Sermon Tone Analysis

*ELIJAH: A MAN LIKE US*

*1 Kings 17:1,2; James 5  :17*

* *

*INTRODUCTION*

1.  Suppose we were looking for person to fill a leadership position in our church.

Resumes started coming.

One of them read something like this:

 

* Occupation: Prophet

* Spiritual gift of prayer

* Prayed and it didn’t rain for 3 ½ years

* Prayed and fire consumed water soaked altar and sacrifice

* Prayed and drought ended

* Gift of miracles:

* Multiplied food to sustain a family for over 3 year drought and famine

* Raised the dead

* Parted the Jordan River

* Translated into heaven rather than experience phy death

 

2.

I think that would qualify them to be on our leadership team.

What do you think?

We’d just take a chance on him.

These are some of the spiritual feats of one of the great prophets in the OT – Elijah.

When we look at most of the biblical heroes we get a crick in our neck because we’ve placed them high on a pedestal.

They are the spiritual elite.

We place them several notches above us mere mortals.

We are not worthy to carry their shoes and certainly not fill them.

The Bible contains a long list of spiritual giants:  Joseph, Moses, Daniel, David, the prophets, Paul..

About all we can do is read their resumes, shake our head in wonderment and awe and put some more ben gay on our sore neck.

 

3.

This spiritual giant Elijah burst on the scene in 1 Kgs 17.

He immediately confronted   King Ahab and told him, in the name of God, it is not going to rain again until I say so.

For 3 ½ years there was no rain in Is.   Drought brought about food shortages and famine.

Elijah was # 1 on Ahab and Jezebel’s most wanted list.

Their hostile relationship resulted in a great confrontation on Mt Carmel where Elijah, as God’s representative, destroyed the prophets of Baal and proved beyond a shadow of doubt that God is the only God.

 

4.

Before we lift Elijah too high on the pedestal, did you hear James’ description of him?

He was *a man like us*.

He was a human being just like us.

He has the same nature as we.

He accomplished spiritual victories not because of who he was but WHOSE he was.

He had passions, feelings, and sufferings like us.

No matter what your spiritual resume might be, Elijah’s life story is applicable to us common mortals.

Elijah teaches us that we can be people whom God uses to do mighty things for His Kingdom.

5.

Let’s take a detailed look at Elijah who is a man like us.

His story will challenge us, comfort us, renew us and encourage us in our walk to become the kind of servant that honors God.

 

*I.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT*

*A.

POLITICAL~/SPIRITUALLY*

1.

We need to put Elijah in his political and religious context so that we can fully understand and appreciate him.

150 years before Elijah, the nation of Is divided into northern kingdom we call Is and the Southern kingdom we call Judah.

Jeroboam rebelled against King Solomon.

He untied10 tribes to the N and established the northern kingdom with Samaria as its capital city.

He began a long lineage of evil kings.

Jeroboam led Is into idolatry.

He ordained his own priests.

He set up high places throughout the land for people to worship.

In Elijah’s day, Ahab was the King of Is.

He was the 8th king in this lineage of evil.

What a tragic figure.

Look how the Bible describes him:  *30 **Ahab son of Omri did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than any of those before him.

31 He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, but he also married Jezebel daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship him.

32 He set up an altar for Baal in the **temple** of **Baal** that he built in **Samaria**.

33 Ahab also made an Asherah pole and did more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger than did all the kings of Israel before him. 1 Kings 16:30-33 (NIV)  *Ahab led Is deeper into idolatry and sin and further from God.

2. King Ahab imported the Phoenician god Baal when he married the foreigner Jezebel.

He built a temple to Baal, set up altars and brought in numerous prophets of Baal.

Who was Baal?  Baal was the weather god.

Baal supposedly determined the seasons of rain.

Thunder was his voice.

Lightning was his weapon.

Because this was an agricultural society, Baal was also the god of fertility.

He joined his female deity, Asherah, to invoke these life-giving qualities.

Baal worshippers experienced these life qualities by engaging in perverted sexual relations with temple prostitutes.

3.

In 1 Kgs 17, Elijah burst upon this scene of darkness to confront the evil Ahab.

Elijah will show us the darker the circumstance, the brighter Christians shine.

God uses the events recorded in 1 and 2nd Kings to mold Elijah’s character and trust so he could be a useful instrument for God’s kingdom.

4.

I certainly don’t have to tell you that we live in dark times.

Sin and evil abound.

Idolatry is rampant.

We might not set up altars in our homes but our society worships many idols such as money, self, success, power, prestige.

God places us in dark times and difficult circumstances to mold us into people of character and trust so we might be children of light to shine like the stars in a crooked and depraved world.

*II.

WHAT KIND OF MAN WAS ELIJAH*

*A.

MAN OF PRAYER*

1.  Who was Elijah?

What kind of man was he?  James tells us Elijah was a man like us.

What does that mean?

James introduces us to Elijah as a man of prayer.

He prayed earnestly that it not rain and it didn’t.

3 ½ years later, he prayed for rain and it rained.

Elijah was a man of prayer that resulted in being a great man of faith who was confident in God.

It also resulted in a deep intimate relationship with God.

These 2 qualities allowed God to mightily use Elijah.

We like Elijah can develop them in our lives so we can please God in all we do.

2.

Elijah bathed life with prayer.

He was staying with a widow in Zarepheth during the famine.

Her son died.

She brought him to Elijah and demanded he do something.

Elijah did.

He prayed fervently.

What’s so unusual about that?

There is nothing unusual about the action of prayer.

Do you remember what he prayed?