1 Kings 19:1-8 - Victory to fear

Elijah's actions did not go unchallenged. Ahab told Jezebel and she issued death threats against Elijah. This struck fear into the heart of Elijah. Now this is amazing from one perspective, for Elijah has been living a life of miracles. He has raised the dead, seen fire fall from heaven, defeat all the false prophets and caused the weather! Yet now he is in great fear, so much so that it sends him into a deep depression. But this is a very human reaction. We must never build our lives on outward circumstances, they are a fickle foundation. The circumstances can change so easily, but more than this, they actually provide no foundation at all. Just as here, something else can come in, Jezebel's threat in this case, that totally undermines our life. God is the only sure foundation.

Why was he so afraid of this woman? She had power in the kingdom and had already had many other prophets of God killed. But why did Elijah not think that God could save him from her, especially after all He had already done for Elijah? Our hearts can be very fickle indeed. We often think that if only we saw great miracles we would have no problems believing. This is simply not true. There is also the possibility that behind Jezebel there was demonic power. Now Charismatics are beloved of speaking of the Jezebel spirit and there is mention of this elsewhere in the Bible, but not here. So we will leave things hanging for the time being. In a sense this is more realistic, for things often happen in life for which there is no obvious explanation.

Elijah ran out into the desert and wanted to die. An angel of the Lord appeared to Elijah. Now if an angel appeared to us we might expect it to say something significant to us, a great message from God. What did this angel say? "Get up and eat", and it had to do this twice. Sometimes God is much more practical than we are. Elijah did as he was told and went on to Horeb. Horeb is probably another name for Mount Sinai.

1 Kings 18:16-46 - Battle of Mount Carmel

We now come to the most famous incident in Elijah's life, the battle on Mount Carmel. 

Obadiah went to see Ahab, despite his misgivings, and so Ahab went to meet Elijah. Ahab called Elijah that "troubler of Israel", when in fact the truth of the matter was that it was Ahab and his idol worship that was the source of the trouble. This is what Elijah tells Ahab. Disobedience to God is the source of a nation's problems, not the prophet who tells them to repent. 

Elijah now summons the prophets of the false gods to a confrontation on Mount Carmel, there were over eight hundred of these. This is an indication of how deep rooted the baal and asherah worship had become in the nation.

Ahab agreed. When they had all gathered Elijah laid down the challenge. This was to see who was really God. The reason for worshipping the Lord is not philosophical, but the simple fact that He is Lord, He is the creator of all things and the sustainer of all things. The challenge was to the people, they had to decide who they would follow. But the people remained silent. However, Elijah was not leaving them to make the decision without evidence. Faith is not, despite the claims of atheists, believing something without, or even despite, evidence.

The challenge would be to see who would send down fire on a sacrifice, the baals or God. The battle was, in superficial terms, uneven. For there were over eight hundred false prophets, though verse 22 seems to indicate it was only baals prophets who were being challenged at this point. That still made it 450-1. The people agreed to this.

So the prophets of baal tried to get their "god" to send down fire, without any success. Elijah taunted the prophets. They tried all the harder, but to no effect. 

Elijah then restored the Lord's altar. Then he poured water over the sacrifice, just to make it clear beyond all doubt that only the Lord could send fire. Fire duly fell. The  people then had to acknowledge that the Lord was God. Elijah commanded that the prophets of ball be seized and slaughtered. 

Elijah then gives the message to Ahab that rain is about to come. This is a statement of faith. Elijah went up to the top of Carmel and told his servant to look for a cloud. Eventually a tiny cloud appeared. Elijah then knew that rain was about to come.

1 Kings 18:1-16 - Elijah and Obadiah

The Lord now instructs Elijah to go to Ahab and say that the Lord will send rain, this was probably after about three years of drought.
Menawhile Obadiah had been summoned by Ahab. Obadiah was working secretly to help save as many of God' prophets as possible from Jezebel who was seeking to kill of the prophets. The enemy does not want people who will speak the word of God. The same is true today which is why we witness our society trying to silence the preaching of God's word. So we see that God has people who work in outright opposition to the enemy, as Elijah did, and people who work in a more covert fashion. We should never imagine that God has only one manner of working.
The drought was getting very serious and Ahab was having to hunt harder and harder for food to keep the animals alive.
Obadiah meets Elijah on his way back and is not too pleased. He knows that Elijah is considered an enemy of Israel and can see only trouble. This is made even worse by Elijah's instruction to Obadiah to go and tell Ahab that Elijah is back. So Elijah goes himself to the king.

1 Kings 17 - Elijah

In the midst of all this disobedience God is still at work, and now we will read of His servant Elijah. No matter how rebellious a nation becomes God does not leave Himself without a witness.
Elijah goes to Ahab and tells him there will be no rain for several years until he says so. Why does God do this? It is to demonstrate to Ahab that God is Lord, not any of these baals who he is worshipping. Moreover, baal was a supposed god of fertility. The futility of this would be clearly demonstrated.
Meantime, Elijah would also be absent from the land, so there would be no natural nor heavenly rain (ie the word of the Lord) in the land. Elijah would be taken care of, would be provided for by rain from a brook, and ravens would provide food. 
Eventually the brook dried up. So we see that God's provision for Elijah was partly natural (the brook) and partly supernatural (the ravens). When it dried up the Lord told Elijah to go to Zarephath where He had directed a widow to provide for him. God speaks to all sorts of people and uses all sorts of people to fulfil His purposes.
When Elijah reaches the widow it seems that things have not be taken care of, for she has no food to give him. In fact she thinks she and her son are about to die. So we see more of God's provision here. God is going to save the woman as well, and do it supernaturally. We want to have everything worked out well beforehand, but that is not always God's way. Elijah pronounced the word that the resources would not run out, and this word was true.
Then the woman's son died and she was distressed and angry with Elijah. Elijah then brought her son back to life.

1 Kings 16 - Divsion and Violence

Jehu brought word of God's judgement to Baasha. He actually continued this ministry for about fifty years. When men become leaders we tend to become proud and arrogant, thinking we are there on merit and by our own efforts, and use the position to achieve our own ends. Jehu's word reminds the king that he is there purely because God has raised him to that position, Jesus reminded Pilate of the same truth (John 19:11), and that we are there to serve God's purposes not our own. As with many other kings, reference is made to the other things that the king did and achieved being recorded in the annals. Our lasting legacy is determined by our moral uprightness. Since Baasha did evil he left a legacy of judgement on the nation, not of blessing. 

His son succeeded him, but Elah was not better, getting drunk while the army was fighting. So Zimri killed him and assumed the kingship, killing all of Baaasha's family. However, Zimri did not last long, reigning for only a very short time.

For a time Israel was split in two, but Omri led the stronger faction and became king. "Sinned more than ..." The sin in the kings and in the nation increased. Then came Ahab, one of the worst kings they ever had (which is saying something). He married Jezebel and this led to baal worship spreading throughout the land, and Ahab himself worshipped baal. He rebuilt Jericho and suffered the judgement declared by Joshua (Josh 6:26).

We see a land of constant intrigue, division and violence, with no stability at all. This is the result of rebellion against God. We see this pattern repeated in many nations today. As rebellion against God increases a land becomes more and more ungovernable.

1 Kings 15 - More bad kings, plus one good one

Abijah was the next king of Judah (both Rehoboam and Jeroboam had sons called Abijah). Abijah did evil in the eyes of the Lord. Sadly it is a common refrain in 1 and 2 Kings that such and such a king did evil and was not like David, and the nation invariably followed the same road. The overriding message of Kings is the sinfulness of the people and the consequences of this sin. A point I have made several times before is, "if this book was purely man-made do you think Israel would really have written this book about herself?" For this book clearly shows, justifiably, Israel in a bad light.

The Bible makes reference to David's faithfulness, and also points out his sin against Uriah. 

There was continual war between Judah and Israel. The results are not mentioned here, largely because they are immaterial. The sin within each nation and the disunity between them were the fruit of their behaviour.

We then get a welcome break, Asa one of the better kings. He also reigned for a more substantial period, forty one years. Asa got rid of the temple prostitutes and cleared many of the idols away. He also deposed his grandmother from her position as queen mother. However, Asa did not get rid of the high places, though Kings speaks well of Asa's heart.

There was was war between Judah and Israel and it seems that Israel was the stronger. So Asa used silver and gold from the temple to get help from Damascus. So Israel was thwarted, and Asa built up some of the towns of Judah.

Meanwhile Nadab became king of Israel and did evil in the eyes of the Lord. There was strife within the kingdom and much bloodshed and Baasha succeeded Nadab. However, he just committed the same sins.

1 Kings 14 - Two bad kings

Jereboam evidently felt as though he was persona non-grata amongst the prophets, so when his son became ill and he needed help he sent his wife to the prophet Ahijah, and in disguise. He clearly knew that Ahijah was reliable, having earlier prophesied what would happen to Solomon's kingdom. 

However, this subterfuge did not work as God spoke to the prophet what was happening. Men cannot defeat God! Ahijah then gave Jereboam's wife the word of God. This condemned him for his disobedience in not following the way of David. So disaster would come upon him and the nation. Moreover, the boy would die. The boy was the only one who would be buried in Israel, and the only one in whom the Lord found anything good. Now this seems rather strange to us that the boy's "reward" for this is to die.

The key lesson from all this is that ruler's need to know that they are there to fulfil God's commands, not follow their own way.

Meanwhile things were no better in Judah. Rehoboam set up all sorts of idols. It seems to be inferred that this is partly a result of Rehoboam being the son of an Ammonite woman. Egypy attacked Judah and took off the gold shields, along with other goods. So Rehoboam was reduced to using bronze shields, but then seemed to carry on as before. Rehoboam died and was succeeded by his son Abijah.