In the Whisper: 1 Kings 19

 You can turn with me in your Bibles to First Kings 19. First Kings 19. Around a month ago, or a little over a month ago, uh, I preached on the first half of First Kings 19. I promise that we would return to the second half before the new year. Well, I was sick last week. Thank you to Mark again for filling it for me while I was gone.

I'm still getting over it a little bit. Um, but thank you again, mark. And if you were not at that service when I preached on the first half of One Kings 19, or you need a refresher or you slept through that sermon, don't think I can't see you from up here. The first part of One Kings 19, it follows Elijah now.

Elijah is a prophet of God who had only recently taken on the prophets of the false God bail. In this battle, there were two altars made. And, and from Elijah and through God, fire ran down on his altar to burn it, to defeat the prophets. And Elijah killed all of these prophets in a dec, a decisive victory to show God's true power and his authority.

And following this, the Queen Jezebel, who worshiped veil herself, Jezebel, ordered the death of Elijah and sent Elijah into a fear. Elijah retreated into the desert and settled under a room tree where God encountered him in Elijah's pain and his sorrow and his despair. God shows up and he feeds Elijah.

He lets him rest and he acknowledges Elijah's pain. And right after this, and where our passage is about today is God calls Elijah to Mount Hob to meet him. That's where our passage picks up this morning. So if you're willing and able, please stand with me for the reading of God's word from One Kings 19.

Nine through 18

there he came to a cave and lodged in it, and behold the word of the Lord came to him and he said to him, what are you doing here, Elijah? He said, I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars and killed your prophets with the sword and I even, I only and left, and they seek my life to take it away.

And he said, go out and stand on the mount before the Lord. And behold, the Lord passed by and a greatness. Strong wind tore the mountains and broken pieces, the rocks before the Lord. The Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind, an earthquake. But the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake of fire, but the Lord was not in the fire.

And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face and and his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, what are you doing here, Elijah? And he said, I've been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts for the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant.

Thrown down your altars and killed your prophets with the sword. And I even, I only am left and I seek my life to take it away. And the Lord said to him, go return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you arrive, you shall anoint hazael to be king over Syria. And Jay, who the son of Nims, she you shall anoint to be king over Israel.

And Elisha, the son of Shaha. Of Alala, you shall anoint to be prophet in your place. And the one who escapes from the sword of hazael shall jehu put to death, and the one who escapes from the sword of jehu, shall Elisha put to death. Yeah, I will leave 7,000 in Israel. All the knees that have not bowed to ba in every mouth that has not kissed him.

The prophet Isaiah tells us that people are like grass and beauty, like the flowers of the field, while the grass withers and the flowers fade. But this, the word of God will stand forever. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated.

Have you ever heard people say something like this? No, God I follow would fill in the blank. The God I know wouldn't allow such a thing to happen, or, I know the God I follow must feel this way about this thing because I feel this way about this thing. So God must agree with me to be my God. Maybe you've heard people say that.

Maybe you've said that. Maybe you've felt that way. I know how I have at moments, we create an image of the God that we want to serve the God that in the way that we want him to act and the way we want him to feel about things, we want it to match the ways in which we would act and the ways in which we feel about things.

And we want our God to do what we want him to do. We make God into. Our own image in the garden. God used to walk with Adam and Eve, but when Adam and Eve turned away from him, they turned toward something. And we still do this in our sin. We try to replace God. We turn away from God and toward something else.

We forget who we serve our worship of God has become imperfect. I don't think I need to convince you. It's wounded and we tend to worship ourselves and our own desire. Instead, we worship something because we have a need for God. All of us have a need for God. And so in that need we worship something. If it's not God, it's something else.

Remember, when we, when we worship ourselves, we let our idols be made in our image based on what we want our God. To look like and we struggle to see God the one true God correctly. And I think we all have to answer this question, which is the main question I want to ask you guys today. What does God need to be like for you to worship him?

What does God need to be like for you to worship him? And in our passage today, Elijah struggles with the same question. And we're gonna explore that question through these three points. One, Elijah's plea, two God's reply. Three. Our response, Elijah's plea, God's reply and our response. So first, Elijah's plea.

Look with me at verses nine and 10. There he came to a cave and lodged in it. Okay, pause Mount Hob. If you don't know, Mount Hob is another name from Mount Sinai, which most of you are familiar with. It's where God appears to Moses in the burning bush. It's where God appears to Moses and Israel and gives them the 10 Commandments.

It is a holy mountain of God. Okay, with that in mind, let's get back to the verse. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him and he said to him, what are you doing here, Elijah? He said, I've been very jealous for the Lord of the God of hosts for the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword.

And I even, I only am left and they seek my life to take it away. God asks, Elijah, what are you doing here? What are you doing here? Now, God does not ask because God does not know. God knows what Elijah is doing here, but if you are a teacher or you work with kids, or you have kids, you understand what's going on here, right?

You don't always ask questions because you, you don't know. You ask questions because you want the children. You want the kids, you want your students to, to, to learn. To by answering. They figure out their own reasons by answering. They work through it in their own minds. God knows why. Elijah's there. He wants Elijah to learn to figure out why he's there.

By asking him, by asking him to explain it. And what's Elijah's answer? What does he do? He self justifies. He tries to provide and prove his own value. He says, I have been very jealous for God. The the God of hosts for the Lord, the God of hosts for the people, the other people of Israel. They've forsaken your covenant.

They've thrown down your altars. They've killed prophets with a sword, and I even, I only am left, and they seek my life to take it away. Elijah's saying, I did everything right. I did everything right. I did my part, and I think there's something due, right? I did my part. Why have you not delivered me from this yet?

I have served you faithfully. See Elijah's, what Elijah's doing is he's trying to make God into his own image. He knows what he thinks God should do, and he's trying to get God to do it, and that is sin. It is sin it. It breaks the law that God gave his people on this very same mountain. The second commandment, don't make for yourself a graven image, meaning don't make for yourself a God in the way that you want God to be.

It's a commandment for a good reason because we all do this all the time. We make our idols and we make them to serve us to be like we want them to be. Money. It's an easy one. More money. If we get more money, it means more power, more control, and more safety, right? Isn't that what that means? Status. If people know me and like me, and I'm popular, then now finally feel secure in who I am.

The more people that make me feel secure, the more secure I am. Right? Right. Our bodies, if I look good, then people will treat me as worthy of their desire and affection, and that will finally make me feel. Valuable, right? We think we know what we want. We think we know what we want. So the lie we tell ourselves is if we just devote our lives to it, that we'll get what we, we will get that thing that we want, and we'll finally feel secure.

We'll finally feel whatever it is that you're trying to feel, what you're looking for. And these things take our time and our attention and our devotion, our worship, they take our worship, they're idols. And unfortunately, when we view. Worship as something only worth devoting to a source that can provide us something at all times, a, a source that will give us what we want when we need it.

It distorts our view and our worship of God himself. It distorts what we do here. Even on the Sunday morning, we cast this faulty view of worship on God like Elijah does in this passage. And one way to, to wonder if this is true for you is, is how you talk to God. How do you talk to God? How do you worship God?

What do your prayers. Look like if you are God, if you love me, if you truly care, then what? Heal me, help me hurt them. And yes, God does want to hear a request and God does answer our prayers, absolutely. But if all of our prayers only ever sound like a Christmas wish list. If all that, if all that's what our prayers are, then we have shoehorned God into basically becoming a vending machine in our hearts, who we only turn to when we have things that we want.

I know that I'm guilty of this for Elijah. What does Elijah want? He wants a powerful victorious God. Elijah only wanted the God who reigned fire down on the altar. He remembered that, right? That felt good. Where's that God now? He's there, but he is not doing what Elijah wanted. Elijah put God into an Elijah sized box.

What box do you keep God in? How big is the box that you keep God in? What image do you make God into? It's a question we all have to ask ourselves. I've heard the pain from so many for who God did not live up to. Their expectations, what they wanted from God. They did not seem to. Get. There's a famous video of an interview with the British actor Steven Fry, who is a known atheist, and the interviewer asks him this.

He says, you walk up to the pearly gates and you're confronted by God. What would Steven Fry say to him? And Fry's answer Is this bone cancer in children? What's that about? How dare you? How dare you create a world in which there's such misery that is not our fault. It's not right. It's utterly evil. Why should I respect a God that creates a world that is full of so much injustice and pain?

And look, the apologetically minded of us in here, like me, might, might be once quick to explain to Stephen P. Fry, like why it is our fault, right? Why, why the pain of the world? We can point at Genesis and see the fall and why that is a, a result of our disobedience and why the atheist problem of evil is contradictory in of itself.

But, but what I wanna show from this example is there, there are millions of people who believe this. Who believe the same things that Steven Fry does, and maybe you two in this room struggle with the problem of pain and suffering and have these questions, and you can look upon your own suffering and the suffering of loved ones or people around the world and wonder how could God allow it?

How could God not be what I want him to be when I want him to be it? And yes, and suffering is a result of our disobedience. And yes, God has done something and is doing something and will complete that work. To end suffering and sin and death. But presently and currently, these questions are real. And I know many of you struggle with them, and I know that I have struggled with these questions.

What does it mean for God to be our God and who is he? And Elijah's asking these same questions here? And they're laden with doubt and with frustration and with hurt. And to find out the answer to those questions, Elijah had to turn to the only one who could actually answer to them. Answer them. And that's God.

Which leads us to 0.2, God's reply. How does God reply to Elijah in the midst of his pleas of his asking for help? Look with me to verses 11 through 13 when God said, go out and stand on the mount before the Lord. And behold, the Lord passed by in a great and the strong wind tore the mountains and broken pieces, the rocks before the Lord.

But the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind and earthquake with the Lord was not in the earthquake and after the earthquake, a fire with the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper, and when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and he went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.

And behold, there came a voice to him and it said, what are you doing here, Elijah? This has to be one of my favorite stories in the Old Testament. So I was very excited to be able to preach on it. See, God does not smite Elijah for his doubts and his anger and his questions. God does not respond, but how dare you question me.

He hears Elijah. He takes his questions and his anger and he says to Elijah, Hey, come stand before me and let me show you who I really am. See, Elijah wanted power like the wind, and God sends the wind, but God's not in the wind. God. And Elijah wants power like the earth, and God sends an earthquake, but he's not in the earthquake.

And Elijah wants power like fire. And God shows he has power like fire. He sends the fire, but he's not in the fire. God could be in those things. In Job 38, God is in the wind. In a whirlwind, he answers Job out of one. At Pentecost, the spirit descends like a wind and Exus 19, uh, Mount Sinai, uh, Mount Sinai.

Here there's an earthquake. Jesus' death on the cross, there's an earthquake in Revelation, we see earthquakes fire on the same mountain of Mount Sinai in a bush, a burning bush. God's in that fire and he leads Israel as a pillar of fire. God could be in those things, but to Elijah here, he does not show up in those things.

God is in the whisper, a low whisper. God says, I can do everything that you want me to do and more. Yet, like he says to Moses out of the burning bush, I am who I am. I am who I am. It's not, I am who you want me to be, it's I am who I am. Elijah knows the part of God that he wants. He knows it. And God could be all of those things.

And God is all of those things when God wants to be all those things. But God gives Elijah the part of himself that Elijah actually needs in the moment to whisper, to calm a peace in the storm of the fear that Elijah has found himself trapped in, because that's actually what's going on in Elijah's heart, is fear.

God will not fit into the box that Elijah has made for him in his heart and his mind. And my favorite example of this is from c. S Lewis is the horse and his boy, if you're not familiar with it. Narnia is a fictional world created by CS Lewis as an allegory to the biblical story in which there are talking animals and there are magical creatures and the horse and his boys.

A story about a horse free and a boy Shasta, who go on a journey to escape from their country into Narnia and attempt to stop an invasion from the country they're fleeing from. Read, read the book. It's a great book. Um, but in the Narnia books as an allegory to the biblical story, there exists a, a lion named Alan, who is a Christ figure, and he is known as a lion to the creatures of Narnia.

But Brie the talking horse, he's heard of Alan. He's, he believes in Alan, but he does not think he's an actual lion. He doesn't think that's possible. He says this in the scene from the book. He says, no doubt. Continu to breathe. When they speak of him as a lion, they only mean he's as strong as a lion or as fierce as a lion or something to that kind.

Even a little girl must see it be quite absurd to suppose he's a real lion. Indeed. It would be disrespectful if he was a lion. He would have to be a beast like the rest of us. If he was a lion, he would have poor paws and a tail and whiskers. And as he says this in the book, Azlan shows up right behind him and he walks up behind him and he brushes Brie with his whiskers.

And Azlan says this now, Brie, you pour proud, frightened horse draw. Near, near, still my son. Do not dare not to dare. Touch me, smell me. Here are my paws. Here's my tail. These are my whiskers. I am a true beast because Brie, the horse could not fathom that God was anything else than what he made him to be in his mind until God shows up.

In the same way God reveals himself to Elijah. He shows up to Elijah in unexpected and humbling ways, and he wants to know, the good news is he does the exact same thing for us in Christ, because for centuries, what did Israel want? They wanted a, a fearsome king, a powerful deliverer. A warrior. And I think if you're like me, we often want this same thing.

We know who Jesus was, but we still want. The powerful deliverer warrior one who destroys enemies, who will show everyone that disagrees with us that we're right. That's what we really want. One who delivers justice when we want it. Think back to the answer to your question. What does God like have to be like for you to worship him?

What is that image? And then let me ask you a further question. Does Jesus match that description?

Jesus in Matthew 11 says this. I am gentle and lowly in heart. I am gentle and lowly in heart, gentle lowly. We might hear those words often and move past them quickly, but that's how God describes himself. But what about the God who, who uses his power to conquer and destroy my enemies? How will gentleness and lowliness do anything to help the problems that we face?

Well, that's exactly what happened. In Philippians two, the Christ hymn, it says it like this, Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.

He humbled himself by becoming obedience to the point of death, even death on a cross. I love that passage, one of my favorites in the New Testament. Jesus did not exploit his power. That's what means with grasps. He emptied himself, just like Aslan was the beast for the Nars. Jesus became a human to relate to us and our weakness to die.

The death that we cannot die to do what we cannot do. Our God is the God who allowed himself to be strung up on a cross and to die for our sins. And we know that and we hear that, but what that actually means is something even more powerful. The God who is all powerful became a man and was put up on a cross and was executed.

That's your God. One who's gentle and lowly, who is all powerful. Yes, God can do all the things you want him to do. He sends the fire and the earthquake and the wind. He can do all those things. But what does God do with all of His power is he loves and he serves and he sacrifices. That's what God does with his power.

That is God. Early Christians faced persecution from the Romans, in part because the Romans saw their God as weak. If you know anything about Roman theology or theology, if you know anything about Roman gods, their, their gods are mighty and destructive, and jealous and angry. The first artistic expression or depiction of Christ that we know of, I'm not sure if you know about this.

It's called the Alexa Manos Frito, and it was found in a Rome scratched into a wall. And it's an image. It's a picture of Jesus on the cross with a man banging before him. But Jesus has the head of a donkey in this image, and it's meant to mock him. And the words under the graffiti, say, Alex Manos worships his God.

It's meant to mock this Christian, this early Christian for worshiping a God who could be so weak to be put up on a cross. Whoever made that art. The idea of a gentle and lowly God who sacrificed himself and humbled himself was not a God worth worshiping. What is that God compared to someone like Jupiter or Mars?

Right. And yet Christian, this is the God that you worship. The God who with infinite power was born as a baby who showed up as a whisper, who died on a cross. Any other God that you make for yourself is an idol. If God in your mind does not have those attributes of self sacrifice of service, then it's not the God of the Bible.

Our God is the God of a whisper. And if it frustrates you or makes you uncomfortable, it does with me too sometimes when I want God just to be the one who's powerful, who's going to do everything that I want him to do or be, we have to encounter how we've God made God into something other than who he is and how he reveals himself to us.

So 0.2, God's reply. Our God is the God of the whisper. God replies in a whisper. Now 0.3, our response. What do we do with all of this? What do we do with this? What do we do with the reality of how God reveals himself to us? Well, let's see what God has Elijah do. Verse 15. And the Lord said to him, go return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus.

And when you arrive, you shall know Isaiah to be king over Syria. And Je who the son name, she shall anoint to be king over Israel. And Elijah, the son of Shaha of Al, you shall anoint to be prophet in your place and the one who escapes from the sword of Isaiah l shall J who put to death and the one who escapes from the sword of Jay, who shall Elisha put to death?

Yeah, I shall leave. 7,000 in Israel. And all the needs that have not bowed to bail. And every mouth that has not kissed him. God has a plan for Elijah. Are you ready for it? One go. Anoints a pagan king. Two go anoints a new king over Israel. Three, go find your replacement. Go and anoint someone that you don't agree with.

A new king who, if you remember, there's already a king, but go anoint a new king, um, and find somebody to replace you. Imagine how that felt. But the point here, and the point for us too, is that it's not about Elijah. It's not about us. It's not about me, it's about God and God's plan. An amazing thing about this passage is that in God's instructions here, he tells him to anoint jehu, and if you know who Jehu is, this is actually God answering Elijah's request, even though Elijah doesn't know it, because Jehu, if you know anything about who he was, he was the king who puts an end to the line of Ahab.

He killed Jezebel. All the things that Elijah wanted, God was doing, God was actually going to do, but not because Elijah was demanding it of God in the moment. God already had a plan. Elijah was working in that plan. God is sovereign over that plan. God was doing it, but it wasn't about Elijah. The crux of history wasn't, wasn't all leaning toward Elijah and the fulfillment of Elijah's wants and needs.

But God did answer Elijah's prayer. But our first application for this passage is one of humility. Discover the joy of humility. Discover the joy of humility. 'cause Elijah had to set aside the box that he made for God to live in. And instead had to live the life that God was calling Elijah into. He had to rely on faith that God, the God of the whisper was sovereign.

That the God who ruled with his power in gentleness and loneliness was still enacting his plans, that he was doing good things, that he had a, a sovereign thread that he was protecting all the way through Israel. That he was true to keep his promises in his covenants, he had to rely on that faith. He had to rely on that faith that that faith in God had to be enough, that God was true to keep his promises.

God says, I know you don't think I do, but I have a plan. I know you don't think I do. I don't know. You don't see it, but I have a plan. It won't go how you want it to go. It'd be different if you designed this, but it will be for the best because I am who I am. I am who I am. Humility is realizing that our lives are dependent on the grace of God.

The faith that he gives us to do the tasks that he presents to us, humility is realizing that it's about God and not about us. Paul says this in Romans 12, three, for by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think of himself with sober judgment, each according to the measure of the faith that God has assigned.

We have to know who we are before God and, and the PCA. We adhere to the Westminster Catechism, which is a list of questions and answers, and the very first question asked, what is the chief end of man? What is the chief end of man? And many of you know it, to glorify God and enjoy him forever, to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.

And notice this says nothing about us. This says nothing about us. Our chief end is not something to do with self. Right. Humility is recognizing who God is. When you become a Christian, if you are one, it's saying, you're saying, God, make my life more about you and less about me. Make me not the center of my life.

When we are the center of our lives, that's when we make idols. That's when we make idols to serve us instead of us serving God. It's living every day with a greater purpose. It's far more beautiful when we get to wake up every morning and live a life for God rather than living for ourselves and realizing at the end of the day that we've not achieved anything for ourselves and we still feel the same way.

But when we live about God, when we live our lives for God, we know that he's doing work in us. And through us. And at the end of the day, he has us in his arms. Jesus was gentle and lowly and humble and a servant and in the New Testament we're asked to live like him. So my question is, are you are gentle, lowly humble, A servant?

I struggle to be. Imagine though a community shaped by people who use their power to serve. Rather than to serve themselves. Imagine people who lead with gentleness rather than self-righteousness and anger, who show humility and gentleness to the world, who have power and use it for others rather than using it to advance their own desires and wants.

Our second point of application after humility to learn who God is. Learn who God is. If you're going to worship God, if you're going to know God. How do we figure out who he is? Well, let me ask, if I gave you a task, if I gave you a responsibility to go to go get to know somebody, if I gave you someone specific, how would you do it?

Maybe social media. You'd see what they post about. Maybe ask friends about them. Maybe you would look at pictures of them, see what they look like and all those things might help a little bit, but they're not the best. You know what the best way is? Go talk to them. Go ask them questions. Go, go hear their story.

Listen to the way they talk about themselves. Spend time with them. We all know that's how you get to know people. And yet sometimes when it comes to God, we think that we just, you know, oh, I can just spend time by myself in nature and I'll get to know God. Or if I just spend time with people only then I'll get to know God.

But God has given his word to us. His word, what he says, he's given it to us and he sends this word to us and tells us to, to read it and spend time with us with it. And he tells us to talk to him in prayer, to spend time with what he's saying to us and to talk to him. And so to get to know God, we read our word.

We see how Jesus talks about himself. See how God describes himself. Jesus. See how God talks with his people and works with his people and makes promises and keeps them. And what that means for you. That's how you learn who God is. And this spring we have the joy of looking in the Book of John and the I Am statements that Jesus makes pay attention.

How does Jesus describe himself? How does God describe himself to us? That's a big deal. We gotta pay attention to it. Also, talk to God. It's amazing that God invites us to speak to him constantly. Pray to him, not only to ask for things, though, please do go to God with your requests and ask him for things, but also look at the Psalms and see how the psalmist go to God with absolutely everything, all your sorrows and your joys for guidance.

Just sitting with him in silence and listening to him, imagine if our prayer lies, were far more expansive, just getting to know God, and and, and resting in the joy and his pleasure of speaking with him. Discover the joy of humility, knowing it's not about you. It's a life. Your life is one meant to live and serve a God who has lived and served you, and also learn who God is through his word and through prayer.

And notice that one day we will walk with him forever like I'm and Eve did in the garden. We will have eternity. Getting to discover are and know are gentle and all powerful and lowly and infinite God. And the God of the whisper that Elijah meets on the mountain is the same God who delights in you. And by the power of his grace and the power of his word, he will hold you in his arms and he will deliver you from your sin and from your suffering into his eternal kingdom.

Let's pray. Lord God, I confess that daily I wake up ready to serve. Lord I, I look at the world often and other people as ways in which I can advance the things that I want, Lord, and my own desires. And I know there are many in here for whom it's the same Lord, that when you made your law and commandments, you knew the depravity of the human heart.

You know how quick we are to turn to idols, how quick we are to be self-serving Lord. But I pray that we look at your example, that when you lived, Lord, you took all the power you had and you served, you died. Lord, you gave everything so that we might live for you and I pray, Lord, we do not forget that quickly or easily, Lord, just how much you've sacrificed and I pray, Lord, we might make our lives into living sacrifices, Lord, using everything that we have to serve others and to serve the world in one day.

Lord, rest in your arms knowing that you love us, and then walk us beside us every step of the way, and I pray all this in your name. Amen.

Sermon transcript is computer generated.