[0:00] 1 Kings chapter 17 and verse 1. 1 Kings 17 and verse 1. Finish this part of Elijah's life tonight.
[0:21] 1 Kings 17. We've been talking over the last few weeks about the fact that Elijah, along with a lot of other people that God used, were ordinary people like you and I.
[0:35] The fact that God can use us, what a tremendous blessing that is to think about. God Almighty can use me. God Almighty can use you to do things.
[0:49] What was it special about all these men like Elijah? They were willing. They were obedient. They would do whatever God asked them to do, and they would follow him.
[1:01] The Bible tells us in James that he was subject unto like passions as we are. We talked about the fact that he was a common man, and the fact that his home, Gilead, was just a rugged terrain type thing.
[1:16] He had nothing special as far as education and all that. He was an ordinary man. We talked about his humanity, you know, subject to like passions, and face the same temptations and things that we do.
[1:29] We talked about the fact that, you know, when they were going to choose David as king, Samuel had seen all the different brothers, and God said to him in 1 Samuel 16, 7, he said, Look not on his countenance, nor the height of his statue, because I have refused him.
[1:50] For the Lord seeth not as man seeth. The man looketh on the outward appearance. The Lord looketh on the heart. And we talked about Isaiah. It was a man who just said, Here, my Lord, send me. Do we have that kind of attitude?
[2:03] Here, my Lord, use me. Here, my Lord, send me. Wherever you want me to go. Second thing we talked about, he was a courageous man. He defied a foolish ruler. And Sunday, I mentioned the sin of Jeroboam.
[2:17] We were talking about that. We're going to finish that this coming Sunday. Okay. It says in chapter 16, verse 31, if you look at it, it said, And it came to pass as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat.
[2:35] A light thing to follow those things. And then, if you look at verse 30, it says he did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him. This is Ahab.
[2:46] Verse 33, he says toward the end of that verse, that Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him. He did more to anger God than anybody.
[3:01] And part of what he did in verse 32 is he put up an altar to Baal, in a temple of Baal, and had the people following and worshiping Baal. And then, last week, we talked about the fact that he denounced false religion, we talked about Baal worship and some of the things that were involved, and how he had set that up for the people to follow.
[3:29] And Elijah walks in to the king's area and says, Look, this is the way things are going to be. There's not going to be any rain until I say so.
[3:43] And you can do whatever you want, but you and Jezebel and Baal have no control. My God is greater than Baal, and to prove it, he's going to turn off the water.
[3:55] There will be no water. And I told you, part of the Baal worship was that Baal was a god of fertility. He was also a god of rain and thunder and all of that. And basically, they're saying, we're shutting him down.
[4:07] There is no, there is nothing that he can do compared to us. Third thing we talked about, Elijah was a committed man. We talked about his designation.
[4:18] His name, Elijah, meant my God is Jehovah. We talked about the fact that he was willing to follow Jehovah with everything.
[4:33] Okay, questions? Before I go? Were you trying to follow me? Oh, you're trying to follow me? I'm on the outline of giving you. I'm just kind of reiterating what I've already done.
[4:45] So his designation was that he's Elijah. You couldn't find your paper. Okay. Elijah was, his name means my God is Jehovah. And he was going to follow him no matter what.
[4:58] And he's followed him partly by saying, look, I'm dependent on God. I, everything I'm going to do with my life, everything that's going to happen in my life, depends on God working in my life.
[5:11] He's right there to you. And we talked about the fact in Romans chapter 14, verse 23, the last part of the verse says, for whatsoever is not of faith is sin.
[5:24] We need to trust God. We need to follow him. If we're not, he says, look, that's sin. If you don't trust me, if you're not following me, if you're not doing what I want you to do, be careful.
[5:35] We talked about his devotion. He says there in chapter 17, verse 1, he says, the Lord God of Israel liveth before whom I stand. His devotion was of God.
[5:46] And he proved that by walking into the area there where Ahab was and just walking in and saying, Ahab, this is what God says. This is what God's going to do.
[5:57] This is what God wants. Ahab, you're sinning. And you need to pay attention to what God wants. Which brings me to the fourth thing.
[6:08] And we're going to finish this up tonight. Elijah was a confident man. He was a confident man. He was confident in who God was and what God was going to do.
[6:21] He was confident, first of all, in the person of God. In the person of God. You notice one of the things he says in verse 17, verse 1 of chapter 17.
[6:35] He says, As the Lord God of Israel liveth. Too many people today are wandering around acting like God is dead. Too many people are walking around today going, Oh God, you know, he doesn't really exist.
[6:51] You know, he's a myth made up and stuff. And a lot of Christians are, yeah, God, God, you know, yeah, I believe in God, but, you know, and they kind of don't really trust him to do what he says he will do.
[7:06] You know, you can live like God is dead. Elijah says to Ahab, but you know what? I'm going to live for him because he lives in me.
[7:18] And we as Christians, we need to have that kind of attitude. I'm going to live for God because he lives in me. We just passed Easter a little bit ago.
[7:28] One of the favorite songs to sing. He lives. He lives. Christ Jesus lives today. Do we really believe that? Do we really believe that he is who he says he is?
[7:42] Do we really believe he can do the things that he says he is going to do? See, Elijah's situation, God was living in him and God was using him and God was being able to do things through using Elijah because Elijah was willing and obedient to what God had for him.
[8:03] See, I keep coming back. It's a really, some people like formulas. One of the things, I used to hate geometry because in geometry they say, I would use to figure out the answer and I'd get the answer right.
[8:20] But they say you did it the wrong way. Well, I use this theorem and this postulate and this and this and this and I got this answer. Yeah, but you didn't need those two. If you'd use this one and this one you'd have the answer sooner than doing all those steps.
[8:33] Did I get the right answer? Well, yes, but you did it wrong. I hated that. I liked algebra though because algebra is you do this, you do this, you do this, you get the answer. Let's do that you do this, you do this, got the same answer.
[8:47] You do this, you do this, you do this, you get the answer. So you want a formula for living a Christian life? Obey God and follow him. That's it.
[9:00] Obey God and follow him. And that's what Elijah did. He was going to obey God. He put his trust in the person because he said there is a God who is alive and he lives in me and I'm going to follow what he says and do what he says.
[9:17] Elijah's God who is alive is ours until he lived like he really is. Second thing, he was confident in the power of God, the power of God.
[9:32] You don't have to turn if you don't want to but over in James chapter 5 you probably know these verses or at least familiar with them. Elias was a man subject unto 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 and he prayed again and heaven gave rain and the fruit and the earth brought forth her fruit.
[10:00] You know you look at those verses it seems like the drought was Elijah's idea but he wouldn't have done that without God giving him instruction and giving him the idea that this is the way things are going to go but he prayed I prayed based on God's instruction I prayed it is not going to rain again until I say so he had assurance of what God was doing going to be obedient going to follow him I have assurance of what God is doing marches into Ahab says look I'm serving God doing what God wants me to do one of the things of this generation that we live in probably that's the hardest we don't have a lot of confidence in God and his ability we don't have a lot of respect for God and who he is and what we can do what he can do yeah any of you get
[11:07] Earl Myers on your Facebook page let's see if I saved I think I did this is a off the cuff thing but let's see if I saved it for those of you who think God has abandoned Israel and has annulled his promises to them or has replaced Israel with the church an Israeli scientist who works for the security system and is a doctor of physics wrote the following words to his rabbi yesterday I wanted to share with the rabbi something that is much more than a feeling that on Shabbat night something happened here on the scale of the splitting of the Red Sea that's a pretty impressive thing that happened I'm a doctor of physics and I worked for several years in the defense industry in Israel in projects that are still the cutting edge of the state of
[12:15] Israel when I look at what happened on Saturday night on the scientific level it simply cannot happen everyone and I mean everyone acted as one man in overall unity he continued the likelihood that everything works out just as it should does not exist in complex systems like the defense systems that were operating we have never I mean never even beyond the state of Israel been tried in real time I took a pencil and dove into the calculations to check the likelihood of such a result that would materialize a large number of events that had to be handled at precisely the right time doubles the chance of making a mistake with all the high technologies the expectation was for a breach in the defense of the skies of the state of Israel even if we got 90% protection it would be a miracle what happened though is that everyone I mean everyone the pilots the system operators the technology operators acted as one man at one moment in total unity dr.
[13:28] marvels and adds this is sharper than a victory of the six day war or the day of independence there it can be explained according to nature the rescue that took place for the people of Israel on Shabbat night is simply impossible naturally I believe that this miracle saved the lives of many people from Israel the defenses had failed to intercept a number of cruise missiles the result would have been dragged us into a very complex campaign I wouldn't bet that the next time it will work like this without divine supervision the simple proof of what I said is that the managers of the security industries who developed and manufactured these systems guarantee no more than 90% success since the day you came out of the land of Egypt we have shown you wonderful things and I can't remember the exact statistics but when Iran fired those missiles at
[14:30] Israel the other night there were something like 300 drones 186 surface to air type missiles and stuff and like 80 some odd cruise missiles the fact that they knocked down I think they like seven made it through that was it one little girl was hurt and that was it yep after all that stuff was thrown at them yeah and that's what yeah that's what this guy is saying he's saying that couldn't have happened without God's intervention so God does work in our behalf and we need to remember that Luke 137 says for with God nothing shall be impossible we sing that chorus nothing is impossible you put your trust in God God can do amazing things but do we trust him
[15:33] I keep coming back to that Ephesians 3 20 now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that worketh in us God is able to exceeding abundantly above everything we ask and think that guy just said this worked way beyond what anybody expected it to do he says if that's not a miracle I don't know what is you know God can meet our needs he can take care of us remember in Genesis Abraham is told that he and Sarah are going to have a child we were talking about that a little bit earlier and God says is there anything too hard for me I can do anything is there anything too hard for me when you're battling sin sin is really coming down on you remember he is
[16:34] God when we have a need he is God when Satan is tempting you and throwing things at you he is God do we trust him and put our faith in him third thing he had confidence in the promise of God the promise of God he's standing before Ahab he has enough sense to know that when God told him something was going to happen it was going to happen God says I'm going to turn off the water it's not going to rain Elijah said okay I'll give the message I'll take it to him you know Romans chapter 4 verse 21 says being found fully persuaded that what he had promised he was able also to perform are we persuaded of what God says he is able to do Elijah walked in there to see
[17:39] Ahab Jezebel he stirred up a hornet's nest boy he stirred things up and we'll see some more of that as we go into future weeks here but the point of the verse here verse one is he stood believing in a living God knew that he had to answer to God he says before whom I stand and he believed God to keep his word one little verse but there's so much there my God lives I'm going to stand before him now and in the future I'm going to stand before him I believe what he says he will do ordinary guy just like us do we believe like he believed that makes all the difference in the world prayer request