A Man Like Us (1 Kings 16:29-17:6)
March 29, 2020
Things are going great in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, or so it seems. Omri, the king, has solidified an alliance with the coastal city of Tyre by joining his son, Ahab, to the princess of Tyre, Jezebel. Tyre is a city that will open up all kinds of trade opportunities. The Northern kingdom of Israel will be rich! But there is just one problem; Jezebel wants to bring her gods with her. She comes with 400 prophets of Baal to establish a new religion in Israel. This god, she thinks, is the god of fertility, and this god will make Israel great like Tyre. Their crops will be fertile, and their major exports abundant. She is going to whip these people into shape, and Ahab is going to submit to everything she says because the prosperity she promises has that kind of pull over people.
The Bible tells us that Ahab did more evil than any king before him, and it will go on to say that he did more to provoke the Lord to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him. He considered the sins of those who preceded him to be a light thing. He was all too willing to accept the leadership of this foreign wife. So Ahab set up an altar for Baal in Samaria, the capital of the Northern Kingdom, and he also made an Asherah in the city, which is an idol for the fortress god. He promoted this new religion alongside his wife. They completely ignored the commands of the Lord throughout the Torah to avoid idolatry. This led the people away from the Lord. It was so bad that Hiel rebuilt the fortress of Jericho under Ahab’s direction. This is the first city that Joshua came into the land and conquered. After it was defeated, Joshua said this curse, “Cursed before the Lord be the man who rises up and rebuilds this city, Jericho. At the cost of his firstborn shall he lay its foundation, and at the cost of his youngest son, shall he set up its gates” (Josh 6:26). This curse proves true as Hiel lost both his firstborn and his younger sons as he rebuilt the city.
Imagine being someone who trusts in the Lord at that time. You see, all of your family are getting rich and turning away from the Lord, but you have decided that you are going to stick it out. At first, that seems okay; everyone is tolerant of those who want to hold on to the old ways. But then they decide that you can’t have any of the riches that they are enjoying because you don’t worship their god. The best goods could only be found in the temple of Baal, and those who resist worshipping Baal would be made to suffer. Wouldn’t you be tempted to pursue this false religion just to make your life easier? Many might say, “It’s just a place where everyone else is going. Refusing to go there is just being old fashioned. Why wouldn’t we pursue what will give us the greatest advantage? God would want us to be happy.”
Enter Elijah
In Chapter 17, Elijah, whose name means “My God is Yah,” said to Ahab, “As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” I love how the text makes this startling of a transition. All of a sudden, Elijah comes on the scene and tells Ahab that God will now withhold the rain and dew until Elijah comes back and says otherwise. We get no warning and a little introduction to Elijah. He just kind of shows up out of nowhere. This makes a statement of God’s feelings toward Ahab and Ahab’s new religion. God is responding quickly to the oppression of his people, and he wants it to be known that he is behind the calamity that is about to happen.
The judgment against Ahab is significant. He says that there will be no more rain or dew. Of course, this is significant because people need rain to have food and water. But it is more significant than that because rain is the provision of Baal. The god of Jezebel is supposed to bring the rain. You see, God sends a death blow to their false religion. He is going to show Israel once and for all that these other gods are doing nothing for Israel. God has been providing them with their rain and dew these many years, and it is about to stop, following the covenantal curses God promised in Deuteronomy 11:16-17.
Deuteronomy 11:16--17 (ESV) --- 16 Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; 17 then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the Lord is giving you.
This is intended to make the people think about what they are trusting in and whether or not it can indeed provide them with anything. This is their major failure. But doesn’t drought make us do that? Droughts in our lives come in many forms. It could be a bill, losing a job, several things going wrong at the same time, an injury, or even losing a loved one. When bad things happen in our lives, maybe God is goading us like we need to be goaded. Do you remember how Saul of Tarsus was asked, “Why are you kicking against the goads?”
God wants us to evaluate what do we put our trust in? Do we put our trust in people, relationships, jobs, houses, or technology? Do we think these things will provide us the necessities of life? God wants us to see that everything on this earth will ultimately fail us if we approach it like we are supposed to approach God. As we look around and see the nations striving after these things, we are supposed to be different from the nations. Instead of relying on false gods to provide us with satisfaction and meaning, we are supposed to rely on the one true God. He provides us with food and drink, and with that alone, we must find satisfaction. We can’t give the credit of those things to other gods that we make up or even to ourselves. The credit belongs to God.
This is what Elijah wanted Israel to understand, and surely it is what we want our nation to understand. But is this why this event has taken place? I have wrestled with this question all week. I have even brought other people into this question and heard some great feedback. We will talk more about that in just a moment, but first, let’s see what happens to Elijah.
God Provides
The story continues in verses 4-6 with God telling Elijah to hide himself by the brook Cherith, drink from the brook, and wait for the ravens to provide him with food. God commanded the ravens, and they brought Elijah bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening. We might be tempted just to overlook this and think, “Wow, that’s a neat miracle.” But there is a lot more to this miracle than meets the eye at first glance.
For one thing, ravens are unclean animals. The Israelites were specifically told not to touch them, but here, God chooses to use them as his carriers. Why is that? Here is a picture of God using an unlikely instrument to accomplish his purposes and a follower of God accepting this gift. I wonder what Elijah was thinking as he heard the words from the Lord, and I wonder what he thought as he saw the first set of ravens bringing him meat and bread twice a day. That is another interesting fact. Elijah was given meat and bread in the morning and the evening. If you remember, Israel was given manna in the morning and quail in the evening. So, as Elijah was in the wilderness, he received double of what Israel received.
Meanwhile, Israel was dying around him. Everything was drying up for the people as they worship in their newfound religion. Imagine waking up and worshipping this new god as you ask him for food and drink, and he gives you nothing. Imagine being Elijah, who is worshipping God every day and having his food delivered to him by ravens. There is no pantry or storehouse. What you get is dependent on what the Lord brings you for that day. While the rest of Israel is learning what life without God is like, Elijah is getting everything he needs at the hand of God.
What Do We Learn?
This story is the beginning of Elijah’s miracle-filled story. We are going to study more of the story in the next few weeks. But I wanted to take some time and consider how the situation that brought about Elijah’s grand entrance onto the scene of Israel is similar and different from our situation today. Do you remember what Elijah said to Ahab? “As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.” Why does Elijah introduce God in this way, and where did Elijah get the idea that God wanted a drought? Did God tell him to go to Ahab and tell Ahab that?
God’s Not Dead
Notice that Elijah says that the “Lord, the God of Israel, lives.” The situation in Israel is the same situation we face today. The push today is just like the push of Ahab. The world wants to say, “God is dead!” He can do nothing for us. We must instead go after these gods. The gods of our day are science, materialism, pleasure, financial security, fame, and sports. These are the things that make us successful and provide us with the rain we need. God does nothing for us. These gods are what life is all about. When we worship them, we find success. There is nothing wrong with science, materials, pleasure, financial security, fame, and sports. But they make terrible gods because they are full of uncertainty. God is the only certain thing who never changes.
Elijah Stands Before Him
Elijah comes onto the scene and says, this God lives, and I stand before him. Elijah knows that God lives because he stands before him. Elijah is a worshipper of that God and has been given a word to approach the king and relay this bad news to the king. Imagine doing that. Imagine going up to an evil king in those days and telling him that God has cursed the land. Maybe it wouldn’t be a big deal to the king since he does not regard the word of God. Perhaps he would just laugh at you, but think about what would happen after the curse comes true! You are effectively signing your death warrant. Why would anyone do that? This is a testimony to the faith of Elijah. He trusts that God will bring about his word and that God would be able to keep him safe during this difficult time.
“Except By My Word”
The last words of Elijah are the most surprising. He says, “Except by my word.” I want you to notice what Elijah does not say. He does not say, “God has commanded me to provoke his covenantal curse against you.” I believe Elijah has been given the authority to say this to Ahab by God, but I don’t think this was all God’s idea. You see, in the book of James 5:17, we read, “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth.” The most amazing part of this story is that Elijah is the one who asks God for the drought. God doesn’t just up and decide that it needs to drought. Elijah prays fervently to God, and God answers his prayer.
This is amazing on many levels, and this explains why Elijah speaks this way. This drought was not the result of God’s hatred for Ahab or his people. He is not trying to make them suffer because he enjoys doing that. He allows it to happen because God’s prophet is very jealous for him as we read in 1 Kings 19:10. Elijah wants the drought to happen so badly that he was praying that it not rain for the full three and a half years. Elijah wanted to make a statement in the hearts of the people that Baal is not god and that Yahweh is the one and only living God. He wanted the hearts of the people and the heart of the king to be turned back to the one true God.
We Need Drought
Elijah’s attitude toward sin and toward God is a strong example for us. I imagine Elijah is praying for a drought to come upon the land while being willing to suffer through that drought with everyone else. He didn’t know how God was going to take care of him after he uttered those words to Ahab, but he said them anyway. He trusted that God would deliver him through the drought. But it is so fascinating to me that Elijah even said this prayer. He is surrounded by an increasingly prosperous and increasingly evil society. He doesn’t want it to continue. He is the most immaterial person you see in scripture besides John the baptist, his counterpart in the NT. Elijah does not care about the temporary benefits of what is false. He is holding on to the one true God with a desire for all Israel to hold on along with him. We can see his passion and strong desire to save his nation. He wants God’s name to be glorified, and the only way he can see for that to happen according to the law is through a drought that will cause the people to turn back to God. That’s what he wants to see more than anything else.
Is that what we want to see? As the days get more and more evil around us, we are full of self-reliant people who are indulging in all of the pleasures and worshipping all kinds of false gods. Are we supposed to ask God to bring calamity to our nation in hopes that we will turn again to the Lord? That’s what Elijah did. But that is not the end of the story. If I can spoil it for you, in the end, everyone does say, “The Lord, He is God,” but they go right back to doing what they have always done. Calamity does not bring a change of heart throughout the Old Testament. I appreciate Elijah’s zeal for the Lord, but God knows better, and he has provided a way to transform hearts that calamity will not thru the sacrifice of Jesus.
A Man Like Us
James 5:17 starts with these words, “Elijah was a man like us.” This incredible work of God to stop the rain for three and a half years was all the result of Elijah praying to God with fervency and jealous love for the Lord. We may be tempted to believe that there is a significant difference between ourselves and this man who was so vital in the history of Israel. But remember this, he was no different from you and I. As we study this man’s life and see all of the amazing things God worked through him, we need to remember what James said. If we look a little earlier, we see that James wasn’t encouraging prayer for calamity. He was encouraging prayer for those who are sick and going through trials. He wants us to pray like Elijah for them. Elijah was just like us, he prayed with a desire for God to help Israel see the truth, and God fantastically answered his prayer.
We want the same thing, but we know God uses us to help people see the truth. Calamity might be used by God to goad us or the world, but the ultimate source of life change is the gospel we proclaim. We need prayer warriors like Elijah. We need men and women who are zealous for God’s glory like Elijah. God is not in a covenant relationship with this country like Israel. But God knows what would help us. We need to pray for God to work in a way that would create a greater opportunity for us to reach the lost. People around us are in a daze with all of their wealth, and they need to snap out of it. Maybe this is our opportunity to help them see Jesus and the eternal hope he offers.
Conclusion
So what are you trusting in? Is God your life? Do you rely on him for everything you need? When calamity hits, we need to consider what we are putting our trust in. Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. If we trust him, he can provide everything we need from the most unlikely place.