Who is Your God?
1 Kings 18:21
“And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.” -
Today’s church struggles with idolatry just like the nation of Israel struggled with it. Repeatedly Israel invited God’s displeasure by their dual allegiance which was and is idolatry. While we may not carve out grotesque images of wood and stone we may still find ourselves guilty of idolatry. Idolatry is giving divine honor, reverence, admiration, and devotion to and ascribing divine power to a created thing rather than to the Creator God, with the hope of obtaining a meaningful and fruitful life. Elijah saw the condition of Israel’s dual allegiance and challenged Israel to settle the issue as to who or what their god was. The church must settle the issue as to who their God is.
I. The Condition of Dual Allegiance
A. “How long halt ye between two opinions?”
B. Elijah confronted the people of Israel. They were guilty of worshipping both God and Baal. He asks them, "How long will you hesitate between two opinions?"
C. In addition to worshipping Jehovah they were seeking to worship Baal.
D. Baal - The Hebrew noun ba‘al means ‘master’, ‘possessor’ or ‘husband’. Baal was the Canaanite god of weather. They referred to him as the lord of rain and dew. He was the storm god who rode on the clouds. Lightning was his weapon. His consort was Asherah, the mother goddess worshipped by the prophets of the groves.
E. Israel’s dual allegiance was a familiar pattern as they yielded to the influences of the culture around them.
F. The charge of this dual allegiance is seen in Hosea 10:2 “Their heart is divided; now they are held guilty.”
G. This dual allegiance of Israel was nothing short of committing idolatry. The Holy Scriptures likens or equates idolatry with spiritual adultery.
H. Jeremiah 3:8-9 (NET) “…I gave wayward Israel her divorce papers and sent her away because of her adulterous worship of other gods. Even after her unfaithful sister Judah had seen this, she still was not afraid, and she too went and gave herself like a prostitute to other gods. Because she took her prostitution so lightly, she defiled the land through her adulterous worship of gods made of wood and stone.”
I. Idolatry is either the worship of false gods or the worship of the true God in a false way. Also when one gives honor and worship to the creature which is due only to the Creator, one becomes an idolater.
J. They wanted “to have their cake and eat it too”—they wanted both God and the spiritual high of idolatry. They wanted to be married to God and still keep their lovers.
K. The worship of false gods occurs when we put anything above God. That object, person, activity, desire, or thought, becomes an idol and occupies the place that should be occupied by God.
L. God's unalterable command recorded in Exodus 20:3-5 was clear: “Thou shalt have no other Gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.”
M. Many of us are guilty of having more than one god:
1. We have the Lord and our house
2. We have the Lord and our family
3. We have the Lord and our recreation
4. We have the Lord and our career and work
5. We have the Lord and sports
6. We have the Lord and our finances
7. We have the Lord and entertainment.
8. We have the Lord and....... We struggle as to which will have precedence or preeminence in our lives.
N. God clearly says dual allegiances do not work.
O. Matthew 6:24 “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.”
P. Seeking to worship God as well as following after something else is the same as going to your spouse and saying, "Honey, I love you and I'm going to stick by you, but I'm going to keep another lover on the side as well."- copied
II. The Causes for Dual Allegiance
A. The reason for seeking to maintain a dual allegiance is touched on in the definition we gave for idolatry. Idolatry is giving divine honor, reverence, admiration, and devotion to and ascribing divine power to a created thing rather than to the Creator God, with THE HOPE OF OBTAINING A MEANINGFUL AND FRUITFUL LIFE.
B. Following idols is a matter of the heart and its desires.
1. Ezekiel 14:3 “Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts, and put before them that which causes them to stumble into iniquity. Should I let Myself be inquired of at all by them?”
2. Romans 1:24-25 “Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.”
3. Realize that your god is that which you have set as the object of your heart’s affection.
C. Idolatry is caused by a covetous desire to meet one’s needs and desires with or without God.
D. 1 Kings 18:2 “…there was a severe famine in Samaria.” Israel was experiencing famine as a result of the drought and needed divine intervention.
E. 2 Chronicles 7:14 “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
F. Rather than humbling themselves, and in repentance seeking God’s face they turned to the Canaanite gods. They felt that Baal, the “god of rain and dew” and Asherah, mother nature, would be able to end the drought and give them the fruitful life they desired. Israel exchanged their allegiance from the one true God alone to gods of their own making.
G. Colossians 3:5 equates covetousness with idolatry.
H. Someone has said, “Most appear to be "looking for that inner and more subjective kind of payoff" from religion.”
I. Philippians 3:18-19 “For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who set their mind on earthly things.”
J. Idolatry is the result of a failure to see or place Christ as central in everything.
III. The Challenge to Dual allegiance
A. “If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.”
B. Elijah demanded a definite decision on Israel’s part. There is only one true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Jehovah, the great I Am. There is no other God. He will not accept a divided heart on the part of His people.
C. Isaiah 44:6 “Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts: ‘I am the First and I am the Last; Besides Me there is no God.”
D. Elijah lays down the gauntlet. Let the true God answer by fire.
E. 1 Kings 15:24 “call on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the LORD; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.”
F. Elijah challenged the Baal worshippers at the very core of their belief system. If Baal was the sky-god, lord of the weather and the sender of lightning surely he could answer by fire from heaven.
G. Hour after hour the prophets of Baal called upon their god to prove his existence and demonstrate his power and existence by causing fire to come down from heaven and consuming the sacrifice which they had placed upon his alter; but all was to no purpose for we read that "there was no voice, nor any that answered."
H. False gods do not answer. You can do everything you want to muster up warm feelings, to create a good environment, or to show your sincerity, but false gods will not respond because they cannot respond.
I. Concerning false gods Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 46:7 “…one shall cry unto him, yet can he not answer nor save him out of his trouble.”
J. Psalm 115:5-11 “They have mouths, but they do not speak; Eyes they have, but they do not see; They have ears, but they do not hear; noses they have, but they do not smell; They have hands, but they do not handle; Feet they have, but they do not walk; Nor do they mutter through their throat. Those who make them are like them; So is everyone who trusts in them. O Israel, trust in the LORD; He is their help and their shield. O house of Aaron, trust in the LORD; He is their help and their shield. You who fear the LORD, trust in the LORD; He is their help and their shield.”
K. Elijah called on the one true God and we see in 1 Kings 18:38 “the fire of the LORD fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood and the stones and the dust, and it licked up the water that was in the trench.”
L. Psalm 127:1 “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.”
IV. The Condemnation of Dual Allegiance
A. God is not content to be one of two gods. He will not stand for it. If God is God then give Him the glory, honor, worship, adoration, and obedience due Him.
B. Isaiah 45:5-6 “I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me: that they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me.
I am the LORD, and there is none else.”
C. Idolatry is condemned as an insult to God’s majesty. Idolatry is condemned in the Scriptures because it degrades both God and the men and women who are created in God's image.
D. Idolatry is hated by God and invites His chastisement.
E. Jeremiah 44:2-4” ‘You have seen all the calamity that I have brought on Jerusalem and on all the cities of Judah; and behold, this day they are a desolation, and no one dwells in them, because of their wickedness which they have committed to provoke Me to anger, in that they went to burn incense and to serve other gods whom they did not know, they nor you nor your fathers. However I have sent to you all My servants the prophets, rising early and sending them, saying, “Oh, do not do this abominable thing that I hate!”
F. Someone has said, “God calls us to make a choice. Half-hearted faith is no faith! We cannot be part time believers. God calls us to serve and honor Him at work, in the way we deal with our children, in the way we respond to the environment, in the way we participate in and set limits on sports, in the way we use our time, in the way we spend our money, the way we respond to disappointment and in the manner in which we treat those who disagree with us. – copied
G. Either serve the Lord completely, or choose something else to follow. As for me and my house, we've chosen to serve the Lord.
H. We cannot maintain a dual allegiance and keep Christ central in everything and on the throne in our lives. Once Christ is off the throne of our lives something must fill the void. This is true both individually and corporately as the body of Christ. So long as Christ is the head, the parts of the body of Christ are healthy. When the head is cut off, the parts die. “I am the vine, ye are the branches.” We cannot obtain from the bodily parts the enlightenment and life that can only come from the head. – copied
I. The question you need to answer today is “Who or what is the god of your life?” Realize that the gods of your making cannot hear, cannot help, cannot deliver, cannot save, and will not satisfy.
