"Elijah (Part 4 )"

Victory Can Be Yours!

Article #66 – “Elijah (Part 4)”

Ahab raced his horse drawn chariot down the mountain.  When he reached Jezreel, he told Jezebel, his wicked wife, that Elijah had killed all of the prophets.  “Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah saying, ‘so may the gods do to me and even more, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time.’ And he was afraid and arose and ran for his life and come to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there.” (1 kings 19:2, 3)  This is one of the great things about God’s Word, the Holy Bible, it not only tells of the great acts of the people of the Bible but it also tells us of their failures.  Elijah’s response to Jezebel’s threat was to be scared and run and hide from her.  Most would probably have done the same but, after what God had just accomplished through him, then being scared and running from a woman just does not seem to make sense.  But, don’t we do the same things?  We ask God in our prayers to do something or help us to do something.  When He does, we can’t believe it.  The next time we need something, we do not even lift it up to Him in prayer, and we just try to do it in our own strength.  We, indeed, are strange creatures!

Now that Elijah was out of the reach of Jezebel, he was in such depression that he wanted God to take his life, there was nothing more for him.  The Bible assures us, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” (Eph. 1:3)  That means that we have been given all of the spiritual enrichment that is needed to accomplish the things for God.  We have all that is needed to serve Him, we just need to appropriate it in the same way that Elijah did.  Of course, we will from time to time falter, as Elijah did, but we must remember that the Jezebel’s of this world are nothing but a speed bump in our service to God.  It is never easy or comfortable to take a stand for God and when we do there will be testing. 

While we are earnestly trying to follow and serve our living God, there are at least these three things we must keep in our hearts and minds constantly:

1.      You must be convinced of the reality of God.

2.      You must know that you are God’s representative.

3.      You must be convinced of the resources available to you.

Without a person knowing completely, those three things, I do not believe he or she can successfully serve God.  It is not easy to serve God.  In Elijah’s case, there were 7000 followers of God hidden in caves and only Elijah took a bold stand for God.  Elijah knew the three steps listed above, otherwise he, too, probably would have failed in carrying out God’s plan to bring His people back to Him.  He was convinced of the reality of God when he said, “As the Lord, the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand,” (1 King 17:1) there was no doubt in the mind of Elijah that God is real.

               You, too, can have victory in Jesus!  More on Elijah next week.

Lowell Parrish