10/4/2015 The Word Of God Obeyed Pastor Josh Sheldon

The Covenant at Sinai and Israel’s Call to Obey

Which is on page 698 of the Deuteronomy. When we arrive at this passage, we stand for the reading of God's word. In the third month, after the children of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on the same day, they came to the wilderness of Sinai.

For then, as the target from record, had come to the wilderness of Sinai, and camped in the wilderness. So Israel camped there before the mountain. And Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain, saying, Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel, You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you to myself.

Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice, and keep my covenant, then you shall be a special character to me above all peoples, for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel. So Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before them all these words, which the Lord commanded him. Then all the people answered together and said, All the Lord has spoken to Jacob.

So Moses brought back the words of the people to the Lord. And the Lord said to Moses, Behold, I come to you in the fifth cloud, that the people may hear when I speak to you, and believe you forever. So Moses told the words of the people to the Lord.

Then the Lord said, Go to the people and concentrate on their food, and wash their clothes, and let them be ready for the third day. For on the third day the Lord would come down upon Sinai in the sight of all the people.

You shall set bounds for the people all around, saying, Take heed to yourselves that you do not go up to the mountain or touch its base. For whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death. Not a hand shall touch him, but he shall surely be stoned or shot with an arrow.

Whether man or beast, he shall not live. When the trumpet sounds long, they shall come near the mountain. 51 -62. When the time was come for him to be received up, he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem, and sent messengers before his face.

And as they went, they entered a village of the Samaritans to prepare for him. But they did not receive him, because his face was set for the journey to Jerusalem. And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, just as Elijah did?

But he turned and rebuked them, and said, You do not know what manner of spirit you are of. For the Son of Man did not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And they went to another village. And as they journeyed on the road, that someone said to him, Lord, I will follow you, and Jesus said to him, Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.

Then he said to another, Follow me. But he said, Lord, let me first go and bury my father. Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and preach the kingdom of God. And another also said, Lord, I will follow you, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house.

But Jesus said to him, No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. Amen. You may be seated. Lord, we are just coming before you now. Holy God, that you have created here on earth and in the heavens above, that you truly are with Josh right now as he brings the message that you would strengthen him both physically and spiritually, that you would remove difficulties that he might be facing, that you might give him clarity of thought and clarity of speech, that he would speak your words to us, Lord, that you would have us to hear.

I pray that you would prepare our hearts, Lord, and that through this message we might have a living and active Word, that as the psalm says, Lord, that we would have the almighty seed, Christ always will be living in us.

And I just pray this in your holy name, Amen. Amen. Thank you, Joseph.

Elijah’s Immediate Obedience and the End of the Drought

Well, from the mount, God speaks to Moses and reveals through Moses to Israel his will for them, the law. And we heard Israel respond there, All that the Lord has commanded we will do. Everything God is saying through Moses, we will obey.

And, of course, we know in their history, as we go from that point forward, that the times of obedience were few and far between. The times they obeyed were actually kind of sparsely obeyed. All that the Lord has said we will do, this is the commitment they made for themselves, for themselves, for their children, and for their children's children.

And there from Sinai, God promised blessings for those who would obey and curses upon those who would not. God spoke from this mountain, revealing himself to his people who gave their word to obey. And this morning we're going to come to the prophet Elijah, who's going to climb another mount and make some resolution for the disobedience that had come for the many years after the time at Mount Sinai.

All that the Lord has said we will do, we will obey his commands, we will be his people. The first commandment they heard was you shall have no other gods before me. And here in 1 Kings 18, in this whole study of the times in which Elijah prophesied, we find that this is immediately broken.

They might say, well, we didn't have that God before God. He was just along with God. Which, brethren, is no better in God's sight. If we listen to the words of the Lord Jesus Christ when he was asked what is the great command, he said this, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.

All, all, all. Meaning that the first command then is implicitly obeyed because if all your heart, soul, mind, and strength is given over to God and him alone, there's no room for another God. So from the mount, the law, now we're going to come to Mount Carmel where their violations of that law are in a sense resolved.

After three and a half years in this Gentile land, when we last were with Elijah, he was in the land called Zarephath, a city called Zarephath in the land of Sidon. He was there for three and a half years during the drought, which he himself had prayed for.

We'll pick up just the first couple of verses in chapter 18 of 1 Kings. And it came to pass after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year saying, go, present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the earth.

So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab, and there was a severe famine in Samaria. The drought, you see, this drought that Elijah had prayed for, the prayers of a righteous and fervent man avail much, we learn from the book of James.

Elijah having prayed for God to enact his own will as revealed in Deuteronomy chapter 28, that he would bring drought upon a land where the people were disobedient, this was the drought that Elijah had prayed for.

And now he finds this drought will soon be over. You go present yourself. I'm going to send rain, is what the Lord is saying. God will again allow the rain, and with the rain, he will allow the crops that had failed these past years.

Now not all at once. The skies will be opened as promised because God's word never fails, but only when the relief can be attributed to him and him alone. And we'll see this as we develop what happens.

We all know about this famous confrontation of Baal at Mount Carmel against the prophets. Let me rephrase that. Famous confrontation of Elijah at Mount Carmel against the prophets of Baal. We need to see that one of the things God is accomplishing in the way this is all arranged and the way this is done is that when the drought is over, according to God's word, God Almighty said the drought will soon be over.

And we will see that he and he alone can be attributed as having done this. Elijah obeys without hesitation. Elijah does what in Exodus 19 Israel had promised to do. All that the Lord has said we will do, Elijah obeys here without hesitation.

Going from Zarephath, where he had been for those years with the widow and her son, being miraculously provided for by the bin of flour and the jar of oil that would never fail to be replenished each day they went.

There in Zarephath, the home ground of this God that these people worship, that's where he was from, and being infused into Israel, he obeys without hesitation and goes back to Israel. Now in verse 10 of this chapter, a man named Obadiah, who we'll come to fairly soon here, he's going to tell him how Ahab has been searching everywhere for him.

Ahab's been looking everywhere for Elijah to capture him. It's undoubtedly a death warrant. It's issued in the hope that the prophet's death would appease Baal and bring fertility back to the land. And it's very certain that Elijah was aware of this.

Yet, he goes. He goes in immediate and unquestioning obedience to the word of the Lord. Go to this land that does not worship me as they ought. Go to this land where the king is not only a powerful king, but he's your enemy.

You go. Without question, he goes. You might think forward to Ananias in the book of Acts, when he's told, you go to Paul, for he is my chosen instrument to bring the gospel to the Gentiles. And Ananias says, wait a second.

Don't you know the violence this man has done to the church? Can we paraphrase and say, Lord, he's going to kill me. And Jesus says, no, you go. We have none of that here from Elijah. He packs his things, as it were, and goes.

And he goes so immediately that maybe he didn't pack his things. He just goes. And praise God, brethren. Praise God for faithful men who do as God commands, without question, without hesitation, without any equivocation.

Elijah had been at the lonely brook Cherith, where by the word of God, he was to depend upon ravens to bring him food. And then he goes to Zarephath, which is the center of this enemy God, dependent upon a poor, starving, ready-to-die widow, but not really dependent upon her at all, but God's daily provision, as we said a moment ago.

And now back to Israel to face the king, so determined to kill him and continue his promotion of false God. And Elijah just goes. Praise God for men, and I say for women, who follow the word of God without question, who do God's will.

All that the Lord has commanded we will do. We have a great example here already in Elijah. God says go, and he goes. It's one of the reasons I had Luke read to you. Luke chapter 9 up to verse 51. You just heard it a few moments ago.

And we read how when it was time for Jesus to be received up to go to Jerusalem and there to face his crucifixion, that he simply turned and went. Why did the Samaritans not show him hospitality? We're not going to take that apart right now, but let's understand that Luke says because he was determined to go to Jerusalem, he had no time to waste.

He had not a footstep to spare in accomplishing God's will. It's no accident that Luke wrote what we just spoke of there so soon after Jesus' transfiguration, because on that mount the disciples saw Moses and who?

Moses and Elijah talking to Jesus about his soon-to-come departure. The actual word that Luke uses is his soon-to-come exodus, which he would accomplish. Well, Elijah, in his determination to turn his face and go to where God had pointed him, Elijah is the forerunner.

Jesus is the exemplar, but Elijah, the forerunner. Thank God for men who turn and steadfastly follow God's word. You know, Luther stood on God's word at Worms when he said, Unless I am convinced by Scripture and reason, I cannot and will not recant because acting against one's conscience, can I say parenthetically, one's conscience as it is informed by the word of God and by prayer and by submission to his spirit, that conscience, not the conscience that we have that we make up for ourselves, not our own self-righteous conscience, a conscience informed by God's will.

To go against that conscience is neither safe nor sound. God help me. Amen. What did Luther expect? He expected to be burned at the stake, much as Elijah might have expected to be killed immediately by Ahab.

Thank God for brave men like Luther who are steadfast for God and who would anticipate even to be burned at the stake in order to propagate the true gospel of Jesus Christ and the forgiveness that God has wrought in him.

Ephesians 4 .11 speaks of the gifts that God has given to the church, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, men with feet of clay just like Elijah's, men with a spirit like Elijah's as James tells us, and some even with the courage of a Luther.

Excuse me. Nothing with anything like Jesus. None who accomplished anything like he did. Luther brought us what? The cry of the Reformation. Ad fontes, back to the sources. Elijah, we'll return to in a moment.

But what do these men who are steadfast for God bring us? These men who turn the direction that he points them and will not turn back. Jesus brought us salvation. Elijah the forerunner. Jesus the exemplar here.

Obadiah’s Fear, Courage, and the Demand for Undivided Loyalty

If we carry on in 1 Kings 18, the next few verses, the author takes a moment to kind of catch us up on events in Israel. What is this context to which Elijah is returning? What's been happening there?

Let me go on. Beginning at verse 3. And Ahab had called Obadiah who was in charge of his house. Peren. Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly for so it was while Jezebel massacred the prophets of the Lord that Obadiah had taken 100 prophets and hidden them, 50 to a cave, and had fed them with bread and water.

And Ahab said to Obadiah, Go into the land to all the springs of water and all the brooks. Perhaps we may find grass to keep the horses and the mules alive that we will not have to kill any livestock.

So they divided the land between them to explore it. Ahab went one way by himself and Obadiah went another way by himself. This is where Elijah finds his first contact who of course is Obadiah. He's searching for water.

Water that is scarce because of his, because of Elijah's prayer. What is Obadiah? He's a chief of staff of sorts for the king. He's a high ranking official in the palace. We learn that he fears the Lord greatly.

But he's sort of a closet Christian because he needs to keep his faith to himself. His king's land was suffering because Obadiah's God had listened to Elijah's prayer and sent this calamity. And we have to assume if it were known that he worshipped this God or he was a friend of that particular prophet who had called God to bring this upon the land, he'd almost surely be killed along with the others that Jezebel had already massacred.

With a courage that must rank with the best, he hid 100 prophets from slaughter and provided for their food. Obadiah should go into sort of a hall of fame. I say fame, not faith because the hall of faith is Hebrews 11.

And that's too good a name for it to play around with it. But let's put him in a bit of a hall of fame. Can not Obadiah, having hidden these men at great risk, while Jezebel is, without restraint, massacring God's true prophets, can not he go alongside the Hebrew midwives who ignored Pharaoh and saved the Hebrew children alive?

Can he not be ranked with Jehoshaba, the woman who rescued young Joash from Athaliah's murderous rage? How about Ebed-Melech, who was King Zedekiah's servant the one who rescued Jeremiah from the pit when the mire went up to his armpits?

Ebed-Melech means servant of the king. He's the one who rescued him. Does not Obadiah's courage in saving these prophets rank with Daniel and his friends who preferred to be eaten by beasts and burned by fire rather than bow down to an image?

Or Nehemiah, who ignored the death threats against him and continued and then finally finished rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem? Obadiah, this first man that Elijah finds when he returns to Israel. He was a brave and a godly man.

And he was the first to learn that the word of God had returned to that forlorn land. He was the first to see the return of hope. Now read of this as we go on, beginning at verse 7. Now as Obadiah was on his way, suddenly Elijah met him and he recognized him and fell on his face.

He says, Is that you, my Lord Elijah? And he answered him, It is. Go, tell your master, Elijah is here. So he said, How have I sinned that you are delivering your servant into the hand of Ahab to kill me?

As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my master has not sent someone to hunt for you. And when they said, He is not here, he took an oath from the kingdom or nation that they could not find you.

Now you say, Go, tell your master, Elijah is here. And it shall come to pass as soon as I am gone from you that the Spirit of the Lord will carry you to a place I do not know. So when I go and tell Ahab and he cannot find you, he will kill me.

But I, your servant, have feared the Lord from my youth. Was it not reported to my Lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord, how I hid 100 men of the Lord's prophets, 50 to a cave, and fed them with bread and water?

And now you say to me, Go, tell your master, Elijah is here. He will kill me. Then Elijah said, As the Lord of hosts lives before whom I stand, I will surely present myself to him today. So Obadiah went to meet Ahab and told him.

Now what's he doing? He's out minding Ahab's business. His business, but it's really his master's business. And all of a sudden, he's facing Elijah. And the conversation starts very simply. He says, Is that you?

And the answer is just as direct. Yes. Now go do what I tell you to do. And when he hears what he must do, he has these two grounds upon which he objects. First, he put his own life at risk when he protected the Lord's prophets.

In verse 13, he is sure that this was reported to him. Did you not hear? Don't you know what I've already done? Don't you see? Haven't you been aware of the good work that I did and am still doing? He's asking, Really?

Haven't I done enough? Why do I have to risk my life? Why do I have to risk my job? Why do I have to go and make Ahab angry with me? Elijah, I've served the Lord from my youth. And I put my life on the line to save 100 of them.

He is as we were speaking of a little bit ago. Isn't he sort of claiming his own self-righteousness? I wonder how Jesus might have answered that. Didn't our Lord say in Luke chapter 17, verse 10, that when we have done our duty, we should say, I am an unprofitable servant.

I've only done that which is required of me. His first ground is, I've done enough. And we all feel like this sometimes, don't we? That I've sung in the choir. Well, we don't have a choir here, but you take my point.

I've come to the work days. I show up at all the meetings. I obey my husband. I love my wife. I've done all my duty. Haven't I done enough? The answer is from Scripture, no, no. What is the limit of our service?

The limit of our service is what Christ did to bring us into his service. He's claiming his own self-righteousness in a way. His second ground is that should he go to Ahab and then Ahab can't find Elijah, he's gonna be executed as a traitor.

He'd be treasonous. Then not only is he dead, but also the prophets who were under his watch would probably perish. And in verse 12, he theorizes that the Spirit of God might carry him somewhere as he did when he sent him to Cherith and then to Zarephath and now here.

Remember, this meeting was totally unexpected. Suddenly, there is Elijah. It's like he didn't see him coming. Is that you? How'd you get here? What's going on? It was sudden. It was without warning as though God had simply transported him there as he did, for example, Philip in Acts chapter 8.

And he knew that once Elijah went somewhere else, he was ducidly hard to find. So in short, what's he saying? I've done enough and this is too risky. He just wants out of this whole adventure. Now, Elijah has no time for arguing.

He has no room for compromise. He has commandeered Ahab's servant to do his, not Ahab's, but his, Elijah's bidding. And the oath he gives Obadiah settles it. He swears by Yahweh Tzva 'ot, the Lord of hosts, the Lord God at the head of the heavenly armies.

And he swears by that, that Ahab and Obadiah will be safe. When he first met Elijah, he took an oath in the name of the Lord God of Israel that the rain would stop. And here the oath looks ahead to what's coming.

The Lord has come to do battle against his opponent. The Lord has come to do spiritual war of the severest sort. And so Elijah swears to him in that name, the martial name of God, in the name of the Lord of hosts, Yahweh Tzva 'ot, I will appear before Elijah.

You go and do what I tell you. You see, we all have fears to overcome. A few of us are concerned that we'll be killed because of our faith and because of our service to Christ. Certainly not impossible, not in these days, but unlikely.

As the author of the Hebrew puts it, and this applies to all of us, you have not yet resisted to bloodshed. Obadiah feared the Lord greatly. He also feared Ahab. The question is, which fear is going to rule the day?

Now, if your faith is in Jesus Christ, if you have repented of your sins and fled to the cross for forgiveness, then you are one who we could say fears the Lord. You fear the Lord. If you believe in Jesus Christ, you must, by definition, be one who fears the Lord.

And we all have other fears. Fear of failure. Fear of taking chances. Fear of public speaking. Fear of, fear of, fear of. Which fear rules the day? Which fear rules the moment? Well, the first part of this at verse 16 actually told us where Obadiah finally landed.

And my guess is he landed there very quickly, just by how short the conversation is and the personality of Elijah that we've been seeing throughout this short study we've been in, I think was pretty quick.

So Obadiah went to meet Ahab. Just that simple. Is that you? Yes, go to Ahab. Tell him I'm here. The objection? Elijah says no. I swear to you in the name of the Lord of hosts I will be there. And off he goes.

He went to meet Ahab. He knew that Elijah was God's true prophet. He knew that the word of the Lord was to be obeyed. He knew that if Elijah swore he'd be there, he'd be there. God demands no less from all his children than this.

A settled confidence in his word that all hazards be put at risk for obedience above all else, even life itself. Let's not look at this and say well that was them then. That they had a special spirituality or they were more superstitious, they weren't as modern, weren't as thinking of people as we are.

It's all nonsense. These were people, sinners, men and women with feet of clay just like the rest of us. And obedience for them was no easier than for us. Obadiah, at the risk of his life, but in trust in God's word, standing on the promise of God, trusting that God was speaking through the prophet.

Obedience above even life itself. We'll continue. Chapter 18, beginning at the second half of verse 16. And Ahab went to meet Elijah. Then it happened when Ahab saw Elijah that Ahab said to him, Is that you, O troubler of Israel?

And he answered, I have not troubled Israel, but you and your father's house have, in that you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and followed the Baals. Now therefore send and gather all Israel to me at Mount Carmel, the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah who eat at Jezebel's table.

So Ahab sent for all the children of Israel and gathered the prophets together on Mount Carmel. You know the first part that I read, which is the second half of verse 16, that should have been a little bit of a stunning statement for us.

When you read that, you have to stop and take notice of what the scripture is saying there. What do we notice? Ahab obeys the word of the Lord through the prophet. Wicked King Ahab, submitting himself to the word of God.

This idolater, infusing Baal worship in favor of his wife, who brought it to Israel. And when Elijah says, here's what we're going to do, you're going to come and meet me. Obadiah says, Elijah is, as it were, commanding your presence, O king.

What does Ahab do? He obeys. Think of the power of the word of God. Think of the strength of a prophet who can declare that word with such confidence. And a man like Obadiah who will trust and obey. And then a king.

A king. We know he was wicked. We know he was a pagan idolater. We also know he was very powerful militarily. He was a very able and strong leader in a strictly worldly sense. He obeys the word of the Lord.

He doesn't know the Lord. He knows Baal. He doesn't worship God. He prefers figurines. God's word never fails. When he sends it, it accomplishes his purposes. The will of God. Brook's no resistance. Brook's no alternative.

Even with great kings. Even with great kings who would have nothing to do with him if they could. Proverbs 21 .1 says, The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord. Like rivers of water, he, God, he turns it wherever he wishes.

Didn't King Nebuchadnezzar, the greatest king of his day, didn't he acknowledge this when he prayed that God removes kings and he raises up kings? He also said, God does according to his will in the armies of heaven.

No one can say to him, what have you done? In Acts 2 .23, speaking of Jesus' arrest and crucifixion, Peter said that the men who did this were acting in what? According to the predetermined purposes of God.

This includes the crowd who said, No, crucify him. Let his blood be on our heads and our children's heads. This includes the Pharisees who turned them over to Pilate. This includes Pilate who caved to the Pharisees' will.

Whose will were they following? What were they obeying? They were obeying the inalterable, irresistible, going to accomplish what it is sent for, word of God. I think just those few words and Ahab went to meet Elijah.

They should say so much to us about the God we worship and this word that we have. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable to us. All scripture, ultimately, is obeyed. Ahab does what most of us have done at one time or another.

When he's confronted by his sin, he deflects it back to the one who confronts him. He says to Elijah, You troubler of Israel. That's what he called him. That's quite an accusation. Elijah last spoke to Ahab in verse 1 of chapter 17.

That's just a few paragraphs for us, but that was three and a half years before this meeting was the last time these two met. You remember how quick that meeting was? As the Lord God of Israel before whom I stand lives, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years except at my word.

And off he goes to the brook Cherith. That was three and a half years before this meeting. All he said was that according to God there's going to be a drought and he's out of there. He hasn't been there in Israel stirring up trouble.

He hasn't been there in Ahab's reign fomenting rebellion. One simple proclamation. That's it. Yet Ahab knew that he, that Elijah was the one who was heard by God when he called for this drought. Now can you feel his insanity?

I mean Ahab's insanity? He believes that Elijah is God's prophet. He believes that the drought is, as it were, Elijah's fault. He's seen for himself that the famine was severe. He's seen that Baal can do nothing about any of this.

Yet he refuses to humble himself under the mighty hand of God. He knows that Elijah prayed for the drought. How do we picture him? Is he still on his mighty war horse? Spear in his hand? Sword buckled to his side?

He calls him the troubler of Israel instead of coming off the horse and bowing down before God. Not Elijah, before God and seeking repentance. But he knows that Elijah, by the power of God, called for this.

This is all of us. Without Christ, we are only different from Ahab in our relative positions in the world because we're not kings. Think of it. He knows where the calamity came from, from God. He knows it is God's judgment against his, against Ahab's idolatry.

And now he has right in front of him the one man God will listen to and bring an end to his nation's misery. But he will not repent. He will not humble himself. The most difficult duty the gospel calls us to is humility.

Abandoning self-righteousness. Abandoning self. It's all of us. He will not repent. Stubbornness wells up. Pride overcomes reason. Humility is eschewed and only arrogance remains. Now, there's something very similar towards the end of our scripture, towards the end of the Bible, very, very similar to this.

It's in Revelation chapter 16 and verses 10 and 11. Now, however you look at the book of Revelation, futurist or preterist or idealist view, we have in these two verses a summary of man's obstinacy. As I read these two verses, think of the power of the gospel that overcomes this in all of us.

Think of the power of God that brings life to dead souls. Because what I'm going to read to you is dead men's souls. Listen to this. They blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores and did not repent of their deeds.

Do you see Ahab there? Do we see ourselves there without the mercy, without the grace of God, without the regeneration of his Holy Spirit to give us faith to believe and just a hint of humility? Do you see that in there?

Where was their suffering from? It's from God. Why did God send this suffering to them? Because of their evil deeds. How can it be stopped? Repent? But that's too hard. That harms our pride. To repent means to admit sin, which is the worst sin of today's modern world.

If you're raised in this ethos that surrounds us, there's hardly anything you can do that's worse than to admit sin. Though the Gospel, the Scripture, as you might expect, says there's nothing better you can do.

What happens when we confess our sin? It reduces one of this age's greatest idols, which is self-esteem. And repentance is not a natural thing. It's a gift of God. Not by works of righteousness we have done, but according to his mercy, through the washing and regeneration of the Holy Spirit.

Proud King Ahab obeyed the word of God by submitting to Elijah's summons. But would he submit to God by repenting? By falling down before God? Having known the judgment of God? Having admitted that it was from God?

No, like those men in chapter 16. It's almost like the worse the suffering got, the more certain they were that it was from God. The more they blasphemed his name. Proud King Ahab obeying the word of God by submitting to Elijah's summons.

And he obeys again when he agrees to Elijah's demand for this contest between his God and the true God, between Baal and between Yahweh. Let's press on. In verse 21, Elijah came to all the people and he said, How long will you falter between two opinions?

If the Lord is God, follow him, but if Baal, follow him. But the people answered him not a word. Then Elijah said to the people, I alone am left a prophet of the Lord, but Baal's prophets are 450 men.

Therefore, let them give us two bulls and let them choose one bull for themselves, cut it in pieces and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it, and I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood and put no fire under it.

Then you call on the name of your gods and I will call on the name of the Lord, and the God who answers by fire, he is God. Pretty fair contest. 450 against one. Though as Goliath should have trembled, these 450 should be much more circumspect about entering into this, but they are who they are.

And the terms are the same. We're both going to do the same thing. We both get a chance to call on our God and let's just see what happens. Here's really what he's saying. And all the people answered and said, It is well spoken.

In other words, okay, that will settle it for us. How long will you limp along, he asks. How long will you falter between two opinions? The word is really limp. They're not walking. They're not striding.

They're not hiking. They're not running. They're limping. They're getting nowhere. Many of you see me, you know, I have multiple sclerosis, if you don't know it, and one of the effects it's had is my left leg just will not obey commands to walk rightly.

And one thing that happens when you limp, it's really hard to go straight. You actually end up going in circles. Now, I've said before, you don't want this disease if you don't have a sense of humor. You have to be able to smile at yourself a little bit.

But it illustrates really what Elijah's saying here. You're limping along. You're faltering. Choose one. Choose the other. Don't have one with the other because Baal would be no happier to be with Yahweh than the other way around.

Just choose one. You're limping. One thing happens when you're limping, you go in circles. You're not getting anywhere. You're faltering. You see, they hadn't ultimately abandoned Yahweh. They had mixed him with these other gods, this growing pantheon.

The first command, you shall have no other gods before me, that's in tatters here. Unless they think that they're okay having other gods only with but not before, remember what we said at the early part of this message.

According to Jesus Christ, the great command is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, all your strength. No room for anything else. Not before, not beside, not along with, not number one, but I'll keep these others.

This is such an abject lack of faith as can hardly be described. It means that they don't think God alone is God. They might think he's the chief of all gods, but that's really not enough. That falls infinitely short of the biblical confession of God, the only true and living God.

It says, they answered him not a word. Shame left them silent. Shame, again, think of shame in the modern world. Think of shame in the ethos that's outside these walls, outside the scripture. What does shame do?

Well, shame would crush your self-esteem, which it does. Praise God that shame crushes our self-esteem. You see, shame is a good thing if it leads us somewhere. Shame is good if it leads us somewhere.