I asked Brother Eisen if they
could sing for us. I asked him about an hour ago. And his dear wife found out about
20 minutes ago. I'll tell you, that's just wonderful. Such good words to that song. Let's go to 1 Kings chapter 17. Again this evening, 1 Kings chapter
17. The book of 1 Kings 17. Due to great foolishness on the
part of Solomon, he brought into Jerusalem false gods. These were the gods that were
worshipped by the women that he loved. He was a man given
to lust. A lustful fit, as it were. He brought into the city of David all of these idols. One was a
goddess of fertility. One was a fish god. One was a
fire god. And one was the sun god. And God was angry. And God said
to Solomon, He said, I'm going to rend the kingdom from you. But I'm not going to do it until
you die. You won't see it. And the Lord said, I do this
for David's sake. And if I could just I sort of
repeat what I said this morning. God doesn't avenge His justice upon us for
Christ's sake. That's the only reason. Oh, Solomon,
he deserved for the Lord to just pour out on him. Infinite wrath. What an awful, awful thing to
introduce idolatry into Jerusalem, into the temple of God. Yet God spared him. God spared
him. For David's sake. You think of your sins. Even,
yes, sins of idolatry. family, possessions. We don't have gods that we've
whittled out of wood and gold and silver. We've got idols,
though, all around us, don't we? And they take a part of our
heart. And sometimes we even put family
above our god. We put the things of this world
above the worship of Christ. Why doesn't God just wipe us
off the face of the earth? For Christ's sake. That's the
reason God forgives us. It's always for Christ's sake.
That one that we've been in union with from old eternity, that
one who took responsibility to save us, That one who said to
the Father in the covenant of grace, look to me for everything
that they owe. Don't look to them, look to me. That's why we're not cut off.
You think of your foolishness just today. Think of the sins you've committed
even this hour. Nobody worships perfectly. Our minds wander. We read the
Word of God and we find ourselves thinking about something else.
And then you say, I can't even remember reading what I read.
I've got to go back and read it again. You think about when
you bow your head to pray to God. In the middle of your prayer,
great time of solemnness, seriousness, and your thoughts go off somewhere
else. Has that ever happened to you?
I know it's happened to you, because it happens to me. Why
doesn't God cut us off? Why doesn't God say, I'm not
going to put up with that foolishness? For Christ's sake. For Christ's
sake. All those sins, they've all been
paid for. That's past sins, present sins,
future sins. In fact, when they were paid
for, it's all in the future, at least all of ours. They were
in the future. But God said to Solomon, I'm
going to rend the kingdom from you. Well, Solomon still had to attend
to business in the kingdom. They needed to rebuild the walls
of Jerusalem that were somewhat in bad shape. He also wanted
to build a fortress up the northern part of Jerusalem to guard him
against any attack that might come from the north. And so he
raised the taxes on the people. And they liked it just about
as much as we like it. They weren't a happy people.
And then he said he appointed a man, a man by the name of Jeroboam. He said, I want you to rebuild
some of the walls that are crumbling down, and I want you to rebuild
this fortress. This man, Jeroboam, the son of
Nebat, he despised Solomon, but he didn't reveal it. So he goes
out and he begins to work. And as he does, he wins the favor
of the people. Because he didn't like tax increase
either. He made lots of friends. And
then Solomon saw he was such a good
worker, Solomon said, I'm going to put you in a position of great
authority. I'm going to put you over two
tribes. in the north, Ephraim and Manasseh. We were in charge
of them. He got a big promotion. And one day he was out kind of
overseeing the job and God sent one of his prophets to him, a
man by the name of Ahijah. And this prophet of God, this
preacher, He just got him a new coat. He took his coat off and he ripped
it in twelve pieces. And he gave to Jeroboam ten pieces. He said, this is how much of
the kingdom you're going to get. God's going to give you ten tribes. If you walk in the ways of David,
God said all will be well. But you're going to have the
northern kingdom. You'll have a nation to yourself."
Word got back to Solomon. He was fit to be tied. Jeroboam found out Solomon knew,
and so Jeroboam leaves the country. He goes to Egypt. Well, in the course of time,
Solomon died. He died. And his son was Rehoboam. And Rehoboam, he's the new king, and he goes
up to Shechem, a city in the northern part of Israel. And
that's where the people were going to anoint him as king. And of course, once Jeroboam,
who's now over in Egypt, Once he found out that King Solomon
was dead and that his son Rehoboam was going to reign in his stead,
he came back into the kingdom. He said, well, where is the anointing
going to be? And they said, well, it's going
to be in Shechem. He said, I'll be there. So he was there with
a bunch of other of the hierarchy of Israel. And so Jerboam and
the others said to Rehoboam, they said, now, we'll follow
you. But you've got to do something about these high taxes. It's
such a burden on the people. People are not happy. And Rehoboam
said, well, give me three days to think about it. And they said, OK. So Rehoboam
goes and talks to his advisors, to the wise men. And he said,
what do you think I ought to do? And they said, you need to
tone it down. And you need to back off on these
high taxes because people are not happy. But if you go back
off, you'll cut taxes. They'll be for you. Hey, that's
what everybody wants to hear, isn't it? Hey, will you be for
me if I cut your taxes? Oh, yeah, I'll be for you. Well,
see, that appealed to the people. So Rehoboam goes back in three
days. And they said, well, what did
you decide? He said, this is my decision.
You think you had it rough under my daddy? You hadn't seen anything
yet. Your taxes are going up a whole
lot more. And I'm going to demand more
work out of you. Well, everybody, of course, was
very upset. And Rehoboam gets with the leaders
and they all say, we're not going to put up with this. And the
kingdom of Israel began to be divided. Jeroboam then became the king. And Rehoboam goes back to Judah You
know there are 12 tribes of Israel, right? Okay. Ten tribes in the
north, two tribes in the south. It was the tribe of David, Judah,
and Benjamin, they hung together. But Solomon's son, Rehoboam,
he goes back south and he begins to amass an army. We'll teach
them. I'll wipe them off the face of
the earth," he said. But this is what the Lord said.
Go back, look at chapter 12, verse 24. Go back to verse 23. The man
of God is supposed to speak to Rehoboam. Are you there? 1 Kings 12.23. Speaking to Rehoboam,
the son of Solomon, king of Judah, and unto the house of Judah and
Benjamin, and to the remnant of the people, saying, Thus saith
the Lord, ye shall not go up, nor fight against your brethren,
the children of Israel. Go back to your houses. And that next statement, you
ought to underline it. For this thing is from me. That's what God said. This is
what I purposed. God said it's what I ordained.
And they hearkened therefore to the word of the Lord, and
returned to depart according to the word of the Lord. And
then Jeroboam, now he's ruling in the northern kingdom. The people of the Northern Kingdom
had got time for the festivals, for the three feasts of Israel. Passover, Pentecost, Feast of
Tabernacles. And the men were supposed to
go. And here's what Jeroboam said,
the king of the Northern Kingdom. He said, because he's afraid
if they go south, They might just stay down there in the southern
kingdom. So he says, you don't have to
go down there to go to church. I'll build you a church. And
he built a church. He built one in Bethel. It means
house of God. He built one there and he built
one in Dan. He put a golden calf at both
of them and said, now that's God right there. That's God right
there. You don't need to go to Jerusalem.
You don't need to go to the temple. But you see, that's where God
was to be worshipped. And I said this morning, there's
only one location, one place, one person whereby we can worship
God. We've got to come to God through
Jesus Christ the Lord. That's the appointed way. There
isn't anywhere else but Jeroboam. He did not walk in the ways of
David. And he fell into sin. Well, time goes by. Jeroboam reigned for a little
while. He was ungodly. And then Nadab,
his son, took over after him. Nadab was assassinated. reigned in the northern kingdom
after him. And then Ahissa, he died, and
then Elah, he reigned for a little while, but he was a drunkard.
And he got murdered while he was drunk. He was murdered by
the man who would take his place, Zimri. And then Zimri reigned
for a little bit, and then he was replaced by his son Amri. And then Omri, he reigned for
a little while, and then his son Ahab took over, and he was
worse than all of them. Seven kings since the kingdom
split. We get to 1 Kings chapter 17. It has now been 58 years since
the kingdom divided. 58 years since the kingdom divided. It's a total mess. in the Northern
Kingdom. Idolatry everywhere. I told you
this morning that Jeroboam, he appointed preachers, priests,
and of course they weren't from the tribe of Levi, false prophets,
false priests, men who didn't believe the gospel, had no interest
in the gospel whatsoever. And into this religious mess,
all of a sudden, a man appears by the name of
Elijah. Nothing's told us about his birth, his earlier ministry, and of
course we know that he didn't die. He ascended up to heaven
in a chariot. He's Elijah the Tishbite. I'll
tell you something about this man. Go over to chapter 19. Chapter
19. He makes this statement about
himself. He makes this statement two times.
And he's right. This is an accurate statement.
I don't think he's just tooting his own horn here. This is true. Chapter 19 verse 10. And Elijah
said, I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts, and
that's the truth. And he said the same thing in
verse 14, and he said, I have been very jealous for the Lord
God of hosts. He loved the gospel of substitution
and satisfaction. He was one of the prophets. And
like all of the prophets before him, and all of the prophets
who followed him, he preached the coming of the Son of God. He preached the gospel of grace,
the gospel of the blood sacrifice. And I know that those men, they
looked through a glass darkly, and they preached in pictures
and symbols and that sort of thing, but still they understood
in order for a sinner to be saved, an innocent victim's got to die
in the stead of the guilty. And that's still the truth today.
That message has not changed. Elijah is God's man. Now there
are other prophets, and we'll see as we study the life of Elijah. There's a fellow by the name
of Obadiah, and he hides prophets by the fifties. But this is the man that God
used in such a powerful way. He comes on the scene, he brings
this message to Ahab, such an ungodly king, a man who married
Jezebel. She brought in the worship of
Baal. Baal, he's the god of masculinity. Baal, he's
the greatest god of the Canaanites. Baal, he's the sun god. His name means Lord. Baal means Lord. Literally, Lord
of the flies. That's what Ahab brought in. And God sends Elijah to him,
and Elijah comes. He's jealous for the glory of
God. Oh God, make me jealous for Your glory. That's what I
pray. As I studied this and I read what was said about Elijah there
in 1 Kings chapter 19, I said, Oh God, make your preachers jealous
for Your glory. Jealous for the glory of Christ
Jesus. Jealous that God have all the
glory and salvation and man gets none of it. We don't deserve
any glory. What have we ever done to deserve
even a pat on the back? I tell you, what we deserve is
death and judgment and hell. That's what we deserve. But due
to the merits of our blessed Savior, His substitutionary death,
that which we now merit through the Savior, through the Lord
Jesus, is all the glories of heaven. It's almost too good
to believe, isn't it? But it is the truth. It is the
truth. God puts him right in front of
King Ahab. He says, "...as the Lord God
liveth," 17 verse 1, "...before whom I stand there shall not
be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word." 1
Kings 17 verse 1. I told you this morning Elijah's
name means My God is Jehovah. The most illustrious of the prophets
of God was raised up to speak to the most wicked of the kings
of Israel. And he didn't back down. He set his peace. And then, verse 2, The Word of the Lord came to
Elijah saying, get thee hence, turn thee eastward. He says,
I want you to hide thyself by the brook Kirith. That CH is
pronounced as a K. Kirith, that is before Jordan. And suddenly as he appears, that's
how suddenly he's gone. Now, he had already told the
king, there's not going to be any rain, there's not going to
be any dew, till I say so. And that's an awful judgment
from God. A famine, a drought, it's going
to mean no crops. What's going to happen? All the
water supply is going to dry up. But as bad as that was, there's
a judgment that's even more severe. God took away his preacher. That's
even worse. You say, well, what could ever
be worse? What could possibly be worse
than a drought? I'll tell you what's worse than
a drought. A drought for the Word of God. No gospel. No preaching. No truth. No truth. When God removed Elijah
from the scene, it meant that God was removing His Word. You see, Israel was in for an
even greater famine. A famine for the Word of the
Lord. The Word of the Lord is said
to be, back in Deuteronomy chapter 32, It's like the rain and the
dew. That's what the gospel is. It's
the rain and the dew. But there won't be any publishing
of the name of the Lord as it says there in Deuteronomy 32.
There won't be that in Israel. No. There won't be any good news
of forgiveness through the blood. No. No. Nothing but silence. That's the judgment of God right
there. That's the most severe judgment God can give. You see,
the gospel, the doctrine of Jesus Christ, this message of forgiveness and
righteousness freely imputed to sinners who believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, This message of God's eternal purpose of grace
and full and free and accomplished redemption at the cross. And
the message of the regenerating grace and power of the Spirit. It's good news! This is good
news to sinners! But they're not going to hear
that message anymore. No. God took His preacher away. You can do what you want to,
you can say what you want to, but if God takes the dew and
the rain away, it's gone. There's nothing you can do to
get it back. As we will see in our studies
in 1 Kings 18 and 19, no rain, the drought, the famine, it's
severe. All the false creatures come
out. The false prophets and the prophets of the groves. I told
you this morning, the groves, those are the places that Ahab
planted. Kind of an oasis or a rest area
for travelers. And there were idols there and
you could worship your idols while you relaxed. All of these men, they don't
have any truth at all. All they've got is error. And
we'll get to chapter 19 over there, and that's where they're
going to pray and cry and beg their gods to send the rain. But nobody can send the rain
but the Lord God of glory. He's the only one who can send
the rain. And I'll tell you what, this rain, it's more than just
the Word of God or the Gospel. Look at Psalm 72. Psalm 72. Psalm 72 verse 6. Starts with a little bitty pronoun.
Just a little pronoun. Two letters. He. He shall come
down like rain. Who is that? That's Christ Jesus. He's the rain that falls, that
softens the hearts, that cools that conscience, that rages with
guilt over sin. It's the Lord Jesus. He rains
from heaven upon us. He's that rain that's always
successful. Isaiah 55 says that. God says
He sends forth the rain and it accomplishes His purpose. He
sends forth His Word, His written Word and His incarnate Word. He is the water of life who soothes
our thirst for Him. He quenches our thirst for salvation. In Job 28 and 26, it says, when
He made a decree for the rain and a way for the lightning and
the thunder. The Son of God came by God's
eternal decree in the covenant of grace. It was appointed for
Him to come. He is the Messiah. He is the
Savior. He is Himself the refreshing
shower that comes to us. He comes to us in our unconverted
state. He woos us to Himself. He draws
us with effectual love. And He comes every time His people
meet together like a refreshing shower. There is no message that
refreshes the hearts of God's people like the gospel of free
grace. The gospel of the doing and the
dying of the dear Redeemer. As we speak of who He is and
what He's done for us. Doesn't it refresh your heart
just like a gentle shower? And you just soak it up and say,
oh Lord, thank you. As we've met today, some of you,
this is the third time you've heard me speak today, but I think
each time we meet, and even when somebody else is speaking as
far as that goes, preaching Christ Jesus, it's like a refreshing
shower that the Lord sends. A hot summer day, or He's just
wiping perspiration off of you. Then God opens up, He sends some
showers, and you watch the temperature drop. You say, oh, it's so wonderful. And the ground, you can almost
hear the ground say, thank you, thank you, thank you. And that's
the way we are, aren't we? By nature, we're spiritually
dry. The gentle shower of the Gospel
comes. But God says to Israel, No more
showers. I tell you, if He doesn't send
the rain of His grace, the rain of His Son, you're dead while
you live. Isn't that right? You're dead
while you live. If He doesn't send the Word of
His grace, God just takes His servant away. I tell you, the greatest blessing
that God can give to a community is a faithful gospel preacher
and a body of believers who support him, support this gospel, attend
the gospel, prayerful for the gospel. It's the greatest blessing
God can give to a community. And the greatest curse that God
can put on a community is just take it away. Don't ever take this for granted. And a lot of other churches that,
for whatever reason, to serve God's purpose, they just dry
it up. Why? He withheld the rain. That's all he's got to do. Withhold
the rain. Elijah told Ahab, no more rain. And then God removed His prophet
from the scene. And you know, you ask this question,
but how shall they hear without a preacher? Yeah, good question. Had a preacher standing in front
of Him. Had a preacher looking at Him eye to eye. After he spoke those words, why
didn't King Ahab say, Wait! Wait! Wait! Oh, I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Our kingdom's sorry!
We confess our sins! Oh, would you pray to God for
mercy for us? No. No, he's just a hard-headed
idolater. Hard-headed and hard-hearted. Let every idolater heed this
warning. God doesn't have to continue
to send you the Word of God. He doesn't have to continue to
send you the Gospel. He can make certain you can't
come and you won't come. So Elijah, he goes by Brook,
Kirith. Look at verse 4. 1 Kings 17. And it shall be, it's what the
Lord told him, that thou shalt drink of the brook. And I have
commanded the ravens to feed thee there." The ravens? You know, ravens were unclean. Couldn't use them for sacrifices.
No, sir. But you see, God will even use
that which is unclean to bring about His purpose. When the raven
brought him food in the morning and went away, that raven who
was unclean when he delivered the food, he is still unclean
when he left. But God used him. God used him. It's like Judas. Judas betrayed our Lord Jesus. He was unclean when he did it.
He was unclean after he did it. But God used him. And this world is full of unclean
people. You'd be unclean but for the
sovereign grace of God. And you know what? God uses everybody
to accomplish His purpose, even the unclean. And many of them
are unclean when He uses them, and they're still unclean after
He uses them, but He uses them according to His will. So, the ravens are commanded
to feed him. You know the ravens obey his
will. They have a master. It's like
that passage I appreciated Joe's prayer a while ago. He was talking
about us being defiled and depraved from the top of our heads to
the bottom of our feet. Wounds, bruises, putrefying sores.
You know what the Lord says in that same passage? The ox knows
his owner. The ass knows his master's crib.
The animals recognize. They bow to the will of God. God uses them. Man's the rebel. We're the rebels. Well, God uses the ravens. Look
at verse 5. So he went and did according
to the word of the Lord. For he went and dwelt by the
brook Kirith, That is, before Jordan and the ravens brought
him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening,
and he drank of the brood. He never had but one meal in
front of him. Had to trust God for the next
one. That's the walk of faith right
there. You know, we go to We go and
buy a bunch of groceries somewhere. We were at, Nancy and I were
at Sam's yesterday. Was it yesterday? We saw Charlie
over there. Whenever it was, I can't even
remember now. And he was buying a bunch of stuff. And we stock
up. But, you know, we visited. Of
course, we visited Japan several times. And they don't do that.
Because they live in little bitty houses, apartments. And their
refrigerators aren't nearly as big as ours, so they go to a
local market and buy just enough food for the day. And then the
next day, go back and get it again. Isn't that the way you've
been there? That's the way they are over there. Elijah, God didn't say, okay,
here's enough to do you for a month. Let's stock your freezer. No. He comes to Raven's Inn. Bread,
flesh, there's water. The raven goes away. Whatever. It's gone. There goes my meal
ticket. Yeah, but I trust God he'll be
back. That's the walk of faith. Just
trust God for the next meal. Doesn't the scripture say? Having
food and raiment therewith, let us be content. Doesn't God say
as He instructs us in the disciples' prayer, that we're instructed
to pray, give us this day our daily bread. Which means give us a sufficiency
for today. Well, here's Elijah. God provides for him and it says
in verse 7, and it came to pass after a while, the brook dried
up. Why'd the brook dry up? He prayed
that the Lord wouldn't send rain. And guess what? It even had an
effect upon him. But God is going to take care
of him as we shall see the Lord willing next week. Next week. Let's sing a closing song.