Elijah and the Prophets of Baal

1 Kings 18:20-40 (NASB)

20 So Ahab sent orders among all the sons of Israel and brought the prophets together at Mount Carmel. 21 Then Elijah approached all the people and said, “How long are you going to struggle with the two choices? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people did not answer him so much as a word. 22 Then Elijah said to the people, “I alone am left as a prophet of the Lord, while Baal’s prophets are 450 men. 23 Now have them give us two oxen; and have them choose the one ox for themselves and cut it up, and place it on the wood, but put no fire under it; and I will prepare the other ox and lay it on the wood, and I will not put a fire under it. 24 Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.” And all the people replied, “That is a good idea.”

The story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal is probably a familiar story to you. If it is, you know what happens next, and that this story stands as a historical testimony to the power of the one true God. Familiar or not to us, I want to look closely at this event and see if there is a lesson in it for us today.

To set the scene, there had been a three year drought and severe famine in the land. God had told Elijah to tell King Ahab that He would soon send rain, but before the rain came, God wanted Elijah to gather Ahab and the false prophets of Baal together. Before we get back to the story, and we first need to learn more about Ahab. 1 Kings 16:29-33 says this about him:

29 Now Ahab the son of Omri became king over Israel in the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria for twenty-two years. 30 Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all who were before him. 31 And as though it had been a trivial thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, he married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went and served Baal, and worshiped him. 32 So he erected an altar for Baal at the house of Baal, which he built in Samaria. 33 Ahab also made the Asherah. So Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him.

Now, there were a lot of kings of Israel who did a lot of terrible things, but Ahab was even worse than those terrible kings. This text tells us he erected an altar for Baal, made the Asherah and married Jezebel. Have you ever wondered why Baal? Why did the Israelites keep worshiping a false god named Baal? We first hear the term Baal, in Genesis 36:38, which says, “Then Shaul died, and Baal-hanan the son of Achbor became king in his place.” Here, Baal is being used as a title which means lord, according to the Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon. Then we see Baal mentioned for the first time in Numbers 22:41 which says, “And it came to pass on the morrow, that Balak took Balaam, and brought him up into the high places of Baal, that thence he might see the utmost part of the people.”

The name Baal was a name for a Canaanite god who was thought to be the god of fertility and weather, specifically the god of rainstorms. The people who lived around the Israelites had a complex structure of gods, which they worshiped. They had stories for each of them, much like Greek mythology. This is why God repeatedly told the Israelites not to marry the neighboring people; He knew they would adopt their false religions. We see this is exactly what happened to King Ahab. He worshiped Baal and the Asherah, which was thought to be a wooden pole or tree (www.worldhistory.org/baal). And he did so because he married Jezebel, who worshiped those things.

Jezebel was the daughter of the “king of the Sidonians.” She did not worship the one true God. Rather, 1 Kings 18:4 tells us that Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord. She and Ahab hunted down all the prophets of the Lord and had them killed. The prophets had to scatter and hide in caves. 1 Kings 18:19 tells us that there were “450 prophets of Baal and four hundred prophets of the Asherah, who eat at Jezebel’s table.”

When I read about Jezebel in secular sources, they not only acknowledge that she existed and that her name is synonymous with an evil woman, but they have sympathy and admiration for her. The World History Encyclopedia writes, “Jezebel is increasingly recognized as a strong woman who refused to abide by what she saw as the oppressive nature of her husband’s religious culture and tried to change it”(www.worldhistory.org/jezebel). That sounds like the world’s logic, doesn’t it?

This is the background we should know as we read this account of history. Picking back up in verse 25:

So Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose the one ox for yourselves and prepare it first, since there are many of you, and call on the name of your god, but put no fire under the ox.” 26 Then they took the ox which was given them and they prepared it, and they called on the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no voice and no one answered. And they limped about the altar which they had made. 27 And at noon Elijah ridiculed them and said, “Call out with a loud voice, since he is a god; undoubtedly he is attending to business, or is on the way, or is on a journey. Perhaps he is asleep, and will awaken.” 28 So they cried out with a loud voice, and cut themselves according to their custom with swords and lances until blood gushed out on them. 29 When midday was past, they raved until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice; but there was no voice, no one answered, and no one paid attention.

30 Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come forward to me.” So all the people came forward to him. And he repaired the altar of the Lord which had been torn down. 31 Then Elijah took twelve stones, corresponding to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, “Israel shall be your name.” 32 And with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord; and he made a trench around the altar, large enough to hold two measures of seed. 33 Then he laid out the wood, and he cut the ox in pieces and placed it on the wood. 34 And he said, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.” And he said, “Do it a second time,” so they did it a second time. Then he said, “Do it a third time,” so they did it a third time. 35 The water flowed around the altar, and he also filled the trench with water.

36 Then at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet approached and said, “Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, today let it be known that You are God in Israel and that I am Your servant, and that I have done all these things at Your word. 37 Answer me, Lord, answer me, so that this people may know that You, Lord, are God, and that You have turned their heart back.” 38 Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood, and the stones and the dust; and it licked up the water that was in the trench. 39 When all the people saw this, they fell on their faces; and they said, “The Lord, He is God; the Lord, He is God!” 40 Then Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal; do not let one of them escape.” So they seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slaughtered them there.

God proved to the people that He is real, and Baal is not. After seeing proof of this, the people turned away from worshiping Baal and proclaimed that, “The Lord, He is God!” They realized their worship of Baal was useless. He could not help them, only the Lord, the true God, could help them. We of course know already that false idols are useless, so we might simply nod in agreement and move on. But before we do, there are a few verses from this passage that I want to highlight. The first is verse 21, which says: Then Elijah approached all the people and said, “How long are you going to struggle with the two choices? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people did not answer him so much as a word.

In the ESV, the question Elijah asks is translated like this: “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” I really like that translation. The Hebrew word is the same Hebrew word used in verse 26, which says, “And they limped about the altar which they had made.”

According to Strong’s Concordance, this Hebrew word is pacach, and it means to “(figuratively) skip over; by implication, to hesitate; also (literally) to limp, to dance -- halt, become lame, leap, pass over.”

Elijah is asking the people, “how long are you going to dance back and forth with two conflicting ideas?” He’s pointing out to them that they are trying to get two opposing ideas to work together, and that will never work. They need to decide. Either follow God and stop worshiping Baal, or just follow Baal. Stop trying to fuse the two together. It reminds me of Revelation 3:15-16 (ESV) which warns, “I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.”

You might be wondering why Elijah would tell them to just worship Baal, or why God would say that He rather someone be hot or cold instead of lukewarm. Of course Elijah and God would rather that the people follow God wholeheartedly, but I think the reason being lukewarm or trying to worship God and some other god at the same time is worse than not following God at all is because lukewarm people are harder to convert. People who are lukewarm consider themselves to be a Christian. They think they are following God, even though they are not. Just as people who have fused other religions into Christianity think they are following God, but they are not.

Today, there are a lot of people just like these Israelites; they believe God is real, but they also believe other religions are also true. Many people believe that there are many paths to God and they attempt to combine religions. Some people do that purposely, other people do this unaware they are doing it. I’ve heard Christians say things like, ‘knock on wood’ in an attempt to make something come true or bring good luck. Other Christians will say they believe in karma. By doing all these things, people are attempting to worship God and combine that worship with appeasing other gods, like the gods or ‘forces’ of karma and luck.

God is jealous for our worship, and He will not accept our worship of Him if we are attempting to worship Him and another god at the same time. Exodus 34:12-14 tells us, “Be careful that you do not make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land into which you are going, or it will become a snare in your midst. But rather, you are to tear down their altars and smash their memorial stones, and cut down their Asherim —for you shall not worship any other god, because the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God—.”

Usually, jealousy is not a trait to be admired. Modern definitions paint it in a negative light. Knowing that God is only good and always perfect, how can He be jealous? Charles Spurgeon, in a sermon he delivered in 1863, said, “False gods patiently endure the existence of other false gods. Dagon can stand with Bel, and Bel with Ashtaroth; how should stone, and wood, and silver, be moved to indignation; but because God is the only living and true God, Dagon must fall before his ark; Bel must be broken, and Ashtaroth must be consumed with fire.”

Because God alone is Creator and Lord of all, He cannot tolerate people worshiping false gods. When He gave the 10 Commandments He said, “You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them nor serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God” (Exodus 20:3-5a).

As Spurgeon so eloquently said, unlike fake gods which endure other fake gods, God is not tolerant of fake gods. God is rightfully jealous of the worship and attention that people give to false gods. We should not be surprised that He does not want people to worship other gods, for He alone is worthy of worship.

The other verse I want to highlight is verse 29, which says, “When midday was past, they raved until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice; but there was no voice, no one answered, and no one paid attention.”

There was no answer from Baal, for Baal cannot answer. A false idol could not bring needed rain on the land, it couldn’t even consume the wood on the altar. The people who lived around the Israelites prayed to their gods for help, but those gods could not answer them. The only God who can bring rain and grow the crops is the God who created our world and formed the complex system of rain and sun. Yet, all throughout history and all around the world, people have looked to idols for help. We see this in the New Testament. In Acts 14:15, Paul addressed a crowd of people in Lystra who worshiped idols and also wanted to worship Paul and Barnabas, and Paul said to them, “Men, why are you doing these things? We are also men, of the same nature as you, preaching the gospel to you, to turn from these useless things to a living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything that is in them.”

Idols are useless. They are not living. Psalm 135:15-18 says, “The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; they have eyes, but do not see; they have ears, but do not hear, nor is there any breath in their mouths. Those who make them become like them, so do all who trust in them.”

That Psalm is saying when people trust in a false idol, just like the idol they worship, they too will become mute, blind, deaf, and eventually will die, not having seen the truth. That is because the devil has so clouded their minds that they cannot see the truth. 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 explains, “And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they will not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

This is exactly what has happened to people. I saw on the news that three contestants on the trivia game Jeopardy could not fill in the blank to the opening of the Lord’s Prayer. These supposedly learned people had never heard it or read it before. People have become deaf, dumb, and blind to all the things of God. Yet they could probably have easily recited all the lyrics to some profane popular song. That is because, even if they are not aware of it, they worship false idols.

We probably don’t worship sticks or statues, although many people around our world do, but we might worship other idols, for an idol is anything that is more important to us than God. Some modern day idols are money, work, fame, our appearance, other people, our pets, entertainment, comfort, food, or ourselves. The list could go on and on with anything that we might prioritize as paramount in our lives over God. None of those idols can actually help us. If we are looking to money or fame to help us and make us happy, then we have prioritized those things over our love of God. He wants us to look to Him for help.

I also think there is a far more subtle danger that surrounds us. It’s the danger of trusting in ourselves instead of God. I think it’s human nature to doubt that God will actually help us, and so we make plans and set up safety nets in case He doesn’t come through for us. Isn’t that what ultimately happened with the Israelites. God wasn’t bringing the rain fast enough and so they decided to try asking Baal to bring them rain. How many times in our lives has God not answered our prayers fast enough and so we take matters into our own hands?

Just as God spoke through Elijah to the people and told them to make a decision, we too have to make a choice. We either are going to follow God and worship Him alone, or we are going to follow the world and end up worshiping its many false idols. We are wrong to think we can continue to limp back and forth between worshiping God and worshiping false idols. Just like the people we read about in our text, let us respond to God’s Word with repentant hearts. Let us worship only Him and declare, “The Lord, He is God!” If we do that and ask for His help, we will find that He is a living and true help who is always present in times of trouble.

Pray: Heavenly Father, we pray that You would reveal to us by Your Holy Spirit the false idols in our lives. Please show us anything that we have turned into idols in our hearts. Please forgive us and help us tear down those idols so that You will reign supreme in our hearts and minds. Help us to wait for Your help and not take matters into our hands. We don’t want to limp along; we want to follow You whole heartedly. We look to You to be our help. We love You and want to give You all the glory and praise alone. In Jesus name we pray, amen.