You remember the account of David the young shepherd going up to Goliath for battle. We marvel at his courage. No one else in Israel had the fortitude to go to battle against the nine foot 450 pound champion of the Philistines. Moreover, David took with him five smooth stones. Why five? He knew there were four other giants waiting in the wings.
There is another profile in courage in Israel's history. It is story of Elijah going up against the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah. In a nutshell, these 850 false teachers were prophets of porn and potions--drugs and demons. They exploited people, sacrificed children, and worshipped in reality, the devil. They were ruthless, truth-less, heartless front men from hell.
Imagine you are the one man who must stand up against such a large l grizzly group. They have gathered at Mt. Carmel northern Israel. A bloody showdown is at hand. As Elijah stands before the 850 false prophets, the demons that hovered over them, and the large crowd of people assembled, he lays down a challenge. "Take two bulls. We will lay them on the altar. Cut up your bull first. I will cut up mine after. You call on your god. I will then call on my God. Whichever God sends down fire from heaven to burn up the sacrifice, this is the living God."
First up were the Baal prophets. After cutting up their bull they went into dancing, limping, yelling, screaming, begging their lifeless god to send fire down from heaven. What happened? Crickets. Nothing. Not so much as a whisper. So desperate were the false prophets that they began to cut their bodies--a ritual common to them--likely stoked by the drugs of their day.
After hours of this fanatical craziness Elijah steps forward. "Enough of that--it's my turn. Gather around." The Baal prophets had made a mess of the whole altar area where their hysterical actions unfolded. Elijah began to put the altar back together. He then took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes of Jacob. With his muscular body, Elijah then dug a fairly wide trench around the altar. He laid firewood on the altar, then cut up his ox, and put it on the wood.
Next Elijah said, "Fill four buckets with water and drench both the ox and the firewood." Then he said to the workers, "Do it again." They did. "Do it a third time." They did. The altar was drenched with water.
When it was time for the sacrifice to be offered, Elijah the prophet prayed to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, asking Him to make known that He is the living God. In so doing Elijah's prayer was that the people would repent, confess their sins, receive forgiveness, and live. Elijah was seeking to lead them to Jesus (1 Kings 19).
Immediately fire from heaven fell. The One who appeared in the burning bush burnt up the offering, the wood, the stones, the dirt, and even the water in the trench. All the people at Mt. Carmel saw what happened. They fell on their faces in awe worshipping the God of all grace.
Immediately the 850 porn prophets were grabbed by the crowd, killed, and removed from ever hurting the vulnerable again. The action also ushered in rain--a gift from God--after a three year drought--to reveal the reign of God. Out of nowhere, Jesus sent a huge cloud and watered the parched lands. A huge cloudburst of rain came down. Elijah rolled up his robe and ran all the way back to Jezreel ahead of King Ahaz' chariot hoping for a Reformation in Israel.
Instead of a Reformation where people confessed their sins and turned to the living God, Elijah was met with the stone hard heart of Queen Jezebel. This demonic woman put a death warrant over Elijah's head. Exhausted from all that had happened, spent body, soul, and spirit, Elijah ran for dear life all the way South to Beersheba. He had been mightily strengthened from God and ended up--get this--running about 120 miles. Now Elijah was really totally tapped out.
He was wiped out. He did not want to live any longer. From the stunning mountaintop experience at Mt. Carmel he is now in the depths of despair. His hope was to go to one of the Southern Mountains of Israel where the Sinai Commandments had been given and perhaps encounter God. Guess who showed up? The One Who come into the world to die on the cross for him--Jesus. The whole next chapter is the story of how Jesus came to Elijah feeding him, providing his rest, putting him on a walking program for forty days, and then putting Elijah back into fellowship (1 Kings 19).
The same Savior who dwells in our heart as God and man was the same Savior of Elijah--talking to him, touching him, and speaking to him in the still small voice. It is this same still small voice by which Jesus speaks to us today--His Word (1 Kings 19:12). This truth raises a question. Dear child of God, do you each day allow the still small voice to come into your ear, into your heart, into your soul? Do you find quiet time each day to let Jesus lift up your heart through His strong Word?
We live in an age where God's still small voice is drowned by the noise of this world? Neil Postman years ago wrote we are "entertaining ourselves to death." The devil will do everything he can to fill up our lives with huge chunks of screen time, sports, endless addictions to the passing things of this world, and all the while our souls are starving, shrinking, suffering.
Elijah had for a long time been running on empty. Jesus had given him power to raise the dead. Jesus had a raven bring him his daily bread. Elijah began to think, if God would just perform a big eye-popping miracle like the one at Mr. Carmel, the whole nation would repent from their sins. But they did not! When Jesus by wind shattered a mountain, caused an earthquake that made mountains rock, and then lit a ferocious fire...Elijah grasped these signs were not the way for faith to flourish. Rather, it was the still small voice of Jesus through the Word. Rather than looking for a theology of glory, a heaven on earth, Jesus came to Elijah in the message of the cross (Genesis 3:15) via the Word bringing Elijah back to His very first promise to Adam and Eve.
The Psalmist records God in Psalm 46, "Step out of the traffic! Be still and know. Take a long loving look at me your Most High God, above politics, above everything. Take that look each day through the still quiet voice of my Word." (Paraphrase Ps 46:10) That word will lead to the cross, the sure signs of the sacraments, the scarlet threads* of real hope**. Through His Word Jesus promises to give us power from on high to live here below. It is a hidden power of grace. Through His strong Word Jesus grants us the Spiritual endurance to stand in these days, empowered especially by the good news of Mt. Calvary and Mt. Carmel and Mt. Zion the Church joined together. Amen.
