Two Journeys

This morning we are looking at Matthew 9: 14-17 at the issue of change. Christy and I have relatives in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and we love to go up there. It's a beautiful area; very rural, very attractive, farmland, it's a peaceful place. And if you go and drive around there any length of time you might chance upon a black buggy or two drawn by horses and driven by an interesting group of people called the Amish. The Amish are different than us in so many ways. They still speak the language of their ancestors; they wear clothing something like from the 17th century almost — wide-brim hats, straw hats, beards without mustaches, clothes without buttons. The women don't wear jewelry. They have no church buildings; they worship in their homes, and they've been doing that for generations. Now, what many of you may not know, is the ancestry of the Amish goes way back to the Reformation with the Anabaptists.

 The Anabaptists were called by some, the Radical Reformation. The word radical means they'd sought to get back to the roots; they sought to get back to what Christianity really was. Not all the accretions that had come under the Roman Catholic system but rather the true New Testament faith, and so they held dear some doctrines that we as Baptist now hold dear. For example, regenerate church membership, the desire that everyone in that fellowship be truly born again, which they would testify to by baptism by immersion after a profession of faith in Christ. They believed in separation of church and state, and those early Anabaptists were passionate about missions and about evangelism. They were willing to suffer; they were willing to be persecuted. But somewhere from the genesis of that group to the Amish, something went awry. Something went amiss. They started to pull in and one can guess it was probably because of the suffering and  persecution as they were abused by one group after another, by one government after another, and they fled to America and  just wanted to be left alone; they started to pull inward. Many of them lost their zeal for evangelism and for missions, and they started to basically encrust their religion in a set piece kind of way that would be handed on from generation to generation to generation. They became traditionalists. 

Change is a constant reality we have to face. Probably our generation and the generations that immediately preceded us have seen more change than any of the other generations that came before. After the industrial revolution took people off the farm and put them in the factory, one invention after another came just reeling in and changing the way everyone lived. Since then, we've also gone through the technological revolution, and things are changing even faster. Change is a fact of life, and we know as Christians that nothing that you can see with your eyes or interact with, with your senses in any way is permanent. Everything changes. Relationships change, churches change, nations and cities change. Durham has gone from being a rural community of tobacco farmers and tobacco factories to being the City of Medicine and  a place in the Research Triangle Park, where there’s cutting edge of pharmaceutical research and other forms of electronic research.

There's been big changes in this area, and some of you who have lived here for longer than I have can testify to the fact that when you first lived in your homes there were dirt roads and now it's a major city area. Changes have happened and change is a fact of life, and it's very unsettling. And in times of changes, change just rolls in. We begin to wonder, "What can we hold on to? What's stable? What can we grab on to?" Some people do that by looking backward; they look back into memories, and those memories are comforting. All of us, for the most part,  take photos of important parts of our lives, and we like to look at them. We like to remember the way that things were, and there's nothing wrong with that. Memory is a great gift of God. One of the things that we do in looking backward to memories is to have traditions, and traditions are good things. We use our traditions to give meaning to holidays and to life itself, and those are good things as well. I would like to stand up and say to you that tradition has an absolutely indispensable role in the advance of the kingdom of Jesus Christ.

You might say, "What am I talking about?" In 1 Corinthians 15: 3-4, the Apostle Paul said, "For what I received, I passed on to you as of first importance, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures." So he received something and transmitted it or passed it on. That is a tradition. But the problem comes when traditions become traditionalism and that's a very different matter. Traditionalism seeks stability in unchanging external forms that are not mentioned in the Bible. Unchanging externals that are not mentioned in the Bible rely on old methods because they've worked in the past, whether missionary or evangelistic traditionalism. Just doing it the way it used to be done because it worked back then. Jaroslav Pelikan said this, "Tradition is the living faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living."

There's a difference between tradition on one hand and traditionalism on the other, and  that's the issue that Jesus is dealing with here in this question about wineskins. I think, rather than looking primarily backward, we need instead to look upward to our King, the King of the Kingdom of Heaven is Jesus Christ. He's basically saying, "Watch me, follow me through all the changes. If I go left, go left. If I go right, you go right. If I stop, you stop. If I accelerate, you move. Follow me through all the changes." He is the King of the Kingdom of Heaven and he's leading us through change, but he's leading us in specific ways. I think in that way we find our stability, an unchanging King, an unchanging Word of God, but an advancing Kingdom of Heaven following him through all the changes. That's what I want to give you today, a sense of confidence that our king is leading us through all of these changes. The whole issue came about when John's disciples saw Jesus celebrating at Matthew's house. In the last sermon we talked about how Matthew the tax collector had given his life to Jesus Christ; he'd trusted in Christ. Jesus walked by and he said, "Follow me." 

And Matthew left everything, got up and followed him. And so he became a Christian; he followed Jesus Christ. Then he decided to have a celebration, a feast, a party at his house, and invited all of these people to come and Jesus... The celebration, the feast was in Jesus' honor, he was his Lord, his Savior, and he wanted to give a celebration of feast in Jesus' honor. Many people came and they were categorized by the Pharisees standing on the outside as tax collectors and sinners. Who would want to eat with them? But Jesus did. We talked about that last time, how Jesus would seek to transform that situation and make it an opportunity to evangelize for the Kingdom of Heaven. 

John the Baptist's disciples are standing out there too, and they were puzzled. They were curious. In order to understand this, you have to understand John the Baptist and his ministry. A little bit of background is helpful here. John the Baptist preceded Jesus Christ by a little. He came, he was probably about six months older than Christ. The story of his birth is recorded in Luke 1, and Matthew 3:3 speaks of John the Baptist and said, "This was he of whom it was spoken through the prophet Isaiah, a voice of one calling in the desert, 'prepare the way for the Lord.'" John's coming had been prophesied by Isaiah, and he came to do this great work. John McArthur said that John the Baptist came for three reasons: Number one, to prepare the way. Number two, to proclaim the way. And number three, to get out of the way. Now, what do we mean by that? 

First he came to prepare the way for Jesus Christ. Now how did he do that? He did it by setting an example by the way he lived. What kind of lifestyle did he have? He had a rough austere lifestyle, much like that of Elijah. He lived out in the desert; he had camel hair garment and he had a leather belt around his waist. He ate locusts and wild honey. He fasted and he prayed, and he preached out in the deserts. And he baptized. Now that was shocking by the way. Baptism was a ritual that only Gentiles had to go through, a kind of a ceremonial cleaning in order to become Jews. And in effect, John was saying, "You all need to be cleaned. All of you need to be washed; you all need to be cleansed. You're so far from the original faith of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You're so far from what you should have been; you're disobeying the Law of Moses." So he's baptizing anyone upon repentance for their sins; and so, he came to prepare the way. He also came to proclaim the way. How did he do that? By taking his finger and pointing at Jesus Christ, and saying, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." That was a key moment when Jesus came to where John was baptizing, and he pointed at him and he said, "I have seen and I testify that that man right there is the Son of God." He came to proclaim the way. 

He also came to get out of the way, and what does that mean, "get out of the way"? What it means is that John the Baptist was a wildly popular preacher. Many people... Everyone came to hear him preach; everyone came to watch the baptisms. He was incredibly popular, and his disciples were immensely loyal to him. John had to get out of the way and let Jesus take center stage because it was not John's role to take what Jesus had come to have. And what is that? One day John's disciples heard that Jesus was baptizing and actually it wasn't Jesus himself who baptized but his disciples were, but more people were going to Jesus than were going to John, and John's disciples were jealous about that. Earlier, the next day after John had first pointed his finger and said, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,"  his disciples were there again with John, and John saw Jesus passing by and he said, "The Lamb of God." His disciples left John and followed Jesus. Isn't that what John wanted? He's saying, "Don't follow me anymore; follow him, follow Jesus." John's disciples didn't quite get the message, some of them, and they were distressed that Jesus was becoming popular, distressed that he was baptizing more people than John had been; very upset about it and they came to John ask him about it. "Rabbi," they said, "that man who is with you on the other side of the Jordan, the one you testified about. Well, he is baptizing and everyone is going to him."  They're frustrated; they're not happy about this. To this John replied,  "A man can receive only what is given him from heaven." Oh, is that so true? You can only get what God gives you. "God hasn't given that to me. I had my role. A man can only receive what is given him from heaven. You yourselves can testify that I said I am not the Christ, but I'm sent ahead of him. The bride belongs to the bridegroom; the friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom's voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete. He must increase, and I must decrease." That means get out of the way. He said, "The bride isn't mine. That's the bridegroom right there, and the bride belongs to him. How wrong would it be for me on the bridegroom's wedding day to interpose myself and take the bride. The bride belongs to Jesus." Now, what is the bride? It's the disciples, the followers; it's the believers who are streaming to Christ and believing the bride is being put together. John is saying that the bridegroom is going to get married to the bride someday, and he’s glad to hear his voice. “I’m glad to stand, but he must become greater, I must become less.” 

Some of John's disciples missed the boat. They were lingering, they were loyal to John, they did not follow. They did not go after Jesus at that point, they stayed with what they knew. They knew John and they knew he was a man of God, so they did not follow Christ. There are some disciples in Acts 19, who only knew the baptism of John; they'd never heard of Jesus, like Apollos in Acts 18. He'd heard faithful teaching about Jesus, but didn't know actually about what had happened after John. These disciples, though, knew very well about Jesus, but they were, I think, beginning to be repulsed away from Jesus. And the problem is this issue of fasting.  Look again at Verse 14. "Then John's disciples came and asked him, ‘How is it that we, John's disciples, and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?'" John led a strict ascetic life. He fasted regularly. He just got enough nourishment to keep him going; he wasn't there to eat, that wasn't his purpose. He was called specifically in that way. His father Zechariah had been told that he must not take any alcoholic beverage from the day he was born which was a  Nazarite vow. John's disciples followed his strict regimen of fasting and asceticism, perhaps even living in the desert though we don't know for sure. But Jesus' calling was different; he was called to do different things than John. Certainly Jesus fasted. As a matter of fact, I think, Jesus' fasting was even more intense than that of John the Baptist. Forty days out in the desert without eating or drinking with direct assaults from Satan himself.  Now, that's a fast. But Jesus also feasted, didn't he?  He was feasting here; he was celebrating. He was eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners, and John's disciples stood outside and said, "We don't get it. Are you really a man of God? This is not what we understand a man of God would do." I think that they may have even affected John himself. John is in prison waiting to die, and he sends his own disciples later on in Matthew 11: 3 and asks Jesus, "Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?" So John himself begins to waver because he doesn't really know and understand how Jesus' calling is different from his.  John's disciples come with deep doubts and with a strong loyalty to the way of life learned from John. Jesus gives them a message, a message from the King, and it is "It is time to change. It's time to leave John, and it's time to come over to the bridegroom." Look what he says in Verse 15, “Jesus answered, ‘How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, then they will fast.’” Do you see how Jesus borrows John's language?   He uses John's phraseology. “I am the bridegroom, these are my friends. This is a time of celebration; it's not a time for fasting. It's a time for celebration because Matthew has left his tax booth and he's following me; it's a time to celebrate.” Someday Matthew and all the disciples would fast; they would mourn when the bridegroom is taken away from them. What does this refer to? Well, at least it refers to his death. Jesus gathered his disciples together in John 16 and says, "I'm going away, and where I am going you cannot follow." He's referring to his death on the cross. "You can't follow me there, and I'm going to be separated from you. Strike the shepherd and the sheep of the flock will be scattered. And in that day, you will mourn." He said, "You will mourn and grieve while the world rejoices, but then you will rejoice and no one will be able to take away your joy." That must refer to the resurrection. At the least the bridegroom is going to be taken away from them by his death, but I think it actually refers  also to his ascension into Heaven.

Jesus was with them during those days eating and drinking; he was carrying on an ongoing ministry. But the time would come when that would be finished, and then they would have to face a world that needed conversion; they'd have to face the devil whose kingdom they were trying to take over. They would have to face their own fleshly lust and temptations, and in those days many, many times they would need to fast and they would need to mourn. Notice in the text the connection between fasting and mourning. Fasting is really a form of mourning. It's a form of grieving, I think, primarily over sin. James, in James 4:8-9 commands mourning for sin. He says, "Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn, and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom." There's a time for that, and I think fasting is a way of showing seriousness in the issue of sanctification. Perhaps you've been convicted of sin, and you need to turn away for a time from food and drink and give yourself in seriousness to prayer.  But sometimes it's also just a way of clarifying your calling, where you fast and pray and seek the Lord's will. Anyway, Jesus said the time for that is not now. Now is  a time of celebration. 

We also have mentioned the Pharisees; now that's a different matter than John's disciples. Look again at verse 14. "Then John's disciples came and asked him, 'How is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?'" The Pharisees were the quintessential examples of religious traditionalists. They were constantly importing new man-made things and establishing them as God's law and God's way; that's traditionalism. Because of this bent they had imported many fasts throughout the year. There's only one fast mentioned in the law of Moses, and that's connected with the day of atonement, but the Pharisees were getting to the point where they were fasting twice a week. In Luke 16, the Pharisee stands and prays and thanks God and he says, "I thank you that I'm not like other men. I fast twice a week and I give a tenth of all of my possessions." That's how the Pharisee prayed  and fasted. We know from Matthew, Chapter 6, that when they fasted, they would disfigure their faces and get all dirty and look horrible, so that everyone would know they were fasting. And Jesus said, "I tell you the truth. They have received their reward in full. I don't recognize that kind of fast." But they were traditionalists, they had imported these fasts. The Word of God said nothing about them. It was something the Pharisees wanted people to do. This is just one of the many traditions that the Pharisees made equal to God's law. Mark Chapter 7: 3-9 says, “The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial religious washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. When they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions such as the washing of cups, and pitchers, and kettles. So the Pharisees and teachers of law asked Jesus, 'Why don't your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders, instead of eating their food with unclean hands?' And  Jesus replied, 'Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites. As it is written, these people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain. Their teaching are but rules taught by men.'" 

That's traditionalism, folks.  Mark 7:8, Jesus says, "You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men." That is traditionalism. Where you put something man-made in the place of the Word of God. He said to them, "You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions." Well, along with traditionalism comes religious authoritarianism. What do we mean by that? They were in charge, and if you didn't follow their traditions, you were out; you were rejected. They wanted you to dance to their tune. Jesus spoke of that in Matthew 11, when he said, "To what can I compare the children of this generation? They're like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling out to others. 'We played the flute for you and you didn't dance. We sang a dirge and you didn't mourn.’” Now, if you don't understand, when we play the flute, you need to dance, that's happy time. And when we do the dirge and the fasting you need to mourn, that's fasting time.'"

Jesus didn't have anything to do with any of that; he did not follow their ways. Note the hypocrisy by the way. John the Baptist did almost nothing but fast and they said he had a demon. Jesus came feasting and they said, "He's a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners." Why? Because neither John nor Jesus fit into their traditionalism box. They weren't doing it their way. Christ was totally independent from all of that. He did most of his healings on the Sabbath. Why? One might say, to tick them off. I would say, to put it positively, he did it on the Sabbath, so that he could provoke change, so that he could teach them about what the Sabbath is for. Man was not made for the Sabbath, the Sabbath was made for man. It's a different approach, and he would teach on that after healing on the Sabbath. He didn't do those ceremonial washings because the Scripture said nothing about them, and here he would not join them in their man-made fast.

There are modern traditionalists too, aren't there? I grew up in the Roman Catholic Church. Every week we celebrate the Mass, and I still don't understand all of the rituals connected with the Mass. When you first walk in, you're supposed to dip your fingers in a bowl of holy water and you're supposed to cross yourself.  At certain parts of the service you do a different kind of sign of the cross. I was an altar boy and  was trained to ring bells and do other things at certain times. I didn't understand what it was all for, but we were told, "You don't need to really understand, just do what you're supposed to do in the way you're supposed to do it." This was a set piece thing, so that anywhere in the world, any country in the world you went to, that's what you would observe. The languages would be different since Vatican II; it used to be just Latin. The languages were different, but the Mass was the same everywhere.  It's traditionalism because the word of God doesn't mention any of these things, and yet they've been elevated up to the level of the Word of God. But Southern Baptists have their traditions too, don't they? Over 150 years ago, there was a man named Charles Finney who was a powerful revivalist preacher. Everywhere he would go, people would flock to listen to him preach, and he invented something new called the "Anxious Bench.” H’d put it right in the front and anyone who was concerned about their soul after his preaching would come forward. Have you heard that phrase before? They would come forward and as they're sitting on the "Anxious Bench", people would go over and counsel with them. Never been done before. It was part of Finney's new measures. Does that sound vaguely familiar? Have you seen anything like that in any Baptist church you've ever been to? At the end of the sermon, you have the invitation. I'm not saying it's bad, I don't think ceremonial washing is bad, either, but when you elevate it up to the level of the Word of God, it can become traditionalism. So that you say, "Without the coming forward, no one can be saved." Is that true, without the coming forward no one can be saved? I know this, without faith no one can be saved. Abraham didn't come forward, he came out of a tent, looked up at the stars, and saw and believed. Now, “coming forward” some people say is a way of publicly demonstrating your faith. As Baptists we believe water baptism is a way of publicly declaring to the world that we are believers in Jesus Christ; be careful of traditionalism.

I heard of another Baptist church that had a revival. The Holy Spirit was poured out in a mighty, in a powerful way. People came to faith in Christ, families were reunited, sins were confessed, people were weeping. It was a powerful time of outpouring of the Spirit, and the hymn they were singing during that time was, "Spirit of God Descend upon my Heart." The next week, they thought it might be good to sing that same hymn again. And the week after that, they sang it again, and again and again and again, month after month, year after year, decade after decade until  some courageous pastor said, "It's time to choose a different hymn to close the worship service." Now what's going on there? It's holding on to something, some external form that God chose to use one day and say, "This must be elevated to equality with the Word of God." This is a problem.

 Jesus addressed this in Verses 16 and 17. "No one sews a patch of un-shrunk cloth on an old garment. For the patch will pull away from the garment making the tear worse. Neither do people pour new wine into old wine skins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out, and the wine skins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wine skins, and both are preserved." He's illustrating his principle in two different ways, and it's very, very important that you see the difference between the patch and the wine skin. I've thought a lot about this, and it's only recently that I've come to understand it. The patch is a piece of un-shrunk cloth. What does it mean? It's never gotten wet before. What happens to that patch when it gets washed the first time? It's going to contract. However, the coat around it has already done that; it only does it once. And so it's set in its shape, set in its way, one could say.  The patch is there and it needs to move, but the garment is not going anywhere. As the patch contracts, the tear is worse; it's worse than it was at the beginning. And what about wine skins? The Jews kept their wine in the skins of goats or calves, and they would put them into these skins and they'd block them off. The wine would be allowed to ferment and as the fermentation process went on, gases were given out, and as a result, the wine skin would need to expand like a balloon. If the wine skin could not expand, if it was old, if it was hard, if it was brittle or dry, it couldn't move, but that gas kept building up. In the end, the gas  would win. Actually, they both lose because once that skin is ruptured, it pours out on the ground, the wine skin is ruined, everything's lost.

Why am I talking about these details? I think you need to understand the essence of discipleship is followship. If Jesus says, "Contract," then contract. If Jesus says, "Expand," then expand. He's the king. He's in charge. He rules over change. The issue is that the Kingdom of Heaven involves change, sometimes in, sometimes out, who gets to decide? Jesus does. He's the king. He rules. He's in charge. And so, if you want to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, you need to follow. He's walking by the sea and he sees some fishermen  says, "Come follow me, and I will make you fishers of men." In Matthew 8:22, Jesus said to one man, "Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead." He said to Matthew at the tax booth, "Follow me," and Matthew got up and followed him. Jesus said in Matthew 16:24, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me." What does “follow me” mean? Where I go, you go. When I stop, you stop, when I go, you go.

 The old garment cannot follow inward. It is set in place and so it's ripped. The old wine skin cannot expand outward; it is set in place, and so it's ruptured. The basic principle then is that the Kingdom of Heaven is all about change; it is about transforming a lost and rebellious world. The status quo is the Devil's; the advancement is God's. The Kingdom of Heaven is advancing. Satan always wants us comfortable with the way it is. We need to be willing to advance, to march. Now, I want to clarify something about this principle. Liberals, those that reject the authority of the Word of God would say "Amen" to this, that Jesus is a radical wanting to change all kinds of things. They like that idea, but what they neglect is that Jesus would say, "Yes, but there are some things that never change, never." For example, the character of God never changes. He can't improve, and he can't get worse. "I, the Lord, do not change," Malachi 3. James 1:17, says, "The Father of the heavenly lights does not change like shifting shadows." God never changes. Secondly, God's eternal Word never changes. Jesus said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words,"  [plural,] "My words will never pass away." 

It is the eternal Word of God and it never changes. God's Gospel message never changes. The Apostle Paul said in Galatians 1:8, "Even if we or an angel from Heaven should preach a Gospel, other than the one you believed let him be eternally condemned." The Gospel message must not be changed. The unchanging doctrines of Christianity must never be changed; nor will they ever change. However, it is the external trappings, not mentioned in Scripture, that change all the time. And Jesus says, "Follow me, as I navigate through those changes." How are we going to apply this principle? Well, first of all, let's realize how Jesus applied it to the first century Jewish nation. To John's disciples, what is he saying? "The time for following John is over. Soon John will be dead. Follow me, I'm the bridegroom. Leave that ministry behind. The time has come to follow the bridegroom, Jesus Christ.” What would he say to the Pharisees? "Follow me and leave behind your man-made traditions, your traditionalism. Follow me. I'm the Messiah. I'm the king."  Even more significantly though, what does he say to the whole Jewish nation? "The Old Covenant is over; it's finished. When I give my blood, the sacrificial system will end, and so, the time has come for a new covenant in my blood. Follow me." 

What does he say to individuals today? Basically, the status quo belongs to the Devil. You must be changed in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. You can't stay the way you are and be saved. It says in Matthew 18:3, "Unless you change and become like little children you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven." He said to Nicodemus, "You must be born again." He's going to take the wine of the Holy Spirit and he's going to pour it into a new one. So, you also must be made new. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is gone, the new has come.” You must be regenerated; you must be born again. Secondly, you must be sanctified; you must grow step-by-step, following Jesus. 2 Corinthians 3:18 says, "We are being changed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory."

 You know what's the key to that? The key to that is how you listen to the Word of God. How you read it, how you hear it preached and taught, how  you respond at that key moment. Do you have a stiff neck? Remember He spoke of the Jews as being stiff necked. What does that mean? Unyielded. They won't move, set in their ways. Or are you rather yielded to the Spirit? Do you say basically, "Teach me what I need to know from the Spirit, and I will follow you." Finally, there's coming a great change for you individually, it's called glorification. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a flash, in a twinkling of the eye at the last trumpet. “For the trumpet will sound, the dead in Christ will be raised and we be changed.” There will be  a transformation because flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. You've got to be transformed by the power of the resurrection.

Well, that's individually. What about to churches today, is he's speaking a word of change to churches? Absolutely. First of all, if a church is healthy, it's going to be constantly growing. And if it's going to be constantly growing, it’s going to be constantly confronting issues of change, all the time. Therefore, we have to have a constant assessment. We have to keep constantly weighing the changes against the unchanging Word of God. We must keep bringing it back again to the touchstone of Scripture. Is this matter covered in Scripture or not? If not, then it's a matter of discussion about strategy, mission strategy, worship styles, other things. But if, however, the matter is covered in Scripture then it's unchanging, and so, we need to be Bereans, constantly re-assessing our ministry, constantly taking it back. And why? Because there's constant truths, aren't there? We just told you what they were. The unchanging nature of God, the unchanging nature of his Word, the unchanging Gospel, and even some methods are unchanging. Preaching is permanent, folks because it's covered in the Word. It's through the faithfulness of proclamation that people come to faith in Christ.  I want to tell you again that tradition is essential to the advance of the Kingdom of Heaven. Speaking  a word to you parents, if you have young children in your home, you must pass on the tradition of your living faith to them; you must share with them day after day. It is primarily your responsibility to evangelize your children. Sunday School has a role, the church has a role, the pastor has a role, but it is your primary responsibility to lead your children to Christ, pass on your faith to your children.  Psalm 78 said, "He commanded our forefathers to teach their children, so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn, would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds, and would keep his commands." Generation after generation, like a relay race. You receive this faith, you cherish it, you walk with it, and you pass it on to your children, yes, but also to your disciples. I hope you have some. Lead some people to Christ and then share the Gospel with them, transform them, work with them. What does Jesus say in Matthew 28? "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I've commanded you." That's tradition.

But please, watch out for traditionalism, where external trappings become elevated to the level of the Word of God. The Book of Revelation is a book of new things, isn't it? If you're a child of God, you're going to be given a new name. How will my friends know me? I won't know what to call myself. It's written on a white stone and it'll be given to you, a new name. You'll be singing a new song, you'll be dwelling in the new Jerusalem, and you'll be surrounded by the new heavens and the new earth, because God the one who's seated on his throne says, "Behold, I'm making everything new." Let's follow Jesus Christ, our King, through all the changes he has in mind for you individually, for this church, until you finally see him face-to-face.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches an expository sermon on Matthew 9:9-13. The main subject of the sermon is that Christ befriended sinners who came to him rather than self-righteous individuals for the sake of their souls.

We're looking together today at Matthew Chapter 9:9-13. "Jesus is called the friend of sinners," not in this text,  but in Matthew 11, but here we see it very admirably. We've seen that the whole story of the Gospel of Matthew is that of an advancing Kingdom, the Kingdom of Heaven. And every Kingdom needs a king, and Jesus is the King of the Kingdom of Heaven. But as we looked at it, we are trying to understand how His Kingdom is built. It's not like the kingdoms of the world; it doesn't advance by military conquest or by power. How does it advance? How does someone enter the Kingdom of Heaven? We're going to  see the way that Jesus Christ builds his kingdom. Recently in Presidential elections, we've seen a major change in the way that candidates package themselves for the American people.  As the political process has been mingled with advertising and marketing agencies and all that, there've been more and more of a concern constantly for what the people think about every little thing.   What do they think about the color of a tie that the candidate is wearing or the tone of voice or inflection when he said this or that? There are  focus groups, people that come together,  paid for their time, and they sit around a table and  watch a speech and they'll react moment by moment, up or down. Do they like it, do they not like it? Constantly concerned are the politicians for the ebbs and flows of the populous. They're concerned about what people think, what they like and what they don't like.

We're going to see in our text today that Jesus Christ is not that way. He didn't care at all what people thought about how he built his Kingdom. He's going to choose a tax collector to be an Apostle.  Are you stunned by the fact that he would take a tax collector and make him one of his own? If not, it’s because you weren't a first-century Jew. If you lived in Jesus' time in Palestine, you would have had at least six good reasons to hate a tax collector.  Number one, you'd have personal reasons to hate a tax collector because that man sitting in that booth is taking food off your table, he's taking things away from you, and so, you had personal reasons to hate the tax collector. You also had national reasons. Behind the tax collectors was the tyranny of the Roman Empire. The Romans were Gentiles, they were outsiders who had conquered Israel and were ruling over them. The Romans were seen as national enemies. Any patriotic Jew would hate a tax collector. That's why it's all the more bizarre that Matthew and Simon, the zealot, would be together, brothers in Christ, we'll get to that by and by. But if you were patriotic, you had good reason, you believed at least in the first century, to hate a tax collector.

What about theological reasons? Devout Jews understood that they were on the Promised Land. Palestine had been promised on oath to Abraham as Abraham's land. Through the sins of the people, the breaking of the Covenant, they had lost dominion or sovereignty over the Promised Land, but they desperately wanted it back. They felt that the Messiah certainly would come and give them sovereignty over their own land back. But here was this class of people that was selling out to the Romans. They were doing their work, they were collecting money for them. The had theological reasons to despise them. How about ethical reasons? The tax collectors were characterized by greed, by avarice. They frequently collected far more than was required. And what did they do with the extra tax money? They pocketed it, and they lived high, mighty, and large. Therefore, for ethical reasons they were also hated. And behind them was the might of the Roman Empire. So that if you got upset, if you objected, if you cross them in any way, heaven forbid that you should attack or kill one of them, the full might of the Roman Empire would come down on you if you touch one of those tax collectors.

There were also social reasons. For the above reasons, tax collectors were seen as outcasts. Nobody wanted them around, they were pariahs. We're social beings by nature, and so we want to hang around with somebody. Who are the tax collectors going to hang around with? The other outcasts, the other rejects, the sinners, the way the Pharisees called them. And finally, they were morally reject-able. Many tax collectors use their excessive wealth and earnings to live immoral lifestyles. They would have banquets were immoral acts occurred, and fine upstanding Jews would stand on the outside and say, "This is what you get when you're a tax collector."  I'm going to say again, what I said earlier, Jesus Christ came and chose a tax collector to be one of his Apostles. Are you stunned? Well, you should be.

Matthew in the Gospel shows his humility, shows his willingness, to open up his past and say, "This is what I was. This is the life that I lived before I knew Jesus Christ." He follows in the long line of writers of Scripture who are willing to bear their own sins to all posterity, to show that the true hero of every story is God Himself. The true hero of the Bible is God, the mercy of God.  We see even more than Matthew's humility, we see Christ's greater mercy. More than anything, this is the story of a stunning and sovereign gracious God, Jesus Christ, who saves a wretched sinner who really has nothing to offer. Now, as we look at the text, you're going to see eight things that I'd like you to look at. We're going to see the choice,  the collectors, the call, the crisis, the commitment, the celebrations, the criticism and the correction. 

 Verse 9, "As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth, "Follow me," He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him." Here we see the choice. What do I mean by the choice? I mean, Jesus Christ's sovereign choice. Christ's choice of US precedes our choice of Him. He said to his Apostles, of whom Matthew was one in John 15:16, "You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, fruit that will last." Matthew was sitting there listening, it was truly true of him. In Matthew 11:27, Jesus said, "All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the son and those to whom the son chooses to reveal Him."  The son is choosing to reveal the Father to Matthew. Christ's choice comes first. The initiative in the story is with who? It's with Jesus Christ. He comes to Matthew, he walks by and he speaks to Matthew, "Follow me,"  — the initiative is with Christ. Later on, he would choose Matthew to be one of the inner circle, one of the 12 apostles. But all of this is of grace, not of merit. The commentator John Calvin said this, "That Matthew from his tax office should be received into Christ fellowship, yea, called even to the office of an Apostle, is an illustrious example for us of the grace of God. It was Christ's will, not only to choose simple blunt men for that rank, to bring down the world's wisdom, but also this tax officer who had followed a career of small credit, which had involved him in a great many corrupt deeds. To make him an instance of his free goodness, and then this person to teach that the calling of us all depends not on the merits of our own righteousness but on his sheer generosity.”

We also see in this choice of Christ his independence. Christ doesn't care what the neighbors think. He's not concerned what the Jews will say. He's not worried about the Pharisees standing on the outside being critical. He knows what he wants in His kingdom, and He goes and gets it. He looks with a vision that we don't have. He sees with a sight that we don't have. His thoughts are not our thoughts. It says in Isaiah 55: 8-9, speaking of God, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the Earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." If you had been putting together a kingdom in those days, would you have chosen a tax collector? I think not, but you and Jesus think differently. God looks at the heart and as he reaches down to the heart, He's looking for things we're not looking for. He  is looking for brokenness. He's looking for a way that his grace may be magnified. In 1 Corinthians 1:26 and following, Paul talks about the Corinthian Church, and says, "Brothers, look at what you were when you were called. Not many of you are wise by human standards, not many were influential, not many were of noble birth, but God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. God shows the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of the world and the despised things, and the things that are not, to nullify the things that are. So that no one may boast before Him. It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus."  We see the independence of Christ, we see his willingness to put his Kingdom together the way He wants to. His ways are different than ours. He wants to choose outcasts. He delights in what we reject and He rejects what we delight in. This is the way He is. And more than anything, how wonderful is it that Jesus Christ is a friend of sinners. Matthew 11:19, it says, "The son of man came eating and drinking," and they say, "Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners, but wisdom is proved right by our actions." Jesus is willing to put together a kingdom of sinners and tax collectors.

Secondly, we see the collectors. This is a tale of two collectors, is it not? We've got Matthew and we've got Jesus. Matthew is a tax collector, Jesus is a collector of man; He's a collector of souls. He knows what He's seeking and He's seeking souls. Matthew is constantly collecting, gathering, accumulating. Jesus is constantly collecting, gathering, accumulating. Christ is the collector of souls with a focus on souls, souls, souls every day. Other things meant nothing to Him, they would burn in the end.  Matthew got up every day concerned about what?  Money, money, money, material possessions, accumulating stuff for this world.  When Jesus saved another tax collector, Zacchaeus, He said in Luke 19, Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man too is a son of Abraham for the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." Jesus is a collector of what was lost. He's a collector of souls.  Matthew every day is getting up looking for money, collecting money, showing that his heart is full of greed and idolatry for  greed is in fact, according to Colossians 3:5, idolatry. He has displaced God in his mind and is willing to establish money, material prosperity, a comfortable lifestyle over his love for God.  As a result of this, he's willing to break off fellowship with his fellow Jews. It didn't matter to him enough to go to the temple and worship there, he was willing to be a spiritual outcast and all of this for money. If he was anything like his brother tax collectors, he was also living “high on the hog” with golden goblets and enjoying his life. Sin was destroying his soul. So what was he collecting? He was collecting wrath day after day after day, but Jesus came to collect him and save him from the wrath of God. 

Thirdly, we see the call. Look at verse 9, "As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth, and here's the call, "Follow me," He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him." This was a life changing event. This was a fork in his road. From that day forward, nothing would be the same. And it all starts with the call of Jesus Christ. Simple words, "Follow me.” We have here, therefore, the external call of Christ. If you’d been standing near Matthew in the tax booth, you could have heard those words, "Follow me." Your ear drums would have vibrated. You would have heard the sound. There was an audible call, "Follow me." But before that call even occurred, some things had happened. Realize that Matthew's tax booth was in Capernaum which was Jesus’ base of operations, it was his center, that's where he did his work, it was his home area. Many miracles had been done in Capernaum and Matthew had heard about them, probably had seen some of them. It wasn't coming completely out of the blue. Jesus was not a total stranger to Matthew, but rather there was a history that had already been built up. On the basis of that history, Jesus is going to come and harvest the soul. He's going to come and He's going to call him into his kingdom, "Follow me." But realize this, the external call of Jesus Christ is insufficient, it's insufficient for salvation. Why do I say that? Well, Jesus Himself said it in Matthew 11:20 and following, "Then Jesus began to denounce the cities in which most of His miracles had been performed, because they did not repent." He included Capernaum, and he said, "Woe to you Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the depths. If the miracles that were performed and you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day, but I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the Day of Judgment than for you Capernaum." What is he saying? He's done miracles in front of them. He's done teachings in front of them, and they did not repent. Something more than the external call must go out. There must be an internal transformation. Jesus said to Nicodemus, "Unless you're born again, you can never enter the Kingdom of Heaven. You want to enter the Kingdom of Heaven? You must be transformed from within." It's not enough for Jesus just to walk by and say, "Follow me." There had to be an internal call, an internal transformation by the power of the Holy Spirit, so that there was a hearing with the soul of the call. A hearing with the ear of faith. "My sheep hear my voice," said Jesus, "And they follow me." 

Fourthly, there was an external call, and there is also an internal call of the spirit that brought Matthew immediately  to a crisis. What do we mean by crisis? The external call brings you to a point of crisis, it brings you to point of decision, you need to know what to do. What are you going to do? Satan is going to flood the mind at that moment with temptations. He's going to flood you with reasons not to get up from that tax booth. “Do you know what's going to happen, Matthew, if you follow Him? It's over, your career is finished.” Temptation's flooding in. Is he going to follow or is he going to stay? Christ is not one for minimizing the crisis, is he? He's not going to make it easy. “It’s going to be comfortable, it'll be a good lifestyle for you. Come on, if you have any questions, come and talk to me.” It's not that way at all. He walks by and says, "Follow me.” It's a command from a king.  He's already said in Matthew 8:20, "Foxes have holes and birds have the air of nest, but the son of man has no place to lay his head.” That's the kind of life it's going to be, it's a crisis. In Matthew 16:24-26, Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it into eternity." What good would it be for a man to gain the whole world, tax collector?  What good would it be to gain the whole world and lose your soul? Or what would a man give in exchange for his soul? Jesus is not one for minimizing the crisis. You want to follow me? You’ve got to pick up your cross every day and be willing to die. Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it this way, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. The cross means sharing the suffering of Christ to the last and to the fullest. Only a man thus totally committed in discipleship can experience the meaning of the cross. In fact, every command of Jesus is a call to die with all our affections and lust." Bonhoeffer was right.  When Jesus calls you, he calls you to come and die, to die to yourself, to die to your worldly ambitions, to die to a comfortable lifestyle, to die to earthly pleasures and to live only to please your Master, Jesus Christ. This is a real crisis and Jesus is bringing Matthew to it. He had already said in the Sermon on the Mount, “No one can serve two masters. You can't do it. You cannot serve both God and money. Either you will hate the one and be devoted to the other, or you will despise the one and love the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”  Matthew must choose, you must choose. Matthew cannot remain where he is and follow Christ. Do you see that? It's a command, it's dynamic. "Follow me, stop what you're doing and move, follow me," he says. This is what I say to you, Jesus Christ, is the greatest friend that a sinner ever had. Because yes, he finds you in your sin, and it doesn't matter what the sin is, it doesn't matter how low you've sunk, it doesn't matter what you've committed, Jesus Christ is your friend. He's the friend of sinners. But He's so great a friend that he will not leave a sinner in their sin, but he will command them to come out of their sins and follow him in holiness. “You cannot stay at that table Matthew, you must follow me.” From that time on, Matthew 4:17, Jesus began to preach, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near." You've got to think about a whole different life, Matthew, it is a crisis. 

That brings Matthew to commitment. “Follow me, Matthew,” and Matthew got up and followed Him. Do you think that Matthew is up in heaven right now rejoicing at the truth of this text? I think he is. Matthew is saying, “Praise God. I got up and followed. Praise be to God, that I didn't stay there. That Satan's temptations were insufficient, that the internal call of Christ was enough to overcome every obstacle.” This is the faith that overcomes the world. Our faith conquers every obstacle. Matthew didn't stay seated,  he got up and he followed. Actually, Luke 5:28 says that, “he got up, left everything and followed Him.” he underscores it. he left everything. What does that mean he left everything? "Matthew," said the chief tax collector to Matthew, "You can be replaced. You get up and walk away, don't bother coming back. Because there are other greedy Jewish people who would be very happy to sit down in your seat and become wealthy. So you get up and walk away, that's fine, that's your decision, but don't come back. Don't come back." Matthew knew that. He knew that walking away meant his career as a tax collector was over, and yet he did it. In February 1519, Hernán Cortés,with 500 Conquistadors with him, landed near the Yucatán Peninsula, and established a city called Veracruz. He took 20 horses. His purpose was to conquer the Aztec empire. Before he went, he burned the 11 ships that had carried them to those shores and the men stood on the shores and watched them burn. There was a near mutiny at that point, but he overcame it, and said, "We've got only one thing before us, and that's an empire to win." They knew they could not turn back. Does Jesus call you to burn your ships? Yes, he does. He says, "Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead. You follow me. No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is worthy of the Kingdom of Heaven. You, burn your ships and you go win that empire with me. “Follow me," said Jesus. Matthew made the commitment. He stood up. The attraction of Christ was greater than anything that his career as a tax collector could offer him. 

Next comes the celebrations. I think we skip this too much in the Christian life. We have a wrong view of God. Do you know that our God is a happy God? Do you know that He's a joyful being? He rejoices all the time, He's not grumpy.

He's not irritable, he's not out of sorts and he certainly isn't leaning over the ramparts of heaven to see if anybody down there is having fun, telling them to stop it. That is not God. Our God is a God of joy. He's a God of happiness. What is it in this world that destroys joy, and happiness, is it not sin? Is it not sin that's brought all this misery upon us and therefore redemption out of sin brings us into a life of joy that cannot be calculated? Celebrate if you're a Christian, rejoice and be glad. Paul says, "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice.” A tremendous joy is waiting for you in heaven. Matthew 25:21 says, "Well done good and faithful servant. You've been faithful in the few things, I'll put you in charge of many things. Enter into the happiness of your master." That's called Heaven folks.

You want to know how happy God is? You're only going to find out in Heaven, and when you enter into the joy of your master, then you will know at last what it was all about. Our God is a joyful celebrating God. He's not grumpy, and out of sorts, and you know why? Because everything is on schedule. He is sovereign, he is ruling, and his kingdom is advancing and nothing can stop it. He is about the business of saving souls, and Satan can't stop Him. There are two celebrations in this text. There's a celebration on earth at Matthew's house, but then there's a celebration up in Heaven before the angels and God. It's not mentioned in the text, but it happened because the Bible said it did. Look at verse 10, "While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with Him and His disciples.” Luke 5:29 gives even more detail.  Matthew held a great banquet for Jesus. It wasn't just a dinner. It was a great banquet in Jesus' honor. This banquet, my savior, my Lord. And he invited his friends, tax collectors and sinners to come. The banquet was filled with food and joy and laughter. Something I've noticed as a theme of Jesus' life is his attendance of banquets. Now he fasted like no man has ever fasted before -40 days and 40 nights- when tempted in a direct way by the devil. But when a feasting time came, he was there feasting. Do you remember where his first miracle is performed? At a wedding in Cana of Galilee, where he turned water into wine. Then there was the feast or the banquet at Simon's house where the woman came and anointed him.Then after he raised Lazarus from the dead, they had a great dinner in honor of Jesus and Jesus was there.  Furthermore in his parables he's mentioning one banquet after another. If you're Christian, your whole life is drawing you nearer and nearer to the greatest banquet that's ever been thrown in history. The wedding banquet of the lamb. I can't wait.  That's what it means. Our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. Your salvation, if you're Christian, is near now than when I began preaching, this morning. Every minute brings you closer and closer to the greatest banquet there's ever been. Do you have a place reserved? Many will come from the east and the west and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven. It's all about  the feast, it's about the banquet.  Do you have a place reserved through faith in Jesus Christ? 

The Lord Jesus was a banqueter and it bothered the Pharisees. They're upset about it because of the guests who came to the banquet —tax collectors and sinners. In the NIV, it's in quotation marks, what does it mean? It means people that have basically given up trying to obey the law of Moses. They feel like they're so deep in the hole that there is no way they will ever get out. There is no forgiveness, no atonement, nothing that can be done for them, so they say,” Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow, we die. It doesn't really matter how we live, we’re so far in debt anyway.” That's what a sinner was, and the Pharisees stood outside criticizing this assemblage of guests at Matthew's house. I think what Matthew did, is he went through his list of friends and invited all of his friends to come and why? For evangelistic purposes. He wanted them to know his Savior.  Jesus came there not just to feast, but so that he might witness to them. When we get surrounded by unbelievers in a party, we get sucked down to their level.  Jesus gets surrounded by sinners at a party and it's an evangelistic rally, I guarantee it. How does that work? Jesus Christ can touch the vile, diseased hand of a leper and transform it so that it's healthy pure and clean like a new born baby's. He has the power to be at that party and be a holy man, and preach the Kingdom of Heaven and that’s  what I think was going on.  

That's the earthly celebration, what about the heavenly one?  In Luke 15, there are three parables about the lost being found. There's the lost sheep,  the lost coin, and the lost son, whom we call the prodigal son. The uniting theme of these three is that the lost thing gets found and then there's a great big celebration as a result. With the lost sheep in Luke 15, it says, “When he finds the sheep, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders, and goes home, then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me, I have found my lost sheep.’ I tell you, in the same way, there will be more rejoicing in Heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who do not need to repent." Joy in Heaven, they're celebrating in Heaven when one sinner repents. Or the lost coin in Luke 15. "And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me. I have found my lost coin.' In the same way I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Then there's the prodigal son, he finally comes home. What does the father say? "Kill the fatted calf, bring a ring for his finger, bring shoes for his feet, bring my best robe and put it on him. For my son was dead and now he's alive again. He was lost and is now found." The older brother, standing outside is very angry. "I slaved all this time for you. You never gave me even a calf or anything for my needs. I'm not going to go in there, when this son of yours who's been wandering and sins, comes back and you kill the fatted calf for him." So he stands outside, and the father goes out and pleads with him,saying, "We had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours, was dead and is alive again, he was lost, and is found." Our God is a celebrating God, and it is right for us to celebrate when the lost get found.  David Barrett, who does the World Christian Encyclopedia estimates that 20 million people come into the kingdom every year through conversion. I don't have any idea if that's true or not, but let's just run with it. That means that approximately one person every second gets saved from every tribe and language and people and nation. How much celebrating is going on in Heaven? Is there like a whole angelic detachment that just does nothing but celebrate all the time? Isn't that incredible? More joy in Heaven over one. And that happens every single second somebody gets saved.

Then the criticism. Look at verse 11, how tragic is this? When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" The Pharisees are playing the role of the elder brother at the banquet who doesn’t want to  come in. The Pharisees don’t want to be defiled by those people. The Pharisee's holiness was all about separatism. They're staying away from the sinners. They don't want to touch them or get involved in their lives, and they certainly don't want to be near them or eat with them. They're too holy for that. At the core is a self-righteousness that says, "You better dance to our tune." John the Baptist never banqueted,  and they said he had a demon. The Son of Man comes banqueting and, they say, "Here's a glutton and drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.” Why are they angry? Because Jesus would not dance to their tune, he wouldn't go along to get along. They played the flute, and he wouldn't dance. When it was celebrating time, as far as they were concerned, he didn't celebrate. When it was mourning time and they played a dirge, he celebrated, and they hated him for it. But instead of going courageously to Jesus, who do they pick on? The weaker disciples. They said to his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" Jesus has to go out and confront them and answer them. They don't go to Jesus, they go to the disciples. 

Finally we see the correction, verse 12 and 13, "On hearing this, Jesus said, 'It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick, but go and learn what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice, for I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.'" How does Jesus correct them? How does he reach out? First of all he speaks from life experience. What is a physician for except to reach out to sick people? What is the courageous physician for, except to go into the middle of a plague-infested town, with no fear of his own getting infected, no fear of his own disease and administer to every single sick person who needs it?  Jesus was a courageous physician surrounded by sinners. He's a physician who came to heal the sick. What do the Pharisees do for the epidemic? Not a thing. They just stand outside and make sure they don't get infected. They're not involved, they don't want to touch these people, they don't want to get involved in their lives. They just stand outside, and yet in effect their heart disease is worse than anybody that ever lived because in order to get saved, you need to know that you're a sinner, and they didn't think they were. So they called other people sinners and they call themselves, 'The righteous who didn't need a Savior.'   They stood outside and criticized. Jesus corrected and said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor. It is the sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners," Luke adds, "to repentance." "I'm not going to leave them in their sin. What are you doing for them, Pharisees?" Then he quotes scripture to them. "Go and learn what this means." That's a Pharisaic formula for, "You haven't studied the Bible carefully enough." “Go and learn what this means.” Hosea 6:6, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” Pharisaic religion was all about meticulous observance of religious rules and regulations. They gave a tenth of their spices, mint, dill and cumin but they neglected the center of the law. What was it all about? It was about mercy for sinners like you and me. If it had been about condemnation and judgment, God would have done that a long time ago.

 Now, what application can we take from this? First of all, look at Christ's sovereign choice. Christ's grace is utterly unpredictable. He delights in choosing and saving some of the least attractive people on earth. Don't write anybody off as un-savable. You never know what the grace of God is going to do. He does the most surprising and amazing things. Also, realize that Christ's sovereign choice precedes any choice you made. We love Him because why? He first loved us. Understand, that's the solid foundation of your salvation. Secondly, on the collectors, can I ask you a question, what are you collecting? Every day you get up and collect something, what are you collecting? Are you collecting material possessions and money and ambitions and ladder-climbing and all this stuff that Matthew was about? That's what he did before Christ called Him. 

Or are you more like Jesus, who every day is collecting souls for the kingdom. Jesus said, "Unless you're collecting with me, you're scattering. He who does not gather with me, scatters." What are you collecting? Third of all... Third, the call, the external call was made by Jesus in his day. He walked by the tax booth and he said, "Follow me." Who makes the external call now? It's people like you and me, witnesses who have personal faith in Christ and go out on Tuesday night or at other times, and reach out with the Gospel and say, "Follow Christ, come to faith in Christ." Are you willing to go out and speak a word for Christ? When was the last time you invited somebody to church? When was the last time you spoke to somebody that you believe was a non-believer or you didn't know, about Jesus Christ? Can you speak a word? Can you give the call? 

Fourthly, the crisis. When you're witnessing, don't try to minimize the crisis that Jesus Christ comes to bring in someone's life. Don't say it's going to be an easy, comfortable life, but rather show that you must leave all things to follow Christ. The commitments. Have you burned your ships? Cortes burned his ships. Did you burn your ships or are you trying to live two lives, trying to serve both God and money, trying to turn both ways? Have you made a full commitment to Christ? The celebrations; do you realize that joy is part of the Christian life, as a matter of fact, the central part? Do you realize that right now, even while I'm preaching, celebration is going on in Heaven, joy over sinners that are repenting. Rejoice with God. The criticism. Are you willing to associate with people who aren't like you? Do you want a neat, tidy, comfortable church or do you want people in here who may be a little bit messy? Maybe a little bit difficult. Maybe their lives are a little out of control and they need Christ. Do you want people from Northeast Central Durham in this church? Are you willing to witness and lead people to Christ that Jesus would associate with or do you just want people whose lives are already mostly together, and then they add Christ to it?   None of us are really like that, we're all sinners. Are you willing to associate with people that most people consider rejects, or outcasts? It's difficult for most American church people to do. And then finally, the correction. Do you realize that Jesus Christ desires mercy and not sacrifice? That he desires that you follow him and love him and know him and not some meticulous religious observance, day after day.

There's nothing that Christ cannot do. He is sovereign and powerful, and he is a king. As we consider him as a king, an utterly unique king in all the history of the world, we see that history is full of the accounts of one king after the other. Some of the kings of history have been totally colorless. There's nothing about their reign that's worth studying. You read them, you find out when they're born, when they died, how long they were king and nothing else, because they didn't do anything. Perhaps their reigns were characterized by selfishness or by laziness. But we see also some extraordinary human kings throughout history, and we still have records of some of the things that they've done.

For example, Croesus who is the final king of the kingdom of Lydia, lived around the time of Josiah of the Bible. He was known for his fabulous wealth. It seemed that everything in his kingdom was made of gold and silver. Some think he was even wealthier than Solomon. Or consider, Caesar Augustus who was the mightiest and most capable of all the Roman emperors. He was known as the architect of the “Pax Romana”, the Roman Peace. He put in place a style and a system of government that lasted longer than any other that's been found on the face of the Earth.  Or how about Richard, the Lionheart of England who led the third crusade. He was known for his physical size and for his strength. When he was meeting with his Muslim counterpart, and they were negotiating, they each took out their respective swords and each king exhibited stunning sword prowess. Genghis Khan of Mongolia was known for his cruelty and his incessant hunger for the advancement of his geographic kingdom. When he died, he ruled over the largest kingdom that had ever been up to that point. Hung-wu of China founder of the Ming Dynasty, 14th century AD was known for his love for education. He set up  more schools than had ever been seen in China, up to that point. Because of his example he was able to train and educate leaders and prepare them for future generations. The Ming Dynasty lasted the longest of any of the dynasties, 300 years. Or consider  Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal who set up a school of navigation and because of him navigators went all over the world exploring.  As another example consider Sulieman the Magnificent of Turkey, called The Lawgiver of the Ottomans who lived around the time of Martin Luther. He was so powerful and strong  that he brought his kingdom right up to the walls of Austria. Many people including Luther thought that the church was going to be swept away. Or Shah Jahan the Mughal, emperor of India, renowned for architecture who left behind the Taj Mahal as a memorial to his dead and beloved wife.  Or Louis XIV of France, the Sun King, known for extravagance and luxury who left behind the Palace Versailles as a testimony to his love of grand things. Or Peter the Great of Russia, known for his humble taste, his versatility and incredible work ethic, who wore common clothes, like a peasant,  and enjoyed talking about ship building or anything else with anybody who wanted to. He could easily be seen in the blacksmith shop working alongside the other blacksmiths. Or Frederick the Great of Prussia, a military genius whose battles are still studied at West Point. All of these kings were renowned for some extraordinary aspect to their kingdom. 

Now I ask you today as you think about Jesus Christ, the King of the Kingdom of Heaven, what is the extraordinary aspect of his kingdom? Can you really choose just one thing? Is not his kingdom like a diamond that every time you turn it, another facet shines more brilliantly and more brightly?  I think as we've looked at Christ, as we studied the exploits of the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the King of the Kingdom of Heaven, we see  that his kingdom is characterized by, number one, perfect righteousness. And number two, absolute power. And number three, immeasurable mercy to the needy. 

First of all, perfect righteousness. The first words that Jesus speaks in the New Testament he speaks to John the Baptist, when John hesitated to baptize him.  Jesus said, "Let it be. So now, we must fulfill all righteousness." Jesus' kingdom is founded on his love for purity and righteousness and holiness. Also we've seen in Christ, absolute power. Is there anything that can be done by power, that Jesus Christ cannot do? He has all power and no obstacle that faced him was too great.  He had kingly power over disease and sickness and death. Anybody who was brought to him, he could heal. He had absolute power over the elements,  absolute power over demonic forces; he had power over all things. We also see in Christ immeasurable mercy to the needy. He had a tender compassion for those that were needy.  Within any group of people there are more needs than we can measure yet Jesus Christ is equal to each one of them. He is merciful and compassionate to each one. Financial needs, health needs, loneliness, family struggles, broken relationships.   All of these needs, Jesus faced as well, and he was tender and compassionate to all of them. We will see in this section of Scripture today that Jesus points the way, in the text, to the greatest need that any human being has, and that is the need for the full forgiveness of sins. That our sins might be forgiven through his blood.  Jesus Christ in his sovereign reign, through his perfect righteousness, through his absolute power, and through his tender mercy points the way to his kingdom, full forgiveness of sins. “Take heart son. Your sins are forgiven.”  

We also see in our text that it is only through personal faith in Jesus Christ that this gift is given. Look at Matthew 9: 1-2 "Jesus stepped into a boat crossed over and came to his own town. Some men brought to him a paralyzed man, lying on a mat.” When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Take heart Son, your sins are forgiven.'" The context is this: Jesus has just left the region in the Gadarene. He's just by a word of power cast out Legion, that most powerful of demons, and he leaves behind a single witness in the  ten-city region of the Gentiles, saying, "Go tell them the great things that God's done for you.” Then he gets in his boat and crosses back over to his hometown.  This is not Nazareth. They expelled him from Nazareth for preaching the truth. They didn't want to hear it. They said, "A prophet has no honor in his own country,” so he took up residence in Capernaum which became his base area. In verse 2, it says, "So men brought to him a paralytic lying on a mat and Jesus saw their faith and said to the paralytic, "Take heart your sins are forgiven." What is the faith that's just demonstrated before us? It is a faith that overcomes obstacles. In order to get the full story,  you have to look at Luke and Mark as well to see just what these men and this paralytic went through. Listen to Mark 2:2-4. "So many people gathered." It says there that, "there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the Word to them. Some men came, bringing to him, a paralytic carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was on." Incredible obstacles faced these men that day. Now we think if only I had lived back then, I would be able to go and spend sweet time with Jesus.  Is that what it would have been like? Not at all. You won't even get close to Jesus. You couldn't  get close. Huge crowds were around Jesus all the time.  These men bringing this paralytic on a mat couldn't even get close to Jesus. What did they do? They had obstacles, but they also had a genuine faith. They overcame these obstacles. They said, "We're not giving up, we're not going to go away. We've carried him all this way, we're not going to turn back. Jesus is able to heal him. What shall we do?"

Can you imagine standing there? Maybe there were four of them, and they were talking among themselves how to get him through. Perhaps one said,  "I have an idea. Why don't we go up onto…” It's probably Peter's house, I think Peter was, he was living in Peter's house. “Why don't you go up onto the roof and dig through and maybe we can drop him down in front." And that's exactly what they did. They removed some of the tiles, they ruined Peter's roof in order that they might get this man right in front of Jesus. They lower him down. This is an obstacle-overcoming faith and any genuine faith from God overcomes obstacles. It doesn't matter what Satan or what anyone puts in front of that faith, the obstacles will be overcome.

There was another obstacle too and that's the theology of suffering that the Jews had back then. They believe that anyone who was suffering, any paralyzed man, any blind man, anybody who had a disease, it was because of specific sin that they had committed. The sufferer would be considered to some degree, outcast since they had done something wrong. “We don't know what it is, but there is some sin there.” This attitude comes across in Job 4:7-8, "Consider now," said Job's friends to him, "who being innocent, has ever perished? Where were the upright ever destroyed? As I have observed, those who plough evil and those who sow trouble, they reap it." In other words, this guy must have done something terribly wrong to be paralyzed. They had to get over that and say, "We don't care what anybody thinks about us, we want him to be healed,” so they came to Christ.

Faith works, faith overcomes. Look again at verse 2. "When Jesus saw their faith." There are two different ways to take that. First, Jesus had the ability to see into their hearts, to perceive the true status of their souls before God. He could perceive their faith. He could read their hearts and their minds.  He could perceive that they had faith and not just faith for healing, but faith for salvation.  But there's another truth here as well. You would have been able to see their faith by what it accomplished, by what it did. A true, saving faith is not a quiet inner thing that never breaks out into your life, but rather as James says, "What good is it my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds, can such faith save him?" Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by actions, is useless. So this was a genuine faith, accompanied by deeds, accompanied by actions. They carried the man, they dug through the roof, they would not give up. It was an active living faith. Faith overcomes obstacles, faith defeats those things that Satan puts in front of it.

Look at Romans 4.  Abraham is our example, our father-in-faith. How was it that Abraham was justified? The Scripture says very plainly that God made a promise to Abraham, Abraham believed that promise and it was credited to him as righteousness. What was the promise? He took him out and had him look up at the stars. He said, "Look at those stars, Abraham. I know that you're barren. I know that your wife is barren and you have no children. I know that, but look at the stars, and here's My promise to you. ‘So shall your offspring be.’” As a promise of God, Abraham heard that promise, he believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. In order to believe God, however, he had to overcome some obstacles. He had to face the fact that as Romans 4 says, his body was as good as dead since he was about 100 years old. He had to face the fact that his wife Sara's womb was also dead. He didn't have an ostrich faith, with his head in the ground, instead he saw the obstacles, he saw what was in front and he said, "I believe you anyway. Because you are sovereign, you are almighty, you are powerful, you can do anything."

So also it is that anyone who would desire to come to personal faith in Christ must overcome obstacles. If you want to become a Christian, you have to basically run across a landmine strewed, barbed-wire-infested, machine gun nest world in which Satan opposes every step of the way. 1 John 5 says, "Everyone born of God overcomes the world." This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.

If you want to come to personal faith in Christ, you need to be a conqueror, you need to be an overcomer. It says in Revelation 21:6-7, "he said to me, 'it is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end to him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God, and he will be my son." It's to the overcomer that salvation comes. And these persistent actions speak of a deep faith. The men refused to be stopped.

It also speaks of the humility of faith. Not only is faith obstacle-overcoming, not only is it persevering, but it is also humble and broken-hearted. This man by his physical inabilities actually pictures all of us before the throne of God. This man could not move. He couldn't do anything. In order to survive, he had to be a beggar and  Jesus said, "Blessed are the spiritual beggars for theirs and theirs alone is the Kingdom of Heaven.”   It's only the beggars, the helpless ones, the ones who know that they are spiritually needy that go to Heaven. So in verse 2, pardoned by faith in Christ,  Jesus saw this kind of faith when he saw their faith and  said to the paralytic, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven." The most astonishing thing about this is the price, the cost, of this forgiveness. Jesus looked down at them and gave this man, this one man, the greatest gift that any king has ever given. Full pardon. Full forgiveness of sins. 

It's not great if you don't understand what kind of record of sins awaits you, apart from Christ. The Bible says very plainly that on Judgment Day you will have to give an account for every careless word you have spoken. By your words, you will be acquitted and by your words, you will be condemned. There's a careful record being kept of everything we've ever said or done and of everything we didn't say and didn't do, every opportunity we did not take advantage of. All of these things. A careful record is being kept because our God is a just and righteous judge. At that moment, Jesus looks down and says, to this man, "Your sins are forgiven, take heart, your sins are forgiven." 

It was not the effort, the struggle, the obstacle-overcoming that earned them salvation, not at all. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith alone, apart from works of the law. You can dig through a million roofs and you'll never be saved. It's simple faith in Jesus Christ that saves. There's an interesting detail here in verse 2,  "When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, 'take heart son, your sins are forgiven.'" It's very easy to make a misstep here.  I myself  was raised in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Catholic church especially in the Middle Ages, they had the idea of a treasury of merit. The idea was that other righteous people, saints, they call them, went before us, and lived more righteous than you really needed to live in order to get to Heaven.  So they had some righteousness left over, and it was as if it were put into a bank account for you. This treasury of merits is a thing that you're drawing on if you're not as good as them. They've made their extra... It's kind of like an inheritance. They bequeathed to you their extra righteousness, not quite enough to get you to Heaven, but it's enough to help maybe reduce your time in purgatory some.  The idea is that as we do righteous things we can actually help other people, reduce their time in purgatory, even get them out of Hell and into Heaven. This is utterly false.  Just because you have a godly father, godly mother, godly Sunday school teacher, godly pastor, that doesn't save you. You have to yourself, personally, individually, appropriate the salvation that is available through faith in Christ. Jesus knew his theology of salvation very well. When he looked down to that paralyzed man and said to him, "Your sins are forgiven," he didn't forget what was going on, he knew that this man had faith to believe for salvation and so he believed. But the Bible does say, "When Jesus saw their faith." Well, what is that? I think what it means is that the faith of faithful people can actually make it easier for others to trust Christ. Missionaries, go out. Hudson Taylor, for example, the one who threw himself on a map of China and said, "Give me China or I die." He had a strong faith and went to the inland regions where it was tough and witnessed to the Chinese. He was in effect dragging all these paralyzed Chinese people, paralyzed spiritually to Christ, and they were able to trust in Christ through his faithful light, through his witness.  We by our faith can make it easier for others to believe: by preaching the gospel, by living in front of them a witness. But ultimately each individual person must believe for him or herself and we have this incredible good news from the judge, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven.”

Have you ever used or heard the expression, ”Consider the source."  “Consider the source” means to look at the individual who's making the statement and weigh accordingly. I'm urging you to consider the source of the one who said, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven."  Imagine that you were accused of a serious crime and you were being dragged into court to face a judge. As you're dragged into court some bystander whom you've never met calls out to you and says, "Be encouraged, you're acquitted, you can go home." Would you be happy at that moment? Would you feel a sense of joy filling your heart? Consider the source, they're just a bystander. They have no authority to make that statement. But suppose an hour or two later the judge says, "Take heart, son, you're acquitted,” and then the gavel goes down, case dismissed. Would you be encouraged at that particular moment? Yes, consider the source. This one's the judge and he has acquitted you. You're free to go home. So who is it that spoke these words, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven?" It was Jesus Christ the judge of all the Earth.  John 5:22, "Moreover, the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son even as they honor the Father."

 All judgment in heaven and earth and under the earth has been has been entrusted to Jesus, and he will be the one sitting on the throne.  Recently I was in an airplane witnessing and I was talking to a person about the Ten Commandments. He said,  “I’ve never murdered, I've never committed adultery, I've never done these things.”  I said, "Well, Jesus actually gave us a legal commentary on the Ten Commandments in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said you may not have murdered, but have you ever been angry with your brother? You're in danger of the fire of hell. You may never have committed adultery, but have you ever looked at a woman lustfully? You're in danger of the fire of hell. "Well, that's just Jesus' opinion,”  was the reply. No, it isn't. Jesus is the judge who's going to be sitting and judging you. He will be the one who will apply the law of Moses and therefore his opinion in this matter, matters greatly because he is the judge of all the earth. If on the other hand, Jesus looks at you saying to you, "Take heart, your sins are forgiven,” now that is something. That's what happened to that paralyzed man that day. The judge of all the earth looked down at him and said, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven." 

Meditate now on the cost of that statement. One of the aspects of Jesus' Kingdom is his perfect righteousness. If we had, for example, a judge who looked out at a murder where the evidence is clear that this person committed the crime, and the judge said, "You know, I'm a nice guy, I'm a kind individual, case dismissed." They might be a kind individual, but would they be a good judge? A righteous judge? Not at all. Jesus is a righteous judge,so when he said, "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven," what he said was, in effect, the blood necessary to atone for your sins will be shed on your behalf. Your death penalty will be paid for you for the wages of sin is death. Hebrews 9: 22 says, "Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness." Later in Matthew's gospel, at The Last Supper, Jesus took a cup filled with wine and he offered it, gave it to all of them and said, "Drink from it, all of you. This is the blood of my covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." Ephesians 1:7 says, "In him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins in accordance to the riches of God's grace." 

When Jesus spoke these words they were not idle words, they were expensive words. "Take heart, Son, your sins are forgiven," means “I will pay for all of the things you ever done wrong. I will pay for your sins with my own blood.” At this particular moment, some teachers of law said to themselves, "This fellow is blaspheming,” Blasphemy was a very serious charge. Blasphemy means to take on yourself the attributes of deity, something that only God could say or do, or to use the divine and blessed name in a careless flippant way.  This would be the charge that would kill Jesus Christ. In John chapter 10, Jesus made the statement, "I and the Father are one."  At that moment the Jews picked up stones to stone him. There was no time anymore for discussion, no more time to listen to the teaching. "I and the Father are one," means “I am God.” They picked up stones to stone him. Jesus said, "I've shown you many great miracles from the Father, for which of these are you stoning me?" The Jews answered, "We are not stoning you for any of these, but for blasphemy because you, a mere man, make yourself equal to God." Later in Matthew's Gospel, Jesus is standing before the High Priest on trial for his life and the high priest says, "I charge you under oath by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God." And Jesus said, "I am." The high priest tore his robes and said, “He has spoken blasphemy. Now, you've heard the blasphemy. What do you say?" And they all yelled, “He's deserving of death." This would be the very charge that would kill Jesus Christ — blasphemy. They uttered true doctrine. They said, "Only God can forgive sins like this." They were right. Their doctrine was true. Only God can forgive sins like this. Isaiah 43:25 says, "I, even I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake and remembers your sins no more."

Now imagine that you were a police officer and arrested a man for burglary having caught the man right in the act. Suppose the homeowner was standing right there. The homeowner's a Christian who loves the Lord and says, "Officer, I want you to know that I forgive this person completely for what they've done and I'm not going to press charges." Is there any weight to that?  Absolutely. That person is the one who's been transgressed against, and so it is that all of you can and should forgive people who transgress against you.  But suppose, again, you were that officer, the burglar's caught in the act, and the neighbor across the street comes in the room and says, "I want you to know, officer, I forgive this person's sins."  What right does that person have to make the statement that some sin that this individual committed is forgiven?  And not just any sin, but all the sins are forgiven? Only God can make this kind of statement.The Pharisees were the teachers of the law, but they missed it through unbelief. What would the logical conclusion be? That this is God in front of them. God can say this thing and therefore Jesus is God. He can make this statement. Instead they concluded that he was a blasphemer. But Jesus gives them some proof for faith. In verses 4 though 8, knowing their thoughts, Jesus said, "Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts?" Which is easier to say? Your sins are forgiven or to say, get up and walk.  But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on Earth to forgive sins,  he said to the paralytic, "Get up, take your mat and go home." And the man got up and went home. The whole crowd was filled with awe and they praised God who had given such authority to men.” We have evidence of Christ’s deity. The logic of faith. He's reasoning with them here. He's saying... “Let me ask you a question, which is easier, to say your sins are forgiven or to say, get up and walk?” 

 There's nothing to the saying, but there's something to the doing. There's nothing to the words, but there's something to the power of the words. You see, we throw words around all the time. They don't mean much to us. It's a whole different thing with God. When he speaks, it is. He's not a liar like us. He used words to create Heaven and earth. He used words to say, "Let there be light," and there was light. He spoke through the prophets and every word is true. When he wanted to communicate, finally, and speak a final word to the human race, he sent his son, who is called The Living Word of God. We throw words around, Jesus doesn't. “So that you may know that my words have power, watch this.” That's the logic of faith.

Remember also,  “Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said to them…” You see the fact of the matter is they never vocalized their statement. They're feeling that Jesus was speaking blasphemy. Can you read my mind? No. But Jesus can. As a matter of fact, all of your secret thoughts lay open before him. Before a word is on your tongue, he knows it completely. This is the God we worship.  Jesus can read minds, and said, "Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts?" Jesus has the power to read minds and all of your thoughts will come before Him again on Judgment Day. He wanted teeth Pharisees to know  that He has the power to do that and even a greater power than that. He has the power to heal bodies so that they may know that this man's sins have already been forgiven.  All of the time this discussion has been going on, this paralyzed man has been laying there and his physical condition hasn't changed at all, but his spiritual condition is radically different. He is saved now. If he were to die at that moment, he would go to Heaven and not to hell. Can he feel the difference? No, he cannot, but by faith he knows it's happened. It's already occurred, his sins are forgiven simply by the words spoken by Jesus. But so that you may know that it's happened, he speaks to that paralyzed man and says, “Rise and walk.” When Jesus says it, he just speaks and it is because with his words come power. Jesus speaks and says to the paralyzed man, "Rise and walk." At the moment that he speaks it, whatever disease it is, is instantly healed by the power of Jesus Christ. This is the God that we worship. Not in word only, but also in power, 1 Corinthians 4:20, "For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk, but of power." The word of the Gospel is powerful simply by believing.

 Now, I want you to understand, it's because of this that all the miracles were done. Jesus wasn't opening up a permanent miracle shop so that every time somebody was hurt, they could run to Jesus or be carried to Jesus and be healed, but rather so that we might know why he really came, the forgiveness of sins. And that power is here even today. The reality is in Heaven, the evidence is on Earth. Verse 7, "And the man got up and went home." Do you believe, do you believe it happened? Do you believe that Jesus has this kind of power? Even more, do you believe that by his death on the cross all of your sins can be forgiven? Do you think you need a Saviour? Do you believe and accept that the greatest need any human being ever has is forgiveness of sins?  Even if you're paralyzed. The greatest need is forgiveness of sins. Do you believe that today? Because if so, then salvation is available simply by believing and hearing the word. That's all. Faith comes by hearing the word, that's all. And that healing power is here today. 

What kind of application can we take for this? Number one, rejoice in Christ's unlimited power, not in word only, but in deed and in truth. Look at verse 8, "When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe and they praised God who had given such authority to men." Rejoice that Jesus hasn't changed. He's the same today as he was then. Secondly, complete forgiveness of sins. Think about what your burdens are — Burdens of health problems, physical loneliness, other problems, difficulties, unemployment, broken relationships. All of them are small compared to the need for forgiveness of sins. Set your hierarchy properly and if you know and you know by faith that your sins have been forgiven through Jesus Christ, then you can say, in the words of the hymn, ”It is well with my soul," no matter what's going on with my body. 

Did Jesus heal this man? Yes, he did. He cares about your problems. He just wants you to know the hierarchy: first, forgiveness of sins. Secondly, all these other things will then be given to you. “Seek first the Kingdom of God and all of these things will be added to you as well.” Thirdly, there are  obstacles to overcome for faith. Any good thing you want to do for God, there are going to be obstacles. Do you have an obstacle-overcoming faith the way these men did? Would you have turned away and gone home shrugging and saying, "I'm sorry, we tried, ” or would you have climbed up on the roof and dug through? What kind of faith do you have? Do you have a small faith or an obstacle-overcoming faith? Fourthly, I want you to be an instrument by your faith and leading others to Christ.  You could find yourself in two ways in this story, you could find yourself the paralyzed one, who was totally forgiven by Jesus Christ or you can find yourself the one carrying the one who needs to be forgiven. I think you should find yourself in both ways, first the one and then the other. I want this Church to be a witnessing Church, I want you to carry people to Jesus who need Him. I want you to invite your friends and your family to Church. I want you to open your mouth this week and speak for Christ. Have the courage to bring somebody to Christ this week. Our God is a great God and the same power that was available then, for healing and for forgiveness, is available today for salvation. 

Pastor Andy Davis preaches an expository sermon on Matthew 8:28-34. The main subject of the sermon is Christ's power over the demons in the Gospels and even now.

We begin with Matthew, Chapter 8, verses 28 - 34, "I stand here today to proclaim that Jesus Christ has absolute power over demons." Isn't that wonderful? Jesus Christ has absolute power over the demonic realm. He has effortless power over the demonic realm. It's no struggle, no strain for him to show his influence and power over the devil. You need for Him to have that absolute power. You are surrounded at this present moment by demonic forces of evil that seek to do you harm. They seek to oppose you, resist you, tempt you, and destroy you if they can, and you need Christ's power in order to survive. The major point is that Christ has all power and all authority over demons, and the second point is that you need that power. C.S. Lewis wrote in his introduction to Screwtape Letters,  advice from a great demon to a lesser demon on how to tempt human beings. This book is a study on temptation and the process of sanctification. In the introduction, Lewis wrote, "There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence and the other is to believe in and feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. Demons are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist on the one hand, or a magician on the other, with equal delight."

In the church in America in the 20th century, we saw more of post-enlightenment skepticism. We are a scientific people. We believe that all you need are your five senses. If you can make some observations about the world, you can formulate some theories about how it really functions, and if you can test those theories in a lab through experimentation, you can learn everything that there is to know about the universe. People need a God if they don't understand science, and the more that science learns, the less you need God to fill in the gaps. So, away with mythology, away with all of those ancient superstitions. We are a scientific people, we are a rational people, a logical people, and therefore, we think of demons somewhat the way you would think about Santa Claus. We've outgrown that concept. Well, that is un-Biblical. That is false. Demons surround us at all points.

David Powlison well noted that attitude is saying, "Can a modern person believe that God controls lightning and thunder if a meteorologist can use satellite pictures and computer modeling to predict the storm a week ahead of time? Can a modern person believe that demons could cause paralysis, seizures, and deafness if an EEG and electromyogram can map patterns of electrical impulse in the nervous system?" You see that's what we face as scientific people who trust in our own logic, our own science. After a while, we become  thoroughly secularized and so we don't really see the need for Christ's power and protection against the demonic realm. That is false. Demons are around us right now making it difficult for you to listen to my sermon.  The demons harass us at all points. This is a biblical truth. If it were not so, then we would have no way to make anything out of the text that we're looking at today. Demons are real, but in some senses, perhaps, at least in some quarters, we may have swung totally to the other side. Powlison said, "We've gone out of one ditch into the ditch on the other side of the road. We have a preoccupation, in some cases, with the demonic. We are essentially spiritual people, but sooner or later, we were going to move back toward a spiritualist way of looking at things, if we're not going to be Christian.” There is a present fascination with the occult, with witchcraft. The immensely popular Harry Potter books, for example, speak of a boy that's got power over witchcraft.These books and movies appeal to the younger generation as they show people with supernatural occultic powers.

 In the Christian realm, for its part, there's been an incredible interest in the demonic. Probably this is best and most popularly summarized or symbolized by Frank Peretti's novels, This Present Darkness, and Piercing The Darkness. These are incredibly vivid books, with lurid descriptions of demons. From This Present Darkness there is a description of a demon trying to enter into a church building. "A shadow with a shape, an animated creature-like shape appeared, and as it neared the church, sounds could be heard. The scratching of claws along the ground, the faint rustling of breeze-blown membranous wings wafting just above the creature's shoulders. It had arms, and it had legs, but it seemed to move without them. Crossing the street and mounting the front steps of the church, it's leering, bulbous, eyes reflected the stark blue light of the full moon with their own jaundiced glow. The gnarled head protruded from hunched shoulders and wisps of rancid red breath seethed in labored hisses through rows of jagged fangs." Where in the world did that description come from? I've read the Bible from cover to cover, and I don't find any support for that kind of physical description of demons. I think it came from Frank Peretti's incredible skill and his creativity as a writer. Behind that, though, is a whole  approach to spiritual warfare, and behind that is a whole movement, the spiritual warfare movement, which has uncovered some valid things for Christians to be aware of; namely, my second point that you need Christ's power every day for protection from the demonic realm. It's gone way beyond the Bible though, as Peretti goes in his descriptions to talk about such things as spiritual mapping and sanctification by expelling certain demons, demons of lust, demons of overeating, demons of procrastination.  Any sin that you would have would have a demon behind it and you need to expel that demon. But they come back, and so you need to keep on it, and you need to have specific words of power. If you don't have special knowledge, they're not going to leave. A generalized prayer is not sufficient. There's also a sense, and this is a big theme in This Present Darkness, of territorial spirits. That demons can kind of take over a town, and the only way you can get them out is to know what they're about. This is spiritual mapping and with research you're able to pray with special words of power to get those demons out.

 Have we gone too far the other direction? Have we gone way beyond anything that the Bible teaches? David Powlison, again, in his book, Power Encounters: Reclaiming Spiritual Warfare, speaks of Cynthia and Andrew, a married couple that he counsels. Cynthia once cast demons out of her toaster when it failed to work. Even worse, she and her husband, Andrew, had a remarkable and remarkably destructive way of arguing with each other. For the first five minutes they warmed up with normal person-to-person bickering, but at a certain point when the fighting turn nasty, they shifted gears and wheeled in the heavy artillery. They would bind, rebuke, and attempt to cast out demons of anger, pride, and self-righteousness from each other. In Cynthia's words, and this is a quote, "I saw the demon looking out of his eyes, glittering and murderous. So I said, 'Demon of anger, I bind your power in Jesus' name. Then I claimed the power of Jesus' blood as my cover from all demonic assault coming through my husband.’”   Is this a valid approach to spiritual warfare? This is where we need to return to the Scriptures and see what the Bible says. 

As we look at our text, we're going to get some basic principles, and I'd like them to be the bedrock on which you're going to begin to form your conception of the demonic realm. The central lesson here I've already stated: Christ has absolute sovereign power over all demons. But secondly, demons are most certainly real. They exist and they are active in the world today. Were demons given full sway with absolutely no restriction from God, your life would be somewhat like a living hell on earth. If on the other hand, demons were completely cleared away from you and couldn't touch you in any way, couldn't tempt you or harass you or in any way cause you any opposition, it would feel somewhat like an 800-pound weight has been lifted from you, spiritually. 

The central lesson of this passage is salvation from demonic powers which is something that only Christ can do. He does it effortlessly, absolutely effortlessly. Christ's sovereign power over demonic authority is clear. The context in Matthew,  the point of the book, is to portray Jesus Christ as the King of the Kingdom of Heaven. He is the son of David. He's also the son of God and His kingdom is advancing through the world. A king must have power. He must have power over his own subjects, but he must also have power over his enemies. Jesus displays that power in Matthew. We've seen already in Matthew 8, Christ's awesome power over sickness. We've also seen Christ's power over natural opposition. He's in a boat  when a terrible, terrible storm approaches.  Jesus just quiets the storm with a word, "Peace, be still,” and it's gone. We've seen His power over sickness, we've seen His power over the natural realm. 

Now we’ll see His absolute power over the supernatural realm. What are demons? They are spiritual beings. They live in a spiritual realm which means they are not physical, but they can have a physical impact, as we see in this text today. The are spiritual for they were originally angels.  God created the Heaven and the earth.  He created the spiritual realm and He created spiritual beings in that spiritual realm, and some of them as revealed in the book of Ezekiel and the Book of Revelation are quite unusual. We really don't even know what those living creatures are before the throne, they're just spiritual beings of some sort, but God created, in the invisible, spiritual realm, angels. They were created first, I believe, because Job 38:7 says that all of the angels, the sons of Heaven, sang for joy when God laid the foundations of the Earth.  They were there watching and applauding God on, and worshipping Him while He created the physical world. They were created good, including Satan himself, the king of the demons. At some point in ancient history before the fall of man, demons fell, Satan fell. There was some kind of a rebellion and Satan was able to gather up according to the Book of Revelation, some say, a third of  all the angels and turn them into demons. Rebel angels who fought against God.  Hell was  therefore created for them as a punishment.  As I read scripture, they're not in hell, yet. They are roaming through the earth, most of them, creating havoc. As it says in the Book of Job, "Where have you been?" And Satan says, “Roaming through the earth and traveling around in it."

Some of the demons, I believe, are bound up in a deep pit waiting for the day of judgement. They're suffering, according to 2 Peter and Jude, but most of them are free to roam and create havoc, but they know their time is short.  Hell itself was created for them as we see in Matthew 25. The Lord, sitting on his throne,  speaks to the sheep and the goats and says to the goats, to the reprobates, to the rejectors of the Gospel, "Depart from me, you who are cursed into the eternal fire prepared, listen for the devil and his angels." Hell was prepared for them. They're terrified of their judgment, they don't want it to come, but it's inevitable. There is no gospel for them. There's no hope of salvation for them. Nothing but an expectation of fiery judgment that will come. It says in Ephesians 6:12, "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” There are these dominions of power and the devil, Satan, has a kingdom.

Jesus mentions in Matthew 12, his kingdom is divided if Satan drives out Satan. Satan has a kingdom, and there's an order and structure in that kingdom; powers, and rulers, and principalities. The demons are, in effect, Satan’s henchmen carrying out his plans, his evil plots. What is demon possession?  There's really no record of it in the Old Testament. For the most part, it is mentioned in on Matthew, Mark, Luke, and the Book of Acts. We get an example in the large group of people that Jesus healed in Matthew 4:24, “ News about him spread all over Syria and people brought to Him all who were ill with various diseases. Those suffering severe pain, the demon possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed, and He healed them.” In the chapter we're studying now, Matthew 8:16, "When evening came, many who are demon possessed were brought to Him and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick." In the Greek, these words of sickness usually translate as demon-possessed or demonized.

I do think demons can inhabit people. That's the only way, I think, to be fair to the biblical text. For example, in Matthew 12, verse 43 and following,  Jesus is teaching about evil spirits. You learn so much from Matthew 12:43-45. It says, "When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes to arid places seeking rest and doesn't find it." There's a sense that the evil spirit has been in the man; he's lived there, it's like the man is his home. In our text, the demons say, "If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs." There's a sense that they're looking for a resting place.  When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and if it does not find it he says, "I will return to the house I left, when it arrives, it finds a house, unoccupied, swept clean and put in order, then it goes and takes with its seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first." The last shall be worse than the first. In other words, this man now has seven demons living inside of him, plus the original one.

That is how it will be with this wicked generation that demons can inhabit, in some sense, a person. Luke 8:2 speaks of Mary Magdalene and  says that out of her, seven demons were cast. There's the Greek preposition "out of," so the demons came out of her. We don't understand how they came in to begin with. The Scripture is absolutely silent on that, and this is one of the problems I have with the whole spiritual warfare movement. They're very specific about how demons can come in to you, but the Bible actually doesn't say anything about that. Casting a demon out of a person is an act of great spiritual power and authority. In Mark 1:23 and following, in  Capernaum, "Just then, a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an evil spirit, cried out, 'What do you want with us Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are the holy one of God.'"  "'Be quiet," said Jesus sternly, 'Come out of him.' The evil spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek. The people were so amazed that they asked each other, 'What is this? A new teaching? And with authority, He even gives orders to evil spirits. And they obey Him.'" It's an act of power, an act of authority, to be able to drive out an evil spirit. In Acts 19, there's a story of the seven sons of Sceva, the Jewish high priest, who aren't believers, but they hear Paul preach and they decide they're going to try some exorcism. They're going to drive out demons and they say, "In the name of this Jesus, whom Paul preaches. We command you to come out." The demon says, "Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?" And then the man who is demon-possessed beat them up and drove them out of the house naked and bleeding.” It is an incredible act of power, therefore, to drive out a single demon from a person. Jesus has that kind of power. To be demonized, I think,  means to be so completely dominated and controlled by a demon, even a sense that the demon inhabiting this person is controlling him, so that they're almost, I would say, out of their mind. They have no control over themselves any longer. It is really, I think, a picture of total human powerlessness. The demon-possessed person can do nothing to help himself. 

As we look at the demoniac of the Gadarenes, this was perhaps the most vicious, most powerful of all cases of demon possession in the Bible. Look at Verse 28, back in Matthew 8. “When he had arrived at the other side in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were so violent that no one could pass that way."  Right away, we have some interpretive issues. First of all, it has to do with the location. Gadarenes, it says here in our text, sometimes it's called Geragasenes, and other spellings, Gerasenes. The best way to take it, I think, is to follow Matthew. There's a town, Gadara, six miles away, that controlled the whole region right up to the lake. Jesus had just crossed over the lake. This was predominantly a Gentile region as we know because they were raising a herd of pigs. Jews would never have raised a herd of pigs. They would have no interest in that. A second interpretive  issue has to do with how many demoniacs were there. Matthew has two; the other accounts all just speak of the one. There's no contradiction here, whatsoever. It's just that Matthew, in this one case, is a little more explicit than the others. There were two- there's no contradiction- but there is one in particular that all of the accounts zero in on, and it has to do with the one who's got the demon “Legion” inside him. He is far more noteworthy, and so, the others just zero in on him. Usually, it's the other way around. Usually Matthew strips things down, almost problematically, so it gets it very, very succinct. But in this case, he gives us more information than the others do. We have more information in Luke 8. It says, "When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town. For a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs." In Luke 8:29, it says, "Many times the demon had seized him, and though he was chained, hand and foot and kept under guard, he had broken the chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places." 

"As we look at the demoniac of the Gadarenes, this was perhaps the most vicious, most powerful of all cases of demon possession in the Bible."

What incredible power — able to take a chain with his own bare hands and rip it to shreds. I can't imagine who was guarding this guy, and what kind of night that was.  The demon-possessed man runs into the tomb areas. How isolated, how desolate, how tragic this man is. He is totally apart from human fellowship, apart from love, out of his mind, out in the tombs, and attacking anyone that goes by. That's what's going on.   Literally stark raving mad is this man. So violent, says verse 28, that no one could pass that way. Matthew tells us that his name is “Legion”. The demons begged Jesus, [Luke 8:29-31], demons plural, begged Jesus, "If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs." There was a legion of demons inside this man. Jesus asked him, "What is your name?" And he answered, "Legion," for there were many demons inside him.  A Roman legion could have anywhere from 3000 to 6000 soldiers. Terrifying, absolutely terrifying. Immense power. I believe there was one demon that ruled over them all, because in the accounts, the Greek goes from singular to plural. One demon is answering for them all. There's a sense of authority there, and there's a power and a strength, a terrible awesome power of the demons.  But next, we see the absolute power of deity. In verse 29, the demons questioned, "What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?" 

Recently I've been reading a history of D-Day.  By all accounts, the toughest place to land was Omaha Beach that morning, because the naval shelling hadn't done the job. There was a crack Nazi troop regiment right there, just thoroughly entrenched, and as soon as the first wave hit that beach, almost without exception, the soldiers were mowed down.  I pictured Jesus that way. He's crossing the lake and there's a terrible storm. He quiets the storm and he's almost like in one of those Higgins boats about to land, and take enemy territory. It's an entrenched area with powerful, demonic force there. More powerful than any human being can deal with. He gets out of the boat and immediately these demons confront him. "What do you want with us, Son of God?" they shout. Here we see a little bit of an element of demonic faith. In James 2:19, it says, "You believe that there is one God, good. Even the demons believe that and they shudder." This tells us a lot about demons. They don't see God all the time, so they've got to believe things about God. They believe that there is one God. Good, even the demons believe that. But in this case, they believe that Jesus is the Son of God. No human being had come to this conclusion yet — not even his own disciples. His disciples had just asked the question, "What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves do his bidding." The demons knew who he[Jesus] was, and they were beside themselves with terror.  They say in Verse 29, "What do you want with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?" 

One of the faulty ways you can get into thinking about the demonic realm is that somehow you've got a good kingdom, the kingdom of God, and you've got an evil kingdom, the kingdom of Satan, and they battle it out on more or less equal terms. Wrestling through history, that is Manichaeism, that is dualism: The good and the evil battling it out. Utterly un-Biblical.  God has absolute power and authority, and the demons know it. They are terrified of Jesus. I love the account in John 18, when Jesus is arrested and there's a cohort, about 600 soldiers there to arrest him, and Judas the traitor is there with them. We've already learned that Judas is inhabited not by a demon, but by the devil himself. When Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him. Jesus comes out and says, "Who are you looking for?" And the soldiers say, "Jesus of Nazareth." And Jesus answers in the Greek, "Ego eimai." [I am].  What He is  saying is: “I am.” That is his name, he is God, he is eternal, and when he said his name, “I Am” , the soldiers drew back and fell to the ground with Judas, too. The devil himself in Judas fell at the statement of Jesus' name.  [John 18] This is an incredible display of power.  These demons are terrified of Jesus. "

"God has absolute power and authority, and the demons know it. They are terrified of Jesus."

James 4:7 says, "Resist the devil and he will run screaming mad away from him." Well, that's a paraphrase, "Resist the devil and he will flee from you." Why?  Because he sees the power of Christ in you.  What are they afraid of? "Have you come here to torture us?" it says, "before the appointed time?" The Greek gives a sense of a definite time. There's a time for judgment. The demons didn't think it was yet so they didn't understand why he was there. “Have you come here to torment?”  They know that they're heading for the lake of fire, they know that their time is short.[Revelation 12].  2nd Peter 2:4 says that God did not spare some angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them in the gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment. So some of the demons are already somewhat in a pit, Tartarus. That's the word translated in the NIV as “hell”.  They're down there and they're bound with chains to be held waiting for the lake of fire. They don't have freedom the way that the other demons do.  I think these demons are very afraid they're going to lose their freedom and be sent to be tormented and tortured before judgment day. At this point it gets really thrilling. Look at verse 30-32.  Some distance from the demons, a large herd of pigs was feeding. The demons begged Jesus, "If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs." He said, to them, the only word that Jesus speaks in this whole encounter, "Go!" That's it. It's a word of power. Is there any striving, any effort, any strain from Jesus here? Absolute, total authority. "All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me," said Jesus. And then what did he say to us? "Go, therefore." Demons are more obedient than we are. Anyway, he said to them, "Go!" and they went out. They came out, went into the pigs, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank, into the lake, and died in the water. A single word, “Go," is all it took. Martin Luther in “A Mighty Fortress is Our God” put it this way, "And though this world with devils filled, should threaten to undo us, we will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us. The Prince of Darkness grim, we tremble not for him, his rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure."One little word shall fell him." That's it.

The most powerful manifestation of Satan's kingdom in history is right before Jesus returns during the reign of the Antichrist, 2 Thessalonians 2 speaks of the Man of Sin. The book of Revelation fills in the picture of this total demonic kingdom reigning openly on earth. In 2nd Thessalonians 2:8, "Then the lawless one, the antichrist, will be revealed whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth, and destroy by the splendor of His coming.” Revelation 19 has Jesus riding on a horse in front of the armies of heaven with a sword coming out of his mouth. What that means is he fights with the breath of his mouth; he speaks and it is done. Isn't that powerful? That is the God that we serve. Absolute power over the demonic realm. As a result of that came total healing. Luke 8:35 says, "When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone out sitting at Jesus' feet, dressed and in his right mind." He's healed. He's a person again, he's free again, all by a single word from Jesus.

Then we get the anxious plea of disbelief in verses 33 and 34. "Those tending the pigs ran off, went into the town, and reported all this including what had happened to the demon-possessed men. Then the whole town went out to meet Jesus and when they saw him, they pleaded with him to leave their region." This is nothing but fear speaking. In the Song Amazing Grace, “twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved.” There's a fear that leads to salvation, and then there's a fear that does not lead to salvation. The disciples have already shown us the first. They're terrified of Jesus in the boat. Remember when he speaks to the wind and the waves, they say, "What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey Him?" And they're afraid. But that fear leads them to trust in Him for salvation. For the people in the region, the Gadarenes, that's a different kind of fear. They were afraid of the demoniac. They didn't want to walk by him because they were afraid he would beat them up. But now with a single word, this other man has come and driven out the demon. The demon is terrified of Jesus. How powerful does that make Jesus? "Therefore please get out of here," they said. The people there were afraid of Jesus, and they expelled him from their region.

Now, he gets in the boat and leaves, and goes back to his own area. [Matthew 9: 1] For a full account you have to put it all together from the Gospels. In Mark's account, he leaves behind a gift of his grace, a witness, to that unbelieving area.  Mark 5:18-20,  "As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon possessed, begged to go with Him. Jesus did not let him, but said, "Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you. So the man went away and began to tell them how much Jesus had done for him, and all the people were amazed.”  Jesus leaves one man. The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed. Just plant it, and then it  grows to be larger than anything. This man was a traveling evangelist with his story of what God had done for him, and how Christ had shown mercy.  Jesus goes across in the boat, lands, drives out the demon, converts one man, sends him as a witness, and then goes back across. Mission accomplished.  That is the power of Jesus Christ.

How are we going to apply this to our lives? First of all, understand, the demonic world has not changed. It's still around us all the time, and  Christ's power hasn't changed either. “Greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.” And so He has all power, in heaven and earth and under the earth, all power on you if you're a Christian. Secondly, understand balance. Let's not go from one ditch to the other. One of the problems I have with the whole spiritual warfare thing is that it lends almost to polytheistic superstition where you can't do anything until you understand the right words of power, and have a whole history and all that. This is a new movement. They’re saying that there was no advance of the kingdom of heaven before all of this spiritual mapping, and all this stuff came in. It can't be. Rather, stand firm. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. These things are openly taught in scripture. So, let's have balance. Let's not  be materialist about it and say there are no demons. We don't want to go too far the other way and say that demons are the issue of my life. “Every day, I have to wrestle with the demons. I've gotta fight them. I've got to oppose them.” Demons are not the issue of your life. Christ and His supernatural power is. Thirdly, believe. Believe in Christ. Trust in Him. First of all, for salvation. Do you realize that Christ saved that demon-possessed man? That's why he sent him out as a witness. "Go tell how much God has done for you." What has he done? Rejoice that your name is written in Heaven.

"Believe that Christ's power is sufficient to conquer whatever demons you face. Rest in his name. Trust in him and worship him"

The greatest thing you can get from Christ is salvation, forgiveness of sins. Trust in Him for salvation, trust in him and rejoice. Believe that Christ's power is sufficient to conquer whatever demons you face. Rest in his name. Trust in him and worship him. I tell you, fall before Christ and His majesty. One single word, "Go," is all it took and those demons were expelled. He is worthy of worship today. Finally, I want you to fight. You're going to go home and you're going to have demons around you, tempting you and harassing you. Put on your spiritual armor, Ephesians 6:10 - 20, "And stand firm and fight by the power of God. Resist the devil," the Scripture says, "And he will flee from you." 2nd Corinthians 10: 3-5, "For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of this world." On the contrary, our weapons have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the authority of Christ and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Jesus Christ. 

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on 1 Kings 19:9-21. The main subject of the sermon is Elijah's meeting with God and the call of Elisha.

 We are looking tonight at 1 Kings 19. And as we saw in the first part of 1 Kings 19, Elijah, suddenly overcome by terror and fear of man, fear specifically of a woman in this case, he's afraid of Jezebel, runs for his life, wants to die. He's lost all perspective. He gets out into the desert and he lays down. He wants to die. He says, "Take my life, I'm no better than my forefathers." He's ready to die and God is not ready for him to die. Instead, he wants to replenish and refresh him. And so he sends him some food and a little jar of water by the angel's hand. And so he eats and then he falls back asleep. And then God calls on him to wake up again and he does it again. And he says, "Get up and eat" in verse 7, "for the journey is too much for you." And so he got up and eaten and drank. And then in verse 8 it says, "Strengthened by that food, he traveled 40 days and 40 nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. And there he went into a cave and spent the night." And that's about where we left it last time.

Now, he traveled about 200 miles in 40 days. Now, you work that out, you realize he wasn't in any major hurry to get there. That's about five miles a day. He could have probably done it easily in 10 days. But it's also amazing in that God used that last little cake and jar of water to sustain him for 40 days miraculously. And that he would go to Horeb is very significant as we're going to see. Now, we're going to begin in verse 9, middle of verse 9, and then read to the end of the chapter, “And the word of the Lord came to him, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ He replied, ‘I've been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant. They've broken down your altars and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left and now they are trying to kill me too.’ The Lord said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord for the Lord is about to pass by.’" Oh, that brings goose bumps, doesn't it? I can't even get past that, 

“The Lord is about to pass by.”  Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And then after the fire came a gentle whisper, still small voice. And when Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left and now they are trying to kill me too." The Lord said to him, “Go back the way you came and go back to the desert of Damascus. And when you get there, anoint Hazael, king over Aram. Also anoint Jehu, son of Nimshi, king over Israel. And anoint Elisha, son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escaped the sword of Jehu. Yet, I reserve 7,000 in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him.” So Elijah went from there and found Elisha, son of Shaphat. He was plowing with 12 yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the 12th pair. Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him. Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah. “Let me kiss my father and mother goodbye,” he said, “And then I will come with you.” “Go back,” Elijah replied, “What have I done to you?” So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them, burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his attendant.

So we have in this account a story of how God ministers to his prophet. Now, Elijah has reached the end of his rope. He's fatigued, he's tired. And I think we get two prominent themes, therefore, out of this situation. Number one, we get the bitter fruits, I think, of Elijah's sin. Elijah has turned away from the purposes of God. We know that because the hand of the Lord came on him powerfully and he ran ahead of the chariot and got to Jezreel. Now, we can't imagine that the hand of the Lord would've come on him so powerfully that he would immediately abandoned his post and run to the desert. And so we can only speculate, we can only surmise as to what God intended in Jezreel had he stood at his post. What kind of revival, what kind of changes would've been made? We have no idea.

But yet in the middle of all this, number two, we see God's tender mercies and his gentleness in dealing with us in our sin. And I think all of us can relate to that. There are no perfect servants of God. God takes ordinary sinners, people like you and me, and he uses us in mighty way. We see therefore lived out here before us in all of the ways that God ministers to Elijah. We see the truth of Psalm 23:1-3, "The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters." And what's the next part? "He restores my soul." Now, how many of us have needed soul restoration at some point in our journey? Sometimes you think, "I need it every day," and to some degree you do. But there are times that you get very low in your service to God and you need him to restore your soul. You know, there is a strain of worship and hymns in which there's a sense in which every day is better than the day before. Every day brighter, every day more powerful. Every day's stronger than the day before. Is that your experience? Do you find that every day is better than the last day? That you're 10 times the Christian now that you were a year ago? Are you finding that to be true? Now, we should be growing in the Lord, but you know, if our experience was going to be an unbroken line right up to perfection and right up to heaven, then why would you need Psalm 23:3? "He restores my soul." You wouldn't need it at all. But your soul does need restoration. I think that's exactly what God is doing for Elijah here.

Now, I think Elijah deserves some correction. I think he deserves a rebuke. And to some degree in the text, there is a gentle rebuke here, isn't there? God asks him, not once but twice. There's the same question. What does he ask him twice? "What are you doing here, Elijah?" I think that's significant. "What are you doing here?" The implication being, "You should be in Jezreel." Okay? But yet at the same time we see the hand of God very, very gently.

Now, he goes into this cave and he spends the night. And the word of the Lord comes to him and says in verse 9, "‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ And he replied, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, put your prophets death with the sword. I am the only one left and now they're trying to kill me also.’" Now, we pointed out before just how self-centered Elijah is in all of this. He's focused completely on himself. That is the problem here. Frank and I were talking about this last time. He said, "This is not an issue of depression, it's an issue of focus. He's focusing on himself and not on the power of God." And if that's the case, then what will God do to restore him? He'll get his eyes off of himself back onto what God can do. "I have power, Elijah. Why did you run? I am able to bring fire down from the heavens and protect you," as we will see in 2 Kings chapter 1. God is able to protect his servants. You had nothing to fear from Jezebel, so why did you run? The power of God. And so the cure to self focus, to selfishness, to get your eyes off of yourself onto, number one, the Lord, and secondly onto God's people. And that's in effect what he does. He first gives him a sense of his presence and power and he passes by and we get the still small voice and then we get business. "Now, get up and get busy. Go anoint this man and anoint that man and understand that I've reserved 7,000, who have not bowed the knee to Baal. God's people are out there. Now, get out and get busy.” Where is the so-called depression at that point? There's work to be done. And we have a powerful God, we have an energetic God, and that's efficient for us. So I think that's how he restores his soul. He focuses Elijah off of himself onto God. And then secondly, to look at God's work in God's people. So that's what we're going to do.

Now, he goes to Mount Horeb. And this is a very significant thing that he ends up there. The 200 mile journey after 40 days, he ends up at Mount Horeb. Now, Mount Horeb's called the mountain of God and has a deep and rich history for Israel. God first appeared to Moses in the flames of a burning bush on Mount Horeb. In Exodus 3:1 and following it says this, "Now, Moses was tending the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the desert and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire, it did not burn up. So Moses thought, 'I will go over and see this strange sight why the bush does not burn up'. When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, 'Moses! Moses!' And Moses said, 'Here I am,'” verse 5 of Exodus 3, “'Do not come any closer,' God said, 'Take off your sandals, for the place where you're standing is holy ground'." So that's Mount Horeb. The burning bush happens on Mount Horeb. And that's where Moses gets his call to go back to Egypt and to lead the people out, people of Israel out of Egypt. Now in that same encounter, God also commanded that Moses should bring his people to that very mountain to worship. In Exodus 3:10 and following, it says, "So now go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, 'Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelis out of Egypt?' And God said, 'I will be with you'." Isn’t that wonderful? He says to Moses, "I'm going to give you a big job. I want you to go and do a great work." And Moses answer is so typical, "Who am I that I should do a great work?" And God's answer is perfect, "I will be with you." The point is, “You're nothing! You're a vessel. You're dust. You're a jar of clay. You are not the point.” And that's in effect what he's doing with Elijah. He's getting his eyes off of him saying, "You're not the point. I've got a great work for you to do. So get your eyes off yourself." Can you imagine God saying, "Well, you know something? Actually, Moses, you have some hidden talents. There's more there than meets the eye with you, Moses. You've really been underestimating yourself all this time. Now sit down and listen and I'm going to build up your self esteem. I'm going to tell you just how strong you are and how capable you are and all the mighty things that you'll be able to do." Can you imagine God counseling that way? In effect, he's saying, "Forget about you. In a few years you'll be dead and you'll be with me. All right? But I can do great things through somebody like you." He says, “I will be with you." And that's in effect his same message to Elijah.

So Mount Horeb, the same place, and God says, "I will be with you and this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain." Do you hear that? So Mount Horeb would also be the focal point of the exodus. They were going to come out of Egypt, they're going to cross through the Red Sea. They were going to go through the desert and they were going to worship God at this specific mountain. That was the call of God, Mount Horeb. Now after he has encountered, God, Moses now, he's come down off the mountain and God said that Aaron would be with him and it was at that very same mountain that Aaron came to meet Moses. Exodus 4:27, it says, "The Lord said to Aaron, 'Go into the desert to meet Moses.' So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him. Then Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say and also about all the miraculous signs he commanded him to perform." And from that interaction, they went and began to call the people of Israel, reveal themselves to the people of Israel and do those miraculous signs that God had called them to do.

Now, after the Exodus, it was to Mount Horeb that he brought the people. And it was right there that the waters of quarreling at Rephidim occurred. This is in Exodus 17, "The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the Lord had commanded. They camped at Rephidim but there was no water for the people to eat or to drink. So they quarreled with Moses and said, 'Give us water to drink.' And Moses replied, 'Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test?' But the people were thirsty for water there and they grumbled against Moses. They said, 'Why did you bring us out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?' Then Moses cried out to the Lord, 'What am I to do with these people? They're almost ready to stone me'." In verse 5 of that chapter, the Lord answered Moses, "Walk on ahead of the people, take with you some of the elders of Israel and take also in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. I will stand there before you at the rock at Horeb." So there at the Mount Horeb, he stands before him, “‘Strike the rock and the water will come out of it for the people to drink.’ So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the place Massa and Meribah because the people, the Israelites quarreled, and they tested the Lord saying, 'Is the Lord among us or not?'" very, very significant moment that happens right there at the base of Mount Horeb. We learn later from 1 Corinthians 10 that that rock was a symbol of Christ and the water that flowed, the water of life is symbol of life through Christ, but it happens there at the base of that mountain. And then it was at Mount Horeb that God gave Israel the 10 Commandments.

Now, it's actually not easy to put this together because in the Exodus account, it calls it Mount Sinai. It's really in Deuteronomy that we understand that it's at that same mountain, Mount Horeb, that the 10 Commandments were given. Deuteronomy 4, "Remember the day you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb when he said to me, 'Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children.' You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain while it blazed with fire to the very heavens, with black clouds and deep darkness. And then the Lord spoke to you out of the fire. [Listen] You heard the sound of words, but you saw no form. There was only a voice. He declared to you as covenant the 10 Commandments which he commanded you to follow, and then he wrote them for you on two stone tablets. And the Lord directed me at that time to teach you the decrees in the laws you are to follow in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess. You saw no form of any kind the day the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore, watch yourselves very carefully so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol." incredibly significant what happens. They go to Mount Horeb and God comes down in a cloud and fire and an earthquake. And there he is and he speaks out of that the word of God. And there's no form, there's nothing visible, just a voice. Just the voice of God. And he speaks to them the words of his covenant and he said, "You didn't see any form there, so don't make any physical representation of me because you can't. There's no physical thing you can make that represents me adequately. Make no idol." You remember at that time when God spoke, it was so terrifying to the people. It was so terrifying that they said, "Please tell God to stop because if we keep hearing this voice, we will surely die." And God said, "What the people have said is good. I will speak to them from now on through a prophet.” You know, tone it down a bit; the people couldn't handle it.

And so God spoke to them on that mountain, Mount Horeb, very significant for what's about to happen with Elijah, because God had called his people to covenant faithfulness at that moment. He'd called them to the 10 Commandments. He'd called them to the Mosaic law, and they had broken this law. The very thing that Elijah is saying to God, "They've broken your commandments." God has brought Elijah as his representative back to this mountain, back to this place, back to the starting place for Israel and said, "Remember the covenant and remember also what happened at this mountain. You saw no form. It was just the voice of God, just the voice of God." I'm telling you something, there's a unifying theme between this morning’s sermon and also this, and that is the power of the word of God. Do you see it? It's just the voice of God as he speaks and it is powerful. There's no form, just a voice. And it was also finally at Horeb that God appeared to Moses. Moses went up on the mountain to receive the 10 Commandments. And in Exodus 33, Moses said to the Lord, "You have been telling me lead these people, but you have not let me know whom you'll send with me. You have said I know you by name and you have found favor with me. Well, if you're pleased with me, then teach me your way so that I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people." And this is what Moses says to God. If you can boil all that down, he says, "God, I want to know you. I'm hungry to know you." So also the Apostle Paul, in Philippians 3 he said, "I want to know Christ." After all of the revelations that God had sent to the Apostle Paul, he said, "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death. So somehow to attain to the resurrection from the dead." He said, "I want to know Christ.” Jesus in his prayer, “Now, this is eternal life that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." And so also it is here. Moses up on the mountain says, "I want to know you." “The Lord replied, ‘My presence will go with you and I will give you rest.’ Then Moses said to him, ‘If your presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?’ And the Lord said to Moses, ‘I will do the very thing you've asked because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.’" In other words, "I will go with you. I will be with you. That's how the people will know that you are my chosen people because I go with you.” “Then Moses said,” now this is one of the boldest prayers in the entire Bible, "Now show me your glory." That's amazing. "Show me your glory. And not that tone down thing. I want to see the whole thing. Show me your full glory," said Moses. That's what he wants. Is that your heart too? Do you want to see God's glory? I do. He said, "‘Now, show me your glory.’ And the Lord said, ‘I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,’” “You know it's up to me who I show my glory to," that's what he's saying. "I don't owe it to anybody.” “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But you cannot see my face for no one can see me and live.” “You can't survive.” So he prayed for something that would kill him. He probably would've been happy in the death. But he said, "You can't survive. You can't endure." We get the New Testament version of it in 1 Corinthians 15, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.” You can't survive seeing the glory of God. He says, "‘You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.’ Then the Lord said, ‘There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. And when my glory passes by, I'll put you in a cleft.’" Or what would be another word for a cleft in the rock? Maybe a cave. Now, I'm not saying that Elijah was in that exact same cave, but wouldn't it kind of ring true the way God works? To bring Elijah back up to that exact same cave where Moses was and said, "Here's a cave for you. It's kind of a special place. I had a time there with Moses. Why don't you come up here?" Now it's all speculation. The Scripture doesn't say it, but he said, "I'm going to put you in a cleft and a little carving out in the rock.” “I'm going to cover you with my hand until I've passed by. And then I will remove my hand and you'll see my back, but my face must not be seen." All of that happened at Mount Horeb.

Now what's interesting is from all of that history until this point, the text we're looking at today, Horeb disappears from Israel's history. There's no other recurring trips back to Horeb. There's no other time. Basically, it's Moses and then it's Elijah. So God brings him, I believe, to Mount Horeb. And then we get the still small voice. The Lord said in verse 11, "Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by." Now, this is an incredible thing. He's in effect going to do for Elijah in some regards what he had done for Moses, "I'm going to pass by you." You can see there's a hearkening back to that interaction with Moses in Exodus 33. So, “‘Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ And then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord.” This has got to be like tornado force or hurricane force, huge boulders flying and smashing into each other and just being crushed to pebbles in front of him. It must have been terrifying. And maybe only if he kind of shrunk back into the cave could he survive as this wind is blowing, the power of God, but it says the Lord was not in the wind. Well, what does that mean? Well, it was not the way he was choosing to reveal himself. He had made a promise to him. "Now stand here and I will pass by." The wind passed by, but God wasn't in there. The promise was as yet unfulfilled. So he's not in that powerful wind that smashes rocks into pebbles. “After the wind,” it says, “there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake.” Now, very few of you perhaps have experienced an earthquake. My family and I have. It's an incredible thing when the ground beneath your feet moves. It's scary when there's nowhere to go. And it was terrifying. It was 1995. January of '95 or it was February of '95. There was a huge earthquake at Kobe, Japan. Were you there at that time? Incredible. Jordan was there and us folks were missionaries. 5,000 people died in Kobe from the fires that resulted. Terrible, terrible suffering. In our city, Tokushima, we had a huge, huge shaking of the house, 45 seconds it lasted. So powerful that the water sloshed out of the toilet. That's how much the thing was moving back and forth. The curtains were moving like it was a breezy day. Incredible thing. Terrifying thing really. And for weeks after that, there were aftershocks. We had a pool for the kids out in the backyard and you'd feel something, you'd go out and you'd see the ripples in the pool. That's how you knew. And it was really a scary thing, a terrifying thing. Nathaniel was about what? 3, 5, 4 and a half? Four and a half. He said, "Daddy a giant's shaking the house." He was so excited. I'll never forget that. Hope you don't mind my sharing that story. He said, "A giant's shaking the house." Christi was not so excited actually. I remember that. Hope you don't mind my sharing that either. It was a scary thing. Terrifying, really. It's a sense of absolute powerlessness that you have as the ground beneath your feet is moving.

But the Lord was not in the earthquake. Elijah standing there at the ground, the mountain itself is moving, but God's not in that. The Lord is not. The promise is yet unfulfilled. And, “After the earthquake came a fire.” Book of Hebrews says that our God is a consuming fire. It was on that mountain, Mount Horeb, that he had revealed himself in a fire that did not consume the bush. The fire was in the bush, but the bush was not consumed. God revealed himself in a fire to Moses, but he did not choose to reveal himself that way that time. He was not in the fire. What does that mean? Well, after all of that terror, all of that power, God was not in any of those things. Not in the wind, not in the earthquake. He's not in the fire. And then it says after the fire, in NIV it says there came a gentle whisper. Now there's been some translation work on that. One person thinks that it's this huge powerful voice that's so strong it can crush rocks. That's what one of the Hebrew linguists does with this word. Now, I don't think so because there's a contrast here, isn't there? These powerful things and then there's this quiet thing, this gentle whisper. And I go with that. I think it may be possible the other way, but there's a voice, a gentle whisper. And this is the way that God reveals himself to us for the most part, isn't it?

It says in the book of Isaiah, "Your teachers will be hidden no longer. Your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, 'This is the way. Walk in it'." Isn't that what the Holy Spirit does for you? "This is the way. Walk in it." And so he speaks to us in this way. This is the very thing that on this same mountain the people had asked for. "Don't speak in this great big powerful voice. We can't handle it. Speak to us in a quieter voice so that we may hear and live." And so he speaks in a gentle whisper, that still a small voice.

And then, “When Elijah heard it,” it says, “he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.” Now, why does he do that? There's a sense of the sinfulness of man here, a sense in which we don't have the right to stand in the presence of God, a sense in which you want to cover yourself. Do you remember what happened when Moses was there and God spoke to him? The Angel of the Lord spoke out of the flames of the burning bush. Moses was terrified. Exodus 3:6 he said, "‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ And at this, Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God." It's a sense of the fear of the Lord here. Also in Isaiah 6, "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, the train of his robe filled the temple. And above him were seraphs, each with six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying." There's a sense of the holiness of God, a sense of his power in his presence.

Now as we look at this whole encounter, we see something of the range of what God can do. Take a minute if you would and look in your bibles at Isaiah chapter 40. We see the exact same thing in a beautiful way in Isaiah chapter 40. Isaiah 40:9, "You who bring good tidings to Zion, go up in a high mountain. You, who bring good tidings to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with a shout. Lift it up. Do not be afraid. Say to the towns of Judah, 'Behold your God'." I love that. "Look at your God." Let's try to understand who God is. Isaiah 40:10, "See the sovereign Lord comes with power and his arm rules for him. See, his reward is with him. And his recompense accompanies him." And then in verse 11, "He tends this flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart. He gently leads those that have young." And then in verse 12, "Who has measured the waters in the hall of his hand or with the breath of his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket or weighed the mountains and the scales or the hills in a balance?" Verse 15, "Surely, the nations are like a drop in the bucket. They're regarded as dust in the scales. He weighs the islands as though they were fine dust." What do we get in Isaiah 40? We get an incredible display of the range of God. He's awesome in power. He measures off the heavens with the breadth of his hand, the universe we're talking about now with the breadth of his hand. This is the immensity of God. "Do I not fill heaven and earth?" said God. That's how immense and powerfully he is. And yet here he is in verse 11, "Tending his flock like a shepherd, gathering the lambs in his arms and gently leading those that have young." He's tender; he's gentle. I think we get the exact thing here with Elijah. We get a display of his power, but also of his gentleness, his willingness to speak in that quiet voice. We experience God that way too, don't we? We've been looking and studying in the morning on Jesus. He speaks to the storm, the wind and the waves obey him. And then he speaks gently. "Why are you so afraid?" speaking to his disciples. And so that's the scale that we have of God.

So he has a vision of God, he covers his face and he goes out. Now, A.W. Pink summarizes some of the lessons that we can learn just from this encounter. First of all, it is God's way to do the unexpected. Now, if you were to predict which of those four modes God would use to speak wouldn't it be one of those three big powerful ones and not a quiet general whisper? It doesn't seem to be God to do that. We would go for the earthquake or maybe the wind. That would be awesome. Our God is a consuming fire. Maybe that's where he would be. God's unexpected. He does unpredictable things. He also doesn't always do the same thing. He did something different from Moses than he did for Elijah. It's a different interaction.

Second of all, as we've already alluded to, we see the preeminence of the Word. It's not the spectacular display of power that really changes things. It is the word of God, even if spoken gently that makes the true changes. The word of God is what changes things. Why do you think Elijah is discouraged? Why do you think he's downcast and his soul disturbed within him? Why is it? I think we could surmise that it's the failure of the ministry that he's had up to that point. There's been no revival. All it seems that he looks around and Israel is just like a barren desert with no fruit at all. And he's going to get to it. In verse 18, he says, "I've reserved 7,000, who have not bowed the knee to Baal." “There's fruit. You may not be able to see it Elijah, but it's out there.” The word of God is powerful. Not all those big displays. Not fire coming down and consuming the sacrifice. That's powerful. But it's the word of God that's ultimately powerful.

Third of all, A.W. Pink talks about the law and the gospel. First, the word of God comes and shatters and then the gospel comes and speaks peace. Isn't that the way it is? In the book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah the prophet says, "‘Is not my word like a fire?’ declares the Lord, ‘and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?’” Yes it is. And so first, there's a shattering through the law and then a word of peace through the gospel. Too often these days we skip the law work though, don't we? We don't want to do the shattering. We don't want to bring to conviction of sin. We just want to get to the gentle soothing voice. But instead, we get the law and the gospel.

Fourthly, God's method of answering prayer, it's very quiet. Do you usually get the earthquake, the tornado and the fire when you go to pray? Have you ever had this still small voice in your heart? Yeah, it's there. And God speaks by his Holy Spirit and he tells you what to do. A message for preachers and for anyone in the ministry, "Do not become discouraged. You don't know what I'm doing. I'm powerful. My word can transform anything." And then sixthly, Pink gives a solemn warning for the unsaved. God has that kind of power. It's out there. Don't play with him. Don't underestimate him. He is powerful and he is strong.

So that's the restoration that God does for Elijah. "When Elijah heard it, he pulls his cloak over his face. He went out and stood at the mouth of the cave and a voice said to him, 'What are you doing here, Elijah?' He replied, "I've been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left and they're trying to kill me too.’" Well, Elijah's self-pity is still there even after this still small voice and all that. But we're going to deal with that. He says, "I want you to look at the work that's yet to be done." In verse 15, “The Lord said to him, ‘Go back the way you came and go to the desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael, king over Aram.’” Now Hazael is a vicious murderer. There's nothing else to say about him. He's going to destroy a part of Israel through military power. He's going to become the king of the Arameans. "So you go anoint him king over Aram." And then in verse 16, "Anoint Jehu, son of Nimshi, king over Israel." If you know anything about Jehu, you realize that he is an act of judgment on the house of Ahab and on Jezebel. It is God's judgment. In other words, "I'm about to bring an earthquake and a tornado and a fire on Israel. It's going to come." Hazael is an earthquake, I guess. Jehu is the tornado. And then Elisha is the fire. I don't know. But it's coming. The power of God is coming for judgment. "It's been quiet up to this point, but it's not going to stay that way. I'm going to bring judgment." And so Jehu is coming. And then, "Appoint Elisha, son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet." Now Elisha is going to be his helper. He's going to succeed him in the ministry. He's going to watch him when he goes up in a chariot of fire up to heaven. He's going to succeed him. And so, “there's going to be helper, your ministry's going to continue.” So he gets his eyes off of himself and he says, "Look at the work. There's still work to be done, so let's get busy and let's go do that work." But then in verse 18 he says, "Yet I reserve 7,000 in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him." The final thing that he does is he reminds him of God's sovereign grace and of God's people, specifically a remnant chosen by grace.

Take a minute if you would and look in Romans chapter 11, for this exact passage is quoted by the Apostle Paul in Romans 11. Now, in Roman's 9,10, and 11, the Apostle Paul is dealing with an issue of Israel, God's chosen people. Why so many of them were rejecting Christ their savior. Why was it? And he's dealing with that issue. Romans 9, Romans 10, Romans 11. And here in Romans 11, he gets to a culminating argument that he's making here, namely the remnant of Israel. Reading in Romans 11:1, "I ask then, did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham from the tribe of Benjamin. God did not reject his people whom he foreknew. Don't you know what the scripture says in the passage about Elijah- how he appealed to God against Israel: ‘Lord, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars. I am the only one left and they're trying to kill me’? And what was God's answer to him? ‘I have reserved for myself 7,000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal.’ So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if it is by grace, then it is no longer by works. If it were, grace would no longer be grace.” So what is going on here? He's saying, "You know why his own generation, the Jews within his own people are rejecting Christ with this exact same thing that happened back in Elijah's time?" He hearkens back to the experience of Elijah and he says, "Just as in the days of Elijah, so it is at this present time.” He says in verse 5, 11:5. "So too at the present time." There is in both cases a remnant chosen by grace. Paul says elsewhere, "Not all who are descended from Israel are Israel." Just because there's a physical lineage doesn't mean that they are all, ultimately, his people. And so you've got all of these idol worshiping, Baal following Jews physically descended from Abraham, but they are not truly, ultimately God's people. Within that however, there is this remnant. The Apostle Paul says, "A remnant chosen by grace." And so he says in our text, in 1 Kings 19:18, "I have reserved for myself, I have held back for myself 7,000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal."

Now this is fascinating. Elijah doesn't necessarily know who they are. He doesn't know where they live. He hasn't really interacted with them much, so much so that he can say, "I'm the only guy here." Maybe they have been like Nicodemus, hidden believers in God. Or like that servant that hid some of the prophets in a cave, perhaps so. Maybe they haven't even been converted yet. They're a remnant chosen by grace. And through the preaching ministry of Elijah, they're going to come to faith. But God has his people, chosen by his grace, his remnant. And so they have not yet bowed the knee to Baal. "You are not alone, Elijah. So stop your discouragement, stop your complaining, stop your discouragement, depression and all of this stuff. Get up and get busy. There's work to be done. Get back by the way you came. Go back to Damascus. Do the anointings and realize that there are 7,000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal that are my chosen remnant."

Now, what do we take out of all this? First of all, I want you to know our God is a gracious and compassionate God. Slow to anger, abounding in love. He does not treat us as our sins deserve. Is he not very gracious to Elijah here? The most he's going to get are two gentle questions. "What are you doing here, Elijah?' Both of them nudges to say, "Why did you ever leave your post at Jezreel?" Second of all, God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy. He has compassion on whom he wants to have compassion. He doesn't owe anybody that he pass by in front of them. He doesn't owe anybody a display of his glory and his splendor, but he promises it to any who trust in Christ by faith. Isn't that incredible? And so the experience that Moses had at Horeb, the experience that Elijah had at Horeb, they pale in comparison of what you're going to have when you die and see Christ face to face. Isn't it incredible? The grace of God. Thirdly, when you're discouraged, downcast, go to God. Allow him to reveal himself again to you. "He restores my soul," it says. He does that by revealing himself to you, by refreshing yourself through that still small voice, reminding yourself of who God is. And then finally, he does it by getting your eyes off of yourself onto the work that you have to be done.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches a verse-by-verse expository sermon on 1 Kings 19:1-8. The main subject of the sermon is Jezebel's threat to Elijah.

We're looking this evening at 1 King's 19, and this is the story of Elijah's flight to Mount Horeb. And it's really a pretty shocking story when you stop and think about it. I mean, all of a sudden there's a shocking transition from the heroic conflict at Mount Carmel and for all of the boldness and courage that he showed for his Lord God, and suddenly he wilts in the face of a single woman. All of a sudden he just becomes totally cowardly, really, and flees for his life. And I think this is a very instructive story for us as we look at it. Let's read in 1 King's 19:1-10 and we'll see how far we can get this evening. Beginning at verse 1,

Now Ahab told Jezebel everything that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. So Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah saying, "May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like that of one of them.” Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, while he himself went a day’s journey into the desert. He came to a broom tree and sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” Then he lay down under the tree and fell asleep. All at once an angel touched him and said, “Get up and eat.” He looked around, and there by his head was a cake of bread baked over hot coals, and a jar of water. He ate and drank and then lay down again. The angel of the Lord came back a second time and touched him saying, “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” So he got up and ate and drank. Strengthened by that food, he traveled 40 days and 40 nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. There he went into a cave and spent the night. And the word of the Lord came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too."

Now as we look at this account, we see an incredible transition in Elijah. Now, he's been almost supernaturally bold and courageous up to this point. You think he's got to be almost like a whole other kind of human being who could do the kind of things that he's done. But we go from the mountaintop of glory down to the valley of despair. Chapter 18, Elijah had been focusing on God's glory, the glory of God's name, that's all that mattered to him, and also the salvation of his people. He was concerned about the glory of God and concerned about the welfare of his people. But in chapter 19, he's only concerned about himself. His focus zeros in at that point and he loses perspective. And yet as we look at this chapter, I think we see some incredible benefits for us to study, perhaps as much as the benefits that we've seen already in chapter 18.

One thing that I think it tells me right from the start is that again verifies the Bible as completely accurate and truthful, really having been written by God himself. What do I mean by that? Well, the Bible consistently exposes the weakness and failings of its heroes. Over and over in the biblical accounts, we get glimpses into the human frailties, the sinfulness and the weakness of some of the greatest servants of God. Epics of heroes never do this. Do they? They always want to exalt the individual, exalt the human person. And so they're going to hide the skeletons in the closet and lock them away. We don't really want to consider those things. That's what ordinary epics of heroes do. But you know, the fact of the matter is the real hero of the Bible is God himself. And the real truth is that all of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And so even Elijah, a man just like us, it says in James: 5, a man of like passions just like us, was a sinner in need of salvation. The real hero of every biblical account is God himself. So just when you are thinking that Elijah's floating away from us like a balloon without a string, his DNA must have been different than ours, right? He is an ordinary human being. And so we in fact don't get off the hook that easily, do we? If he's really just an ordinary, sinful human being, then how did he accomplish all of these things? Well, he was faithful to the Lord his God. He trusted in the Lord his God. He was willing to obey the Lord his God, no matter what it cost him. And so we're right back on the hook to need to be faithful and obedient. I'm not saying that God's going to bring you like John Patton to a showdown with some pagan priests, cannibal priests, or like Elijah to Mount Carmel where you face off against 450 prophets of Baal. It may be enough for you just to witness to somebody sitting next to you on the plane the next time you do. But the fact of the matter is: we're not off the hook. Elijah was a man just like us, a sinner, a frail human being, and yet God used him in a mighty way.

We look across the Scripture and we see this again and again, don't we? You look at Noah, for example. Noah built the arc in faithfulness to God, and yet it was Noah that got drunk after he came off the arc. You look at Abraham, Abraham was a man of faith. He was a father of many nations, and yet he lied about his wife, Sarah, just to save his own life. Moses was a mighty leader of God's people. And yet Moses, just through a temper tantrum, basically loses the right and privilege to enter the Promised Land. David was a man after God's own heart. And you know what he did? He committed adultery with Bathsheba and killed Uriah, her husband. Jonah, courageous prophet of God willing to stand in front of the Ninevites, in front of the Assyrian empire and preach the word of God. A courageous man, but just openly flagrantly rebellious against God. The Scripture never conceals the sins of its heroes.

And then when you get into the New Testament, what do you see? You see the disciples, the apostles are traveling around with Christ. And what a lot they are? They're never quite getting it, do they? They never really understand what Jesus is doing. And furthermore, I mean this is the incredible thing. The night before Jesus dies on the cross, the night before he is to lay down his life for them, they're up in the upper room arguing about which of them is greatest in the kingdom. What a shameful thing. And yet, how do we know about it? Because they wrote about it themselves. They want us to know that they also were sinners saved by grace. And so Elijah's failure here helps us to realize again, the truthfulness of the Bible's history.

Now in verse 46 of chapter 18, where we left off last time, it said literally the hand of the Lord was on Elijah and he girded up his loins and outran Ahab to Jezreel. That's the NAS translation I like better than the NIV. Because the hand of the Lord is on him, there was a personal empowerment from God and he had the ability to outrun a horse and chariot all the way to Jezreel. And so he gets there ahead of Ahab. But the question you ask when we get to chapter 19 is what did he make the run for? Because as soon as he gets there, he turns around and runs away. The hand of the Lord came on him powerfully, gave him energy to get to Jezreel first. There had to be some reason for that. God doesn't do things for no reason. And yet as soon as he gets there, he turns around and turns tail and runs. Now, I don't think he ran with the hand of the Lord on him running away. Not the way he did going to Jezreel. The mission was not accomplished. Elijah abandoned his post.

Now, I have to tell you, it's with fear and trembling that I even go into this kind of thing because I can't carry Elijah’s shoes. But we have to be honest, God had something intended for him in Jezreel, and he did not stay to his post. He did not stay where he was assigned. And so we have a problem. Now, Ahab finally gets there to Jezreel and he goes to his wife Jezebel. Now Jezebel's an interesting character. Remember that her father was Ethbaal, the king of the Sidonians. She was a pagan idolater. She led Israel through Ahab and all this wickedness. Now, she must have been looking out her window wondering what the outcome was. I'm sure she never wanted this whole contest with the prophets of Baal because she had the upper hand anyway. She only stood to lose. But then she's looking out the window and she must feel that somehow Baal has been powerful enough to conquer this one troublesome man who Ahab calls the troubler of Israel. And all of a sudden she sees storm clouds and it starts to rain. "Finally, we have the rain now that Elijah's dead," so she thinks. But Ahab comes with the bad news in verse 1, “Ahab told Jezebel everything that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.” Now, we've mentioned this before, but this is incredibly troubling to me. Why is it troubling? Because you notice that there's no mention of God here at all. There's no mention of the Lord God Almighty. Who is Ahab focusing on as he makes his report? “Look at what Elijah did.” Let me ask you a question. Did Elijah bring down fire from heaven and ignite that sacrifice? He most certainly did not. Did Elijah cause the rain to fall from those clouds? Most certainly he did not. So why does Ahab only talk about Elijah? Well, I'll tell you why. Because in Psalm 10:4 it says, "In his pride, the wicked does not seek God. In all his thoughts, there is no room for God." There's no room for God in Ahab's mind. And so he's got to focus down... However much it doesn't make any sense, he's got to focus on the human. He's got to focus on Elijah and say, "Look what Elijah did." And it's so tragic, really.

This man was a king of Israel. He was a descendant of Abraham. Three and a half years of drought had not brought him to repentance. Famine had not brought him to repentance. The sudden reappearance of Elijah and his powerful preaching had not brought him to repentance. The fire from heaven had not brought him to repentance. Elijah's gentle humility saying, "Why don't you go sit down and eat while I go and pray for rain," had not brought him to repentance. God's gift of rain after three and a half years, supernatural, had not brought him to repentance. Why do I underscore this? Nothing will bring the wicked to repentance, but the direct act of the grace of God. That's how hard our hearts are. And the thing we should rejoice over is that we got saved. How did you get saved? How did you repent? "Can a leopard change his spots or an Ethiopian his skin? Neither can you who are evil choose to do right." That's what Jeremiah said. We can't change our hearts, but God is gracious to grant us, the Bible says, repentance. And so all of these incentives to repentance have failed.

Now, Ahab, interestingly enough, I think is not really this hardened Baal worshiper. I don't really think he cared about Baal. I think he was essential materialist. Why do I say that? Because after the display of the prophets of Baal getting slaughtered, right? And God being proved to be the true and only God, what did Ahab do? He sat down and ate a meal. His God was his stomach not Baal. And so all he cared about was that his donkeys had enough grass to chew on and that he had a wife and a comfortable life, but Jezebel was different, you see. Jezebel was a hardcore worshiper of Baal. She was a hard woman. She was a sinful and wicked woman. In verse 2, “Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah to say, ‘May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like one of them.’” Now, who's she referring to? Well, the prophets of Baal. She's heard that 450 of them have been slaughtered by Elijah and she sends him a warning and says, "By this time tomorrow you will be dead." And so this is the hardness of Jezebel. Jezebel the very pattern of wickedness. Revelation 2:20 to the church of Thyatira, the Holy Spirit mentions Jezebel by name as the symbol of a godless prophetess, a woman who's leading God's servants into sexual immorality. And so Jezebel, a very picture of evil. But as you look at her, she's very prideful and presumptuous, isn't she? "May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely." That's an Old Testament oath. She's taking an oath. "If by this time tomorrow you're not dead." Reminds me of the men who took an oath not to eat anything more until they killed Paul. Remember in the book of Acts? I think they ended up breaking that oath as it went on month after month, you know? Paul was able to escape because one of his little nephews gets him out of jail in time. And so, so much for that oath that went out the window.

But Jezebel is very presumptuous here, isn't she? Now what do I mean by presumptuous? She assumes that she will be alive tomorrow. Edwards in “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” pictures the wrath of God like a taut bow and arrow pointing right at the heart of the wicked. And she's presuming that God will allow her to live her wicked life one more day. And so it says in the book of James, "Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.' Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, 'If the Lord wills, we will live and do this and that.' As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil." Do you hear that? Presumptuous. It's presumptuous for the Lord's people to say, "Tomorrow or next year we'll do this or that." We should say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that." Jezebel all the more, had no reason to assume that God would allow her to live even one more day. And so she's presumptuous and she makes an oath, "May that gods deal with me, be it ever so severely if I do not make your life like one of them."

Now, Jezebel had terrifying power. She had slaughtered every one of the Lord's servants that she could get her hands on. She had power and she was in that sense, terrifying. She's very, very high-handed here against the Lord God. She hates God, but she can't get at God. So she's got to persecute God's servant, Elijah. She's got to attack him instead. Just the very same way that Satan can't get at God, so he is got to attack us. But here's the beauty of it. I just love this. It says in Proverbs 21:1, "The king's heart is in the hands of the Lord. He directs it like a watercourse whichever way he chooses." Well, could we extend that for a queen as well? I think so. And so what do I mean? Well, why didn't she just kill him? Why the threat? Why the boast? Why didn't she just send a guy to kill him right away? And so she makes the boast and Elijah's got time to run. Now, I don't think that that's what God intended, that Elijah would run. Rather that he would take himself to prayer, to fasting, to preparation. Perhaps this was the moment that Jezebel would be toppled for good. But I just think it's remarkable. Instead of just killing Elijah, she gives him a warning.

And so in verse 3, Elijah is afraid and runs for his life. And this really is the saddest part of all. I don't really have any idea what God intended in supernaturally bringing Elijah to Jezreel. We will never know because Elijah fled. We'll never find out. But could it be that that would've ended Baal worship in the northern kingdom of Israel at that point? I have no idea. If Jezebel had been brought to justice for the murders that she'd committed, perhaps everything would've been different. The key thing for Elijah here is that he did not wait for God's guidance. And that's been a consistent theme with Elijah, hasn't it? Remember after he made his original statement to Ahab that there would be no rain except at his word, very next thing, 1 King 17:2-3, just back one chapter, "Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah” verse 3, “Leave here, turn eastward and hide in the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan.'" That's very specific, isn't it? God said, "Turn eastward, go such and such a distance. You'll find a little brook. Stay there." When the brook dries up and the time comes, the word of the Lord comes a second time, verse 8-9, "The word of the Lord came to him: 'Go at once to Zarephath of Sidon and stay there. I have commanded a widow in that place to supply you with food.'" Again, very specific that he is to leave now the brook and go to Zarephath and there's a widow there. Chapter 18:1, "After many days, a long time, in the third year, the word of the LORD came to Elijah: 'Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the land.'" So three times God gives him specific guidance as to where he's to go and when he is to go there. All right? And then in chapter 18:36 in his great prayer, “At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed, 'O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant [listen] and have done all these things at your command.'" Well, that's what it means to be the servant to the Lord. “I don't move except that God tells me what to do.” And so at this moment, in effect, he ceased being the Lord servant. He was serving himself and so he fled for his life.

All of this, I think, this whole story about Elijah is to teach us to be humble and to trust no man. I mean, Elijah was a great man. He was on the Mount of Transfiguration with Moses, but he's still just a man. Isaiah 2:22 says, "Stop trusting in man who has but a breath in his nostrils. Of what account is he?" Don't trust in human beings. Don't trust even in great servants of God. Don't trust in godly pastors. Don't trust in any mentor that you may have, ultimately. Your trust is in the Lord because he's the only one who cannot fail you. But Elijah was a man just like us. We have a tendency all the time to trust in the flesh, don't we? Ultimately, we have a tendency of trusting ourselves. We're trusting in our own abilities. 2 Corinthians 1:8-9, "We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers," said Paul, "about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened so that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead." What is he saying? "I got thrown in prison and beaten up and thought I would die the next day so that I would stop trusting in myself," said Paul. Now if Paul needed that kind of teaching, what do you need? What do I need? We trust too much in people. Ultimately, we trust too much in ourselves. It teaches us not to trust ultimately in ourselves or in people. It teaches us also to pray for godly leaders.

Elijah was under spiritual attack here. We don't see the demonic realm, but my feeling is there's got to be a demonic aspect to what's going on here. You've got to pray for spiritual leaders. No one is safe. You're on a mountaintop of glory one minute and you're in the valley, the slough of despond the next. Just like that, it can change. And so you have to pray for your spiritual leaders. Pray for me that I would be faithful in my struggle against the world, the flesh, and the devil, but pray for each other too. Get people to pray for you. "If anyone thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall," 1 Corinthians 10:12, because it could happen to you. Ultimately, at this particular moment, Elijah stopped fearing God and started fearing man, actually a woman at this particular moment, more than he feared God.

A.W. Pink wrote this, and I just am so indebted to Pink for his study in Elijah. But this is what he wrote, and I think I may put it up somewhere, "To fear the Lord means to esteem the smile or frown of God to be of infinitely greater importance than the smile or frown of man." Let me read that again, "To fear the Lord means to esteem [to weigh] the smile or frown of God as of infinitely greater value than the smile or frown of man." We don't care ultimately what they think, only what God thinks.

Also realize at this point that Elijah's total focus is on himself. Look at verse 14. When he gets into the cave, he's talking to God about his situation. Look what he says. Verse 14, “He replied, ‘I’” just stop right there. You don't need to go any further. Who's he thinking about? I. "I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and they are trying to kill me also." Who is he thinking about in that prayer? His focus is on himself and so he flees.

Pink also points out that Elijah's flight at this particular moment may have been a judgment on Israel. In this way he reads between the lines, and I think it's very, very powerful what he says, “After the 450 prophets of Baal were dead, after the fire fell onto the sacrifice, Israel as a nation should have risen up in revival, in worship of Yahweh and surrounded Elijah as he went to Jezreel to confront Jezebel. But he was alone there. They had not responded. Their so-called revival on Mount Carmel was transient. The next day it was back to business as usual. 450 fewer prophets, of course, but we can always raise up some more. Business as usual. And so Elijah stood alone.” And I believe the core of Elijah's situation here is discouragement over his ministry. I think he's discouraged over the effects of his ministry. He wanted to bring a genuine revival to his people, and it was not coming. And so he was discouraged, he was also afraid, and so he fled. And I think that that's so powerful.

And so off he goes into the desert. He goes down to Beersheba, way in the south part of Judah, a long journey. And you can see him in your mind's eye. You can just picture the prophet traveling through the burning sand. He leaves his servant behind so that his servant can't see him in his lowest moment. And also so that he doesn't have to drag his servant out into the desert. He really is going there, so he believes, to die. He doesn't want anything more. He's finished, his ministry's done as far as he's concerned. He just wants to die. And so he goes out into the desert, he's wandering through there, he's exhausted, and he sits down under a broom tree. Does anyone know what a broom tree is? I have no idea. It's just a desert scrub. And there he is sitting on the burning sand under a beaten up, weather-beaten tree, and he says, "I have had it. I want to die." And that's where he is at.

Now, it doesn't make much sense, does it? I mean, stop and think about it. Just think about it for a moment. Why did he flee from Jezebel? Because he was afraid to what? Die. And there he is in the middle of the desert saying, I want to what? I want to die. It doesn't make any sense. And so he's really lost his mind. His faith is gone south; temporarily, it'll come back. But there he is and he's got I think, severe physical problems. He's exhausted. He's fatigued. And so he's in the slough of despond. And so it's time for him to be ministered to. And you got to start with the body. And why? Because we're flesh. We're just flesh. We're bodies, right? We have this treasure, as Scott said, in jars of clay. We are clayish and we get tired, don't we? We get worn down, broken down, susceptible to temptation. Psalm 103:13-14, "As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust." And so the Father has compassion on Elijah. And you know what he gives him? He gives him sleep. And you think, "What's so big about that?" Well, do you realize in Psalm 127:2 it says, "The Lord grants sleep to the ones he loves." He grants sleep. Do you realize that when you close your eyes and you go to sleep, it's a gift from God? It's a gift from God. Give him glory for it because then you wake up. Could you explain sleep? Why it is you sleep? Other times you can't sleep. Have you ever noticed that? It's got nothing to do with fatigue. Sometimes you can be so tired you can't sleep. Our son Calvin is like that. We wear that boy out and he gets so tired that he's laying down in his crib, screaming and crying and crying and screaming. What does he need? He needs to be quiet and fall asleep. That's all he needs. He's eaten. He's got all his needs met. He's just so tired and he can't sleep, right? And so just because you're fatigued, you're tired, does not mean that sleep's automatic. And so God gives Elijah a gift. He gives him sleep, but then he is got another gift in store.

He sends an angel down. "Are not all angels ministering spirits?" Hebrews chapter 1, and he wakens him up and he says, "Get up and eat." And there is what Alistair Begg calls a biscuit. Scottish guy. He says, "Here's a biscuit. You need a biscuit and some water. Go back to sleep." It's just time to eat and a little drink. And so he gives him sleep and he gives him this angelic biscuit. And you think of the condescension of this angel making some bread with his own angelic hands, bread from heaven. Can God spread a table in the desert, the Israelites ask in Psalms 78? Yes, he can. Now, it's not much of a feast. He couldn't expect much, realize he's running out of the will of God, but God is faithful, even more faithful. And so he lays a table for him, basic necessities, bread and water. And so he eats and he goes back to sleep- more sleep. And then the angel comes back, wakes him up again and says, "Wake up, eat again." There's that biscuit again and another jar of water. And he says, "The journey is too much for you." Now, that's an interesting statement. I'm not sure which journey it refers to. Could it be the journey he's made already up to this point? I think so. And in effect, it's a general rebuke saying, "What journey is this? What are you doing?" And we know that once he gets to the cave, what's the first thing that God asks him? "Elijah, what are you doing here?" That's a great question. "I don't know, Lord, I don't know why I'm here." "What are you doing here, Elijah?"

Now Elijah has severe spiritual problems and they're going to get dealt with in that cave. And we'll get to that, God willing, next time. He's got severe spiritual problems, but first we've got to deal with the physical problems. And so he gives him a couple of biscuits, a couple of jars of water, and he eats and drinks. And then there's a 40-day journey to Mount Horeb. On a couple of biscuits and some jars of water, and now that's amazing. God can do that? Yes, he can. So he renews his strength. But yet in the middle of it all, again, you have to read between the lines. You notice something missing. What do you notice missing? Elijah doesn't say a word. Now, what should he have said? Let me ask you a question. What did Jesus do every time he ate? What did he do? Every time he ate something, he gave thanks. Gave thanks. Where's the thanksgiving? There is none. And why? Because he's focused on himself. That's what happens. When you focus on yourself, worship goes out the window, praise goes out the window. What takes its place? Complaining. And we're going to see that next time. But he's got not a word. He's like a petulant child at this moment just focused on himself. And, “yes, all right, so you sent me an angel and some biscuits, miracles and all that, whatever, back to sleep.” Not a word of thanksgiving to God, but God is working in his soul. And when the time comes, he's going to deal with him mightily. And so next time, God willing, we're going to see him confront Elijah with who he truly is, on the very same mountain where he confronted Moses with the exact same thing. The glory of God, a vision of God unlike any that we have seen.

This text reveals one of the most spectacular miracles that Jesus ever did.  I think to myself, if I could be back in time to just see a handful of things in history, this might be one of them. To be in the boat with Jesus, when He rebukes the winds and the waves, and it becomes instantly calm. Now, wouldn't that have been something to see?  I want you to see it in your mind of faith today, I want you to feel again the power of Jesus and to see and understand who He really is. 

The central question of this text is, what kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey Him. When Christi and I, and our two older children were doing mission work in East Asia they had a season there every year called the typhoon season which I loved. A typhoon is the East Asian version of a hurricane. I remember one in particular when we were staying with Christi's sister and husband, and their two children. We were all in the house which was being rocked and buffeted by the wind and the rain. We would slide open the storm shutters to look out to see what was going on outside. How exciting and thrilling it was to see these trees bent over, almost touching the ground and to see the ocean just churned into a froth and heaving, frenzy by the wind, and to realize that my God was controlling all of this. I remember thinking, you know, just knowing that it's God that is controlling all of this and that makes all the whole difference. 

As we come to this text, we come to a little bit of a danger zone for a Scripture interpreter. The danger here is the problem of allegory. An allegory is an extended spiritual story which has no real connection necessarily in history, but which teaches us something about our spiritual lives.  You've heard this kind of thing before. The idea of this text is that Jesus can control the storms of your life. I want to be careful; I want you to understand that whatever you mean by storms of your life, He can certainly control those things. In the end, we end up about the same place, looking to Christ who is sovereign and powerful and can do anything in your life, and trusting Him. But I don't want to skip the history that this reflects. This text recounts a historical event that actually occurred in space and time, and I think with the allegory, you lose that. What do I mean by allegory? Let me give you some examples. There was a man named Tertullian who lived a long time ago. When he came to this text he said, "That little ship did present a figure of the church, in that she is disquieted in the sea, that is in the whirls, by the waves, that is by persecutions and temptations. The Lord, through patience sleeping as it were, until roused by the prayer of the saints, he checks the world and restores tranquility to his own."  That is a beautiful example of an allegorical approach to this text. The boat was not really made of wood, the boat is actually the church. The wind and the waves are persecution and hardship that piles up, and Jesus seems like he's sleeping during that time of persecution, and then at the last minute He gets up and shows himself powerful. The persecution abates and the church is at peace again.

 Or this one, from Augustine. He says that individually, each of us is God’s temple, that is true, and his own heart is the vessel in which each sails. He cannot suffer shipwreck if his thoughts are only good. You have heard an insult, it is the wind, you are angry. When therefore the wind blows and the wave swells, the ship is endangered, the heart namely is in jeopardy. The heart is tossed to and for. When you have heard an insult, you long to be avenged, and low avenged you have been. Rejoicing in another's harm, you have suffered shipwreck, because Christ is asleep in you. What does it mean that Christ is asleep in you? You have forgotten Christ. Rouse Him that He may get up in that time of temptation and give a gentle answer. What is going on there? That's allegory. The ship represents your heart, the storm is temptation that you might rebuke or respond harshly to somebody and Jesus is asleep. You've forgotten that Christ would not respond that way, rouse Him up that He might give a gentle and kind answer. 

Another example some of you have heard, "Lord of my Rocking Boat." On the back it says, "Refuge in the storms of life. No storm in your life is so great," says, the author, "That our Lord's clear voice can't quiet the waves and bring you inner peace and strength." During a stormy period of the author's life, the author found not only strength but growth in her relationship with God. She shares what she learned about the waves of life that frequently toss us about and carry us off course. Waves created by people, by priorities, by pain, by death of loved ones, and psychological prisons.  Don't misunderstand me. Is God sovereign over people, priorities, psychological prisons, financial distress? Of course, he is. It would have been easy for me to preach this kind of sermon. What are the waves and the winds that face you today? All of you coming in here today have some, and I could immediately make a connection with you. What's the problem with this? I don't want you to forget that there was at one place and at one time, an event that occurred in history, and that Jesus was there, and he displayed himself to be God by stealing the storm. That's the thing we lose with this whole allegorical approach. The purpose of all of this, is to portray that Jesus is the Messiah, He is God. They ask the question that we should all ask when we come to this text. What kind of man is this, that even the winds and the waves do his bidding? 

That's the focal point here, the nature of His Kingdom. Throughout Matthew's Gospel, by way of review, we've had a list of credentials for Jesus as King of the Kingdom of Heaven. He wants to show us and to prove to us that Jesus of Nazareth was actually and is actually the King of the Kingdom of Heaven. It begins with a genealogy, in which it starts right out with the human side of Jesus, His genealogy, His ancestors. He is the son of David, He is the son of Abraham, right from the very start. He's physical, He's a man, He's a Jew, He's got a genealogy. That's true, but also in Matthew Chapter 1, we have an account of the virgin birth, unlike any of us, and unlike anyone who's ever lived. Jesus was born of a virgin and was the fulfillment of prophecy. Isaiah said, "The virgin will be with child and give birth to a son, and so not only is He physically man, but He is also the son of God, He is God in the flesh. In Chapter 2 of Matthew, the Magi come and worship Him, showing that He is in fact the Savior of the whole world. It's a foretaste of the fact that Gentiles will bow down before this one and they will offer Him treasures, they will offer Him worship.  We are foreshadowed to some degree in that Magi worship, because we are Gentiles for the most part. We come here and we worship Jesus Christ in fulfillment of that prophecy for Jesus is Savior of the world.

 In Chapter 2 also, we see Jesus fleeing as a baby to Egypt. He is the fulfillment of prophecy, "For out of Egypt I called my son," says the prophet. Jesus would have a, if you will, stormy life on Earth. He would be persecuted, He would be in fulfillment of Scripture, harassed until his death. But He is the fulfillment of prophecy. In His baptism in Chapter 3, we see that He is totally willing to identify with us as sinners. It is proper for us... It was proper for Him, He said to be baptized, because He needed to fulfill all righteousness. John the Baptist consented, and He was baptized and yet at that moment as much as He was identified with our fleshly sinful nature, yet was without sin, He was perfect, and a voice came from heaven. This never happened at your baptism, I can assure you. "This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased,” says a voice from heaven. The blending together of the humanity of Christ, and the deity, is a constant theme. In Chapter 4, we see the beginning of His ministry, He begins to preach, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near. The advent of the kingdom means that you must repent, you must turn away from sin, turn away from flesh, turn away from selfishness, and you must come to Christ, you must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Repent for the King of Heaven is near." Then He backed up His claim by doing one miracle after another in Matthew Chapter 4. Then in Matthew 5, 6 and 7, what's commonly known as the Sermon on the Mount, we get a display of kingdom teaching from the mouth of the king himself. What is the essence of kingdom life? It begins with those that are willing to be spiritual beggars, who are willing to just come and say, and say, "I have nothing. Blessed are the spiritual beggars for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." And then He explains what that life is like, and He teaches and speaks as one who had never spoken or taught before. He taught as one who had authority and not as their teachers of the law. He was powerful in teaching.

Now in Chapter 8, we've seen Jesus doing incredible miracles. In Matthew Chapter 8:1-17, He's doing incredible healings, things that only God could do. A leper comes and kneels before him, right after He comes out the Sermon on the Mount and says, "If you're willing, you can make me clean.” Jesus says, "I am willing, be clean.” He just touches him and instantly he's cleansed. Then a centurion comes as a servant is lying at home paralyzed in terrible suffering, and Jesus is willing to go, but the centurion says, "You don't even need to move. But just say the word and my servant will be healed." "Just say the word.” The very same word He's going to speak over the wind and the waves, He speaks, and it's done. How powerful is the Word of Christ? We're going to see later in Matthew when Jesus speaks and says, "Your sins are forgiven,” and it is so. Isn't that wonderful. 

 When He speaks to you and says, "Your sins are forgiven,” it is so because He's has that kind of authority and power.  He can see Peter's mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever, He can just touch her, and the fever is gone. Then in the evening, all kinds of people come, and Jesus heals them all. He drives out demons with a word. Just a word and the demons flee, the power of Jesus. The last time that we talked about this, however, we talked about the cost of following Christ. A teacher of the law comes to him and says, "Teacher, I'll follow you wherever you go." "Oh really? Foxes have holes, birds of the air have nest, but the son of man has no place to lay his head." Isn't that powerful? Why? The teacher of the law, was he encouraged or was he dissuaded? What if he turned back out of a love of ease and comfort and did not follow Jesus that day? What if he went back into his home? 

Later that evening, the teacher of the law looks out over the lake, sees a terrible storm, and says, "Boy, I'm glad I'm here. I'm glad I'm in my own home safe and sound. I'm going to sleep in my bed tonight. Jesus, who knows where he's going to put his head down, but I'm safe and secure in my home. Look at that terrible storm, I'd hate to be out in that storm tonight." What would he have missed, though? What would he have missed through his cowardice and through his fear? “I’m not willing to follow Jesus, my life's going to be too tough.” Yes, but what did he miss? A display of the deity of Christ, unmatched in history. He just speaks and the wind and the wave are silent. I hope he followed Jesus, but we really don't know. 

Our account begins with Jesus challenging his disciples to follow him. Then in Verse 23 it says, "Then He got into the boat and his disciples followed Him." We're going to see in this account the fact that Christ is totally obeyed by the natural realm. What do I mean by that? It means that the physical universe around us is in total submission to the word of Jesus Christ. He is in fact the creator and ruler over the physical universe. This is New Testament doctrine. Listen to John 1:1 and following, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." He was with God in the beginning, through Him all things were made, without Him, nothing was made that has been made. The writer says, "Mountains rose and valleys sank at His command. Atmospheres were formed and oceans gathered through His power. Every species of life, sharks, lizards, flamingos, wild boars, chipmunks, electric eels, gila monsters, bald eagles, Shetland ponies, and every man, woman, and child in history, all were created by God the Father through Jesus Christ His eternal Son." He is king over the physical universe. The Scripture also says that He actively rules over all things physical. He actively rules over. In Colossians Chapter 1, "Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him, all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things were created by Him and for Him." We've already said that He's a creator of all things, visible and invisible, but verse 17 says, "He is before all things," that means He is supremely preeminent, like king, over all physical things, “and in Him, all things hold together." Jesus is holding your atoms together right now, so that the nucleus will not fly apart, should He withdraw His hand. He's holding that wooden pew you're sitting on together.  Aren't you glad that moment by moment, He sustains the physical universe? Hebrews 1:3, "The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word." The Word goes out; He sustains the physical universe moment by moment. Christ holds every atom of the universe together. He rules over creation with absolute sovereignty. Earthquakes and storms come when He says so. When he says to go, they must obey.

I came across a great Scripture, Psalm 89: 8-9. "Oh Lord, God Almighty, who is like you, you are mighty O Lord, and your faithfulness surrounds you. You rule over the surging sea when its waves mount up, you still them." That is directly fulfilled in Jesus Christ. He rules over the surging sea and when He says so, they are stilled and quieted. This is our Sovereign God.  Christ's miracles display his power over nature. Think about them now. Think of how Christ's miracles display that He is king over the physical world that we live in. For example, turning water into wine, it's a process of fermentation, usually takes years for a fine wine. Jesus did it in a moment. In a moment, it was done.  Or how about Peter's miraculous catch of fish? Let's say, you are fish swimming in the sea of Galilee, minding your own business. You're just swimming around in your native habitat, and all of a sudden you have a strong urge to turn left. You don't know why, you just do, and you start swimming, and you're swimming faster and faster, you don't know why, you're just swimming and all of a sudden, you're caught in a net. Peter pulls you up and believes that Jesus is God because Jesus is sovereign over the fish of the sea. He can do anything. Or how about Peter again? Needing a little tax money, Jesus gives him some fishing advice. Go out into the lake, throw out your line, take the first fish you catch, open its mouth, and in the that mouth, you'll find a four-drachma coin. How did that happen? Somebody, a fisherman, I guess, lost a four-drachma coin. That's no small amount of money back then, especially for a poor fisherman. It fell out of his pocket by the hand of God., it started to flutter down to the bottom, and a fish saw it and grabbed at it. He couldn't swallow it, though, it was jammed there.  Sometime later, Peter's hook goes down, there's something else to swallow and the fish swallows the hook, out he comes and there's that coin. The sovereign hand of Jesus Christ over physical nature. How about walking in water? Ordinarily, the laws of hydrodynamics or whatever will tell you that you sink. Jesus says, I don't follow those rules. He just walks right across the water; He is sovereign over these things. He curses a fig tree; usually it might take months for a fig tree to wither, shrivel up and die. Jesus curses it and that same day it's dead, because He gives life and also takes it back when He chooses. He is sovereign and He is powerful. All of the healings that Jesus did show his sovereign control over the physical body. He knit you together in your mother's womb. When Peter again pulls out his sword, and chops off Malchus's ear, Jesus has the power to reach out and create him a new one just on the spot. This is Jesus' power over the physical universe. 

Now, Jesus challenges His disciples to follow Him. He says, "I want to show you and give you a display you will never forget of my sovereign control over the physical universe. He says to his disciples, "Follow Me and let the dead bury their own dead," and then He gets into the boat and his disciples followed Him. Now, hardship is going to follow you if you are a Christian. You're not going to have an easy road. If those disciples had known that a storm was coming, would they have gotten in the boat if Jesus had only told them part of the story? “By the way, a vicious storm is about to come up. Will you follow Me anyway?” Who knows? 

Jesus actually does warn us in John 16:33, "I've told you these things so that in Me you may have peace. In this world, you will have trouble, but take heart, I have conquered the world." Isn't that powerful? The Apostles Paul and Barnabas told the new disciples of Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, "We must go through many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God. You want to follow Jesus? It's not necessarily going to be easy all the time.” They're about to be challenged to the depth of their being. They're going to go through a ride unlike any carnival ride they'd ever been on their life. There weren't carnivals back then, that's an anachronism, but they were going to be lifted up to Heaven and they were going to go down to the depths. They were going to be convinced that they were going to die; it was their last day on Earth, that day. That’s what Jesus was going to bring them through.

In verse 24, we see the test come and it comes without warning.  Matthew uses the word “behold.” "Suddenly a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat, but Jesus was sleeping." Now it's just a sudden storm, a powerful storm that literally comes out of nowhere. This is actually not unknown in the Sea of Galilee. What's going on is that the Sea of Galilee is actually one of the lowest, if not the lowest point on Earth, 700 feet below sea level. Hot winds would come down and hit the mountains and kind of curl down like that. Meteorologists tell us why this storm comes. Winds sweep down the steep ravines, and they whip up instant storms on the Sea of Galilee. But this was an exceptionally violent storm. The Greek word is “seismos” from which we get seismic which has to do with earthquakes. It's almost literally an earthquake of water. Imagine like the Sea of Galilee, a bowl of water and a huge giant shaking it. That's what it was like. It was like a seismic storm, and it was so severe, in the NAS in verse 24, it says, "The boat was hidden by the waves." Literally covered, you couldn't see the boat because of the waves. It was just an undulating tidal wave kind of situation, and this little boat is going up and down, and you just can't see it. A storm so severe that the disciples who were veteran fishermen, who spent from their boyhood every day on that sea were utterly convinced that they were going to die. 

Let me give you an illustration of this. I’m on a plane ride and I meet a pilot who flies with USAir, and we get into a great conversation. We're talking. Let's say that the pilot and I sat together, the pilot's at the window seat, and I'm sitting next to the pilot. We take off and we're having an amicable conversation. All of a sudden, as we fly along, we fly into an electrical storm with some severe turbulence, and he looks out and shrugs. “Been through that before.” He doesn't seem concerned at all, and says, "A bad storm." He said, "I've seen much worse than this." But all of a sudden, there's a strange sound that you have never heard on an airplane before. The pilot sits bolt upright, and then immediately looks out the window, and then says, "I got to get past." He pushes past you and starts looking for a parachute. How would you feel at that moment? 

Let's say you're in the boat with the disciples, and they've been on that sea every day of their life, and they say, "We're going to drown today." That's the kind of storm it was. But Jesus is asleep in the back of the boat. Can you explain that? This is the mystery of the incarnation. We have Jesus’ physical side displayed right before us here. Jesus is sleeping. We're about to see his divine side and his power over the wind and the waves, but we see his physical side here. How so? Because He's asleep. Our God neither slumbers nor sleeps, right? It's not a deity phenomenon to be asleep, it's a physical thing. Jesus had a body. Why was He asleep? Well, He was tired.  What happens when you're tired? Things that happen physically to us when we're tired, were happening in his body. It says in Mark 4:38 that, "Jesus was in the stern sleeping on a cushion." That's an interesting detail isn't it? Why was Jesus sleeping on a cushion? Because it was more comfortable. Doesn't it make sense? He put a cushion under himself, the same reason you put a cushion on yourself, it's more comfortable, and He fell asleep. Jesus was fully man, He got tired, He got weary, He sweat, He got hungry, He got thirsty, He bled, and He died so that you might have eternal life. He is truly man.  He just finished saying, "The Son of Man has no place to lay His head, so I'm going to sleep in this boat. I'm going to catch a little sleep because who knows what I'm going to face on the other side." You know what He's going to face on the other side? “Legion,” the demonic force, and so he’d better catch a little sleep now because it's the only chance He's going to get. So, He rests. We see the physical incarnation side of Jesus. 

We also see the human side of the disciples, don't we? They are absolutely terrified. The disciples went and woke Him saying, "Lord save us, we're going to drown." Absolute terror in the Greek, it comes across in three short words, "Lord, save, we perish," that's what it says. They can barely get the words out. Mark 4:38, "The disciples went and woke Him saying, ‘Teacher, don't you care if we drown?’” Oh, that's awful. Fear causes you to lose your mind, it causes you to lose perspective, "Don't you care?" What a stunning loss of perspective.  Jesus left His Father's throne above, took on a human body, subjected to the very frailty, that I talked about, because He did nothing but care. Never has there ever been a man who cared about the perishing like Jesus. Jesus deeply cares for the perishing, but they had lost perspective. "Don't you care that we drown?" "Of course, I care." Their fear drove out their faith. Let me tell you something, either faith will drive out fear or fear will drive out faith. They can't co-exist. In Jesus, there was no fear, He's asleep completely trusting in His Heavenly Father. He entrusted His life into His Father's hands and said, "I'm going to go to sleep."

The disciples had lost their confidence, their fear had driven out their faith. Thankfully, as Jesus wakes up, He says, "You of little faith," verse 26, "Why are you so afraid?" Isn't it better to be of little faith than to be of no faith? If you have no faith, you are lost, you're dead in your transgressions and sins. If you have no faith, then all the record of your sins is kept in Heaven and you will perish in your sins and die eternally in hell if you have no faith. But if you have a little faith, that's different, isn't it? It means you're justified, you've trusted in Christ, but you've just lost perspective, you've forgotten for just a moment, how powerful is God. "You of little faith," He says, "Have you forgotten how powerful God is?"

 Job 28, "God established the force of the wind and measured out the waters. God made a decree for the rain and a path for the thunderstorm." Psalm 135:6-7, "The Lord does whatever pleases Him, in the Heavens and on the Earth, in the seas and all their depths, He makes clouds rise from the ends of the Earth, He sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from His storehouses." God is in charge of every storm. Have you forgotten that you of little faith? Psalm 148:7-8, "Praise the Lord from the Earth, you great sea creatures and all ocean depths, lightning and hail, snow and clouds, stormy winds that do His bidding." Have you forgotten that you of little faith? He's in charge of every storm.

In the days of Noah, at the end of the flood, God sent a wind and dried the Earth. In the days of Moses, He sent an east wind, and locusts covered the whole country, and then He sent a west wind, and then they left. When they went through the Red Sea, a night-long east wind was so strong that it carved a path in the sea. That's what God can do with wind. In the days of Jonah, when he rebelled against God and fled away from Him, rather than witness to the Ninevites, a storm came up at God's command. God sent the furious storm, and when the sailors threw him overboard, God immediately caused the storm to stop. "Have you forgotten you of little faith? Why are you so afraid?" said Jesus. Here's where we lose the allegory and zero in on the significance of this moment and this is so important, listen.

Jesus was an utterly unique man in history, and this was an utterly unique moment in history. The disciples were uniquely called to be apostles. They should have understood not just God's general power, but His specific momentary power on Jesus' life. Let me say it to you very plainly. God did not send His only begotten Son into the world to die in a boating accident. I mean, think about that. "We're perishing," "No, you're not. Go to sleep. Rest. We'll get across the lake." Imagine the headlines of the heavenly newspaper. "Christ mission's on Earth ends in tragedy, boating accident claims the life of God's only begotten Son."   Sub-stories: all the prophets stunned, Isaiah the prophet shocked and saddened. "I had thought that He was going to die as a sacrifice for our sins, but instead, His lungs filled with water." Zechariah wrote, "They will look on the one they have pierced, but the water killed Him." King David would be most surprised of all. He would write in Psalm 22, "Those hands and feet would be pierced," and in Psalm 16, “that He would rise again but instead He drowned." What a tragedy. Do you see how this fear causes us to lose all our perspective, but also how this is not allegorizable? This is a unique moment in history.  Jesus did not come to drown and therefore He could fall asleep completely safe.

The disciples should have understood that. They forgot God and they forgot His promises and His purposes. "You of little faith. Why are you so afraid?" In verse 26, He gets up and rebukes the wind and the waves by a simple word. He does a miracle, He rebukes the winds and the waves, and it is completely calm. You know what's interesting to me about this? Jesus' first priority in the Matthew account is His disciples lack of faith; the storm He'll get to by and by, because He's not going to die, neither are they. The storm can wait, the disciples lack of faith cannot wait because if they continue to show this lack of faith, they will not be fruitful for God the way He intends. He must deal with their lack of faith. Stilling the storm was nothing more than simply giving the Word. Just speaking the Word and it's done. The Word of God is infinitely powerful, and Jesus' Word is enough to rule the winds and the waves, completely, and so He speaks, “Peace, be still." That's all.  Then Matthew tells us, "A great calm came over the sea." He had early told us that a seismic storm had come up. This is a great calm. Jesus doesn't do things, small. It's going to be a great storm and it’s going to be a great calm. I get the image that it was like a mirror and that you could have heard a pin drop. They're all still wet, the boat is soaking wet, but …. Incredible, just like that, the power of the Word of Christ and the storm is gone.

If you had been in that boat, what would you have thought at that moment? If you had been normal, like the disciples, you would have been even more afraid than you were a moment ago. You know why? Because you know here in the boat with God, God Himself is right over there looking at you. That's scary in a way, isn't it? Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. They were terrified. It says in the Mark account, “They were terrified, they were afraid, they asked each other. ‘Who is this? Even the winds and the waves obey Him?’” They were terrified.  Ecclesiastes 8:8 says, "No man has power over the wind to contain it." Did you hear that? "No man has power over the wind to contain it?" Listen, "So no one has power over the day of his death." We are weak and powerless beings, but Jesus has power over the wind and also has power over the day of His death.  Jesus said in John chapter 10, "No one takes My life from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord, I lay it down freely and I have the authority to lay it down and I have the authority to take it back up again. This command I received from My Father." That's what Jesus said. 

So, what is the connection here? If Jesus can speak to the wind and the wave somebody that powerful, how did He end of dying?  How did someone that powerful end up so weak? He died in our place that we might have eternal life. God took our sins and laid them on His Son, and His Son perished like a weak, frail human being that we might have eternal life. No lack of power there. It's the most powerful thing that's ever happened because it emptied Hell of people like you and me who simply believe in Christ. By simple faith, we don't have to go to Hell, we have eternal life. The most powerful thing that's ever happened is the atonement and resurrection of Jesus Christ. No man has power over the wind or power over the day of his death except one, Jesus Christ. 

So, what's the answer to the question? What kind of man is this even the winds and the waves obey Him? He is God. He is God and He came to give you eternal life through simple faith. What kind of application can we make here? Well, let's not do the allegorical thing. Let's get those same truths from another place in Scripture. They're all true.

"Even the very hairs of your head are all numbered," Jesus said, “so don't be anxious, don't worry about your life, what you'll eat, or drink, about your body, what you'll wear. Don't worry about those kinds of storms of your life, don't be concerned about those things because God is sovereign over those things and He will care for you." But there is a storm coming, and this one you must be concerned about. Jesus said, "Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock, the rains came, the streams rose, the winds blew and beat against that house, but it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who build his house on sand. The rains came, the streams rose, the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” 

So, the Sermon on the Mount ends with a crash. And what is it? It is Judgment Day, that storm is coming. Are you ready for it? Because there's only one voice that will still the storm of the wrath of God, and that's Jesus Christ. He stands under the wrath of God to take it in your place that you might have eternal life. Have you trusted in Him? Is He your Savior? Do you believe in Him today? He is God. He came to be frail and weak that we might have eternal life. 

There is a serious danger in doing the allegorical thing in another sense. How are you going to face troubles, and trials, when you don't get the successful outcome? Do you know that a lot of Godly people have drowned in history? Do you realize that? In 1870s, Horatio Spafford was a successful Chicago lawyer close friend of Evangelist, DL Moody. Spafford had invested heavily in real estate, but the Chicago Fire of 1871, wiped out his holdings. And so, he devoted himself to an evangelistic life, helping DL Moody. He wanted to go over to England and help DL Moody and Ira Sankey in an outreach there. But at the last minute, he couldn't get on the boat, so he sent his wife and his four daughters, on ahead of him, stayed behind to do some business. He would catch up with them later or so he thought because there was a collision at sea and the ship “Ville du Havre”, sank in 12 minutes. The ship went to the bottom and Spafford's four daughters were all killed, they all drowned.  His wife survived, went over and cabled him back these words, "Saved alone." Where was God then? Is He not sovereign over that? Oh, He is. And Horatio Spafford put it in words. He said, "When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul, though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, let this blest assurance control that Christ hath regarded my helpless estate, and has shed His own blood for my soul." I'm not going to stand up and promise you a successful outcome to every storm you will face in your life. But understand this, what really matters is the state of your soul before Christ. He will handle all the rest. All of those other things. Seek first the Kingdom of God and all of these things will be added to you. Don't be troubled over those storms of circumstance. Zero in on this. If you have come to faith in Christ, it is well with your soul, it doesn't matter what happens to these other things ultimately.

If you have not trusted in Christ, it is not well with your soul and you must come to Him. If God has been speaking to you today and you have never trusted in Christ, as your Lord and Savior, I would urge that you not walk out of this place. I would urge that you come and talk to me.  If you're not sure that you're a Christian, will you please come down and talk to me? Meanwhile, the rest of you, if you know of a lost neighbor, relative, friend, I would like you to spend the time that we are singing, while you're singing, I want you to think about that person and commit yourself to praying this week, for their salvation. If it's not well with their soul, it's not well at all.

Pastor Andy Davis preaches an expository sermon on 1 Kings 18:41-46. The main subject of the sermon is the end of the drought.

Tonight we're going to be looking at I Kings 18, more or less beginning at verse 41. But before we do that, I got in my car and I was driving home and something occurred to me that I had wanted to share with you this morning, and I was sxao frustrated that I forgot. I wanted to share in terms of the morning sermon that I gave. Jesus was talking about the cost of commitment, and "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests and the Son of Man has no place to lay his head." God had put a great thought in my mind middle of last week and I wrote it down, made a note of it, but I never said it. I got home and Chris said, "Why don't you share it tonight?" So you're going to have to listen to it because I have this microphone now. It just has to do with this: there's a tremendous cost in following Christ. We have no idea where God's going to lead us. We have no idea, and in effect, Jesus said to his disciples, "You don't know where you're going to spend the night tonight if you follow me. As a matter of fact, when it comes to sleeping, I'm about to catch a little nap in the back of this boat," and that's exactly what he did because he fell asleep in the boat. You remember the story. The very next story was Jesus stilling the storm. If you're willing to follow Jesus wherever he leads, you may not know where you're going to sleep tonight, you may not know what you're going to eat tonight, but what an exciting, thrilling life it is to follow Christ. Think what that teacher of the law missed if he decided not to get in the boat with Jesus.

I think the stilling of the storm is one of the greatest miracles, and if I had a chance, I'd preach it right now, but we'll wait for that next time. But all I'm saying is, and I think it relates to the Degas ministry and to all the things, is if you're willing to follow Christ, you're willing to step out in faith, do something that would basically shake your whole world up. You may not know where you're going to sleep or what you're going to eat or whatever, but what an exciting, thrilling life it is to serve Christ, and to be free from a worthless wasted life, to know that the things you're doing are going to count for eternity. That's what I wanted to share with you this morning. Think what that teacher of the law would've missed if he didn't get in the boat with Jesus. I want to get in the boat with him and wherever he goes, I want to go. Wherever he goes, that's where I want to be. I want see him still the storm, don't you? I want to see him do awesome things. And so as we've been looking at Elijah, also, I see the same God at work. Our God is a spectacular God, is he not? And so the Christian life should be an exciting, thrilling journey. Tough. Elijah goes through some hard things, but it's exciting and it's thrilling.

Now we ended last time with Elijah praying a simple prayer to God. Do you remember? He looked up to heaven and he said basically in effect, "Father, thank you that you sent me to do this and now send down the fire from heaven so that all of them may know that you alone are God and that you sent me to do this." That's all. And the fire came down from heaven and it lit up that sacrifice, burned it up. It burned up the stones, it burned up the water, the soil, everything was gone and the people fell down on their faces and they proclaimed, they declared in an act of worship from the heart, "The Lord, he is God. The Lord, he is God.” What a worship service that was. What an awesome thing. And that's where we ended.

Now I mentioned at the end what happened next and that is the slaughter of the prophets of Baal. And I really, I want to begin there. Let's look beginning at verse 40 and I'm going to read to the end of the chapter. It says,

Then Elijah commanded them, “Seize the prophets of Baal. Don't let anyone get away.” They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered them there. Then Elijah said to Ahab, “Go eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain.” So Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel, bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees. “Go and look toward the sea,” he told his servant and he went up and looked. “There's nothing there.” he said. Seven times Elijah said, “Go back.” The seventh time the servant reported a cloud as small as a man's hand is rising from the sea. So Elijah said, “Go and tell Ahab, ‘Hitch up your chariot and go down before the rain stops you.'” Meanwhile, the sky grew black with clouds. The wind rose, a heavy rain came on and Ahab rode off to Jezreel. The power of the Lord came upon Elijah and tucking his cloak into his belt, he ran ahead of Ahab all the way to Jezreel.

Let's start with this very sobering and difficult story of the slaughter of the 450 prophets of Baal. After the fire came down from heaven, it was Elijah that ordered that the prophets of Baal be seized and that they be executed in the Kishon Valley. Now, this may seem harsh to our modern sensibilities. You might think, "How could a God, the God that I know, the God of the Bible desire a slaughter like this?" Now you must think that Elijah had probably asked the prophets of Baal to stand around close so that they could see, they probably had the best view available of the miracle that God was going to do. But what that meant was that all of Israel surrounded them, you see? And so the altar was at the center, the prophets of Baal probably standing around and then Israel, the leaders, and the officials and all those that had been invited by Ahab standing around them. And so the moment was right as soon as the fire came down, lest these prophets of Baal, reading the sensibilities of the people, should try to make their escape that he said, "Seize them, capture them before they escape," and so they did. The question is why would God desire this? This was something that Elijah clearly did at the behest of God, that he wanted him to do it, doesn't say that in the text, but we have to assume that he was under God's orders to do this. It really was a matter of God's justice at this particular moment. These were false prophets. They were leading Israel astray. They were leading them to worship false gods. And so before the rain could come down, before God could bless the people, the sin had to be dealt with and had to be dealt with thoroughly and completely. And in the Old Covenant that meant death for these transgressors of the Law of Moses. Prophets of Baal were leaders in this rebellion. In Deuteronomy chapter 13, I'd like you to take a moment and look there with me if you would. Deuteronomy 13. So that you would know that Elijah did nothing unseemly or did nothing contrary to the will of God, but actually was just carrying out God's express commands as given through his servant Moses. The Law of Moses makes it very plain what was to be done that day. Deuteronomy 13, beginning at verse 1,

If a prophet or one who foretells by dreams appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign, a wonder, and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place and he says, “Let us follow other gods” (gods you have not known) “and let us worship them.” You must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The Lord your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. It is the Lord God you must follow and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him, serve him and hold fast to him. That prophet or dreamer must be put to death because he preached rebellion against the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery. He has tried to turn you from the way the Lord your God commanded you to follow. You must purge the evil from among you.

So that is dealing there with a false prophet who is able to perform, it seems, a miraculous sign. He's able to do something extraordinary. But even if he is able to do a miracle like that, still the people should turn him in for execution. It says very plainly, "You must purge the evil from among you," keep reading, look at verse 6,

If your very own brother or your son or daughter or the wife you love or your closest friend secretly entices you saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods that neither you nor your fathers have known, gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far from one end of the land to the other), do not yield to him or listen to him. Show him no pity. Do not spare him or shield him. You must certainly put him to death. Your hand must be the first in putting him to death and then all the hands of the people. Stone him to death because he tried to turn you away from the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. Then all Israel will hear and be afraid and no one among you will do such an evil thing again.

Now if you look at that section, who is he dealing with? It's not this time a false prophet, but it's a relative. It's a father, a mother, a husband, a wife, a child, a friend, somebody close to you. If somebody even very close to you comes and entices you, and commands or suggests in some way that you worship a false god, you are to turn them in so that they be executed and your hand would be the first against them. Deuteronomy 13, keep reading verse 12,

If you hear it said about one of the towns that the Lord your God is giving you to live in, that wicked men have arisen among you and have led the people of their town astray saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods you have not known), then you must inquire, probe, and investigate it thoroughly. And if it is true and it has been proved that this detestable thing has been done among you, you must certainly put to the sword all who live in that town. Destroy it completely, both its people and its livestock. Gather all the plunder of the town into the middle of the public square and completely burn the town and all its plunder is a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. It is to remain a ruin forever, never to be rebuilt. None of those condemned things shall be found in your hands so that the Lord will turn from his fierce anger. He will show you mercy. He will have compassion on you. He will increase your numbers as he promised on oath to your forefathers because you obey the Lord your God, keeping all his commands that I am giving you today and doing what is right in his eyes.

And so there it is a whole town or village. If you find out that a whole town or village has gone corrupt, that a whole town or village has been induced somehow by some evil men to follow a false god, then the rest of the towns, the rest of the people around must come and purge the evil from among Israel by death, put them to death by the sword. And so the body of Israel will be purified from that tumor, which if it's not dealt with will engulf the whole body and destroy it.

Well, we know from history that Israel did not follow these commands, did they? But rather they went corrupt. And there was one man, one man who stood up, Elijah, and sought to obey fully the commands of the Law of Moses. And so after the fire fell on the sacrifice, he ordered that these false prophets, prophets of Baal, be executed according to the Law of Moses so that God's fierce anger would be turned. And why? Because he wanted the rain to fall. The rain's not going to fall until the prophets of Baal have been executed according to the Law of Moses. Now, it's interesting to me that God wanted the people to do it. Think about it now. Could God have done this job? All you need to do is just expand the scope of the fire a little bit. Instead of the pinpoint laser accuracy that God used from heaven and all it hits is this little sacrifice. All he's got to do is go out a little bit and you've got all the prophets of Baal, right? Did God ever do anything like that? Time and time again in the Old Testament he did it. Once, the people of Israel complained about the food as they were traveling through the desert and fire came from heaven and burned some of them up and burned the edge of the camp. Another time there was a rebellion, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram and the fire fell from heaven and burned up 250 that were holding censers. I don't know if you remember that time, but they, God told Moses, "You and Aaron choose a censer and then those rebels, they can choose a censer and we'll see who I choose." And the fire fell on 250 of them at that point. Even in the story of Elijah, later on, in II Kings chapter 1, a captain goes with 50 men to arrest him and fire falls from heaven and destroys those 50 men. God could have done it without any trouble at all, but he wanted the people to do it. Why did he want the people to do it? Because he wanted them to reject Baal worship once and for all. They must purge the evil from among them. It's their task, it's their job. And so he led them. Now, we don't know who actually put the prophets of Baal to death, whether it was Elijah himself, which would run into some serious logistics, late in the day killing 450 people with the sword. And so almost certainly, it was a lot of people that were involved in killing these prophets. And so he descended to the Valley of Kishon and he purged the evil from among Israel.

Now why do I dwell on this? Because it's in the Bible folks, this is what the Scripture says. This is the God that we worship and God wanted this done. And what was done to the prophets of Baal that day is nothing compared to what will be done to the lost on judgment day. It is nothing compared to the lake of fire. It is nothing compared to hell and damnation. And so we must realize that the God we worship is a God of holiness, a God of purity, a god of righteousness. And Elijah himself, if he were here today, would testify that he deserved himself to be burned with fire from heaven, because all have sinned and fall short to the glory of God. But it's only by the grace and mercy of God and the blood of Jesus Christ that we are not also executed the way the prophets of Baal were that day.

And so the evil was purged from Israel and now it's time for the rain to fall. The fire has come, but now we need the rain. And why? Because if the rain doesn't come, we will perish. We will perish from the land that God has given us. And so the rain comes and he gives Ahab some advice. Look at verse 41, “Elijah said to Ahab, ‘Go eat and drink for there is the sound of a heavy rain coming.’" Now it's interesting in verse 42 that Ahab does in fact go off to eat and drink. What is it with Ahab? Ahab's just the picture of a lost person. Is he not? Who's god is his stomach, this is what he's living for. Fire has just fallen from heaven, 450 prophets of Baal have been executed, and he says, "Why don't you go have a meal? I'm going to go pray." And so we see so clearly the distinction between Ahab and Elijah: Ahab sits down and has a good meal. Elijah goes up on Mount Carmel to pray. And so we have a picture of the life of Esau and then the life of a believer. It's funny how carnally minded people are far more likely to take advice on physical matters than spiritual matters. He gives him advice concerning his physical body and he'll take it. But if he gives him advice concerning his eternal soul, he won't give him the time of day. And so he says, "All right, I'll go. I'm going to go eat. I'm hungry anyway." And apparently this prophet who's got a good track record, says "Rain is coming, so let's go ahead and have a feast. Let's have a celebration in advance." And so his god is his stomach and off he goes. It's interesting later, if you look at chapter 19:1, Ahab... We're not going to get there tonight... But it says, "Ahab told Jezebel everything that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword." What do you notice about that? Ahab told Jezebel everything that who had done? Elijah. Do you notice anyone missing from verse 1 of chapter 19? Who would be missing from chapter 19:1? God, that's right. Praise the Lord for you, your faithfulness and your love for the Lord. It just shines. Yes, the center actor in this story is God himself. It's not Elijah. Did Elijah cause fire to fall from heaven and was it Elijah that caused rain to fall either? No, it isn't. But in Ahab's little puny mind, there is no room for God. In all his thoughts there is no room for God. And so he is got no place. And so he goes off and he sits down and he eats and he drinks. But Elijah gets right to business and the business at hand is praying for rain.

Now that the evil has been purged, it's time for the rain to come. Now rain is a gift from God. I think we feel that more than we've felt before, don't you? I mean it's a gift from God and it's got nothing to do with science. Now we can observe and meteorologists can more or less predict the things that are going to come, but we have no power over them. We cannot make the wind blow. "The wind blows where it wishes," Jesus said. You hear the sound of it, but you can't tell where it comes from, where it's going. Neither can we make it rain. Only God can do that. And so rain is a gift from God. It says in Psalm 147:8, "He covers the sky with clouds. He supplies the earth with rain and makes grass grow on the hills." And then, more familiarly to you, Matthew 5:45, "In order that you may be sons of your Father in heaven, you should pray for and love your enemies. He [our Father] causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous." And so it is God, our Father that sends rain. God also had complete control of rain in the Promised Land, and it was a big theme in the book of Deuteronomy, this issue of rain. In the Law of Moses, there would be blessings and curses; there would be blessings for obedience. There would be curses for disobedience. In Leviticus 26:4, it says, "I will send you rain in its season and the ground will yield its crops and the trees of the field will yield their fruit." And so in other words, God would send the rain and then the Promised Land would be fruitful. But if God didn't send the rain, the Promised Land would produce nothing. It was a curse for disobedience. Deuteronomy 11:17, if the people turn away and worship false gods, it says, "Then the Lord's anger will burn against you and he will shut the heavens so that it will not rain and the ground will yield no produce and you will soon perish from the good land the Lord is giving you." And then in Deuteronomy 28:23-24, it says, "The sky over your head will be bronze. The ground beneath you will be iron." That sounds like my yard, by the way. "The sky over your head will be bronze. The ground beneath you will be iron. The Lord will turn the rain of your country into dust and powder. It will come down from the skies until you are destroyed." So there was still perhaps wind, a dry, hot desert sirocco, blowing dust and sand, but there was no life, there was no water. And why? Because the people had disobeyed.

God also has complete control over the rain. He says in Amos 4:7, "I also withheld rain from you when the harvest was still three months away. I sent rain on one town but withheld it from another." Have you noticed that here in the Triangle region? It'll hit one place and not another. I'll get a call from Christie. "Is it raining where you are?" "No." Well, we got a little, and according to Amos 4:7, it's God that controls all of that. He's the one that says, "It's going to rain on this town but not on the other one." And so God has total control over this. He also, through his prophet Zechariah, commanded that we pray for rain. Zechariah 10:1, "Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime. It is the Lord who makes the storm clouds. He gives showers of rain to men and plants of the field to everyone." So God has commanded a prayer for rain. The sin has been dealt with in Israel. Now it's time for Elijah to go pray. And so he says in verse 41, “Elijah said to Ahab, ‘Go eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain.’” Now let me ask you a question. If you've been standing there, would you have heard anything? I think only Elijah could hear that sound at that particular moment. The Hebrew's actually very strong. There's actually the sound of the clamor of a multitude of a heavy torrential downpour coming. It's a really laden Hebrew expression. "There's a big rain coming and I can hear it." Look at the sky, there's not a single cloud. Looks like it's looked for the last three and a half years. "Oh, but it's coming. There's a sound. So you better go get your eating done, Ahab, because you're going to have a tough ride home tonight."

Now I think as we look at this, we can learn some lessons from prayer. James 5:16-18, it says this, "Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain and it did not rain on the earth for three and a half years.” Verse 18, James 5:18, "And he prayed again and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit." That's what we're reading about tonight, James 5:18, "He prayed again." When did he pray again? In I Kings 18:42-45, this is the second prayer of Elijah. And so there in James, it clearly ascribes to Elijah's prayer, the torrential rain that fell. And therefore he also, James, holds up for us as an example in prayer this man, Elijah. You want to learn about prayer? You learn from Elijah, look at Elijah, and see how he prayed.

Now, what are some things that we can learn? Well, what's the first thing that Elijah does? It says in verse 42, "Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah climbed to the top of Mount Carmel." So the first thing that he does is he withdraws from the people. There's probably nobody left on the top of Mount Carmel at this point, all right? The fire has fallen. The people have come down off to the Kishon Valley, they've destroyed- they've killed the prophets of Baal, and they've gone home. Elijah goes back up to the top of Mount Carmel to be alone. He withdraws. He prays by himself away from the hustle and the bustle, away from the hubbub. Now Elijah can hear, by faith, things that we can't. He knows that a rain is coming, all right? So he's hearing, by faith, something that nobody else can hear, just like seeing by faith, something that no one else can see. Elisha will do that later. The chariots of fire and the armies of the heaven surrounding him and his servant, nobody can see it, but he can. Same thing with Elijah. But here's the thing: Elijah was a man just like us. What did that mean? It means that he had five senses and those senses were distractible by things you see things you hear, hubbub, trouble, right? So if you really want to pray, you got to get off by yourself alone.

Now, there's two different kinds of prayer that the Scripture enjoins upon us. One is the withdrawing, praying by yourself where you're doing nothing but prayer. That's what we see here from Elijah. The second is the praying without ceasing prayer that you pray throughout your day, somewhat like Nehemiah did in the presence of the king, where he just speaks a prayer. He just prays through the day. Both of them are godly, both of them enjoined upon us, but they have different purposes. One of them keeps us close to God through the day, brings him into our presence at all points. But another is that effective fervent prayer of a righteous man in which you are concentrating on nothing but prayer. Does that have a place in your life? Is there a place for that? So many times I talk to people about their quiet times. "Well, I read the Bible five minutes." "Well, what about prayer?" "Well, I pray as I drive in." Well, is it good to pray while you're driving? For some it's better than others, some more needed than others. We need you to pray while you're driving. Okay? For all of us, it's beneficial to stay in fellowship with God, to pray while driving. But that kind of prayer does not take the place of the kind of prayer that Jesus spoke about in Matthew 6:6, "When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father who's unseen, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you." We're talking about secret prayer in your so-called prayer closet or wherever you can be alone, where you're concentrating on nothing but prayer. And so the first thing that we see is that Elijah withdrew. He prayed alone. He prayed by himself.

Secondly, we see him praying in humility. How do we get that? Well, we get it from his physical posture. Look what it says. It says that, "Elijah went up to Mount Carmel and he bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees." That's a picture of total subjection to God, of total humiliation before him. And this is a remarkable thing. Now, the Scripture has actually examples of all kinds of body positions in prayer. Kneeling, certainly, Paul says in Ephesians 3, "For this reason, I kneel before the Father from whom his whole family in heaven and earth derives its name." Kneeling is an example. Paul gives an example of kneeling. Elijah here with his face pressed between his knees gives us an example of kneeling in the extreme, where there's a sense almost of total pressing humiliation before God. Solomon, when dedicating the temple stood up and spread his arms out like this in prayer. David, while he lay on his bed, had God search his heart and know him, and all of these things are acceptable. There's no one right and one wrong, but here he gets down on his knees and he does it because he wants to demonstrate his humility.

Why is that important? Well, think of the temptation to pride that Elijah might have felt at this moment. I mean, have you ever seen answers to prayer like Elijah just saw? Fire coming down from heaven, God listening to the voice of a man and sending fire from heaven. What the devil could do with that, right? "Hey, not bad, Elijah. That's pretty good." I mean, there's not any other man that's ever done that. And so the ego starts to puff up a little bit. And it's so important at this moment for this man of God to get by himself and give all glory to God and humble himself in subjection to him and say, "What next God? What's the next thing you want me to do? You want me to pray for rain? I'll pray for rain." But he'd humble himself and not be boastful or arrogant or prideful before him. How wrong is it for us to come boldly into the throne of grace with arrogance? Okay, the Scripture does say that we should come boldly into the very presence of God, but not with arrogance. We need to have a kind of a balance in this matter, don't we? I think it's boldness just to be in God's presence. Don't you understand that? Just to be with him, just to stand in his presence and that he not destroy us, that's bold enough. We don't need to carry arrogance along with us. So just to be there and like that publican, that tax collector to beat your breast and say, "I don't even deserve to have you listen to me." That was the attitude, I think, that Elijah brought, humility into the presence of God.

You know, there's a balance in this matter. You need to be somewhat like the Apostle John who pillowed his head on Jesus' chest at the Last Supper. Just put his head there, just so intimate, so close. We could say, "Abba, Father," there's a closeness, an intimacy. And yet on the morning of the Resurrection, he would not deign to go into the place where Jesus lay. He stood outside and looked in. There was a sense of holy awe and how much more in Revelation 1:17, when the Lord appears to him in a glorified vision, now glorified presence and his eyes are like flaming fire. And John says, "I was at his feet like one dead." So is there a way to combine those two? I think so. There's a sense of intimacy, loving intimacy with the Lord, but a sense of the fear of the Lord as well. And Elijah had that. He shows us humility.

And then thirdly, we see him praying based on God's Word. I Kings 18:1, beginning of this chapter, "After a long time in the third year, the word of the Lord came to Elijah, 'Go and present yourself to Ahab and I will send rain on the land.'" Do you see that? It's so important that we understand this. He is praying for the thing that God has promised to give, not just generally promised, and that is true as well. II Chronicles 7:13-14 should be familiar to you, "If I shut up the heavens so there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among my people, and my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray" Does that sound familiar? "And seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." Solomon prayed that or God spoke that to Solomon. And so what I'm saying here very, very plainly is that he had the word of the Lord, generally. If the people have turned from their sin and there's been no rain, it's time to pray. And they said, "The Lord, he is God." They've turned from their sin; it’s time. But he's got a specific word from God. I Kings 18:1, "Go and show yourself to Ahab and I will send rain on the land." So if you want to be faithful and fervent and effectual in prayer, you have to pray according to God's word. You're not trying to change God's mind, are you? "God, I have an idea that you didn't have and it's a doozy. Listen to me for a while. Let me give you some advice on how to run the world." Is that what we're doing in prayer or are we saying, "God, show me what you want to do here. I pray according to your Word." And so he prays by faith based on God's Word.

He also prays... And he's, I think, exhorted and encouraged to pray because of God's sovereignty. Now, I don't think any of us are ever going to figure out a mixture, a proper theological understanding of the relationship between God's sovereignty and human action and responsibility. Let's think of it this way: God's power brought the rain. We've established that already. Elijah's prayer brought God's power. God's word brought Elijah's prayer. Okay, who wins here? When does it... It all starts with God. And we know that we give him the highest place, but he has chosen to work through people. James chapter 5 ascribes to Elijah prayer, the rain that fell, and there is truth to that. But we know that Elijah's prayer came only at the command of God. We know that as well. And so there's a mixture here. I think what we ought to do is say, "God, you have stated that you will do this thing in the earth. I pray that you do this. You've said that there's going to be people from every tribe and language and people and nation worshiping Christ. Here's an unreached people group. I pray and I'm going to keep praying until somebody comes to Christ in that group, until there's a church growing there." Why not? God's already said he's going to do it. Pray according to his word. We don't need to work out sovereignty and responsibility and all that in order to get down on your knees and pray. We just get on our knees and say, "God, do the thing that you have promised," and he moves.

Fourthly, we see Elijah praying specifically. If you had stopped Elijah at that moment, put your hand on his shoulder and said, "Elijah, what are you praying for?" "I'm praying for God's blessings on his people." What? He would've been able to tell you what he was praying for. "I'm praying for rain today. I'm praying for rain today, and I'm going to keep praying until it starts to rain." You need to pray specifically. George Mueller had 50,000 specific answers to prayer that you could write in a notebook. I think this is where we mess up so often. "God, I pray that you'd bless this church and bless it good." Well, how do you know when God's answered that prayer? Did he bless it good today? I don't know. I sometimes think that prayer's like buying stock in a company or buying stock in something that God's doing, right? And you're going to get returns on your investment. The more you invest in prayer, the more joy comes back to you as a dividend because you took part. It isn't that it happened only because you prayed, but there's a sense that you bought into that, you see, and you get some return back. You know what I'm saying? Well, can you imagine buying into some vague company and you have no idea who it is or where it is, and how are you going to go to the paper and find out how the company's doing? You have to pray specifically. You have to pray for things that you can write down and you know that God's done, that God is doing. You keep praying as God leads. So he prayed specifically. He knew what he was praying for. He's praying for rain.

Fifthly, he's praying fervently. I believe this whole account is a picture of fervent prayer. Seven times, Elijah says, "Go back." He is fervent. He's burning. He wants rain. The fire from heaven isn't enough. He wants rain because rain means life. Fire's not going to mean life. The rain means life. So he is praying for life for his people. He's praying for rain and he's praying fervently. John Bunyan said, "Cold prayers melt before they get to heaven." I love that. "Cold prayers melt before they get to heaven." You know those formal prayers where you just say, in a very distant way, "God bless this..." You're going through your list. That's not fervent prayer. KJV, I love in James 5:16, "The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." Isn't that beautiful? It's a fervent prayer that's effectual.

Sixthly, praying watchfully and expectantly. Watchfully and expectantly. Did Elijah expect anything that day? Oh, yeah. What evidence? "Go back." "No, there's nothing there yet." "Go back again and look. Look out over the Mediterranean Sea. You can see it from Mount Carmel, just keep looking." "Still nothing, my Lord." "Go back." Seven times. He's watchful; he's expectant. "God is going to do something and I'm going to keep praying until it happens. Go look toward the sea." "There's nothing there." Seven times Elijah said, "Go back." The seventh time the servant reported, "A cloud as small as a man's hand is rising from the sea."

Seventh: prayer with perseverance. Don't give up. Now, let me ask you a question. You can answer yourself. You don't have to call it out. If you like to, you can. We'll share in your answer. Where would you have given up? He went out to seven times, all right. Know yourself. How long would you have stayed at it? Would you have kept praying and kept praying and kept praying, or would you have given up? Elijah was going to pray until it happened. Let me ask you another question. Why didn't God give it to him on the first try? He is, after all, Elijah. There's no more work needing to be done in his soul is there? Of course there is. There's always work to be done in people's souls, and so he does not answer Elijah's prayer the first time or the second or the third or fourth or fifth or sixth. The seventh time he answers his prayer. Why? He's testing Elijah. Will you be faithful? Will you persevere, Will you... As it says in Luke 18:1, "Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up." And then there's the parable of the persistent widow. Oh, if I can just open my heart, I give up. I just do. I pray for things for a while and I don't stick with it the way I should. Elijah's kind of a wake up call for me to get back and say, if I shouldn't have prayed for it perseveringly, I shouldn't have prayed for it even one time. But if it was worth praying for one time, I should stick with it until God tells me to stop praying or until it gets answered, to keep praying for it again and again. So we see Elijah as a model of effective fervent prayer. Verse 44, "The seventh time the servant reported, 'A cloud as small as a man's hand is rising from the sea.' So Elijah said, 'Go and tell Ahab, ‘Hitch up your chariot and go down before the rain stops.'" Don't you love that? He's got just this tiny little cloud and he says, "It's coming. No doubt in my mind it's coming. So you better get going, Ahab." Do you wonder why he told him that? What'd he care about Ahab, right? "Go ahead and get stuck in the mud." He said, "Well, if you don't want to get stuck in the mud, if you want to get across that brook that's going to be at flood stage pretty soon, you better get moving." I think it's because he showed respect for him as his king, even though he was an ungodly man. And so he said, "You better get going." In verse 45, "Meanwhile, the sky grew black with clouds. The wind rose, a heavy rain came on, and Ahab rode off to Jezreel." So the rain comes, an answer to a man's prayer. Isn't that incredible? Does that characterize your prayer life? Wouldn't it be beautiful if it did? Do you remember the George Mueller fog story? Some of you do. Come and ask me afterwards, what a phenomenal story that is. God answers prayer like this still today, if we will just be faithful and pray.

One last thing, I like this verse 46, "The power of the Lord came upon Elijah and tucking his cloak into his belt. He ran on ahead of Ahab all the way to Jezreel." What is that? 18 miles. Frank and I were talking. We were praying for each other before the service. I said, "I'm a little tired." "I'm tired too." But I said, "I can't be tired, though. Look at what Elijah did." I didn't have a day like Elijah. Prophets of Baal, 450 guys slaughtered, going up and praying fervently. I don't know how long it took the seven times, but I mean that's draining. And when he got done, he ran 18 miles, by the Spirit of the Lord. Are you tired? Do you ever get tired? The Spirit of the Lord can make you powerful. And he beat Ahab's horses. I don't know what happened. Maybe the chariot wheel fell off or maybe he ran and set the record for the 18 mile race. I don't think that's an event, but he still holds the record for 18 miles in rain. But at any rate, he went and powerfully moved. The Spirit of the Lord can make a weak person strong.

Now, next time we study, we're going to see an entirely different Elijah. It's amazing how frail we are. If chapter 18 is Elijah's glory moment, chapter 19 is his lowest moment, where he really looks weak and faithless and puny and small. But God does this, I think, that we might know that it was not Elijah, but it was his power through Elijah. And our God is still with us and he hasn't changed one bit. Let's close in prayer.

Father, we thank you for the study that we had tonight. We thank you for the opportunity to go through your Word. We thank you for the example that Elijah is to us all. Lord, to me, especially, Lord, of effectual, fervent prayer. We thank you for the seven things that He shows us, how he withdrew privately to a quiet place to pray, and how he prayed according to your Word, in faith, believing and trusting you. He prayed with humility. He humbled himself before you, O Lord. And he prayed specifically knowing exactly what you had commanded him to do and knowing what he was praying for, praying for rain. He prayed perseveringly, and he prayed watchfully, O Lord. And he prayed until you answered. We thank you, O Lord for this example. And now I pray if there's any here that are weak in prayer, if there... It says strengthen, strengthen the feeble knees, the knees that give way, O Lord, I pray that you'd strengthen their knees in prayer so that we would be a praying church. We asked this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

We're looking this morning in Matthew 8:18-22 at the cost of following our Lord Jesus Christ.  In 1803 representatives of the United States of America met with Napoleon Bonaparte and bought a chunk of land from him- the Louisiana Purchase- 828,000 square miles for $27 million, which is less than a signing bonus of some NBA athletes these days. It worked out to just less than three cents an acre, an incredible bargain when you stop and think about it. Included in the Louisiana Purchase are the states of Louisiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, North and South Dakota, Nebraska, and Oklahoma as well as parts of Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and Minnesota. At the time that the purchase was made, the $27 million represented a huge chunk of the Federal Reserve, but it was deemed worth it.

 The costs of following Christ Jesus is also deemed worthy as it offers us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms, for he offers us full pardon of all of our sins, past, present, and future through His blood. He offers us fellowship with believers, from all ages into all eternity, he offers us His own righteousness to cover us on judgment day, He offers us eternal life. Does he ask nothing of us? No, he does not ask nothing of us. For just as He offers everything to us, he also asks everything from us. I think we're losing sight of that, more and more as we go on in American Evangelicalism. We've slipped into something called “cheap grace”. Think about what Jesus said when he talked about the pearl merchant who looks everywhere for excellent pearls, and when he finds one of great value, he understands the value of that pearl so much so that he goes and sells everything that he has, so that he can buy that pearl. Or think about the man in Palestine, who finds a treasure of great value hidden in the field, and then in his joy, not grudgingly but in his joy, he sells all of his possessions, that he might buy that field.

I think we've lost the fact that in both of those stories, there's a selling first before there's an obtaining. Am I thinking that we can buy salvation? No, it's far too expensive. Only the blood of Jesus Christ could purchase our freedom from the wrath of God.  Yet there was a cost to following Jesus, and it is not “cheap grace”. Dietrich Bonhoeffer spoke of “cheap grace”. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a brother in Christ who lived in Nazi Germany during World War II and wrote a book translated into the words the cost of discipleship. He wrote about this phenomenon called “cheap grace.” He said, “Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our church.” We are fighting today, for costly grace.

 “Cheap grace” is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession.  “Cheap grace” is grace without discipleship, it is grace without the cross-grace, without Jesus Christ living and incarnate; costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field for which the man will gladly go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buy for which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble. It is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows Christ. Such grace is costly said Bonhoeffer because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life there is. It is costly because it condemns sin, and it is grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his son. You were bought at a price, the Scripture says.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer speaking on “cheap grace” versus “costly grace”  said that this grace is not cheap because God did not reckon his son too dear a price to pay for our life but rather gave him up for us all. Bonhoeffer was here in America in the summer of 1939 at seminary with American friends. He saw that war was imminent. His friends begged him to stay in the States and to continue work here, but he said no, that there would be war. Looking ahead, he said  that his  country will need to be rebuilt. He assumed that Germany would lose the war, and he said "I cannot be with them in the rebuilding and the reconstruction of the church in Germany and not suffer through the war with them. I must go back.”  Soon after he returned home, World War II began. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was martyred in May of 1945. It's one of the last acts of Adolf Hitler before Hitler took his own life. Bonhoeffer knew that when Jesus Christ bids us to follow, he bids us come and die, to be willing to lay down one’s life. That is true; it is to that kind of costly following of Christ that today's Scripture calls us.

We need this message. Don't we? Today's American gospel has very little concentration on the preaching of the law, or the wrath of God. Christ proposed is proposed as someone who will make your life better  — a life enhancer —  it goes better with Christ, you know, that kind of thing.   The key verse for this way of looking at Christianity is to hear, “As I have come that they may have life and have it abundantly” and take this abundant life saying and  run it through the mill of our carnal imaginations and think “What kind of abundant life did Jesus come to give? Well, it's a life of material possessions, a life of freedom from inner turmoil and external troubles. It’s a life in which there are resources to solve all your problems. You'll have friends, you'll have popularity, you'll have all kinds of good things coming. If you'll only follow Christ, conviction of sin is minimal. Constant assurance of salvation is given.”   I think now more than ever, we need to hear again the words of the text that we're looking at today. "Foxes have holes, birds of the air have nests, but the son of man has no place to lay his head.” More than ever we need to count the cost of following Christ.

This passage I believe banishes “cheap grace”, and delves into true motivations for following Christ. There's a movement today called Seeker sensitivity that’s a part of the overall church growth movement.  It's good for us to look at this passage and try to understand seeker sensitivity according to Jesus. How would Jesus be sensitive to seekers? What would he do with somebody coming to him who's interested in following him? The modern church growth movement, espouses a view called Seeker Sensitivity. They want you to be sensitive to seekers. Modern church growth is constantly looking at ways to enlarge one’s church by studying the science of what makes a church grow, specifically numerically. With this kind of approach to church growth it is difficult to discern the difference between a church and a crowd.  You appeal to un-regenerate sensibilities. In this approach the physical arrangement of the church is paramount. You need a new church building with  state of the art physical arrangements since physical comfort is the constant goal. Pleasure, earthly pleasure, the organizing theme, there's going to be visual pleasure with that attractive sanctuary. The more striking the better, there's going to be auditory pleasure, music that attracts and appeals to the ear. There is nothing wrong with that, but it is wrong when this is the focus. The seeker sensitive values relational pleasure— there's going to be friendly, happy people welcoming you in and ushering you to your place, no problems inside here, no difficulties only pleasure. There's going to be heart pleasure; messages that are relevant and that minister to your heart, you walk away feeling good every time.  That's the approach, that's the formula for church growth — be sensitive to seekers. 

First of all, let us ask what is a seeker? It's somebody who shows interest in spiritual things, right?  Somebody who might come to Christ and say, "I'll follow you wherever you go.” Somebody interested in spiritual things. That's a seeker, but the Scripture testifies that no one naturally seeks God. Think again what it says  in Romans Chapter 3:10-12, “As it is written, There is no one righteous. No, not one. There is no one who understands…” Listen to the next part,  “No one Who seeks God.” No one naturally seeks God, the Bible says, “All have turned away.”  So if someone is genuinely seeking Christ, guess what? According to John 6:44, it is the Father who is drawing them.  “No one can come to me,” said Jesus, “unless the Father who sent me draws him and I will raise him up at the last day.” So a true seeker is somebody that the Father is drawing into full commitment to Christ, right? Somebody who is interested in following Christ, the way He really desires to be followed. That's what seeker is. What does it mean to be sensitive to the seeker? With the church growth approach, seeker sensitivity, says we must filter out anything that would cause them to turn away from Christ. You see what I'm saying? We're going to filter out any difficulties, we're going to filter out anything offensive or troubling, especially filter out any mention of sin or conviction or wrath or judgment or hell. These things are not popular and so we're going to filter them out. We'll get to them by and by since we are after all an evangelical church, we'll get to them by and by, but at the first blush we're not going to talk much about them, we want the seeker to be comfortable; we want them to come... “I want to meet them where they're at,” is the expression.   We're also going to filter out any offensive aspects of the gospel message, the cross, the blood, the thorns, the stripes of Christ and also the narrow gates and the commitment that it's takes to be to follow Jesus Christ. Those  ideas are for the advanced seekers, you see.

 Is this Jesus' approach to a seeker?  Not at all. What is seeker sensitivity according to Christ?  Jesus was constantly going for the heart. What is going on in there? He understands the genuine needs of each person. Think about a parallel account of the rich young ruler. There's a seeker who comes and  says, "Lord what good thing must I do to get eternal life?” Jesus, after some discussion, says,  “One thing you lack, sell all your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven and then come follow me.”  I can see at this moment, a church growth consultant coming alongside Jesus as the rich young ruler walks away because he had many possessions, and saying,  “Jesus, you've got a great message and people are really warming to it, you're doing well. But that was a mistake right there. What happened there was a mistake. Here's a guy who's rich first of all. He's young, he's got years ahead of him. He's a ruler in a position of authority, and you turn him away. Now, We like what you're doing. But I might try a different approach.” Jesus' brothers tried to do the same in John chapter 7, where they're giving Jesus PR advice. “No one seeking to be a religious leader behaves the way you do.”  Could it be that Jesus was not seeking to be what they wanted.

Could it be that His ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts higher than our thoughts, and could it be that the idolatrous rich, young ruler really did need to sell his possessions in order to follow Christ? We have in our text today two seekers coming to Jesus. How does he deal with them? What approach does he take?  First, we have a teacher of the law. In verse 19, the teacher of the law comes to him and says, “Teacher I will follow you wherever you go.” What an opportunity... First of all, he is a teacher of the law which means  he's used to a comfortable standard. He's at the higher echelon of Jewish society, well respected in Jewish culture. He's a scholar who is constantly studying the word of God. They, scribes, they were called would write copies of the Bible and make them available for synagogues. They didn't have printing presses so this man spends his full time copying scripture.  He's called a teacher of the law, so he would also teach scripture. He was probably wealthy among the upper echelon of society.

In Matthew's Gospel we see that teachers of law were not usually friends of Jesus. This man was an anomaly. He was interested in Jesus. He actually is very interested in Christ. He's not opposed to Jesus as were most of the teachers of law who constantly challenged Christ.  In Mark 14:1 it was the teachers of the law who met together plotting to kill Jesus. Jesus for his part in Matthew 23, gives them the seven woes. “Woe to you teachers of law and Pharisees, you hypocrites.”  But this man is an exception. He comes up and gives Jesus in effect a blanket declaration of loyalty. “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.”  He's in effect handing Jesus a blank check when he says, "I'll follow you wherever you go.” Jesus in verse 20 challenges him deeply. Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes. And birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”  Was Jesus driving the teacher of law away? Not at all. He was basically preparing him for the kind of earthly life a disciple of Jesus Christ could expect. It's not what you think He's saying to the teacher of the law. It's not a life of miracles, celebrations, power and ever-increasing glory until we take the throne in Jerusalem. It's not going to be like that. Physical earthly comfort is not in my future. And if you're going to follow me, it's probably not going to be in your future either.  "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the son of man has no place to lay his head.”  Now think about that, Jesus had just gotten done with the Sermon on the Mount. Remember how he says in Matthew 6, that we're not to be anxious for anything. “Don't worry about what you'll wear, don't worry about what you'll eat and why?  Because look at the birds of the air. They don't labor or spin or do any of those things. And you heavenly father provides them. You're worth much more than they are.”  So don't worry about food, don't worry about clothes, don't worry about any of those things. And yet, just two chapters later, he's saying, "Oh by the way, the foxes and birds get it better than I do.  Foxes and birds get it better than the Son of Man on Earth. Are you ready to follow me? Are you ready for that kind of life? It's challenging. Do you find it interesting that we get no response, here? We don't find out what happens with this man. Did he follow? Did he not? Wouldn't you love to know. But you know something, it's written in here not for him, is it? Who's it for? It's for us. What about you? "Foxes have holes, birds of the air have nests. I don't know where I'm going to sleep tonight. I don't know where I'm going to be.”  Will you follow me anyway says Jesus.  

Then the second seeker,  another disciple, said to Him, "Lord first let me go and bury my father.”    He's called the disciple; he's willing to follow Jesus.  He's already following Jesus around, listening to his teachings. But he sticks in a word, and there's the problem.  He said, “Lord first, first let me go and bury my father. “ That word “first”.  Do you know what the problem is?  It's got to do with his hierarchy of values. “My first, and most important value Jesus is not following you. My first, and most important value is I've got to go take care of my father.”   What does he mean when he says "let me go and bury my father”?  It  doesn’t  means that his father was on his death bed. It was a Jewish way of saying “I have responsibilities as a son.” We don't know but perhaps he was a first born, and he stood to inherit his father's possessions, but if he did not stick around and care for his father, he would forfeit and the next born son would get his inheritance. John MacArthur put it this way: since a man's inheritance was customarily lost or reduced if He did not fulfill his expected duties to the family, the phrase “I must bury my father” was frequently equivalent to... I want to wait until I get my money.  After I get my inheritance, then I will follow you. It was open-ended. It could be years and years away before he finally followed Jesus.  Jesus speaking about that hierarchy of priorities said,  "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me.” Do you hear that, anyone who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me? 

 There's a hierarchy here, isn't there? According to Jesus there is no higher call than following Christ. There's no higher call than loving Jesus and serving Him with all your heart. Any other earthly commitment comes lower than that. In a parallel account in Luke, another  disciple said, "I will follow you Lord, but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home." But Jesus said to him, "No one after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God." You can't look back, we're moving ahead, we're not going backward into inheritances and houses and lands and all of those things.  It's interesting the second half of what He says, "Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead." What does that mean? “Let the dead bury their own.”.. How do dead people bury other dead people?  I think it would be clear if we understood, let the spiritually dead bury the physically dead but you follow me. What does it mean- the spiritually dead? According to Ephesians Chapter 2, "Before we come to faith in Christ, we are every one of us dead in our transgressions and sins." 

 If you haven't come to Christ yet, you're dead in transgressions and sins. So Jesus says, "Leave that earthly way of thinking for people who don't know life yet. Leave it for those who are dead and you come follow me.” Now we know, doctrinally that no one is saved by following Jesus. You're not saved by your good works, you're not saved by any of those things. You're saved by faith alone, but by faith alone, appearances can be deceiving. You can have somebody that's going to say, "I'll follow you wherever you go. I'm willing to do anything."  But it's Jesus, with the precision of a heart surgeon, that goes right to the heart of the matter and says, "What is really going on inside of you?  Have you trusted me with all of your heart?” In John Chapter 2, John says of Jesus, "Many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name, but Jesus would not entrust Himself to them for he knew all men, he did not need anyone's testimony about what was in a man, for he himself knew what was in a man." In other words, people wanted to come entrust themselves to Jesus, but  he would not entrust Himself to them because he saw what was going on in their hearts.

 Simple faith is not so simple, the faith that saves is a faith that will follow even if Jesus has no place to lay his head that night. What we need instead is Christ's definition of an abundant life. What kind of life do you expect as a Christian? What do you think it's going to be like the rest of your years here on earth?  What is your life in following Jesus going to be like?  There's a common misconception that Jesus has come into our life as a life enhancer. I heard a tape recently talking about this, and there's an analogy concerning Christ as life enhancer. Suppose you're on an airplane and  the stewardess comes and offers you a parachute saying, "I want you to put this parachute on. It's going to improve your flight. It's going to make every part of your flight more pleasurable and more enjoyable. Go ahead and put it on." This sounds good, I want my flight enhanced, so I will put this parachute on.  You put the parachute on, but you know those seats are pretty small, and the enclosure just got a little tougher. You're now leaning forward, the parachute pushing you forward. It's an eight-hour flight and you're going to make it with a parachute on your back. Then they bring you the meal, and the tray is jammed into your chest, and you're having a hard time eating it anyway. Suddenly you notice that no one else has a parachute on.  You're the only one. The other passengers are looking at you like, "What's that for?" "Well she told me my flight would be enhanced," and they start to titter and laugh and make jokes about you and criticize you. Or family members think you're insane and none of them have a parachute on either. Eventually, what are you going to do to that parachute? It's not really enhancing your fight very much, is it? You're gonna to get rid of it. Suppose instead a stewardess comes and says, "Here I have a parachute for you if you don't put it on, you're going to die because we have four engines on fire right now, and one of the wings is about to break off and within probably 10 minutes you're going to be hurdling through space. Put the parachute on if you want to live." Will you put that parachute on?  Yes, now the discomfort of leaning forward in the seat is nothing to you, the in-flight meal doesn't look very appetizing. and you're only thinking about one thing and that is surviving what's about to come. I think if we preach the Gospel with the law, and you understand that Judgment Day is coming, and wrath is coming, and you have to give an account for every careless word you've spoken, and you cannot survive unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and teachers of the law,  that you will by no means enter heaven, and Jesus comes and says, "I will give you my righteousness, I will take all of your sins off of you. Follow me and I will lead you to Heaven. But along the way you're going to have trouble and difficulty and struggle and strife. But in the end, you will have full rewards by grace, and you will not die in the lake of fire, but you'll be with me forever.”  Will you take that parachute off? Or will you put up with whatever comes your way? We need a new definition I think therefore, of abundant life. It is not Jesus as life enhancer. 

What is abundant life according to Jesus? It's, “I don't have a place to stay tonight, but it doesn't matter because I'm going to be in the center of my Father's will. Everything I do, will be according to his way, and when I've finished, I will have brought him glory on Earth by finishing all the work he gave me to do, and there will be eternal fruit as a result.” I don't know where I'm going to stay tonight, but I know that I'm going to be in the center of my Father's will. "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of Him who sent me and finish my work." Knowing God is abundant life. “Now this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom ye have sent.” Now that is sweet, that is abundant, and in the middle of trials, just like Paul and Silas, you can be singing in prison praising him. Why? Because it's exactly what you knew was coming.

What application can we take from this? We have to count the cost of following Jesus. First of all, praise Jesus that he was willing to leave his father's throne above, and come down and live that kind of life for you. Think about it, look at all He left behind:  He left His father's throne above so free, so infinite His grace, emptied Himself of all that love, and bled for Adam's helpless race. That's what Jesus did, He was willing to leave the throne and say, "I've got no place to stay tonight, I'm going to be homeless, I'm going to walk through somebody's wheat field, I'm going to pluck heads of grain, roll them in my hand... 

Secondly, evangelism. We need to be more honest folks. We need to tell people the truth right from the start. We need to tell them that Judgment Day is coming and Jesus offers them the only hope of salvation. What kind of life do you expect the rest of the way? Jesus is not a life enhancer; He's a Savior, and He came to give you eternal life.

We need to get up therefore every day as Christians, and count the cost. Can you say, "Am I willing to follow Jesus today? Suppose it leads me into discomfort, suppose it leads me into trouble. Will I follow him anyway? Am I willing to follow Him no matter what?" We need to understand luxury and necessity differently. Have you ever thought about Jesus's last will and testament? Who was on his will? "To my mother I bequeath... " What? Do you remember what he... What did he carry with him up the cross? No money. Everything was gone. He had his clothes. And what happened to them? Well, they got gambled away to fulfill a prophecy.  He had nothing left. He had nothing earthly to give. What about Paul? Paul's inventory of what was truly necessary. 1 Timothy Chapter 6, he said, "If we have food and clothing, we'll be content with that." 

Americans have expectations of earthly comfort, don't we? We have expectations that it must be comfortable, it must be pleasurable, it must be plenty, or else I will not follow Jesus.  Our wealth is not evil, is it? Not at all. But there are certain ways that we are called to live. 1 Timothy 6, verse 17 and 18, "Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds and be generous and willing to share." How then shall we live? The apostle Paul, who's learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, well fed or hungry, living in plenty or in want says,  "I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength."

Jesus knew how to feast and he knew how to go through forty days in the desert with nothing to eat. He could do all those things through the will of His Heavenly Father. So what's a good diagnostic for your expectations? Have you complained at all this past week? I think complaints are a good indicator of expectations. You take faulty expectations and combine them with difficult circumstances, and out comes a complaint, right? Jesus worked on faulty expectations. "Foxes have holes, birds of the air have nests, the Son of Man has no place to lay his head. That night, they laid down on the ground and the guys who followed said, "Well, He told us this is what was going to happen."

If you expect kings' palaces and  instead you lay on the ground that night, you're going to abandon the faith, walking away from Jesus. What kind of life do you expect? What's it going to be like from here on out for you? From the apostle Paul, “Five days, five times I received from the Jews the 40 lashes minus one, three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked. I spent a night and a day in the open sea. I've been constantly on the move. I've been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles, in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea, and in danger from false brothers. I have labored and have toiled and have often gone without sleep, I've known hunger and thirst, and I've often gone without food, I've been cold and naked.” Will you come anyway, if that's what I promise you? At the IMAX in Raleigh and saw the story of Shackleton who went down to Antarctic, and you know how he recruited people? The sign said,  "Dangerous journey, small pay, extreme cold, healthy return unlikely." 5,000 people showed up to be with Shackleton.   Jesus in effect does that, he says, "Will you follow if this is what it's going to be like?" I think you will, if you're one of His sheep, "My sheep hear my voice and they follow."  I’ll follow him anywhere, I will go with him. Why? Because the Lord Jesus alone has the words of eternal life.  I have no other way to survive Judgment Day and I will follow Him, I will follow Him to the end.

This is what Jesus said, "Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Follow me and serve me. John 12:26, "Whoever serves Me must follow Me, and where I am My servant also will be, My father will honor the one who serves me. Follow me and be willing to suffer disgrace." Hebrews 13, "Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood. Let us then go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore." That means if you follow Christ, people might not like you, people might reject you; follow him anyway. "Follow me," Jesus said, "and be willing to die." Jesus said, "If anyone would follow me he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. And follow me all the way to Heaven. I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." 

Many of you perhaps have heard sermon after sermon, perhaps you didn't understand what the Christian life was genuinely about. Jesus says if you've never trusted Him, you are dead in your transgressions and sins. "Follow me and let the dead bury their own dead." Jesus has life giving power. He can speak and Lazarus comes alive. Come to Christ today. What are you expecting when you follow Jesus? Will you follow him anywhere? Even if foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head. Will you follow Jesus? 

Andy Davis preaches an expository sermon on 1 Kings 18:17-40. The main subject of the sermon is Elijah's trial of the false prophets.

Please, if you would, take your Bibles. We're looking tonight at 1 Kings Chapter 18, at the contest at Mount Carmel. We began this last week, and this has got to be one of the most exciting passages of scripture you're going to find in the Old Testament. I can't imagine a more dramatic contest than the one we get at Mount Carmel between Elijah and the 450 prophets of Baal. I mean, think about it, if you could go back in time to events in the Old Testament, don't you think this would be on your top 10 list to just stand there and see it? To see the fire fall from heaven, and the look on people's faces as they fall down to the ground and say, “the Lord, he is God,” but you know you wouldn't be seeing their faces because you'd be falling on the ground too and saying, “the Lord, he is God.” And so it's a dramatic encounter, and it's one that brings great glory to God. And that was his whole point; his desire was to glorify himself. Now, we've already looked at half of this encounter, but I'm going to begin reading where I began last time at verse 17 or verse... Yeah, verse 17, "When Ahab saw Elijah, he said to him, ‘Is that you, you troubler of Israel?’ ‘I have not made trouble for Israel,’ Elijah replied. ‘But you and your father's family have. You have abandoned the Lord's commands and have followed the Baals.’” Now he gives him the contest. He says, 

"Now summon the people from all over Israel to meet me on Mount Carmel and bring the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah who eat at Jezebel's table.” So Ahab sent word through all Israel and assembled the prophets on Mount Carmel. Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waiver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, then follow him, but if Baal is God, follow him.” But the people said nothing. Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only one of the Lord's prophets left, but Baal has 450 prophets. Get two bulls for us. Let them choose one for themselves, and let them cut it into pieces and put it on the wood, but not set fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and put it on the wood but not set fire to it. Then you call in the name of your god, and I will call in the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire, he is God.” Then all the people said, “What you say is good.” Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose one of the bulls and prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your god, but do not light the fire.” So they took the bull given them and prepared it. Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. “O Baal, answer us,” they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made. At noon Elijah began to taunt them. “Shout louder,” he said, “Surely he is a god. Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened.” So they shouted louder, and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention. Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come here to me.” They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which was in ruins. Elijah took 12 stones. One for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come saying, “Your name shall be Israel.” With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs of seed. He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood. Do it again,” he said, and they did it again. “Do it a third time,” he ordered, and they did it the third time. The water ran down around the altar and even filled the trench. At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that these people will know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.” Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, “The Lord, he is God. The Lord, he is God.” Then Elijah commanded them, “Seize the prophets of Baal. Don't let anyone get away.” They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered them there.  

Now when we looked at it last time, we talked about the fact that Elijah gave to the prophets of Baal the opportunity to go first. They were allowed to select the sacrifice. They were allowed to go first and to cut it apart, and to lay it out, and they were allowed to do all of their work first. Now I think it makes sense that he did it this way. Number one, he wanted to show that he was willing to give any advantage to the prophets of Baal. He was willing to allow them to go first and to do whatever they needed to do first. But we know also that God was going to answer with fire that day, wasn't he? And if Elijah had gone first, there would've been no need for the prophets of Baal to go. And God fully intended not only to establish himself as the true God, but to show Baal for the fraud that he really is. He wanted to strip Baal of any power. He wanted to show Baal to be the emptiness that he is. And so Elijah said, “go first.” And so these prophets began their prophesying. They prophesied energetically. They danced with strength and power around the altar. And as I think about that scene, I think about how easily duped are so many of our people. We think about religions around the world, and people, our neighbors, coworkers as we're witnessing, they'll say to us, “you're very zealous for your religion, but there are other people that are every bit of zealous for their religion as you are for yours. They believe every bit as much in their God as you do in yours. They're every bit as sincere about their God as you are about yours. And they're willing to make sacrifices too for their God.” All of that is true, is it not? And we see that exemplified in these prophets of Baal. They are very zealous for their faith. They're willing to lacerate themselves. They're willing to puncture their bodies until their blood flows. And so their level of commitment is much higher than that of most Christians I know, but that doesn't make it true, does it? God wants those who will worship him in spirit and in truth, for there is a true God and Baal is a false god. And so zeal in worship does not prove the truthfulness, the verity of that religious system. There are many Muslims, for example, that are willing to lay down their lives in suicide bombing attempts, aren't they? They're willing to die for what they believe. Does that make their belief true and accurate? No, it does not.

So zeal in religion is not enough. The Apostle Paul himself, when he was going around from place to place persecuting Christians, exemplified the zeal of a rejecting Judaism, a Judaism that had turned away from Christ. And he was willing to go from place to place, he was willing to drag people off and put them to death. His zeal was strong and powerful, but Paul later repudiated it, didn't he? He said it's a zeal without knowledge. It's a false zeal. And so let's not be duped. There are people that will throw themselves into their religion far more than we ever will to ours, to our shame I must say. The Jehovah's Witnesses will go from door to door tirelessly, knocking on doors, reaching out. The Mormons will take two years of their young people's lives and send them all over the world as missionaries. Their level of commitment in some cases is so much higher than ours. But it does not mean that their religion is true.

So as they're dancing around, as Baal is being called upon, there is no answer. The silence is eloquent. "No one answered," it says. "No one heard at all." You know why? Because there was no one there. Baal is a false deity. He's an emptiness. He's a nothing. Psalm 115 says, "Why do the nations say, where is their God?" It's very interesting, Psalm 115, the nations say, “the Jews have no God because they have no images, no idols. We can't see their God, so they must have no God.” And so they say, "Where is their God?" The psalmist answered, "Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him." Isn't that a wonderful answer? That's where our God is. He's in heaven. And that day, he was in heaven waiting for a simple prayer from Elijah, and he would pour down fire. But at this point, he was quiet and so was Baal because Baal doesn't exist. The psalmist continues in Psalm 115, "Our God is in heaven. He does whatever pleases him. But their idols are silver and gold, made by the hands of men. They have mouths, but cannot speak, eyes, but they cannot see. They have ears, but cannot hear. They have noses, but they cannot smell. They have hands, but cannot feel, they have feet, but they cannot walk, nor can they utter a sound with their throats." They are mute; they're silent. The idols and the gods behind them. "Those who make them will be like them and all who trust in them." Do you hear that? You become like what you worship. Isn't that amazing? As you focus on the God of the Bible, you focus on Christ. You look at him and worship him; you are transformed into his image little by little. But here, these Baal worshipers, little by little are being transformed into that of an idol with deaf ears, blind eyes and mouths that cannot speak. And so there is no answer because there is no god, there's no Baal. But there is a Satan, is there not? And there are demonic forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Now, wouldn't you love to have seen what was going on in the heavenly realms around Mount Carmel at that point? Wouldn't that have been dramatic to see what was happening with Satan and his demons? How much would they have loved to just put a little spark under that sacrifice, just a little bit of fire to persuade the people that Baal really was a god? Satan would love to have done it. And you know something, at the end of the world God will permit him to do miracles. Did you know that? Through the antichrist, he will enable the antichrist to do great signs and wonders and miracles, and many people will be deluded and deceived by this. 2 Thessalonians mentions this, "The coming of the lawless one [that's the antichrist] will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders." It's coming folks, Jesus said, “to deceive even the elect if that were possible.” Well, it's not possible because his sheep hear his voice and they will not follow another. They know it's counterfeit miracles. But the antichrist will do many miracles through the power of Satan really. Revelation 13 gives us a clear indication of this. Revelation 13:11-14, "Then I saw another beast coming out of the earth. He had two horns like a lamb, but he spoke like a dragon. He exercised all the authority of the first beast on his behalf. And made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast whose fatal wound had been healed. And he performed great and miraculous signs [listen] even causing fire to come down from heaven in full view of men." Did you hear that? So at the end of the world, the antichrist will do this exact same thing, but not that day. Satan was not given freedom; he was not given power or ability to have fire come down from heaven that day.

Now, all false religions have, I believe, a demonic side. I think behind every world religion, every non-Christian world religion, there is a demonic influence. 1 Timothy 4:1 says, "The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and the doctrines of demons." Did you hear that? So the demons concoct these religious systems, and then they act as Baal impersonators, that's how it works. And so they stand there behind the worship and they do little things and persuade people that Baal is real. They're Baal impersonators. And so demons are worshiped. Book of Deuteronomy speaks of this in the Song of Moses. Speaking of Israel, it says, "Jeshurun grew fat and kicked;" this is speaking of Israel. "Filled with food, he became heavy and sleek. He,” this is speaking of Israel now, “abandoned the God who made him and rejected the Rock his Savior. They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered Him with their detestable idols." Listen, this is Deuteronomy 32:17, "They sacrificed to demons which are not God- gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear. You deserted the Rock, who fathered you; you forgot the God who gave you birth." So there he predicts- the Song of Moses predicts that Israel will sacrifice to demons. They will worship demonic powers. One of the names is Baal. Asherah would be another one. And so the whole Baal system of worship came from demons, and how much I'm sure the demons longed to show themselves that day. But the beauty of the whole thing is that Satan is on a leash, is he not? He's held back by the power of God. He can do nothing except at the permission of God. You know this from the book of Job, he's got to go and ask permission. He said, "Now God, you're frustrating me. I would love to get at Job, but you put a hedge around him and everything he has, and I just can't get at him." And so God opens up the hedge according to his own command, and fire does come down from heaven and kills and destroys Job's people and possessions. And so Satan is well capable of doing this if God will permit it, but God simply would not permit it that day.

All false religious systems are ultimately demonic. Listen to 1 Corinthians 10 speaking of this very same thing. "Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything or that an idol is anything? No, but listen, the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons." Do you hear that? So all the idolatrous sacrifices are really being offered to these spiritual beings, demonic forces of evil in the heavenly realms. But they were silent that day, praise God. Aren't you glad that God restrains the power of the devil and all of his angels? Aren't you glad that they have to come and ask permission to get at you? Aren't you glad that God filters out the temptations, so that nothing comes at you except what you're able to bear? And with that temptation makes a way of escape so that you can bear up under it? Aren't you glad that God will not just let the devil have free rein in your life or in the world, but he restrains everything that the devil does? Aren't you glad that he's simply a created being? And when God says so, it's all over for the devil. Aren't you glad about that? I am. And so A.W. Pink speaks of that altar. He says, "The Baal altar stood cold and smokeless, the bullock was unconsumed. The powerlessness of Baal and the folly of his worshipers was made fully apparent. The vanity and absurdity of idolatry stood completely exposed. No false religion is able to send down fire upon a vicarious sacrifice. No false religion can put away sin, bestow the Holy Spirit, or grant supernatural answers to prayer. Tested at these three points, they all fail, as did Baal worshipers that day. They cannot take away sin. They cannot answer supernaturally with fire. They cannot send down fire from heaven. They cannot send the Holy Spirit. All of these things they cannot do. And so they're ultimately weak and impotent."

Well, you have to give it to the prophets of Baal. They certainly were persistent. Hour after hour, they danced around until finally Elijah thinks it's about time to add some taunting, a little bit of sarcasm, a little bit of mockery. And so he begins to make fun of them. In verse 27, it says, "Shout louder. Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought; he's distracted, he's thinking about something. Keep at it, maybe you'll get his attention soon enough. Or maybe he's busy or maybe he's traveling, maybe he's sleeping and he must be awakened." Now, Elijah's sarcasm you may think is an ungodly thing, but not at all. Because the Bible makes it very plain that God mocks this kind of unbelief. If you look at Psalm 2, it says, "Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his anointed one, ‘let us break their chains’ they say, ‘and throw off their fetters.’” Now listen, Psalm 2:4, "The One enthroned in heaven laughs at them; the Lord scoffs at them." So there's laughter and there's mocking from heaven as God looks at these idolatrous systems that shake their fist, their puny little fist at God, and he laughs down because they're just grasshoppers before him. But then Psalm 2:5 says, "Then he rebukes them in his anger, and terrifies them with his wrath." These prophets of Baal are acting out their last few hours on earth. They're going to die that day, and they're going to face their Creator. They're going to face him without an atoning sacrifice. They're going to go to hell. And so this mocking is just the final warning to repent and turn away from this idolatrous system.

Take a minute if you would, and look at Proverbs Chapter 1, had a similar thought. The whole book of Proverbs is given to explain what wisdom is that we would know a truly wise life. And we learn from the book of Proverbs that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And God stands and reaches out with both hands all day long. He says, "I've held up my hands to a disobedient and rebellious people." He has warned them again and again. There's been ample time for them to repent. Three and a half years the drought's been going on. And so wisdom reaches out to the people and says, "Come and follow me, and I'll give you the richest of fare." But look at verse 24, Proverbs 1:24, "But since you rejected me when I called and no one gave heed when I stretched out my hand, since you ignored all my advice and would not accept my rebuke; I in turn will laugh at your disaster. I will mock when calamity overtakes you, when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when disaster sweeps over you like a whirlwind, when distress and trouble overwhelm you. Then they will call to me, but I will not answer; they will look for me, but they will not find me, since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord. Since they would not accept my advice and spurned my rebuke, they will eat the fruit of their ways and be filled with the fruit of their schemes. For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them; but whoever listens to me will live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm." Do you see that? God stands with his wisdom and reaches out to sinners, and he invites them to turn away from their foolish and sinful ways. To turn away from my idolatry, to turn away from sin. But if they harden their hearts and will not listen, if they reject his advice, in turn he will turn from them and he will mock them, and in the end they will be destroyed.

So if you go back to 1 Kings 18, we see Elijah basically as a mouthpiece of God taunting and mocking these false prophets. Well, did they listen to his mockery? Did they say what are we doing? Did realization hit them that they were wasting their time, that Baal was a false God and nothing would come? No, they only try harder. They're going to try harder. They're not doing it enough. They're not making enough effort in religion, and so they're going to try harder. And so what they do is they begin to lacerate themselves. They begin to puncture themselves with swords and spears until their blood flows. Now, note the cruelty of pagan worship, the cruelty and viciousness of this idolatry system. It says it was their custom to do this. This is what they did frequently, so it wasn't anything new. And so the doctrine of demons is ultimately vicious and hate filled, isn't it? Ultimately, it's cruel and vicious. And why? Because Satan hates you. He hates the image of God, and he wants to attack. And if he can somehow persuade you to hurt yourself, to lacerate yourself so that your own blood will flow, then he's just carrying out his hatred of God in your own body. You think about some of the pagan worship systems all over the world. Think about in the middle America, the Aztec system, the human sacrifices they used to do, they're unspeakably cruel and disgusting, repulsive. The doctrine of demons leads to this kind of cruelty and viciousness. Psalm 16:4, David put it this way, "The sorrows of those will increase who run after other gods. I will not pour out their libations of blood or take up their names on my lips." And so their flowing blood is supposed to appease Baal and supposed to make him more disposed to listen to them. And it's funny how Satan perverts true religion. Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness, blood must flow. The blood of the sacrifice must flow, but the sacrifice is already on the altar, they're going add to it their own blood as though that somehow are going to atone for their sins. It cannot. The blood of Jesus Christ is sufficient. You see the perversion here, their own blood and not all of it, only some of it. Jesus poured out his blood unto death for an atoning sacrifice for our sins. And these priests, by the way, they are Jews after all, let's keep that in mind. They were doing what was expressly forbidden in the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy 14 says, "You are the children of the Lord your God. Do not cut yourselves. Do not shave the front of your heads for the dead. For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. Out of all the peoples on the face of the earth, the Lord has chosen you to be his treasured possession."

We also see, I think, intrinsic in false religious systems is a concept that harming your body will somehow advance you with God. We even see this in medieval Catholicism. And some of these monks would go out and do extended fastings and extended beatings and flagellations. They would wear things called hair-shirts with the hair turned inside so that they would constantly be tormenting their flesh. As though this somehow had any value in advancing them in religion, advancing them in their relationship with God. Colossians Chapter 2 talks about this, "Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence." The punishment of the body doesn't advance you at all. But what does, the mortification of sin by the power of the Spirit. Now that's something different. By the power of the Spirit to put sin to death, now that advances you if you have already come to faith in Christ through justification.

Well, the prophets of Baal have done everything they can. They exhaust themselves, literally nothing more for them to do. They've done everything. They've danced around the altar, they've lacerated themselves, they've cried out to Baal for hours and hours. And the time has come for Elijah to move. In verse 30, it says, "Elijah said to all the people, ‘Come here to me,’” “come close to me.” It's the time of the evening sacrifice about 3:00 in the afternoon. And he, I think the prophet at this point, is representing God. What is the point of this whole contest on Mount Carmel? Is it not to bring the people back to God? Isn't that the whole point? To show Baal worship to be empty and nothing, so that the people will reject it. And to show that the worship of the true and living God is everything so that the people will be attracted again to God. And so he says, "Come near to me. Come stand near me." That is exactly what he is doing.

Now, Elijah has, in effect here on Mount Carmel, made a three-fold appeal to the people. First of all, he's appealed to their conscience. Remember, he said, "How long are you going to stumble or waiver between two convictions? If the Lord is God, follow him; if Baal is God, follow him." So he is appealing to their conscience, but they remain silent. Secondly, he appeals to their reason. He says, “I have an idea. Let's set up a contest between God and Baal, and you will be able to see side by side which of the two religions has power and which does not.” So he's appealing there to your reason, “Judge for yourselves people who is the true God,” that's what he's doing. Now, he's going to appeal to their hearts, and he does it by pointing to this broken down old altar. An altar to the Lord. And he begins to rebuild it. He begins to put it back together again. He takes these stones and begins to put them together. How often in your Christian life does God do this to you? How often does he appeal to your memory to bring you back to where you should be, where you should have been? Perhaps you've backslidden, you've slid away from a worship of the true and living God, and he reminds you of how it used to be in your life. He appeals to your memory. Think about Revelation 2:4-5, the church at Ephesus. Christ speaking to the church through the Holy Spirit says, "Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love." Isn't that painful to hear Christ say that to you? “You've forsaken your first love. It's not an accident. It was a willful choice you made. You exchanged me for something idolatry or something earthly. You turned away from your first love.” And what is the very next thing that he says to him? He says, "Remember the height from which you have fallen. Repent and do the things you did at first." “Remember how it used to be for you. Remember how in your earlier days in your walk with Christ, how you used to pray for a long time, how you used to love reading the Bible, how you couldn't wait to go to church, how you enjoyed singing hymns and Psalms and spiritual songs. How you just loved to witness, how you had a freshness and excitement to your life with Christ. Remember that height from which you have fallen, repent and go back to where you were before.” And I think that's what he's doing. He's deliberately kind of slowly building this altar up, and it takes time too. God is patient. It's going to take time. I don't think he had any help. They're all standing and watching, “Well, what's going to happen next? I don't want to get anywhere near that sacrifice, something might happen.” And so Elijah alone is building this up, and he uses these 12 stones. And the 12 stones clearly represent the 12 tribes of Israel. They were God's people. They were called Israel. And how powerful is this? Elijah is doing his ministry in the nation called Israel, which was not truly Israel, but just the 10 northern tribes. There'd been a separation between northern Israel and southern Judah. God's people had been rent, had been ripped in two, right? So there were 10 tribes that King Ahab was king over. And then there were the two tribes in Judah. There'd been a separation and why? Because of Solomon's idolatry and wickedness, and Rehoboam's rebellion as well. And so there'd been a separation, but in God's mind it was one people still. You see, there's an essential unity here, isn't there? 12 stones representing the 12 tribes of Israel and so the altar was built up.

We also see Elijah continually regulated here by the Law of Moses. In Exodus 20, it says, "If you make an altar of stones for me, do not build it with dressed stones, for you'll defile it if you use a tool on it." So you can't take a chisel and a hammer and get them all smooth and perfect looking. “Take those stones as they are, just as you find them, and stack them up. Stones that I made, you haven't done anything to them, and just put them on it.” He doesn't want any idols at all. Nothing human, but just put that altar together. And so he's just doing everything according to the law of the Lord. And it says the altar is built in the name of the Lord. Look what he says, he's going to build the altar. Verse 31, "Elijah took 12 stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come saying, ‘Your name shall be Israel.’" And verse 32, "With the stones, he built an altar in the name of the Lord." Now what does that mean? Well, I think it means two things. Number one, he builds an altar in the name of the Lord, means at his command. God commanded. “By whose name are you doing this?” “In the name of the Lord I build this altar, he told me to do it,” number one. And number two, in the name of the Lord means, “I build this altar for his glory, for his reputation, that his name may shine and be proclaimed. I want you to see how great is God.” So that's what it means. To do something by God's word and his authority, number one. And number two, to do it for his glory and his reputation. Just stop for a minute and apply this to yourselves. Wouldn't it be fantastic if everything you did, you did in the name of the Lord? If at every moment you say, “Do I have a word from God on this issue? Has he spoken to this? Am I doing this under his command?” Secondly, “Am I doing this for his glory?” A good test of that is, can you pray God's blessing down upon whatever you're doing at any given moment? Could you stop a minute and just say, “Lord, please bless what I'm doing right now?” If you can, you're doing it in the name of the Lord. It says in Colossians 3:17, "Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus." Ain't it sweet that the name Jesus has been added to the word Lord so we know who he is? In the name of the Lord Jesus, we'll do all things by his word and for his glory.

And so Elijah built that altar, and then he cuts up the sacrifice in pieces as per the word of the Lord in Leviticus 1:6-8. He lines it up. And the Baal worshipers didn't do any of this. They just threw it together, and who cares, right? Because they had no commands on this matter. God had given commands on this matter, and Elijah follows them to the letter. He cuts the sacrifice up, and arranges it in pieces on the wood just as God had commanded. "He who is faithful in little will be faithful in much. He who is dishonest in little will be dishonest in much." Elijah is about to pray to God. His own reputation and God's will be on the line when he prays. He better be faithful and do everything the way God said. And so he does it completely by the word of God. Now, I think it's important for ministers of the word of God to be meticulously careful in how they handle the word of God, isn't it? I think all of us need to be careful, we all need to be faithful. But here, Elijah is not just anyone. He is ministering to God. He's going to offer a sacrifice. And so it's very important for ministers of the Lord to do all things according to his command, right? And so it says in 2 Timothy 2:15, "Study to show yourselves approved unto God, a workman who do not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." I think about that. Just as Elijah rightly cut up that bullock just as God had said, so we must handle the word of God and be faithful. I think about this. Actually, somebody quoted this verse to me once. I won't say who it is, but Jeremiah 48:10 says, "Cursed be the one who does the Lord's work negligently." What a comforting message, isn't it? Cursed be the one who's negligent in God's work. Do it the way God said. And so I take that seriously, and Elijah did that day. And then he says, “Let's pour some water on this sacrifice.” And he pours four buckets or barrels of water, right? Now you might ask, “Where in the world after three and a half years of drought do they get four barrels of water?” And the answer is, I have no idea. Now there might be salt water because Mount Carmel's right near the ocean. So they may have been salt water that would do the job just fine. Or they may have been precious barrels of water that King Ahab was storing up for that Baal feast afterwards that he was... they were going to drink some water, right? Either way, four barrels of water poured on there. And then Elijah says, “Do it again.” Okay, eight barrels of water. And then he says, “Do it a third time.” Okay, how many barrels of water are we up to now? 12. Just an accident. These are the kind of things that just kind of happen in the word of God. 12 barrels of water poured on this. And why? Because God loves to set up obstacles and then overcome them. He loves to show his power by doing something that only he can do. And so it's like a little lake up there by the time they get done, there's water everywhere. It's like a pond, there's just water dripping all over everything. It's just the exact opposite of that which will burn, humanly speaking. And so God is setting up an obstacle. It reminds me of the time when he calls out Gideon with an army, and they're going to go take on the Midianites, right? And what does He say to Gideon? He says, "Gideon, you have too many men here." Has there ever been a general that thought that, “Gee, my army's just too big, I need to send most of them home.” And then he says that a second time to Gideon, "It's still too many men here. I don't want you boasting against me that you did it by your own strength." That's what he says. So he gets it down to 300 guys who can lap water like a dog, and they're going to hold pots, and they're going to crash them and stand there and watch God win the victory. “Yeah, but I was a pot holder that day.” Well, there's not really much in that is there? God honored and glorified his own name. God loves to set up obstacles that only he can overcome. And so that sacrifice is totally drenched with water.

You know something? We are in the business of removing obstacles and difficulties all the time, aren't we? You look at car manufacturers, how many difficulties are they seeking to overcome for you? Electric seats, that little air bladder. We've got this little thing that adjusts just to your lumbar region if you... Do you have one of those? They're always thinking of ways to remove difficulties from your life. God is actually thinking of ways to put difficulties in your life, and yet not discourage you. How much difficulty can he or she handle today? That's how much I'm going to measure out. Why, because that's when you grow in faith. When you see God do things that only he can do. Constantly trying to remove the difficulties, here, God tells Elijah, “Put some difficulty in there. It's too easy right now. Everything's crackling dry, and waiting to ignite. I want them to know what happened here that day.” And so it's soaked, soaked, soaked. And at the time of the evening sacrifice, Elijah draws near to the people. He comes near to them, and he prays.

Now it's interesting, it's the time of the evening sacrifice. Evening sacrifice is done where? Well, it's done at the temple in Jerusalem, right? And so there's a solidarity there. That sacrifice is going to go on the exact same time as the one going on in Israel or in Jerusalem. And it all points to Christ, doesn't it? All old covenant sacrifice points ahead to Christ. There's that dead bull on there, and the wrath and the fire is going to fall down from heaven on the bull and not on the people. Praise God for that. That is the essence of your salvation. It's on the substitute that the wrath falls. It's on the substitute that the judgment comes, not on you, not on the people.

And so Elijah steps forward and he prays. And this is what he prays, "O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel. Let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that these people will know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you're turning their hearts back again." 63 words in the English translation, that's it. It reminds me of Jesus's even shorter prayer in front of Lazarus's tomb. "Father, I thank you that you heard me. I know that you always hear me, but I'm praying for the benefit of the people standing around here that they will know that you sent me," end of prayer. That's it. What a contrast to the kind of praying that went on for hours by the prophets of Baal. Jesus said this, "When you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them for your heavenly Father knows what you need before you ask," right? The real issue is that Elijah had prepared himself all his life for this moment. He was holy, he was righteous. He was there at God's command. And in the prayer he says that, he says, "I want them to know that you are God, you alone are God, and that I am here as your servant and have done all this only at your word." So many people think faith is just leaping out and doing something big and spectacular, and God will have to bless it. Is that what faith is? Jesus was tempted that way. “Jump off the pinnacle of the temple.” Jesus said, "No, because I have no word from my father to do that. And when he tells me to jump off the pinnacle of the temple, he will send his angels to rescue me. But until then, I'm not jumping." Faith instead steps inside the will of God and doesn't go out. And so it was God that told him to do this whole contest. Yes, God wanted this done. God is a spectacular being. He wanted this thing done, this wasn't Elijah's idea. And so everything that he had done, he had done at the command of God's simple prayer.

And what was the goal? Verse 37, "Answer me, O Lord, answer me so that these people will know that you O Lord are God and that you're turning their hearts back again." Can you control your heart? Think about it. Can you turn your heart back to God? Who does the heart turning here according to Elijah? It's God who must turn your heart. Ask him. Ask him. If your heart is hard, say, “God soften my heart.” How many prayers are there in the Psalms about one's heart, the psalmist's heart? “God work in my heart. Move in my heart, change my heart. Transform my heart.” And here, Elijah prays, "Turn their heart back to you." And that's exactly God's point. It's his purpose. And then in verse 38, it says, "Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil." Do you see that? The dirt. He burned up the dirt? Yes, He burned up the dirt. He burned up the stones? Yes, He burned up the stones. Do you know that everything has a burning point? Did you realize that? Every single material has a combustion point. It's all burnable. And the word of God says it's all going to burn someday. All the soil, all the stones, all of it are going to be consumed, 2 Peter 3, in a huge fire that will melt the elements. That's what it says, stoicheio, the Greek word for element will melt in the heat. It's kind of a nuclear thing, Steve, I'll talk about that later. But it's a melting of the elements. God is capable of burning anything. And you know why? Because our God is a consuming fire. We love to say, “O God, he is love,” and he is love. He's also holy. He is a consuming fire, and he consumed that sacrifice that day. Would've done it to the people had it not been for Jesus. Do you understand that? If it weren't for Jesus, he would've consumed the people that day, and they would've deserved it. But thank God for Jesus. Thank God that He is our atoning sacrifice.

Now, one final footnote: 450 prophets of Baal. They perished that day, and they perished under the law of Moses because they were false teachers. There was no outreach to the prophets of Baal. There was no effort made by Elijah on their part. They were false prophets and false teachers. And false prophets and false teachers are the vicious enemies of the church. Always have been; always will be. The most damage ever done is done by false doctrine, by false teaching. And so under the law of Moses, they perished that day. It was a theocracy. God ruled, and his law said they must perish, and they did perish that day. Next, God willing, the rain comes. And you know something, it's no accident that first we deal with this, the fire falling from heaven, and then God's blessing is opened up. The hearts turn back to the people. They fall to the ground and say, “The Lord, he is God. The Lord, he is God.” And then God's ready to send the rain again. Think about your own life. Are there any idols that are creeping into your hearts? Is your heart hard toward God? Turn to him. Repent. Do the things you did before. The church at Ephesus in Revelation 2 said that. Allow God to move in you today.