May it please God to bless us
this morning as we consider his word together. Let us turn to
the first book of the Kings, chapter 18, and we'll read verse
21. The first book of the Kings,
chapter 18, and reading verse 21. And Elijah came unto all
the people and said, how long, haught ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him. But if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not
a word. It is interesting to realize
that Elijah lived and this period was not all that many years from
the time when Solomon had in actual fact built the temple
and where Israel were wonderfully blessed. It's somewhere about
60 years after Solomon died that we come to this occasion and
during that period we see how the kingdom was divided it became
Israel and Judah And we see that for the most part, Judah followed
the Lord through the kings, and Asa was the king in Judah at
this time. And we see the followers of Jeroboam,
who was of Israel, generally did not follow the Lord, but
followed their own way. And we come down to the time
of this account of Ahab. Ahab was the son of Omri. And
both those kings were exceedingly wicked kings. And so we observe
that in that relatively short period of time, the children
of Israel had greatly changed. And we observe, as we read together,
that there were 450 prophets of Baal. From following the Lord
God, many had turned then to following Baal. And we should
recognized that because of the relatively short time there must
have been a number of people who were still alive who would
remember the days of Solomon. Those wonderful days when Israel
was so blessed to be able to come to that glorious building
which had been erected, the temple which was wonderfully blessed
by Almighty God. And yet we see the influence
of Satan so clearly set before us in these accounts We come
down to this period now when Elijah was on the earth and the
situation which had developed to bring about such a situation. Now, Elijah had prophesied and
had said that there would be no rain. It had now been some
three years since there'd been any rain. So there was a pretty
bad condition, a condition of famine. which was existing in
Israel at this time. And so Elijah had been wonderfully
preserved over that period. And as we know, he'd been by
the brook Cherith and the ravens had fed him and he'd received
the water and then he moved on. The Lord had been with him and
now he was brought to this situation. Now the time had arisen when
Ahab and Elijah were to meet. Ahab had wanted to meet Elijah
for a long time. And he knew he existed, he knew
he was a prophet of the Lord, and he wanted to meet Ahab. And
as we read just previously about the situation, Obadiah, again
a good man, was instructed with Ahab to go through the country
and to find out where there was some suitable grass for the asses. And then at that time he came
across Elijah. And Elijah told him to go and
tell him, tell Ahab that he was there. And Obadiah was fearful
because of the situation, because he knew that the spirit of the
Lord can move Elijah away very quickly. And therefore he was
fearful that he might lose his life. But anyway, Elijah came
and told him that now he would stay there. And so Obadiah went
back and Ahab came and met Elijah. Now we see the situation which
was developing. And we come to these words which
Ahab had told, Elijah had told Ahab to gather the people together. And Ahab sent unto all the children
of Israel and gathered the prophets together unto Mount Carmel. And
Elijah came unto all the people. And he then asked them this question,
how long between two opinions. And then he states, if the Lord
be God, follow him. And if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not
a word. It was a very straightforward statement that Elijah had brought
before these people, the two options, the options either to
follow the true God, the Lord, or to follow Baal. And he asked
them then, how long, how long would it be that they still halted
between two opinions? That's interesting. Also that
this word halt, in our current language today, we would think
of it means to stop. Halt means to stop, you know,
when we come to road signs. If you're to halt, you're to
stop there, you're not to go across, you're not to move until you
see the way clear you are to halt. But in actual fact, this
word halt has a number of meanings in the original, and one of them
speaks about hopping. We may think, well, that's very
different to halting. Well, what it really means, it
signifies the picture, as it were, of a bird. a bird hopping
from one branch to another, hopping from one place to another. The
question might be said then so, as Elijah said, how long would
you hop between one branch and another? And to bring it into
the reality of this statement, how long would they hop between
the true God and the false God? No doubt there were many who
his conscience is being moved by their actions. On one occasion
perhaps worshipping or pretending to worship God, and then on another
occasion worshipping Baal. And so Elijah comes and asks
them very pointedly, how long is it going to be that you continue
in this situation? How long are you going to carry
on serving or pretending to serve God and Baal. How long are you
going to do this for? Well, did the people answer?
No, they didn't. We're told, and the people answered
him, not a word. They were probably too embarrassed
to actually give an honest answer. Here they were faced by the prophet,
a man of God, asking them this important question. How long
haunt ye between two opinions? And we may think, well, of course,
this only had reference really to the people in that day. Well, I'm afraid it didn't. It
has a direct application to everyone down through the ages, and it
has an application to us today, to observe whether we are like
this. And it's easy to make an assessment
and say, well, of course, we are worshipping the true God.
Well, it may not be so if we analyse our minds a bit more
closely. We may, in fact, be hopping from,
as it were, one branch to another. You may say, well, I don't quite
understand. Well, let's just think of it
in this way. There are many, many temptations
today that may distract us and may take us away from worshipping
the true God. Now, worshipping Baal was a much
easier option than worshipping the true God, because there weren't
all those regulations, there weren't all those laws, there
weren't all those obligations which Israel had before them,
which Moses had been given by God on Sinai, and Israel were
commanded to keep those commandments and all those various ceremonies
which they were instructed in. Whereas to serve Baal was really
relatively easy. There weren't those laws, there
weren't those conditions that Israel had. And so we may think
of the same situation today. You see, we have the Word of
God. The Word of God is God's law.
The Word of God is God's instruction to us. And if we are honest and
if we search the Word of God, we will find it's very comprehensive. It enters into every avenue in
our life. There's no real situation in
our life that the Word of God does not detail and the Word
of God does not instruct us in. And it may be that the Word of
God is a bit too close for us, a bit too narrow for us. We may
say, well, I believe I'm a Christian, I believe I'm following the right
way. We need to examine ourselves.
I read recently, I think it was in the British Church newspaper,
I believe it was, the example of a Scots minister up in Aberdeen. And he was speaking about the
desolate situation which exists in Aberdeen. We know that naturally
it is a wealthy city because of the oil industry. And he was
going about and he was talking about Christianity and he met
a man he said to ask him I think whether he was a Christian and
he said yes, I'm a Christian So the minister said to him.
Oh, that's good And he said so so where do you worship? And
he said well, um, well, I don't I don't go anywhere. I just I
just don't don't go to any place of worship. Oh So the minister
well, he said I'm so um Do you read the Bible and he said well,
no, I don't read the Bible. I Well, the minister now was
becoming more concerned, and he said, well, do you pray? And
the man said, well, no, I don't pray. And so the Christian minister
said, well, how do you then call yourself a Christian? And he
said, well, I was Christian when I was a baby, and therefore,
I'm a Christian. Now, you see, that man was under
a very false impression, and obviously, he thought his Christianity
was a very easy Christianity. He'd carry on doing everything
he wanted to in a worldly way. There was no opposition. And
yet he classified himself as a Christian. Now put it in this
condition here, he would have been a worshipper of Baal. Yes, he wouldn't have been amongst
those who worshipped the true God. And we may say, well, that's
of course a bit extreme, when it probably is a bit extreme.
But I'm sure today there are many, many people that come under
that category. And we may say today, well, I'm
thankful I don't come under that category. Well, I hope we don't.
But we do need to examine ourselves a bit more closely, perhaps,
and to see whether we are, as it were, hopping from one branch
to another. When it gets a bit hot, when
things get a bit close, a bit tight, we think, well, I'll just
jump across the other way and I'll just get out of that situation
so that I'm not confined to the Word of God. No, I just think
I'll give that a miss today or perhaps this week or perhaps
this year and I'll concentrate perhaps on other things. The Word of God is very clear
and very decisive in the right way and the true way. Now, Elijah
here on this occasion was wonderfully blessed by God so that the people
had a very, very clear picture set before them of who the true
God was. And there was this development
as Elijah was commanded by God to challenge the prophets of
Baal as to who was the true God. It was a challenge to them. You
may think, well, how is that going to be operated in my life
today? Well, we do exist in a day when
God still hears and answers prayer. He still comes and he does answer
prayer. It may not be in quite the same
dramatic way that this was, but nonetheless God does still hear
and answer prayer. And so it is important that we
come and worship the God who does hear and answer prayer. You see, these people who were
Baal worshippers, there was no answer from Baal, because Baal
was not a god. He was only a pseudo-god. The
people thought he was a god. In actual fact, he was no god.
He couldn't do anything. Just an idol. Just a lump of
wood, or stone, or however he was constructed. And nothing
of any true spiritual nature. Just a false god. And so we have
here the picture of Elijah, concerned that people might realise who
was the false god and who was the true god. be set upon that
God who was right and that God who was true. And so today, my
friends, we need the same understanding, the same revelation, the same
appreciation in our lives that we are amongst those who worship
the true God, who do not allow ourselves to be sidetracked to
worship a false God. As it were, again the illustration
is a good one, to jump from one branch to another when the situation
doesn't quite suit our natural understanding, our natural appreciation. And as I've said so often, and
so true it is, the true Christian life never has been and never
will be an easy life. Whereas a false religion, a pseudo-religion,
is an easy life by comparison. Well, may the Spirit of God move
our hearts so that we may realise that we do come and stand before
the true God, the Almighty God. And as we have the Word of God
before us, to understand that the Word of God is the Word of
God. It's true. It is true. We are thankful that Lord Jesus
Christ, when he was on the earth, when he prayed to his father
on that 17th chapter of John, he spoke those words and said,
thy word is truth. Now, my friends, may we take
that to heart. that the Word of God that we
have before us, I know it's a translation and I know a translation of course
cannot be exactly as the original, but nonetheless it is a faithful
translation and we can believe we do possess in our hands the
Word of God. And as we possess the Word of
God, may it be our real concern at all times to follow the Word
of God. the commandments of God. What
did Elijah say? He answered Ahab, and he said,
I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy father's house,
in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and
thou hast followed Balaam." Balaam was a sad case, he was not a
true follower of the Lord. And so it's a forsaking of the
commandments of the Lord. You may think, That's a very
legal statement. Well, it is a legal statement,
but it's a very blessed statement. And the true Church of God desire,
I believe, to follow the commandments of the Lord. They don't want
to have a religion which follows some of the commandments of the
Lord and leaves other aside and assume that they can miss those
out because they don't, well they might, they're optional. Well you see, we very quickly
start making excuses that things are optional if we don't like
them, if they're not in accordance with our view of the Word of
God. If God enables us to study the
Word of God, to pray over the Word of God, and the desire to
follow the Word of God, we will find that there are many, many
things in the Word of God, perhaps which we may not have really
understood as commandments. And we may have been walking
contrary to the Word of God. We may have been suiting our
own view of things. and yet have not really followed
the Word of God. And we may have looked and said,
well, that person was all right, and that person did that, and
they were all right. We must think of those words
that the Lord spoke to the Apostle Peter. Peter, in his life, came down not long before the
Lord was to be taken from them. The Lord was telling what they
should do, and he told Peter what he should do. And Peter
said, but how about this person? What shall he do? And what did
the Lord say to him? He said very straight words.
He said, what is that to thee? Follow thou me. It wasn't a question
of what other people were doing. It's what the Lord speaks to
us. and what the Word of God speaks to us. That's our direction. And that's what we should be
concerned about. Because we should be concerned
about obeying the Lord so that His name may be honoured and
glorified. And so the question comes, and
it comes to us today as it came to all these Israelites, how
long, how long Will it be that you continue in this situation,
as it were, jumping from one place to another? How long will
you? How long haunt you between two
opinions? And so Elijah comes and tells
them, if the Lord be God, follow him. But if Baal, follow him. That's very clear, isn't it?
We don't need to be very educated to understand that, do we? And
if the Lord is the God, the Lord is the true God, that's who you
and I are to follow. And we are to follow Him wholly. Again, we have a wonderful example,
the Bible is full of examples, so suitable. We have the case
of Caleb. Now Caleb was one of the 12 spies
that was sent to spy up the land of Canaan to see how good it
was. And he went with the other 11.
And one of the other spies, of course, was Joshua. And it was
only Caleb and Joshua who came back with a good report. All the others said, no, we can't
go up. We can't conquer. It's too difficult. It's too hard a way. The big
people there, the giants, the cities are all well built. No,
we can't go up, we won't win. They lack the faith in God. My friends, that's the truth
today. People lack the faith in God. Now we're told of Caleb,
and this is the point. Caleb was described as one who
wholly followed the Lord. Wholly followed the Lord. Was he a good man or a bad man?
He was a good man, wasn't he? And he wholly followed the Lord. And so when we think of this
statement here, how long are we wholly following the Lord
in our lives? Christians, true Christians are
called to follow the Lord. They are called to follow his
example. They are called to enjoy fellowship,
communion, and union with the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the
privilege, and that is the favour, and that is the blessing of the
true Christian Church, who are real followers of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And that is really the separating
statement. And so in answer to this question,
if the Lord be God, follow him. Is the Lord God in our lives? Now, just remember that this
statement of following the Lord is a very comprehensive statement. It's very broad. It involves
so many things in our lives. Everything that you and I do
and say, we should question as to whether it is following the
Lord. Put it another way, would the
Lord Jesus be doing the things that we're doing? We can analyse
the accuracy of our following and when we think of, we can
ask ourselves the question, well I'm going to do this, I want
to do this, would Jesus have done that? Would he have walked
that way? Would he have said that? And you and I, not very hard
is it for us to be honest in our answer to that question.
And when we've answered it, well, I'm pretty sure that's what Jesus
would have done. Then are we doing the same? So
that's a great question, is it not? And that's the important
thing. And here we see this wonderful example of these people of these
children of Israel and let us not forget they were wonderfully
privileged. Israel were wonderfully privileged people because they'd
been given the law of God. They'd been blessed with a temple
to worship Him. They'd had a wonderful position
given to them and yet you see many had turned away from the
true God. We may say today You and I have
been given the Word of God in its fullness, in its completeness,
and are we turning away from the Word of God? Have we turned
away from the Word of God? These people had turned away,
but it would seem that this wonderful occasion turned them back to
God in at least a good measure. They were reminded of the true
God and the work that was shown to them by Elijah's example and
his prayer and the answer to the prayer, they came down and
they spoke in that way and they said, the Lord, he is the God. The Lord, he is the God. Now, they had a wonderful revelation
of God's power before them. And we might say, well, of course,
if I had that in my life, I wouldn't then be in any doubt. Don't forget,
we today have the Word of God, and the truth of God. And the
Word of God tells us the truth of God. We don't need any wonderful,
great, personal revelation. We have the Word of God before
us, which explains everything you and I need. And the truth
is, therefore, that all of us are without excuse. We cannot say, well, I need a
wonderful revelation. No, we don't. We have the Word
of God. What do we need? I'll tell you
what we need. You and I need faith to believe
the Word of God. And we need faith then to follow
the Word of God, to follow the truth of God, to follow the example
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We read of the Savior,
he pleased not himself. How great a statement is that?
and how we, by nature, please ourselves. We set our own timetable,
we make our own rules, we set our own boundaries. You see,
we're not pleasing God, we're pleasing ourselves. The Lord
pleased not Himself. The Lord did His Father's will. That was the great operation
The Saviour came into this world to fulfil His Father's will. And you must think that you and
I today are here upon the earth, and if we are His people, we
are to follow and do His will. His will. And again, it's good
to examine ourselves and to think in these terms, how long, Hortje,
between two opinions, how long will we still be following our
own way, our own plans, our own boundaries, our own situation?
Or do we come to our God, desiring that He will take possession
of us, that we may be concerned only to be occupied and to do
the will of God in all our lives, for His honour and for His glory? Well, we know that these prophets
of Baal, they were put to confusion. They did all they could to bring
about the result that fire should come down from heaven and consume
the sacrifice. But of course, it was all in
vain. There was no true God. Baal was not a true God. And then we come and we see Elijah. And it's interesting that the
time now as we read, was the time of the evening sacrifice.
A time when every day there was this evening sacrifice made.
And here we have this time of the evening sacrifice. And Elijah
then prepared the altar for that sacrifice in that right way with
those stones taken, those 12 stones representing the 12 tribes
and the Buddha cut up and put on the and the water poured upon
it. And then what did Elijah do? Did he stand back and wait for
God to appear? No, he prayed. And my friends,
he prayed, and he prayed a very blessed prayer. And he came and
said, Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel. Again, we see
how he brought in those really Abraham Isaac and Jacob and of
course really the whole Church of God in Israel And it was that
God the true God the living God that he was coming before and
he said let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel
and I am thy servant and I have done all these things at Thy
word. What was he doing? He was obeying
the Word of God He was obeying God's commands to him And he
prays and he says, hear me, O Lord, hear me. We can almost sense
coming up the real burden and the pressure upon him and the
sense of urgency that he wanted his God, who had his confidence
in, to hear his prayer. Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that
this people may know Thou art the Lord God, and that Thou hast
turned their heart back again." Well, what a blessing, isn't
it? To have a God who does hear and answer prayer. And so all
these Israelites, you see, who'd been turned away, they'd been
following Baal. We don't know precisely how many,
but we know there were a vast quantity because of 450 prophets
that Ahab had brought into being. And so now Elijah is praying
unto the Lord. He prays unto God. And what happens
then, when he prayed, 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. And when all the
people saw it, they fell on their faces. It fell down before God. They were clearly acknowledging
the Lord God was the true God. They fell down before him. And
it's a good thing, you know, if you and I fall down before
God, what that means is we bow down to him as the true God.
And if we truly bow down to him as the true God, we would desire
to do that, which he will have us to do in accordance with his
holy word, to follow him in our lives. And they fell down, and
they said, and they spoke. And it's so important, isn't
it, to realize they didn't just fall down and then carry on. They acknowledged that the Lord,
He is the God. The Lord, He is the God. They
repeated it. The great truth, the Lord, He
is the God. And you and I today, my friends,
we stand before that same God, that same almighty God, Don't
think that God has lost any of his power. Don't think that the
Lord is not able to do these things, he is. But my friends,
he's given us now today, which of course the Israelites did
not have, the whole counsel of God as we have it from Genesis
to Revelation, the wonderful truth of God's word, and that
directs us in all that we must do and say. Everything. There is nothing in your life
and my life which is omitted from the Word of God. There is
detail about everything that you and I must do and say. It's
complete. It's a wonderful book of directions
for the Christian Church. And my friends, it's wonderful
that you and I are privileged to have it now in our own language
and are able to read it. But the importance is that whether
You and I do acknowledge it as the Word of God and whether we
are truly serving the Lord or whether we are like these people
trying to serve two masters. How long halts ye between two
opinions? How long? How long will it be
before you, as it were, come down on the side of God? As it
were, are we sitting on the fence? Are we thinking, well, now which
is the best side to jump? Which way should I go? What should
I do? Should I go here? Should I go
there? Should I do this? Should I do
that? Which way? Which way should I go? So we
have this statement here. How long? How long? Elijah addresses the people,
how long, Hortji, between two opinions? How long will you be
like it? Now then, the Spirit of God was
clearly displayed to these people. My friends, the Spirit, the Word
of God is clearly displayed in His Word to you and me today. An account like this is very
interesting, but it has a very deeply, deep spiritual implication
for all of us. to direct us to be a true follower
of the Lord God, and to keep and to not forsake His commandments. You see, the statement is here
in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord. Now
it's good if you and I, my friends, just sit down before God. You
know, David in his life, there was an occasion when he came
and sat before the Lord. That's a good position, to come
individually before God and to sit before the Lord and to examine
ourselves whether we are a true disciple, whether we are a real
Christian, and whether we are following the blessed word of
God. Or have we forsaken? Not totally
perhaps, but in measure. gone aside, we've left, as it
were, the true God. Israel had left the true God
largely. It's tragic really, sad. In such
a relatively short time, it wasn't as though the temple had been
destroyed, it was still there in Jerusalem. And my friends,
there was still that ability to worship the Lord, and yet
you see they settled for the easy option. My friends, today,
people settle for the easy option. They don't want to be disturbed
in their comfortable little life, their cozy little position. They
don't want to be disturbed. They want to carry on. What it
means, I suppose, is very simply this. They do not want to take
up their cross and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, the Word of God tells us,
the Apostle Paul tells us, the Lord tells us, to take up our
cross every day. Every day. Take up our cross
daily and to follow him, my friends, is the most blessed path. It's
a path of rejoicing. It's a path of comfort. It's a path of union. And if
we hope one day to be found in heaven, if that's our object,
if we desire that the Lord will look upon us and receive us unto
himself, surely our life today should be one that desires to
follow the Lord as closely as we can, not as far off as we
can, not a long way away. but to follow the Lord as closely
as we can. Well, that's a great question,
isn't it? It's a test for us to know whether
you and I today have in our hearts this desire to follow the Lord
closely and to be able to say, the Lord, he is the God. Perhaps we ought to address it
in this way. If we honestly say the Lord,
he is the God, then is our life honestly walking in closeness
to the Lord, or is it not? Are we indeed following afar
off, at arm's length? We don't want to get too involved.
We don't want to get too close, because it might stop us, it
might alter our lifestyle. We might not be able to do certain
things that we want to accomplish. Well, may the Spirit of God move
us move us in this way, in love to the Lord Jesus Christ, as
we see what love he has toward us. What love he has toward us. I heard recently, I may have
said recently, I heard someone say, and it was a very simple
testimony, a very real testimony, the statement was this, I realised how much the Lord
had done for me. And so the least I could do was
to follow him. Now that's a simple but a good
testimony. And so may we today think of
what God's done for us and to appreciate the great cost
of our salvation, to think that it involved the
giving of the life of God himself, so that you and I might possess
life. And if so, ask this question,
how long, which ye between two opinions, may we be able to come
and say, by the movement of the Holy Spirit, The Lord, he is
the God. The Lord, he is the God. And
to take up our cross daily and to follow him. Amen.