Repairing Our Altar — E.A. Johnston

Repairing Our Altar Through Wholehearted Fellowship

I have a very important message for us today, friends, and I believe it will hit 50 of my audience, because I believe that half the Christians out there aren't living for the Lord as they should. My text can be found in the book of 1 Kings.

You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. We will camp out in chapter 18, beginning at verse 20. The title of my message today is Repairing Our Altar. Our walk with God is the single most important priority in our life.

If we are out of step with God, then we are out of fellowship with God, and if we are out of fellowship with God, we can do nothing worthwhile for God. For Jesus said, Without me ye can do nothing. In 1 Kings chapter 18, we have the story of the prophet Elijah contesting with the prophets of Baal atop Mount Carmel in an effort to turn the hearts of the people back to God.

Elijah Confronts Israel’s Divided Worship

You see, friends, the people of God have been trying to serve God with a divided heart, and you can't do that long and get by. You can't walk with God with one foot and with the other foot play footsie with the world.

Well, let's look at this striking passage of Scripture, beginning in verse 20. Hear now is the word of God, and may the Spirit of the Lord attend the reading of His holy word. So Ahab sent unto all the children of Israel, and prophets together, unto Mount Carmel.

And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long, Halchi, between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him, but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word. Let me pause here, friends, to say that Elijah is confronting the people of God by calling them out in their divided worship to God.

They had been mixing idol worship with serving Yahweh. When the Israelites hear the words of Elijah, How long, Halchi, between two opinions? They stand guilty as charged, and their mouths are stopped, for they answered him not a word.

I believe the first step to realigning ourselves back to God is to be honest with ourselves before God. Are we really serving Him with all our heart, or is our heart divided with the world? First, we have to see our need of repairing our altar before we can go about the work of doing just that.

The Emptiness of Idolatry and False Worship

In our passage today, friends, we see the prophets of Baal as they go first by calling on their gods, and they really put on a show for the people. There's 450 of them, and they dance around and work up their flesh and even cut themselves with knives, but to no avail.

Their god is silent, because their god is only an idol carved out of wood. The prophets of Baal are false prophets, like we have today in many of our pulpits across the land, where unconverted ministers play church on Sunday, and because God is absent from their midst, they put on a display of flesh, through flashing strobe lights and loud music and physical gyrations up on the platform, and you leave their church the same way you came in, unchanged.

I've been to a lot of churches like that, that get by on money and manpower, but the power of the Holy Ghost is absent, God is far away. So, Elijah lets these false prophets do their thing, while he mocks them, and he mocks their impotent god.

Repairing the Broken Altar

I want us to look at verse 30, and Elijah said unto all the people, come near unto me, and all the people came near unto him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord that was broken down. You see, friends, the Jews had to see for themselves that their idols were just blocks of wood with no power.

When the prophets of Baal failed to call down fire on their sacrifice, it proved to the people the emptiness of their idolatry. So when Elijah tells the people to come near, they do so because he now has their undivided attention.

Before we can rebuild the altar in our own life, God has to get our undivided attention. We have to see the emptiness of serving our idols, so to speak. Perhaps we've gotten away from God because our business is so successful that we give it all our time, and then give God the leftovers of our lives.

Or maybe discouragement and disappointment has crept into our hearts, and our passion for God has, like a flame, gone out. Or perhaps a sin area in our life keeps popping up and pulling us down into sinful behavior and hurting our fellowship with God.

A backslider in heart is a miserable individual, so the first thing needed in our lives is repairing of our altar. Our daily quiet time with God needs a fresh infusion of love onto God. Our daily walk with God needs power from above so we can live above the world.

Restoration, Revival, and the Fire of God

When we take the steps to repair our altar, then something marvelous occurs. We will soon see that our walk with God is restored. So there is a repairing first, and then a restoring. And when that happens, we enter a fresh encounter with God.

Look at verse 38 where God answers by fire. Then the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench.

God showed up, and the fire fell. Let me ask you, friend, when was the last time that God showed up in your life, and the fire fell? I recall times in my own life where I was in a red-hot love relationship with Jesus, and I felt his presence as a reality in my life.

And I've had other times when I've gotten out of step with God, and he's a million miles away, and all is dryness, and a cold formality in my service to him. Brother Pastor, where are you now? Are you serving God out of mere routine and duty while your passion for God has dwindled away?

Is it time for an honest assessment? Is it time for repairing and restoration? Are you ready to keep the coals on the altar of your heart stoked all the time with a fresh intimacy with Christ Jesus? How about you, friend?

Surrendering to God’s Lordship

How is it with you? Well, look at the people's response when God showed up in their midst. We see in verse 39. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces, and they said, the Lord, he is the God, the Lord, he is the God.

When we come to the place in our life where we realize our lack, where we sense our need of a deeper experience of God, and we go about repairing our altar and restoring our walk with God, then we will gladly surrender to his lordship in our lives and say, the Lord, he is the God, the Lord, he is the God.

And it is here that personal revival visits us and strengthens us and empowers us to go all out for God with an undivided heart for his namesake and for his great glory. Amen.