1 Reis 18
F.B. Meyer · Citado em PreceptAustin
1 Reis 18
Meyer - See, with what malignant glances his every movement is watched by the priests. No tiger ever watched its victim more fiercely! If they may have their way, he will never touch yonder plain again.
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Meyer - TAKING SIDES "Who is on the Lord's side!"-- Ex 32:26. "How long halt ye between two opinions! If the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, follow him. And the people answered him not a word."-- 1Ki 18:21. MOSES AND Elijah uttered practically the same call, which is always being spoken to each fresh generation. As soon as we can think for ourselves, we are accosted by the challenge of the Divine Voice- Art thou for Me or against Me? Which side dost thou take? From the lips of our blessed Lord comes the additional challenge, which compels us to face the alternative as one that may not be trifled with or put aside: "He that is not with Me is against Me." How long halt ye between two opinions? We must take one side or the other. When the division-bell rings in the House of Commons, the Ayes must go to the right and the Noes to the left. A man must choose which he will take! If Jehovah, If Baal, We cannot be neutral without being stultified. Who, then, is prepared to take sides, and to come out to Christ, without the camp, bearing His reproach? (Heb 13:13). To be on the Lord's side is to acknowledge Him as our King as well as Saviour. It is to render to Him our reverence, obedience, love and devotion. It is to abandon all refuges and resorts to our own works and ways, and to strive for heart, mind, and life to be assimilated to His will and character. This is what our Saviour expects and asks of each of us! We are to belong wholly to God, to give Him all that we are capable of giving, to choose His cause, and to find in Him the beginning and ending, the first and last. Jesus Christ possesses an unimpeachable and absolute right over us--the right of Creator, "it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves"; the right of Benefactor, not only in the realm of temporal but of spiritual existence; the right of Redeemer, and this is the greatest claim of all. Our decision demands declaration. Christ will not have His followers live in secret. In the days in which we live, when there are so many temptations to compromise between the disciples of Jesus and the votaries of the world, there is overwhelming reason why we should take His side. And in that great day, He will take our side and acknowledge us before His Father and the Holy Angels! PRAYER O Lord, we acknowledge Thy dominion over us; our life, our death, our soul and body, all belong to Thee. Grant that we may willingly consecrate them all to Thee, and use them in Thy service. AMEN. Vance Havner - SPECTATORS And the people answered him not a word.... 1 Kings 18:21. And sitting down they watched him there.... Matthew 27:36. When Elijah called the priests of Baal and the people of Israel to a showdown between God and Baal, they refused to take a stand. At Calvary, they crucified my Lord and then they watched Him die. Whether Carmel or Calvary, we have set forth here that spectatoritis is the sin of both country and church today. We are a nation of onlookers, a grandstand generation in the stadium, at the show, at home watching television. The church has become a professional pulpitism financed by lay spectators. Everything is geared to showmanship and entertainment that involves no commitment. It is easier to dramatize than to duplicate so what was once an experience has become a performance. We are playactors which is of course another way of saying hypocrites. Vance Havner - Stand Up and Be Counted! And the people answered him not a word. I Kings 18:21. There were seven thousand in Israel who had not bowed their knees to Baal. There were four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal. They could be counted, but Elijah's audience was noncommittal. They did not declare themselves. They were spectators, onlookers. Too many Christians are in the grandstand when they should be on the team. Too many are snug at home reading communiques from the front instead of going to the battle. Too many in our meetings are spectators. They are great onlookers. They get used to it at the movies and in the stadium, and they come to church to be entertained. But we are all participants in eternal issues, whether we know it or not. "He that is not with me is against me, and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad." We cannot play hands off and answer not a word. "The Lord knoweth them that are his," but He wants us to stand up and be counted Round Toes or Square Toes? President Ronald Reagan learned the need for decision making early in his life. A kindly aunt had taken him to a cobbler to have a pair of shoes custom-made for him. The shoemaker asked, "Do you want a round toe or a square toe?" Young Ronald hemmed and hawed, so the cobbler said, "Come back in a day or two and tell me what you want." A few days later the cobbler saw young Reagan on the street and asked what he had decided about the shoes. "I haven't made up my mind," Reagan answered. "Very well," said the cobbler. "Your shoes will be ready tomorrow." When Reagan got the shoes, one had a round toe and the other a square toe. Says Reagan, "Looking at those shoes every day taught me a lesson. If you don't make your own decisions, somebody else makes them for you." Vance Havner - Elijah's Decision Showdown on Carmel By Elijah's Decision I mean the choice he called upon Israel to make: "How long halt ye between two opinions? if the Lord be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him." (See 1 Kings 18:21.) Elijah, that solitary prophet of God, broke out of the woods to announce three years of dry weather. When he appeared again, famine was raging in Samaria. It had rained on neither the just nor the unjust. In the eighteenth chapter of First Kings, rain is promised in verse 1 and provided in verse 45, but between those verses, preparation was made for showers of blessing. Rain is a symbol of the favor of God in revival. Shut up heaven that there be no rain (see Deuteronomy 11:17) is a figure of spiritual drought. We live in such a drought today. There is a famine of the hearing of the words of the Lord, partly because it cannot be heard and partly because so many will not hear it. The drama on Mount Carmel sets before us a pattern for spiritual revival. In order to understand that pattern, we must study the background and the characters that move upon this scene. First, there was that rugged man of God, Elijah. Spiritual awakenings usually are spearheaded by a prophet. Elijah was no superman; he was subject to the same passions as we are, but he prayed, and prayed earnestly, and in that, he outstrips us. He could pray down fire or water. We need both today, the fire of the Spirit and showers of revival. He got ready for his mission by the brook Cherith (see 1 Kings 17:3) as did Paul in Arabia (see Galatians 1:17). Every man of God needs a session by the brook before going into battle. Then there were Ahab, the weakling, and the notorious Jezebel. (See 1 Kings 16:29-33; 17:1-6; 18:4, 13.) They set up the worship of Baal in Israel, and through Athaliah, they did the same in Judah. Jezebel was one of the most wicked women on record. She persecuted the prophets of the Lord and frightened even the sturdy Elijah; so that he took off for the wilderness. In Revelation 2:18-23, we read of another Jezebel, in the church at Thyatira. The church is still plagued with her kind. She would mix the church with the world, join the altar of Jehovah with the altar of Baal, the mystery of godliness with the mystery of lawlessness. She hates prophets, and when Elijah calls for a showdown on Carmel, she wants to murder him on the spot. She teaches and seduces Christians to commit spiritual adultery, forgetting that they are married to Christ, espoused to one spiritual husband. Our Lord condemned the church for suffering—tolerating—Jezebel. We do the same today, and God judges us as much by what we allow as by what we practice. We need a prophet to call the church to decision between Jehovah and Baal, between Christ and Belial. On the way to meet Ahab, Elijah found Obadiah, who was a good man but lined up with Ahab looking for grass, when he should have been with Elijah praying for rain. It is true that Obadiah hid one hundred prophets in a cave, but prophets that must be hidden in a cave probably would not be worth much in broad daylight! Obadiah was a religious politician trying to work both sides of the street. If Israel had turned to God, it would not have been necessary to send out grass-hunting expeditions. It is not necessary to look for grass when God sends rain, but there will be no showers, until first there is a showdown. There is spiritual famine today and some well-meaning church leaders are trying to alleviate the drought by social reforms and government projects under church auspices. We are oversupplied with Obadiahs, but are woefully short on prophets who can stand on Carmel and call God's people to repentance. A little grass may be discovered now and then by Obadiah's foragers, but it is not God's way to relieve drought and famine. We have no business entangling ourselves with the affairs of this life and becoming infected with the futile enthusiasms of this age. Glorified socialism under the banner of the church is not the answer to our ills today. It is more popular to stand in with the powers that be and team up with Ahab instead of taking one's place with lonely Elijah. Today church convocations spend much of their time trying to work out a grass-hunting program when every one of them ought to turn into a showdown on Carmel, praying down fire and water from heaven. God has plainly told us that if He withholds rain, He will send showers of blessing when His people humble themselves, pray, seek His face, and turn from their wicked ways. The difference between Obadiah and Elijah was this Obadiah tried to remedy the situation from within the establishment; Elijah sought to change it from without. Obadiah lacked conviction and courage, for otherwise he would never have had a job in Ahab's administration. He reminds us of Lot in Sodom. Both men were vexed and shocked by what they saw—Obadiah in Samaria and Lot in Sodom—but neither of them changed the situation. Dr. F. B. Meyer said: "There is not a single hero or saint whose name sparkles on the inspired page, who moved his times from within: all, without exception, have raised the cry, 'Let us go forth without the camp.'" They tell us today, "Stay in the world, join its clubs, attend its festivities, copy its styles and fashions." That is like a good woman marrying a bad man in order to reform him. The man who joins the world to level it up will find himself leveled down. The church that marries the world becomes worldly instead of making the world become Christian. The times do not need an Obadiah, but an Elijah, to confront Ahab and call for a showdown on Carmel. Archimedes said he could move the earth if he had somewhere to stand. Men who have moved the world have not done it from within: their lever was rested on a fulcrum without. "And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and thou hast followed Baalim" (1 Kings 18:17, 18). That put the shoe on the right foot; yet Elijah was a troubler of Israel, one in that noble succession of disturbers of the peace who, through the ages, have kept nations off the rocks and God's people from slumbering their time away. They have aroused sanctuary sleepers, given wicked rulers insomnia, and brought discomfort to the palaces of the mighty. How we need troublers of Israel today! William
1 Reis 18
Meyer - Few of us have faith like this! We are not so sure of God that we dare to pile difficulties in His way. We all try our best to make it easy for Him to help us. Yet what Elijah had, we too may have, by prayer and fasting. 1 Kings 18:34 And he said, “Fill four pitchers with water and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.” And he said, “Do it a second time,” and they did it a second time. And he said, “Do it a third time,” and they did it a third time. Fill four: Da 3:19,25 Joh 11:39,40 19:33,34 pour it: Jdg 6:20 Do it a second: 2Co 4:2 8:21 SOAKING THE SACRIFICE AND WOOD WITH WATER And he said, “Fill four pitchers with water and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.” And he said, “Do it a second time,” and they did it a second time. And he said, “Do it a third time,” and they did it a third time. There is a perennial spring near this traditional site, from which the water may have been brought.
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Meyer - We scarcely recognize him, he seems so to have lost his identity. A few hours before, he stood erect as an oak of Bashan; now, he is bowed as a bulrush. Then as God’s ambassador he pleaded with man; now as man’s intercessor he pleads with God. Is it not always so – that the men who stand straightest in the presence of sin bow lowest in the presence of God.” Philip Ryken offers an incisive commentary on prayer (it certainly cut to the quick of my heart as I read it)... How did Elijah do it? How did he keep the home fire burning? Elijah tended the flame through prayer. The interpretation that the apostle James offers of the life and ministry of the prophet Elijah cannot be escaped (see James 5:16–18). We keep coming back to it again and again: first and foremost, Elijah was a man of prayer. Let us be honest, though: prayer does not sound very exciting to us. We are ready to go up the mountain with Elijah, ready to confront the people of Israel, ready to mock the prophets of Baal, ready to see the fire of God, and ready to fall on our faces and worship God. Perhaps we are even ready to put sin to death. But are we ready to pray? Most of us find prayer to be such difficult labor that it does not excite us. Prayer is an intensely spiritual activity that cuts against the grain of our natural inclinations. For proof, consider what happens in a typical prayer meeting, where people spend plenty of time enjoying fellowship, sharing requests, discussing life’s problems, and doing anything and everything except praying. Prayer is always the first thing to go. It is the first thing to go during a busy week, the first thing we leave out of our morning routine, the first thing we abandon when we go on vacation. Prayer is raw spirituality, and most of us are not very spiritual. Yet there is no other way to receive the blessings of God except through prayer. All the spiritual blessings that God has to give come through a life of petition and intercession. If we want the good things that God loves to give, we must pray for them. Wisdom for life’s decisions comes through prayer. So does the awesome presence of God in worship. Conversions to faith in Christ, the revival fire of the Holy Spirit, the reformation of a culture—it all comes through prayer. When we look behind any great movement of the Spirit of God, we will always find prayer. Consider the Moravian revival of 1727. It began in a prayer meeting: “So overwhelmed were the people with the Presence of God, they were convicted to pray 24 hours a day, 7 days a week—and this lasted over 100 years, with astounding results around the world.”1 Or consider the ministry of William Carey, the father of modern missions and soul-winning evangelist to India. The secret of his success? Carey’s supporters included a paralyzed, bedridden sister who prayed incessantly for him for fifty years. (Borrow Liberating ministry from the success syndrome page 74) Spiritual blessings come from God through prayer. There is no way around it. There is no other way to receive spiritual blessings but to pray for them. We cannot have a demonstration of the power of God in our lives, our worship, our evangelism, our families, our church, or our nation without prevailing in prayer. Frankly, this comes as a disappointment to many Christians. Elijah was able to get a whole nation to the top of a high mountain to see a bullfight. But imagine what would have happened if he had called it a prayer meeting instead. It really was a prayer meeting, of course, but the people in marketing would never let Elijah advertise it that way. No one would show up! Except the firekeepers, that is. The firekeepers would be there, tending the flame, praying to God, and waiting for his Spirit to descend with fire. The spiritual firekeepers would gather in the longhouse for prayer, kindling their heart-fires and blowing on the coals of biblical faith. We can become firekeepers like Elijah. We must become firekeepers, because prayer is the only way to stay warm with God. Cold days are coming for the church. We need to know how to keep the flame of faith in Jesus Christ alive in the longhouse so that other people can gather next to us and get warm. (1 Kings- digital edition or hardbound copy 1 Kings - Reformed Expository Commentary) (Bolding added) J. C. Ryle on the practice of selfless prayer: We are all selfish by nature, and our selfishness is very apt to stick to us, even when we are converted I commend to you the importance of intercession in our prayers. We are all selfish by nature, and our selfishness is very apt to stick to us, even when we are converted. There is a tendency in us to think only of our own souls, our own spiritual conflicts, our own progress in religion, and to forget others. Against this tendency we all have need to watch and strive, and not least in our prayers. We should study to be of a public spirit. We should stir ourselves up to name other names besides our own before the throne of grace.… This is the highest charity. He loves me best who loves me in his prayers. This is for our soul’s health. It enlarges our sympathies and expands our hearts. This is for the benefit of the church. The wheels of all machinery for extending the gospel are moved by prayer. (See Practical Religion and topic A Call to Prayer) Hudson Taylor, the pioneer missionary to China, was mystified by the numbers of souls being won to Christ at a particular mission station. He was mystified, that is, until he met a man back in England at the end of one of his public addresses. The man was so thoroughly conversant with that particular work that Taylor asked him how he knew so much about it. “Oh!” he replied, “the missionary there and I are old collegemates; for years we have regularly corresponded; he has sent me the names of inquirers and converts, and these I have daily taken to God in prayer.”7 This was the secret: a man praying daily and definitely for specific conversions. (From E M Bounds The Purpose of Prayer page 53) Alan Carr: How he prayed can help us to be more effective prayer warriors for the glory of God. – He Was Humble – v. 42b, He bowed himself before the presence of the Lord. The man of God had stood tall as an ambassador of the Lord, now he bows low as an intercessor before the Lord! It would do us good to remember that God does not exist merely to answer our prayers or fulfill our wishes. He is God and he will honor the person who comes into his presence humbly, 1 Pet. 5:5-6; James 4:6; 10 – He Was Specific – v. 43, James 5:17-18 tells us that Elijah was very specific in his prayer life. He did not waste time on mere generalities, but he prayed in faith specifically naming the things that needed to be done. – He Was Earnest – Elijah was sincere about his prayer, James 5:16-18. He did not take a spiritless attitude toward his prayer life, but he prayed with fervency. His soul was moved with the need of the people. He felt the pressure of the thing he prayed for! – He Was Persistent – v. 43, eight times the servant is told to go and look toward the sea. Seven times there is nothing there. Yet, Elijah kept praying and kept believing. He did not allow the outward circumstance affect his inward assurance that the answer was on the way. He was persistent! – He Was Expectant – v. 41, 43 – Elijah kept praying and kept sending his servant to look to the sea. Why? Because he was operating in faith in the promise of God. He knew the rains were coming. He was expecting big things from God! (Note: the word for “rain” in verse 41 refers to a heavy downpour. Elijah was expecting big things from a big God!) -He Was Answered – v. 44 – On the eighth trip, the servant saw a little cloud rising out of the sea. When this news is brought to Elijah, the prophet knew that God’s answer had come. His prayers had prevailed and God was sending the rains! F B Meyer - Our Daily Homily So Ahab went up to eat and drink. And Elijah went up to the top of Carmel. Such differences obtain still. The children of this world and the children of light are manifest. What though the bodies of four hundred and fifty prophets lay slain in the gorge of the Kishon; or that by one great act Elijah had hewn down the upas tree, the deadly, influence of which had corrupted Palestine; or that the long-expected rain was in the air— yet Ahab must eat and drink. These are the things which the children of the world seek after. Watch and pray, lest you enter into this temptation. Let appetite be kept well in hand— your servant, not your master; and see to it that you are capable of such profound and absorbing interest in the things of the Kingdom of God, as to count the gratification of physical desire unworthy to be compared with the high delights of service, prayer, and communion with the unseen. Though he must have been exhausted with the excitements and efforts of the day, Elijah must spend the evening hour with God. Though he knew that the rain was near, he felt that his prayers were a needful condition for its bestowment. Though any part of Carmel might have become his oratory, he sought the lonely solitudes of the summit with the outspread sea before him, that his soul might hold undisturbed vigil, and that he might see over the wide expanse of the ocean the first tokens of the coming answer. His attitude denoted his humility. His repeated injunction to the lad, his perseverance. His success approved his faith. Stand, O suppliant soul, on the highest point of expectant hope; see the hurrying answer, which was being prepared from pools and lakes and seas, long ere thy prayer began. “Before they call, I will answer.” 1 Kings 18:43 He said to his servant, “Go up now, look toward the sea.” So he went up and looked and said, “There is nothing.” And he said, “Go back” seven times. Go up now, look toward the sea: Ps 5:3 Lu 18:1 Go back: Ge 32:26 Hab 2:3 Lu 18:7 Eph 6:18 Heb 10:36,37 LOOK AT THE SEA He said to his servant, “Go up now, look toward the sea.” Rain normally came on Carmel from the west, from the Mediterranean Sea. So he went up and looked and said, “There is nothing.” And he said, “Go back” (return) seven times - Elijah had already proclaimed in 1 Kings 18:41 that he heard “the sound of the abundance of rain,” yet there was no visible sign of rain. Seven times being symbolic of completion or divine fulfillment (creation in 7 days, walk 7x around Jericho, etc). Note that this also signifies Elijah was showing persistence (and faith) in his prayer.