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Elijah Part 3: Our God Hears, Acts and Gives Back Life · Growing Together in the Gospel

• 0:11
  SPEAKER_03: This passage follows Elijah's stay with the widow of Zerapha, whose flour and oil God had miraculously sustained.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_03: What's interesting about this whole episode is that God has sent Elijah to the land of the Sidonians.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_03: This is Jezebel's home to Earth, a place where people worship Baal.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_03: It's as if God is sending Elijah to Zeraphaph to show anyone who would take time to notice that he is Lord and that Baal is not.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_03: It's within this context that a second crisis arrives.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_03: The widow's son falls gravely ill and stops breathing.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_03: In her anguish she turns on Elijah.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: What do you have against me, man of God?
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_03: Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_03: Her grief becomes accusation.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_03: Elijah takes the boy, cries out to God with raw urgency.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_03: Have you brought tragedy even on this widow?
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_03: And stretches himself over the child three times, pleading for his life.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_03: God hears.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_03: The boy breathes again.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: Elijah carries him downstairs, and the widow declares, Now I know that you are a man of God, and the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_03: This is not healing, this is resurrection in the heart of enemy territory.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_03: I am the God who will bring life and fullness even to nothing.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_03: God's faithfulness doesn't exempt his people from suffering, but it meets them inside it.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_03: The widow lost her son at the very moment she was serving God's prophet.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yet the same relationship became the avenue of restoration, of resurrection.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_03: The passage holds together the darkness of unanswered questions and the reality of a God who hears, acts, and gives life back on the cross.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_03: Let's listen to Dean.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: Chapter 17 of 1 Kings, reading from verse 17, where it says, as it did before, it said sometime later, and then we got the incident with the bread, and then it's another sometime later.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: It says, the son of the woman, so the woman who had the bread and the little bit of bread that didn't run out, the flour and the oil doesn't run out.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: Sometime later the son of the woman who owned the house became ill.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: He grew worse and worse, and finally stopped breathing.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: She said to Elijah, What do you have against me, man of God?
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Give me your son, Elijah replied.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: He took him from her arms, carried him to the upper room where he was staying, and laid him on his bed.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: Then he cried out to the Lord, Lord, my God, have you brought tragedy even on this widow I am staying with by causing her son to die?
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: Then he stretched himself out on the body three times and cried out to the Lord, Lord God, let this boy's life return to him.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord heard Elijah's cry, and the boy's life returned to him, and he lived.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah picked up the child and carried him down from the room into the house.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: He gave him to his mother and said, Look, your son is alive.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Then the woman said to Elijah, Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: Father, we ask that you would again speak from your word.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: You would open our eyes, help us see the glory of your gospel.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: May its truth transform us.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: May your spirit breathe life into it.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: And may our hearts be receptive, good soil where it can find good, strong roots and grow to bear fruit in our own lives.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: We ask this in your precious name.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: Next week we're planning to go camping with some of Naimi's family, and so we thought we'd do a little tester on Friday nights just to make sure we had everything.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: Just go away for one night and make sure the tent goes up.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a new tent, one of these inflaceable ones.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: You pump it up.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't trust it.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: I was always worried that you're going to pump it up, and at some point in the night you're going to hear a good scan.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: And the reason I thought that was because we got out all the airbeds to make sure we had enough airbeds and pump them up.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: I thought I'll leave them up on sort of Thursday, Wednesday, Thursday, make sure they're there.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: And came down, I think sort of two of them were a lot softer than they were in the morning.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, we went away and hit poor Henry, his bed.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: We thought it was okay.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: Then in the morning it was very, very squidgy.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: There was a lot of sort of, you know, the water bed type through when someone moves on it, you go flying through the ceiling, and when you bounce on it.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: The reason I start with that is that it's a sort of a picture of things that we try and rely on, but they don't they aren't strong enough to lean on.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: For us this week it was inflatable beds, but in life there are many things that we we put our trust in, that we lean on, only to find that they're not quite as firm as we think they are.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: Things that we think were going to hold us and things that will keep us, and maybe it's not beds or things of that nature, but there are there are careers, there are relationships, there are habits, there are things that we do and things that we've grown up with that we think are stable and strong, only to find that they're not quite as firm as we thought they were.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: The Bible has a term for this, and it's not a term we often use, but it talks about it in terms of idolatry.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: Things that we lean on, things that we rely on that aren't strong enough to bear the weight.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: We think of idolatry as a sort of a religious term of worshiping different gods, and that that's one element of it.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: But the idea is of putting our weight, putting our trust, putting our security on something that cannot hold it.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: Now that might be a false God, it might be some idea of God that isn't quite true, or it might be something much more mundane, it might be a person, parents, or siblings, or partners, or children, people that we say, you are the one who gives me meaning, you are my protection, you are my help, and then they are in part, let's not get that wrong, they are a wonderful gift of God and a tool that God uses.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: But what you realize if you live with someone and lean on someone heavy enough, that no one person is enough to bear that weight.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: And people have a habit of passing away, as in this story, where they're no longer there to lean on.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: It can be stuff, land or wealth or homes.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: One verse in the Bible says your belly is your God, with the provision that we have and our appetite, stuff, they're all good gifts, wonderful gifts, but when we put all our weights on them and they become scarce, suddenly it's not just a problem, it's a crisis.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: Where is my hope?
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: Where is my security?
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: Where is my safety?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's just things, ideas, a voice in your head that says you'll never amount to anything, or even a good voice that says, I'm so proud of you.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Either one, if we put all too much weight on it, it either drives us to prove ourselves or drives us not to lose that affirmation.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: All these things, they are good things, but they become God things.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: I share that because that's the context of this story.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: Israel is a nation, and you need a bit of context here, that Israel is a people called by God.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: They've been saved, they've been formed into a people, and that gradually, over time, what they've seen is that they've trusted in lots of things and they've all failed.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: They trusted in Moses and then Moses went and died.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: Then they trusted in their God and their might and their ability to take over the land, but they they they they fell short of that.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_01: They trusted in wisdom and their wisdom has failed.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: They trusted in their unity that we are one people, but now they've been split into two.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: They've trusted in kings, and each king has gradually got worse and worse until Ahab, who we're told is the most evil of the kings that have been so far.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then they've turned to this God Baal, we talked about him, this god of harvest and life, and he too has failed because now there is a drought that he cannot seem to solve.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: Again and again they've gone after things, and Elijah is sent as a prophet, and a prophet is a very particular role.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's a bit like a fire alarm.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: We had this the other day where a battery had gone on one of the fire alarms, and you know, you get you like, right, I've got to stand in the kitchen, and you hear a beep, and you think, well, it's not this one.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: So you've got to go to another room, then you've got to stand there for five minutes, wait for the beep, beep, nope, not that one, and then go to another one.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: It takes them about three hours on Tuesday night, walking from room to room, waiting for that beep.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: No, not this one, not this one.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's what they do when they're running out of battery.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: But when there's an actual fire, they make a bit more noise.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: They make a bit more noise.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the battery is gone.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: Prophets are meant to be a fire alarm, they're meant to be noisy and loud, they're meant to catch your attention because you're in danger.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: They're not meant to be quiet and meek, and Elijah is typical of this.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's why Elijah's have this high threshold.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: They need to tell the truth, they need to be right, because there's no good having a false alarm, there's no good having an alarm with no battery in it.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: You need someone who's gonna make a noise when people are in danger, and Israel are in danger.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so Elijah has been brought up, he's been sent for this time to be a fire alarm, to make some noise, to alert the people.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: You are in danger.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: You're trusting in stuff and it's not gonna work.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: You're leaning on these things and it's gonna fall short.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: I know some of these things are good, I know some of them are wonderful, they're what makes life glorious and beautiful, but make sure you have them in the right place.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Only God can be depended on eternally.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Only He can hold, only He is strong, only He is able to provide again and again.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: Fire alarms don't whisper, they scream.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: And Elijah is sent to be a fire alarm to announce this, and so he's announced it already with the closing down of all rain, all business shuts down, no crops, you're in danger.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm trying to bring you back, and so I'm gonna alert you that the things you're leaning on will only lead to death and destruction.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so Elijah has then been taken on this course where he's been shown different things, and now we come to this point in the story where he's saved this family.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: He provided food.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, she was gonna have their prepare the last meal, they were gonna go and eat it, and then they were going to die.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: And Elijah saves them.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: They're provided with food that they keep going and keep going, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, the son dies.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: The son who is this woman's future.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: She's a widow who's lost her provision to her husband.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: This son is the one who will raise up and provide for her in her old age.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: He will care for her and he'll harvest and farm for her and he'll look after her.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: This is her hope.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: And now that has been taken away.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And her life collapses.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting how she responds.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: She responds how most people do.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: Most of us respond where she says to Elijah, um, Why have you come against me, man of God?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: Why has this happened?
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I've done something wrong.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: God's out to get me.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: God's going to hurt me.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's how most of us feel it's the initial reaction of most tragedy or suffering.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: What have I done?
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: Is God punishing me?
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Is he trying to hurt me?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: And these questions that doesn't mean that they're true, but they're the questions we come up with.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: What I love is that the Bible includes these questions.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't skirt over them, doesn't gloss over them, it allows them.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: And throughout scripture, we are invited to question, to cry out to God, to from that honest heartache and pain, go, God, why?
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: Why is this happening?
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: What is going on?
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't mean that our conclusions are right, doesn't mean God is punishing her, let's be careful.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: But we are allowed to question.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: We're allowed to bring ourselves to God.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: He is a high priest, we're told, who understands, who weeps at the graveside of his friend, who longs that death would be eradicated and knows the pain of separation.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so we can come to him and cry out to him in these devastating moments.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so she does that.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah, it says, takes the son.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: He carries him up into his bed.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: There's a real intimacy, a real care and concern of Elijah to take him to a place where he can pray and cry out to God.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_01: And even Elijah, he doesn't give answers.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: That's our temptation.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't try and explain this theologically.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: He takes it and he cries out to God, Lord God, have you brought tragedy even on this widow I am staying with by causing her son to die?
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: Again, he's not saying God has, but he's asking the question, God, is this what it's about?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: Is this what you wanted?
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus later says that it's the enemy who steals, kills, and destroys.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: I've come that you may have life.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: But doesn't stop us questioning when real tragedy strikes.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: God, why has this happened?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: What is going on?
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: He comes near and he takes this child and then he cries out to God.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: It says he stretches himself out on the boy and cries out, Lord my God, let this boy's life return to him.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: He lifts him up to God.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: This is a place of real ministry that doesn't stand at a distance but lays itself down, draws near.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you're gonna love people, this is sort of an aside, but if you're gonna be in any sort of ministry, loving people, living for Jesus, pain will be involved.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: If you're gonna serve, be ready to hurt.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus weeps over Jerusalem and is longing.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_01: Paul says, I'm in the pains of childbirth over you.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: Whenever we serve, we take on the pain of others.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: We can't keep our hands clean.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: We reach out, we enter into the mess, and from there we cry out to God.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: And Elijah does just that.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: He cries out to God, and the son's voice amazingly, life returns to him.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: First time in all of scripture where someone is resurrected from the dead, never happened before.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: No one knew it was possible.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: Death was death had been final, and this is the first time Elijah cries out, and God doesn't give a word answer, but he does a miracle and brings the son back, and then he gives him back tenderly to the mother, and the mother finally says, I now know that you are a man of God and that the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: An incredible miracle.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a way you can look at it nice and close and see the intimacy of Elijah and the way he ministers, and there are lessons in that, but I want to just pull us back because I don't think this is just something that happened once upon a time.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: I think this is part of God's training, something he's showing Elijah.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so and in that there is a bigger picture at work.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to lose the small because I know for some of you that will be where God speaks.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: Through your loss and through your tragedy, a God that you can call upon, knowing that there is a promise of resurrection.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: One day where you will be reunited.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe not now, but at some point, or maybe is now.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: We live on the other side of a resurrection that did happen.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: But that idea, but as we pull back, we see that God is doing a good work in Elijah and preparing him for something else.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: You see, Elijah's been taken to this place.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's called Zaraphath.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: He was by the brook.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: Do you remember the brook ran out and then God takes him to Zaraphath?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And we pass by that and go, don't know whether it is, not really interested, but when you look at it, there is, you know, those maps at the back of your Bible, sometimes they are useful.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: They're not just pictures to look at when you're bored in a sermon.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes there's something in them.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: And what you find is that as you go to those, those, the the maps, this is what the in the it looked like.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: There was Israel and there was Judah, so they're separated.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: So the blue is kind of God's land.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where God is at work, and where God is in charge, although they're worshiping Baal, so it's but that's where God is expected.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where Elijah is, and then he gets taken up here, we're told, to Zarephath and Sidon.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you notice, that isn't blue.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: This is outside of God's land.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: God is taking him into the enemy.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: This is Baal's land.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: This is where where Baal is king and he is in charge, where he is worshipped.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah hasn't been taken down the road from where he was, he's been taken outside of his people to a place that isn't his land, to a woman who doesn't know her his God yet, and to a place where they aren't worshiping God at all.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is Baal's home turf, okay?
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: This is the football match where they've gone to the enemy's ground and they're cheering for the enemy and that they're worshiping the enemy.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's where Elijah is working.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's where he's doing something that God can do anywhere, but he chooses to do it in the one place where he isn't expected to do it.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: Ahab has been looking for him.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: We're told that Jezebel has been killing prophets, and Elijah's taken.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: And at this point, Elijah probably thinks we're the only two people, me and this widow, and even she hasn't got the full picture yet.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: We're the only two left who are worshiping God.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: Only two, and in this place, God, you're gonna you're gonna do something like this, you're gonna let this son die.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: We're in Baal's home turf, and here God does this miracle where he brings the child back to life.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Do you remember Baal's meant to be the God of life?
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: He's meant to be the one who can bring life and harvest and fruit to people.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: And in that place, when he raises this son, suddenly you see that God is doing something bigger.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: He's going toe to toe with his enemy and saying, I'll show you.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to do this in Israel where everyone expects it to happen.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to do it deep behind enemy lines, in the place where no one would expect it.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: There, I'm going to start a work that will continue.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: You're going to go to Zarephath, this town, this pagan town in the middle of nowhere, where people remember to Baal, they're sacrificing children.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: They're killing their children to worship this God.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: God's going to say, I'll show you what kind of God I am.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: I don't demand your children die for me.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not killing this son so that I can be glorified.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to raise him to life.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: The enemy steals, kills, and destroys.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: I come that you may have life and have it to the full.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I can do it anywhere, but I'm going to do it here to show you that I can do it anywhere.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: What we also find out, going back a bit further, is 1 Kings 16.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: It says, Ahab, son of Omri, did more evil in the eyes than the Lord than any of those before him.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: This is the king.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam, son of Nebat, but he also married Jezebel, we talked about her, daughter of Ethbal, king of Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship him.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: King of the who?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: King of the Sidonians, Zarephath in Sidon.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: He's gone to Jezebel's home turf.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: He's gone to this woman who's killing all the prophets, and there God is going to say, I'm going to start my work.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to bring this son back to life.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because he is going to be the first of many.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: This is all preparation for next week.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_01: Next week, God is going to resurrect an entire nation.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: He's going to bring people back to life.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: He's going to destroy death and he's going to restore life.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: But he's going to start with this son so that Elijah knows that the gospel he has, the God he believes in, is a God of resurrection.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: A God who specializes, and our God is the only God who does this.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Our God specializes in death and resurrection.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: The word Zarephath means place of refining.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah needs his message to be refined.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because Elijah could go out to Israel and go, right, guys, you've made a bit of a mess of things.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: Let's try and sort it out, shall we?
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, let's try, let's start being nice to each other.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: Let's stop killing the children.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, let's all get together, let's have a conversation, let's work things out, let's talk it over.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: Let's try and be better people.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: Let's be good people, yeah?
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: Let's try a bit harder, let's be more loving, let's be nice.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: It'll be better for you, it'll be better for all of us.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: We'll enjoy ourselves more if we do that.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: Sounds good, doesn't it?
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of the message you might go if you go to WH Smith's or a bookstore, a nice self-help section, full of books.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Try harder, be a bit better, get more organized, sort yourself out, get a diary and make notes, journal and get things off your chest.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: You know, just work things through, just be a bit kinder, be a bit happier, be grateful, and things will work out fine.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: All wonderful stuff.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: The problem is, with all self-help, and with all religion for that matter, the weak link in all of it, the problem, the broken component is that it all involves people doing it.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: And people are not very good at doing it.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: Every system of belief, every form of morality, every this is the right, we all know what it is.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: The problem is that we do not do it.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: And scripture says we don't do it because we are spiritually dead.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, buck your ideas up, get up out of the ground, let's go to work.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, stop lying around doing nothing, stop decomposing, put on some clothes, let's go, let's start doing this.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: You can be good people, you can work hard, just try, and you'll get up off the grave.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: And what do you expect they will do?
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: Nothing, because they're dead.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's this problem that Israel has, it's the problem that we have, that we've tried try harder, we've tried be better, we've tried be a better you, we've tried work and solve and fix, we've tried morals and practices that make things better, and they sometimes appear to work to an extent, but at some point we realise we just don't have it.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: That it's like we're disconnected from life.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: We're like a phone, it goes a day, but then it needs recharging.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: We haven't got a we don't know where to plug it in, and so we end up dead.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: We end up without the strength to carry on, we end up worn out.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps you feel that.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: You're trying your hardest, you are working hard, you're faithful, you're good, you're doing all these things, but you just feel exhausted.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: You just feel I don't have it in me.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't, I don't, I can I can't do it.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm burdened by it.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: These things, that they're they're great advice, they're all true.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: But it's like it's crushing me because I can't, it's me.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: I can't live up to I can't climb up to those heights, I can't achieve those things.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: I I just it's like I'm cut off from a source.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's like I'm I'm pouring out water, but there's nothing pouring in.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's like I'm giving out life, but there's no life flowing in.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like I'm slowly dying, or perhaps I'm already dead.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: And Elijah's message can't be to Israel, right, guys, let's buck our ideas up and let's sort ourselves out.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: Because God's already given them the law, He's given them Solomon, and all his wisdom has been given to them.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Them.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: The kings, faithful kings who are powerful, have come before.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: They've had God and his presence among them.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: They've had all of that, and yet still the broken component is them.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: The thing that has been consistent throughout it all is them.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: And each thing, each thing has become an idol that has not been able to bear the weight.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: And now Elijah needs to bring them a message.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: Now we come back to the source.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so God is teaching him that this isn't self-help, this is resurrection.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: This is you are dead, but if you believe, if you call on his name, then you will have life.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's admitting not I've made some mistakes and got things wrong, but I can't fix me.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: I can't save me.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: I don't need a second chance because I'd only mess that one up.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: I need something more.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: I need resurrection.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: And here's the beauty of what Elijah's learning.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: If you die, if you die in repentance, then you will rise in mercy.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like Jesus says, even though you die, yet you will live.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: Unless the grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains alone.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: But if it dies, it will bear much fruit.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: Last week we saw that God, that little is enough.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: God goes a step further this time and says, now nothing.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: I am the God who will bring life and fullness even to nothing.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: When I created this world, I didn't do what you guys do.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't get a piece of paper and a pencil and take all the resources and put them together to make something.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: I spoke out of nothing.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: I can work even in nothing.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's what death is.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's nothing.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's cut off from life, it's cut off from love, it's cut off from healing and hope, it's cut off from energy, it's cut off of power, it's cut off from all these things, it's nothing, but even there, God says, that is not beyond me.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you call on my name, if you return, I will not just give you another day's worth.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'll not just give you some more advice or some insight on how to make things better.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: I will breathe into you the breath of life, and you will resurrect.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: You will come alive.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: And this little boy becomes a picture for Elijah of what God is about to do with an entire nation.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: And God does it with him in a pagan land, on the enemy's home turf, to show Elijah this is the message you're going to bring.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: You're not going to tell Israel, well, if we all be good Jewish people, if we all be good Israelites who honor God and do the right thing all the time, then we'll be okay because they aren't capable of doing that.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: You go to them, not to condemn them, but to say, though you have died, if you turn and believe, then you will live.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: Not really self-help, but sort of self-death, which is how Jesus preached his message.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: I've come that you may have life and have it to the full.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: You take up your cross daily and follow me, but then the result will be that you will have life eternal.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: This is not just a story about a boy in Zarephath.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's pointing us to the gospel, which is not be good people as much as we like good people.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's the resurrection story.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: The good news that centuries later Jesus would stretch himself out.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: Not on a boy, just on a boy, but on a cross.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: And on that cross, he would identify like Elijah does.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: He comes near and he would identify with us.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: He would bear our death and he would rise again, not for one household, but for all who would believe.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: And Elijah, unknowingly, the first resurrection in Scripture, looks forward to that time.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: We look back.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah looked forward to that hope that was to come, but we get to look back and we get to remember.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: Even when everything is gone, still there is resurrection.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Even in our grief and our sorrow, even when we stand at the graveside of a loved one and it feels like everything has fallen apart, our whole world has come crashing down, we can stand there with tears and heartache and still, I remember resurrection.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: When life falls apart, when the marriage breaks down, when everything collapses, when the job that was so secure is taken from us, when the ministry that gave us so much meaning is suddenly stripped away, when our health becomes less and less, when it's all gone, we can lose it and still stand and say, I remember resurrection.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: That I have a God who specializes in bringing life where it feels like there is only death, of restoring and bringing back what is lost in more glorious ways.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's how Paul puts it in 2 Timothy.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: He says, Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: This is my gospel.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: This is our gospel.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: Our gospel is not just loving people and being nice people and singing nice songs.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: Our gospel is resurrection, Jesus Christ raised from the dead.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: And you can stand on the precipice of the greatest pit, of the deepest darkness, of the most painful situations, and there you can hear by the Spirit God saying, Remember Jesus Christ raised from the dead.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: This is your gospel.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: This is my gospel.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: This is where my hope is.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: When all else is gone, when everything is taken away, and when on that day, one day I will be laid in the ground, even then I can remember Jesus Christ raised from the dead.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: This is my gospel.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus comes and he stands, like Elijah does.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: He enters into enemy territory and he stands face to face, toe to toe with death.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: And there he gives himself to it.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then he returns, overcoming it, so that we can stand in the face of our own death, in the face of the death of a loved one, a death of a friend, the death of a ministry, a death of a relationship, the death of some ambition or dream, we can stand there and still say, but I remember Jesus, raised from the dead.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: This is my gospel.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: Not, well, this is bad, but I better try harder.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: But Jesus, who resurrected and will resurrect me.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: So many of us, I think, find ourselves exhausted with a gospel that says, Well, try harder and then God will be pleased with you.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: You do not need to strive your way into God's love.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: You cannot bring it down from heaven, you cannot reach those heights, but there is one who has come down, who brings it to you.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: Today we don't have to pretend that we are good people in need of a boost.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: We can own the truth, I am dead, but he has made me alive.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's how Paul's that's this is the gospel.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: You were dead in your transgressions and sins, but God made you alive.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: And in Jesus you'll be raised to life.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: You can die to these things, you can let yourself die to these things.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to put them on life support and keep them going, thinking they're the thing where you find life.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: If they die, our God specializes in death and resurrection.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so Elijah's journey in 1 Kings 17 has been to be humbled, to see God in the little, and now finally to see that God's message is not about judgment, it's about resurrection.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's about announcing you were dead, but only so that we can know that we can be made alive.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: And in the light of this, the widow's faith becomes personal.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: She sees this and she goes, Now I know.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Now I know.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_01: Now I have tasted it for myself.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't believe it before, I still wasn't sure.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: I thought maybe Baal could help us still.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: I thought there was a way out, but now I know.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: Now I know that every word you say is truth.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now I know that when God promises life, he means life.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: When God promises healing and hope, he means healing and hope.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: This is our gospel.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: Today, do you feel spiritually dead?
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: Have you had things fail you, things that you've trusted in or put your hope in?
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: There's a question: will we fight against it?
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_01: Will we put it on life support and try and keep these things going, or will we surrender to it?
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: So it's this scary thing to do, to surrender to it.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: You can only do it if there is a God who says, I will hold your hand through there and into resurrection life.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: The place of Zarephath for Elijah is a place of refining, where things are stripped away so that he can know that all he has is God and that is more than enough.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: I know there will be people here whose story will be just that.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know God was all I needed until God was all I had.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: But there is a great truth to that.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: One that I can't convince you from a stage, but you will experience for yourself if you walk with him long enough.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: That even if the worst should happen, it doesn't need to be the worst thing because even though you die, yet you'll live.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: This is our gospel.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: Remember Jesus.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: He died and rose.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: Not so that we could look back and say, good for him, but that's we should have the promise that even though we die, we too will rise.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_01: And perhaps God needs to refine us, to strip back our dependence on other things or even our dependence on ourselves.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: We're tired.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_01: We are this generation is a tired generation.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: We're trying our hardest, we're trying to keep things together, we're trying to hold things and hold the whole world and all the information that we have.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: We're trying to be good people and work hard and provide and all these things, and we're exhausted from it.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: There is a place of rest where we finally come and say, I cannot carry this burden.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's what Jesus' invite is all about.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: Come to me.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: If you are weary and heavy burden, perhaps it's because you're preaching a gospel of try harder and be better, and you're exhausted by it, you're crushed by it.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: But come to me and I'll give you a new burden.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it won't be heavy, it will be light, it won't be too much for you because you'll be connected to the source.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: God is the source of life.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_01: He is when we are plugged into him.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: There is there is energy that flows, there is power that flows, enough to bring a child back to life, enough to bring, we're gonna see a nation, in fact, enough to bring the entire world back to life as they call on Jesus' name.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's what the gospel is all about.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: A God of resurrection.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so it starts.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: Elijah, it starts for him with one young boy in the enemy's territory.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: Next week we're going to see how it spreads and how God does something so amazing in the midst of such desperate circumstances to bring his people back.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Today, perhaps it feels that bit more personal.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: Where is God wanting to resurrect your life?
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: Where is he wanting to bring that hope to you?
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_01: Let me just pray, let's be still for a moment and pray as we consider where God might be speaking to us today.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps you know already you can feel where you there is a lack in your life, where you need resurrection, where perhaps you feel like you're you yourself or you're keeping something on life support.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: Just take a moment to pause and invite you, God, to come and speak with us.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_01: Where we are trying our best and yet we find that we we are not enough.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: Where we're working our hardest, but we feel burdened by it.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: We thank you, Jesus, that your gospel is not not try harder or be better.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's when we find ourselves at an end of ourselves that even there you can work.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: So we bring you today, God, what we can't fix though we've tried.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: We bring you what's slipping out of our hands as hard as we try and cling to it.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: We bring you these things trusting that you are a God who can raise what is dead, who can restore hope where there is no hope, who can breathe your life where it feels like we are dry and parched.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: We thank you, Lord, that you are not finished with any of our stories.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: You are the one who brings life out of loss and hope out of despair, power out of our surrender.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: We ask you, Lord, would you raise what is dead?
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: For you, God, are our living hope.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: You are the one who said you hold the keys of death and life, behold, you were dead, but now you are alive forevermore.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_01: And we want to remember that today, Father.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: Remember Jesus Christ risen from the dead.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: This is our gospel, this is our proclamation, this is our hope, this is where our trust is, the one who is life, the one who is the source, and whose power is so great that no matter what we bring, no matter how long it has been dead, you can bring it back to life.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the one who holds us, even though we pass through that door, even though we pass through death, it is not the end point.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_01: It is part of the journey into resurrection life with you.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so we bring you not only ourselves, but those who may be grieving, those who may be hurting.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, would you meet them in that place too?
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: With your comfort, with your care, with your kindness and with your mercy.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it is enough.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_01: Help us, Lord, like that widow, to know that every word that comes from your mouth is truth.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: That we can believe it, that we can believe you, Jesus.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: When you said, whoever believes in me, though they die, they will live.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_01: Help us to believe that truth, that we might live it.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: We bring you now, Lord, all that is dying, all that is dead, that you might breathe your life into it.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Breathe, Holy Spirit, we pray.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: And as you work, Lord, may we rejoice with you.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_01: You, the God who conquered the grave, you, Lord, over every situation, over all the earth.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: Help us remember you, Jesus, risen from the dead.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: We ask it in your precious name.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: Music group are going to come and lead us in a song that reminds us of that living hope that we have, that he is alive, that he is the resurrection and the life.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: Whoever believes in him will not perish, they will live forever.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: That is the power of our God, that is our gospel.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: Let's celebrate it together, shall we?
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: We hope that you've enjoyed listening to Dean's thoughts today.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: If anything that he has said has challenged you or raised questions that you'd like answers to, please don't hesitate to contact us and ask for a chat.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_02: You can find our details on our website which is leobc.co.uk, as well as on the information that we have posted for this podcast.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_02: Alternatively, if you live in our area, you're very welcome to join us on Sunday morning at 10 30 to hear things first hand.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_02: We'd love to see you there.