Unrequited Love - 1 Kings 18:20-40

Introduction

There once was a woman who was jilted at the altar by a conman that she loved with all her heart. She determined that, not only would she never be hurt in that way again, but she would also seek to inflict pain on men so that they could experience what she’d known. So, she took in a beautiful, young orphaned girl, and she raised her to be alluring but not loving. The young girl was conditioned throughout her childhood to find her only pleasure in the pain of others. Then, this bitter old woman engineered scenarios where a boy would fall in love with this beautiful girl just so she could watch his heart be broken, just so she could see his love go unreturned.

Many of you have, no doubt, already realized that this is the plot line of Charles Dickens’ classic novel, Great Expectations. But, we have a story that’s more similar than you might think. When you read of the crafty and cunning evil of Miss Havisham, you can only think “What a devil!” And, that’s dead on. You see, the Bible teaches that there is a deceiver working at every turn to condition us so that we reject what is good and enjoy what is wrong. Consider Satan’s effectiveness if he could condition you individually to desire what is evil while simultaneously conditioning the broader culture collectively to redefine what is right and true and good by what you desire.

God’s Word

Goodness, that’s what we see, isn’t it? And, if we’re honest, it’s the great conflict of our personal faith in Jesus. We desire what is wrong, and our culture says it’s okay. This conflict isn’t new because Satan’s methodology isn’t new. That’s what brings us to this morning’s passage.

You’ll remember that Israel, under the leadership of King Ahab and Jezebel, is entrenched in Baal worship, and they’re worshiping Baal because they desire to have more of what the other nations have to offer, because they desire more and greater prosperity. As a result, God, through Elijah, sends a drought that lasts more than 3 years to show them that Baal doesn’t, in fact, actually control the rain or their wellbeing. So, a confrontation between Ahab and Elijah has been building for a long time, and here it is. This confrontation makes clear that this A Story with Three Different Types of Love (Headline):

A story of “half-hearted” love.

1 Kings 18:21 “And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word.”

In Great Expectations, Estella is always leading Pip along. She gives him just enough to keep him interested, but never enough to show him real love. This is the common approach to faith in Jesus today. I’ll give him a little. I’ll acknowledge that the evidence of his resurrection is impressive. I’ll be baptized in case it’s true. I’ll jump into a church service if nothing else is going on, but I can’t give him everything. And, that’s exactly where Israel is in 1 Kings 18 in their relationship with the Lord. When Elijah is able to confront all of Israel, he asks them: “How long will you go LIMPING between two opinions?” “Limping” is an interesting word that will come up again in verse 26. It can mean to be on two crutches so that you’re not on solid ground, or it can be the picture of hopping from one leg to the other. It’s having one foot in two different camps. It’s a description of half-hearted love. It’s an attempt to love two opposing realities at the same time. You see, half-hearted love...

Half-hearted love keeps its “options” open.

That’s how we should see this “limping”. Isreal is open to the possibility of more gods, even better gods than what they would have thought of as their ancestral God. That’s why the “people did not answer him a word.” They didn’t want to decide. They wanted the ability to jump at a better opportunity if it should present. Did you know that 30% of Tinder users are married? 30% have made a vow to another person, but are keeping their options open. Is that love? Is it love when we reduce God to the margins of our lives so that we pay attention to him only if nothing more exciting or seemingly more advantageous comes along? Are you keeping your options open with the Lord? Because, it’s also true that...

Half-hearted love refuses to “commit”.

Elijah assures Isreal that their indecision really is a decision. The very nature of God demands a decision. If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” There’s an implied monotheism here, isn’t there? That is, Israel had been called distinctively by the LORD to forsake every other God and to love him alone. All of the other gods were supposed to control this or that, but they were figments of human imagination. God, if you believe in him, controls it all! So, it was freedom. You don’t have to worry about this god or that god. There’s only one God so you commit to him alone. Concern yourself with him alone. In 2020, the US had the lowest number of marriages since 1963 when the population was about half of what it is now. We live in an age of non-commitment. But, you cannot actually know the Lord, obey the Lord, and love the Lord and not commit to him. A God this great demands decisive faith.

Truthfully, ours is a polytheistic culture. You can take some people’s posts about little league or sports or exercise or education or career, and you could substitute the name Jesus, and the post would still make sense. Our commitment to our own success and the achievement of our dreams is religious in nature. Jesus becomes a contributor to our well-roundedness rather than the blazing center of our lives, which is really just a way to say that He’s one god among many. Is that love?

You see, what we would say of a person who keeps their options open even though they’re married and the person that refuses to commit to their husband or wife even though they’ve made a vow is that they’ve forsaken the covenant. Because that’s what half-hearted love leads to.

Half-hearted love forsakes the “covenant.”

The fundamental issue here is that Israel had broken the first and greatest command. And, as Jesus teaches us, the first and greatest command is the very command upon which all of the Law hangs. Lose it, and you lose the whole covenant. They had not loved the LORD with all of their hearts, minds, and strength. They had welcomed competitors to romance them away from the Lord with enticing fantasies. As the drought has proven, Baal is impotent. He offers big, but delivers little. But, what Baal does is draw out of Israel the presence of a half-hearted love which, it turns out, isn’t love at all. Could it be that all of the opportunities that we are afforded, all of the prosperity that is open to us are really just serve to prove how much we love ourselves and how little we love God? Half-hearted love isn’t love at all. That’s clear in our marriages, and it should be even more clear in our devotion to the Lord. But, to whom are we actually devoted?

A story of “unrequited” love.

So, Elijah issues a challenge, a proposal. There will be a contest between the LORD and Baal. If Israel believes that Baal is a rival and competitor to the LORD, then we’ll settle this on the field. They meet at Mt. Carmel, which is right on the edge of Baal territory. Baal is given a bit of home-field advantage. Baal’s 450 prophets will have first pick of the animal to sacrifice. Double advantage Baal — more prophets and first pick in the draft. Then, they’ll call down fire from heaven, which should be Baal’s specialty since he supposedly controls lightning. Advantage Baal. Elijah stacks the competition in Baal’s favor because dead men can’t dunk, even if it’s a six foot goal. This proposal is meant to prove two things: God is greater, and Israel’s love is lesser. There are two different dimensions of unrequited love in this story — two different instances of one loving someone without the other loving them back. First, there’s Israel. God had loved Israel, saved Israel, and set Israel apart. But, Israel had not loved him back. Secondly, there’s Israel’s love for and pursuit of Baal. And, Elijah was proving to them that Baal didn’t love them back. In both cases, the love had been one-sided. As the prophets of Baal seek to prove his power, you see the tragedy of loving a god that doesn’t love you back.

Other gods are “absent” from the chase.

1 Kings 18:26-29 “And they took the bull that was given them, and they prepared it and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they limped around the altar that they had made. And at noon Elijah mocked them, saying, “Cry aloud, for he is a god. Either he is musing, or he is relieving himself, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened.” And they cried aloud and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances, until the blood gushed out upon them. And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the oblation, but there was no voice. No one answered; no one paid attention.”

In Great Expectations, Pip is always pursuing Estella, always chasing her, always hoping to win her heart and acceptance. But, the more he pursues her, the more he chases her, the more obvious the absence of her love for him becomes — at least for those of us reading. Israel’s chase of Baal has been a long one, going all the way back to the Golden Calf melted at the bottom of Sinai. They wanted Baal to love them so badly. They wanted the advantages that he promised. And, in 1 Kings 18, their chase redlines. They’re put the pedal down and are going for broke. But, what they get is a cold shoulder. They call and call on Baal for hours with everything on the line, and nothing happens. The mockery of Elijah stands out. Can you imagine playing backyard ball with this guy? But, it’s meant to highlight what a silly, foolish pursuit it is to chase after a god who doesn’t love you, when you have a God who is committed to you chasing after you. Each satirical insult points to a different known and accepted flaw in Baal’s character. He was known to be flighty and undependable and sleepy — like a man. It’s not just that Baal isn’t a good god; he’s not even a good man. Chase after him all you want, and you’ll never catch anything be air.

That’s because...

Other gods are “abusive” of their followers.

Ironically, Estella spurns the love of Pip, who really did love her, and she marries an abuser instead. A kind man was chasing her, but she chose an abuser instead. My goodness, that’s Israel’s story here. For hours, the prophets of Baal — who are likely Israelite prophets that caved to Jezebel’s persecution and converted to Baalism — do everything imaginable to catch Baal’s eye. They dance and shout. They’re ecstatic and fanatical. They cut themselves so that their blood begins to spill out — something that the Lord forbids his people to do — hoping to arouse the interests of Baal in any way possible. And, it’s interesting that the word “limping” comes up again, isn’t it? They’ve been limping between two gods, and the god they’re chasing has left them quite literally with a limp after years of abuse. “Idols abuse their worshipers.” Phillip Ryken Like a drug, they offer a hit of pleasure, only to require more and more every time until the person’s life is ultimately ruined.

Other gods “abandon” when it matters.

And, the prophets are a sad story, aren’t they? They were fanatical, passionate, and more than committed. They had sold out to the hope of Baal. And, I point that out because it contradicts our western ideals. You can be whole-heartedly zealous and whole-heartedly wrong at the same time. Passion doesn’t equal legitimacy. There is an open-mindedness that is humble and beautiful, and there is another form of open-mindedness that is blasphemous and lethal. And, that becomes clear when the silence of the Baal becomes loudly apparent. You’ll notice the sequence of three “no’s” in verse 29. It’s a punctuation of the silence of Baal. He’s not coming; he’s not speaking; he doesn’t care. Is there a greater tragedy than selling out your soul to a god that doesn’t hear you, love you, or answer you? If there is, it’s teaching our children to do the same. Are we living for gods that won’t love us back? Our jobs and sports and money and even our relationships — they’ll move on from us in a second — yet we sell out our lives to them. It’s unrequited love — these other gods won’t love us back.

A story of “relentless” love.

Don’t you see how much better the love of God is? That’s the point of this story. That’s the point. We keep chasing other gods, and the LORD keeps chasing us. He’s relentless. Sometimes, people read the Bible, and they wonder: Why does it have to be all about God all the time? Why does He have to rule over the details of my life? Is He some kind of narcissist or something? But, you see, God is the sun, and we are the earth. If the gravitational pull of the sun is off just a bit, the earth is destroyed. God is our “gravity”. He is the one whole holds our lives together. We can only flourish when our lives rotate around him. You see, life with God is qualitatively better. He releases you from answering to gods that don’t care about you. You see, we can spend 15 hours per week teaching our son how to throw a curveball, and the second he graduates, he’ll be replaced. We can work 80 hours per week so that our company appreciates, and as soon as we retire, they hire somebody they’re more excited about. What a harsh slavery. But, a life centered upon the enjoyment of God is just the starting line for an eternal joy. It’s one thing to focus upon, to revolve around that will reap dividends for billions of years to come. That’s freedom, man. And, in the Kingdom of God, there are no replacements. What does your life revolve around? What does your family revolve around? What does your career revolve around? What do the conversations with your kids revolve around? What does your calendar and your budget and your decision-making revolve around around?

1 Kings 18:36-39 “And at the time of the offering of the oblation, Elijah the prophet came near and said, “O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back.” Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The Lord, he is God; the Lord, he is God.””

Elijah rebuilds the altar of the LORD with 12 stones to represent all of Israel — a reminder that they had been fractured because of false gods already. Three different times, he has water poured over the sacrifice. He’s disadvantaged the Lord in every way possible. This isn’t going to be a slight-of-hand trick. And, without fanatical dances or ecstatic shouts or pouring blood, a missile of fire shoots across the darkening sky and consumes the sacrifice — and all the stones too. Again, God had proven his power, but more than that, He had proven his love. When the fire consumes the stones, it’s a picture of what could happen and what should happen. How should God respond to the unrequited love of his people? He should consume them. How did He respond to them? By pursuing them again. By displaying his glory again. By showing, again, that He is alive and sovereign and the ruler of the gods. It was on one hand — to the answer of Elijah’s prayer proof of his power, and it was on the other— a call for them to love him decisively.

And, God’s kindness leads his people to repentance. Elijah says that God turned their hearts back, not that they turned their hearts back. God had loved his people too much to leave them in their sin, broken as they were before him. Of course, the fire of God has since fallen upon a greater sacrifice, where He had stacked the deck against himself. His own Son hung upon a cross, and He cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The fire of God fell upon him upon the cross, but the Spirit of God raised him three days later. Why? So that his people would know He is greatest and decisively love him, so that He might turn their hearts toward Him.

Estella comes to realize the purity and power of Pip’s love for her, and she seeks his forgiveness. She says, “I have been “bent” and “broken”, but — I hope — into a “better” shape.” Perhaps, you’ve found yourself pursuing other gods, and now you walk with a limp because of it. Won’t you look to the love of God? Won’t you see that He will take your brokenness, and by his kindness, bend you into a better shape?