{"id":768,"date":"2015-11-02T13:51:39","date_gmt":"2015-11-02T18:51:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/?p=768"},"modified":"2015-11-02T14:01:23","modified_gmt":"2015-11-02T19:01:23","slug":"the-misery-of-taking-god-out-of-the-picture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/?p=768","title":{"rendered":"The Misery of Taking God Out of the Picture"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Here are the completed notes from the Sunday Morning Service November 1, 2015:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>Scripture: 1 Kings 18, 19<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3><strong>The Background for the message<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><strong>Elijah the Prophet of God:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Elijah announced God\u2019s judgment in the form of a drought upon Israel \u2013\u00a01 Kings 17:1<\/li>\n<li>Elijah is supernaturally cared for during the drought \u2013 1 Kings 17:2-7<\/li>\n<li>Elijah raised a widow\u2019s dead son to life \u2013 1 Kings 17:17-24<\/li>\n<li>Elijah prayed and the drought ended \u2013 1 Kings 18:17-40; James 5:17, 18<\/li>\n<li>Elijah carried to heaven in a chariot of fire \u2013 2 Kings 2:9 (Translated to glory without dying)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Elijah challenges Ahab and his 450 pagan prophets to meet him on Mount Carmel \u2013 18:17-19<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ahab <\/strong>\u2013 King of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the most wicked up to this time \u2013 He marred <strong>Jezebel<\/strong>, a fanatical Baal worshipper<\/p>\n<p><strong>Baal <\/strong>\u2013 Lord of the Canaanite religion, seen in thunderstorms as a god of weather, also worshiped as a god who provided fertility<\/p>\n<p>Elijah rebukes Israel for wavering between worshipping the Lord and worshipping Baal \u2013 18:20-21<\/p>\n<p><strong>Elijah proposes a contest between himself and the prophets of Baal -18:22-24<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Each side was to prepare a young bull as a sacrifice and place it on the altar<\/li>\n<li>Elijah tells the prophets to call on their god to send fire down to consume the sacrifice and Elijah will call upon his God to do the same<\/li>\n<li>The God that answers by fire, \u201clet Him be God\u201d \u2013 18:24<\/li>\n<li>As the prophets of Baal shouted, leaped on the altar and cut themselves till the \u201cblood gushed out\u201d \u2013 18:26-28<\/li>\n<li>Elijah prays and fire falls from heaven and consumes the sacrifice \u2013 18:30-39<\/li>\n<li>The people acknowledge \u201cthe LORD, He is God\u201d \u2013 18:39<\/li>\n<li>The prophets of Baal are executed \u2013 18:40<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Elijah announces the end of a 3 year drought and there is a terrific rainstorm that sweeps over the land \u2013 18:41-45<\/p>\n<p>(Drought was punishment for the sins of the king and those of Northern Israel)<\/p>\n<p><strong>News comes to Jezebel (Ahab\u2019s wife) and she determines to have Elijah killed \u2013 19:1-2<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Elijah\u2019s response \u2013 19:3-4<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Elijah suffers here from discouragement, despondency and depression<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3><strong> Taking God out of the Picture:<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Can happen to anyone at any time<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Elijah, a great and mighty prophet of God<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Elijah raised a widow\u2019s dead son to life \u2013 1 Kings 17:17-24<\/li>\n<li>Defeated the prophets of Baal \u2013 1 Kings 18:22-40<\/li>\n<li>Elijah prayed and the drought ended \u2013 1 Kings 18:17-40; James 5:17, 18<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong> Many times begins with a trigger \u2013 See 19:1-3<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Here we have Elijah, tired, drained and alone<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>When God is taken out of the Picture:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>We are left with what we see on the surface <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2013 19:10\u00a0 <\/strong>We focus of self and our own circumstances<\/p>\n<p><strong> We are left to our own understanding<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong> We are left to struggle through life on our own and in our own strength<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3><strong>During times when God is taken out of the Picture:<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><strong> God has not changed<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong> God continues to be faithful \u2013 19:5-8<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>God provided Elijah a time of rest and refreshment (that\u2019s what he needed at the time) \u2013 19:5-8<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong> God wants us to consider where we are at and what we are doing \u2013 19:9, 13 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong> God wants our attention and for us to have listening ears \u2013\u00a0<\/strong><strong style=\"line-height: 1.5;\">19:11, 12<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3><strong>God brings clarity to our lives \u2013 19:18<\/strong><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here are the completed notes from the Sunday Morning Service November 1, 2015: Scripture: 1 Kings 18, 19 The Background for the message Elijah the Prophet of God: Elijah announced<span class=\"excerpt-ellipsis\">&#8230;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/?p=768\" itemprop=\"url\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sunmorn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=768"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":770,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions\/770"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csbcva.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}