CAPITAL BIBLE CHURCH October 2, 2016 SERMON NOTES PASTOR BILL HAKEN Elijah: God s Mountain Man Lord of the Flies 2 Kings 1 Big Idea God wants us to trust only Him about the future. This is the story of Elijah's last assignment. God has one final job for his mountain man, and then he will take him home to heaven. The story begins this way: After King Ahab s death...israel s new king, Ahaziah, fell through the latticework of an upper room at his palace in Samaria and was seriously injured. So he sent messengers to the temple of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, to ask whether he would recover. 2 Kings 1:1-2 1. The king of Israel seeks to know his future by a demon-god The name Baal-zebub appears only here in the Old Testament. Baalwas the name of the false god that Jezebel had brought in. He was the god of the sun, the god of the storms, the god of fertility. He was the god of the pagan nations surrounding Israel. The rest of the name means what it sounds like. Zebub actually gives you the sound. Zzzzzebub, it means the buzzing of flies. Baal-zebub literally means "lord of the flies." Baal-zebub was the name for the god of the people of the region of Ekron, a city on the Mediterranean Sea, one of the five major cities of the Philistines. When they offered sacrifices to Baal-zebub, the Philistines believed he could predict the future. If this was true, it was the work of demons through this false god. That's why Ahaziah wanted to consult Baal-zebub. He wanted to know if he would get better or if he was going to die from his injuries. Only one catch to this story. Israel already had a God, the Lord God of Israel. Instead of turning to the true God, Ahaziah put his future in the hands of Baal-zebub. On one level we can understand Ahaziah's desire. All of us would like to know the future. We want to know what's going to happen tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. Big corporations spend millions of dollars on consultants who can predict future business trends. If you have a loved one with cancer, you want to know what the future holds. If you have children, you constantly wonder (and sometimes worry) about the decisions they make. If you re healthy you wonder how long you ll stay that way! Ahaziah he went to the wrong place which proved to be a fatal mistake. We should not be surprised because when people get desperate, they will turn to any source that promises them help. You talk to a
friend on the phone. You call the psychic hotline. You look at your horoscope. You might even call a medium, a spiritualist. We tend to think of mediums as if they were like the wicked witch in The Wizard of Oz. But today's mediums look like you and me. There was a TV show on the SciFi channel called Crossing Over with John Edward. A lot of people get suckered in by this kind of thing. 2. God sent Elijah to confront the enemy head-on We pick up the story again in verse 3: But the angel of the LORD told Elijah, who was from Tishbe, Go and confront the messengers of the king of Samaria and ask them, Is there no God in Israel? Why are you going to Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, to ask whether the king will recover? Now, therefore, this is what the LORD says: You will never leave the bed you are lying on; you will surely die. So Elijah went to deliver the message. v. 4 "So Elijah went." That's all it says. God gave him the message, and Elijah delivered it. Bam! Just like the other times. He shows up out of nowhere, gives the message, and disappears. Evidently the messengers were so upset that they never made it to Ekron. They went back to the king with this report: They replied, A man came up to us and told us to go back to the king and give him this message. This is what the LORD says: Is there no God in Israel? Why are you sending men to Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, to ask whether you will recover? Therefore, because you have done this, you will never leave the bed you are lying on; you will surely die. v. 6 So the king wants to know who dared give such a negative message. It's clear they have no idea who he is. They describe Elijah like this: They replied, He was a hairy man, and he wore a leather belt around his waist. Elijah from Tishbe! the king exclaimed. v. 8 Lost People Watch Us Think about this for a moment. How did the king know Elijah? Because Elijah had dealt with his father Ahab. Lost people watch us more than we know. Lost people pay more attention to us than we ever dream. Lost people know more than we think they do. More than anything else, lost people know whether we know God. They watch us to see if we're the real deal. They watch us from a distance. Your coworkers are watching you. Your neighbors are watching you. Your unsaved relatives are watching you. They may not say much to you. You may not be aware of it. You may not even hear from them for years.
But the day will come when you're going to find out that some people were watching you all the time and drawing conclusions about your faith, your integrity, and your honesty. And they are drawing conclusions about the reality of your faith in God. I believe God often gives lost people amazing insight into the Christians around them. In other words, I believe God's Spirit gives unsaved people the ability to penetrate to the core of who we are. If you went to lost people and gave them a doctrinal exam, they would flunk it. But if you took most lost people and put a group of Christians they know in front of them, I believe most lost people would without any trouble at all be able to say, "He's for real, she's for real, and those two in the back, I don't see anything in them at all." They may not understand the Trinity or total depravity, and the whole concept of the premillennial return of Christ may be a mystery to them, but lost people can tell the difference between reality and fakery. If you doubt that, just ask some of your unsaved friends, "What do you see when you look at me?" You might be surprised at the answer. So the king knew. He said, "That was Elijah the Tishbite." Now watch what happens next in the story. vs. 9 15 The angel of the Lord told Elijah to go with him to see the king. Earlier he had stood before Ahab the father; now he stands before Ahaziah the son. It took a certain amount of courage to do that because Ahaziah is sick. He's now been told by the prophet he's going to die. A hundred of his soldiers have died, consumed by fire. I'm sure he's in a foul mood. I am sure Elijah knew that the king might try to put him to death at any moment. What do you think Elijah did? He didn't wait for Ahaziah to say a word. Elijah said to the king, Here s what the LORD says: Why did you send messengers to Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, to ask whether you will recover? Is there no God in Israel to answer your question? Therefore, because you have done this, you will never leave the bed you are lying on; you will surely die. Is there no God in Israel? What a question for all of us! Is there no God in your town? Is there no God in your church? Is there no God in your family? Is there no God in your marriage? Is there no God in your life? Is there no God to whom you can go in the time of trouble? Abraham Lincoln said, "I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming thought that I had nowhere else to go."
So the king died just as Elijah said he would. There are no details because it doesn't matter. He's gone. The only thing that really matters is the first part of verse 17. "So he died, according to the word of the LORD." For many there s a Fear Factor about death: We fear dying alone. We fear dying a painful death. We fear what may happen after we die. We fear leaving our loved ones behind. We fear the unknown, and death is the ultimate unknown. We fear death because of our sins. We fear standing before God after we die. And so we do whatever we can to avoid death at all costs. We change the subject, we live as if we were never going to die, we drink ourselves senseless, we turn to sex to keep us occupied, we bury ourselves in our work, and we try our best not to think about the moment of our own death. Martin Luther said we should live with the day of our death constantly before our eyes. That way we won't be surprised when the day finally comes. And come it will. Death is no respecter of persons. The statistics are awesome to contemplate: One out of every one person will die someday. No one gets a free pass. Death is a problem. It was a problem in Bible times, and it's still a problem today. 3. God warns against any occult involvement Today thousands, probably millions of people want to know the future horoscopes, psychic networks, mediums, spiritists, Ouija boards, abound. I typed psychics in Google got 16,800,000 results (0.66 seconds). So what does the Bible say? What s our Big Idea for today? God wants us to trust only Him about the future. Do not defile yourselves by turning to mediums or to those who consult the spirits of the dead. I am the LORD your God. Leviticus 19:31 I will be against anyone who goes to mediums and fortune-tellers for advice, because that person is being unfaithful to me. So I will cut him off from his people. Leviticus 20:6 10 Don t let anyone among you offer a son or daughter as a sacrifice in the fire. Don t let anyone use magic or witchcraft, or try to explain the meaning of signs. 11 Don t let anyone try to control others with magic, and don t let them be mediums or try to talk with the spirits of dead people.
12 The LORD hates anyone who does these things. Because the other nations do these things, the LORD your God will force them out of the land ahead of you. 13 Be completely loyal to GOD, your God. Deuteronomy 18:10-13 Psalm 116:3-15 Psalm 118:18-21