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New Season Church
Elijah Part 2
If God is God, then follow Him. No other statement holds more true nor has more weight in today's time than this. In this message we look at the decision we all need to face at some point in our journey: To Go All In.
Locations & Times
Platform 98, Blanco Center (7de Laan), Eersterust, Pretoria
Spitfire Ave, Eersterust, Pretoria, 0022, South Africa
Sunday 5:00 AM
Above anything else in our lives, God wants to have all of our hearts, our worship, our focus, our adoration.
God wants to be number one and have all of our hearts. In fact, the very first of the Ten Commandments, command number one, God says, “You shall have no other gods before me.
When Jesus was questioned, what is the most important commandment, Jesus said, “Above all else, we are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.” God wants all of our hearts, not just part of our hearts. Which gives good reason, if you are Satan, if you are the spiritual enemy, what would you try to do to hurt God?
False gods promise what only the true God provides.
Money promises what only God can provide. Money says if you have enough money, you’ll be happy and secure. That’s what many people believe about the false god of money. But the reality is, once you get enough money and someone says, “You have cancer and you are going to die in thirty days,” you realize it doesn’t matter how much money you have. It doesn’t make you secure.
It’s a false promise. Money says if you have enough, you’ll be happy, but it doesn’t matter how money you have. If one day you find you’ve lost one of your own children, there’s no amount of money that can buy your happiness in that moment. It’s a false promise. It’s a false god. It promises something that it does not provide.
In the life of Elijah, many people were living idolatrous lives. They were worshipping and serving false gods. In fact, if you missed last week, let me review to give you context, which will help us in understanding as we move forward.
Elijah confronts the king, and basically says, “Because of your idolatry, God sent me to tell you it’s not going to rain until God tells me to pray and asks it to rain.” So, here is this major drought.
Tons of people are dying. It’s, it’s just, it’s famine. It’s the worst thing you could imagine, and so God sends Elijah into a period of hiding and preparation. Why? Because king Ahab wanted him dead. He said to everybody, “You find him, kill him on the spot.” And so, God takes Elijah to the place called the Brook Cherith. If you were here last week,
Brook Cherith means the place of cutting, cutting down. It’s a place of humbling, where God humbled him and developed him into even a stronger man of God. God fed him by morning and evening, by ravens who flew in, would drop bread and meat, and then he was, had drink through the brook.
But one day, the brook dried up. God called him to move on to a place known as Zarephath, where there was a widow, who God used to provide for him with just a little bit of oil and a little bit of flour that never miraculously ran dry. One day, the widow’s son died.
This growing man of faith took the son up to the upper room, called out to God, and God raise this boy from the dead.
And we see the prophet developing into the man of God that God wants him to become.
After 3 years of drought to present himself to Ahab because He will soon send rain.Now, our last verse told us that he went into hiding.
17-19 The moment Ahab saw Elijah he said, “So it’s you, old troublemaker!”
“It’s not I who has caused trouble in Israel,” said Elijah, “but you and your government—you’ve dumped GOD’s ways and commands and run off after the local gods, the Baals. Here’s what I want you to do: Assemble everyone in Israel at Mount Carmel. And make sure that the special pets of Jezebel, the four hundred and fifty prophets of the local gods, the Baals, and the four hundred prophets of the whore goddess Asherah, are there.”
20 So Ahab summoned everyone in Israel, particularly the prophets, to Mount Carmel.
You may or may not know these words, but they’re the words monotheism and polytheism. If you are taking notes, what is monotheism?
It’s the belief that there is one God. As Christians, we are monotheistic in our beliefs. Polytheistic, though, is the belief that there are multiple gods, and Elijah was confronting a very polytheistic culture, where they would worship multiple gods.
Now, those of you who are Christians, you would say, “Well, we are monotheistic. We believe in one true God.” But even though we believe in one true God, many of us live what I would call polytheistic lives.
We believe in God, but in reality, we worship and serve many false gods.
Most people I know aren’t worshipping the false gods of Baal or Asherah. In reality, the false gods today that people worship and serve are much more socially acceptable.
When you elevate anything into the rightful place of the one true God and put anything on the throne of your life besides God, that is idolatry, even something as good and important as your children. So, that’s why I would ask the question to all of you today to identify Him.
What are the false gods that you serve?
What are the false gods that you put ahead of the one true God? And, I’ll tell you a few in my life.
So, Elijah, the prophet, steps into this polytheistic culture and he makes a very prophetic and very strong statement. If you are taking notes, I could summarize this, this story in this one message.
1 Kings 18:20-21
20 So Ahab summoned everyone in Israel, particularly the prophets, to Mount Carmel.
21 Elijah challenged the people: “How long are you going to sit on the fence? If GOD is the real God, follow him; if it’s Baal, follow him. Make up your minds!”
Nobody said a word; nobody made a move.
There was no objection and no repentance.
They lacked the courage to either defend their position or to change it.
They were willing to live unexamined lives of low conviction.
If God is God, follow him.
Quit wanting the benefits and being unwilling to sacrifice
I believe every single one of us will be faced with this decision at some point in our walk with God. If God is God, then serve Him. Go all in. But he is not God then go all in with the other stuff.
In other words, if material possessions, if they’re really the most important thing, then quit just sort of accumulating them, but go for it. I mean, get into massive debt.
Steal, if you have to. I’m not joking about this, because if the, if the greatest thing is accumulation, then everything should be justified, and stealing would be justified.
And don’t ever give again. Don’t ever do anything generous, because that would, then, diminish your ultimate goal of accumulating.
1 Kings 18:22-24
22 Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only prophet of the LORD who is left, but Baal has 450 prophets. 23 Now bring two bulls. The prophets of Baal may choose whichever one theywish and cut it into pieces and lay it on the wood of their altar, but without setting fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood on the altar, but not set fire to it. 24 Then call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the LORD. The god who answers by setting fire to the wood is the true God!” And all the people agreed.
In this proposed test, Elijah was careful to give the prophets of Baal every potential advantage. They picked the two bulls, and picked which one they would sacrifice and which one Elijah would sacrifice.
Again, Elijah gave plenty of advantage to the prophets of Baal. It was thought that Baal was the sky-god, lord of the weather and the sender of lightning (thought to be fire from the sky). If Baal were real, he certainly could send fire from heaven.
ii. To put God and himself on the line before the gathered nation of Israel took a lot of faith. Elijah learned this faith over the many months of daily dependence on God, both at the Brook Cherith and at the widow’s house at Zarapeth.
1 Kings 18:26-27
11
26 So they prepared one of the bulls and placed it on the altar. Then they called on the name of Baal from morning until noontime, shouting, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no reply of any kind. Then they danced, hobbling around the altar they had made.
27 About noontime Elijah began mocking them. “You’ll have to shout louder,” he scoffed, “for surely he is a god! Perhaps he is daydreaming, or is relieving himself.[b] Or maybe he is away on a trip, or is asleep and needs to be wakened!”
The prophets of Baal had a devoted prayer life. Here, they prayed long and with great passion. Yet because they did not pray to the real God, their prayer meant nothing.
There was no voice; no one answered.
This is the sad result of worshipping an imaginary god or the god of our own making. We may dedicate great sincerity, sacrifice, and devotion to such gods, but it means nothing. There is no one there to answer.
The prophets of Ball were sincere in their worship but there were sincerely wrong.
They leaped about the altar which they had made: The prophets of Baal had an energetic prayer life. Their worship was filled with enthusiasm and activity.
Yet because it was not directed to the real God, their prayer meant nothing.
1Kings 18:36-38
36 At the usual time for offering the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet walked up to the altar and prayed, “O LORD, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,[f] prove today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant. Prove that I have done all this at your command. 37 O LORD, answer me! Answer me so these people will know that you, O LORD, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself. 38 Immediately the fire of the LORD flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust. It even licked up all the water in the trench! 39 And when all the people saw it, they fell face down on the ground and cried out, “The LORD—he is God! Yes, the LORD is God!”
This also was essential, and helps us to understand the whole event. Elijah did this according to the word of God. It wasn’t prompted because of his own cleverness, because of presumption or because of vainglory. God led Elijah to this showdown with the prophets of Baal.
The prophets of Baal had passion, commitment, sincerity, devotion, and great energy. What they did not have was a God in heaven who answered by fire.
ii. “Elijah’s petition had lasted less than a minute but produced spectacular results.
The difference lay in the One addressed.
When you know Him through Christ, then all the false gods just seem to fall away.
1 Cor 1:17-22
17-19 Are you now going to accuse me of being flip with my promises because it didn’t work out? Do you think I talk out of both sides of my mouth—a glib yes one moment, a glib no the next? Well, you’re wrong. I try to be as true to my word as God is to his. Our word to you wasn’t a careless yes canceled by an indifferent no. How could it be? When Silas and Timothy and I proclaimed the Son of God among you, did you pick up on any yes-and-no, on-again, off-again waffling? Wasn’t it a clean, strong Yes?
20-22 Whatever God has promised gets stamped with the Yes of Jesus. In him, this is what we preach and pray, the great Amen, God’s Yes and our Yes together, gloriously evident. God affirms us, making us a sure thing in Christ, putting his Yes within us. By his Spirit he has stamped us with his eternal pledge—a sure beginning of what he is destined to complete.
God wants to be number one and have all of our hearts. In fact, the very first of the Ten Commandments, command number one, God says, “You shall have no other gods before me.
When Jesus was questioned, what is the most important commandment, Jesus said, “Above all else, we are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.” God wants all of our hearts, not just part of our hearts. Which gives good reason, if you are Satan, if you are the spiritual enemy, what would you try to do to hurt God?
False gods promise what only the true God provides.
Money promises what only God can provide. Money says if you have enough money, you’ll be happy and secure. That’s what many people believe about the false god of money. But the reality is, once you get enough money and someone says, “You have cancer and you are going to die in thirty days,” you realize it doesn’t matter how much money you have. It doesn’t make you secure.
It’s a false promise. Money says if you have enough, you’ll be happy, but it doesn’t matter how money you have. If one day you find you’ve lost one of your own children, there’s no amount of money that can buy your happiness in that moment. It’s a false promise. It’s a false god. It promises something that it does not provide.
In the life of Elijah, many people were living idolatrous lives. They were worshipping and serving false gods. In fact, if you missed last week, let me review to give you context, which will help us in understanding as we move forward.
Elijah confronts the king, and basically says, “Because of your idolatry, God sent me to tell you it’s not going to rain until God tells me to pray and asks it to rain.” So, here is this major drought.
Tons of people are dying. It’s, it’s just, it’s famine. It’s the worst thing you could imagine, and so God sends Elijah into a period of hiding and preparation. Why? Because king Ahab wanted him dead. He said to everybody, “You find him, kill him on the spot.” And so, God takes Elijah to the place called the Brook Cherith. If you were here last week,
Brook Cherith means the place of cutting, cutting down. It’s a place of humbling, where God humbled him and developed him into even a stronger man of God. God fed him by morning and evening, by ravens who flew in, would drop bread and meat, and then he was, had drink through the brook.
But one day, the brook dried up. God called him to move on to a place known as Zarephath, where there was a widow, who God used to provide for him with just a little bit of oil and a little bit of flour that never miraculously ran dry. One day, the widow’s son died.
This growing man of faith took the son up to the upper room, called out to God, and God raise this boy from the dead.
And we see the prophet developing into the man of God that God wants him to become.
After 3 years of drought to present himself to Ahab because He will soon send rain.Now, our last verse told us that he went into hiding.
17-19 The moment Ahab saw Elijah he said, “So it’s you, old troublemaker!”
“It’s not I who has caused trouble in Israel,” said Elijah, “but you and your government—you’ve dumped GOD’s ways and commands and run off after the local gods, the Baals. Here’s what I want you to do: Assemble everyone in Israel at Mount Carmel. And make sure that the special pets of Jezebel, the four hundred and fifty prophets of the local gods, the Baals, and the four hundred prophets of the whore goddess Asherah, are there.”
20 So Ahab summoned everyone in Israel, particularly the prophets, to Mount Carmel.
You may or may not know these words, but they’re the words monotheism and polytheism. If you are taking notes, what is monotheism?
It’s the belief that there is one God. As Christians, we are monotheistic in our beliefs. Polytheistic, though, is the belief that there are multiple gods, and Elijah was confronting a very polytheistic culture, where they would worship multiple gods.
Now, those of you who are Christians, you would say, “Well, we are monotheistic. We believe in one true God.” But even though we believe in one true God, many of us live what I would call polytheistic lives.
We believe in God, but in reality, we worship and serve many false gods.
Most people I know aren’t worshipping the false gods of Baal or Asherah. In reality, the false gods today that people worship and serve are much more socially acceptable.
When you elevate anything into the rightful place of the one true God and put anything on the throne of your life besides God, that is idolatry, even something as good and important as your children. So, that’s why I would ask the question to all of you today to identify Him.
What are the false gods that you serve?
What are the false gods that you put ahead of the one true God? And, I’ll tell you a few in my life.
So, Elijah, the prophet, steps into this polytheistic culture and he makes a very prophetic and very strong statement. If you are taking notes, I could summarize this, this story in this one message.
1 Kings 18:20-21
20 So Ahab summoned everyone in Israel, particularly the prophets, to Mount Carmel.
21 Elijah challenged the people: “How long are you going to sit on the fence? If GOD is the real God, follow him; if it’s Baal, follow him. Make up your minds!”
Nobody said a word; nobody made a move.
There was no objection and no repentance.
They lacked the courage to either defend their position or to change it.
They were willing to live unexamined lives of low conviction.
If God is God, follow him.
Quit wanting the benefits and being unwilling to sacrifice
I believe every single one of us will be faced with this decision at some point in our walk with God. If God is God, then serve Him. Go all in. But he is not God then go all in with the other stuff.
In other words, if material possessions, if they’re really the most important thing, then quit just sort of accumulating them, but go for it. I mean, get into massive debt.
Steal, if you have to. I’m not joking about this, because if the, if the greatest thing is accumulation, then everything should be justified, and stealing would be justified.
And don’t ever give again. Don’t ever do anything generous, because that would, then, diminish your ultimate goal of accumulating.
1 Kings 18:22-24
22 Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only prophet of the LORD who is left, but Baal has 450 prophets. 23 Now bring two bulls. The prophets of Baal may choose whichever one theywish and cut it into pieces and lay it on the wood of their altar, but without setting fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood on the altar, but not set fire to it. 24 Then call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the LORD. The god who answers by setting fire to the wood is the true God!” And all the people agreed.
In this proposed test, Elijah was careful to give the prophets of Baal every potential advantage. They picked the two bulls, and picked which one they would sacrifice and which one Elijah would sacrifice.
Again, Elijah gave plenty of advantage to the prophets of Baal. It was thought that Baal was the sky-god, lord of the weather and the sender of lightning (thought to be fire from the sky). If Baal were real, he certainly could send fire from heaven.
ii. To put God and himself on the line before the gathered nation of Israel took a lot of faith. Elijah learned this faith over the many months of daily dependence on God, both at the Brook Cherith and at the widow’s house at Zarapeth.
1 Kings 18:26-27
11
26 So they prepared one of the bulls and placed it on the altar. Then they called on the name of Baal from morning until noontime, shouting, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no reply of any kind. Then they danced, hobbling around the altar they had made.
27 About noontime Elijah began mocking them. “You’ll have to shout louder,” he scoffed, “for surely he is a god! Perhaps he is daydreaming, or is relieving himself.[b] Or maybe he is away on a trip, or is asleep and needs to be wakened!”
The prophets of Baal had a devoted prayer life. Here, they prayed long and with great passion. Yet because they did not pray to the real God, their prayer meant nothing.
There was no voice; no one answered.
This is the sad result of worshipping an imaginary god or the god of our own making. We may dedicate great sincerity, sacrifice, and devotion to such gods, but it means nothing. There is no one there to answer.
The prophets of Ball were sincere in their worship but there were sincerely wrong.
They leaped about the altar which they had made: The prophets of Baal had an energetic prayer life. Their worship was filled with enthusiasm and activity.
Yet because it was not directed to the real God, their prayer meant nothing.
1Kings 18:36-38
36 At the usual time for offering the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet walked up to the altar and prayed, “O LORD, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,[f] prove today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant. Prove that I have done all this at your command. 37 O LORD, answer me! Answer me so these people will know that you, O LORD, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself. 38 Immediately the fire of the LORD flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust. It even licked up all the water in the trench! 39 And when all the people saw it, they fell face down on the ground and cried out, “The LORD—he is God! Yes, the LORD is God!”
This also was essential, and helps us to understand the whole event. Elijah did this according to the word of God. It wasn’t prompted because of his own cleverness, because of presumption or because of vainglory. God led Elijah to this showdown with the prophets of Baal.
The prophets of Baal had passion, commitment, sincerity, devotion, and great energy. What they did not have was a God in heaven who answered by fire.
ii. “Elijah’s petition had lasted less than a minute but produced spectacular results.
The difference lay in the One addressed.
When you know Him through Christ, then all the false gods just seem to fall away.
1 Cor 1:17-22
17-19 Are you now going to accuse me of being flip with my promises because it didn’t work out? Do you think I talk out of both sides of my mouth—a glib yes one moment, a glib no the next? Well, you’re wrong. I try to be as true to my word as God is to his. Our word to you wasn’t a careless yes canceled by an indifferent no. How could it be? When Silas and Timothy and I proclaimed the Son of God among you, did you pick up on any yes-and-no, on-again, off-again waffling? Wasn’t it a clean, strong Yes?
20-22 Whatever God has promised gets stamped with the Yes of Jesus. In him, this is what we preach and pray, the great Amen, God’s Yes and our Yes together, gloriously evident. God affirms us, making us a sure thing in Christ, putting his Yes within us. By his Spirit he has stamped us with his eternal pledge—a sure beginning of what he is destined to complete.