Today is the day that the Lord has made. So let us rejoice and be glad in it. And everyone said, Amen and Amen. Have you ever seen those videos where you have a mom and a dad and they stand a few feet apart and they have their toddler a couple feet in front of them and they're both parents are calling to the child to see which one the child goes to. You ever seen those videos? That's horrendous. That's like torture. That's terrible. I think those videos are so mean, but what are those videos trying to do? You know what they're trying to do. These parents are trying to figure out who does the child love more. I Would never do that to my child Because I know I would lose But in that, you know, I know psychologically there's a lot going on there with familiarity and a sense of security and all that sort Of stuff but here's what I think is happening, and I think here's what we're trying to see. Right? The parents are trying to figure out who does the child love more, and the way they're going about that is they're trying to figure out who is the child going to obey. When they're calling out to the child, the voice, the person that the child obeys, it's kind of like revealing who the child loves more. At least that's the notion of this whole game that they're playing. When the parent calls out to the child, which one will the child obey? Now here's the point I'm trying to make. When we are free to choose, what we obey shows what we love. Again, when we are free to choose, I know that's not always the case, but when we are free to choose, what we obey shows what we love. I understand that is a very loaded and complex statement. So let me just make it a little bit more hometown for us here and put it like this. I want my children to obey me, not just because I'm the authority in their life, but I want my children to obey me because they know that I love them and because they love me. And that sentiment should be challenging for us today, but it's exactly the notion that we're going to need as we walk through this passage here today. It's a very challenging passage and we are walking alongside the life of Elijah and that's going to cause us to skip a couple of chapters in the Bible, but we're not, we're just following the path of Elijah.

So here's what I'm going to invite you to do. If you have your Bibles, would you go ahead and please now turn to 2 Kings. We've been in 1 Kings, but we're going to jump a couple of chapters and go to 2 Kings 1, verses 9-7.

Now, let me catch you up to speed with what's been happening since we last were in our Bibles together. So, at the end of 1 Kings, here's what happens. The wicked king Ahab dies. He dies in war. And his son, now Ahab was wicked, but his wicked son Ahaziah has risen to the throne. He's the king in Israel. Ahab ruled for about 22 years, but his son Ahaziah rules only for a few years, and we're about to find out why. But with the emergence of Ahaziah to the throne, we see the return of the prophet Elijah, God's prophet. Now, early in his kingship, Ahaziah has a terrible accident. He falls out of a window, and he's wondering if he's going to die or not. And so what does he do? He doesn't pray. He doesn't consult the priests of the temple. He doesn't read the scriptures. What he does is he gets a group of people, like a convoy, and he sends them to a foreign country to consult their foreign god to find out whether or not he's going to live or die. Now, God tells Elijah that this is going to happen and he sends Elijah to intercept this convoy of people with a message for the king. And so Elijah goes and he intercepts this convoy of people with a message from God for the king. And here's the message. You're going to die. God basically is saying to Ahaziah, you didn't come to me, you went to a false God. God is basically saying to this king, you've rejected me, and you're leading your kingdom away from me, and you looked for life and for answers where there's only death, and so death is what you shall have. Now, Elijah gives this message to this convoy, and they take it back to the king, and they give the king this message, and the king is like, who told you this? And they said, we don't know. It was just some rough looking dude with a leather belt. And Ahaziah goes, I know that was Elijah. So what he does is he gets a platoon of men, soldiers, and he sends this platoon to go find Elijah and bring Elijah back to him. And that's where we're going to pick up our story. But I'm just going to warn you right now, we're going to read a little bit longer of a section and it's a gritty and a gruesome passage. But here at Peace Church, we don't shy away from passages like this. We're going to enter into them. We're going to see what's going on, because there's so much there.

So with that, would you hear the word of the Lord?

2 Kings 1:9-17

Then the king sent to him a captain of 50 men with his 50 men. He went up to Elijah who was sitting on the top of a hill and he said to him, Oh man of God, the King says, calm down. But Elijah answered the captain of 50 and said, if I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50. Then fire came down from heaven and consumed him and his 50. Again, the King sent to him another captain of 50 men with his 50 and he answered him and said oh man of God this is the King's order come down quickly notice the difference there verse 12 but Elijah answered them if I am a man of God let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50 then the fire notice before it said heaven but now it says then the fire of God came down from heaven and consumed him and his fifty. Again, the king sent the captain of a third fifty with his fifty, and the third captain of fifty went up and came, look at the difference here, and fell on his knees before Elijah and entreated him, O man of God, please let my life and the life of these fifty servants of yours be precious in your sight. Behold, fire came down from heaven and consumed the two former captains of 50 men with their 50s. But now let my life be precious in your sight. Then the angel of the Lord said to Elijah, go down with him and do not be afraid of him. So he arose and went down with him to the king. And he said to him, thus says the Lord, because you have sent messengers to inquire of Beelzebub, the god of Ekron, is it because there is no god in Israel to inquire of his word? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up. You shall surely die.' Then he died according to the word of the Lord that Elijah had spoken."

Prayer

This is God's word. Let's take a moment and pray and we'll continue. Let's pray together.

Father in heaven, Lord, you are great and you are good. Would you help us in our weak understanding and our limited knowledge to know how your greatness and your goodness did not just coincide with this passage, but Father, are revealed in it. Help us to see and to know you better today by the words that you've given to us through the scriptures. Help us to obey you above all else. It's by the power of the spirit and in the name of Jesus we pray these things.

And everyone said? Amen.

All right, so as we walk through this passage, there's so much we could do with the prophet Elijah, but we've been using this one specific lens for this series, and it's about how to have a faith that endures.

Main Point

And so our main point for this morning will be this.

A faith that endures obeys God above all else. Yes, in this life there are authorities that we need to obey, whether parents or teachers or government or maybe even the elders of the church. But this all falls under the canopy of our first love and our first allegiance, which is to God. This is what it means to be the people of God. That we obey God above all else.

And so as we walk through our passes, we're going to look at three specific things I'll give them to you ahead of time here. Elijah, the man of enduring faith shows us that

1. God's people know God's seriousness.

2. God's people extend God's grace.

3. God's people share God's message.

God's people know God's seriousness

All right, first thing, God's people know that God's serious, that God is serious.

Now, I am fully, fully aware that with a text like this, our Western, American, enlightened, compassionate, and romanticized ears, we come to a passage like this and let's just be honest. We really only have one question Why did those men have to die? Why were they consumed by fire why did Elijah do this why did God allow this why all the death and all the killing And I need to share something here like not every culture on the face of the planet would come to this text and that be their first question. The reason that's our first question is that that's exposing something about our worldview, about the way that we are told to think, about the ways that our society works. That exposes something about us with that being the first question that we come to, that we come with for a passage like this. But here's the thing, I'm not saying that's a bad question. It's a fair question. I'm just trying to help us all recognize that's not everybody's first question. That's us Americans. And so, fair enough though.

Let's talk about that. Why? Let me pose a philosophical inquiry for you for a moment. So I have four children, a sophomore down to a kindergartner. Now, I'm going to ask you a question here. Am I, as the father, am I entitled to do things that my children are not allowed to do?

It's not a trick question.

What I mean by that is I'm not assuming an answer for you. I don't know what people think nowadays. In fact, I'm willing to tell you that, yeah, cards on the table, the answer is yes. But I believe there is an emerging generation that's parenting differently, and I think that will become more pronounced in the next 15 to 30 years. I think a lot of us here, we assuming the answer is yes. Yes, there's things that you're allowed to do that your children are not allowed to do. But I'm here to tell you, I think that tide is turning, and I think there even may be some parents in here who are not sure what the answer is to that. So let me ask you this again Are there things that I as the father that I am morally allowed to do that would be sinful for my children to do Yes, is it hypocritical if I do things that I don't allow my children to do is that hypocritical? No Okay, so that shows me that you're already on your way To understanding the passage like this if you struggle with that scenario that I just proposed, you're probably gonna struggle with a passage like this.

We cut right to it.

God has the right to take the life of sinful people whenever it pleases His good and righteous divine will. Why can He do it and not us? Because he's the father and we're the kids.

And if we don't understand that about God,

we are really gonna wrestle with faith. If we think that God is equal to us, we're really gonna struggle.

Number one, I would tell you,

you don't want a God like that. You want a God who has more authority than you do. But that whole notion tells us something about the relationship we have with God and the authority that God has. I'll say it again. God has the right to take life. God has the right. It's not morally wrong for God to take the life of sinful people whenever it pleases his good and moral and divine will. As we look at the pages of Scripture, we do see a God who loves us. We see a God who challenges us. But listen to me, we do not see a God who is equal to us. And this passage is a case in point. He is the creator of all the universe. He's the father. We're the kids. He's the creator of humanity and all that is good. And the life that he's given to us all here, me church, the life that he's given to us, and the faith that he's instilled in us is serious. This is the fabric of our life. This is the reality of who we are. These are the guiding principles in life. We as God's people, know something. We know that God's serious, that God is serious. He's serious about our life. He's serious about our love. He's serious about our faith and he's serious about our obedience to him. This is all not just one big joke or test. What we're doing here, we're not doing here because we like and have fun doing it, we're doing something because we believe we're here because God is real, doing something real in this world, doing something real in our lives, and it's serious. And we need a passage like this to remind us of this. God doesn't play around. So let's go to our verses and find out more about this. Go to verse 9. Please keep your Bibles open. Then the king sent to him a captain of 50 men with his 50. He went up to Elijah, who was sitting on the top of the hill. This captain did, and said to him, oh man of God, the king says, notice that the king says, come down. But Elijah answered the captain of 50, if I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50. Then fire came down from, what's it say there in your Bibles from heaven and consumed him in his 50 so let me just stop right here for a second and I want to speak to a few of you and if you're struggling with this if you read a passage like this and you are shocked by the brutal murder of innocent men at the hand of an evil God I'm here to tell you you're already off to a bad start this is this is not the brutal murder of innocent men. This is the righteous divine judgment upon wicked men. Wicked men who did the wicked works at the order of a wicked king. Elijah is saying, if I am a man of God, then it will show because the judgment will be from God. It will be godly. And then God brings the judgment upon these men with fire. And what happens next for me is just absolutely nuts. This king sends another group of 50 plus one.

Verse 11

In verse 11, he doubles down on this. Again, the king sent to him another captain of 50 men with his 50, but listen to the tone this next guy takes. And he answered him, and the captain said to Elijah, oh man of God, this is the king's order. The first captain just said, the king says, now this guy comes with an order. This is the king's order. Come down. The last guy just said, come down. This guy doesn't just say come down. He says, come down quickly. Kind of like when I was growing up, my dad wanted me to come over here when he was mad at me. He would say, get your blank over here now. That's kind of the tone these guys are taking.

Verse 12

Look at verse 12. But then Elijah answered him, if I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50. Then the fire of what? What does it say this time of God? Then the fire of God came down from heaven and consumed him and his 50. Listen to me, people. God's not trying to get off the hook here. He wants to make sure that you understand this isn't from Elijah, this is from Him. God doesn't answer to us, we answer to God. He does whatever His good, moral, and divine will allows and pleases Him to do. Then the fire came down from heaven, and then the fire came down from God from heaven and consumed Him and His fifty. Listen, I know I gave a quick answer, that God can do this because He is God, but 102 men died. This is not to be taken lightly, even if they deserved it, this is not to be taken lightly. Church, this needs to bring sobriety to our faith and to our life. Hear me on this. Faith is a matter of life and death. It is the most important thing in your life.

And the church, hear me on this. You can't fool God with a faith that doesn't obey him. Let me say that again, you cannot fool God with a faith that does not obey him above all else. Elijah shows us this, and God's people know this because God's people know that God's serious.

God is serious.

When someone tells me that they're a Christian, and it's clear that faith isn't the primary thing in their life, for me it's like a person who's sitting in a house and that house is on fire and they're not doing anything about it. It's like I don't think you understand the seriousness and the gravity of the situation here. And I think in large part the reason they have that perspective is because they truly don't understand God's love and God's grace in their life. If you call yourself a Christian, then it's because you have accepted the grace of God and you cannot accept the grace of God without it changing the very fiber and fabric of your being. I'm not saying it makes you perfect, but I'm saying it changes you from the inside out. Grace does this. Grace is the truth that our salvation is a free gift from God. Elijah knew that as he looked forward to Christ. We know this as we look back on the cross. Grace is the truth that our salvation is a free gift from God. We cannot earn it. We just receive it. You can't earn it by giving money. You can't earn it by attending church. You can't even earn it by being nice to people. You can only receive it. And it's made possible because of the finished work of Jesus Christ who died on the cross in our place. Taking the punishment for our sins and then rising on the third day He proved that he was who he said he was and rising on the third day. He proved that the promises of God are real Elijah Called down fire on these men. He called down the judgment of God on these men.

The Bible says that Jesus was obedient to God to the point of death. He was obedient in the ways that we should be but aren't. And because we're not, we deserve judgment. But Jesus took that judgment, that wrath, for us. I don't know how a Christian can believe this and have it not envelop their entire life. How it changes us from the inside out. When we repent and place our faith in Christ, then we are saved. Not by what we have done, but by what Christ has done. And this is called grace. We can't receive it. We can't earn it. We can only receive it. I don't know how we can receive it and not be changed by it. Because when you get God's grace, you extend God's grace.

God's people extend God's grace

And that's what we see in this next section. God's people extend God's grace.

Verse 13

Go to verse 13. Again the captain, again the king sent the captain of a third fifty with his fifty, and the third captain of fifty went up and look at the difference here. Look at the difference between this guy and the third captain of fifty who went up and came and fell on his knees before Elijah and entreated him, meaning he pleaded with him in a kind and compassionate way. Oh, a man of God, please let my life and of these 50 servants of yours, not servants of Ahab, but servants of the prophet of the true God. Let my life and the life of these servants of yours be precious in your sight. And right there, we see a key difference. This platoon of men, while they were following the king's orders, had their ultimate allegiance to God. And look what happens. The king says, behold, fire came down from heaven and consumed the two former captains of 50 men in their 50s. But now let my life be precious in your sight. Do you see what's happening here? He's asking for grace. And so Elijah gives him grace. God tells him to.

Verse 15

Then the angel of the Lord said to Elijah, go down with him, do not be afraid. So Elijah rose and went down with the captain to the king. So, look at this. This is so key for us here nowadays. Elijah and this platoon of men, do you notice, they are still obeying the orders of this wicked king, but they're doing it because their ultimate allegiance is to God. They're ultimately obeying God. We live in a time of a godless society ruled by godless authorities. How are we to live in the midst of such wickedness? Well, here's what I tell you, church. Start by looking at the life of Elijah. It's because we ultimately obey God. And so when we obey a wicked government, we all come to the Bible with things that we don't want to hear.

Because whether or not we like it, passages like Romans 13 and Titus 3 remind us that the people who are in authority are the people who God allows to be. In this passage, do we really think that God had no control over Ahaziah being crowned king? Having obedience to a wicked government is an act of faith in God's providence. Having obedience to a wicked government is an act of faith in God's providence. But hear me, when we submit to them, we do so within our submission to God. But our obedience to wickedness, our wicked government, our obedience to a wicked government should never lead us to sin because we obey God above all else. We see this even in Jesus Christ's own disciples.

In Acts 5, the authorities tell them, you all better stop preaching or you're going to pay for it. And what did the disciples say? God has called us to do this and we obey God, not man. That leads nicely to this next notion. For those of us who are up and ready to go and defy the government in obedience to God, let me tell you what that means. That means sharing God's message.

God's people share God's message

For those of us who wish to be faithful, for those of us who want a faith that endures, share his message. Share his message. Let's go to the end of verse 15.

Verse 16

So Elijah arose and went down with him to the king, verse 16, and Elijah said to him, thus says the Lord, because you have sent messengers to inquire of Beelzebub, the god of Ekron, is it because there's no God in Israel to inquire of his word? Therefore you shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.' So he, King Ahaziah, died according to the word of the Lord that Elijah had spoken." Now if we think sharing God's message is a hard thing to do in this difficult, is a difficult thing to do in this world, then imagine being a prophet, trying to tell a king he's gonna die.

But here's the thing, Elijah brought a message of death. But for those who believe in Christ, our message is one of life. It's one of love, it's one of the gospel. We are to bring the gospel, which is life. It's the good news of Jesus Christ that brings life to those who believe this is what we are called to do if we are going to be faithful and obedient to God because God's people share God's message.

Fruit baskets & Evangleism

Before I went into ministry, before I was in college, I was also working at a grocery store. I was doing many things during that time, but I was working at a grocery store, specifically in the produce department. And during Christmas time, we would always get these big orders for fruit baskets, okay? And this one year, we got this massive order for like a ton of fruit baskets. And so they paid me and this other dude to work through the night, get paid overtime, to put together these like 150-some-odd fruit baskets.

Okay, so this is like, I've only been a Christian for a few years at this point, but I am a Christian, I said I was a Christian, and I go into the back room this night with this other dude, and we got this boxes of fruit that we had to put in the fruit baskets, and it was like this moment where God was like, well, you got eight hours alone with this guy. And so I was like, well, time to share my faith. And again, I was young in my faith, but I knew the gospel. And I'll tell you, even nowadays, I'm not any like a big evangelist, but I started the conversation just by asking what he believed about God. I just wanted to open the door. He gave the typical answer that most people nowadays do, which is normally something like, I believe there's probably a God, but who really knows? And so I asked him about this God that he thinks may or may not exist. And you know what he said about this God? Oddly enough, this God that may or may not exist, the moral ethic of this God looked oddly similar to progressive American society. Surprise, surprise.

And I just said to him, can I share with you what I believe? Hey, listen, I didn't want to shove it down his face. I just, man to man, I gave him my testimony, I shared about the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I, you know, again, I was young in my faith, I didn't know everything, I still don't, but I just shared what I knew, which is what the Bible said, that Christ died for our sins, that he was buried, and that he was raised again on the third day. I shared with him the gospel. And you know what? Not only did he start asking questions, but he started attacking the Christian faith.

I mean like, he brought out his fangs and he went after the Christian faith. And you know what? I sat there and I did what I could to provide a defense and try to answer his questions. But you want to know what really happened? For eight hours of time and a half pay, I got utterly destroyed. He took me to task and he destroyed me. He was smart and articulate. It was terrible. I made no headway. I sounded like a fool. My answers were weak. They were lacking. But you know, it didn't discourage my faith. I'll be honest with you. I felt bad. The next morning, I couldn't eat or sleep. I did feel sick to my stomach about it, but it didn't discourage my faith. Do you know what it actually did? It forced me to go deeper in my faith.

Because here's the thing, I was getting comfortable. If you're not sharing your faith, you're getting comfortable. I was getting comfortable, so I needed to share my faith. And you know what he did? He started asking questions that I should have been asking, but I was too comfortable in my faith to ask those questions. And so he started challenging me with questions that I should have already been asking. And what he did, so it forced me to go drive deeper into my faith and try to seek answers. Some of them I found easy answers to. For some of them, I was a little digging. Some of them I'm still wrestling with. But he forced me to ask questions and to drive my faith deeper. And here's what I'd say to you. It didn't discourage my faith. It made me seek answers. And church, when the Bible calls us to share our faith, which it does, by the way, it calls us to share our faith, but you know what? It never promises it's going to go well. It never promises it's going to go well. And here's the truth, and here's why you can rest at night because you can't convert anyone anyway. Only God can.

In that conversation with that guy, you know what? He didn't get his answers, but he saw my faith. He didn't get his answers, but he saw me willing to step to the plate and try. He saw that my faith was alive. And sometimes sharing God's message simply results in people seeing your faith and that's awesome. I consider that night a key moment in my faith journey. Honestly, it was a terrible night, but I consider it a key moment in my faith journey because God used it to help me develop a faith that endures. that even among my sloppy answers, I know a seed was planted in his heart. And I pray that God's people along the way do what they're meant to do and continue to water that seed.

Challenge

Church, my prayer for us all, all of us who call Peace Church home, my prayer is that as we approach Easter, you are considering who you would invite. I don't know if you noticed it, but there's a card on your seat, maybe you sat on it, that is yours to give away to someone and invite them to Easter. But here's what I'm going to say to you. Would you share with them the gospel before I do? You're going to invite someone to Easter? Would you share with them the gospel before I do? That's what I'm asking for the Peace Church people. Because there's no faith in God without obedience to God, and your faith will not endure if you don't obey God above all else. Like that video of those two parents calling to their child to see which one the child loved more, there are two calling to you now. God and everything else. Who are you going to obey? Who are you going to show that you love more? Like the righteous Father that He is, God is calling to you in love, that you might have a faith that endures by obeying Him above all else. Yes, because He's God, but also because He loves you. And the love that He's shown to you is made evident in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

So go and share that. Obey God above all else and you'll see your faith endure. Amen. Would you please stand and let's prepare our hearts to worship? Would you bow your heads for a moment? Let me just share something with you before we pray. I just want you to answer in your own heart. Is faith, is your faith alive? Is your faith driving you to obey God above all else? Let that be the faith that drives you now to worship. Don't just sing because everyone else is. Sing because you have a God in heaven who is turning your heart towards him. Sing because you have a God in heaven who has shown his love to you and his son. Sing because you're obedient to God because you are walking in step with the Spirit.

Ending Prayer

So let's pray together.

Father, we come before you, thankful that we worship the one who is perfectly obedient, Jesus Christ, even to the point of death, dying in our place so that we might have life, not wrath, not death, not judgment, that we might have life. So, Father, I pray, Lord, that you, by the power and presence of your Spirit, would develop in this church a faith that endures because we obey you above all else. Father, let our submission to the authorities here on earth be under the canopy of our ultimate submission to you. And so Father, I would pray here and now that we sing, that the words we're about to sing, we just don't sing them because they're on the screen. We sing these words because they are the cry of our hearts. So Father, I just pray in Jesus' name that you would fill the people in this room as you fill this place, that we would sing unto you because we honor, love, and obey you above all else. Father, I pray, Father, that our song would be known. So help us to sing it now in Jesus' name. So help us to sing it now in Jesus' name.

And everyone said, Amen.