First Kings 17:19

The Bible says in First Kings 17:19-24, “And he said unto her, Give me thy son. And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into a loft, where he abode, and laid him upon his own bed.[20] And he cried unto the LORD, and said, O LORD my God, hast thou also brought evil upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?[21] And he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried unto the LORD, and said, O LORD my God, I pray thee, let this child's soul come into him again.[22] And the LORD heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived.[23] And Elijah took the child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house, and delivered him unto his mother: and Elijah said, See, thy son liveth.[24] And the woman said to Elijah, Now by this I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of the LORD in thy mouth is truth.” Elijah is speaking in verse nineteen. Notice one of the first things that Elijah does: he prays. It says in verse twenty, “he cried unto the LORD.” Hopefully, we have learned to go quickly to the Lord with our troubles. Do not wait. And then one of the great miracles of the Old Testament took place: the little boy was given his life back. The little boy had to leave heaven and come back to earth: not so good for him, but good for his grieving mother. This is a passage that shows that everything fits into God’s plan. Even the things that we think are bad work out to a good conclusion for believers. That is because God is leading our lives and He loves us. Romans 8:28, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, and to them that are the called according to His purpose.”

The Bible says in First Kings 18:1-4, “And it came to pass after many days, that the word of the LORD came to Elijah in the third year, saying, Go, shew thyself unto Ahab; and I will send rain upon the earth.[2] And Elijah went to shew himself unto Ahab. And there was a sore famine in Samaria.[3] And Ahab called Obadiah, which was the governor of his house. (Now Obadiah feared the LORD greatly:[4] For it was so, when Jezebel cut off the prophets of the LORD, that Obadiah took an hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.)” The scene has been set. Three years have gone by and God is going to stop the famine in the land. Life is like that: bad things come and then they go, because God takes the bad things away. He brought them in the first place, so He can take them away when He wants. God tells Elijah to go and tell the king Ahab that the famine will end now. We are told something about wicked Jezebel in verse four. She killed some of the prophets of the Lord. She was probably angry about the famine, and instead of repenting and turning to the Lord, she was angry with the Lord’s messengers.

The Bible says in First Kings 18:5-16, “And Ahab said unto Obadiah, Go into the land, unto all fountains of water, and unto all brooks: peradventure we may find grass to save the horses and mules alive, that we lose not all the beasts.[6] So they divided the land between them to pass throughout it: Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself.[7] And as Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him: and he knew him, and fell on his face, and said, Art thou that my lord Elijah?[8] And he answered him, I am: go, tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here.[9] And he said, What have I sinned, that thou wouldest deliver thy servant into the hand of Ahab, to slay me?[10] As the LORD thy God liveth, there is no nation or kingdom, whither my lord hath not sent to seek thee: and when they said, He is not there; he took an oath of the kingdom and nation, that they found thee not.[11] And now thou sayest, Go, tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here.[12] And it shall come to pass, as soon as I am gone from thee, that the Spirit of the LORD shall carry thee whither I know not; and so when I come and tell Ahab, and he cannot find thee, he shall slay me: but I thy servant fear the LORD from my youth.[13] Was it not told my lord what I did when Jezebel slew the prophets of the LORD, how I hid an hundred men of the LORD's prophets by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water?[14] And now thou sayest, Go, tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here: and he shall slay me.[15] And Elijah said, As the LORD of hosts liveth, before whom I stand, I will surely shew myself unto him to day.[16] So Obadiah went to meet Ahab, and told him: and Ahab went to meet Elijah.” These verses tell us how wicked King Ahab was. Obadiah is so afraid that Ahab will murder him that it takes quite a bit of coaxing from Elijah to get Obadiah to take a message to Ahab. Elijah is doing God’s will, and so he is going to see Ahab, no matter what the danger is.

The story that follows is one of the great events of the Old Testament. The Bible says in First Kings 18:17-20, “And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel?[18] And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the LORD, and thou hast followed Baalim.[19] Now therefore send, and gather to me all Israel unto mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, which eat at Jezebel's table.[20] So Ahab sent unto all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto mount Carmel.” In verse seventeen Ahab did exactly what many politicians do: he blamed Elijah for what he himself was guilty of. Ahab also blamed Elijah for the famine as if Elijah had brought the famine. But God brought the famine on the land. Ahab needed to think about why God brought such a great famine on the land. Ahab’s sins were the reasons. Ahab’s sins involved terrible false religion and Ahab was corrupting the people of Israel. But God is going to show Ahab and all of Israel who is the one true God. That is why all the false prophets are being gathered to mount Carmel.

The Bible says in First Kings 18:21-36, “ And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.[22] Then said Elijah unto the people, I, even I only, remain a prophet of the LORD; but Baal's prophets are four hundred and fifty men.[23] Let them therefore give us two bullocks; and let them choose one bullock for themselves, and cut it in pieces, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under: and I will dress the other bullock, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under:[24] And call ye on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the LORD: and the God that answereth by fire, let him be God. And all the people answered and said, It is well spoken.[25] And Elijah said unto the prophets of Baal, Choose you one bullock for yourselves, and dress it first; for ye are many; and call on the name of your gods, but put no fire under.[26] And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. And they leaped upon the altar which was made.[27] And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked.[28] And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them.[29] And it came to pass, when midday was past, and they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded.[30] And Elijah said unto all the people, Come near unto me. And all the people came near unto him. And he repaired the altar of the LORD that was broken down.[31] And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, unto whom the word of the LORD came, saying, Israel shall be thy name:[32] And with the stones he built an altar in the name of the LORD: and he made a trench about the altar, as great as would contain two measures of seed.[33] And he put the wood in order, and cut the bullock in pieces, and laid him on the wood, and said, Fill four barrels with water, and pour it on the burnt sacrifice, and on the wood.[34] And he said, Do it the second time. And they did it the second time. And he said, Do it the third time. And they did it the third time.[35] And the water ran round about the altar; and he filled the trench also with water.[36] And it came to pass at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet came near, and said, LORD God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and that I have done all these things at thy word.” In verse twenty-one Elijah asked an important question and made what should be an obvious statement. The important question was, “How long halt ye between two opinions?” That is called being double-minded. James said that a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. That does not sound like the way to live. We need to have a great zeal to serve God and to walk in fellowship with the Lord. We need to make a definite decision in our hearts that we will do that every day in every circumstance. Joshua said, “Choose you this day whom ye will serve. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” It was a problem in Elijah’s time, and it is a problem today. Too many people serve the Lord when it is convenient or once in a while. Their heart is partly with the world or even false religion, especially in a day of compromise in churches. The obvious statement that Elijah made was, “if the LORD be God, follow him.” If you are in your right mind, there is no other choice than to choose the Lord, the all-powerful Creator, the lover of our souls. And so Elijah set up a contest between himself and 450 false prophets. It turned out to be no contest at all. The false prophets had no power, and Elijah had access to all power through faith in the Lord. Why did Elijah have so much power? For one reason, he did what the Lord directed him to do. How can you have the power of God if you go your own way instead of God’s way?

The Bible says in First Kings 18:37-39, “Hear me, O LORD, hear me, that this people may know that thou art the LORD God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again.[38] Then the fire of the LORD fell, and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench.[39] And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, The LORD, he is the God; the LORD, he is the God.” Elijah was right about the fact that God likes to make Himself known. That is what salvation of the soul is all about. How does someone go from being a lost soul to a saved soul? Jesus reveals Himself to that soul. When you pray for something that God Himself wants, you are much more likely to see an answer to that prayer. That is what Romans 8:26-27 is talking about when it says, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.[27] And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.” Also, the people did turn back to God after this great miracle as described in verse thirty-nine, “And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, The LORD, he is the God; the LORD, he is the God.” And that is exactly what we need today. We need people to turn back to God with all of their hearts. We need a revival. God brought the drought for three and a half years and the famine were necessary to lead up to this event and to this revival. What will God have to do to wake up the current generation?

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