Sermon Page:

Silver Street Mission

Please use your browser's back arrow to return to the previous page

The Battle for the Soul — 2

I Kings 16: 29 – 17: 6

Rev. Peter R Green, Sunday morning, 18 Jun, 2006

WE ARE looking at how we Christians should act in light of the tussle for our loyalty which currently affects the world. We lie between anti–God religion and anti-God secularism. What next?

Last week we saw that Elijah lived through similar times. We recognised that Jezebel is the promoter of anti–God religion. King Ahab represents the political force that uses gods but denies God. And Elijah and Obadiah stood against those forces.

I said that we live in a world where political and religious forces are committed to suppressing and defeating Christianity.

But how well has Christianity done in countering those forces?

Do you remember that program on TV called Monkey Magic? It was full–on Buddhism, and it was entertaining for kids. Where are Christian programs as interesting? Monkey Magic was a story for kids or adults. It wasn’t preachy, it told a story of a quest; it introduced fallible, semi–allegorical characters, it had struggles, failures and successes. And it had the Buddha intervening in times of crisis.

What do we do to promote the Christian story?

Secularists tell stories about their successes in changing the human condition. Sometimes they even take over the Christian story. They will tell about prison reform or about hospitals, or education or any of the million and one things Christians have done: but they tell it as though they had done it. Faith is never mentioned; Christ is known only by Christian’s failures.

When secular forces opposed reform, it was Christians who stood up for it, yet the forces opposed to God shout loud and clear about our Christian failings. You can easily find references to wierd US Government decisions based on fundamentalist readings of the Bible. You will be told ad nauseam about paedophile priests. But who mentions that Martin Luther King was a Christian, or that the majority of welfare across the world is done by Christians?

Have you seen that picture of Martin Luther King in that little park in Newtown? It has the words, “I have a dream” under the picture. It used also to have a large slab of the actual sermon, only that was overpainted. Even non-Christians I know said it was wrong to remove the reason for King's dream from public display. But someone might be offended by references to Christianity, so Christianity got offended instead by its removal from history.

And what do we do to promote our own story?

The reason I ask is that I don’t believe that we have a lot of time left in which we can freely express ourselves and our faith.

Think about this. Over the past 10 years we have seen 160 years of welfare policy overturned, we have seen 100 years of workplace reforms rolled back, we have seen the crumbling of the Westminster system of accountability, developed through 350 years of struggle.

In the past 3 years, we have seen large slabs of habeus corpus overturned — reforms that go back to Magna Carta in 1215AD. Terrorism is the excuse, but taking control is the reason. Totalitarianism isn’t far off.

If so much can change in so little time, don’t ever feel secure in our rights to pursue our faith without disruption. We must seize the day, because the night comes, when no one can work.

Elijah’s story shows what happened when a crisis struck Israel, and it shows us how we can respond.

There is no “one size fits all” solution.

There are times to confront, and there are times to avoid confrontation.

We had a chap come here a few times who was considering joining himself to our church and working with us in outreach.

Then he saw a handout or something I had produced with contact details for Catholic churches and organisations as well as Protestant ones.

So he severed all contact with us, because we were compromising with Rome.

I still think he was the one with the problem.

There are Catholic practices and beliefs I genuinely disapprove of. But a Catholic who trusts Christ and seeks to obey him is my brother or sister, regardless of the detail of his or her faith.

As Christians we are called to be in the battle, not to cause fights.

As we read in Ecclesiastes,

^{ECCL 3:1} There is a time for everything,

and a season for every activity under heaven:

^3:2 a time to be born and a time to die,

a time to plant and a time to uproot,

^3:3 a time to kill and a time to heal,

a time to tear down and a time to build,

^3:4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,

a time to mourn and a time to dance,

Everything has its time and its place.

THE PROPHETIC WORD

Elijah hid. Why was that? It was because he had confronted Ahab earlier on. In 1 Kings 17:1 we read,

Now Elijah the Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, “As the LORD, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.”

That is a pretty bald statement. Wouldn’t Elijah have explained to Ahab why God would withhold the rain and dew? What point is there in declaring a punishment if the reason for the punishment isn't explained?

So, before the crisis comes, that’s when we have to speak up.

Tell society its faults. Tell the leaders their faults. Tell them the consequences.

That means we have to be informed, we have to be alert to our prophetic calling.

Didn’t Joel prophesy it? Didn’t Peter apply it to us?

^{AC 2:17} “ `In the last days, God says,

I will pour out my Spirit on all people.

Your sons and daughters will prophesy,

your young men will see visions,

your old men will dream dreams.

¹⁸ Even on my servants, both men and women,

I will pour out my Spirit in those days,

and they will prophesy.

The coming of the Holy Spirit frequently involved speaking in tongues, but the emphasis is on prophecy.

Similarly, when Paul preached to people in Ephesus, we read,

⁵ On hearing this, they were baptised into the name of the Lord Jesus. ⁶ When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied.

It was both speaking in tongues and prophecy.

And prophecy means speaking from God’s perspective to people about the situation they are in, and revealing the consequences of continuing the way they are going.

We are called to prophesy to our world about sin and righteousness and judgment as the Holy Spirit gives us utterance.

So we can say that we need to speak when it is right to speak, and be ready to withdraw when it is right to withdraw.

WITHDRAWAL

But when things get tough, sometimes it is time for withdrawal.

That might seem cowardly, but it isn’t necessarily so.

There is a famous Old English poem, The Battle of Maldon, about the local leader, Beorhtnoþ and his battle against the invading Norsemen in the 10th Century AD.

Beorhtnoþ was a decent, honourable man, who tried to live his life by Christian principles. His wife loved him, and commissioned the poem in his memory.

But it emerges that Beorhtnoþ* lost the battle by being too honourable.

The Norsemen were thugs, the kind that invade houses and beat up weak old people because they can.

Beorhtnoþ had the best position, on the rise above the river plains; the Norsemen toldi him he was a coward, to take the high ground and make them attack him by coming up the slope.

So Beorhtnoþ decided to be honourable, he decided to fight fairly, he came down onto the level ground.

While the English soldiers were still sliding down the slope, the Vikings slaughtered them. Beorhtnoþ was killed, and the Vikings pillaged the town.

Some Christians have a problem with ordinary sensible measures.

Jesus told his disciples,

^{MK 13:14} “When you see `the abomination that causes desolation’ standing where it does not belong — let the reader understand — then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. ¹⁵ Let no one on the roof of his house go down or enter the house to take anything out. ¹⁶ Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. ¹⁷ How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! ¹⁸ Pray that this will not take place in winter, ¹⁹ because those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now--and never to be equalled again.

There are times to stand our ground; but there are also times to run and hide.

Christianity survived because Christians obeyed their Lord.

Beyond any consideration of tactics, that’s foundational, isn’t it: obeying our Lord?

It’s like those prophets that Obadiah hid in the cave. They didn’t confront Ahab and Jezebel directly. They hid, waiting for the time when they would be needed again.

Even Elijah kept out of the way of the murderous Royal Family.

^{1KI 17:2} Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah: ³ “Leave here, turn eastward and hide in the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan. ⁴ You will drink from the brook, and I have ordered the ravens to feed you there.”

⁵ So he did what the LORD had told him. He went to the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan, and stayed there.

It’s important to know it’s OK to withdraw. Some Christians seem not to know they have an option. They are compelled to confront.

This means that we have to learn to view ourselves in a different light.

Remember that fellow who saw his role in terms of combat?

He was in conflict with the Catholics, he got into holts with the Council, he was arguing with the police. Everywhere he went, he seemed to be in a conflict.

He saw himself as a fighter for the Lord. That was his role in life. Sadly, that's not a Christian role.

Don’t get stuck. Don't let a role define your life. Let the Lord be your guide.

Elijah had a different idea. His role was to obey what he heard from the Lord. If his calling was to confront, he did it; if his calling was to withdraw, he did it.

What he heard from the Lord, he did. That is our role: not to be a fighter, but to be obedient. And, if that means fighting, then do it; if it means withdrawal, do that.

Next week, we will look at his final confrontation with Ba’alism; but today, we can leave it at that point. Elijah was, above all, a man who spoke and acted as God led him.

I was halfway through preparing to speak for today when I began to have serious doubts about what I was going to say. I had these doubts, because I realised that I was going into the area of tactics before I came to the issue of lifestyle.

But that is the critical issue here.

Elijah’s lifestyle was what informed his tactics, because his lifestyle was geared to honouring God and obeying his revealed will.

When I was in theological college, we had a speaker at one of our college mid–year retreats who told us to take our Bibles and go away alone, and ask God to show us what he wanted to say to us.

One person returned tearful. She had not been able to find a word from God in the Bible. She was looking for guidance as she finished her course. She was expected to go home, but she didn’t want to go. Too much sadness faced her. Then, as she sat by the lagoon, asking God what he had to say to her, she saw waterbirds flying off, and God spoke to her about going home, just as he sends the birds to their homes.

For me, my Bible opened three times at a passage it normally didn’t open to. The third time, I read what it said. It was a message to Israel’s leaders about not running away in tough times if God hadn’t decreed it. It was a message of judgment on those who disobeyed and ran when God said not to.

This was a really hard time for our denomination, and the leaders were running from conflict instead of facing it in the name of Christ.

For over 20 years I have felt bad that I didn’t deliver that message to the Baptist Assembly in its full implications.

But it has struck me this week that I delivered it where it counted – to our speaker for that year, who was a leader of the denomination, and on whom – sadly – judgment did eventually fall.

In difficult times, we can’t always tell which way to go. That is where obedience is vital, because it is only God who sees the end from the beginning.

I can’t say exactly how God will communicate his will to you as we face difficult times. But I can say that he really does want us to know what his will is.

There are some very clear principles in the Bible.

There are parts of the Bible which may speak to you in your situation, but not to me in mine, like that account of leaders running from difficulties.

But God may also speak through Christian brothers and sisters, or through some well–wisher, or through a natural event.

Be prepared to hear from him!

And be ready.

As you get opportunities, seek to promote the cause of Christ. Speak about his love. When some religions threaten hell if you don’t come their way, speak the love of Christ, who offers redemption and rescue from the pit. Look for ways to speak of his love, his justice, his thirst for righteousness.

And, when he says, “Leave! Run away! Hide!” be prepared to go.

He will hide you in the hollow of his hand. He will be your stronghold and shelter. He will keep you safe when the storm is raging and when the devil is raving.

And when it is time to confront the powers of darkness, he will have preserved you and prepared you for that very day.

May we all be ready!

AMEN

* Pronounced something like “bay-orkt-noth” – although the “k” is more like “ch” in Scottish “Loch” or German “Nacht”

© Peter R. Green 2006. Permission is granted for quotation in full for non-commercial purposes provided that authorship is acknowledged and this copyright notice is displayed with the text. Portions also copyright The Bible, NIV (Zondervan Ltd.)