one delivers a sermon. No one sings. The group brainstorms together on what they can do to honor Jesus, besides just pray to him.

“These days, religion is intellectual masturbation. It’s not experimental enough,” said Mark Scandrette, the founder of the group, called ReImagine, and author of the book “Soul Graffiti.” “We look at what Jesus taught,” Scandrette said, “then we try to develop an experiment that helps us learn that.”

The group is one of a growing number of do-it-yourself Christian communities forming in the Bay Area, looking for alternatives to institutional churches and what its members see as their passive rituals.

“The modern version of worship, of sitting on a bench and being read to, is on the way out. It’s boring everybody, including the pastors,” said Matthew Fox, an Oakland pastor and author of several books on spirituality. “People are hungry and thirsty for something to touch their hearts and souls.”

After Scandrette moved to San Francisco from Minnesota 12 years ago, he began calling himself a recovered fundamentalist Christian. He says he was like many young Christians who migrate to the Bay Area from a conservative setting: burned out on institutional Christianity, but not ready to give up on Jesus. Rather than focus on the savior from eternal damnation, he wanted to focus on Jesus as a guru of simplicity, a fighter against poverty and oppression.

“We think spiritual formation that’s really vibrant looks more like a karate studio than a conference hall,” he said. “It’s like a Jesus dojo.”

So on Thursday nights, at Ahler’s two-bedroom apartment overlooking Valencia and 22nd streets, about 15 Christian hipsters gather to eat pizza and sip beer. They squeeze onto the Craigslist couches and compliment each other’s cuffed jeans and neat bangs.

“Bible groups are more focused on orthodoxy,” said Ahler, 26, a mechanical engineer and regular dojo member. “ReImagine is more orthopraxy, where the focus is more doing than talking.”

Raves, minus the drugs

For Fox, the Oakland minister, the focus is more dancing than talking. Fox has long recognized that church hymns make the best lullabies. Years ago, he looked to raves for spiritual inspiration. He spent months talking to ravers, developing his own Christian version, the Cosmic Mass, melding prayer and multimedia images of Jesus with electronica, house and jungle beats.

“If you connect the liturgical message to the rave, you don’t need the drugs,” Fox said. “We can create a form that makes getting high possible again.”

Hundreds of people line up outside Sweet’s Ballroom in Oakland on Cosmic Mass nights – repeated once a month at first, now down to twice a year because of difficulty raising funds. Images of Christ and other holy figures from all religious backgrounds are projected onto several screens for people to meditate on while they dance. The computer effects and the fractals that break through the images are today’s stained glass, Fox says.

The ritual uses dance to escort participants through feelings of ecstasy, anger, grief, and recovery. So many people have been moved by the experience, Fox has consulted with others who’ve started Cosmic Masses around the world, from Kansas City to Melbourne, Australia.

“This movement is to look for what you want and find it,” Klein said. “And if you can’t find it, create it.”

We should be troubled over the direction things are headed — we should NOT be content. Christians have by and large come to accept LUKEWARMNESS as NORMAL Christianity. They see that world is SO bad and they think that God grades on a relative curve — and they think that if we’re doing O.K. — if we’re not in the “SO BAD” category — that we’re fine! And if and when we get to the place where that is our take on NORMAL Christianity — we are GOOD — just fine — sitting in a cave doing NOTHING.

Elijah WAS a man of ZEAL and PASSION in a world that was indifferent to the true and living God. And yet he ended up in a cave doing nothing!

I have to believe that nearly all of you are here because you CARE about God. You are not indifferent to Jesus. But we can ALL end up in a cave DISCOURAGED and DISAPPOINTED — doing NOTHING! Elijah did!

Up until Chapter 19 — Everything Elijah had done was at the Lord’s instruction. But tired and disappointed after the contest on Carmel, Elijah ran without instruction. When he was tired and disappointed he started to run without a compass! He ends up under a little shrub in the Judean wilderness saying “Enough Lord — I’m done.”

God meets Elijah in that state — and God FEEDS Elijah and SUSTAINS Elijah. God gives him supernatural strength for almost SIX WEEKS — 40 days and 40 nights. He directed Elijah — not to just any cave — but THE cave in Horeb. For you and I a trip to the Holy Land is Galilee and Jerusalem. But for the Jew of Elijah’s day a trip to the Holy Land was Mt. Horeb because that’s where God met with Moses and gave the Law to Israel.

God gets Elijah to the place where He can speak to Elijah. And the Word of the Lord came to Elijah and HE spoke to Elijah. It was no easy thing that He said to Elijah. And then He lets Elijah respond.

AMAZINGLY — Elijah’s answer is essentially: God, don’t mess with me! I’m all you got. In case You didn’t notice, Israel’s a mess! I’m the only guy jealous for You. I’M IT! And you better be a good steward of what You’ve got. I’m holding the world on my shoulders and if I go down — You got nothin’ — and it’s curtains for You! I’ve done my part — How about some shaking things up!

Look at what God did!

¹¹And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind.

These are rocky granite peaks! A wind comes. This is not a windy day, this wind comes and breaks off boulders of granite that go crashing down the sides of Horeb. And no doubt Elijah must have thought — He must be here! This is what Moses must have seen! But God is not in the wind!

And then things start to shake!

And after the wind an earthquake,

WOW! Get me in a cave and the worst thing that I could imagine is an earthquake! God must be walking up to the cave!

but the Lord was not in the earthquake.

¹²And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper (KJV – Still, small voice).

You see — Elijah has known God in those manifestations of power! But God is saying

Elijah — is my whisper LESS powerful than fire on Carmel.

Elijah — Have you written the script for Me? Are you telling Me what I need to do?

Elijah — When did I tell you to trust in miracles and signs? It’s always been MY WORD in every generation.

Elijah — When I spoke the worlds into existence, when I said “Let there be light,” do you think I was yelling!

Elijah — Because you live in the physical realm, do you think the only way that I can work is through wind and quakes and fire.

Elijah — You think this generation needs wind and quakes and fire — You’re defining the terms — You’re writing the script for me!

¹³And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” ¹⁴He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Elijah— While you’re in this cave of self-pity — I’m still controlling NATIONS!

¹⁵And the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Syria.

I’m CHANGING the dynasty of Ahab —

¹⁶And Jehu the son of Nimshi you shall anoint to be king over Israel,

And By the way Elijah — even though you’re the only one left — go anoint Elisha to be the next prophet in Israel.

and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your place.

And then in VERSE 18

¹⁸Yet I

What tremendous words in a dark generation — YET I

will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.”

TWO REALLY BIG POINTS TO CLOSE WITH

1.) One of the reasons that we get depressed is because the Lord isn’t doing something BIG. He is NOT SHAKING us up with experience. He is NOT FIRING us up with the Miraculous. He is NOT BUSTING things up or BLOWING winds of change. We ask, “Lord, Where are You?” The Lord says, “I am NOT in the earthquake or the fire or the wind — I’m in the still small voice in your heart — Just WHISPERING My Word and My will in your heart —  Just leading you ONE STEP at a time in your life, causing situations and circumstances in your life that they might work ON you and IN you.”

2.) If we assume that the only way God can do things is through the spectacular — then we start to invent stuff. That’s why there has been stuff like “Power Evangelism,” or “The Toronto Blessing / Holy Laughter.” That’s why there was stuff like the “Kansas City Prophets.” That’s why people want to throw out orthodoxy for orthopraxy. That’s why people come up with the “Cosmic Mass.” That’s why people say — “This movement is to look for what you want and find it. And if you can’t find it, create it.”

It’s no longer about GOD. It’s about what YOU want.

It’s no longer about what GOD HAS SAID! It’s no longer about the Word of God — It’s no longer about the still, small voice.

GUYS — I am committed to what God has called us to do!

Week after week — the still, small voice of God thunders into our hearts and we respond to Him by pouring out our lives to and for Him.

1 KINGS 19:1-4

Related Topics: Elijah; Ahab; Jezebel; Failure; Failure In Place of Strength; Discouragement; Fatigue; Fear; Despair of Life; Taking Eyes Off of God; Looking At Circumstances; Sleep; Angels; Second Visits;

¹Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. ²Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” ³Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. ⁴But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.” ⁵And he lay down and slept under a broom tree. And behold, an angel touched him and said to him, “Arise and eat.” ⁶And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. And he ate and drank and lay down again. ⁷And the angel of the Lord came again a second time and touched him and said, “Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.” ⁸And he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God.

James 5:17 KJV ¹⁷Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are,

From the moment we are introduced to Elijah in Chapter 17 we have seen him fearless — full of faith — obedient — and manifesting the power of God in radical ways. 1 Kings 18 closes with Elijah the ultimate hero of faith! He has thrown down the gauntlet to Israel — Why are you limping between 2 opinions? If the Lord…. Then there was the spectacle of that epic contest between Baal and Yahweh in which Elijah calls down fire from heaven. Then Elijah single handedly executes the 450 prophets of Baal at the brook Kishon. And as we left that incredible chapter Elijah prays for the return of rain after 3 ½ years during which there was no dew or rain in Israel — and the rain fell!

I have to say that I have been STIRRED and CHALLENGED by this man’s heart for God — his passion for God — His knowledge of the Scriptures —His boldness — His life of prayer and faith!

But I have also been discouraged. Quite honestly — As much as I’ve been moved by the account I’ve also been thinking — I’m not so sure that Elijah is a man just like ME! I’m not THAT kind of a man. I’ve never prayed and had the rain withheld for 3 ½ years — and then prayed and they returned! I haven’t been able to pray our plans through the building department!

But HERE in 1 Kings 19 he goes from Carmel to laying under this bush in the desert saying “kill me” – And I can finally see ME in the story!

After such radical manifestations of the presence and power of the Living God , we expect to find him more the mighty prophet of God — more the hero of faith than ever before — going “from strength to strength.

In this moment the Lord says — If there was any doubt that Elijah was a mere man just like you — look at him now!

QUOTE: “The best men are at their best – men.”

QUOTE: Robert Murray McCheyene — when he was dying who said, “Few men are important. None are necessary.”

Elijah is not the FIRST mighty man of God to falter and fail — nor would he be the LAST. In this moment Elijah is now in the company of:

• Noah — the man that saves the world and then gets drunk
• Abraham, the man of faith — who in unbelief, goes to Egypt in the famine;
• Moses, the meekest man who ever lived — who can’t enter the land because he lost his temper
• Aaron, the first high priest — who begins his ministry by making a golden calf
• David the man after God’s own heart — and his adultery
• John, the apostle of love — who wants to call down fire from heaven and destroy Samaria
• Peter — who denies the Lord, runs out into the night weeping
• Paul, who gets in such an argument with Barnabas — that they can’t even work in the mission field together.

God faithfully records the WHOLE story of these men — which I believe is evidence that the Bible is truly inspired.  If this collection of writings was penned by man — we would have no record of frailties and failures — because we want to show ourselves — and our heroes — in the best possible light. But God doesn’t hide anything.  He brings his people out into the open, so that we can not only see their flaws and failures — but also see how God relates to them in their weakness, in their frailty.

God never puts a failed life in front of us so that we can use that as an excuse for our sin — rather he holds men and women in front of us as a warning; as a potent reminder of why we need to cling to Him desperately in prayer. He holds these men before us to say — Come and see what the best and bravest of My servants are when left to themselves. WE must learn that apart from God’s hand on our life — we are men and women made of dust.

Let’s walk through the text!

CHAPTER 18 closes with Ahab trying to beat the rain to get back to Jezreel.  The storm’s coming — the thunder’s booming.  He looks back and he sees Elijah coming. And Elijah — on foot — passes the chariot of king Ahab. This is an eighteen mile sprint, full speed — 1 Kings 18:46 And the hand of the Lord was on Elijah. No doubt when Elijah gets to Jezreel, he thinks, “This is awesome!  The Living God has answered by fire — atonement has been made — the prophets are dead — the rain has returned! Now God’s going to stir the heart of Jezebel — There’s going to be revival in the Northern Kingdom.” NONE of that happens!

CHAPTER 19

¹Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done,

“In front of EVERYBODY Elijah said that your god couldn’t answer by fire because he was taking a dump!” You can see her steaming.  Steam blowing out of her ears.

and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff p.144 — The storm that had burst over Carmel gathered afresh over her brow. Her rage is irrepressible.

²Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.”

She puts out a contract out on Elijah.

HUGE — Based upon all that we have seen of Elijah up this very moment — it would be reasonable to have expected any number of responses besides THIS one! We could have easily expected to find him in a face to face moment with this arrogant and violent woman — telling her to her face that he was the ambassador of the living God. We would expect Elijah to have the same response as did a guy named Chrysostom in response to the Jezebel of the mid-4^th century AD

QUOTE: Chrysostom — “Go,” said Chrysostom to the person sent by the Empress Eudoxia, with a threat of vengeance, “Go, tell her I fear nothing but sin.”

³Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. ⁴But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff, The Prophet of Fire p.148 — He had lost, alike all confidence in GOD and trust in man. He cannot brook even the company of his servant, or suffer him to share his heavy secret. Leaving his attendant to his fate in the city, he himself plunges into the depths of the wilderness;- the wild arid waste terminated in the far south by the tremendous gorges and precipices of Sinai.

And he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.”

It is enough now — My life is a failure; if the fire of Carmel has failed to convince what can I hope in?

WHAT ARE OUR LESSONS HERE?

LOOK BACK AT VERSE 3 —

1.) He LISTENED TO THE THREATS OF JEZEBEL RATHER THAN THE VOICE OF GOD

Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life

The word WHEN makes us ask the question…… WHEN! He became afraid WHEWN he heard the words of Jezebel. He is not being carried along —encouraged — made bold — by the Word of God.  Instead He’s being terrorized by the words of Jezebel.

CONTRAST this with Acts 4

Acts 4:23-31 ²³When they (Peter and John) were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. ²⁴And when they heard it (the threats of the chief priests and elders), they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, ²⁵who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit (the deferred to the Word of God over the threats of man), “‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? ²⁶ The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’ ²⁷for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, ²⁸to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. ²⁹And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, ³⁰while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” ³¹And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

2.) He Took His Eyes Off the Lord

“When he saw. “ When he saw what? When he saw that things hadn’t turned out like he thought. He now only saw the murderous anger of Jezebel directed like a laser beam at him!

Elijah no longer had his eyes on the Lord. He had his eyes on Jezebel. He somehow got his eyes off the Lord and got his eyes on the circumstances. Now that’s not like him. He hadn’t lived that way. But we can do that. We are more prone to do that when we’re completely wasted physically.

AT this moment Elijah is just is spent — in every possible way! After the challenge to Israel and the contest with the prophets of Baal he was emotionally and physically spent. And then in that state he walks down the sides of Carmel to execute the 450 prophets of Baal. Then he climbs back up the sides of Carmel again — gets on his knees, prays for rain.  When the rain starts, he comes back down the mountain, and runs 15-18 miles to Jezreel full speed. And when he gets there it seems things roll out exactly the opposite of how he thought they would. Jezebel says “ You’re dead.”

When I’ve been going and going and going — you really don’t want to get into an argument with me. When I’ve been going and going and going —you really don’t want to be married to me. Pray for my wife. You really don’t want to be one of my kids then. You don’t even want to be my dog. That is not to make any excuses — but when I’m spent is when I’m prone to take take my eyes OFF of the Lord — and only see the Roseville City Plan Checker!

When we are wiped out — it is so crucial that we remember — even REMIND each other — to not take our eyes off of the Lord. Peter demonstrated remarkable courage and faith when he climbed out of the boat to walk on water with Jesus. Matthew 14:30 But when he saw the wind, he was afraid. He had taken his eyes off the Lord. And somehow — When have been serving Jesus — seen Him do radical things — and we have spent ourselves in it — and then things don’t turn out the way we thought — we can become so overwhelmed and so fried, that we can feel like God’s forsaken us.  All we can see and hear is Jezebel (so-to-speak) and we think — It’s enough — it’s the end.  I don’t know how many times I’ve been at the end.

3.) HIS WEAKEST POINT WAS THE PLACE OF HIS GREATEST STRENGTH

We can be painfully aware are of what the book of Hebrews calls “those sins that easily beset us.” But here in the life of Elijah the Lord drives home a crucial truth. If there was one sin that was LEAST likely to do in Elijah — it was the sin of weakness or fear!  We need to beware of falling where we are strongest!

1 Corinthians 10:12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.

Romans 11:20 That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but stand in awe.

4.) He WASN’T FOLLOWING THE LORD

He is laying down under a desert shrub asking the Lord to end his life because he can no longer say — “The Lord, the living God before whom I stand.” His own axiom is gone.  He had said to the people of Israel, “If the Lord is God, follow Him; if Baal is God, then follow him.” But Elijah wasn’t following the Lord.

Had Elijah said — Lord — I’m wasted — I am totally discouraged by Jezebel’s refusal to repent and by her rage against me — but then simply asked, “Lord, what do You want me to do from here” — Elijah wouldn’t have ended up asking the Lord to end his life.

HUGE — Rather than let the Lord be the final judge of what is right — Elijah essentially abandoned himself to his emotions, his fears and his fatigue.

He lost sight of the fact that his life was in the hand of God. He forgot his own words — “the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand”

Up to this moment Elijah had followed the leadings of GOd to the exclusion of his own wisdom. Cherith and Zarephath made zero sense to the natural man. REMEMBER his prayer on Carmel.

1 Kings 18:36 “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word.

But everything in the opening of this chapter has NOT been done because it was the Lord’s leading. His actions in Chapter 19 are a living illustration of

Proverbs 14:12 / 16:25 There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.

Elijah failed to follow the instructions of Proverbs 3:5-6

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. ⁶In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.

Lot followed his own way — and ended up in Sodom and Gomorrah

Jonah followed his own way — and ended up in the belly of a great fish vomited onto the shore of Nineveh — blanched white by the gastric juices — one ugly prohet!.

5.) HE BECAME SELF-ABSORBED / LOST DIVINE PERSPECTIVE

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff p.153 — He has become a fretful, petulant child, morbidly brooding over his disappointed hopes. He flings away the oars of duty and obedience; his strong brawny arms have ceased to pull the bark in which his GOD had bid him struggle,- and now he is at the mercy of winds and waves.

Unlike Chapters 17-18 — Elijah is not thinking about God’s plans or purposes. He isn’t thinking about the honor of God or the people of God.

Philippians 1:23-26 I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. ²⁴But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. ²⁵Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith, ²⁶so that in me you may have ample cause to glory in Christ Jesus, because of my coming to you again.

What a far cry from Elijah’s perspective. Paul’s saying “I love the Lord.  My heart is filled with visions of glory.  I can hardly wait to be set free.  I’m torn. I so long to be with Christ, but I have no right to myself. I’m bought with a price. My life is not my own and it’s necessary for me to stay here and serve for the church. So I will do that.” Now that’s the PROPER PERSPECTIVE. But Elijah’s not thinking that way. He’s just thinking — “I’m shot, I’m fried. It’s enough. Enough is enough. I can’t take it anymore. Lord, I’m going to lay down and close my eyes. When I open my eyes I want to be in heaven.” Now he’s going to wake up and see an angel. I’m not sure what he thought when that was the first thing he saw when he woke up.

AGAIN — Elijah is not the FIRST servant of the Lord to want to die — nor the LAST.

Numbers 11:14-15 I am not able to carry all this people alone; the burden is too heavy for me. ¹⁵If you will treat me like this, kill me at once, if I find favor in your sight, that I may not see my wretchedness

Jonah 4:3 ³Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.”

And here’s Elijah saying the same thing. And none of these perspectives are right. He’s saying. “Lord. It’s enough.” He was wrong.

With hind sight we can look at Elijah and say —

What about meeting with God on Mount Horeb like he met with Moses? You’re ready to give that up?

What about anointing Elisha and passing your mantle to someone who’s going to continue to minister the nation? Going to give that up Elijah?

What about the school of the prophets? Going to give that up Elijah?

What about the fiery chariot? You want to die?  You’re one of only two people that aren’t going to die.

What about Malachi 4:5

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. ⁶And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”

God wants you to put an exclamation mark at the end of the Old Covenant.

Elijah- what about standing on the Mount of Transfiguration with Moses talking to the Messiah?

Elijah what about coming back at the end, Revelation, Chapter 11, as one of the two prophets?

Is it enough? What do you mean enough? Is Your plan is better than God’s? Do you think it’s wise to end things now Elijah?

And we do the same thing — because we can’t see past our own self concerns — our own disappointment over expectations. That’s why we say, “It’s enough Lord.” But we have no idea what He’s going to do.

Elijah’s discouragement is anchored in unfulfilled expectation. Elijah’s discouragement was much like his counterpart in the New Testament, John the Baptizer — the one chosen by God to prepare the way of Jesus. Jesus said this of John the Baptizer — Luke 7:28 among those born of women none is greater than John. John ends up in prison. The Bible tells us that when Jesus heard that John was thrown into prison, He left Judea and went to Galilee. Some of John’s disciples came and told John that when the Messiah heard John was locked up — He split. John — the Elijah of the New Testament — was offended. Why? Because of unfulfilled expectations. He had written out the script for how he thought God was supposed to do things. And in John’s script he was not supposed to end up in prison! As a result of unfulfilled expectations he was left discouraged and broken down, and offended. And we see the same thing with Elijah. “After Mount Carmel, the whole nation should be loving God! And I come back and this woman, Jezebel’s going to strike me down? This is what I have been serving you for? This is …If I was God…” and he ends up out there in the middle of the desert saying “Kill me.” God was not being who he thought God should be. Unfulfilled expectation. Writing the script for the Lord.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff p. 154 — Each of us has, or may yet have, his day of trial — sickness, bereavement, crushed hopes, bitter disappointments, crossed wishes, stings and arrows from quarters least expected. How are we to meet them? Are we to give way to peevish, fretful repining? Are we to say, ‘I am wearied of life. I would I were done with all this wretchedness. What pleasure is existence to this wounded, harassed, smitten spirit? Nay, take courage. It is not “enough.” The Lord has work for you still to do. It is not for you, but for Him, to say, at His own appointed time….”

If we have ever been guilty of saying “It’s enough” — let us be thankful that God hasn’t answered!

It is interesting to see what the Lord does

⁵And he lay down and slept under a broom tree.

The first thing that God did was let him sleep.

Psalm 127:2 for he gives to his beloved sleep.

Sleep’s a gift. He needed some of that. Sometimes a good night’s sleep, and a good meal, straightens a lot of things out.

And behold, an angel touched him and said to him, “Arise and eat.” ⁶And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water.

TWO WORDS from heaven.” “Arise — Eat”

FIRST — This is an angel — a MIGHTY spiritual being. God says to this mighty creature — “I need ya to make a loaf of bread for me for my man Elijah?”

My wife comes in to my office today and shows me these serving platters and asks if I think they’ll look good in the new facility. I’m thinking — I’m a pastor — I’m trying to prepare for tonight’s Bible study — you really want me to stop what I’m doing and talk table ware?

SECOND — When the angel shows up he doesn’t slap him and say — “So you’re the big prophet  – huh?” “You’re out here. You’re discouraged. This is unbelief. If you wanted to die, you should have stayed back there. Jezebel would have killed you.” He doesn’t do any of that. There’s no rebuke here.

God’s is just as careful to include this moment as He was to include the record of Elijah’s failure. He has put it in front of us for everybody who feels that they have failed — perhaps failed where they were strongest  — and now feel as though God is through with them.

God makes sure to give us this record — The angel touches him gently, and wakes him up. Says two words from heaven. “Arise. Eat.” And Elijah is reminded of the tendermercies and loving kindness of the God he served and loved and had failed. He is the God who leaves the ninety-nine to go look for the one who’s gone astray.

And he ate and drank and lay down again.

Elijah wakes up. He eats, drinks and goes back to sleep. Either he’s really tired or God put something in the food to knock him out for a few more hours, I don’t know. And then, I love this.

⁷And the angel of the Lord came again a second time and touched him

What wonderful words — the second time.

and said, “Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.”

Interesting — This time God doesn’t send a raven to drop off bread and flesh for Elijah. This time God is not replenishing supplies like he replenished the barrel of meal and the jar of oil.

There are those times in our life when no human or earthly provision can satisfy us. There are those times when the only thing that’s going to encourage us and sustain us is something divine. It’s right from heaven and it’s just for you — and you know that it’s Him.

He gives us this chapter because he knew there would be those sitting here tonight — Monday night @ metro — who need this chapter to touch them —to say, “Rise. Eat because the journey is too great for you.” And it is too great for you ”Because the best men are at best only men.”

In this world there are those who don’t know Jesus — and they want to die without hope. That’s because they have tried to live without life. There’s a frustration to it all.

Elijah. He’s a man of power.  He’s the man that we couldn’t relate to, because he stands up on Mount Carmel and he calls down fire from heaven.  But he’s the man we can relate to because of his fears and his unbelief and his lack of perspective and his self-pity and disappointment!

DON’T MISS THIS — By way of Elijah we learn that if we are going to encourage a discouraged world — it is because God touches us — prepares a meal for us that will sustain us for the journey that we have through this world. And of course the bread is always a type of His Word; the water, always a type of the Spirit in the Scripture. He gives us those things to sustain us. He prepares a diet for us that will alone – in the final analysis – keep us through all of the things that we have to journey through in this life.

If you don’t know this God — if you think He’s distant and unconcerned —that he doesn’t care about you — you’re wrong! He watches us when we sleep. The Bible says, “Our next breath is in His hand.” He knows where we are.  He knows where we live. He knows when our hearts are broken. I encourage you today not to be discouraged but rather to be encouraged.

1 KINGS 18:40-46

Let’s begin by going back to the top of the Chapter

¹After many days the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain upon the earth.”

Let’s drop down to Verse 39. We remember from last week that FIRE fell from heaven upon the sacrifice.

³⁹And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The Lord, he is God; the Lord, he is God.” ⁴⁰And Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape.” And they seized them. And Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon and slaughtered them there.

450 of these men — marched down the sides of the plateau of Carmel and executed by Elijah at the Brook Kishon.

The great sin of King Ahab was his official sponsorship of the prophets of Baal, and now that the fraud of Baal was exposed, his prophets had to answer for it and were dealt with according to the Law of Moses (Deuteronomy 13:5, 13:13-18, 17:2-5, and 18:9-22).

HERE’S THE PICTURE — Last week — as we looked at the innocent substitute slaughtered and placed on the altar. We said that this was pointing forward to Jesus and His Penal Substitutionary Atonement — His Propitiation — satisfying the wrath of God — enduring the wrath of God in our place.  The execution of these prophets of Baal is a picture of how our lives should be changed after trusting in Jesus. Upon committing our lives to Christ we should take the things that dragged us down — the prophets of Baal, so-to-speak —  and put an end to them, not let a single one of them escape. IF you really believe that God rained down the fire of His wrath upon Jesus — the wrath that you and I deserve — there should be a change in our lives. Knowing that Jesus was slaughtered in our place, endured the wrath of God for us — should produce a new attitude towards sin.

Romans 8:13-14 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. ¹⁴For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

Following that conversion — the rains come — in the person of the Holy Spirit — in the blessing of God showering from Heaven upon our lives.

No doubt — by this time of the day many of the people on their way home talking about this radical, remarkable day. It was a spectacle of Biblical proportions! The fire falling out of Heaven consuming the sacrifice and the altar and the water. And then the prophets of Baal being marched down the side of Carmel and executed. The hearts of the people — at least for the time — being turned back to the living God.

But for Elijah the day wasn’t over — because the rain hadn’t come.  The whole process to him wasn’t finished.

⁴¹And Elijah said to Ahab, “Go up, eat and drink, for there is a sound of the rushing of rain.” ⁴²So Ahab went up to eat and to drink.

Elijah knew that once the official worship of Baal had been defeated — the purpose for the drought was fulfilled. Elijah KNEW that God had promised rain!  And in the closing verses of this chapter we get to watch Elijah as he responds to God’s promise.

Elijah and Ahab would now each do what they wanted to do — Ahab would eat — Elijah would pray.

Someone said that there are 7,474 promises in the Bible. I’ve never checked that for accuracy — But the point is that there are A  LOT of promises in the Bible. Even if we want to be conservative — we could easily say there are over 5,000 promises in the Bible.

As we look at Elijah in this moment we see him standing — or kneeling on the promises of God.  This is of HUGE importance to each of us tonight for a number of reasons.  As we see Elijah dealing approaching God on the basis of God’s promise we are made to consider the very nature of God’s promises and how they relate to us.

A guy named Bernard Ramm, in his book Protestant Biblical Interpretations, says that we must understand that all of those thousands of promises do not belong to us.  Not all of them are ours to claim. Some promises of God are exclusive to a special moment or circumstance.  They don’t belong to us.  It doesn’t mean that God can’t speak to our hearts or stir our hearts by way of them. It doesn’t mean that God can’t use that promise to speak to us about His nature and attributes. But we simply can not take EVERY promise and apply them to our lives personally or to the body of Christ at large. Some of them are promises made nationally to Israel — and they’re not going to be fulfilled in our lives the way they’re going to be fulfilled nationally to Israel.

Having said that — there are promises that are there for all believers and all ages.  There are promises made in the Old and New Testament that are for all New Testament believers.  And of the promises that are available to us we need to understand that some of them are conditional and some of them are unconditional. Trust in the Lord with all your heart.  Lean not to your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge him.  Then he will direct your path (Proverbs 3:5-6). That’s a conditional promise.  The promise of rain at the front of the chapter is conditional — The condition is if you get up and you go to Ahab and show yourself I will send rain.  The rain would come upon the condition of the resulting contest and the return of the people to the Lord and judgment of Baal.

Tonight we want to look at Elijah responding to God’s promises — promises that were conditional.

God had said to him I will send rain.  So Elijah had grounds to expect it to finally rain! But more than that — Elijah understood well what God had declared in His Word very specific things about regarding rain and the people of Israel.

Don’t miss this guys — Any great man or great woman of God is a great man or woman of the Word of God.  Elijah knew that God had said in the Book of Deuteronomy 11:10-17

For the land that you are entering to take possession of it is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you sowed your seed and irrigated it, like a garden of vegetables. ¹¹But the land that you are going over to possess is a land of hills and valleys, which drinks water by the rain from heaven, ¹²a land that the Lord your God cares for. The eyes of the Lord your God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. ¹³“And if you will indeed obey my commandments that I command you today, to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul, ¹⁴he will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil. ¹⁵And he will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full. ¹⁶Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; ¹⁷then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the Lord is giving you.

Elijah KNEW well that the Israelites had turned aside and had served other gods. Elijah knew that God had shut up the heavens. It hadn’t rained for 3-1/2 years — 42 months without no dew or rain.  But Elijah also KNEW that the Lord had promised in Deuteronomy 30 that in the day that the Israelites would turn back to God that the rains then would return. Elijah KNEW that the hearts of the people had turned back to the true and living God when the fire fell from Heaven.  They had put away the prophets of Baal.  And now the thing that still remained was the matter of the coming of the rain.

for there is a sound of the rushing of rain.

He didn’t say to Ahab — Do you hear the pounding of rain drops — the thunder in the distance? This was was something that Elijah heard.

INTERESTING — In verse 26 the prophets of Baal are jumping on the altar trying to get Baal to answer by fire, and it says there was no voice.  That’s the same word used here in verse 41. In verse 29, after they cut themselves and cried out to Baal, it says there was no voice.  That’s our word again.  Over in Chapter 19 (KJV) it says that God spoke to Elijah in a still small voice —that’s our word sound.  When Elijah says — for there is the sound of rushing rain, literally it’s the voice of rushing rain. I believe that God is speaking to Elijah.  Ahab couldn’t hear that voice — Elijah did!

Amos 3:7 “For the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret

to his servants the prophets.

1 Corinthians 2:9-10 But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”— ¹⁰these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.

APPLICATION: Are we listening?  Is he speaking to us?  Can we hear him stirring our hearts?

⁴²…. And Elijah went up to the top of Mount Carmel.

The first thing we see preceding the rain is that Elijah gets alone.  He separates himself.

THIS IS RADICAL — Elijah says to Ahab — Go ahead and eat — God’s going to move.  Try to picture this — Imagine the two of them parting ways. There is the Brook Kishon filled with the blood of 450 prophets of Baal — and the sight of it didn’t even ruin Ahab’s appetite! As they reach a certain point Ahab makes a left and Elijah makes a right — Ahab goes to have a meal and Elijah continues up the sides of Carmel to PRAY. It ‘s as if Elijah has lost his appetite — no desire to eat a bite until the rain comes!

THE POINT FOR US — This is a time for prayer.  On a national level — our nation is at a point, that unless there’s a God-given revival — we’re through. But because God is on the throne and He’s gracious — I think He’s stirring the hearts of his people to pray and seek his face. If you listen closely — you’ll hear the voice of God saying that He wants to rain His grace on us. This is a time of prayer for Metro. God is not moving us into a new building for our comfort. He wants a container for the work that He wants to do. If you listen closely — there is the voice of God saying pray — I want to send rain!

And he bowed himself down on the earth and put his face between his knees. ⁴³And he said to his servant, “Go up now, look toward the sea.” And he went up and looked and said, “There is nothing.” And he said, “Go again,” seven times. ⁴⁴And at the seventh time he said, “Behold, a little cloud like a man’s hand is rising from the sea.” And he said, “Go up, say to Ahab, ‘Prepare your chariot and go down, lest the rain stop you.’” ⁴⁵And in a little while the heavens grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode and went to Jezreel. ⁴⁶And the hand of the Lord was on Elijah, and he gathered up his garment and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel.

Elijah does some things that are important to our understanding of prayer.

As we look at this I think it’s crucial to understand that basis for prayer.

John 14:6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Colossians 1:19-20 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, ²⁰and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

Matthew 27:50-51 And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit. ⁵¹And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.

Hebrews 10:19-20 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh,

Ephesians 2:18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.

Ephesians 3:12 in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him.

ACCESS to the throne of Grace is possible — the price has been paid. It’s left for us TO pray.

Luke 11:1-2 Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” ²And he said to them, “When you pray, say:

It doesn’t — teach us how to pray. They knew how to pray.  They had prayers for everything — for weddings, for funerals, for births, for weather —prayers for everything.  They said teach us (and the tense of the verb is) to be praying.  Make us men and women who pray.  We watch you on your knees and we see a reality.  We see something that is not religious.  It’s relational.  It’s real.  Lord, teach us to pray, to be praying.  Make us people who pray.

That’s what I need. I want God to make me a man who prays.  I don’t need to read more books on prayer. E.M. Bounds wrote five volumes on prayer.  They’re great.  But before he died he said he wasn’t satisfied with his prayer life.  Why should I spend the time to read those five volumes on prayer and then NOT pray! We don’t lack for knowledge.  We lack for doing.  We know about prayer.  But he’s calling us to it — even as Elijah couldn’t rest — even after that epic day on Carmel — until he went to pray!

The first thing we see Elijah do is — get alone.

There is a PART of our prayer life that NEEDS to be alone! Jesus said that when you pray don’t be like the Pharisees who love to be seen by men — when you pray go into your prayer closet and shut the door.  And your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.

You may be a morning person; you may be an evening person. So maybe you’re a night pray-er.  Maybe you’re a morning pray-er.   There’s no law to it.  The challenge is — get alone and pray!

Some of you moms — especially you young ones — you’re dealing you’re your first child or two and you feel like you’re drowning! There was a woman named Susanna Wesley — the mother of John and Charles Wesley. She had 19 kids. Once in awhile she would be so overwhelmed that she would just pull her dress over her head.  Remember that women in her day had layers of petticoats on under their dresses. 19 kids — THAT was her prayer closet. Find a place to get alone.

The last couple of Thursdays the men have been meeting at the new building to do clean up — and before we work we have just gotten alone and gone into the areas of the building INDIVIDUALLY and prayed!

The second thing to notice is his posture. It’s crucial to us because it tells us something of his heart!

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff — The Prophet of Fie: Or the Life and Times of Elijah, With Their Lessons, Page 132

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — “We scarcely recognize him, he seems so to have lost his identity. A few hours before, he stood erect as an oak of Bashan; now, he is bowed as a bulrush. Then as God’s ambassador he pleaded with man; now as man’s intercessor he pleads with God. It is not always so – that the men who stand straightest in the presence of sin bow lowest in the presence of God.”

There is a direct connection between the boldness of Elijah and Carmel and his humility before the Lord.

EXAMPLE: Abraham, the friend of God, the father of those who believe  —When he sought the Lord he said Lord, I’m just dust and ashes.

EXAMPLE: Isaiah, the prophet — Said woe is me. I’m undone. I’m a man of unclean lips.

EXAMPLE: Daniel, the prophet. Perhaps the most exemplary character in the Old Testament — We’re told that when he saw the Lord, Daniel said — all my comeliness, all my beauty, turned to ashes.

EXAMPLE: John, the apostle, who had leaned his head on the chest of Jesus at the last supper — When the Lord appeared to John, he said that he fell down as a dead man.

When we really know the Lord we discover who we are!

QUOTE: Alan Redpath — Bent knees, wet eyes, broken heart, that’s the secret.

So Elijah is HUMBLE — Gets alone with God.

Then he begins to pray according to God’s promise.

How do we know he prayed?  It doesn’t say in our text that he prayed. We read it in the New Testament in the Book of James.

James 5:16-18 The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. ¹⁷Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. ¹⁸And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit.

Effectual — means on target.

Fervent — means with heat, determined.

It avails — it accomplishes.

Elijah was a man subject to like passions.  We’re going to see that in the next chapter.  He’s depressed. He’s running. He’s saying — God kill me, I don’t want to live anymore.

He struggles.  He’s just like us.  But he prayed earnestly that it might not rain.  And it rained not on the earth by a space of three years and six months and he prayed again and the heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth our fruit.

QUESTION: Now why is he praying if God promised?  If God promises why do we have to pray?  Can’t it just happen without us praying?

Through the prophet Ezekiel (Ezekiel 36) God promises that He is going to restore the nation of Israel. Then He says

Ezekiel 36:37 “Thus says the Lord God: This also I will let the house of Israel ask me to do for them: to increase their people like a flock.

Jesus himself said — ask and it shall be given.  That tells us that the people to whom it’s given — are the people who ask.  Seek and you shall find. That tells us that the people who find — are the people who are seeking.  Knock and it shall be opened. That tells us that the people to who things are opened — are the people who are knocking. God who became man is asking us to ask.

In speaking of His Second Coming, Jesus says in Matthew 23:37-39

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not! ³⁸See, your house is left to you desolate. ³⁹For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”

Zechariah 12:10 tells us that Israel will be moved to PRAY in regards that moment.

¹⁰And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son,

Does that mean He’s not coming if they don’t pray?  No, but they’re going to participate in that promise and be prepared for that promise of His return by way of prayer.

Whenever God is going to move — He invites His people to participate with Him in His work and in the accomplishing of His will by means of prayer.

John 16:24 Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

LASTLY — Elijah EXPECTED it to rain — thus he continued to pray.

I appreciate Elijah because he sends this kid to go to a higher elevation to see if there’s any sign of clouds.

SEVEN times up and down! Any of you who have kids know that this isn’t conducive to happiness! He seems more than glad to do it. Tradition tells us that this is the son of the widow of Zarephath’s  — who had died and was raised from the dead by the prayers of Elijah. He doesn’t mind going up a few times.  Elijah said go on back and look again.  Comes back, uh-huh.  Third time, go look again.

If this were me — By the third time I’d be thinking — Maybe the timing is wrong.  Maybe I should pray tomorrow.  Maybe I didn’t hear the Lord.

Elijah just puts his head between his knees.  Go on again.  By the 6^th time this kid’s got to be breathing hard!

We’re told this in 1 John.

1 John 5:14-15 And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.

Elijah knew — THAT’s why he could say — Go on again the seventh time. REMEMBER — Elijah only prayed once for fire.  The kid’s probably saying, Are you sure?  You just prayed one time, fire came down.  Now you’re sending me seven times to go look for water. How many times would Elijah have sent him?  700 times?

⁴⁴And at the seventh time he said, “Behold, a little cloud like a man’s hand is rising from the sea.” And he said, “Go up, say to Ahab, ‘Prepare your chariot and go down, lest the rain stop you.’”

When you live connected to your Father — and you live with expectancy —all you need is something small to be excited. You’re looking for what the Father will do. You just see a little thing and you’re excited, your heart is stirred.  Lord, I know you’re listening, I know you’re watching.

ILLUSTRATION: In the November 9 1904 edition of The Life of Faith, a London newspaper dedicated to the deeper life movement, a writer named Jessie Penn-Lewis reported on a remarkable work just beginning in Wales under the ministry of men like Evan Roberts and Seth Joshua. She reported that a cloud no bigger than a man’s hand had arisen in Wales. It was a fitting description of the clear but small beginning of what became a mighty work.

Elijah said that’s it.  Go tell Ahab he better get out of here.  His chariot is going to get stuck in the mud.  And the rain comes, the lightning, the sky turns black, the rain starts to splatter on hardened ground — the first time in 42 months.

CLOSING

What an awesome record! I think this is a great challenge for us as believers.

Prayer. Pray for your nation.  Pray for Metro.  Pray for your community.  Pray for your marriage, for your children.

Is God speaking to your heart? Are we listening?  DO we hear the voice of what God might want to do?

1 KINGS 18:36-40

Related Topics: Ahab; Challenging a Generation; Limping Between Two Opinions; Prophets of Baal; The Contest Between the Prophets of Baal and Elijah; Repairing the Altar; Propitiation;  The Wrath of God Satisfied; Moved By the Heart

REVIEW

For those of you just joining us we are in 1 Kings 18. This is without a doubt one the greatest spectacles in the entire Bible!

The Challenge

The Contest

The Fire Falling From heaven

The Rain Falls

ALL of these things transpire in ONE day.

The CHALLENGE — v.20-21

This has nothing to do with Ahab and Jezebel or the prophets of Ba-al and the Ashereth.

Elijah throws down the gauntlet and challenges the Israelites

²⁰So Ahab sent to all the people of Israel and gathered the prophets together at Mount Carmel. ²¹And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word.

The CONTEST — v.22-25

This is between Baal and Yahweh

²²Then Elijah said to the people, “I, even I only, am left a prophet of the Lord, but Baal’s prophets are 450 men. ²³Let two bulls be given to us, and let them choose one bull for themselves and cut it in pieces and lay it on the wood, but put no fire to it. And I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood and put no fire to it. ²⁴And you call upon the name of your god, and I will call upon the name of the Lord, and the God who answers by fire, he is God.” And all the people answered, “It is well spoken.” ²⁵Then Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose for yourselves one bull and prepare it first, for you are many, and call upon the name of your god, but put no fire to it.”

²⁶And they took the bull that was given them, and they prepared it and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they limped around the altar that they had made. (KJV = leaped; NLT = danced, hobbling around the altar)

So for at least three hours they were dancing — jumping around and hollering — finally limping — and Elijah is just watching and listening.

²⁷And at noon Elijah mocked them

If there’s no answer it must be your fault – maybe you need to speak up a little.

Maybe your god is meditating

Maybe your god is on the toilet

Maybe he’s on a vacation.

Maybe he’s taking a nap

²⁸And they cried aloud and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances, until the blood gushed out upon them.

QUOTE: Alfred Edersheim — in writing about O.T. times says that it would be typical for pagan prophets to bite large chunks of meat out of their forearms and spit them onto the altar.

²⁹And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the oblation, but there was no voice. No one answered; no one paid attention.

SIX hours have passed – They are fatigued, dehydrated, bleeding, and they are collapsing. This is the sad result of worshipping an imaginary god or the god of our own making. Great dedication — great zeal —great sacrifice — means nothing. There is no one there to answer.

³⁰Then Elijah said to all the people,

And there is so much of the heart of God here -

“Come near to me.” And all the people came near to him. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been thrown down.  ³¹Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord came, saying, “Israel shall be your name,” ³²and with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord. And he made a trench about the altar, as great as would contain two seahs of seed. ³³And he put the wood in order and cut the bull in pieces and laid it on the wood. And he said, “Fill four jars with water and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.” ³⁴And he said, “Do it a second time.” And they did it a second time. And he said, “Do it a third time.” And they did it a third time. ³⁵And the water ran around the altar and filled the trench also with water.

³⁶And at the time of the offering of the oblation, Elijah the prophet came near and said, “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. ³⁷Answer me, O Lord, answer me, that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back.” ³⁸Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. ³⁹And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The Lord, he is God; the Lord, he is God.”

CRUCIAL OBSERVATION: As I look at this I am taken up with the whole scene and with what God is doing, especially when God has Elijah tell the people COME NEAR.

It says there that he REPAIRED the altar of the LORD that had been thrown down.

CRUCIAL — Elijah was very aware that he repaired something that once stood strong. There was once an altar of the LORD at Carmel and in Israel in general. It was now a wreck — not just from being ignored — it had been thrown down! Elijah looked to revive something that once was.

THIS repairing of the altar was at the CENTER of what he is doing! Before the eyes of this generation that is adrift he starts to put the stones back in place!

YOU MIGHT BE WONDERING — What does this have to do with ME in the year 2010!

Geoffrey Hayden – a sociologist – interviewed 7,441 protestan clergy and asked them several questions.

1.) Do you accept the resurrection of Jesus as physical and factual?

51% of Methodists said NO.

35% of Episcopalians said NO.

33% of American Baptists said NO.

30% of Presbyterians said NO.

13% of American Lutherans said NO.

2.) Do you accept the virgin birth of Jesus as fact?

60% of Methodists said NO.

49% of Episcopalians said NO.

44% of American Baptists said NO.

34% of Presbyterians said NO.

19% of American Lutherans said NO.

3.) Do you believe that the Scriptures are the inerrant Word of God?

87% of Methodists said NO.

93% of Episcopalians said NO.

67% of American Baptists said NO.

82% of Presbyterians said NO.

70% of American Lutherans said NO.

The altar of the Lord is in need of repair TODAY!

It’s broken down and a generation is adrift. No wonder that they are adrift.

So Elijah begins to repair the altar of the Lord and he draws them in to watch.

He takes the twelve stones – They understood what was happening. They understand that what he was doing had to do with THEM.

Then he takes the wood and lays it on the altar.

Then he takes the ox and begins to dress it.

KEY INSIGHT: Very interesting to look in Leviticus to look at the how God prescribed Israel to offer a burnt sacrifice! You would take it and flay it and skin it. You would lay the skin on the wood. Then the head on top of the skin. Then you would wash the entrails and the caul and the fat and the legs separately. And then you would put the entrails and the fat around the head and then the legs around all of that. And it was a MONSTROSITY. And then the blood would be poured over the whole thing.

And the children of Israel are watching this and many of them had NEVER seen it.

There’s Elijah — working and bloody.

There’s this pile – this bull – this monstrosity – It didn’t look anything like a bull.

(Isa 52:14 NLT) Many were amazed when they saw him–beaten and bloodied, so disfigured one would scarcely know he was a person.

Then they take the water and pour it around.

Then Elijah prays – Lord let the people know that I am doing this at your direction – let them know that it is you that is turning their hearts back to yourself!

AND THEN the fire falls from heaven and consumes the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the water – there is nothing left but a hole!

Everything is gone!

And the people fall down – responding! God knows that we are responders. The LORD, He is God. The LORD, He is God. The LORD, He is God.

THIS IS SO HUGE — The fire falls — NOT on the people of Israel —they were the sinners – NOT on the prophets of Baal – NOT on Ahab.

It falls on the innocent bullock. They’re being reminded of what Israel had known since coming out of Egypt.

And I am certain that if at that time Ahab would have fallen down and said – God forgive me – God would have forgiven HIM. If the prophets of Baal had fallen down and said – The LORD is God – God would have forgiven them

Because that sacrifice was complete. God’s fire took the sacrifice, the wood, the stones, the water. That fire took everything.

HERE’S THE PICTURE — Jesus from the cross said – IT IS FINISHED!

REMEMBER WE ASKED THE QUESTION — Why not make this contest a matter of answering by RAIN and not fire. After all — there had been no rain for 3 ½ years.

HERE’S THE ANSWER —  It HAD to be fire – because that draught was only the SYMPTOM of the problem. If the rain would have returned it would not have solved the problem! The draught was a SYMPTOM of the fact that they had turned their backs on God. There HAD TO BE ATONEMENT before the rain could come again.

There needed to be a turning of the hearts back to the Lord.

REMEMBER – We are responders. God is the initiator! Let them know Lord that YOU are doing this.

We need to challenge a generation.  There needs to be clarity.

We need to say – There is black and white, right and wrong – We need to say – CHOOSE! But it isn’t that simple.

CRUCIAL INSIGHT: There has to be something DIVINE in the whole process.

1 John 4:9-10 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. ¹⁰In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Propitiation is where the wrath of God is satisfied.

1 Thessalonians 1:9-10 For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, ¹⁰and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

The fire that consumed that sacrifice on Carmel was not NORMAL FIRE

It was DIVINE – it was ETERNAL – it was FROM HEAVEN.

CRUCIAL QUESTION: How do we know that God loves us?

Lord, if You love me. You’ll give me this job. I’ve been working and praying…

Lord if you love me you’ll give me this husband.

Lord if you love me you’ll help me get this mortgage.

Or how about – Lord if you love me you’ll heal my child of cancer.

KEY INSIGHT: Yet somehow God won’t let anything else be proof of His love except that He sent his only begotten Son into the world…. to be the propitiation (the wrath appeasing sacrifice) for our sins.

I have two sons and two daughters. Love all of them.

Sean – when he was about 3 – had a swollen gland that just wouldn’t go down. Doctor said it could be the leftovers of a sore throat, but that it might also be leukemia.

Had to take blood.

Sean and doctors were a bad mix. Blood was worse.

Took three of us to hold him down while a fourth person stuck the needle in his arm.

I was laying across his chest and he was creaming in my ear – Daddy they’re hurting me!

When that ordeal was over I had to sit with my little boy, like a limp noodle, in my arms to wait and see if he had leaukemia.

I remember thinking – God, my son might be dying.

KEY POINT: This was MY son –

What would I do if I were omnipotent and sovereign and could have just spoken the word and I could have stopped the suffering.

And then I think of Gethsemene.

KEY INSIGHT: That night there was an exchanging of cups.

At the last supper Jesus gave the cup to the disciples – the cup of fellowship with the Father.

Then he goes to Gethsemene to take the cup that would have been ours – The cup spoken of in Jeremiah and in Psalms 75:8 and in Revelation 14:10 and 16:9

Rev. 14:10 ¹⁰he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. ¹¹And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night,

The cup of torment — The cup of God’s wrath poured out on the world that they will drink to the dregs.

.

THAT is what Christ was praying about in Gethsemene when He said — If it possible let this cup pass from me.

And heaven is silent - and an angel comes to strengthen Him so that He can continue through His agony.

Jesus sweats drops of Blood and Peter is warming himself at the fire because it was cold!

And I think of how I would have done anything to have saved MY SON from just having blood drawn.

Then they come and take Jesus to the house of the high priest.

They beat him beyond human recognition and the sovereign, omnipotent Father is silent!

KEY POINT: What would it have cost me to restrain myself to watch people rip out my sons beard and tear his back to shreds with a whip, spit in his face?

You mess with my son and you are messing with me!

What did it cost God to restrain Himself while His perfect son suffered for us?

Yet he restrained Himself.

And then there was the crown of thorns and the nails in His hands and feet.

Yet He restrained Himself.

Then the sins of the world laid upon His Son.

I think of how it would break my heart if I found out my son was taking drugs or my son was a murderer – or if I found out my son was child pornographer, or if he had flown into the world trade towers, or if he had killed 6 million Jews.

The sin of the world is placed upon Jesus, and when that transpired  there was separation

Then there was the cry from the cross – Eli Eli Lama sabacthani. Why have you forsaken me? In that instant Jesus is cut off.

Throughout His ministry – I do what you tell me to do…. I say what you tell me to say.

But at that moment He is without information.

What would it have taken me to restrain myself to see my son beaten and accused of all kinds of things that I know he never did and then hear him cry out – Dad, what are you doing, where are you, why are you restraining yourself?

Then heaven finally does answer – by fire!

1 John 4:9-10 this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

That cup – the torment of which ascends forever and ever – Jesus drank that cup to the dregs in those 3 hours of darkness – and the wrath of God was reigned down upon His Son.

What is beyond my imagination and comprehension is not only the fact that God restrained Himself – But that when He finally answers He fires all of His holy wrath down on his own son.

CRUCIAL INSIGHT: THAT was the cost for our sin. THAT is why He HATES sin. He hates it in our lives because His Son had to carry it. He hates it in our lives because He had to fire down His wrath upon His own Son to pay for our sins.

He had to answer that day by FIRE, and not by rain because the altar of the Lord had to be repaired.

What amazes me is that Jesus died for ME.

I’m amazed that I can cry out Abba Father.

PERSONAL: What amazes me is that so much of my Christianity is based upon what I do when being His son is so far superior to anything I could ever do for Him.

KEY INSIGHT: We can call Him Father because the sacrifice was consumed.

One day we are going to stand on a Sea of Glass and in the midst of all of that glory we will see a lamb with the marks of slaughter because the sacrifice was consumed.

YOU and I were the sinners — but we weren’t consumed! The fire of God’s wrath was rained down upon Jesus! Because of our sin.

Sin is the issue and that is what the world does NOT want to hear.

The new threat on the horizon is the possibility of calling sin from the pulpit an act of hate speech. If we say that people are sinners who need to be forgiven they call it hate speech. It’s not hate speech. It’s love speech.

There is no greater love that has ever been shown.

Why do we expect good things from God? Why can I ask God to heal my child or my wife?

Rom 8:32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?

The ultimate proof of His love is that monstrosity –

the sinless lamb beaten beyond recognition, covered with the sin of the world –

under the wrath of a holy God – the LAST place that HE should have ever been.

Elijah calls the people near and he repairs the altar of the Lord.

We can’t command a generation to return

We have to call them near and show them the fire falling upon the sacrifice. The great tragedy is that THIS message is notably absent from modern church culture.

As we RESPOND to this amazing passage — think about this. In the OT — the worshipper was NEVER examined when he came. IT was always and only the sacrifice. Tonight we can worship because of Jesus – the perfect sacrifice for our sins.

1 KINGS 18:1-2; 17-39

INTRODUCTION

For those of you just joining us we are in 1 Kings 18. This is without a doubt one the greatest spectacles in the entire Bible! All of this happens upon Mt. Carmel — All of these events will happen in ONE DAY

• The CHALLENGE
• The CONTEST and the FIRE FALLING from heaven
• The RETURN OF THE RAIN

1 Kings 18:1-2; 17-21 ¹After many days the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain upon the earth.” ²So Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. Now the famine was severe in Samaria…..¹⁷When Ahab saw Elijah, Ahab said to him, “Is it you, you troubler of Israel?” ¹⁸And he answered, “I have not troubled Israel, but you have, and your father’s house, because you have abandoned the commandments of the Lord and followed the Baals.

I am GRIPPED by this account because in it I see a solitary man challenging a nation — challenging a generation. It is one man calling an entire nation — an entire generation — back to God. It is a generation that has grown up under a generation that had been compromised and far from God! The generation standing before Elijah grew up under wicked kings. This is the eighth king. This is ALL they knew.

As we look at Elijah standing before this generation we need to remember that God simply told Elijah to go stand before Ahab. There is NO PLAN. There is NO five year plan — NO ten year plan — He is just told to go.

I’m encouraged by that. I look at the world that we live in — the state of our nation — the state of this generation and I’m at a loss. I thank God for leaving us the account of this man and this moment.

He was simply told to go — and simply obeys — goes up to Carmel. Those of you that have been to Israel with us know what that looks like. It rises 1,700 ft. above the Jezreel valley.

CARMEL = the vineyard of God. It was known for it’s beauty and it’s vineyards.

INTERESTING — There is a part of Mt. Carmel that in Arabic has been known for thousands of years as “the place of burning” – It is out on the edge of Carmel.

Imagine Elijah standing there — All around him sees the effects of sin and compromise and idolatry. Rather than seeing the beauty and fruitfulness of the “vineyard of God” — the land is parched and ugly.

To Elijah — it must have seemed so overwhelming – beyond hope – beyond repair. Yet God tells him to go!

The same is true for us today. I think of my own generation in the midst of a seemingly hopeless time in this nation — the mid-60’s and early 70’s. This nation was about to implode. The Viet Nam War — the Culture War — the drug culture and complete abandonment of any moral standards left this nation with a seemingly irreparable breach between two generations. Anyone over 30 was the enemy. Yet God broke in on my generation during the Jesus movement! Rescued a significant part of a generation and healed a significant part of this nation. Some of you here tonight were taking acid back then – now you’re taking ant-acids.

In many external ways things have changed since those days — but in the most important ways they have not. In those days WE were being led; The Beatles and Ravi Shankar introduced Eastern mysticism to us. Timothy Leary introduced us to LSD. There was an under-toe of spiritual and moral deception sucking a generation to its destruction. The way we dressed and the things we did — we were being led. I didn’t make those decisions – That entire scene was scripted by the god of this world

Ephesians 2:1-2 ¹And you were dead in the trespasses and sins ²in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—

But the generation of today’s youth are being led too! The menu gets set (PBS show: “The Merchants of Cool”). Jesus loved my generation and Jesus loves this generation. He reached us when no one thought we could ever be reached. And Jesus wants to reach this generation too.

¹⁹Now therefore send and gather all Israel to me at Mount Carmel, and the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel’s table.” ²⁰So Ahab sent to all the people of Israel and gathered the prophets together at Mount Carmel. ²¹And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word.

What an amazing scene on this massive ridge above the Jezreel Valley! There are 450 prophets of Baal dressed in the splendor of their priestly attire.  — sashes and robes. There were hundreds of thousands of Israelites gathered around, looking at this spectacle. And there is Ahab in his royal garb. And then there is this solitary figure with long hair and a leather girdle.

As we look at this we MUST stop and ask the question – Lord what is this here?

KEY OBSERVATION: And he poses a challenge — The challenge is NOT to the prophets of Baal – It was to God’s people. The challenge was

²¹And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word.

CRUCIAL OBSERVATION: What Elijah offers is tremendous clarity There are two opinions – That’s all!

There is black and white — right and wrong — light and darkness.

Between there is NO middle opinion!

We hear so much talk today about being relevant. I don’t think that Elijah was relevant. In the late 60’s — early 70’s there was a guy named Chuck Smith – an overweight, balding guy in his early 40’s who was speaking to a generation that had given up on his generation and his values – his God. There could have been no one who was — in the natural — more un-related or irrelevant related to the generation he was speaking to.

What was reaching them was CLARITY – TRUTH – DECISIVENESS and the power of the Holy Spirit. He could say with Paul

1 Corinthians 2:4-5 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, ⁵that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

“How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.”

TRANSLATION: If you are standing in church on Sunday, talking the Christian jargon, and then out doing what ever you want the rest of the week, that is NOT an opinion, it is halting between two opinions!

THE POINT: If you’re going to be a sinner – be a good one! Get out there until you’re sick of it – Get your fill of it. But if God is God, then FOLLOW Him.

What we see here is a single man calling a generation back to God. This is black and white! This clarity! This is truth without apology!

• If God is God, then follow Him
• But if Baal is your god – if you are living for other things — then live for them — but don’t try to live between the two!
• Because if you are, you are LIMPING between two opinions.

KEY POINT: If you are trying to stand between the two worlds and try to hold them both it is CRIPPLING — you will end up LIMPING through life!  THAT is exactly where tens of thousands of church-goers are today. They have never been challenged with the truth – and as a result they have NO CLARITY.

Listen – For the prophets of Baal there was complete clarity – they knew exactly where they stood! But Elijah shows up with this tremendous challenge to MAKE A CHOICE – No apology!

We need that. There are plenty of atheists and materialists who have complete clarity in their convictions (Christopher Hitchens — Book : God is Not Great).

I remember when I got saved there was a choice to be made.

So there we have THE CHALLENGE.  Now we come to THE CONTEST between Elijah and the prophets of Baal.

As we look at the events there on Carmel I pray that we will recognize that everything that we have and are today flows from the Cross. Do you realize that if Jesus hadn’t died for us that most of us would not even know one another. Our paths CROSSED at THE Cross! Wives and husbands, friends, co-laborers. So may the Lord be with us as we look at this record given to us of what transpired on Carmel.

²¹And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.”

NOTICE: And the people did not answer him a word.

²²Then Elijah said to the people,

Just imagine — Hundreds of thousands of people there

“I, even I only, am left a prophet of the Lord, but Baal’s prophets are 450 men. ²³Let two bulls be given to us, and let them choose one bull for themselves and cut it in pieces and lay it on the wood, but put no fire to it. And I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood and put no fire to it.

The he turns to the prophets of Baal and says

²⁴And you call upon the name of your god, and I will call upon the name of the Lord, and the God who answers by fire, he is God.” And all the people answered, “It is well spoken.”

Sounds good to us! What else are they going to say?

²⁵Then Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose for yourselves one bull and prepare it first, for you are many, and call upon the name of your god, but put no fire to it.” ²⁶And they took the bull that was given them, and they prepared it and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they limped around the altar that they had made. (KJV = leaped; NLT = danced, hobbling around the altar)

So for at least three hours they were hollering

O Baal – Baal hear us – Earth to Baal – calling all Baals

Three hours dancing — jumping around and hollering — finally limping — and Elijah is just watching and listening. I’m sure that he was enjoying this.

²⁷And at noon

The sun is in its zenith. REMEMBER — Baal is worshipped as the god of sun and god of elements.

Elijah mocked them, saying

I think that he was in the Spirit here, not in the flesh. I think that God said to him in a still small voice – Give ‘em a hard time!

Cry aloud: for he is a god;

If there’s no answer it must be your fault – maybe you need to speak up a little.

Either he is musing,

The Hebrew is meditating

or he is relieving himself,

QUOTE: Adam Clarke — “Rabbi S. Jarchi gives this the most degrading meaning; I will give it in Latin, because it is too coarse to be put in English; Fortassis ad locum secretum abiit, ut ventrem ibi exoneret; ‘Perhaps he has gone to the ————-.’ This certainly reduces Baal to the lowest degree of contempt, and with it the ridicule and sarcasm are complete.”

or he is in a journey,

Maybe he’s on a vacation.

or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened.”

²⁸ And they cried aloud,

Elijah has them all worked up now, and you can’t help but think that the people watching this contest are snickering and laughing amongst themselves.

²⁸And they cried aloud and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances, until the blood gushed out upon them.

QUOTE: Alfred Edersheim — in writing about O.T. times says that it would be typical for pagan prophets to bite large chunks of meat out of their forearms and spit them onto the altar.

QUOTE: Wiseman — “The practice of self-inflicted wounds to arouse a deity’s pity or response is attested in Ugarit when men ‘bathed in their own blood like an ecstatic prophet.”

²⁹And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the oblation, but there was no voice. No one answered; no one paid attention.

SIX hours have passed. They are fatigued, dehydrated, bleeding, and they are collapsing. This is the sad result of worshipping an imaginary god or the god of our own making. Great dedication, great zeal, great sacrifice, means nothing. There is no one there to answer.

³⁰Then Elijah said to all the people,

And there is so much of the heart of God here -

“Come near to me.” And all the people came near to him. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been thrown down.

Some altar had been there on Carmel that Israel had known of, an altar that God had honored at one point in their history.

CRUCIAL — Elijah was very aware that he repaired something that once stood strong. There was once an altar of the LORD at Carmel and in Israel in general. It was now a wreck, not just from being ignored, it had been thrown down! Elijah looked to revive something that once was.

³¹Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord came, saying, “Israel shall be your name,” ³²and with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord. And he made a trench about the altar, as great as would contain two seahs of seed. ³³And he put the wood in order and cut the bull in pieces and laid it on the wood. And he said, “Fill four jars with water and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.” ³⁴And he said, “Do it a second time.” And they did it a second time. And he said, “Do it a third time.” And they did it a third time. ³⁵And the water ran around the altar and filled the trench also with water. ³⁶And at the time of the offering of the oblation, Elijah the prophet came near

Some 50 years before this, Jeroboam the King of Israel officially deprived the citizens of the northern kingdom from the worship of the God of Israel at the temple in Jerusalem. BUT — Elijah still remembered the evening sacrifice that was offered according to God’s commandment every day at the temple in Jerusalem.

He must have been standing off a little ways while they poured the water on the sacrifice. We don’t know how much time has passed. But he drew near and said -

and said, “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel,

No jumping – No screaming – No cutting –

Just Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel

let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word.

In other words – That this is your will.

³⁷Answer me, O Lord, answer me, that

The reason for answering —

this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back.”

KEY INSIGHT: The tense of the verb is – that You are in the process of turning their heart back again.

³⁸Then

TIME STAMP — when he says that

the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. ³⁹And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The Lord, he is God; the Lord, he is God.”

REMEMBER – That’s Elijah’s name. I wonder if he was thinking – I knew that!

HUGE QUESTION: Why a contest by fire? It hadn’t rained for three years. Why not make it a matter of the God who answers by rain?

Up until this point they’ve received a challenge  – If the LORD is God follow Him, if Baal is god follow him. We noted that there needs to be clarity! We need to define the lines. It needs to be understandable and clear. But you CAN’T COMMAND the people to turn. This was a nation who KNEW the Commandments! Each day they would say the Shema = Hear O Israel – the Lord thy God is One God – But they weren’t living as though that was the truth.

It isn’t enough to define the truth and have clarity! It wasn’t enough for Elijah to command them.

Man is HEART DRIVEN. The heart will always make a convert of the mind! There are people who are brilliant, have their PhD., MBA or the Law Degree or their license to practice medicine and they wreck their lives; destroy their marriage and family. They say – I don’t know how this happened! They would give anything to have their lives back.

It is because of the heart because it LONGS! It is the seat of desire.

That is why the Bible says –

Prov 4:23 Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.

Prov 4:23 NLT Above all else, guard your heart, for it affects everything you do.

HUGE — Desire is a much more powerful force than intellect. And when you let something play there it wears down the intellect. And it will always make a convert of the mind. That is why the smartest people can do the stupidest things. Because of desire.

By the way, stupid people can do stupid things too.

God understands that we are heart driven. We were MADE to be driven from the heart!

1 John 4:19 KJV We love him, because he first loved us.

PERFECT PLACE TO STOP FOR COMMUNION —

1 John 4:10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

He draws the line — declares the truth — and then says

THIS is why you should worship me! YOU are a sinner! But I love you so much that I came and died in YOUR place for YOUR sin

1 Kings 17:17 through 18:19

CHAPTER 17

REVIEW

Elijah, the greatest prophet of Scripture — stepped on to the pages of Scripture in the first verse of Chapter 17. He walks in before Ahab and says — “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” In Chapter 18 we will find Elijah involved in one of the greatest events recorded in Scripture — a showdown on Mt. Carmel between the prophets of Ba-al and Elijah to determine whether the people should serve Ba-al or Yahweh. But — the way to Carmel would be through a place called Cherith and a place called Zarephath. Cherith means “the place of cutting” and Zarephath means “the place of refining.”

⁹“Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you.”

We noted that when God speaks — His direction might not seem logical as man measures logical. Elijah…  go to Zarephath, and Sidon.  I’ve commanded a widow. That can’t be the Lord.  That’s enemy territory.  Widows can’t take care of themselves when there’s rainfall — and you want a widow to care for ME in a draught!

¹⁰So he arose and went to Zarephath.

It was an 80-100 mile journey. We know from 1 Kings 18:10 that his life was in danger everywhere he went. And every step of the way he saw the ravages of sin and idolatry — because everywhere he went the land was parched and burnt as a result of the judgment of God.  Everything is dead.  There’s nothing green.  There’s no life. The destructive nature of sin and idolatry was being impressed on his mind — impressed on his heart — every step of the way. Even the very threat against his life was the result of man rejecting the True and living God.

He finally arrived in Zarephath.

Today this town is in modern day Lebanon.

Zarephath got its name because it was a place where metals were mined; melted down and refined.

When Elijah reached the gate of the city, he meets the widow that God had chosen and commanded / ordained to provide for His servant.

From verse 12 we can safely say that she was emaciated, eyes sunken in her head, her skin sagging on her bones, moving slowly.  Her son is too weak to even leave the house.

In the midst of a devastating draught Elijah says — Give me a drink of water. Remarkably — she begins to move, to get it.

DON’T MISS THIS — In the time of her trouble and HER difficulty, she re-focused herself on somebody else that was hurting and gave out. She did NOT have much water, but she shared that which she did have.

¹¹….. he called to her and said, “Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand.” ¹²And she said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die.” ¹³And Elijah said to her, “Do not fear; go and do as you have said. But first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son. ¹⁴For thus says the Lord the God of Israel, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’”

WE NOTED THAT God didn’t give her enough barrels to last a year. God didn’t give her a month’s worth — He didn’t give her a week’s worth — He didn’t give her a full day’s worth. Each time she went to the jar of flour — she SCRAPED out the last speck. Every time she went to the jug of oil she poured out the last drop. Yet somehow — at lunch she returned to the jar she had emptied and the jug she had emptied — and there was enough flour and oil for lunch.

Cherith was miraculous — but THIS was CREATION. She has literally scraped out the bottom of the barrel — and yet every time she goes back there’ enough for ONE more meal.

¹⁵And she went and did as Elijah said.

She only had one verse.  She lived by it! She determined her life and future and the life and future of her son in one verse.

And she and he and her household ate for many days. ¹⁶The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.

HUGE — The Lord will NOT be a debtor to any man. If you are sharing or sacrificing for the Lord’s work or the Lord’s servant, the Lord will NOT be in your debt.

WE HAD THREE CLOSING POINTS OF APPLICATION

FIRST — Cherith and Zarephath are not designed to destroy us. Zarephath — is intended to REFINE us and FREE us. Peter talks about our faith being tried like gold in the fire.

1 Peter 1:6-7 ⁶In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, ⁷so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

The refiner would put the precious metal in the crucible, heat it until it became molten.  The dross would be come to the surface, and he would continue to scrap off the dross, the impurities, until he could look down in the gold and see the reflection of his face.  Then, he knew it was pure.

That’s what God is doing.

SECONDLY — We don’t like that daily dependence.  It’s always been that way for God’s people.  Going back to the Israelites in the wilderness — God provided them with manna. Every morning it was gathered. Enough provision fell, but it was only provision for that day.  They couldn’t store it up for a week.  We don’t like THAT ECONOMY! We like our 401Ks and our investment portfolios. Don’t misunderstand me — God can use those instruments. But man loves to bank his life on them. Val and I have a friend whose investment portfolio lost $½ million this past year.

Neither can we lay up a reserve in the things of God’s Word. It’s not enough for us to come to here on a Monday night and say — I got my dose for the week.  God does wonderful things — amazing things — each week when we gather in the name of Jesus. But we need MANNA each day from Him.

THIRD — Guys, we are like Elijah in that we too are passing through enemy territory. As long as we’re here — God will never forsake us.  He’ll purify us.  He’ll conform us to the image of his son. And the jar of flour will never run out — and the jug of oil will never fail.  His provision is there for us daily in his word and in his Holy Spirit.

¹⁷After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him. ¹⁸And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!”

Although the meal was always available and the oil was always flowing, her son fell sick. The Miracle did not make her immune from the realities of life in a fallen world.

The death of the son was a double blow to the widow. Not only did she suffer as any mother who loses a child, but she also suffered as one who lost her only hope for the future. The expectation was that her son would grow and provide for her in her old age. Now that expectation was shattered.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff — The Prophet of Fire: Or The Life and Times of Elijah, With Their Lessons p. 74

Her loss was sudden! Remember there was a time when she had watched her son inch closer to death by starvation. But then came Elijah and by miraculous provision from God her son had been strengthened and spared.

In her grief and loss she does two things. Before we look at them listen to these words of Adam Clarke

QUOTE: Adam Clarke — It is mostly in times of adversity that we duly consider our moral state; outward afflictions often bring deep searchings of heart.

First — She indirectly blamed Elijah and in so doing indicts God for her grief. We can be just like that. God pours out the bread of the Word and the oil of the Spirit without fail, and when things get tough we blame God and accuse Him of wanting to condemn us.

SECOND — She even more directly blamed herself and her unnamed sin. Two views on this

1.) There was a particular sin in her past for which she believed God was judging her by taking her son’s life.

2.) She no doubt knew that Elijah had seen the wickedness of Ahab and Jezebel; and he prayed and God sent judgment by way of this great famine. Now she is saying Elijah, you’ve been around my house, heard me yelling, saw me lose my temper — and you’ve reported me to God — and God has punished me by taking my son.

TURN TO JOHN 9

¹As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. ²And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” ³Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.

The death of this widow’s son was not sent as a punishment for her particular sins, but was intended to be the means by which she might learn that the God of Israel was not merely the God who could feed her and her son bread, but that he is the Living God, the author of life, who loved not just Israel, but all people.

So we have a dead boy and a mother overcome with grief and angry at God, God’s servant, and blaming herself.

We do not want to miss the way Elijah responds to her.

He doesn’t remind her of the blessing he had been to her. I believe that Elijah was no doubt moved by the sheer pathos of the scene; this mom clutching the limp body of her dead son. He had watched this little guy go from the brink of death to health by way of God’s miraculous provision day after day.  And he had no doubt come to love this little guy during the time of his stay.

I think he understands that this woman’s words flowed from unbearable anguish.

¹⁹And he said to her, “Give me your son.” And he took him from her arms

The widow was holding desperately to the dead body of her son.

and carried him up

The age of her son — small enough to be carried up stairs in the arms of Elijah.

into the upper chamber where he lodged, and laid him on his own bed.

²⁰And he cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by killing her son?”

QUOTE: Keil and Delitzsch: Commentary On the Old testament vol. 3: 1 Kings – 2 Chronicles

The meaning is, “Thou, O Lord my God, according to Thy grace and righteousness, canst not possibly leave the son of this widow in death.”

²¹Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.”

REMEMBER — Elijah has zero reference point for this moment. There is no precedent, no one has ever been raised from the dead up to this moment. Elijah had no precedent for this. In this moment we see the extraordinary man of faith that Elijah was. Think of David, the man after God’s own heart. David fasted and prayed for his child when he was sick (2 Samuel 12), but when the child died it never occurred to a man of God like David to pray for God to raise him from the dead!

he stretched himself upon the child

INTERESTING — Elisha, the disciple of Elijah, did the same in order to restore the dead child of the Shunammite (2 Kings 4:34). And Paul the apostle appears to have stretched himself on Eutychus in order to restore him to life (Acts 20:10).

INTERESTING — Elijah prayed three times. God didn’t answer the first time he prayed. God didn’t answer the second time he prayed. God did answer the third time he prayed. God doesn’t always answer the first time we call, though many times it is a part of His sovereign will and plans to answer.

Why does God wait? God said by way of the prophet Isaiah says this

Isaiah 30:18 And therefore will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you: for the LORD is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.

Without a doubt one of the gracious outcomes of having to wait for god to answer prayer is that of endurance and the refining of our faith. My flesh does not appreciate it when God waits. But delays demand faith!

We don’t understand the ways of God. God said we wouldn’t. He said,

Isaiah 55:8-9 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. ⁹For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

God is so economical in His working! His timing is such that He accomplishes the most resulting in Him receiving the most glory from the most people.

INTERESTING — Jesus prayed three times, that the cup might pass from Him. Though He prayed three times, the prayer was not answered. He prayed three times — but He submitted to the will of the Father. Paul prayed three times, concerning his thorn in the flesh. After praying three times, the thorn in the flesh was still there, but he got a different answer than what he was asking. Rather than the thorn in the flesh being removed For God said to him — “My grace is sufficient for you. My strength will be made perfect in your weakness”. Paul took a whole different attitude towards the thorn in the flesh. He looked at it now in a whole different light! He now began to glory in the weakness of his flesh, in order that the power of God might be revealed in him.

God does not always answer the first time we pray, He does not always answer the second time and many times He does not answer the third time we pray. Instead of doing what we’ve asked He will give us the strength, the endurance, the capacity, the faith, to live with a situation, seeing the hand of God in it, and the work of God within it.

I utterly reject the teaching that says God has to heal you if you follow a certain formula. God sometimes has purposes that we do not know; purposes for our weakness, or for our failures. We need the kind of faith that can live through and even above the weakness, and suffering, so that God’s power might be manifested through the weakness of our own flesh.

We must ALSO note — that this is not a methodology that is going to work anytime someone dies. This is God at work, doing His pleasure in restoring the child to life, doing it by His power!

The example for us here is that without precedent Elijah believed that the LIVING God was able to bring the dead to life.

THOUGH THIS IS NOT A METHODOLOGY to follow, there is a great PICTURE for us here concerning seeing those dead in sin raised to life in Jesus

1.) He prayed — We MUST be praying for a dead and dying world. CRYING OUT for them.

2.) He touched — He established contact with the boy. Not once but three times.

Today Christianity needs to be in contact with Jesus Christ. When it is not, it is incapable of bringing life to a dead and dying world. You and I were dead in trespasses and sin, the moment we trusted Christ we were united with Jesus. He died, and we died with Him. He was raised, and we were raised with Him. We are joined to the living Christ today. If we are not joined to Him, we are nothing.

Is there someone that you care about who is still dead in trespasses and sins?  Child – Husband – Friends. The solution is simple. You PRAY for them and you establish loving contact with them. Pray for them and LOVE on them. It will blow our minds to see what the Lord will do when you PRAY FERVANTLY and LOVE PRACTICALLY and bring them into contact with the living Jesus!

²²And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he revived. ²³And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, “See, your son lives.” ²⁴And the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”

By what did she know? It was not the miracle of the meal and the oil that persuaded her, it was the raising of her dead child to life.

What is it that will convince the world to receive and believe the Word of God?

FIRST – The Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

SECOND – The witness of YOUR resurrected life — YOUR changed life.

CHAPTER 18

¹After many days the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain upon the earth.” ²So Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. Now the famine was severe in Samaria. ³And Ahab called Obadiah, who was over the household.

Obadiah is an interesting guy.   This may be the same Obadiah whose prophecy against Edom is recorded among the Minor Prophets. It is a little difficult to be certain, because there were 13 Obadiahs in the Old Testament.

• An Obadiah was sent out by King Jehoshaphat of Judah to teach the law in the cities of Judah (2 Chronicles 17:7)
• An Obadiah was one of the overseers who helped repair the temple in the days of Josiah, King of Judah (2 Chronicles 34:12)
• An Obadiah was a priest in the days of Nehemiah (Nehemiah 10:5)

INTERESTING — The Hebrew name Obadiah means “Worshipper of Yahweh” or “Servant of Yahweh.” Yet he was working for the wicked king Ahab.

People ask — “Should I be working for this man or this corporation because they are not believers?” This man serves as an example of a believer serving under an unbeliever.

Phil 4:22 All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are of Caesar’s household. Caesar = Caesar Nero

Paul greets those under his service and does not condemn them. The Lord plants believers in those situations sometimes to be a light and an instrument.

Some believe that Obadiah was carnal. I do NOT believe that.

³ ….(Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly, ⁴and when Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord, Obadiah took a hundred prophets and hid them by fifties in a cave and fed them with bread and water.)

QUOTE: Spurgeon — Account for it how you may, it is a singular circumstance that in the center of rebellion against God there was one whose devotion to God was intense and distinguished. As it is horrible to find a Judas among the apostles, so it is grand to discover an Obadiah among Ahab’s courtiers. What grace must have been at work to maintain such a fire in the midst of the sea, such godliness in the midst of the vilest iniquity!”

Even though he was not powerful like Elijah, he was profitable to the prophets.

SPURGEON was once asked — “What is the secret of your powerful preaching?” He replied — “I have a people that pray for me.” Men and women like Obadiah — Who were not great and powerful voices for God like Spurgeon — were profitable to the man who spoke so powerfully for God and of God. YOU may not be a preacher, but you can be profitable to the preacher.

⁵And Ahab said to Obadiah, “Go through the land to all the springs of water and to all the valleys. Perhaps we may find grass and save the horses and mules alive, and not lose some of the animals.” ⁶So they divided the land between them to pass through it. Ahab went in one direction by himself, and Obadiah went in another direction by himself.

INTERESTING — Ahab sought relief from the famine but he did not seek the reason for the famine. That is the essence of our culture —Seeking to deal with the symptoms rather than the sin.

⁷And as Obadiah was on the way, behold, Elijah met him. And Obadiah recognized him and fell on his face and said, “Is it you, my lord Elijah?” ⁸And he answered him, “It is I. Go, tell your lord, ‘Behold, Elijah is here.’” ⁹And he said, “How have I sinned, that you would give your servant into the hand of Ahab, to kill me? ¹⁰As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my lord has not sent to seek you. And when they would say, ‘He is not here,’ he would take an oath of the kingdom or nation, that they had not found you. ¹¹And now you say, ‘Go, tell your lord, “Behold, Elijah is here.”’ ¹²And as soon as I have gone from you, the Spirit of the Lord will carry you I know not where. And so, when I come and tell Ahab and he cannot find you, he will kill me, although I your servant have feared the Lord from my youth. ¹³Has it not been told my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord, how I hid a hundred men of the Lord’s prophets by fifties in a cave and fed them with bread and water? ¹⁴And now you say, ‘Go, tell your lord, “Behold, Elijah is here”’; and he will kill me.”

This would imply that his parents were believers. During that time, most people worshipped Ba-al and would name their children after Ba-al. But he had a godly name and a fear of the Lord.

In a pagan and perverse day his parents taught him to FEAR THE LORD. We live in a day when we emphasize (And it is good) the LOVE of the Lord. But we also need to teach our kids to fear the Lord —not being afraid of God — But being aware of the power and the righteousness and holiness of God — and the consequences of disobeying God.

No doubt, it was the fear of the Lord that would have prompted Obadiah to take care of the prophets of God.

¹⁵And Elijah said, “As the Lord of hosts lives, before whom I stand, I will surely show myself to him today.” ¹⁶So Obadiah went to meet Ahab, and told him. And Ahab went to meet Elijah.

It has been over 3 years, and now these 2 will meet face to face again

¹⁷When Ahab saw Elijah, Ahab said to him, “Is it you, you troubler of Israel?”  ¹⁸And he answered, “I have not troubled Israel, but you have, and your father’s house, because you have abandoned the commandments of the Lord and followed the Baals.

Ahab saw Elijah in that twisted light because of his theology and world view and because of his own sin. Ahab believed in Baal, so much so that his government promoted and supported Baal worship and persecuted the worshippers of Yahweh. Ahab believed that Elijah had angered the sky-god Baal and therefore Baal withheld rain. Ahab probably thought that Baal would hold back the rain until Elijah was caught and executed.

Ahab had no true North to reference the drought. The Scriptures are true North.  Deuteronomy 28:23-24 promised that drought would come to a disobedient Israel.

We need to understand that this is the reason why God or God’s people get the bad rap when things go wrong. It is a defective theology and world view that lead to blaming the God of the Bible and those who would fear and serve Him.

For many today, Christians are the trouble with America today.

If we would just get these narrow minded people out of the way our problems of greed and racism would disappear…..

If we would just get rid of those puritanical prudes we could enjoy a flourishing of all that is beautiful and good.

This is Satan’s way of priming the world for the absence of the raptured Church. Christians will be removed one day and the world will rejoice over it. But the truth of the matter is that the absence of the Church will not usher in all of the love and freedom that the world thinks Christians are preventing. It will usher in the Great Tribulation.

¹⁹Now therefore send and gather all Israel to me at Mount Carmel, and the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel’s table.”

1 Kings 18:36 makes it clear that Elijah did all this at the command of God. This wasn’t his clever idea or strategy. This was a God-inspired plan that Elijah obeyed. It was important to confront and eliminate these prophets of Baal before God sent rain to the land of Israel. It was crucial that everyone understand that the rain came from Yahweh, not from Baal.

1 Kings 17:8-16

Related Topics: Ahab; Jezebel; Elijah; One Sentence Ministry; The Brook keriyth; The Place of Preparation; The Place of Cutting; Whittled On By God; Absent Yourself; Obedience; God’s Word; God’s Provision; Zarephath; The Place of Refining; Widow of Zarephath; Creative Power of God;

CHAPTER 17

REVIEW

Elijah, the greatest prophet of Scripture, stepped on to the pages of Scripture in the first verse of Chapter 17. In the New Testament Elijah is mentioned by name more than any of the other Old Testament Prophets. This is extraordinary because he’s not predictive like Daniel (think of Daniel 9 and the panoramic view of God’s dealings with Israel up to the second coming of Jesus), like Isaiah (the 5^th Gospel), or Ezekiel (37 the rebirth of Israel, 38-39 the invasion of Jerusalem by Russia and a confederacy of Muslim nations).

By contrast, Elijah is a prophet that speaks to his own generation and brings about a dramatic change in his own generation.  And he steps on to the pages of Scripture with ZERO introduction, ZERO background. That’s the thing that I hope stirs each of our hearts! We look at OUR generation and think — What difference can I make? What chance do I have to bring about any change?  I live in obscurity. Well, that’s Elijah.  We don’t know how old he was.  Was he 80?  Was he 18?  We don’t know anything about his parentage.  He was a man who lived in obscurity in the area of Gilead and all we know about him is that He gets on his knees and prays.  EVERYTHING began there and he changed an entire generation.

God finally sends him — He walks in before Ahab and says — “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.”

THEN the Lord says to Elijah in Verse 3 — Depart from here. He has a one sentence ministry!

God says, ³…. hide yourself. This means much more than to go someplace where people can’t find you. It literally means “absent yourself”. The prerequisite for being used by God is that you “absent yourself”. John the Baptist would say — I must decrease and He must increase.

³…. hide yourself by the brook Keriyth — Keriyth means to CUT or to WHITTLE.  Elijah was going to discover that no man stands on Mount Carmel until he goes to Keriyth. No man can call fire down from heaven until they’ve been CUT away, WHITTLED on by God. And that is the hard bit about serving the Lord! The man or woman who loves Jesus wants to serve him, wants to be used by Jesus and for the glory of Jesus. But we don’t like the time of CUTTING and REFINING!

God has a Keriyth for each of us. God reserves the right to take us to a place that. Not just one time and one place, but He has those places where He teaches us to “absent ourselves” so that the world might see Jesus in us — Where He can WHITTLE away on our hearts.

⁴You shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there.”

Elijah learned that every drop of water and every bite of food was a heavenly provision. Here’s the deal, we love Jesus. We get up, we go to work or school everyday. We have food in our refrigerator. We’re in good health. And complacency sets in, a sense of spiritual apathy sets in. Until one day a doctor’s report comes — Your wife has cancer / you have cancer. Suddenly, you find yourself waking up saying — Lord, thank you for my wife.  Lord, forgive me for not thanking you for my wife / my health. You find yourself waking up saying — Lord, I have food today.  Lord, I have antibiotics if I need them for my children.  Lord, I have sustenance, I have a home.  I have a roof…

Keriyth was the place where God began to cut away from Elijah any sense of self reliance or complacency. In Keriyth, all of the sudden we’re looking to heaven every day.

⁷And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land. ⁷And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.

The drying brook caused Elijah to put his ear to heaven.  God said he was going to sustain me here by the brook.  If the brook is drying up, he must be preparing to move me.

When our brooks dry, it sharpens our hearing a little doesn’t it?

⁸Then the word of the Lord came to him, ⁹“Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there

God said — Arise, go to Sidon. That doesn’t make sense.  That defies logic.  that is enemy territory.  God is sending Elijah sending to the very place where Ba-al worship originated! God is sending Elijah to the very place where Jezebel came from — where her father was still king.  The very person and practice that caused God to bring judgment on Samaria — and stop the heavens from giving rain for 3 ½ years —originated in the very place God is now sending Elijah

⁹“Arise, go to Zarephath

Today this town is called Sarafand — in Lebanon.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff The Prophet of Fire: Or The Life and Times of Elijah, With Their Lessons p. 56

Zarephath got its name because it was a place where metals were mined; melted down and refined.

I wonder if Elijah was thinking — Wait a minute — First God said —Go to a place called CUT or WHITTLE. And that’s exactly what He did to me there! Now He wants me to go somewhere that means the refining place.

If I were in Elijah’s sandals, I wouldn’t have a peace about this.

This was like going from the frying pan into the fire. But you see, the Lord was NOT finished with Elijah. He had done some cutting on Elijah, now He needed to do some refining.

And Elijah is a different man.  He knows that God has spoken.  He’s learned at Keriyth that God can sustain.

HERE’S OUR PROBLEM — When we visit our personal Keriyth and come out the other side, we think that we are a finished product! The truth is that we will not be a finished product on this side of heaven. Jesus has begun a work in us and He will be faithful to complete that work. But it won’t be done until we see Him face to face.

1 John 3:2-3 Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. ³And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.

⁹“…. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you.”

In Elijah’s day and culture, and to the natural mind, it would have made more sense to wait beside a dry brook. Widows were notorious for their poverty in the ancient world. In that culture a widow with a son was the worst possible situation. In the day of Elijah if a widow was without a son had a hope of a reasonable life because it was the customary for a brother of the deceased husband to marry his brother’s wife so that she could bear a son to carry on the family name. But if you were widowed and already had a son, you were on your own.  She’s in bad shape.  Again, were it not for Keriyth it would have been absolutely reasonable for Elijah to think, “HOW is a WIDOW going to sustain me?”

I have commanded

How He did that, we don’t know. Some suggest that the verb commanded is best understood as “I have ordained that . . .”

We will see the influence of God on her life because she will go against every parental instinct in giving Elijah something to eat before feeding herself and her son.

QUOTE: Spurgeon — Yet this woman seemed unaware of the command. This shows how God’s unseen hand often works. “She does not appear to have been at all aware that she was to feed a prophet. She went out that morning to gather sticks, not to meet a guest. She was thinking about feeding her son and herself upon the last cake; certainly she had no idea of sustaining a man of God out of that all but empty barrel of meal. Yet the Lord, who never lieth, spoke a solemn truth when he said, ‘I have commanded a widow woman there.’ He had so operated upon her mind that he had prepared her to obey the command when it did come by the lip of his servant the prophet.” (Spurgeon)

¹⁰So he arose and went to Zarephath.

Last week we noted in Verse 5 concerning Keriyth — So he went!

This was a very dangerous journey. Elijah’s one sentence ministry didn’t resonate well with Ahab and Jezebel. Take a quick look over 1 Kings 18:10

¹⁰As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my lord has not sent to seek you. And when they would say, ‘He is not here,’ he would take an oath of the kingdom or nation, that they had not found you.

As Elijah is making this 80-100 mile journey, his life is at stake. People had to take an oath that they had never seen him. The topography parched.  It’s burnt.  Everything is dead.  There’s nothing green.  There’s no life.  Every step of Elijah’s journey he saw the consequence of sin, of Ba-al worship. The destructive nature of sin and idolatry was being impressed on his mind — impressed on his heart — every step of the way. Even the very threat against his life was the result of man rejecting the True and living God.

¹⁰ ….And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks.

QUOTE: Spurgeon — “You learn this from the fact that she had not even firewood. Now, there was no reason why she should not have had that even in time of famine of bread, for there was no famine of wood, unless she had been extremely poor.”

And he called to her and said, “Bring me a little water in a vessel, that I may drink.” ¹¹And as she was going to bring it,

Elijah comes to the gate of the city and there she is, the widow God had chosen and commanded / ordained to provide for His servant. From verse 12, we can safely say that she was emaciated, eyes sunken in her head, her skin sagging on her bones, moving slowly.  Her son is too weak to even leave the house.

In the midst of a devastating draught Elijah says — Give me a drink of water.

Remarkably — she begins to move, to get it.

DON’T MISS THIS — In the time of her trouble and HER difficulty, she re-focused herself on somebody else that was hurting and gave out. She did not have much water, but she shared that which she did have.

HUGE POINT FOR US — Look across the property of YOUR life and look for someone with parched lips.

QUOTE: Spurgeon — God indeed chose this woman, but He chose her for more than a miracle. He chose her for service. “The choice of this woman, while it brought such blessedness to her, involved service. She was not elected merely to be saved in the famine, but to feed the prophet. She must be a woman of faith; she must make the little cake first, and afterwards she shall have the multiplication of the meal and of the oil. So the grace of God does not choose men to sleep and wake up in heaven, nor choose them to live in sin and find themselves absolved at the last; nor choose them to be idle and go about their own worldly business, and yet to win a reward at the last for which they never toiled. Ah, no! the sovereign electing grace of God chooses us to repentance, to faith, and afterwards to holiness of living, to Christian service, to zeal, to devotion.”

he called to her and said, “Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand.”

“Wait a minute, I’m giving you water and I have precious little of that and now you’re asking for more” Isn’t that just like life? You give out and the person you are giving to wants more. MORE time — MORE attention — MORE of whatever they are seeking.

¹²And she said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die.”

Elijah discovered that the woman commanded by God to feed him was not only poor, but desperately poor.

¹³And Elijah said to her, “Do not fear; go and do as you have said. But first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son. ¹⁴For thus says the Lord the God of Israel, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’”

We don’t know all of the dynamics involved in this moment, but there is something so impressive about her that 1,000 years later, in Luke 4, Jesus mentions this woman.

Luke 4:25-26 But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, ²⁶and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.

I think she knows he’s Elijah.  FIRST — There’s nobody that hairy anywhere.  And besides that, we know from 1 Kings 18:10 that messengers had been sent through her territory looking for him.  She somehow knows that the drought is associated with his one sentence ministry in the presence of Ahab.

When she says — Well, as your God lives — she’s essentially saying — It’s because of your God that I don’t have any bread.

And, Elijah says — Well, as the Lord, God of Israel does live, the jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth

¹⁵And she went and did as Elijah said. And she and he and her household ate for many days. ¹⁶The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.

THIS IS HUGE — It doesn’t say that God gave her enough barrels to last a year. Elijah didn’t give her an address and when she showed up there it was a warehouse full of flour and oil. God didn’t give her a month’s worth — He didn’t give her a week’s worth — He didn’t give her a full day’s worth. Each time she went to the jar of flour — she scraped out the last speck. Every time she went to the jug of oil she poured out the last drop. Yet somehow — at lunch she returned to the jar she had emptied and the jug she had emptied — and there was enough flour and oil for lunch.

Keriyth was miraculous, but this was CREATION. She has literally scraped out the bottom of the barrel and yet every time she goes back there’ enough for one more meal.

I think this woman met Yahweh in her kitchen. I think that after a day or so of watching that, she fell on her knees and said – Ba-al isn’t God — You are God.  I think she walked around there singing – Praise God from whom all blessings!

God is SO INFINITELY WISE in His ways.

QUOTE: Spurgeon — “Why did not God give her a granary full of meal at once, and a vat full of oil instantly? I will tell you. It was not merely because of God’s intent to try her, but there was wisdom here. Suppose he had given her a granary full of meal, how much of it would have been left by the next day? I question whether any would have remained, for in days of famine men are sharp of scent, and it would soon have been noised about the city, ‘The old widow woman who lives in such-and-such a street, has a great store of food.’ Why, they would have caused a riot, and robbed the house, and perhaps, have killed the woman and her son. She would have been despoiled of her treasure, and in four and twenty hours the barrel of meal would have been as empty as it was at first, and the cruse of oil would have been spilled upon the ground.”

according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.

She only had one verse. She lived by it! The word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah determined her life and future and the life and future of her son in one verse.

We have the WHOLE BIBLE — How do we relate to the Word of the Lord? Do we allow the Word of God to determine our lives, our futures, and the future of our families?

As we look at Elijah and we look at this woman, we need to ask the question, “What do You want me to learn from them Lord?”

FIRST — God knows where we are and he knows where we’re going.  He knows when our brooks begin to dry.  He hears us screaming when our brooks begin to dry. Lord, you don’t love me anymore.  Lord, are you getting even with me?  Lord, why are you doing this? Lord, why is this going on? Lord, you’ve forgotten about me.

Isaiah 49:14-16 But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me; my Lord has forgotten me.” ¹⁵ “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. ¹⁶ Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me.

The Lord says that He will never forget me.  The nail prints in His hands remind Him of me always!

When we are at our Keriyths, when our brooks begin to dry, when everything is running out on me, He hasn’t forgotten me.  All that he’s doing is sharpening our hearing.  He wants us to turn our ears towards heaven. If things are drying up here, we’re preparing to move.  There’s somewhere to go.

And when God speaks, His direction might not seem logical as man measures logical. Elijah…  go to Zarephath, and Sidon.  I’ve commanded a widow. That can’t be the Lord.  That’s enemy territory.  Widows can’t take care of themselves when there’s rainfall — and you want a widow to care for ME in a draught!

Listen guys — There are no percentage clauses in the contract when we asked Jesus to become LORD of our lives.  He is not Lord of our lives except for Keriyth or Zarephath — cutting and refining.

When we get to CHAPTER 18 and the great showdown between Elijah and the prophets of Ba-al we will read

1 Kings 18:21 And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.”

Elijah doesn’t say that out of the theory.  He’s done the lab work.  He says that it’s a reality in his life.

The generation that we live in is going to hell and what we need to say to them is how long are you going to limp between two opinions?  There’s life and there’s death. And, if you follow Jesus, you’ll live.

That’s where God’s taking us — to Carmel.

But — the way there is through Keriyth and through Zarephath.

The scenery along that journey may speak to us.  We may see the consequences of sin all around us; the destruction, the drought on humanity.  But, we have to understand this, Keriyth and Zarephath are not designed to destroy us.

Zarephath is intended to REFINE us and FREE us. Remember Shadrach, Mishach and Abednego. When they were thrown into the fiery furnace there was only one thing that was burned!  The cords that BOUND them. The fire freed them and when Nebuchadnezzer looked into that furnace he saw a FOURTH person with them, one like the son of God.

God never takes us to a Zarephath to destroy.  It is always to REFINE and FREE.

Peter talks about our faith being tried like gold in the fire.

1 Peter 1:6-7 ⁶In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, ⁷so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

The refiner would put the precious metal in the crucible, heat it until it became molten.  The dross would come to the surface, and he would continue to scrape off the dross, the impurities until he could look down in the gold and see the reflection of his face.  Then, he knew it was pure.

That’s what God is doing.

SECONDLY — We don’t like that daily dependence.  It’s always been that way for God’s people; going back to the Israelites in the wilderness.  God provided them with manna. Every morning it was gathered. Enough provision fell, but it was only provision for that day.  They couldn’t store it up for a week.

We don’t like that economy! We like our 401Ks and our investment portfolios.  Don’t misunderstand me,  God can use those instruments. But man loves to bank his life on them. Val and I have a friend whose investment portfolio lost $½ million this past year.

Neither can we lay up a reserve in the things of God’s Word. It’s not enough for us to come to here on a Monday night and say — I got my dose for the week.  God does wonderful things — amazing things — each week when we gather in the name of Jesus. But we need MANNA each day from Him.

Guys, we are like Elijah in that we too are passing through enemy territory. As long as we’re here — God will never forsake us.  He’ll purify us.  He’ll conform us to the image of his son. And the jar of flour will never run out and the jug of oil will never fail.  His provision is there for us daily in his Word and in his Holy Spirit.

1 Kings 17:2-8

Related Topics: Ahab; Jezebel; Elijah; One Sentence Ministry; The Brook Cherith; The Place of Preparation; The Place of Cutting; Whittled On By God; Absent Yourself; Obedience; God’s Word; God’s Provision;

CHAPTER 17

REVIEW

Last week we saw how Elijah — the greatest prophet of Scripture —stepped on to the pages of Scripture with the little word  — AND. It’s a word that connects and builds on thoughts or ideas! It is the word that the Holy Spirit used in Chapter 16 to show the progressively building wickedness of the Northern kingdom — culminating in the rule of Ahab and Jezebel. After stringing together wickedness upon wickedness the Holy Spirit gives the SUM of it all —  “….Ahab did more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger than all the kings of Israel who were”

BEARING IN MIND that there were no chapter breaks in the original manuscripts — The narrative would have simply continued with another use of the word AND — ¹And Elijah the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead. The Holy Spirit wants us to see Elijah as connected to that moldy, malevolent, dark, demonic generation! Through 8 dynasties this wickedness has been building and building and building and building and building and building — AND — God has a man ready to stand for Him and with Him against this tidal wave of wickedness.

¹Elijah…. said to Ahab, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” ²And the word of the Lord came to him, ³“Depart from here and turn eastward and hide yourself by the brook Cherith, which is east of the Jordan. ⁴You shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there.” ⁵So he went and did according to the word of the Lord. He went and lived by the brook Cherith that is east of the Jordan. ⁶And the ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the brook. ⁷And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.

Here we see the very interesting way that the ministry of Elijah is going to continue. There is no doubt that he is the man that God is going to use in the face of a generation — will make a greater impact on his generation than anyone else. He walks in before Ahab and says, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” Then the Lord says, “Depart from here.”  He has a one sentence ministry! That would be incredibly frustrating! If you wait for years and pray for years to get into ministry. And you find yourself before the king and you say what’s burning in your heart and you say, “Now what Lord?” and the Lord says, “That’s enough, now get out of here and go hide yourself.” Frustrating would be an understatement.

I want us to think about this. As we look at this passage, there was no one with him at Cherith except the ravens. Only Elijah and Lord and those ravens knew what happened there. But Elijah discovered that his time at the Brook Cherith was so significant that he passed the account on — perhaps to the school of the prophets. I think that during Elijah’s season at the brook Cherith that Elijah discovered that no man stands on Mount Carmel until he goes to Cherith and Serephath. No man can call fire down from heaven until they’ve been refined and prepared. Isn’t that the rub? Isn’t that what is so hard about ministry. We like to be able to speak for God, to be used by God.  But we don’t like the time of preparation and refining.  So God has handed this record because we are so oriented to doing rather than being. I pray that as we study the life of this man that we will desire to be like this man, desire to be the man or woman that he can use to touch our generation, to learn to be the man or woman that has communion with the Living God

We look at our generation and we are ready to GO! I’m sure Elijah (because the Bible says that he was a man of like passions as you and I), said — “O.K. Lord, where now?” You want me to preach in the streets of Samaria? I’m ready to go! And the Lord said, NO, you’re not ready. Get out of here and go by yourself to the Brook Cherith.

The very name of the place tells us what God is up to in this command. Cherith in the Hebrew means to cut or to cut down or to whittle. By the way, if cutting doesn’t sound bad enough — whittling sounds worse. A cut might be painful but it’s quick. Whittling is what old guys do in a rocking chair for weeks! God, please don’t send to someplace called whittle! Zerephath means crucible — and that’s the next stop in the life of Elijah! Isn’t it amazing how we want to be involved in the kinds of things Elijah did, but we give no thought to the whittling and refining that god did in Elijah. God had things for Elijah to do, but he was pre-eminently concerned with Elijah being god’s man. So first we go to whittle.

ILLUSTRATION: During the reign of Oliver Cromwell the government of England ran out of silver with which to make the coinage of the realm. Cromwell therefore sent his men everywhere to see if they could find more of the precious metal. They returned to report that the only silver they could find was in the statues of the saints which were on display in various cathedrals of the land. “Good!” replied Cromwell, “we will melt down the saints and put them into circulation!”

Tan, P. L. (1996, c1979). Encyclopedia of 7700 illustrations  : A treasury of illustrations, anecdotes, facts and quotations for pastors, teachers and Christian workers. Garland TX: Bible Communications.

That’s what God wants to do in our lives. God doesn’t want us to just be found in church. He wants to get us into circulation, but He has to melt us down first. Easy to say but…..

It’s hard to preach passages like this because God is going to say to me at some point — You preached it! And if you’re laughing — you heard it too my friends! We’re in this together!

Job 4:1-5 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said: ² “If one ventures a word with you, will you be impatient? Yet who can keep from speaking? ³ Behold, you have instructed many, and you have strengthened the weak hands. ⁴ Your words have upheld him who was stumbling, and you have made firm the feeble knees. ⁵ But now it has come to you, and you are impatient; it touches you, and you are dismayed.

³…. hide yourself

This means much more than to go someplace where people can’t find you. It literally means — absent yourself. The prerequisite for being used by God is that you absent yourself. John the Baptist would say — I must decrease and He must increase. When people look at you and me they should see more of Jesus and less of you and me. If you want to be used of the Lord — Go on and hide yourself!

HUGE POINT — As Elijah goes to this place he is not going to be alone.

QUOTE: John Trapp

“Elijah could not be alone, so long as he had God and himself to converse with. A good man is never less alone, than when alone.”

We see this throughout the Scriptures —

Joseph in the house of Potiphar refused to engage in sexual sin with Potiphar’s wife — was falsely imprisoned for 13 YEARS. Those 13 years were a time of refining. We are told that The Lord was with Joseph (Genesis 39:21). That was Joseph’s Cherith.

• Moses was not prepared in the house Pharaoh. He was prepared on the back side of the wilderness for 40 YEARS. That was his Cherith.
• David — wasn’t prepared to sit on the throne by killing a giant. It was in all those years that he was being hounded like a fugitive by king Saul that prepared David to sit on the throne.
• John the Baptizer — Elijah’s reflection (if-you-would) spent his adult life in the wilderness preparing to announce the coming of the Messiah.
• Paul spent three years in the desert of Arabia being prepared to preach the Gospel to the non-Jewish world.

God has a Cherith for each of us. Not just one time and one place, but He has those places where He cuts on us, and teaches us to absent ourselves so that the world might see Jesus in us.

I don’t think it necessarily a geographical place — a literal wilderness. But I do believe that there is a sanctified loneliness that He lets us experience. A place that no one can know or be touched by but you. You can be in a room full of people — like this one — and you feel all alone.

God reserves the right to take us to a place that even when we want to be with other people somehow we stand alone. He takes me there. Something is going on and God is going to force me to drink from a stream that no one else knows about.  It is frustrating to my wife, frustrating to those who know me.  Cherith — He takes us there.

CHERITH was a place of OBEDIENCE.

²And the word of the Lord came to him, ³“Depart from here and turn eastward and hide yourself by the brook Cherith,

DON’T MISS THIS — Elijah didn’t have to sit around asking himself “What’s my five year plan” or “What is my long range plan?” It says that the Word of the Lord came to him. Here we are week in and week out, we have the Word of God. We have it in a more sure way that Elijah had it! If we look into it we hear God telling us the same thing that He told Elijah! We are told that we need to get alone with God because there isn’t anything that is going to change anything in this generation but a life that is on fire for God. A life that is marked by it’s consecration to God. It’s a life that in a sense can speak without a word. Cherith is where that life is formed. It’s a place of obedience.

NOTE THIS WITH ME — It’s also a place of protection and a place of sustenance.

⁴You shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there.” ⁵So he went and did according to the word of the Lord.

If Elijah had gone to Maui, none of the ravens would have showed up there!

We don’t want to go to Cherith. We want to go to Maui. Think about this, if Elijah had gone to wherever he wanted to go, the ravens would have still gone to Cherith and delivered their cargo there because that is where God had commanded them to go. It is interesting that in the book of Job (38:41) we are told when the young ravens cry out that their parents won’t even feed them, they’re left on their own to find food. But here are these ravens coming every day dropping off food for Elijah. They will feed you there!

³“Depart from here and turn eastward

TURN EASTWARD — This is where we get our term “to orient our self” or “to re-orient our self.” He is saying to Elijah —

“You have stood before Ahab, but now you have to re-orient your life!” We’re gong to do some whittling — we’re gonna do some cutting away — cutting away of YOU.  You see Elijah, you’ve heard My Word, but you don’t know anything about manna yet. You don’t know anything about food falling out of the sky, let alone fire!  You only know that I’ve told you to go stand before Ahab and say this one sentence.  But you don’t know anything about supernatural provision or supernatural power.  I need you to go to Cherith.

Now we read the account of these ravens and we say — We can’t really take this literally!

TRUE ACCOUNT: Years ago at Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa Keith Ritter — Missionary to China — told us of a Chinese national who was imprisoned for his faith. They were trying to starve him to death in his solitary confinement. The man began to pray and he heard a scratching in the wall. Suddenly a rat poked through with a big carrot in his mouth. It came back every day — sometimes with a cucumber — sometimes with an apple. Fresh produce every day.  A rat! Living in our hyper hygenic culture we wouldn’t have appreciated a rat! But if I was in that place and God was delivering, I’d be eatin!  It gets more amazing — One day the man was granted the unexpected privilege of having a visitor. That day the rat showed up with 2 carrots! The God of Elijah fed this man in China.

Everyday, the ravens showed up, right on time. We don’t always show up at church on time, but these ravens showed up on time, every day.

By the way, as we read this account of Elijah we need to bear in mind that to the Jew a raven was unclean — it might as well have been a flying rat. But Elijah didn’t eat the unclean raven — God delivered kosher food by way of an unclean carrier. There’s a lesson here for those who are involved in bringing spiritual food to a starving world.

QUOTE: Charles Spurgeon

Makes the point that one can bring spiritual food to others and still be unclean spiritually themselves. “But see, too, how possible it is for us to carry bread and meat to God’s servants, and do, some good things for his church, and yet be ravens still!”

Fresh food — fresh running water — everyday!

What was Elijah thinking ever day while he was there? He doesn’t have a One Year Bible. He doesn’t have Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening. I’m sure that he prayed. But I don’t think he heard the voice of the Lord every day. There were days that it was just him and the ravens. Probably got to know them really well — gave them names.

We don’t know how long he was there. It’s believed that he was there for at least a year — maybe two. Then we read —

⁷And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.

If you have read ahead through the chapter you know that Elijah is going from Cherith to Zerephath — gentile territory. But God has prepared him for that. “Gentiles — that’s nothing! I’ve been fed by ravens for the past year — I can handle gentiles!”

He’s going to meet a widow there and he’s going to say, “Will you do me a favor and make a little bread?” The widow is going to look at him and say — “Sorry. I’ve only got this little bit of flour and just enough oil in this container to make a cake of bread for me and my son and then we’re gonna die!” He’s going to say — “NO, No, No — I’ve already learned this lesson. The flour isn’t going to run out and the jug of oil won’t fail.” She’s going to ask a reasonable question, “How do you know that?” He’s going to say, “I just spent a year at Cherith. I’ve learned that ravens can drop food from heaven and that a brook can flow in a drought. God sent me here and that provision is not gonna run out until God is done with what He wants to do.”

I’m sure that Elijah enjoyed the sound of the brook. But one morning he wakes up and he’s not hearing it running. There came a day when there’s just puddles and little things are starting to swim in it.

I wonder what Elijah thought. My FIRST response and perhaps Elijah’s would have been (because we know that he was a man of like passions) — What are You doing Lord? YOU sent me here and now the brook is drying up?

I wonder if he said — God, my brook is drying up. What have I done wrong? If Job’s counselors were there they would have said — Your brook is drying up because there’s sin in your life.

It’s not that he’s out of God’s will. He is in the middle of God’s will. It’s not that God’s love and concern for Elijah has failed in any way.

Our brooks dry up some times! What is God doing in those moments?

Well God was doing something in Elijah’s life as the brook began to dry up. I’m sure that it would have been easy for Elijah to settle in and get comfortable next to that running brook. The rest of the land was in a drought, people were starving. He was camping out in a place with fresh running water and food delivered to his doorstep every day.

But when the brook begins to dry up Elijah is driven to ask, “What now Lord!”  Had the Lord not called Valerie and me to Northern California I would have been more than comfortable in Orange County. Best beaches in the America. Amazing food. Amazing weather. But the Lord sent us up here because there was something he wanted us to do here.

Here’s what happened with Elijah — When the brook started to dry up you can bet that it sharpened up Elijah’s hearing.

When our brooks dry up we get back on our knees and we get back into His Word and we begin to listen for His Word.

The drying brook preceded Verse 8

⁸Then the word of the Lord came to him, ⁹“Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there

The drying brook caused Elijah to return to the posture of listening!

You see, God leads us one step at a time! He isn’t mysterious. He isn’t hiding. He says to Elijah, Go and say these words to Ahab. What if Ahab wants to kill me or imprison me or torture me? God doesn’t tell Elijah any of that. He limits the information so that we are only accountable for what He does tell us.

Then God said, Go east and go to the Brook Cherith because I’ve commanded the ravens to feed you there and there you will have running water.  How Long? What do you mean, ravens?

It says, SO — HE — WENT. I want to be like that. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to have that written on our grave stone — So he went!

The will of God for our lives is a progressive revelation. As we obey what we do know, He unveils the next bit.

Valerie and I would never be at Metro had we not gone to Grass Valley.

Are you at Cherith? Is God whittling and cutting?

Is God asking you to absent yourself? There are plenty of people in this world that are just like you and me. Don’t you want to be different? Don’t you want there to be less of you and more of Jesus?

Is there a brook drying up in your life? F.B. Meyer mentions different kinds of drying brooks we might experience:

• The drying brook of popularity — ebbing away as from John the Baptist.
• The drying brook of health
• The drying brook of finances
• The drying brook of friendship

Let’s bring all that the Lord has spoken to our hearts tonight before Him as we take the bread and the cup. As we take the bread and the cup we can confess our every failure in these areas, knowing that the Body of Jesus was broken and the blood of Jesus was shed for them. As we take the bread and the cup we can view our aloneness — and the cutting and whittling — the drying brooks —  in the light of the cross, and know that He loves us in the midst of all of it!

1 Kings 17:1

Related Topics: Ahab; Jezebel; Elijah; God Seeking A Man; The Man God Uses; Standing before God; Wrapped Up In The Passions Of God; Jealous For God; The Man Who Prays

CHAPTER 17

¹Now Elijah the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.”

In the KJV Elijah steps on the scene with a conjunction — AND Elijah the Tishbite.

I like that reading because it fits so well with the way the Holy Spirit introduces the 8^th king of the Northern kingdom back in Chapter 16.

²⁹ …..and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty-two years. ³⁰And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord, more than all who were before him. ³¹And as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, he took for his wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went and served Baal and worshiped him….. ³³And Ahab made an Asherah.

Grammatically, the conjunction AND connects and builds on thoughts or ideas! By it, the Holy Spirit essentially makes the point that if it weren’t bad enough to walk for Ahab to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, he married Jezebel. We spoke at some length about her last Monday. She reintroduces Ba-al worship to Israel and imported 450 priests and prophets of Ba-al and placed them under the political umbrella of the Ahab’s kingdom by subsidizing their occultic activity — essentially making anyone who believed in the One, True and Living God a traitor to the king. She was Madonna, Barbara Streisand, and Cruella De Vil rolled into one on steroids! She was so wicked that her very name is synonymous with wicked. To prove the point — I can say that as a pastor I’ve dedicated babies for 27 years — and I’ve never once dedicated a Jezebel. 

After stringing together wickedness upon wickedness the Holy Spirit gives the SUM of it all —  ³³.…Ahab did more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger than all the kings of Israel who were

The Holy Spirit adds one more verse to close the 16^th chapter in which He records the fulfillment of a 500 year old prophecy which was a merciful warning to Ahab that God means what He says and says what He means.

REMEMBER — There are no chapter breaks in the original manuscripts. The original manuscript would continue the narrative with  ¹And Elijah the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead. That is the way that the author of Scripture — the Holy Spirit — saw fit to introduce to us the greatest prophet of the Old Testament — the prophet who is mentioned by name in the New Testament more than any prophet! He just says – And Elijah.

REMEMBER — the word connects and builds. The Holy Spirit wants us to see Elijah as connected to that moldy, malevolent, dark, demonic generation! Through 8 dynasties this wickedness has been building and building and building and building and building and building — AND — God has a man ready to stand for Him and with Him against this tidal wave of wickedness.

Here in the first verse of 1 Kings 17 we get to look into the pages of the history of Israel. God pops the lid on it for us — so that as we look at this man found in the middle of that — we can bring that picture forward to 2010! In THIS land we have men in the highest offices of government who think it’s just fine for a doctor to wait for the head of a full term baby to come out of the womb — drill a hole into it’s skull and suck it’s brain out! In THIS land we’re still deciding if a man should marry another man, or a woman should marry another woman. In THIS land people sue State governments (Ohio) because the state seal says – I can do all things through God who strengthens me. The word ‘God’ is not allowed to be there.  In THIS land there is an all out assault on righteousness on every level.

There is something else really important about this rather abrupt introduction of Elijah. The conjunction “and”, gives context for Elijah’s life and ministry, but it leaves us pretty deprived of background.

We don’t know who his parents are.  We know who Abraham’s dad was — Terah (Gen. 11:26). We know about Abraham’s family — his brothers were Nahor and Haran. His nephew by way of Haran was a guy named Lot (Gen. 11:27).  We know who David’s great grandparents were — Ruth and Boaz (Ruth 4). We know David’s grandfather was a guy named Obed (Ruth 4). We know that his dad’s name was Jesse (Ruth 4; 1 Sam 16). We know that David had 7 brothers (1 Sam 16). We know that the father of king Saul was a guy named Kish (1 Sam 9).  We know that Samson’s dad was named Manoah (Judges 13).  We know the names of Samuel’s parents —Elkanah and Hannah (1 Samuel 1).

We don’t’ know anything about this guy. We don’t know how old is he?  Is he 14 or is he 40?  We don’t’ know anything about him.  He steps onto the pages of scripture out of nowhere.  He’s not formally trained.  He’s not formally schooled.  He has no political protocol — no access to King Ahab.  We do know that he had bad taste in clothes and a bad hair cut. In 2 Kings 1 Ahab sent men to find Elijah and they said that they met this man. Ahab said — what did he look like?

⁷He said to them, “What kind of man was he who came to meet you and told you these things?” ⁸They answered him, “He wore a garment of hair, with a belt of leather about his waist.” And he said, “It is Elijah the Tishbite.”

About all we know about this man was that he was HAIRY and he wore HAIRY clothes!

The Holy Spirit is DIVINELY DELIBERATE in every word — or lack of words — in Scripture! I think God has left this man pretty much a blank slate so that we could ALL identify with him.  He comes from an obscure background.  Nobody knows who his parents are.  He seemingly has no credentials or training or skill sets that would give him the right or qualify him to even be a candidate for the role of mighty prophet of God. I think that’s why the Holy Spirit introduces Elijah to us by simply saying — And Elijah.

The stuff that man would hold as crucial and essential when it comes to jobs and titles and promotions — the Holy Spirit completely omits!

However — the Holy Spirit does tell us something about Elijah that only He can see — and that is of tremendous importance to the Lord in regards to choosing instruments through whom He can work. The Holy Spirit gives us a window into Elijah that is so crucial to our understanding of this man and his ministry to the radically lost generation and culture.

1 Kings 19:10 He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts.

The Holy Spirit is letting us know that pedigree, training, schooling and credentials are not the deciding factor in being used by God. Love for the Lord is THE ESSENTIAL qualification for serving the Lord.

ANOTHER INTERSTING OMISSION — Elijah is not called a prophet here — but virtually everywhere we find Elijah in the New Testament — he is referred to as Elijah the prophet.  When we think of “prophet” we think of those men whose prophetic ministry was predictive — Daniel – Ezekiel – Isaiah – Jeremiah.  You know what? Elijah guy is not predictive. That’s not his ministry.  He predicts the weather at one point —  that’s the sum and substance of his predictive activity. He’s not prophetic in that sense.  The greatest prophet that lived in the Old Testament — the prophet that is most often mentioned in the New Testament is not predictive.

You know the first prophet mentioned in the Bible (Genesis 20:7) is Abraham — an angel of God label’s Abraham as a prophet. Abraham’s a prophet! What do you mean he’s a prophet?

We have to understand that ABOVE ALL ELSE — the prophet was someone whose life and passions were — wrapped up in — held captive by — the passions and pleasures of God.  Here’s the man who was the greatest prophet that ever lived — what did he do?  He stepped into the middle of his own generation. He had no qualifications.  He didn’t fill out any resume.  He didn’t even know how to take care of himself.  He was unkempt.  He was rugged.  He steps into the scene.  With his heart on fire.  He was a man who was jealous for God. FROM THAT HEART he becomes unique on the pages of Scripture.

He’s the first prophet — the first man of God in the Bible — to raise the dead. I’ve heard of missionaries praying over the dead and they have witnessed the dead being raised to life. For a missionary to pray for someone who died ‘ they have a reference point — well, Jesus did it. Elijah has NO point of reference for such a thing.  Up to this moment there is NO record that anyone was ever raised from the dead.  What is Elijah thinking when he prays over the dead body of the son of a widow?  He’s unique in that sense.

He’s the first one we know of to shut up the heavens for 3 ½ years.  That had never been done before.  What is he thinking?  There’s 1.5 trillion tons of rain that fall on the surface of the earth every day.  330 cubical million miles of ocean.  1.5 trillion tons of rain that crash down on the earth every day.  And Elijah says – it ain’t gonna rain.  He had ZERO reference point for such a prayer.

Elijah didn’t taste death.  He was taken up in a fiery chariot.  That makes him unique.  Enoch never tasted death but he didn’t leave this world via a fiery chariot.  Elijah is seen in the New Testament on the mount of transfiguration with Jesus and Moses.  He’s a unique man.

Another thing UNIQUE about Elijah — that is incredibly relevant to the day in which we live — the Scriptures say that Elijah is coming again!

The Old Testament ends with the Book of Malachi. In the second to the last verse of the last book of the O.T. we read

Malachi 4:5 ⁵“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.

You look at the world today.  You look at the conditions of the world today.  You look at them falling apart.  You look at the spiritual and moral darkness.  You look at the injustice. OUR world is spiritually and morally dark and malevolent. It is one long connected sting of rotten stuff. You know what — Elijah is the right man for the job — and he’s coming.

That says something to my heart. As we look at this man walk into the pages of Scriptures with a simple — AND ELIJAH — there’s something that’s in keeping with the spirit of Elijah for our generation, for our age.  WE should want in our hearts the same zeal for the Lord  — the same hunger to see the name of Jesus glorified in our lives.

And ELIJAH — What does his name mean? El = God.  I = my.  Jah = Jehovah/Yahweh.  God my Jehovah.  It transliterates into My God is the Lord.  That was his name.  That’s great.  In an era when everyone was worshipping other gods, bowing their knee to all kinds of other master passions, his very name said MY God is Yahweh.

People are willing to stand up for all kinds of things today — without shame and they say that they stand up for then whales, for the spotted owls, for trees, for all kinds of strange rights. What about us? Elijah by name and by action said, My God is the Yahweh, that’s who my God is, He is my master passion.

And ELIJAH the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead—

He’s from Gilead.  Gilead was on the east side of the Jordan River. Is he a Jew?  We assume.  We’re not sure.  Gilead means – hill of witness.  That’s a great place for a guy like this to come from.

THIS IS HUGE for those of you who are parents — and for those who are not — file it in your hearts under — This is what I want to be.

Somewhere there was a godly parent, or godly parents, whose hearts were stirred in some way to name their little kid Elijah.  When he was growing up, he must’ve said – why did you name me Elijah? They must’ve said – because it means ‘My God is the Lord’. When he was growing up — every time somebody called him by name he was reminded – My God is the Lord.  There had to come a point in his young life when he saw the world around him worshipping Ba-al and Asherah and Molech — when his heart became jealous for the True and Living God.

When you look at the condition of our nation — we are desperate for parents who will say OUR God is the Lord — and we’re going to worship him.

This man, Elijah, is one huge — living — exhortation!  Exhortation means to come along side and call to action. By way of the Scriptures the very life of Elijah comes along side and calls US to action. His life doesn’t come along side the person who wants to come sit in church and go out and live for some other master passion. But his life will speak to those whose hearts are moved and broken as they look at THIS generation — THIS culture.  It will speak to the man or woman — young or old — that looks at the world around them and says — I’m just one person — Nobody knows who I am — Nobody knows who my parents are — I’m not qualified — I’m not trained — What could I ever do?

said to Ahab, “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.”

There is much we don’t know about this man — but we can over lay two passages of Scripture on Elijah’s life that will give us a window into this declaration.

Deuteronomy 11: 16-17 Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; ¹⁷then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the Lord is giving you.

James 5:16b-18 The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man —

God wants us to be very clear on this matter — Elijah was not some superhuman guy — he was just a man.

with a nature like ours —

The KJV says — subject to like passions as we are

and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. ¹⁸Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

Jesus concurs with that in Luke 4:25 where He says that it didn’t rain for 3 ½ years.

So those passages are the OVERLAY. Here’s what we conclude. Somewhere in Gilead, this hairy man, wearing hairy clothes, gets on his knees and says –

God, what’s going on?  I know you’re real. You’re alive.  I sense your presence.

Your Word says that if your people sin you are going to shut up the heavens — they will become like brass — that you won’t bless them, that you are going to speak to them.

He was very jealous for the True and Living God.  He was very grieved about his generation.  He felt quite helpless. There was nothing he could do — so he began to pray.  God brought a drought.

Evidently by the time he gets to Ahab — it’s already six months in progress. And from everything we see in the life of Elijah — God would speak and he would obey. So as we see him before Ahab we are on safe ground thinking that God said – Go tell Ahab. He was no doubt much like Moses going to Pharaoh to say – let my people go.  He’s headed from Gilead over to Samaria — there was something burning in his heart.

He comes into Samaria and he comes into the king’s palace, which was no doubt luxurious and opulent, and there’s Jezebel and Ahab.  Here comes this hairy, strange guy.  Nobody stopped him (they were probably looking at all his hair and his hairy clothes and thought — human lice farm!) He comes walking in — he stands in front of Ahab and Jezebel and says — “As the Lord the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” And, he turns around and we walks out.  I’m just trying to imagine the look on the faces of Ahab and Jezebel! WHAT? What was that? He did that at the prospect of losing his life!

Let’s walk around a bit in the words of Elijah.

He says  — the Lord, God of Israel is alive. First of all Ahab — you’re not in charge of Israel.  The Lord is the God of Israel and He’s alive.  Secondly — he’s saying – Baal isn’t in charge charge of anything —especially the rain.

Jeremiah 14:22 Are there any among the false gods of the nations that can bring rain? Or can the heavens give showers? Are you not he, O Lord our God? We set our hope on you, for you do all these things.

He says – Baal is not God.  REMEMBER — They believed that Ba-al brought the rain.  He was the God of the sun and the moon and the stars.  (NOTE TO SELF — Radical environmentalism existed in thousands of years ago.) Elijah walked on the scene and said – he’s not God.  Yahweh is God and he’s in charge and He’s alive.

THIRD — If he were living in our day he could say — My GPS says I’m standing in the palace of Ahab and in front of Ahab — but in reality I’m standing before the True and Living God.  THAT is a huge truth on a couple of levels.  FIRST — Think of how many marriages have ended in divorce because of GPS technology. Wives discovering that their husbands really weren’t at the gym. If a woman can know where her husband is standing — ya think God can? It doesn’t matter where you might be —or how discrete and clandestine and stealthy you have been. Though we can’t see Him with these physical eyes — you are standing before God! No hiding from Him.  SECOND — It is not man or man’s opinion that should concern you. Ahab, Jezebel, teacher, or boss — you live your life as standing before the True and Living God who loves you and sent His Son to die for you. You live and speak as to please Him! You fear Him, not man!

Having said that — REMEMBER — James told us that Elijah was a man of like passions as you and I are.  He wasn’t immune from the feeling we call fear. He wasn’t immune from the feeling that we call despair. We will see that Elijah will throw in the towel at one point.  But, he was a man who loved God.  He was a man who was jealous for the glory of God.  He was a man who was grieved in his own generation.  I’m sure that our adversary the devil was Elijah’s adversary — and like our adversary the devil comes to us — he went to Elijah as Elijah’s adversary and said — Elijah, there is not one thing you can do about it.  Nobody knows who you are.  Nobody knows where you live.  Nobody knows who your mom and dad are.  You aren’t qualified.  You don’t have an audience.  There is absolutely nothing you can do.

But — I’m also sure that when Elijah felt everything that we feel — was lied to by the devil like we are — that Elijah heard a still small voice say something else.  I think when Elijah looked at his world and said —Lord — look where this generation has come.  Look at the leadership.  Look at the moral darkness — look at the spiritual darknesss.  Look at the babies being sacrificed to the god of sensual pleasure — burned alive in the womb.  Look at what people worship.  What kind of a country are children going to grow up in God? What can I do?  I’m just one man. I’m just one man — nobody knows who I am and where I live and what can I do?  I’m just one man I don’t have any resources.  What can I do?

A still small voice said to him – Pray! Pray Elijah! Pray! There’s nothing that’s restricting me Elijah.  I have all the resources.  I’m the God of Israel, I’m in charge, not Ahab.  You stand in my presence, you don’t stand in his.  Pray!  Pray!  A nation needs to be changed.  Pray.

QUOTE: John Bunyan (1628-1688) author of Pilgrim’s Progress.

You can do more than pray once you’ve prayed.  But, you can’t do more than pray until you’ve prayed.

DON’T MISS THIS — In the world of architecture and structural engineering much the superstructure of a building musty always be proportional to its foundation! We might call the words and the deeds of Elijah the SUPERSTRUCTURE of his life and ministry. All that we can SEE in his life — could not have stood without a radical foundation. So much of his ministry was exercised in private — was built in a place that nobody saw.  No eye was on him but God’s.  When he came to the court of Ahab, he had already prayed. When he spoke to Ahab he had already spoken to God — already heard from God!

HOW DOES ALL OF THIS RELATE TO YOU AND ME TONIGHT?

FIRST — He was just a man. How old? God doesn’t tell us — God doesn’t want us to know — Because God wants to speak to us whether we’re 14 or 40 — 18 or 80. He wants to say to all of us  — look at this man, I want you all to know — he’s just a man — who when he saw the mess around him turned to heaven.

Listen to what the Lord said to Ezekiel. Ezekiel lived and prophesied at the beginning of the Judah’s captivity in Babylon. There was still a population of Jews in Judah under a puppet king. The spiritual and moral decay of the people was horrific. (See Ezekiel 22)

Ezekiel 22:20 And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.

I sought for a man — a woman — but I found none. Not for an organization.  Not for a committee.  Not for a denomination.  Not for a concert. One man.  One woman.  The nation was falling apart and God said — I looked for one man, one woman to stand in the gap before me that I shouldn’t destroy the land and I found none.

Listen to what the Lord said to Isaiah —

Isaiah 59:16 He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no one to intercede;

Much is said about seeking the Lord.  Much is written about finding his will.  I would never diminish either of those things. But the Bible says that there is something else that’s going on.  The Lord is seeking a man, he’s seeking a woman. We read in 2 Chronicles 16:9 For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him. In the rule of Ahab and Jezebel the eyes of the Lord were going to and fro throughout the earth and they land on Gilead — because there’s one man. Yeah, he’s a nobody. Yeah, he’s a walking talking carpet. But, he’s on his knees and he’s saying — Lord, I’m jealous for your name. Here we are in 2010 — The eyes of the Lord are STILL going to and fro throughout the whole earth — looking for a man. What kind of a man is God looking for? What kind of a man can stand before the Ahabs and Jezebels of our generation (neighborhood – school – work)? The life of Elijah tells us that God isn’t looking for a superman — He is looking for a HU-man! A HU-man who is on their knees saying — Lord, they’re making a mockery of who you on every front — they are legislating against you and they’re setting up other god’s.  Oh, God, I’m jealous for your glory.  This is who you say that you are.  There’s a generation that is being lost and deceived.

God sees that heart. He found it in ONE man in the rule of Ahab. One person.

Can one man or one woman change a nation?  Can one teenager?  One 80 year old?  Elijah’s life screams — YES!

I’m rebuked by this.  Lord teach me to pray — teach us to pray.

1 Kings 15:25-33 & 16

Related Topics: Divided Kingdom; Jeroboam; Rehoboam; Abijah; Asa; Idolatry; homosexual prostitues; Asherah; Baasha; Buying Security with things consecrated to God; God’s loving Correction; Blowing off God’s Message; Blasting God’s Messenger; Finishing Well; Fresh Faith; Nadab; Elah; Zimri; Suicide; Omri; Ahab; Jezebel

Chapter 15

The chapter begins in the Southern kingdom JUDAH.

We pick up from last week in Chapter 25.  In this verse, we move to the northern kingdom, Israel.

We actually backtrack to the king that preceded Baasha. We begin a fast track downhill from Nadab to Ahab

²⁵Nadab the son of Jeroboam began to reign over Israel in the second year of Asa king of Judah, and he reigned over Israel two years. ²⁶He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of his father, and in his sin which he made Israel to sin. ²⁷Baasha the son of Ahijah, of the house of Issachar, conspired against him. And Baasha struck him down at Gibbethon, which belonged to the Philistines, for Nadab and all Israel were laying siege to Gibbethon. ²⁸So Baasha killed him in the third year of Asa king of Judah and reigned in his place. ²⁹And as soon as he was king, he killed all the house of Jeroboam. He left to the house of Jeroboam not one that breathed, until he had destroyed it, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by his servant Ahijah the Shilonite. (1 Kings 14:7-16) ³⁰It was for the sins of Jeroboam that he sinned and that he made Israel to sin, and because of the anger to which he provoked the Lord, the God of Israel.

Nadab was king little more than one year, but since it covered parts of two calendar years, Hebrew time measurement reckons his reign as two years.

Had Jeroboam remained obedient to the LORD, God promised him a lasting dynasty like the house of David (1 Kings 11:38). Because of his sin, the house of Jereboam is wiped out by murder and assassination!

QUOTE: ADAM CLARKE

“Thus God made use of one wicked man to destroy another.”

³¹Now the rest of the acts of Nadab and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? ³²And there was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all their days. ³³In the third year of Asa king of Judah, Baasha the son of Ahijah began to reign over all Israel at Tirzah, and he reigned twenty-four years.

What follows is exactly what we would expect from a man who comes to power by way of assassination. He ushered in a dark period for the Northern kingdom, both spiritually and politically.

³⁴He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin which he made Israel to sin.

Baasha was not a biological descendant of Jeroboam, but he was a spiritual descendent of this great idolater of the northern kingdom. Because he walked in the way of Jeroboam the house of Baasha would face the same judgment as the house of Jeroboam.

CHAPTER 16

Still in the Northern kingdom

¹And the word of the Lord came to Jehu the son of Hanani against Baasha, saying, ²“Since I exalted you out of the dust and made you leader over my people Israel, and you have walked in the way of Jeroboam and have made my people Israel to sin, provoking me to anger with their sins, ³behold, I will utterly sweep away Baasha and his house, and I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat. ⁴Anyone belonging to Baasha who dies in the city the dogs shall eat, and anyone of his who dies in the field the birds of the heavens shall eat.” ⁵Now the rest of the acts of Baasha and what he did, and his might, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? ⁶And Baasha slept with his fathers and was buried at Tirzah, and Elah his son reigned in his place. ⁷Moreover, the word of the Lord came by the prophet Jehu the son of Hanani against Baasha and his house, both because of all the evil that he did in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger with the work of his hands, in being like the house of Jeroboam, and also because he destroyed it. ⁸In the twenty-sixth year of Asa king of Judah, Elah the son of Baasha began to reign over Israel in Tirzah, and he reigned two years. ⁹But his servant Zimri, commander of half his chariots, conspired against him. When he was at Tirzah, drinking himself drunk in the house of Arza, who was over the household in Tirzah, ¹⁰Zimri came in and struck him down and killed him, in the twenty-seventh year of Asa king of Judah, and reigned in his place.

When was Elah killed? When he had become drunk. Because he was drinking, his defenses were down. Alcohol is not a stimulant. It is a depressant, meaning that it depresses (dulls and diminishes) the higher functions of the brain.

QUOTE: General Pershing

Drunkenness has killed more men than all of the wars in human history

KEY EXAMPLE: Alexander the Great was one of the most prolific leaders in history. At the age of 16 he was ruler over Macedonia. By the time he was 20 he was king of the Greek Empire. By the time he was 30 he had conquered the then known world. He wept bitterly when there were no more worlds to conquer. Just before his death he threw a party and invited all 20 of his leaders to this party and drank to the health of each of these 20 leaders. After he had done that he called for the cup of Hercules, a huge cup. He filled it with wine and drank it all and fell over in a comma. He was carried out back to his tent. It was rainy outside and he got sick and within three days he had died. Alcohol conquered the man that had conquered the world.

Drunkenness is still taking lives.

By the way, there are things other than alcohol that diminish our reasoning, cause us to lower our guard, our defenses — relationships, success, disappointments.

¹¹When he began to reign, as soon as he had seated himself on his throne, he struck down all the house of Baasha. He did not leave him a single male of his relatives or his friends. ¹²Thus Zimri destroyed all the house of Baasha, according to the word of the Lord, which he spoke against Baasha by Jehu the prophet, ¹³for all the sins of Baasha and the sins of Elah his son, which they sinned and which they made Israel to sin, provoking the Lord God of Israel to anger with their idols. ¹⁴Now the rest of the acts of Elah and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?

¹⁵In the twenty-seventh year of Asa king of Judah, Zimri reigned seven says in Tirzah. Now the troops were encamped against Gibbethon, which belonged to the Philistines, ¹⁶and the troops who were encamped heard it said, “Zimri has conspired, and he has killed the king.” Therefore all Israel made Omri, the commander of the army, king over Israel that day in the camp. ¹⁷So Omri went up from Gibbethon, and all Israel with him, and they besieged Tirzah. ¹⁸And when Zimri saw that the city was taken, he went into the citadel of the king’s house and burned the king’s house over him with fire and died, ¹⁹because of his sins that he committed, doing evil in the sight of the Lord, walking in the way of Jeroboam, and for his sin which he committed, making Israel to sin. ²⁰Now the rest of the acts of Zimri, and the conspiracy that he made, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?

Wow, the guy is king for 7 days and wanted to die. Was his path to the throne worth it? He killed and murdered and conspired and found that he couldn’t live with everything he had to do to have the throne.

²¹Then the people of Israel were divided into two parts. Half of the people followed Tibni the son of Ginath, to make him king, and half followed Omri. ²²But the people who followed Omri overcame the people who followed Tibni the son of Ginath. So Tibni died, and Omri became king. ²³In the thirty-first year of Asa king of Judah, Omri began to reign over Israel, and he reigned for twelve years; six years he reigned in Tirzah. ²⁴He bought the hill of Samaria from Shemer for two talents of silver, and he fortified the hill and called the name of the city that he built Samaria, after the name of Shemer, the owner of the hill. ²⁵Omri did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and did more evil than all who were before him. ²⁶For he walked in all the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and in the sins that he made Israel to sin, provoking the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger by their idols. ²⁷Now the rest of the acts of Omri that he did, and the might that he showed, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?

Omri is followed by the most wicked and infamous of all the kings of the Northern kingdom

²⁹In the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, Ahab the son of Omri began to reign over Israel, and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty-two years. ³⁰And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord, more than all who were before him. ³¹And as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, he took for his wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went and served Baal and worshiped him.

The most wicked king in Israel took to himself a wife whose name is synonymous with wickedness. She introduced BA-AL worship to the region

Ba-al was the god of the rain. Ba-al worship was not simple. It was intellectually complex and thus played upon the pride of man. And it appealed to sensual desires.

³²He erected an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which he built in Samaria. ³³And Ahab made an Asherah. Ahab did more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him. ³⁴In his days Hiel of Bethel built Jericho. He laid its foundation at the cost of Abiram his firstborn, and set up its gates at the cost of his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the Lord, which he spoke by Joshua the son of Nun.

Joshua 6:26 26 At that time Joshua pronounced this solemn oath: “Cursed before the LORD is the man who undertakes to rebuild this city, Jericho: “At the cost of his firstborn son will he lay its foundations; at the cost of his youngest will he set up its gates.”

We will close here.

Next week, we are going to take a close look at the spiritual backdrop of the days of Ahab and Jezebel. We will see the relationship between that place and time and the days in which we live.

Not to leave us in the dark here, in our next study we are introduced to one of the most amazing and powerful individuals in the entire Bible. While the darkness is brooding over the Northern kingdom God has been preparing a man who will come out of nowhere as a bright light — ELIJAH the prophet.

QUOTE: John Ross Macduff

The Prophet of Fire: Or the Life and Times of Elijah, With Their Lessons page 21

1 Kings 15:1-24

Related Topics: Divided Kingdom; Jeroboam; Rehoboam; Abijah; Asa; Idolatry; homosexual prostitues; Asherah; Baasha; Buying Security with things consecrated to God; God’s loving Correction; Blowing off God’s Message; Blasting God’s Messenger; Finishing Well; Fresh Faith; Nadab; Elah; Zimri; Suicide; Omri; Ahab; Jezebel

Chapter 15

The chapter begins in the Southern kingdom Judah.

¹Now in the eighteenth year of King Jeroboam the son of Nebat, Abijam began to reign over Judah. ²He reigned for three years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Maacah the daughter of Abishalom. ³And he walked in all the sins that his father did before him, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father. ⁴Nevertheless, for David’s sake the Lord his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem, setting up his son after him, and establishing Jerusalem, ⁵because David did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and did not turn aside from anything that he commanded him all the days of his life, except in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.

Let’s start with the Holy Spirit’s reference to King David.

It is interesting to see how many times David’s name appears in Kings and Chronicles

QUOTE: F.B Meyer How long after David’s sun had set did the light of his life shine over his house.

Because David Loved God so much; Worshipped God so fervently, the glow of his life remained upon his family line for many generations.

KEY APPLICATION: What we enjoy and have as Christians is the result of those who have gone before us and have prayed for us and given of themselves. What we have here as a fellowship is because there have been people that prayed for a work of God here and looked forward to a work of God here.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — We are probably all inheriting more than we know from the prayers and tears of those who have gone before us.

Our relationship with God has long term effects for years after us.

I want my life and this fellowship to leave such a legacy!

⁶Now there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all the days of his life.

This war was an ongoing series of battles and skirmishes between the Northern and Southern kingdoms. The author states the conflict in these terms to emphasize the connection between and the hostility between the houses of Rehoboam and Jeroboam that began with the events of 1 Kings 12.

2 Chronicles 13 fills in more details about the reign of Abijam and in particular this war. He is called Abijah in Chronicles. It tells us how there was war between Jeroboam, king of Israel and Abijam, king of Judah, and how Abijam challenged the illegitimacy of Jeroboam’s kingdom.

2 Chronicles 13:4-12 “Hear me, O Jeroboam and all Israel! ⁵Ought you not to know that the Lord God of Israel gave the kingship over Israel forever to David and his sons by a covenant…. ⁸“And now you think to withstand the kingdom of the Lord in the hand of the sons of David, because you are a great multitude and have with you the golden calves that Jeroboam made you for gods. ⁹Have you not driven out the priests of the Lord, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and made priests for yourselves like the peoples of other lands? Whoever comes for ordination with a young bull or seven rams becomes a priest of what are no gods. ¹⁰But as for us, the Lord is our God, and we have not forsaken him. We have priests ministering to the Lord who are sons of Aaron, and Levites for their service.¹¹….For we keep the charge of the Lord our God, but you have forsaken him. ¹²Behold, God is with us at our head, and his priests with their battle trumpets to sound the call to battle against you. O sons of Israel, do not fight against the Lord, the God of your fathers, for you cannot succeed.”

Jeroboam responded with a surprise attack, and victory seemed certain for Israel over Judah, but Abjiam cried out to the LORD, and God won a victory for Judah that day.

2 Chronicles 13:18 says of that war, Thus the children of Israel were subdued at that time; and the children of Judah prevailed, because they relied on the LORD God of their fathers.

Yet Chronicles also tells us that in the midst of his victory and good leadership for Judah, he never had the relationship with the LORD he should have had. Verse 13 proves that he had sanctioned idolatry.

REMEMBER — God does not measure lives on the basis of human success or achievement. God looks on the heart. It should be the great desire of our hearts that that Jesus would motivate, influence, and receive the glory for all that we do.

⁷The rest of the acts of Abijam and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? And there was war between Abijam and Jeroboam. ⁸And Abijam slept with his fathers, and they buried him in the city of David. And Asa his son reigned in his place. ⁹In the twentieth year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Asa began to reign over Judah, ¹⁰and he reigned forty-one years in Jerusalem. From 910 to 869 b.c. His mother’s name was Maacah the daughter of Abishalom. ¹¹And Asa did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, as David his father had done. ¹²He put away the male cult prostitutes out of the land

These state-sanctioned homosexual idol-temple prostitutes were introduced into Judah during the reign of Rehoboam (1 Kings 14:24). Asa’s father Abijam didn’t remove these perversions and idols, but King Asa did

and removed all the idols that his fathers had made.

¹³He also removed Maacah his mother from being queen mother because she had made an abominable image for Asherah.

Asherah — A female pagan diety believed to give fertility to crops, animals and humans. Worship of this goddess involved every kind of sexuasl sin.

abominable image — The Hebrew word is closer in meaning to frightening, horrible, or abominable. Paul says this in regards to things sacrificed to idols.

1 Cor. 10:19-20 What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? ²⁰No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God.

I think of some of the demonic imagery in today’s movies. I often wonder, what are these guys into to come up with such frightening creatures. We might also read abominable as “obscene.“ Some commentators believe it was some sort of phallic symbol consistent with the fertility cult of Asherah.”

And Asa cut down her image and burned it at the brook Kidron.

Asa is a man that we will study in greater detail in Chronicles. He was dedicated to the Lord. Even to the extent of dealing with his own mother.

Luke 14:26 If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.

Our love for Jesus must be so intense that our love for anyone or anything else is hatred in comparison to our love for him

¹⁴But the high places were not taken away. Nevertheless, the heart of Asa was wholly true to the Lord all his days.

NOTE: Even though he did not complete the task, his heart was perfect towards the Lord. Not morally perfect — but fully towards the Lord — loyal to the true and living God. The Lord looks on the heart above all else. Let that be a comfort to you when people condemn you or misunderstand you. Now we must never say without prayerful consideration — ”The Lord knows my heart.” We must always do as the psalmist —

Psalm 139:23-24 Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! ²⁴ And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!

If you have sincerely done that and you have a clean conscience before the Lord, know that no matter what man might say, the Lord knows your heart!  Having said that, Asa was strong in regards to idolatry, but weak in faith when it came to the threats against Judah’s national security that came from Israel.

¹⁶And there was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all their days.

The rule of Asa continued into the rule of Baasha, the third king of the northern kingdom. The struggle for dominance between the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah rolls on.

¹⁷Baasha king of Israel went up against Judah and built Ramah, that he might permit no one to go out or come in to Asa king of Judah.

Baasha was able to gain the upper hand in the days of Asa because he effectively blocked a main route into Judah at the city of Ramah. He hoped this military and economic pressure on Judah would force Asa into significant concessions.

¹⁸Then Asa took all the silver and the gold that were left in the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house and gave them into the hands of his servants.

REMEMBER — these treasures were dedicated to the Lord for the worship of God in the house of the Lord. The treasures of the king’s house represented the glory of the Lord in His goodness to Israel.

And King Asa sent them to Ben-hadad the son of Tabrimmon, the son of Hezion, king of Syria, who lived in Damascus, saying, ¹⁹“Let there be a covenant between me and you, as there was between my father and your father. Behold, I am sending to you a present of silver and gold. Go, break your covenant with Baasha king of Israel, that he may withdraw from me.” ²⁰And Ben-hadad listened to King Asa and sent the commanders of his armies against the cities of Israel and conquered Ijon, Dan, Abel-beth-maacah, and all Chinneroth, with all the land of Naphtali. ²¹And when Baasha heard of it, he stopped building Ramah, and he lived in Tirzah. ²²Then King Asa made a proclamation to all Judah, none was exempt, and they carried away the stones of Ramah and its timber, with which Baasha had been building, and with them King Asa built Geba of Benjamin and Mizpah.

Asa took things that were reserved solely for the glory and worship of God to buy help from Ben-Hadad, king of Syria. He not only took what belonged to the Lord, he did because he didn’t believe in the loving protection of God for the throne of David

QUOTE: Matthew Poole — He did this out of carnal fear and distrust of that God whose power and goodness he had lately experienced.

He didn’t need to take those treasures. He didn’t have to buy protection from the king of Syria. He only needed to look to the God of Israel; trust in the Lord.

Here’s the critical thing, Asa probably thought he was doing a good thing here, as good a thing as ridding the land of the male cult prostitutes and removing all the idols that his fathers had made and removing his mother from being queen mother because she had made that abominable image for Asherah.  He was trying to preserve the throne of David. But in his fear and unbelief he doubly insulted God.

2 Chronicles 16 tells us that this didn’t exactly thrill God. God sent the prophet Hanani, not to blast Asa, but to inform and instruct Asa, so that Asa could repent and believe!

2 Chronicles 16:7b-9 “Because you relied on the king of Syria, and did not rely on the Lord your God, the army of the king of Syria has escaped you. ⁸Were not the Ethiopians and the Libyans a huge army with very many chariots and horsemen? Yet because you relied on the Lord, he gave them into your hand. ⁹For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him. You have done foolishly in this, for from now on you will have wars.”

Asa did not respond well to this message. When you have a problem with God’s message it’s because you have a problem with God. If you have a problem with God you are going to have a problem with God’s messenger!

2 Chronicles 16:10 ¹⁰Then Asa was angry with the seer and put him in the stocks in prison, for he was in a rage with him because of this. And Asa inflicted cruelties upon some of the people at the same time.

He not only doubly insulted God, but when God threw Asa a lifeline, Asa threw it back in the face of God. He refused to hear God’s correction and then punished God’s messenger. Anyone here ever done that? God sends you a lifeline, gives you a loving and merciful word of correction, and then you blow it off and blast the messenger? (Husbands? — Kids?)

²³Now the rest of all the acts of Asa, all his might, and all that he did, and the cities that he built, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?

2 Chronicles 14-16 provides many more details regarding the reign of Asa.

• He encouraged the southern kingdom to seek the Lord: He commanded Judah to seek the LORD God of their fathers, and to observe the law and the commandment. (2 Chronicles 14:4)
• He built fortified cities and presided over a long period of peace (2 Chronicles 14:6)
• When faced with a huge Ethiopian army that came against Judah he sought the Lord and found victory (2 Chronicles 14:9-13)
• Asa led a national re-commitment to the covenant (2 Chronicles 15:10-15)

But in his old age he was diseased in his feet. ²⁴And Asa slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his father, and Jehoshaphat his son reigned in his place.

Some think that Asa’s foot ailment was gout

QUOTE: Wiseman — “but gout was uncommon in Palestine and ancient Egypt and it is more likely, in very of Asa’s age, the severity of the disease and death within two years, to have been a peripheral obstructive vascular disease with ensuing gangrene.”

The Holy Spirit saw fit to give an interesting detail in regards to Asa’s illness and death in 2 Chronicles

2 Chronicles 16:12 In the thirty-ninth year of his reign Asa was diseased in his feet, and his disease became severe. Yet even in his disease he did not seek the Lord, but sought help from physicians.

The very next thing that we read is

2 Chr 16:13 And Asa slept with his fathers, dying in the forty-first year of his reign.

What is the point? It is not that Asa sought help from doctors. It is that he never sought the Lord. It is not wrong to go to doctors. They are a blessing, a gift from God. But, it is wrong if my faith and hope is in doctors instead of God. If you have need of physical healing, then seek the Lord… even while you are in the doctor’s office.

The tragedy of Asa’s life is that in many ways he ruled well. He sought the LORD for many years, yet when he faced a real challenge of faith, when he was out of his depth, he acted in unbelief and fear. It was apparently within his ability to trust God to deal with idolatry. It was within his ability to trust God when facing a massive invading force from Ethiopia. But when it came to his conflict with the Northern kingdom, he was overcome with fear and the possibility of falling to the 10 Northern Tribes. He wastes resources that belonged to God and the worship of God to find an earthly source of security. He didn’t trust in the Lord with all his heart. He leaned on his own understanding — I’m out matched by Baasha — I know what I can do — I can buy a military equalizer.

If we want to finish well, we must always have fresh faith. We must always stay fresh in our relationship with the Lord. We need to recognize the areas of our life that are most susceptible to fear and unbelief and allow the Lord to speak to us about them.

Sadly, the last years of his life were marked by unbelief, hardness against God, oppression against his people, and disease. Age and time do not necessarily make us better; they only do if we continue to follow God in faith.

IN THE NEXT VERSE WE MOVE TO THE NORTHERN KINGDOM.

We actually backtrack to the king that preceded Baasha. We begin a fast track downhill from Nadab to Ahab.

Read ahead for next week as we begin with the Northern Kingdom

1 Kings 13-14

REVIEW

Chapter 12 ended with the nation of Israel divided into 2 kingdoms. The year is approximately 930 BC.  From this point on in the history of Israel, the name “Israel” referred to the 10 northern tribes and the name “Judah” referred to the southern tribes of Benjamin and Judah.

That division carried on until approximately 722 BC when Samaria — the capital of the Northern kingdom fell to the Assyrians.

The southern kingdom lasted until about 598 BC when they Jerusalem was destroyed and it’s inhabitants carried away by the Babylonians.

The Northern kingdom would have NO good kings. Judah would have 19 kings of which only 8 were good.

²⁶And Jeroboam said in his heart, “Now the kingdom will turn back to the house of David. ²⁷If this people go up to offer sacrifices in the temple of the Lord at Jerusalem, then the heart of this people will turn again to their lord, to Rehoboam king of Judah, and they will kill me and return to Rehoboam king of Judah.”

Out of unbelief and fear he acted to preserve his throne at the expense of destroying the faith of the men and women God had given for him to lead.

²⁸So the king took counsel and made two calves of gold. And he said to the people, “You have gone up to Jerusalem long enough. Behold your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” ²⁹And he set one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. ³⁰Then this thing became a sin, for the people went as far as Dan to be before one.

NLT — ²⁸ …. He said to the people, “It is too much trouble for you to worship in Jerusalem. Look, Israel, these are the gods who brought you out of Egypt!”

To secure his own position, he appealed to the people’s carnality. In other words —  “You don’t have to deny yourself to worship God”

Easy religion is very pleasing to the flesh. The idea of worshipping and serving God without cost or discomfort is very appealing to my flesh. if I go after such stuff, it is proof that the flesh is ruling my life and not the Spirit.

³¹He also made temples on high places and appointed priests from among all the people (KJV = lowest of the people), who were not of the Levites. ³²….. So he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he made. And he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places that he had made.

He did everything his own way, all to the end that he might preserve his kingdom with zero thought about the moral and spiritual pit he was digging for his children and grandchildren.

CHAPTER 13

¹And behold, a man of God came out of Judah by the word of the Lord to Bethel. Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make offerings. ²And the man cried against the altar by the word of the Lord and said, “O altar, altar, thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, a son shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by name, and he shall sacrifice on you the priests of the high places who make offerings on you, and human bones shall be burned on you.’”

WOW! God is so longsuffering.

QUOTE: KNAPP — “If Jeroboam would not have Jehovah’s priests, God sends His prophet into his land.”

A man, un-named, and unknown to us prophesies the birth of Josiah, that would take place some 300+ years later. A great revival came under Josiah (2 Kings 22-23).

Since Josiah’s reign is still 300 years away, the prophet sets forth a very detailed sign to indicating the veracity of the prophecy.

³And he gave a sign the same day, saying, “This is the sign that the Lord has spoken: ‘Behold, the altar shall be torn down, and the ashes that are on it shall be poured out.’”

⁴And when the king heard the saying of the man of God, which he cried against the altar at Bethel, Jeroboam stretched out his hand from the altar, saying, “Seize him.”

The prophecy from this unknown man of God was like most every message of coming judgment. It was a merciful invitation to repentance, restoration and revitalization

Jeroboam obviously did not accept this invitation. Jeroboam’s reaction was immediate, he sought to silence the messenger rather than respond to the message.

And his hand, which he stretched out against him, dried up, so that he could not draw it back to himself. ⁵The altar also was torn down, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign that the man of God had given by the word of the Lord. ⁶And the king said to the man of God, “Entreat now the favor of the Lord your God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me.”

The man who had the Lord speak to him through Ahijah the prophet — and make amazing promises to him says, Entreat the favor of YOUR God.  He knew that he couldn’t call the God of Israel HIS God while he was setting up altars with the images of golden calves.

And the man of God entreated the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him and became as it was before.

The ensuing chapters tell us that Jeroboam either didn’t really repent here or if it was genuine it was only for a moment.

We need to see that wanting to receive something from God is not the same as repentance.

⁷And the king said to the man of God, “Come home with me, and refresh yourself, and I will give you a reward.” ⁸And the man of God said to the king, “If you give me half your house, I will not go in with you. And I will not eat bread or drink water in this place, ⁹for so was it commanded me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘You shall neither eat bread nor drink water nor return by the way that you came.’” ¹⁰So he went another way and did not return by the way that he came to Bethel. ¹¹Now an old prophet lived in Bethel. And his sons came and told him all that the man of God had done that day in Bethel. They also told to their father the words that he had spoken to the king. ¹²And their father said to them, “Which way did he go?” And his sons showed him the way that the man of God who came from Judah had gone. ¹³And he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” So they saddled the donkey for him and he mounted it. ¹⁴And he went after the man of God and found him sitting under an oak. And he said to him, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” And he said, “I am.” ¹⁵Then he said to him, “Come home with me and eat bread.” ¹⁶And he said, “I may not return with you, or go in with you, neither will I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place, ¹⁷for it was said to me by the word of the Lord, ‘You shall neither eat bread nor drink water there, nor return by the way that you came.’” ¹⁸And he said to him, “I also am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘Bring him back with you into your house that he may eat bread and drink water.’” But he lied to him.

It’s very likely that an angel did appear to him, a fallen angel with vested interests in the promotion of idolatry and a desire to destroy the man who spoke for the Living God against idolatry.

¹⁹So he went back with him and ate bread in his house and drank water. ²⁰And as they sat at the table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back. ²¹And he cried to the man of God who came from Judah, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have disobeyed the word of the Lord and have not kept the command that the Lord your God commanded you, ²²but have come back and have eaten bread and drunk water in the place of which he said to you, “Eat no bread and drink no water,” your body shall not come to the tomb of your fathers.’” ²³And after he had eaten bread and drunk, he saddled the donkey for the prophet whom he had brought back. ²⁴And as he went away a lion met him on the road and killed him. And his body was thrown in the road, and the donkey stood beside it; the lion also stood beside the body. ²⁵And behold, men passed by and saw the body thrown in the road and the lion standing by the body. And they came and told it in the city where the old prophet lived.  ²⁶And when the prophet who had brought him back from the way heard of it, he said, “It is the man of God who disobeyed the word of the Lord; therefore the Lord has given him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word that the Lord spoke to him.” ²⁷And he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” And they saddled it. ²⁸And he went and found his body thrown in the road, and the donkey and the lion standing beside the body. The lion had not eaten the body or torn the donkey. ²⁹And the prophet took up the body of the man of God and laid it on the donkey and brought it back to the city to mourn and to bury him. ³⁰And he laid the body in his own grave. And they mourned over him, saying, “Alas, my brother!” ³¹And after he had buried him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave in which the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. ³²For the saying that he called out by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the houses of the high places that are in the cities of Samaria shall surely come to pass.”

You might be asking yourself, “What in the world is THAT all about?” A young prophet being used by God, an old prophet deceiving the young one, and the young man being torn up by a lion.

Gal 1:8-9 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. ⁹As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.

Paul says – I do not care who speaks to you — Even if an angel speaks to you, if that revelation is in contradiction to the Word of God, then you are to totally and completely reject it — Lest you be torn up by a lion……… the one spoken of by Peter

1 Pet 5:8 ⁸Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

Paul said of Satan

2 Cor 11:14 ¹⁴And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. ¹⁵So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness.

KEY APPLICATION: No matter how appealing it sounds…. How exciting the experience — It must measure up to the Word. Study it and ask God to enable you to keep it.

QUOTE: Adam Clarke — From the instance here related, we see, as in various other cases, that often judgment begins at the house of God. For receiving what the old prophet declared, which was in direct opposition to the revelation which he himself had received from God, and which was confirmed by so many miracles, the true prophet is slain by a lion, and his body deprived of the burial of his fathers; while the wicked king, and the old fallen prophet, are both permitted to live! If this was severity to the man of God, it was mercy to the others, neither of whom was prepared to meet his judge. Here we may well say, “If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?”

³³After this thing Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way, but made priests for the high places again from among all the people. Any who would, he ordained to be priests of the high places. ³⁴And this thing became sin to the house of Jeroboam, so as to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth.

Jeroboam is a study in failure despite great blessing and favor from God.

• He failed for the sake of mere political advantage. For the sake of mere political advantage he led an entire nation into idolatry.
• He failed in the light of specific warnings to repent.
• He failed in the face of specific judgment and deliverance from that judgment.

Jeroboam became the prototype of the wicked kings of Israel (the Northern Kingdom). The phrase He did evil in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the way of Jeroboam, and in his sin by which he had made Israel sin was used of many subsequent kings of Israel. These include:

• Baasha (1 Kings 15:33-34)
• Omri (1 Kings 16:25-26)
• Ahaziah (1 Kings 22:51-52)
• Jehoram (2 Kings 3:1-3)
• Jehu (2 Kings 10:29-31)
• Jehoahaz (2 Kings 13:1-2)
• Jehoash (2 Kings 13:10-11)
• Jeroboam II (2 Kings 14:23-24)
• Zechariah (2 Kings 15:8-9)
• Menahim (2 Kings 15:17-18)
• Pekahiah (2 Kings 15:23-24)
• Pekah (2 Kings 15:27-28).

Jeroboam had been given an awesome opportunity by the Lord to be a blessing, but he ends being a great curse to every generation of the northern kingdom after that.  About 200 years later, at the end of the Kingdom of Israel, Jeroboam’s sin was remembered as the beginning of Israel’s end.

2 Kings 17:21-23 When he had torn Israel from the house of David, they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king. And Jeroboam drove Israel from following the Lord and made them commit great sin. ²²The people of Israel walked in all the sins that Jeroboam did. They did not depart from them, ²³until the Lord removed Israel out of his sight, as he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day.

CHAPTER 14

¹At that time Abijah the son of Jeroboam fell sick. ²And Jeroboam said to his wife, “Arise, and disguise yourself, that it not be known that you are the wife of Jeroboam, and go to Shiloh. Behold, Ahijah the prophet is there, who said of me that I should be king over this people.

TWO THINGS HERE —

1.) It would have hugely undermined confidence in Jeroboam’s golden calves if it had been known that he had consulted a prophet of Yahweh.

2.) Like his initial step into idolatry, Jeroboam again operates out of fear that doing the right thing, the Godly thing would undermine stability of his political power and prestige. Ambition rotted out Jeroboam, his family, his kingdom, and GENERATIONS that followed! Real stability and security comes when you turn your heart entirely to the Lord.

2 Chron. 16:9 For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him.

³Take with you ten loaves, some cakes, and a jar of honey, and go to him. He will tell you what shall happen to the child.”

Jeroboam did not tell his wife to pray for their son, or to ask the prophet to pray. He wanted to use Ahijah the prophet as a fortuneteller more than seeking him as a man of God. That is so often the way people view God. Put in a dime and get your answer, your problem solved, your marriage restored. The sad thing about that is the fact that Jesus does ALL of those things. Not as a paid service, but as Savior and Lord.

QUOTE: Adam Clarke — “It would have been more pious if he had begged the prophet’s prayers, and cast away his idols from him; then the child might have been restored to him, as his hand was. But most people would rather be told their fortune than their faults or their duty.”

⁴Jeroboam’s wife did so. She arose and went to Shiloh and came to the house of Ahijah. Now Ahijah could not see, for his eyes were dim because of his age. ⁵And the Lord said to Ahijah, “Behold, the wife of Jeroboam is coming to inquire of you concerning her son, for he is sick. Thus and thus shall you say to her.”

Though his eyes were dim, his ears were open to God — He was TUNED IN to the Lord.

When she came, she pretended to be another woman. ⁶But when Ahijah heard the sound of her feet, as she came in at the door, he said, “Come in, wife of Jeroboam. Why do you pretend to be another? For I am charged with unbearable news for you.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — How strange was the conception which expected that the prophet could look into the future, but could not look behind the disguise assumed by a visitor! Hypocrites are stripped of their garb in the sight of God, and receive their doom: “heavy tidings:’

HERE’S THE PICTURE —

1.) Disobedience and rebellion bring trouble to kingdoms, to individual hearts, homes. The sickness of their son Abijah was a prelude to the miseries that would fall on the house of Jeroboam and by way of that upon the Northern Kingdom. But it was another merciful warning, intended to turn him from his idolatry and wickedness.

2.) To cover our disobedience, to conceal our duplicity, to not be discovered as living a lie requires that you take on whatever disguises you think necessary. But you can never deceive God.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — We are senseless enough to suppose that God can answer our questions and not read ourselves; can solve our problems and not understand us. But God is never mocked, and we reap as we have sown.

⁷Go, tell Jeroboam, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: “Because I exalted you from among the people and made you leader over my people Israel ⁸and tore the kingdom away from the house of David and gave it to you, and yet you have not been like my servant David, who kept my commandments and followed me with all his heart, doing only that which was right in my eyes, ⁹but you have done evil above all who were before you and have gone and made for yourself other gods and metal images, provoking me to anger, and have cast me behind your back,

Saul was a bad man and a bad king. Solomon was a good king but a bad man. Though both men were bad, Jeroboam was far worse. Even as David would be the measuring line for good kings, Jeroboam became the measuring line for the bad kings of Israel to come.

How do we reconcile what the Lord said about David in light of what the Holy Spirit recorded about David?

QUOTE: Matthew Poole — “who though he fell into some sins, yet, first, he constantly persevered in the true worship of God, from which thou are revolted; secondly, he heartily repented of and turned from all his sins, whereas thou are obstinate and incorrigible.”

and have cast me behind your back,

This was a powerful description of intense contempt towards God. We find it in Ezekiel 23:35 – Because you have forgotten Me and cast Me behind your back, therefore you shall bear the penalty Of your lewdness and your harlotry.

Sometimes we can best understand a passage of Scripture by considering its negative or its opposite. Think of this, it is the same figure of speech used to describe God’s forgiveness of our sins.

Isaiah 38:17 but in love you have delivered my life from the pit of destruction, for you have cast all my sins behind your back.

He puts them behind His back, or in other words, He forgets them. That is great news when it describes God’s treatment of our sins. But it is incredibly bad news when it describes a person’s treatment of God.

¹⁰therefore behold, I will bring harm upon the house of Jeroboam and will cut off from Jeroboam every male,

MALE literally = he who urinates against the wall.

both bond and free in Israel, and will burn up the house of Jeroboam, as a man burns up dung until it is all gone. ¹¹Anyone belonging to Jeroboam who dies in the city the dogs shall eat, and anyone who dies in the open country the birds of the heavens shall eat, for the Lord has spoken it.”’

The immediate judgment and the distant judgment.

¹²Arise therefore, go to your house. When your feet enter the city, the child shall die. ¹³And all Israel shall mourn for him and bury him, for he only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found something pleasing to the Lord, the God of Israel, in the house of Jeroboam.

The death of Abijah would be a demonstration of mercy because such great judgment was coming upon the house of Jeroboam that by comparison, this son was blessed in his death.

¹⁴Moreover, the Lord will raise up for himself a king over Israel who shall cut off the house of Jeroboam today. And henceforth, ¹⁵the Lord will strike Israel as a reed is shaken in the water, and root up Israel out of this good land that he gave to their fathers and scatter them beyond the Euphrates, because they have made their Asherim, provoking the Lord to anger. ¹⁶And he will give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, which he sinned and made Israel to sin.”

God knew that the root of Jeroboam’s apostasy would eventually result in the bitter fruit of the entire Northern Kingdom being led into exile in 722 BC when Samaria, the capital of the Northern kingdom fell to the Assyrians.

¹⁷Then Jeroboam’s wife arose and departed and came to Tirzah. And as she came to the threshold of the house, the child died. ¹⁸And all Israel buried him and mourned for him, according to the word of the Lord, which he spoke by his servant Ahijah the prophet.  ¹⁹Now the rest of the acts of Jeroboam, how he warred and how he reigned, behold, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. ²⁰And the time that Jeroboam reigned was twenty-two years. And he slept with his fathers, and Nadab his son reigned in his place.

2 Chronicles 13 tells us that Jeroboam suffered the loss of five hundred thousand of his men in one battle with the king of Judah; and that the LORD struck him, and he died. He didn’t die a common death — it was so remarkable that it was thought of as being by the hand of God.

Now we go back to the southern kingdom where Rehoboam is ruling

²¹Now Rehoboam the son of Solomon reigned in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city that the Lord had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, to put his name there. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite.

²²And Judah did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and they provoked him to jealousy with their sins that they committed, more than all that their fathers had done.

²²And Judah did what was evil in the sight of the Lord

One of the distinct features of 1-2 Kings is that each king listed measured not on the basis of his success as a king but on the basis of his relationship with the Lord in terms of his commitment to the Lord, or lack of it.

This passage puts the spotlight not specifically on the king of Judah, but on the Southern Kingdom as a whole. The whole of Judah had become involved in idolatrous worship. This passage points us out to the end of Judah.

²³For they also built for themselves high places and pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree,

Some of these places were natural elevations, some were manmade elevations. Regardless of the height the idea is that they were publicly accessible structures within which, or on which, offerings were made to pagan gods.

²⁴and there were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations that the Lord drove out before the people of Israel.

This is very important, God will drive Judah out of the Promised Land just as he “drove out” the various peoples that lived there before because of their abominations.

²⁵In the fifth year of King Rehoboam, Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem.

Shishak king of Egypt has often been identified with the pharaoh Sheshonq I (945–924 b.c.), founder of the Twenty-second Dynasty in Egypt, whose army apparently passed through Judah on its way to fight in northern Israel.

²⁶He took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house.

This is the first of a series of notices in 1–2 Kings about the loss of treasure from the temple and the palace

1 Kings 15:18; 2 Kings 14:14; 16:8; 18:15–16; 24:13

The culmination of these treasures being taken away will come in 2 Kings 25 when Nebuchadnezzar conquers Jerusalem.

HERE’S THE PICTURE —

These were treasures reserved for the Lord and for the worship of the Lord and for the upkeep of the house of the Lord. They were taken away by the kingdoms of this world. This is a very sad but powerful picture of New Testament reality. God has placed treasures in His church, the Body of Christ, in the local church, and in our lives individually. The god of this world is looking to plunder those treasures so that they might not be used for the worship and exaltation of Jesus in the saving of souls and the building up of the Body of Christ.

For you history buffs — A monumental relief on the Bubastite Portal of the main temple of Amon at Karnak (near Luxor, in Egypt) catalogs, town by town, Shishak’s military incursion into Israel and Judah. The Karnak relief provides striking verification of the biblical account. (ESV Study Bible)

He took away everything. He also took away all the shields of gold that Solomon had made,

We read about these in 1 Kings 10 — $33 million was invested in gold ceremonial shields – and now in the hands of the Egyptians.

²⁷and King Rehoboam made in their place shields of bronze, and committed them to the hands of the officers of the guard, who kept the door of the king’s house. ²⁸And as often as the king went into the house of the Lord, the guard carried them and brought them back to the guardroom.

Rehoboam did not have the resources to make gold shields. Notice that he tried to maintain the image of having gold shields. This is such a deep-seated part of human nature, trying to appear to be something that we are not.

SPIRITUAL APPLICATION —

Have the spiritual riches in your life disappeared? Are you replacing it with brass? Rather than do that, ask the Lord tonight to bring back the gold, to replenish that which the enemy has robbed. Just say, “Lord, I am tired of playing games… I repent, I want to walk with you starting right now.”

Philippians 1:9-10 KJV And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; ¹⁰That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ;

²⁹Now the rest of the acts of Rehoboam and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah? ³⁰And there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam continually. ³¹And Rehoboam slept with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite. And Abijam his son reigned in his place.

1 Kings 12-13

Related Topics: Divided Kingdom; Jeroboam; Rehoboam; Shechem; Bad Counsel; Idolatry; Carnality and Convenient Worship; Dan; Bethel; Josiah

INTRODUCTION

Chapter 11 records the apex of Solomon’s failure in his relationship with the Lord. As he grew older he failed to fully follow the Lord.

³….. And his wives turned away his heart. ⁴For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.

As a judgment upon Solomon’s DIVIDED HEART and idolatry God DIVIDED Solomon’s kingdom.  God ordained the DIVISION of Israel into 2 kingdoms — 10 tribes in the North and 2 in the south. God ordained a man named Jeroboam to rule the Northern kingdom.

Chapter 11 closed with Solomon passing off the scene.

1 Kings 11:42-43 ⁴²And the time that Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel was forty years. ⁴³And Solomon slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David his father. And Rehoboam his son reigned in his place.

700 wives — 300 Concubines — 1 rebelious son! What a tragic legacy!

So Rehoboam and Jeroboam are the central figures of the coming history of the nation of Israel. We don’t want to confuse the Boam-boys. Reho-boam is the son of Solomon, who will rule the Southern kingdom. Jero-boam is the son of Nebat who will rule the Northern kingdom.

CHAPTER 12

¹Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had come to Shechem to make him king.

The united nation at this moment came to crown Rehoboam king.

In one sense it made perfect sense to crown Rehoboam king in that spot. It the geographical center of the land of Israel. It was also at the center of Israel’s history. Abraham worshipped there (Genesis 12:6). Jacob built an altar and purchased land and dug a well there (Genesis 33:18-20). Joseph was buried there (Joshua 24:32). Mt. Ebal and Gerizim were there.

TWO PROBLEMS

1.) It showed that Rehoboam was in a position of weakness, having to meet the ten northern tribes on their territory, instead of their representatives coming to Jerusalem which was the seat of Israel’s government under David and Solomon.

2.) Most significantly — It might have made perfect sense in the natural to crown the king of Israel there BUT — it made ZERO sense in the plans of God. Shechem was NOT THE CENTER of Israel as far as God was concerned. Shechem was NOT the place where God had placed His name. Shechem was NOT the place that was ordained by God to be the center of Israel’s worship. Shechem was NOT the place from which God had promised that the Messiah would rule over the earth. God had placed His Name on Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the CENTER of Israel by God’s reckoning. In fact — by God’s reckoning — Jerusalem is the CENTER of God’s universe. THAT totally wrecks the mind of the natural man.

Zechariah 12:2 “Behold, I am about to make Jerusalem a cup of staggering to all the surrounding peoples.

There is an irrational animosity and hostility towards the Jews and Jew-rusalem (as Steve the tour guide calls it). Listen to what comes out of the U.N. — an organization that lets some of the most murderous regimes stand in judgment against Israel and accuse Israel of human rights violations. Listen to reporters on CNN or Sky News in Britain and the disdain they have towards that people and that city.

We need to let God determine where the CENTER really is. On a global level Man has his ideas as to where the CENTER is and he has based it on — for the most part —reasonable things, reasonable calculations and considerations. When it comes to global economics it has been reasonable (until only recently) to think of things centered around the stock exchange in London, New York, and Tokyo. When it comes to things geo-political it is reasonable to think of things centered around Washington D.C., London, Moscow, and China things. God says — NO, the CENTER is Jerusalem. God’s redemptive  economy and rule has flowed FROM Jerusalem and is flowing back TO Jerusalem.

On the individual level Man has his ideas as to what the CENTER of his life ought to be. The Bible says that fallen man CENTERS his life around passions, possessions and position.  God says — NO, JESUS is the ONLY CENTER that holds. Life is IN Jesus and LIFE flows FROM Jesus. We determine the CENTER of God’s will for our lives relative to how any decision affects our relationship with Jesus and our relationship to His Word. Think about it — The world outside of Jesus processes decisions about school, job, boyfriend, girlfriend, marriage, where to live from it’s CENTER (passions, possessesion and position). But the life CENTERED in Jesus processes those decisions by asking — Will I know and love Jesus MORE because of this decision? Will I be more effective in serving Him because of this decision?

Even as God’s center of the universe stumbles natural man — so too Jesus stumbles the fallen sensibilities of mankind. There is an irrational animosity and hostility to Jesus and those who have made Jesus the CENTER of their lives.

PSALM 2 sums it up

¹ Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? ² The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, ³ “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.” ⁴ He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision. ⁵ Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, ⁶ “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.” ⁷ I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you. ⁸ Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. ⁹ You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” ¹⁰ Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. ¹¹Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. ¹² Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

²And as soon as Jeroboam the son of Nebat heard of it (for he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), then Jeroboam returned from Egypt.

Remember — Solomon appreciated Jeroboam because he was a talented and industrious guy. While serving under Solomon, a prophet of God named Ahijah came to Jeroboam and told him that God was going to make him ruler over the 10 Northern tribes of Israel. Solomon got word of it and tried to kill Jeroboam (1 Kings 11: 40). Solomon essentially blew off the prophet of God and the Word of God. He sought to kill Jeroboam and thus over rule the will of God  — but he was unsuccessful.

³And they sent and called him, and Jeroboam and all the assembly of Israel came and said to Rehoboam, ⁴“Your father made our yoke heavy. Now therefore lighten the hard service of your father and his heavy yoke on us, and we will serve you.”

REMEMBER — In looking at 1 Kings 11:27 we noted that Jewish has it that Jeroboam opposed the oppressive use of forced labor in Solomon’s building projects — it was like a tax paid by way of labor.  Government had become BIG and EXPENSIVE (I know you can’t relate to this.) So try to imagine this — they are saying — “If you cut or taxes we’ll vote for you!” There really is nothing new under the sun.

BY THE WAY — God warned Israel about this in 1 Samuel 8:10-19, when through Samuel He spoke of what a king would take from Israel. Despite God’s warning the people still wanted a king, and now they knew what it was like to be ruled by a taking king.

⁵He said to them, “Go away for three days, then come again to me.” So the people went away. ⁶Then King Rehoboam took counsel with the old men, who had stood before Solomon his father while he was yet alive, saying, “How do you advise me to answer this people?”

NOTE: THIS people — not GOD’S people. His dad might have ended miserably but he did start well. At the beginning of his rule Solomon asked God for wisdom

1 Kings 3:8-9 ⁸And your servant is in the midst of your people whom you have chosen, a great people, too many to be numbered or counted for multitude. ⁹Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, that I may discern between good and evil, for who is able to govern this your great people?”

⁷And they said to him, “If you will be a servant to this people today and serve them, and speak good words to them when you answer them, then they will be your servants forever.”

These wise old men were telling Rehoboam that the KEY to AUTHORITY is HUMILITY. Jesus is the EPITOME of this

Mat 11:28-30 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Mat 20:28 even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Jesus did NOT come to TAX us but to SERVE us. While we bicker over who is great, He washes our dirty feet. He is AWESOME! There is NONE like Jesus!

⁸But he abandoned the counsel that the old men gave him and took counsel with the young men who had grown up with him and stood before him.

A few thoughts here —

1.) There is disagreement as to the age of Rehoboam at this moment. In 1 Kings 14:21 we are told that he was 41 years at the time he began to rule over the Southern kingdom. It is possible that this is a manuscript error and that it should have read 21 years old.

Regardless — these men are notably YOUNGER than the men Rehoboam consulted at the first.

2.) Before Rehoboam ever consulted with the younger men he abandoned the advice of the elders.

Rehoboam was “advice shopping.” In the setting of the local church I call it “pastoral roulette.” The idea is that you keep asking different people for advice until you find someone who will tell you what you want to hear. This is an unwise and ungodly way to get counsel. It is better to have a few trusted counselors you will listen to even when they tell you what you don’t want to hear.

3.) took counsel with the young men who had grown up with him and stood before him.

That is essentially like my son Nathan asking Travis (our youth pastor) for advice — not liking what Travis told him — abandoning the advice of the older and wiser believer — and asking the kids he grew up with what they think he should do! What would they know about ANYTHING!

By turning to those likely to think just as he did, it shows that Rehoboam only asked advice from the older men merely for the sake of appearances

It is ALWAYS a good idea to seek seeking counsel from outside our immediate context. If I’m young — it is a wise thing to ask advice from someone outside my age and experience — they can see things more clearly than those who share our same experiences.

⁹And he said to them, “What do you advise that we answer this people who have said to me, ‘Lighten the yoke that your father put on us’?” ¹⁰And the young men who had grown up with him said to him, “Thus shall you speak to this people who said to you, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy, but you lighten it for us,’ thus shall you say to them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s thighs. ¹¹And now, whereas my father laid on you a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.’”

¹²So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam the third day, as the king said, “Come to me again the third day.” ¹³And the king answered the people harshly, and forsaking the counsel that the old men had given him, ¹⁴he spoke to them according to the counsel of the young men, saying, “My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.”

Solomon asked a lot of Israel, in both taxes and service. Yet we are never given the impression that a untied Israel ever followed Solomon out of fear. They were willing to sacrifice and labor because they shared Solomon’s vision. They believed in what Solomon wanted to do, and were willing to sacrifice to accomplish it.

Rehoboam didn’t base his appeal to the people — GOD’S PEOPLE —on any sense of shared vision and purpose. He based it in a warped sense of his power and the belief that he could gain respect by way of fear!

DON’T MISS THIS — A dozen rash words resulted in CENTURIES of strife, weakness, idolatry and destruction. The fallout of which would lead to hatred between Jews and Samaritans in the days of Jesus, as witnessed in John 4.

QUOTE: Alexander Maclaren — neither the foolish speaker nor any man in that crowd dreamed of the unnumbered evils to flow from that hour. Since issues are so far beyond our sight, how careful it becomes us to be of motives! Angry counsels are always blunders. No nation can prosper when moderate complaints are met by threats…..

¹⁵So the king did not listen to the people, for it was a turn of affairs brought about by the Lord that he might fulfill his word, which the Lord spoke by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam the son of Nebat.

QUESTION: Is there any human responsibility here — or is it entirely a matter of Divine sovereignty?

On earth we find a rash, proud, young king — and opposed to him a dissatisfied people. Each wanting things their own way. Neither party is free of sin or self-concern. It’s a storm of passions on both sides —without any thought or concern for God or His purposes.

Above sits the Lord — working out His great purposes despite of and by way of men’s sin. Rehoboam’s disregard for the people was ‘a thing brought about of the Lord,’ — but it was Rehoboam’s sin none the less. Looked at from the mere human side — this division is the sinful result of the man’s choice and wrong motives But when viewed from heaven it is the determinate counsel of God.

The death of Jesus on the cross — which is the single greatest sin and crime in the history of mankind — was at the same time the accomplishment of God’s most merciful purpose.

Acts 2:23 this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.

That sovereignty of God in the plan of redemption does not in the least affect the freedom of choice or the guilt of those involved in the cross of Jesus — or in any matter.

¹⁶And when all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them, the people answered the king, “What portion do we have in David? We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse.

Rehoboam’s harshness and arrogance didn’t merely result in the 10 Northern tribes rejecting him — it resulted in those tribes rejecting the entire dynasty of David.

To your tents, O Israel! Look now to your own house, David.” So Israel went to their tents. ¹⁷But Rehoboam reigned over the people of Israel who lived in the cities of Judah.

¹⁸Then King Rehoboam sent Adoram, who was taskmaster over the forced labor, and all Israel stoned him to death with stones.

Apparently, Rehoboam did not take the rebellions seriously until this happened. When his chief tax collector was murdered, he knew that the ten tribes were serious about their rebellion.

Adoram was the wrong man to send. He was famous for his harsh policy of forced labor.

And King Rehoboam hurried to mount his chariot to flee to Jerusalem. ¹⁹So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day. ²⁰And when all Israel heard that Jeroboam had returned, they sent and called him to the assembly and made him king over all Israel. There was none that followed the house of David but the tribe of Judah only.

SO — the Kingdom is divided. The year is approximately 930 BC.

From this point on in the history of Israel, the name “Israel” referred to the 10 northern tribes and the name “Judah” referred to the southern tribes of Benjamin and Judah. That division carried on until approximately 722 BC when Samaria — the capital of the Northern kingdom fell to the Assyrians. The southern kingdom lasted until about 598 BC when they Jerusalem was destroyed and it’s inhabitants carried away by the Babylonians. The Northern kingdom would have NO good kings. Judah would have 19 kings of which only 8 were good.

²¹When Rehoboam came to Jerusalem, he assembled all the house of Judah and the tribe of Benjamin, 180,000 chosen warriors, to fight against the house of Israel, to restore the kingdom to Rehoboam the son of Solomon. ²²But the word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God: ²³“Say to Rehoboam the son of Solomon, king of Judah, and to all the house of Judah and Benjamin, and to the rest of the people, ²⁴‘Thus says the Lord, You shall not go up or fight against your relatives the people of Israel. Every man return to his home, for this thing is from me.’” So they listened to the word of the Lord and went home again, according to the word of the Lord.

Rehoboam intended to make war against the seceding tribes of Israel, but God spoke through a prophet and stopped him. To his credit – or perhaps due to a lack of courage – Rehoboam listened to God’s word through Shemaiah the man of God.

QUOTE: Spurgeon — “Here is one Shemaiah, – some of you never heard of him before, perhaps you will never hear of him again; he appears once in this history, and then he vanishes; he comes, and he goes, – only fancy this one man constraining to peace a hundred and eighty thousand chosen men, warriors ready to fight against the house of Israel, by giving to them in very plain, unpolished words, the simple command of God . . . Why have we not such power? Peradventure, brethren, we do not always speak in the name of the Lord, or speak God’s Word as God’s Word. If we (simply speak) out of our own thoughts, why should men mind us?”

²⁵Then Jeroboam built Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim and lived there. And he went out from there and built Penuel.

Jeroboam’s reign began with energy and opportunity.

REMEMBER —back in Chapter 11:38 God promised that He would establish for Jeroboam a parallel dynasty to the House of David if Jeroboam would walk in obedience to the Lord like David did.

But Jeroboam would not TRUST the promise of God to establish his kingdom or his dynasty. Instead or seeing himself as leading the people to SERVE the true and living God, Jeroboam set out to create a religion that would SERVE the state and PRESERVE his power.

²⁶And Jeroboam said in his heart, “Now the kingdom will turn back to the house of David.

He did NOT talk with the Lord — He just thought it out in his own heart. THAT is where we get messed up. LEAVING God out of our decisions and LEANING to our own understanding.

²⁷If this people go up to offer sacrifices in the temple of the Lord at Jerusalem, then the heart of this people will turn again to their lord, to Rehoboam king of Judah, and they will kill me and return to Rehoboam king of Judah.”

From the human standpoint he had a legitimate concern. But fact that had a kingdom to rule was the Lord’s doing — thus it was NOT his to preserve. But he allowed his human FEARS to overshadow the PROMISE of God. Fear and faith are mutually exclusive. In unbelief he acted to preserve his throne at the expense of destroying the faith of the men and women God had given for him to lead.

²⁸So the king took counsel and made two calves of gold. And he said to the people, “You have gone up to Jerusalem long enough. Behold your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” ²⁹And he set one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. ³⁰Then this thing became a sin, for the people went as far as Dan to be before one.

TWO THINGS HERE —

1.) NLT — ²⁸So on the advice of his counselors, the king made two gold calves.

Here is a guy who had HEARD the REAL Word of God from a REAL prophet of God. Now he listens to advice that is patently contrary to the FIRST COMMANDMENTS given by the God of Israel.

Exodus20:1-4 ¹And God spoke all these words, saying, ²“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.³“You shall have no other gods before me. ⁴“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. ⁵You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God,

We will listen to a lie if we think it serves our selfish concerns.

2.) NLT — ²⁸ …. He said to the people, “It is too much trouble for you to worship in Jerusalem. Look, Israel, these are the gods who brought you out of Egypt!”

NOTE WELL: To SECURE his own position, he appealed to the people’s carnality. In other words —  “You don’t have to deny yourself to worship God”

What a contrast to what Jesus said — Mat 16:24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

Paul the Apostle would write —  Rom 8:8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. I can not simultaneously cater to my flesh and live after the Spirit. They are OPPOSED to each other.

Gal 5:17 ¹⁷For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other

If you are living after the Spirit you cannot be living after the flesh. CONVERSELY – if you are living after the flesh you can NOT be living after the Spirit

If you are looking for a way to please your flesh — an EASY way to SERVE God — an EASY way to WORSHIP God — then it is NOT the right way. It is the way of man — NOT the way of God.

Prov 14:12 There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.

EASY RELIGION is very pleasing to the flesh. The idea of worshipping and serving God without cost or discomfort is VERY appealing to my flesh. IF I go after such stuff, it is PROOF that the FLESH is ruling my life and NOT the Spirit.

³¹He also made temples on high places and appointed priests from among all the people (KJV = lowest of the people), who were not of the Levites. ³²And Jeroboam appointed a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month like the feast that was in Judah, and he offered sacrifices on the altar. So he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he made. And he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places that he had made. ³³He went up to the altar that he had made in Bethel on the fifteenth day in the eighth month, in the month that he had devised from his own heart. And he instituted a feast for the people of Israel and went up to the altar to make offerings.

He did everything HIS own way — all to the end that he might preserve his kingdom. I wonder if he ever thought about the moral and spiritual pit he was digging for his children and grandchildren.

CHAPTER 13

¹And behold, a man of God came out of Judah by the word of the Lord to Bethel. Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make offerings. ²And the man cried against the altar by the word of the Lord and said, “O altar, altar, thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, a son shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by name, and he shall sacrifice on you the priests of the high places who make offerings on you, and human bones shall be burned on you.’” ³And he gave a sign the same day, saying, “This is the sign that the Lord has spoken: ‘Behold, the altar shall be torn down, and the ashes that are on it shall be poured out.’”

WOW! God is so LONGSUFFERING

QUOTE: KNAPP — “If Jeroboam would not have Jehovah’s priests, God sends His prophet into his land.”

A man — un-named, and unknown to us — prophesies the birth of Josiah, that would take place some 300+ years later. A great revival came under Josiah (2 Kings 22-23).

Since Josiah’s reign is still 300 years away, a detailed sign is also described and then enacted, indicating that the prophecy is true.

⁴And when the king heard the saying of the man of God, which he cried against the altar at Bethel, Jeroboam stretched out his hand from the altar, saying, “Seize him.”

The prophecy from this unknown man of God was like most every message of coming judgment. It was a merciful invitation to REPENTANCE — RESTORATION and REVITALIZATION

Jeroboam obviously did not accept this invitation. Jeroboam’s reaction was immediate  — he sought to silence the messenger rather than respond to the message.

And his hand, which he stretched out against him, dried up, so that he could not draw it back to himself. ⁵The altar also was torn down, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign that the man of God had given by the word of the Lord. ⁶And the king said to the man of God, “Entreat now the favor of the Lord your God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me.” And the man of God entreated the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him and became as it was before.

The ensuing chapters tell us that Jeroboam either didn’t really repent here — or — if it was genuine —  it was only for a moment.

We need to see that WANTING to receive something from God is NOT THE SAME AS repentance.

⁷And the king said to the man of God, “Come home with me, and refresh yourself, and I will give you a reward.” ⁸And the man of God said to the king, “If you give me half your house, I will not go in with you. And I will not eat bread or drink water in this place, ⁹for so was it commanded me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘You shall neither eat bread nor drink water nor return by the way that you came.’” ¹⁰So he went another way and did not return by the way that he came to Bethel. ¹¹Now an old prophet lived in Bethel. And his sons came and told him all that the man of God had done that day in Bethel. They also told to their father the words that he had spoken to the king. ¹²And their father said to them, “Which way did he go?” And his sons showed him the way that the man of God who came from Judah had gone. ¹³And he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” So they saddled the donkey for him and he mounted it. ¹⁴And he went after the man of God and found him sitting under an oak. And he said to him, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” And he said, “I am.” ¹⁵Then he said to him, “Come home with me and eat bread.” ¹⁶And he said, “I may not return with you, or go in with you, neither will I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place, ¹⁷for it was said to me by the word of the Lord, ‘You shall neither eat bread nor drink water there, nor return by the way that you came.’” ¹⁸And he said to him, “I also am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘Bring him back with you into your house that he may eat bread and drink water.’” But he lied to him. ¹⁹So he went back with him and ate bread in his house and drank water. ²⁰And as they sat at the table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back. ²¹And he cried to the man of God who came from Judah, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have disobeyed the word of the Lord and have not kept the command that the Lord your God commanded you, ²²but have come back and have eaten bread and drunk water in the place of which he said to you, “Eat no bread and drink no water,” your body shall not come to the tomb of your fathers.’” ²³And after he had eaten bread and drunk, he saddled the donkey for the prophet whom he had brought back. ²⁴And as he went away a lion met him on the road and killed him. And his body was thrown in the road, and the donkey stood beside it; the lion also stood beside the body. ²⁵And behold, men passed by and saw the body thrown in the road and the lion standing by the body. And they came and told it in the city where the old prophet lived.

²⁶And when the prophet who had brought him back from the way heard of it, he said, “It is the man of God who disobeyed the word of the Lord; therefore the Lord has given him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word that the Lord spoke to him.” ²⁷And he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” And they saddled it. ²⁸And he went and found his body thrown in the road, and the donkey and the lion standing beside the body. The lion had not eaten the body or torn the donkey. ²⁹And the prophet took up the body of the man of God and laid it on the donkey and brought it back to the city to mourn and to bury him. ³⁰And he laid the body in his own grave. And they mourned over him, saying, “Alas, my brother!” ³¹And after he had buried him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave in which the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. ³²For the saying that he called out by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the houses of the high places that are in the cities of Samaria shall surely come to pass.” ³³After this thing Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way, but made priests for the high places again from among all the people. Any who would, he ordained to be priests of the high places. ³⁴And this thing became sin to the house of Jeroboam, so as to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth.

You might be asking yourself — What in the world is THAT all about? A young prophet being used by God — An old prophet deceiving the young one — and the young man being torn up by a lion.

Gal 1:8-9 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. ⁹As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.

Paul says – I do NOT care WHO speaks to you — Even if an angel speaks to you, IF that revelation is in contradiction to the Word of God, THEN you are to TOTALLY and COMPLETELY REJECT it — Lest you be torn up by a LION……… the one spoken of by Peter

1 Pet 5:8 ⁸Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

Paul said of Satan

2 Cor 11:14 ¹⁴And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. ¹⁵So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness.

KEY APPLICATION: No matter how appealing it sounds…. How exciting the experience — It MUST measure up to the Word. STUDY it and ask God to enable you to KEEP it.

1 Kings 11

Related Topics: Solomon; Falling Away; Failure by Increments; Lust of the eyes; Lust of the Flesh; Pride of Life; Divided Heart; Submitting to the Truth; Davidic Covenant; Divided Kingdom; Jeroboam; Judgment Deserved; Undeserved Mercy; Adversity For Correction

INTRODUCTION

We have here the record of Solomon falling off the cliff, if-you-would in his relationship with the Lord. But this did not happen over night.

Through out the first 10 chapters of 1 Kings there were hints that all was not well with Solomon’s heart. Beginning in Chapter 3 with his marital alliance with Egypt we have seen individual compromises in his relationship with the Lord. None of them by themselves were spiritually fatal. But in this chapter we have radical proof that our relationship with the Lord does not fall apart overnight. It is always incremental nature.

¹ Now King Solomon loved many foreign women, along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, ²from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the people of Israel, “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love. ³He had 700 wives, princesses, and 300 concubines.

LAST WEEK in Chapter 10 we saw the majesty of Solomon’s kingdom and wisdom.

1 Kings 10:4-7 ⁴And when the queen of Sheba had seen all the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had built, ⁵the food of his table, the seating of his officials, and the attendance of his servants, their clothing, his cupbearers, and his burnt offerings that he offered at the house of the Lord, there was no more breath in her. ⁶And she said to the king, “The report was true that I heard in my own land of your words and of your wisdom, ⁷but I did not believe the reports until I came and my own eyes had seen it. And behold, the half was not told me. Your wisdom and prosperity surpass the report that I heard.

For all Solomon’s great wisdom, he didn’t submit to the revealed will of God in the simple command “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.”

Solomon’s life is one big flashing danger sign. The danger is that of knowing the truth of Scripture but not obeying the truth of Scripture. We must submit to the truth of Scripture. If we are not submitted to the Word we will become slaves — not over night — but incrementally — to “the lust of the flesh (passions), the lust of the eyes (possessions) and the pride of life (position).

1 John 2:15-17 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. ¹⁶For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. ¹⁷And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

PRIDE – POSISITON

These 700 hundred wives reflected his lust for power and prestige. In those days a large harem was a status symbol. It said to the world, “Look how many wives and children I can support.” Solomon’s desire for worldly prestige led him to these ungodly marriages.

PASSION – SENSUAL PLEASURE

Reading Proverbs and the Song Of Solomon we know that Solomon knew a lot about women. Based upon the Song of Solomon, we can say that at the first Solomon seemed to know what true love was with one woman. Yet his life screams out to us that it is possible to be in that place and depart from it. It is not true to say that “love will keep us together.” love of God — resulting in repentance from sin and obedience is what will hold a marriage together.

We don’t know when Solomon added his second wife. When he did, it was easy for him to rationalize a third and a 700 hundredth! After all —the greatest King of Israel, his father David, had several wives and concubines. But it is interesting that Solomon didn’t remember the wreckage that resulted from his dad’s polygamy. That is the way sin is.

Hebrews 3:13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

The Bible tells us that sin deceives us! Lust causes us to forget the wreckage of sin all around us.

LISTEN — Solomon’s life screams out to us that if one wife is not enough to satisfy a man, then 1,000 wives will not be enough. When a man is unsatisfied with the woman God gave to him, the problem is with him, not with his wife. 1,000 women can’t satisfy the lust of man. Solomon should have applied to his own life the truth of Proverbs 27:20: Hell and Destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.

NOTE: In our society today, there is the prevailing attitude — “If I Just had someone else, I would be happy.” To even think that you married the wrong person automatically implies that you believe that there is a right person out there somewhere. It is only is a matter of time before you look for her in your mind and then with your eyes.

There is someone better out there than my spouse is a lie from Satan.

IF anyone discovered it to be true, Solomon would have. But — He found it to be a lie. The search never ended. It never produced anything but vanity and vexation of spirit.

³….. And his wives turned away his heart. ⁴For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.

REMEMBER — The Lord said: Deut. 17:17 Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away

WHAT did all of his wives do to him?

VERSES 3b-4 And his wives turned away his heart. ⁴For when Solomon was old his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.

REMEMBER — This is the wisest man in the world. He received all of His wisdom from the True and Living God of Israel back in Chapter 3.

QUOTE: F.B. Meyer — “It would have been useless to argue Solomon into worshipping false gods. Solomon trying to proof of idols. He could at once, by his wisdom, have annihilated all arguments in favor of idols, and have established the existence and unity of God. But, step by step, he was led by silken cords, a captive, to the worship of other gods.”

HOW THEN DID SOLOMON end up turning away from the True and Living God? Solomon thought that he was different from anyone else.

Well of course the Lord said to NOT multiply gold and horses and wives to yourself because they will turn your heart from the Lord…

BUT I think that I can do it and NOT get burned… I’m the exception to the rule

That is just like Samson (Judges 13-16). Samson had taken the vow of the Nazarite. He was not to touch wine, nor dead animals, nor cut his hair. Samson did all three. He touched a dead carcass; drank wine with the Philistines — and nothing had happened to him. When his head was on the lap of Delilah, and she said — “Tell me the secret of your strength.” He knew what she was up to. But — Samson figured, “I’ve touched a dead carcass, I drank wine with the Philistines, and nothing happened! So I can lose a little hair and not get burned! But he did. He ended discovered that sin blinds and binds and grinds.

when Solomon was old — Age did not make Solomon wiser. He seemed to be wiser in his youth. As he grew older he incrementally became hardened by sin and compromise. Age and experience should make us more godly and wise — but that doesn’t happen automatically.

QUOTE: Alexander Maclaren — This ship went down when the voyage was nearly over. In sight of port it struck, and that not for want of beacons. What pathetic warning lies in that phrase, ‘when Solomon was old’! After so many years of high aims, so many temptations overcome, with such habits of wisdom and kingly nobility, after such prayers and visions, he fell; and, if he fell, who can be sure of standing? No length of life spent in holy thoughts and service secures us against the possibility of disastrous fall. Only one thing does,—‘Hold Thou me up, and I shall be safe!’ John Bunyan saw a door opening down to hell hard by the gates of the Celestial City. When a man that has been had in reputation for wisdom and honour shames the record of his life by a great splash of mud on the white page, near its end, he seldom returns. An old apostate is usually finally an apostate.

It is believed he was about 55 yrs. Old. If you are over 50, don’t think that you are immune from such temptations or difficulties.

⁵For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. ⁶So Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and did not wholly follow the Lord, as David his father had done.

did not wholly follow the Lord — The Holy Spirit sets Solomon in a stark contrast to those who did fully follow the LORD. The phrase wholly followed the Lord is used of three men in the Old Testament: Joshua and Caleb (Numbers 32:11-12, Deuteronomy 1:36, Joshua 14:8-9, 14), and here of David. Solomon is conspicuous as someone who did not wholly follow the LORD.

As David his father did — Solomon had more than one wife and David had more than one wife (fifteen, according to 1 Chronicles 3:1-9). David spiritually survived this failing and Solomon did not survive it.

David’s sin did not turn his heart away from the LORD. The lust of the flesh hindered David — it destroyed Solomon. It is possible for a particular sin in one person to be a hindrance — something that might even cause them to (figuratively) walk with a limp for the rest of their life  — while in another person that same sin is the cause of ruin.

⁷Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Molech the abomination of the Ammonites, on the mountain east of Jerusalem. ⁸And so he did for all his foreign wives, who made offerings and sacrificed to their gods.⁹And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice ¹⁰and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods. But he did not keep what the Lord commanded.

The issue was Solomon’s heart. Long before adding the wives and worshipping their gods — his heart had turned away from the Lord! He allowed his heart to become divided. We must be so careful to guard our hearts.

DON’T MISS THIS — God had appeared to Solomon twice and warned him against this very thing. Did you know that the Lord never appeared to David? Solomon saw the Lord twice but didn’t have the heart towards the Lord that his father David did? Experiencing the miraculous does not mean that you are mature. It is not manifestations that produce maturity — It is the Word of God. David kept the Word of the Lord in his heart. that is why David loved the Lord so much. That is why despite David’s notable moral failures he never departed from the Lord to worship idols.

This is not just a decline — this is plunge over a ledge of the Grand Canyon! This man of great heritage, wisdom, and blessing turns to the most depraved gods of the pagan nations.

DESCRIBE THE WORSHIP OF MOLECH.

This is a tragic example of the power of the lust of the flesh. Because of lust, Solomon found himself in a place where he never thought he would find himself. He found himself burning incense at the altars of depraved pagan gods. He found himself at the altar of child sacrifice unto the god Molech.

This is the power of lust! It can blind us and bind us in a fog of spiritual confusion until we do things we never thought we would do.

QUOTE: Alexander Maclaren — Solomon’s unbridled and monstrous polygamy sapped his manhood and his principle, darkened his clear spirit, blinded his keen eye, and turned a youth of noble aspiration and a manhood of noble accomplishment into an old age without dignity, reverence, or calm. All his wisdom was worth little if it could not keep him master of himself. God means that reason should govern impulses and desires, and that conscience should govern all and be governed by His will. The vessel is sure to be wrecked when the officers are sent below and the mutineers get hold of the helm.

The fact that this happened to the wisest man who ever lived tells us how completely and utterly and constantly we must depend upon Jesus. That is what Jesus meant when He said Apart from Me you can do NOTHING. That is what the Bible means when it says the just shall LIVE by faith. That is what Paul meant when he said This life I now live I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and died for me. TRUST IN — CLING TO — RELY UPON Jesus.

The Holy Spirit records this for us so that Solomon’s falling away will drive you to greater dependence and abiding with Jesus.

¹¹Therefore the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this has been your practice and you have not kept my covenant and my statutes that I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom from you and will give it to your servant. ¹²Yet for the sake of David your father I will not do it in your days, but I will tear it out of the hand of your son.

God is referring to terms of the Davidic Covenant. In our CREDO study titled “COVENANT: God Pursues” we learned that in each covenant in the Scripture there are conditions/consequences.  God says — this is right — this is wrong — I will discipline you if you sin — I will also continue to pursue you so that you can learn to be obedient.

In the Davidic Covenant God promised the entire kingdom of Israel to the descendants of David forever. The only condition was that they remained faithful to God. David reminded Solomon of this promise shortly before his death (1 Kings 2:4). Yet they could not remain faithful even one generation.

HUGE POINT — Solomon’s kingdom was amazing in its wealth, military power, and prestige. Those things did NOT bring security to Israel! The true security of Israel did not rest in any of those things. It rested in the blessing of God and in the obedience and faithfulness of their king.

¹³However, I will not tear away all the kingdom, but I will give one tribe to your son, for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem that I have chosen.”

AMAZINGLY — God tempers this righteous and deserved judgment with undeserved mercy. God announces that the kingdom will be divided, and part of it will be loyal to the descendents of David and part of it will be under a different dynasty. Many other passages in the Old Testament (such as 2 Chronicles 11:12) tell us that the southern kingdom was made up of two tribes, Judah and Benjamin. Several times in this chapter the southern kingdom is referred to as one tribe. Two views on this — Either Benjamin is swallowed up in Judah, or the idea was one tribe in addition to Judah.

¹⁴And the Lord raised up an adversary against Solomon, Hadad the Edomite. He was of the royal house in Edom. ¹⁵For when David was in Edom, and Joab the commander of the army went up to bury the slain, he struck down every male in Edom ¹⁶(for Joab and all Israel remained there six months, until he had cut off every male in Edom). ¹⁷But Hadad fled to Egypt, together with certain Edomites of his father’s servants, Hadad still being a little child. ¹⁸They set out from Midian and came to Paran and took men with them from Paran and came to Egypt, to Pharaoh king of Egypt, who gave him a house and assigned him an allowance of food and gave him land. ¹⁹And Hadad found great favor in the sight of Pharaoh, so that he gave him in marriage the sister of his own wife, the sister of Tahpenes the queen. ²⁰And the sister of Tahpenes bore him Genubath his son, whom Tahpenes weaned in Pharaoh’s house. And Genubath was in Pharaoh’s house among the sons of Pharaoh. ²¹But when Hadad heard in Egypt that David slept with his fathers and that Joab the commander of the army was dead, Hadad said to Pharaoh, “Let me depart, that I may go to my own country.” ²²But Pharaoh said to him, “What have you lacked with me that you are now seeking to go to your own country?” And he said to him, “Only let me depart.”

Why did he need to leave? Because the Lord was raising him up as an adversary to Solomon — It was the Lord placing that pull on his life

²³God also raised up as an adversary to him, Rezon the son of Eliada, who had fled from his master Hadadezer king of Zobah. ²⁴And he gathered men about him and became leader of a marauding band, after the killing by David. And they went to Damascus and lived there and made him king in Damascus. ²⁵He was an adversary of Israel all the days of Solomon, doing harm as Hadad did. And he loathed Israel and reigned over Syria.

KEY QUESTION: Why did the Lord allow these adversaries to be raised up against Solomon? Because God loved Solomon! The Lord brought adversity into Solomon’s life to bring Solomon down from his high horse and bring back to his knees

QUOTE:  Victor Hugo — “Adversity creates men, prosperity creates monsters”

Why do YOU have a Rezon or a Hadad in your life? Did you know that the famous evangelist John Wesley had one? His Rezon was his own wife. Wherever Wesley went to preach his wife would get up on the platform and say — “Don’t listen to this man!” She would rant and rave during his sermons. Wesley saw the purpose for his wife and her behavior — “Humility has been worked into my heart and prayer is a pre-requisite for every day of my life.” Whoever the Rezon or Hadhad is in your life, they are there for a purpose and therefore we MUST embrace it as from the Lord

There was a third adversary raised up by the Lord

²⁶Jeroboam the son of Nebat, an Ephraimite of Zeredah, a servant of Solomon, whose mother’s name was Zeruah, a widow, also lifted up his hand against the king. ²⁷And this was the reason why he lifted up his hand against the king. Solomon built the Millo, and closed up the breach of the city of David his father.

It is not immediately apparent why these construction projects caused him to rebel against Solomon. Jewish traditions say he opposed the oppressive use of forced labor in these building projects. Since he was the officer over all the labor force, this tradition makes some sense.

According to one commentator (Dilday), the name Jeroboam means, “may the people be great.” It is interesting that when the kingdom is divided that he sees the people as greater than the God of Israel — he values the opinion of the people over the true worship of God.

²⁸The man Jeroboam was very able, and when Solomon saw that the young man was industrious he gave him charge over all the forced labor of the house of Joseph.

This man that God sent into Solomon’s life to keep Solomon on his knees was talented and industrious and courageous. From the human vantage point he was a very together guy

HUGE — Though he had ability — He had no history with God. Though he had talent — It was not tempered by God. He was blessed but not broken.

²⁹And at that time, when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite found him on the road. Now Ahijah had dressed himself in a new garment, and the two of them were alone in the open country. ³⁰Then Ahijah laid hold of the new garment that was on him, and tore it into twelve pieces. ³¹And he said to Jeroboam, “Take for yourself ten pieces, for thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Behold, I am about to tear the kingdom from the hand of Solomon and will give you ten tribes ³²(but he shall have one tribe, for the sake of my servant David and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city that I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel), ³³because they have forsaken me and worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of Moab, and Milcom the god of the Ammonites, and they have not walked in my ways, doing what is right in my sight and keeping my statutes and my rules, as David his father did.

This is the first we hear of the divided kingdom — It became Israel’s history for hundreds of years after the death of Solomon. At this first description we would expect that the ten tribes under Jeroboam would be larger, greater, and more enduring than the one tribe left to the House of David. As we walk through this period of Israel’s history we will see that just the opposite happened because the ten tribes forsook the LORD, while the one tribe — for a season — would remain loyal to the Lord.

³⁴Nevertheless, I will not take the whole kingdom out of his hand, but I will make him ruler all the days of his life, for the sake of David my servant whom I chose, who kept my commandments and my statutes. ³⁵But I will take the kingdom out of his son’s hand and will give it to you, ten tribes. ³⁶Yet to his son I will give one tribe, that David my servant may always have a lamp before me in Jerusalem, the city where I have chosen to put my name. ³⁷And I will take you, and you shall reign over all that your soul desires, and you shall be king over Israel.

God ordained the division of Israel and the reign of Jeroboam. As a judgment upon Solomon’s divided heart and idolatry God divided Solomon’s kingdom.

³⁸And if you will listen to all that I command you, and will walk in my ways, and do what is right in my eyes by keeping my statutes and my commandments, as David my servant did, I will be with you and will build you a sure house, as I built for David, and I will give Israel to you. ³⁹And I will afflict the offspring of David because of this, but not forever.’”

WOW! An obedient Jeroboam had the opportunity to establish a parallel dynasty to the House of David.

Both Jeroboam and David were appointed by God to follow after disobedient kings. David waited upon the LORD to remove Saul from the throne of Israel — remained loyal to Saul and Saul’s son Jonathan — and God blessed his reign. Jeroboam did not wait on the LORD and he made his own way to the throne — and God did not bless his reign.

⁴⁰Solomon sought therefore to kill Jeroboam. But Jeroboam arose and fled into Egypt, to Shishak king of Egypt, and was in Egypt until the death of Solomon.

Here is another evidence of Solomon turning away from the Lord. God specifically said this would happen after the death of Solomon, and in judgment of Solomon’s apostasy. Solomon blew off the prophet of God and the Word of God. He sought to kill Jeroboam and thus over rule the will of God  — but he was unsuccessful. God’s Word through Ahijah proved true.

⁴¹Now the rest of the acts of Solomon, and all that he did, and his wisdom, are they not written in the Book of the Acts of Solomon? ⁴²And the time that Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel was forty years.

Many commentators believe that Solomon began his reign when he was about 20 years old. This means that Solomon did not live a particularly long life.

1 Kings 3:14 ¹⁴And if you will walk in my ways, keeping my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days.”

QUOTE: Adam Clarke — “When we consider the excess in which he lived, and the criminal passions which he must have indulged among his thousand wives, and their idolatrous and impure worship, this life was as long as could be reasonably expected.”

⁴³And Solomon slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David his father. And Rehoboam his son reigned in his place.

This does not necessarily mean that Solomon died a saved man. It is a familiar phrase used 25 times in 1 and 2 Kings. It was used in speaking of such wicked kings as Ahab (1 Kings 22:40). It simply means that Solomon died. We cannot say with certainty that he is in heaven.

Some believe that Solomon wrote the Book of Ecclesiastes at the very end of his life as a renunciation of his fall into vanity.

1 Kings 10

¹Now when the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to test him with hard questions.

There has been some question as to whether this woman was Arabian or Ethiopian. History also tells us that they were known to have queens as well as kings.

Josephus, calls her “queen of Egypt and Ethopia,” as do some Rabbinical writers. The Pulpit Commentary: 1 Kings. 2004 (H. D. M. Spence-Jones, Ed.) (202)

The other view relates Sheba to Sabea — which modern day Yemen is today (Southern Arabia). It was especially famous for its gold, gems, and spices (Ezek. 27:22; Jer. 6:20; Isa. 60:6; Joel 3:8; Job 6:19; Psa. 72:10). The Pulpit Commentary: 1 Kings. 2004 (H. D. M. Spence-Jones, Ed.) (202)

The Roman Historian, Pliny the Elder, refers to Sabea as having an abundance of aromatic woods and spices and of gold. (See Pliny, Hist. Nat. lib. xii., c. 17 and Pliny, Hist. Nat. lib. xxxvii., c. 6)

Just how badly did this woman want to meet Solomon — hear from him directly — personally view the majesty of his kingdom? Let’s say she was from Sabea — as it is the shortest distance. This would have been a journey on camel of some 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) to Jerusalem

This would have been not only long — but miserable. (Mounting a camel — The stink of camels — Camels can only walk or trot). She traveled in the manner of royalty – with a large royal procession, heavily laden with gifts and goods for trade. This would have been a very slow journey — like driving on interstate 5 behind all of the trucks!

THE BIG IDEA HERE — This woman was willing to expend time and energy to find out about the Name of the Lord. Jesus makes mention of the length of her journey as a measure of her desire to meet Solomon.

Matthew 12:42 for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon

QUOTE: Alexander Maclaren — This queen points the path by which all pilgrims of the truth must travel. It is not to be won without effort, without conquest of prejudices, repression of weakness, sacrifices of delights, and long effort. There must be humility, which will gladly learn, if there is ever to be its possession.

In today’s world people decide that they want to satisfy their spiritual curiosity with as little effort or cost as possible.

We also want to note that she made this journey because she had heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord. The great prosperity, splendor, and wisdom of Solomon’s kingdom were internationally famous — and it was associated with the Name of the Lord! What a great lesson for us in our successes — No matter how well known our successes might be — it is so important that it be equally well known that our success is wrapped up in the Name of the Lord.

ALSO — The purpose of her trip was to test not just Solomon’s wisdom — but the claim that all of his greatness was wrapped up in the Name of the Lord. Let’s see if this guy really does possess wisdom from Yahweh, the God of Israel. God. Literally — she came to him with parables and riddles. By way of application — When people here of our lives wrapped up in the Name of the Lord they want to see if it’s real — or just more religion.

²She came to Jerusalem with a very great retinue, with camels bearing spices and very much gold and precious stones. And when she came to Solomon, she told him all that was on her mind. ³And Solomon answered all her questions; there was nothing hidden from the king that he could not explain to her. ⁴And when the queen of Sheba had seen all the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had built, ⁵the food of his table, the seating of his officials, and the attendance of his servants, their clothing, his cupbearers, and his burnt offerings that he offered at the house of the Lord, there was no more breath in her.

This woman was a Queen. As a queen she was familiar with the world of royal splendor and luxury. Yet she was so utterly blown away by the wisdom of Solomon and the glory of his kingdom that it took her breath away! Adam Clarke says that this means she fainted!

Listen to her response —

⁶And she said to the king, “The report was true that I heard in my own land of your words and of your wisdom, ⁷but I did no