(Elijah Legacy) 4. Confronting Ahab — David Davis

Elijah Receives the Word to Confront Ahab

And it came to pass, after many days, that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send the rain. This was the third word that we know that God gave to Elijah.

Elijah’s Formation at the Brook and in Seraphat

First, he confronted Ahab and said there would be no rain. The Lord told him to go and wait at the brook. He was there almost a year, where birds fed him, and where he got closer and closer to the Lord, and his character was being transformed.

The Lord told him to go to Seraphat, and a widow would feed them, and for almost two years they had miraculous food, and he became a family man. He became a man of compassion and community, as well as consecration to the Lord.

He raised that boy from the dead. It must have been a wonderful time for Elijah. And he went to the stranger, and to the widow, and to the fatherless, which is what the Torah teaches us we should all do, a Jew going to non-Jews.

Elijah Returns to Face Ahab and Jezebel

But now the Lord says, go back to Israel and confront Ahab, and I will send the rain. I'm not sure that Elijah's flesh wanted to go back to Israel, with the reign of terror going on with Jezebel, Ahab looking for him, everyone calling him the troubler of Israel, Jezebel killing, executing, and murdering the prophets, the true preachers of the word of God.

So he had to leave, and there must have been a wonderful farewell scene in Seraphat. As he said goodbye to the widow, said goodbye to the boy, looked back at them, left, maybe the little boy was crying, that was his spiritual father leaving.

And back he went, down the Mediterranean, toward Mount Carmel, and up on to Mount Carmel. And there he had his second collision, or confrontation, with Ahab. You know, in the Old Testament, you really learn character.

You can get a lot of theology in the New Testament, but the Old Testament is filled with great character studies, like David and Saul. And you can see the difference, the contrast between the two of them.

Joseph, all the great characters of the Tanakh, the Old Testament. And here we have this collision between two men, Elijah, who stands with God, and also Ahab, who is compromised. For me, Ahab represents mixture man.

Ahab as a Compromised and Carnal Leader

He's like a composite of a weak male believer. Men are supposed to be leaders in the household, priests in the household. They're supposed to have a prayer altar, they're supposed to lead their children, and father their children, and teach their children, and be leaders to their wives.

And here Ahab was filled with carnality. He wasn't doing any of that. He married this demonic witch princess, named Jezebel, the daughter of Etbaal, which means man of Baal, the false god of the Canaanites, and brought all of this garbage, all of this mixture, all of this sin, back into Israel, instead of him standing for the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

So he's carnal man, and here he is confronted by Elijah, who is the man of communion, and consecration, and commitment to God. Oh, brothers and sisters, we don't want to be like Ahab. There are Ahabs in the church.

There are Ahabs in the body. They are carnal. They're watching pornography. They aren't the kind of consecrated people they should be. Not only that, he was compromised. There was a little of religion, a little of the true religion, and we'd bring in all this other stuff.

And he was the leader, and it was being spewed about all over Israel, and the people were worshipping Baal and worshipping Jehovah, half and half, and limping between two opinions. There was confusion everywhere, and it was because this man was carnal.

Ahab’s Covetousness and the Theft of Naboth’s Vineyard

He was compromised, where Elijah was this man of great compassion, this man of great community, how he had been with the widow, and how he had been with her son. And here was this man who was covetous.

He coveted his neighbor's vineyard against the Torah. He wanted Naboth's vineyard. He sulked like a little boy in his bed. And Jezebel said, I'll get it for you. And she did this whole set up of lies, and got people involved, and stole it, and had the man killed.

See, Ahab covets things that really aren't supposed to be his. Ahab was a man who coveted, who coveted his neighbor's property against the Ten Commandments. He goes down in the history of the Bible as one of the great weak men that could have been mightily used of the Lord.

And here is Elijah, who's not coveting anything. I mean, he lived in caves. He lived at a brook. Birds fed them. He had a little bit of food. He had a little bit of oil. He prayed, and the Lord supplied all of his needs.

You know, if you do things God's way, and you hear from the Lord, God will always, always provide for your needs. So here we have this collision of these two men. The godly man, the man of the spirit, you might say, and the man of the flesh.

And you know that we are warring the spirit and the flesh. And God is saying, where are the men? Where are the Elijahs? Where is the Lord God of Elijah? Not the false god of Ahab, Baal, which means owner.

Men that are owned by their own delusions, their own emotions, their own desires for things they shouldn't want. And so here we have this collision. Not only that, not only is Ahab a man of carnality and compromise and covetousness, he's also a coward.

The Call for Men of Spiritual Courage

Because he dons, he puts on a king's robes and pretends he's not Ahab, and he actually got killed when he went up to a war that he shouldn't have gone to. He's a coward. God is looking for some men of courage, courage in the spirit.

Men who will take a stand. Men who will be leaders in prayer. Men who will say to their wives, honey, it's time to pray. Men who will have a family prayer altar. Men who will bring their children around and pray for them.

Whether the kids know the Lord yet or not. Men who will maybe even keep a journal and say, see, we prayed for this three months ago, and look what happened. There's been a breakthrough. Now you're doing better in school.

We need men who are fathers. Elijah became a great father. He was a father to that boy, that heathen boy that he raised from the dead in Seraphat, the place of refining. And here is Elijah confronting Ahab, and Ahab says to him, you're the troubler of Israel.

Elijah’s Spiritual Courage at Mount Carmel

And Elijah says right to the king's face, who wanted to kill him, but probably had his soldiers with him. And he said, I am not the troubler of Israel. You are the troubler of Israel. Call all Israel to Mount Carmel, and let's have a showdown.

So Elijah looks the king in the face with spiritual courage, because the Lord had spoken to him, confront Ahab, and I will send the rain. You see, a prophet is a man with a word that is not his own. It's from God.

God told him, if you will confront the king, I'm going to send a downpour of natural rain and the rain of the Spirit. So he had this promise. He had this courage, because he knew the Lord had told him.

So he was acting and obeying the word of the Lord. Elijah would hear the word of the Lord and obey the word of the Lord. He heard the word of the Lord, because he spent time alone with God. That's how we hear his voice.

The Showdown Between Baal and Adonai

So he says to Ahab, now I want you to call all of Israel up to Mount Carmel. Bring all the false prophets. Bring all the false priests. Bring the 400 that eat at Jezebel's table where you're taking the money that comes from the taxes and giving it to all these people who are into all of this idolatry and building temples to Baal and you're having these feasts and all these carnal things are going on.

Bring them all up there and let's have a showdown, a confrontation between Baal and Adonai, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. This is what the Lord is telling me to do. Elijah heard the word of the Lord.

He obeyed the word of the Lord. You know, we need to build spiritual men like Elijah, the Elijah legacy. Here on Mount Carmel in northern Israel and Galilee years ago, we started having men's summits.

Men’s Summits and the Practice of Seeking God

We would call all the leaders of northern Israel up to Mount Carmel to our place. We would sit at the feet of Yeshua, Jesus, for three or four days and most of them came. Jews, Arabs, Russian speakers, English speakers and we sat at the feet of Yeshua.

The Lord came. There was no preaching. There was no agenda. The worship was pure. It was beautiful. God started doing things in us and between one another. It was wonderful to see what he did. God is looking for some men who will step out.

I know so many men. They're so busy. Leaders, pastors, others. And you look at them and you just have a word of knowledge and say, you're not spending any time with the Lord. And they say, you're right.

And why not? I'm too busy with the works of God. Brothers and sisters, get alone with God. Get the word of the Lord. Obey the word of the Lord. And pick up this Elijah legacy. Don't be an Ahab. Be like Elijah.