1 Kings 18: Who Is Really God, and Who Is Your God?

Introduction

"Who is God?" In English, this question from Simon Swadling, assistant pastor at Summer Hill Anglican Church in Sydney, can be heard two ways: who is God, and whose God is he, in other words, who is your God? That is the whole question of 1 Kings 18: who is really God, and who is your God?

The drought has lasted three years. The previous week's message showed a widow and her son on the verge of starving to death (1 Kings 17). In the middle of that distress, the word of Yahweh comes to Elijah, and the story leads to Mount Carmel, where the prophets of Baal and the prophet of Yahweh face off before all Israel.

Simon follows the text step by step: Obadiah, the faithful servant in a hostile palace; Ahab, who accuses the messenger; a people who no longer know which god to follow; idols that take everything and give nothing back; a God who answers by fire; and a small cloud that teaches us to wait.

Outline of the message

1. The drought is in God's hand

In verse 1, Yahweh says to Elijah: "Go, show yourself to Ahab; and I will send rain on the surface of the earth." Simon points out that the rain does not depend on the king's reaction: God does not say he will send rain if Ahab repents.
God makes it plain that these three years of drought come from Israel's idolatry. But the end of the drought is also in his hands.
Ahab and Obadiah, the steward of his house, split the land between them to find a little grass and keep the animals alive. And it is Obadiah who runs into Elijah, the one who comes to announce the end of the drought.

2. Obadiah, servant of Yahweh in Ahab's palace

Simon lingers on this character: his name means "servant of Yahweh," and he lives up to it. Even while working in Ahab's palace, he serves Yahweh.
While Jezebel has the prophets massacred, Obadiah hides a hundred of them in two caves and feeds them bread and water, a rare and precious food in the middle of a famine.
Simon points out the irony: Obadiah preserves the lives of the prophets, while Ahab only cares about the lives of his horses and mules.
Obadiah greets Elijah with deep respect, then "gets carried away" for six verses, in contrast to Elijah's simple, crisp sentences. His fear is justified: if Elijah vanishes, as he tends to do, Ahab will have him killed.
Elijah reassures him by swearing by the living Yahweh whom they both serve. And if Obadiah's reaction seems exaggerated to you, just listen to Ahab's first words.

3. "Is this you, you troubler of Israel?"

Ahab greets Elijah with these words (verse 17). For Simon, it is the classic case of blaming the messenger.
Ahab takes no account of what God had clearly announced would happen if the kings turned to idols. He despises both the message and the prophet.
Elijah sees clearly and puts the blame where it belongs: "I have not troubled Israel, but you, and your father's house, in that you have forsaken Yahweh's commandments, and you have followed the Baals" (verse 18).
Yet God has promised to show grace, even as Ahab accuses him and proves unworthy of this mercy. "That is the whole point of mercy. It is not deserved. It does not depend on the one who receives it, but on the one who gives it."

4. "How long will you waver between the two sides?"

Elijah asks Ahab to gather on Carmel the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of Asherah, nearly a thousand in all. Ahab agrees, perhaps thinking he has found a chance to humiliate Elijah and Yahweh.
Carmel lies at the border of the northern kingdom, toward Tyre and Sidon, where Ahab's wife comes from and where Baal entered Israel. Simon sees this as a concession on Elijah's part: let's go near Baal's home turf, maybe he will answer better there, he who is a storm god and has not sent rain for three years.
One translator renders Elijah's question this way: "How long will you jump from one crevice to another?", like small animals hopping between the cracks of a rock to find shelter. Elijah calls the people to choose. But the people answer nothing.
Simon explains this silence: the people are stuck. Some kings told them to worship Yahweh, others to worship Baal. They keep their responsibility for choosing their worship, but they look like what Jesus calls sheep without a shepherd, led astray by those who should have led them to God.
Elijah then offers something clear: "The God who answers by fire, let him be God" (verse 24). And the people reply: "It is well said."

5. Idols that take everything and give nothing back

The prophets of Baal call on their god from morning until noon: "Baal, answer us!" No one answers. They leap around the altar, the same word Elijah used for the people jumping from one crevice to another.
Elijah mocks them: "Cry aloud; for he is a god. Either he is deep in thought, or he has gone somewhere, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he sleeps and must be awakened" (verse 27). Simon notes that, behind the euphemism, Elijah is suggesting that Baal may be stuck in the bathroom, like someone who cannot get to the door when the bell rings.
He is quick to add that this passage is not an invitation to mock other people's beliefs. There is dark humor in the story, but Elijah is God's prophet, in the promised land, calling God's own people back to him. "Our situations are not exactly the same."
The prophets wear themselves out, shout louder, leap harder and cut themselves until they bleed. "There was no voice, no answer, and nobody paying attention" (verse 29).
"They will give, and give, and give. The idol will take everything, but in the end, this worship is in vain." The prophets give everything and receive worse than nothing, because there is no god to call on.

6. The God who answers by fire

Faced with this frenzy, Elijah acts calmly and with few words. He repairs the altar of Yahweh and takes twelve stones, "according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob." The one who has always been Israel's God already knew him back when Israel was just one man.
Elijah has four jars of water poured out, three times. "What is 4 times 3? 12." The twelve tribes again, but this time to make things harder: the whole contest is stacked in Baal's favor.
Then Elijah prays simply: "Yahweh, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel." The fire of Yahweh falls and consumes the burnt offering, the wood, the stones, the dust and the water in the trench.
The contrast is total. From the prophets of Baal, everything is demanded, with no guarantee and no sign that anyone is listening. From Elijah, what is asked is faith that God will do what he promised. "You turn to an idol, whatever it is, you give everything in the vain hope of getting something out of it, and in the end you get nothing. But the God of the universe is looking for you, he asks only for faith, and he promises life."
The people fall on their faces: "Yahweh, he is God! Yahweh, he is God!" (verse 39). The false prophets are put to death, as Deuteronomy prescribes. But Ahab and the people, who are also responsible, do not suffer what they deserve: Elijah tells the king to go and eat and drink, for the rain is coming.
The detail of the hour, the time of the evening offering, reinforces the point: it is God who lights the fire, God who provides atonement for the people's sin, God who turns hearts back. "He did not need to be woken up. He was not distracted." He had been listening from the beginning, ready to answer.

7. The small cloud: waiting for a God who keeps his word

Simon speaks to the person who feels like they are calling out and hearing nothing back. Elijah sends his servant to look toward the sea, seven times. Why did God not send the clouds right away, the way he sent the fire?
The seventh time, there is only "a small cloud, like a man's hand, rising out of the sea" (verse 44). The servant must have been at the end of his patience.
This silence is not the one the prophets of Baal ran into. It is a silence of waiting, resting on a promise. The prophets of Baal received nothing because there was no one there. Elijah and his servant wait because God is in charge of the situation and of the moment.
God does not promise to always send the rain we ask for, or to burn up all our everyday problems with fire. But it is he, Yahweh, who is God, and there is no other.
The future he promises us may look small and far away, like a hand above the ocean. That takes nothing away from the certainty of the day when all our problems will be solved and everyone will recognize that Yahweh is God.
The rain meant new life for Israel, their sin having been atoned for. We too have received new life in Christ, who atoned for our sins, and we wait for the day when we will live it fully. "This God who can make fire fall and make rain fall, who sends Jesus to save us, who promises to one day give us new life in his kingdom, this God is our God. And there is no other."

Key takeaways

Drought and rain are both in God's hand: his grace does not depend on the merit of the one who receives it, but on the one who gives it.
You can serve Yahweh faithfully in the middle of a hostile environment, like Obadiah in Ahab's palace.
Idols take everything and give nothing back. The living God looks for you, asks only for faith, and keeps his promises.
God is never asleep or distracted: he hears, he knows, and he is ready to answer for our good.
When the answer is slow in coming, God's silence is a silence of waiting. The small cloud announces the promised rain.

Personal application

Between which "crevices" are you jumping today, instead of clearly choosing to follow Yahweh?
What demands all your time, energy or money without ever giving anything back?
Where you work or live, how can you serve Yahweh with Obadiah's quiet faithfulness?
Do you sometimes pray as if God were distracted or asleep? What changes for you when you remember that he always hears?
Which of God's promises seems as small to you today as a cloud the size of a hand, and how can you keep looking toward the sea?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

What does "How long will you waver between the two sides?" mean in 1 Kings 18?

Simon cites a translator who renders the image this way: "How long will you jump from one crevice to another?", like small animals hopping between the cracks of a rock to find shelter. The people, led astray by kings who sent them now toward Yahweh, now toward Baal, no longer know where to stand. Elijah calls them to choose.

Why does Elijah have water poured over the burnt offering on Carmel?

Four jars poured three times makes twelve, like the twelve tribes of Israel. The water makes the sacrifice harder to ignite: the whole contest is stacked in Baal's favor. Yet the fire of Yahweh consumes the burnt offering, the wood, the stones, the dust and the water in the trench. God does it all.

What should you do when God seems not to answer your prayers?

Elijah's servant goes up seven times to look at the sea before he sees a small cloud like the palm of a hand. For Simon, this silence is not the one the prophets of Baal ran into: it is a silence of waiting, grounded in a promise. God is in charge of the moment and he keeps his word, even when the promised future looks small and far away.