June
16th, 2013 “Hedging Our Bets” Rev. Heather Jepsen
Sermon
Series: “Kings of Summer"
1
Kings 18:17-40
Today we are continuing with our
sermon series: “Kings of Summer.” As
your pastor and resident preacher, I have challenged myself to preach solely
from the Old Testament this summer. My
hope is that through this process we will come to better understand the God of
the Old Testament who many of us simply don’t like.
Last Sunday we met the prophet
Elijah. In the time of kings, God called
Elijah to speak against Ahab who ruled the northern kingdom of Israel from
874-852 BCE. According to the writer of
Kings, Ahab did more to provoke the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, than
all the other kings before him.
Ahab and his wife Jezebel have
introduced the worship of Baal, the storm god, to the people of Israel. Elijah was sent to declare that YHWH, the
true God of Israel, would cause a drought to come upon the land, demonstrating
that the power of YHWH was greater than the power of Baal. In our reading from last week, we saw that
Elijah was a true prophet through the miracles surrounding him. From his feeding by wild birds at the Wadi
Cherith, to the miracle of unending meal and oil, to the restoration of life
for the widow of Zarephath’s son; we have seen that Elijah is a true prophet of
the Lord. We have also seen that the God
of the Old Testament is a God who meets with and cares for people living on the
edge of life.
Our reading for today happens three
years later. It has been three years
since Elijah declared a drought and in that time no water has fallen on the
land of Israel. The time has come for
the drought to end, so God sends Elijah to tell Ahab that the rains are finally
coming, this all due to the power of the true God of Israel, YHWH. When Ahab and Elijah meet, Ahab accuses
Elijah of bringing trouble upon the nation of Israel. To prove who the real troublemaker is, Elijah
purposes a challenge between the two gods, YHWH and Baal, and Ahab accepts.
Representatives of both faiths gather
on Mount Carmel before all the people of Israel. The contest is to present like offerings to
the gods, the god who replies first is the true god of Israel. Elijah’s hope is to win back the hearts of
the people. As he challenges them, “how
long will you go limping with two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal,
then follow him.”
The prophets of Baal, 450 of them, go
first. They prepare an altar, slaughter
a bull, and then call on Baal to consume the offering. From morning to noon they cry out but Baal is
silent. The dance around the altar; or
go limping as the author of Kings portrays them, but still there is no
answer. Amused by their display, Elijah
taunts the prophets into a frenzy.
“Perhaps your god is just busy,” he says, “maybe he is out of town or
maybe he is taking a nap.” The prophets
of Baal become even more desperate and they cut themselves to make offerings to
their god. As midday passed they raved
on, but still there was no voice, no answer, and no response.
Elijah alone is up next and calmly he
asks the crowd to gather closer. He
prepares an altar of 12 stones, reminding the people of the unity of tribes
that once was the nation of Israel. Elijah
digs a trench around the altar, prepares the bull, and then drenches the whole
affair with a symbolic 12 buckets of water; just to be sure that nothing
catches on fire by accident. When the
time comes to call upon the Lord, Elijah is cool and collected. “Now is the time,” he says to God, “Let it be
known that you are God and that I am your prophet. Answer my call, so the people will know you
are God, and will know that you have turned their hearts back.”
Immediately fire descends from the
sky, and the Lord consumes the entire offering.
From the bull itself to the last drops of water in the trench, God has
licked the plate clean. Understandably
the people are amazed and afraid. They
fall on their faces and worship the true God, YHWH. And, at the direction of Elijah, they seize
the 450 prophets of Baal, take them down to the creek, and kill them all. (Of course, the lectionary prefers that I
leave that last bit out).
As the story moves on from here
Elijah tells Ahab to go and eat for rain is about to come upon the land. As Ahab feasts, Elijah returns to Mount
Carmel and bows himself in prayer.
Finally a storm cloud is sighted and Elijah tells Ahab to hitch up his
chariot and flee to his summer home in Jezreel.
Elijah himself, girds up his loins, and runs with the power of God, beating
the storm and even Ahab himself into town.
The drought in the land of Israel is finally over, and the power of the
true God of Israel has finally been made clear to the people. YHWH has answered their prayers for rain.
As modern believers, where is our
place in this story? Well, I don’t think
we are Ahab, purposely leading people away from the worship of God. And we certainly aren’t Elijah, calling down
fire from heaven. No, today I see us in
the crowds on Mount Carmel, being asked by the prophet, “how long will you go
limping with two different opinions?”
The phrase Elijah uses here is
directly translated, “hobbling along two branches” like a bird jumping from
branch to branch in a tree. It has been
translated as “sitting on the fence”, “straddling the issue”, “hopping between
two opinions”, but I like to think of it as “hedging out bets.” The people of Israel were being told two
different stories. They were being told
that YHWH was the true God of Israel, but they we also being told that Baal was
also a powerful god, and that worship of Baal would give them reward. But the reality of their situation was
drought, and no god was presently bringing rain. Why not worship both gods, to ensure that you
and your house would be blessed? It is
an understandable position and one I think we can relate to.
Like the people of Israel, we are in
a similar situation. We are getting
mixed messages. Some are telling us to
worship God only, but we are also hearing good things about the other idols
around us, from money to sex to politics.
There are a lot of “gods” vying for our attention these days. And like the people of Israel, we are hedging
our bets, covering our bases, and limping between two if not more opinions. We trust and pray to YHWH, the ancient God of
Israel, but we also cavort and pay homage to the modern gods of money, technology,
politics, etc. Even Jesus the Christ
warns us that we cannot serve both God and money. And yet we try. God will take care of me if I take care of
myself is as common a position for us as it was for the people of Israel.
Unfortunately for us, things are a
lot less clear than they were for them.
I am not Elijah, and I will not set up a contest between my God and the
idols of this day. I am too familiar
with the lure of money, politics, beauty, etc. to pit my understanding of God
against these other things that demand attention. And I am not as confident as Elijah, for I
fear that if I fall on my knees and pray, I will ask for the wrong thing, and
the God of Israel will fail to show up at the contest. I for one know that no matter how great my
faith, I am not confident enough to call down fire from heaven.
In many ways, like the people of
Israel, we are in a time of drought. Of
course, I am not talking about rain here, we have had plenty of that this
year. Rather, I am talking about
evidence of God. I know that there are
people among us, who wonder if God really is active and present in our
world. It is a relevant question in our
day and age of endless war, school shootings, rampant cancer, grave injustice, and
general terror and death. Some of us see
nothing but a drought when it comes to the actions of God in our world. As a friend of mine wondered this week
“perhaps God has washed his hands of us”.
I am sure the people of Israel
wondered the same thing. If the God of
Israel was so mighty, then why didn’t he bring the rain? Three years of drought and starvation is an
awfully long time just to prove a point.
Neither YHWH nor Baal seemed to be making a difference in their lives,
so why not hedge their bets and worship both?
I am afraid I am wandering very near
a bramble patch here, for if our God too is silent then shouldn’t we also hedge
our bets and place our faith in the idols of our world? Especially since I cannot call down fire from
heaven to convince us otherwise?
As a person of faith, all I can say
is that I have been there. I have
wondered, and I have doubted, and I have explored other options. But when push comes to shove and I am backed
in a corner, I always choose God. I
might limp along wasting time with the idol of technology, and fretting too
much about money, but I would give it all up for YHWH the one true God. Not because I have seen fire from
heaven. But because I have felt fire in
my heart and I have seen it in the lives of others. I have witnessed things that have given me
faith, and I have found that faith is what I really need to make it in this
world. Though I am familiar with idols,
there is only one God for me, and YHWH is his name.
Who is the God of the Old
Testament? He is a God who will not
tolerate the worship of idols, and a God who will go to great lengths to demonstrate
his power and love for us . . . just as soon as he decides this drought is
over.
As modern believers, when faced with
this strange story of burnt offerings and fire from heaven, of bizarre competition
between gods that ends in violence, we can’t help but enter a bramble patch of
discussion. As far as I am concerned, we
are a lot like the Israelites, hedging our bets, and there are no easy answers
here. Yes, we shouldn’t be. But I can’t call down fire from heaven to
convince you of that. I can only ask you
to listen for the still small voice in your heart (a clue to the next sermon in
this series) and to trust that the God of Israel is with you, living on the
edge, and that we don’t need to hedge our bets.
Rather, God has come among us, and shown us like the people of Israel,
that we can and will eventually all turn our hearts back to God. Amen.
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