by Rev. Gina Johnson
We are going to continue today on our sermon series that we are working through with some hot fun in the summertime. And we are going to go back to a classic story from the Book of Kings. Our story today involves the prophet Elijah.
This one is a pretty popular story, so it should be familiar. So we have Elijah. To his knowledge, he feels like he's all that's left. Because these other kingdoms, they've been eliminating the prophets of Israel.
And he's at a point where he's wanting them to make a choice. You've been surrounded by the teachings of God. You know there's been evidence of the one true God, and still you are worshiping these false prophets.
He's had it. He's saying, okay, I'm going to prove it to you once and for all. Let's test you and all your false gods versus my one true God.
That's what he's doing here. He's encouraging them to come and make your sacrifice like you would always make. And I'll make mine over here, and we'll see whose God's going to show up and whose God's going to prove that they are the one true God. All the people agreed, a good plan, do it.
That's always a very fascinating story, because Elijah, we see a different side of him as a prophet, as he's taunting that other group. He's saying, come on, you guys are worshiping all these false gods. What's your God made of? What's he going to do? How is he going to come to your rescue now? And it's funny, because these other individuals who have been worshiping false gods, they have more than one God they worship.
And so Elijah's like, come on, call them up. Who's going to save you? When I look at this story, it makes me think about where we are today and what is it that distracts us and pulls us away from the truth when it's always right there in front of us. I wonder, how did they get there? By the time this story starts taking place, there's 450 of them, and Elijah's asking them, make a choice. Are you going to worship your false god, or are you going to worship the God that you know, the God that's given you life, the God that saved your people time and time again?
The question is for us is, how is it when we are on this path? We are on this path to understanding ourselves more, to coming closer to the Spirit, to having things revealed to us that help us ascend in those higher levels of becoming Christ conscious. But then something comes in and distracts us. And that's what I want to write about now, is what are some of those distractions that we need to look out for so when it comes to that day where everyone's called together, there's not a group of us out here, enamored and captured by false gods, by distractions, by things that take us outside of ourselves, instead of inward where we know we can find the kingdom. Jesus says, the kingdom is within.
So how do we do things to keep that situation from happening? I think the first one is that we have to recognize that our option to follow God is a choice. It's something that we choose to do. The source, the creator of the world, the creator of the universe, our God is not a puppet master.
Our God is not a being that sits there and looks upon us as children and says, “I'm going to make you do this, and I'm going to make you do that, and I'm going to make you do this.” We have a choice. Each and every day when we wake up in the morning, we have a choice.
Am I going to live my life in such a way that it shows that I am devoted to a higher purpose than myself? Am I going to live my life every day from a place of love and compassion and understanding? Am I going to live my life in such a way that continues to paint the image of love, the image of truth, and the image of grace?
Or am I going to choose to get caught up with something outside of myself and get distracted?
What are some of your false prophets? I wrote about this a little bit last week. What are those things that you're allowing yourself to be distracted by? What are you building an altar to on the side and losing sight of where you should be placing your attention? It's very interesting that these prophets of Baal were there, worshipping, and nothing was happening, but they kept going. They started cutting themselves, crying out, cutting themselves. This was a ritual. This was something they've done for years.
How many times have we found ourselves in a system or a structure that we know is not serving us anymore and we know that we are being called to a higher opportunity, to something greater that can make a significant impact?
You know, those prophets, they were there. They were watching Elijah standing there in complete confidence and calm. They could look at him and recognize, “He knows something. He is an enlightened dude. There's something that he is about. He's studying something. He's spending time in something. Look at him. He's standing there in reverence while we're all sitting here screaming and crying and cutting ourselves, trying to prove a point that our God is better.”
You know, I wonder how many people in that 450 were like, “I don't even want to be a part of this anymore, but it's all I've ever known. I've been in this structure for so long, if they're cutting themselves and throwing themselves on the ground and crying, then I guess that's what I'm supposed to do too.” But what's crying out internally? Was there something crying out within those prophets that were saying, “I see that other option over there, but I'm just staying over here.”
How many times do we have something in front of us that we know clearly is insanity? Doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting a different result? Isn't that the definition of insanity? How often do we do that? That's the analogy. How often do we give way to things that we know aren't serving, are just distractions, are false in our life, but still we'd rather spend time in that? Because if we go over to Elijah's side, it might mean something new.
It might mean something different. It might mean having to put our trust and faith in something we cannot see, because at least on this side we have gold statues, and we have all sorts of symbols and emblems and temples that we can come in and bow down to. We can worship the God of fertility and the God of creation and the God of the sun and the God of the moon. Whatever flavor you want, it's there.
But if we come over here, we might have to have a thing called faith. We might have to trust that even though we can't see the freedom in front of us, we know that we're no longer captive.
Even though we can't see the abundance of money before us, we know that we are well provided for. Even though it might feel like the dark night is long and the path is windy and confusing, we know that there is always clear direction given from the Spirit, that we will always make it to our destination. But we need to have the faith that Elijah had.
We need to have the sincerity that Elijah had, that “I'm standing here alone right now, and there's 450 of them, but I know the path that I'm on is the right path.” You know, those are some of the distractions that we face. We keep wanting to say, “the grass is always greener on the other side.”
The grass is going to be greener over there. The minute we let go of the idea that we need to go find a grander, better path, and we just embrace the path we're on, the further we're going to get. That's one of our first distractions right there, is thinking there's something better somewhere else.
You're exactly where you need to be. In this very moment, you can't go backwards and be in the past. You can't be in tomorrow.
So no matter where you think you'd like to be right now, you're in the perfect place. You're right here, and this is where you should be present. And that's the whole thing in a relationship with God, in a relationship of walking this path.
If you are present to every moment that is before you, yes, some will be challenging, and yes, there will be some that we want to get through quicker than the others. There'll be the ones that we want to sit in and savor, but if we're present to every moment, then every step will be more clear on that path. We don't have to worry if it's taking too long, if the road is getting too hard, because we have that faith like Elijah. We have that promise of the Spirit, and we know that our God is a faithful God.
The other things that tend to distract us on the path are labels. You know, we could be walking a path that is very familiar to us, and there's all these labels that come with it, and at times, we feel a stirring. It's time to do something a little different. It's time to dig a little deeper. We know that something greater is calling, but then we question ourselves, or we're questioned by others because of the labels that we've allowed ourselves to take on.
It's amazing how the world spends a lot of time trying to tell you who are you, and then once you say, I'm a father, I'm a son, I'm an employee, I'm a brother, I'm an uncle. Well, are you a good one or are you a bad one? Are you a good father? According to who? Are you a good worker? According to who? Are you a bad son or daughter? According to who? It's interesting because the whole world is so quick to tell you who you are.
All of these prophets over here, they were true followers of Baal. They were the ones that had it right. They were the ones that were in charge of the religious authority of that area.
But then there's Elijah over here. “Elijah, you're a good prophet. Although the others have been killed, although you're on your own, you're a good prophet.”
It can get really confusing when we let the rest of the world tell us who we are and who we're called to be. When we let the rest of the world tell us, this is as far as you're going to go. This is where you need to place your beliefs. This is the way you need to do things.
That's another one of those distractions. You can center yourself and recognize it. Ask yourself, “Who am I?”
The answer is, “I am.”
And yes, I get to be a mother, and I get to be a minister, and I get to be a daughter, and I get to have friendships, but who I am is not based on those labels. And when you start to use labels to identify you, you'll lose sight of who you are, who you're created to be.
So whether it's something on the outside that you're worshiping, or whether it's a false idea that you've placed on top of yourself, be careful, because you too will start to have so many false gods all around you, where the call is, “Hey, is this what you still want to be doing? Do you still want to be repeating those patterns over here? Or do you want to wake up and put your faith into a space where you never have to doubt, you never have to worry, and you know the fire is always going to come?”
You know that when you call on your fire that your fire is going to come. You know when there's a storm that if you have the right intention, you can calm the storm and calm the waves. You know that you are not your body, you are not your story, you are not a label, you are not subject to a certain type of life, but you are blessed with abundance. You are blessed with the gift of being directly connected to the source of all life. If our creator is the ocean, then we are a wave. If our creator is the sunlight, then we are a sunbeam.
And Elijah is trying to remind us in this story today that you can put on all your shows and say all your chants and get confused by all the things of the world, but I'm going to stand here in the trueness of who I am. I'm going to stand here trusting on my source of life, turning inward and knowing that in any moment, I have the power to call on God. I have the power to live out what God is doing.
It wasn't God that sent down the fire. It was Elijah and his faith that called upon God and the fire came.
My question for you as we wrap up is, where's your fire? And if you know that your fire is there but it feels like it's flickering or it's wavering, then look around and see why. Ask, “What has distracted me? How many more sentries do I need to place around my mind to protect what I know to be true?”
Where is your fire? And if you're saying, it's been a long time since I've felt that fire, well, great. Let's see what we can do to change that. Let's see what we can do to reignite that. Because each one of us has that Elijah within us that's calling out and trusting and has that faith.
Each one of us has that ability to stand against 450 prophets of Baal, to stand against all the false illusions, all the idols, all the things coming at us, and to stand and say, “Do you know who my God is? Do you know who I am directly connected to? Let me show you how we bring down fire.”
Please pray with me. Gracious and loving God, we give you thanks for this time this morning. We give you thanks for your word and the lessons that we can find from it. God, we pray that as we are in our week this week that we will trust your spirit to reveal to us how we can ignite our fire, how we can recognize the things that are distracting us and no longer serving us, and how we can move past them, that we can continue in our journey of remembrance, of discovery, and that we can continue to be the light and love of Christ wherever we go.
God, we thank you so much for today. And we thank you so much for the way that you empower us and you lead us. May we be a representation of your truth, your love, and your grace.
In Jesus' name, amen.
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