Finishing the Job

The contest was over on Mt Carmel, or was it? Once fire fell in response to Elijah’s prayer the people responded by acknowledging God. But the job wasn’t finished. At Elijah’s command the people who had just been overawed by the demonstration of God’s power and glory were commanded to seize the false prophets. None were to escape, every one of them was to be taken and held. Once this was done Elijah commanded that they be taken down the mountain to the Brook Kishon where he, or others acting on his behalf slaughtered them. The Bible could have said they were put to death, or even executed but it doesn’t it says these people were slaughtered. This was a savage display of brutality, no mercy was given and no excuses were considered. The false prophets were slaughtered.

These men had led Israel into sin; they had deliberately contrived to lead the people away from God. They had to be destroyed. It was not enough for them to be deposed from power or shown up to be the frauds they were, they had to be removed. There may be things in your life that have led you astray. There may be habits, or misplaced priorities, perhaps even attitudes and bitterness. If these things exist and are causing you to leave the altar of true faith and follow after the false illusion of religious activity then they need to be slaughtered. There is no place for neat surgical excision, they must be butchered. What is true of us as individuals is certainly equally true of the congregations to which we belong. While I do not want to suggest that the church of God in all of its expressions is following after false prophets there is no question that much of the church in the west has been seduced away from the truth and into the trap of the world.

In those areas of the world where the church is growing it is characterized by passion, sincerity and truth. Worship in these congregations is vital and genuine but it results in changed lives and demonstrations of righteousness. Where the church struggles to maintain its existence it is characterized by compromise, mediocrity and lethargy. The false prophets of this world try to convince us that the evidence of success includes the size of our congregation, the adequacy or beauty of our buildings and the size of our budget. Too often we are seduced into comparisons between churches on the basis of these things. Seldom do we hear of churches that are famous for their passion or zeal for righteousness. If the measure of our success is determined by the size of our congregation then we can justify the money we spend on making our buildings looking good, or the superiority of our sight and sound systems. We can preach sermons that are inoffensive or at least are calculated to make the hearers feel good when they leave – after all we wouldn’t want them to stay away because they are offended would we?

In our personal lives we are encouraged to fulfil our potential, to make sure that we don’t deny ourselves any pleasure or gratification. It’s all very well to be a Christian, but let’s not get carried away. Not too much religious zeal or enthusiasm. No need to study the bible yourself, there are plenty of commentaries out there – and they are quite inexpensive too. Just stay in the middle of the road, don’t get too hot, or too cold – wait a minute doesn’t that make us lukewarm? And don’t lukewarm Christians and churches make God sick?

Once the fire of God falls sin will become obvious and those things and people that have led us astray will become obvious. When they are, they must be slaughtered, no excuses, no rationalizations. Those sins, habits and attitudes must be pulled out by the root and destroyed. Wait until God reveals them and then act with ruthlessness, only then can we be sure that the fire will remain.