I'm going to be dealing specifically
with verse 27, but let's start reading in verse 21. And Elijah came unto all the
people and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord Jehovah be God, follow
him. But if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not
a word. They were noncommittal. Then
said Elijah unto the people, I, even I only, remain a prophet
of the Lord, but Baal's prophets are 450 men. Let them therefore
give us two bullocks, and let them choose one bullock for themselves,
and cut in pieces, and lay it on the wood, and put no fire
under it. I will dress the other bullock and lay it on wood and
put no fire under it. And call on the name of your
gods and I'll call on the name of the Lord and the God that
answers by fire. Let him be God. And all the people
answered and said, it's well spoken. And Elijah said unto
the prophets of Baal, choose you one bullock for yourselves
and dress it first for your many and call on the name of your
gods, but put no fire under it. You know, he knew these people
would use trickery. That's why he's saying that.
He says twice, don't put fire under it. He knew that they normally
would. And they took the bullock which was given them and they
dressed it and called on the name of Baal from morning even
until noon saying, oh Baal, hear us. But there was no voice nor
any that answered. And they leaped upon the altar
which was made and it came to pass at noon that Elijah mocked
them and said, cry aloud, cry louder, for he's a God. Either he's talking, or he's
pursuing, or he's in a journey, or peradventure he's asleep and
must be awaked. Let's pray. Lord, we come into your presence
in Christ's name. And Lord, we ask for your presence.
For your blessing. That you would be pleased to
speak to our hearts from your word. Lord, we ask that we might be
found in Christ. We ask that we might be enabled
to hear your voice. We ask that we might be enabled
to worship you. Lord, how we thank you for who
you are. How we thank you. The salvation
is all of your grace. How we thank you for the revelation
of your person. Lord, we confess our sins. We
pray for forgiveness and cleansing for Christ's sake. In his name
we pray. Amen. Let's read verse 27 again. And
it came to pass at noon that Elijah mocked them. Now they were very sincere. If
you go on reading, they were cutting themselves, letting the
blood run out, trying to get their God to respond. Obviously
they were very sincere about their religion. And Elijah mocked
them. And he said, cry aloud, for he's
a God, isn't he? Either he's talking or he is
pursuing, and I think what's interesting is that means using
the bathroom. He's using the bathroom. Or he's on vacation
or adventure, he's asleep and must be awake. Now, these bail
worshipers were full of zeal, leaping upon their altar and
nothing was happening. Now, who was bail? Who was bail? Now, before Israel had entered
the land of Canaan, Baal was the god there. He was the god
everybody worshipped. His name means Lord or Owner. That's what the word means. And
all the people of Canaan worshipped this false god. And when Israel
was brought in, God commanded them to destroy all the people
and to destroy their false gods. You know what? Israel didn't
do it. And because of that, they had
trouble for centuries with Baal worship. I think it's interesting
that he's first mentioned in Judges chapter 2 after the death
of Joshua. Now, as long as Joshua was around,
there wasn't any Baal worship. He was ruthless in rooting out
this. But as soon as he died, we read
in Judges chapter 2, that people started worshiping Baal. And
all through Judges, it was going on, and it went on until the
time of David. David is the man after God's
own heart, and during his reign, Baal is not even as much as mentioned. And as soon as David's dead,
Solomon takes over, and you know that Solomon fell before Baal
worship toward the end of his life. And it keeps coming up
over and over again in Israel's history. Now, in this Baal worship,
temple prostitutes were used. And there was actual sexual sin
that went on during this pagan worship. And this lets you know
how appealing it was to the flesh. And by the time Ahab is king,
it's the national religion. You know, that's where Elijah
says, if Baal be God, worship him, but if Jehovah be God, serve
him. So at this time, under Ahab,
under Jezebel, things had become so low that Baal was the national
religion. And look at Elijah's response to the bell
worshipers. He uses such sarcasm. He's mocking
them. He's making fun of them. Now,
there isn't any other way to look at that. Cry louder. Perhaps he can't hear you. Cry
louder. Maybe he's on vacation. Maybe
he's gone aside using the bathroom. Maybe he's asleep and you need
to wake him up. Now can you imagine talking to
somebody about their God like that? He's using such disrespect
for their God. Now the Bible has a lot of this
kind of sarcasm. Paul used it a lot. You remember
when he was preaching and he said, evidently, you're judging
yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Therefore, we're going
to turn to the Gentiles. I mean, he's using sarcasm. I think what
he said to the church at Corinth, he said, I robbed other churches
to keep from taking anything from you. Forgive me this wrong.
He's using sarcasm. And there's a lot of sarcasm
in the Bible, and actually the Lord uses it. Turn with me for
a moment to Psalm 2. Psalm 2, beginning in verse 1, Why did
the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings
of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together
against the Lord, and against His anointing, saying, Let us
break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
We're not going to have Him reign over us. He that sitteth in the
heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision. He'll make fun of them in their
claims to not have His bands and cords around them. In Proverbs
126, God says, I will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when
your fear cometh. Some of these passages regarding
idolatry, let's just look at one, Psalm 115. There's a lot of these in the
book of Isaiah, where Isaiah describes the man who takes a
tree, cuts it down, makes an idol of it, and uses the rest
to bake bread and eat. And then he worships that idol
of the tree cut down and said, these are your gods. You know,
Israel, as soon as Moses was gone, They made those golden
calves and said, these be thy gods, O Israel. Now in Psalm
115, verse one. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto
us, but unto thy name give glory for thy mercy and for thy truth's
sake. Wherefore should the heathen say, where is now their God?
But our God is in the heavens. He hath done whatsoever he hath
pleased. Now, that's God. Absolutely sovereign. He has done whatsoever he has
pleased. Now, their idols are silver and gold. The work of
men's hands. They have mouths, but they speak
not. Eyes have they, but they see not. They have ears, but
they hear not. Noses have they, but they smell
not. They have hands, but they handle not. Feet have they, but
they walk not. Neither speak they through their throat. They
that make them are life unto them. So is everyone that trusteth
in them." Now, in this mocking, he's showing how this Baal, this
false god, has none of the attributes of deity. Now, when it says he's
talking, every other time that word is used, it's translated
complaining. complaining. He's not able to
get his way. He's frustrated. He's complaining. This God is a God that's somewhat
less than sovereign. He's not getting his way. Cry
louder, he can't hear you. He's less than omnipotent. You
need to cry louder so he can hear you. And then he talks about
him using the bathroom or sleeping, a God that's not independent.
He has certain needs. And then he speaks of Maybe he's
on a journey. He's not omnipresent. He's not
here right now. We'll have to wait for him to
get back. What he's doing is making fun of this God because
the attributes of this God, Baal, is less than deity. And he's mocking him. He's showing
disrespect. And after all, you think about
what they were doing. They were so sincere. They were
cutting themselves. Trying to say, hear us. Look,
we're cutting. Much we want you to hear us, we're cutting ourselves
so you will hear us. Now, disrespect. One of the most difficult things
to deal with is when we feel like we've been disrespected. That's a very difficult thing.
As a matter of fact, that's one of the most difficult things
to deal with because when somebody disrespects you, they say, I'm
better than you. I'm of more value than you, and
you don't even count in my mind. That's what disrespect means. Listen, the very foundation of
a good relationship is respect one for another. High esteem
for one another. And if people don't respect each
other, there's not gonna be a relationship. And you think of, anybody you
disrespect, You're coming across as haughty, arrogant, I'm better
than you, I'm more valuable than you. And to treat anybody, listen
to me, to treat anybody, I don't care who it is, with disrespect,
is wrong as it can be. If I treat you with disrespect,
it's wrong. I'm being haughty and arrogant.
If you treat me with disrespect, it's wrong. It's being haughty
and arrogant and having way too high an opinion of yourself.
This thing of treating, what a blessing it is. And you'll
be better off in life if you're a respectful person. If you're
not respectful, you're gonna be one of these people with authority
problems, you're gonna have problems, you're not gonna get along with
people. Respect people. Respect people. Make everyone that is around
you feel like you respect them. And respect them. Everybody,
a human being made in the image of God, in that sense, is worthy
of respect. Treat everybody that way. I pray God will give us all the
grace to do that. Now, that being said, Elijah treated these men with
absolutely no respect. Now this is talking about man's
religion. I'm going to treat, by the grace
of God, I'm going to treat man's works religion that is founded
on a disrespect for the God of the Bible. There's no true, that's
the foundation of false religion, no respect for God. I want to
treat man's religion. You say, but they're so sincere
about it. Well, so are these fellas. They were so sincere
they were cutting themselves. Yet, what does Elijah do? He mocks them. And he treats
them with absolutely, or he treats their religion with absolutely
no respect. Now, I want to temper this. with
what 1 Peter 3.15 says, and this is talking about somebody that
asks you something, be always ready to give an answer to every
man that asks you a reason for the hope that's in you with meekness
and with fear. Not in a cocky, arrogant way,
but in meekness and with fear. Be ready to give every man that
asks you, he's gonna be asking you, give him that reason. But disrespect, turn with me
to Genesis chapter four. Respect and disrespect. Genesis chapter four. Now remember, Elijah is often
considered the greatest prophet. Was he being wrong the way he
treated these prophets of Baal? No, no. He's treating them as
he should have treated them. And you'll find out at the end
of this chapter, what did he do? He said, don't let one of
them escape. All of them were put to death. He slew them. Now
that's, well, let's, let's look at this passage in Genesis four. And Adam knew Eve, his wife,
and she conceived and bear Cain and said, I've gotten a man from
the Lord. And she again bare his brother
Abel, and Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller
of the ground. And in process of time, it came
to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering
unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of
the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof, And the Lord had, what's the
next word? Respect. The Lord had respect unto Abel
and to his offering, but unto Cain and to his offering, he
had not respect. No respect whatsoever. And Cain was very wroth. He was
offended. You know, if someone treats you
disrespectfully, you're offended, aren't you? You're offended. Cain was offended. This is not
right. This is not fair. I should not
be treated in this manner. He was offended because God had
no respect. Now you think of that. That's
such a powerful concept. God had no respect to his offering. And yet to Abel, the scripture
says, the God of glory. We're talking about the creator.
We're talking about the infinite sovereign of the universe. Him
who dwells in holiness, dwells in the light that no man can
approach to. This glorious, infinite being, the God of glory, had
respect to Abel. and his offering. You see, these
two men are defined by the offering they brought. You think of Cain. He brought his best. He brought
the fruit of the ground. Now, God had already cursed the
ground. Remember that? Cursed to be the ground for thy
sake? He brought something that had already been cursed. I mean,
there's no way that he could properly bring this into God's
presence, but he does anyway. But I want you to think about
what disrespect Cain had to God. First of all, he had no regard
for what God said to bring. God never told him to bring the
fruit of the ground. He'd already seen I know he was
taught by his father that the only way to approach God is through
the blood of that coming lamb. He knew that a lamb wouldn't
do anything as far as just a physical lamb. He knew it was pointing
to the coming lamb of God. So he showed no regard for God,
what he commanded him to bring. He showed no respect for God
in that he thought God, he brought God down onto his level. I see
this, this is good, if I can accept it, surely God would.
He brought the holy God down to his level. And he thought,
surely God will accept this. And how he dishonored and disrespected
the living God in bringing him down to this level. He demonstrated
such a high opinion of himself. Surely God will accept this,
this is good. This is good enough for God to accept. He showed
such disrespect for God and he thought nothing of that coming
sacrifice. He just disregarded the coming
one and being accepted in him and through his blood. He disregarded
all that and in the very foundation of all his religion is this an
utter disrespect for God. That's what it's all about. What
about Abel? God didn't have any respect for
Cain, but what's it say about Abel? The last sentence of verse
4, and the Lord had respect unto Abel and his offering. Now, Abel brought what God commanded. Abel knew that that offering
he was bringing was not going to cleanse him. He knew what
it pointed to, the coming one. He believed on Christ just like
you and I do. Scripture says that in Hebrews 11.4, by faith
Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice. He knew
that his only way of approach was through the blood of that
coming one. And he demonstrated by this,
he believed his sin deserved death. He saw himself as a sinner
and the only way he can To be accepted by God is through
the coming sacrifice. He understood that. He acknowledged
God's holiness. He acknowledged God's righteousness
in bringing this sacrifice. That's the only way I can come. Now, God had respect to Abel. And listen to this. If you come
into God's presence through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
only, God has respect for you. That's an awesome thought, isn't
it? Now, it's through the offering. It's not what you are in and
of yourself. It's through the offering of Christ. But if you
come into God's presence only through the blood, the living
God has respect for you. And if you come any other way,
God has no respect for you. Look at verse five. But unto Cain and to his offering
he had not respect, and Cain was very wroth." He was angry
over this. He thought, this is not fair.
This is not right for me to be treated this way. His countenance
fell. You could see on his face that
he was upset with what had taken place. He didn't agree with this. God was showing him no respect. This is not fair. Now, let me
say this. If you, or if I, have no respect
for God, be assured of this, He'll have no respect for you.
None at all. You're going to be an object
of His just wrath. What a horrible thing it is to
have no respect for God. Really, there's nothing worse,
is there? To have no respect for God. Now, Cain had no respect for
God, and God had no respect for him, and the religion of Cain,
that's works religion, salvation depended upon you doing something. Now that's what it comes down
to. If any aspect of salvation is dependent upon you doing something,
then you're of the religion of Cain, and you have no respect
for the living God. The only one who respects the
living God is that man who's afraid, that woman who's afraid
to look anywhere but Christ alone for everything in their salvation.
Now that is respect for the living God. At the very heart of Abel's
consciousness, there was respect for God, fear of God, and God
had respect for Abel. Now, back to Elijah. I have respect for Elijah, don't
you? The way he dealt with this false god, I have respect for
Elijah. And I want wisdom to be just
like Elijah, don't you? I want to treat men with respect.
I don't want to be disrespectful to men. I want to be a respectful
person. And I want to treat human religion with absolutely no respect,
just the way Elijah did. May the Lord be our teacher.
and enable us to be respectful people. It's dishonoring to not
be. All you do is expose yourself.
All I do is expose myself if I fail in this thing. I'm being
haughty and arrogant. I'm being a jerk. I want to be
a respectful person. And I also want to show absolutely
no respect for the God of human religion. I want to be just like
Elijah. May the Lord give us the wisdom to be just like that.
Amen.