Part 19 (1/2)
Thus it was in the days of Elias; there were seven thousand such stars whose light was obscured by the thick clouds of idolatry--who would not yield to the darkness themselves, though they lacked power to enlighten others; yet was there but one star of sufficient power and brightness to dispel the mists and create a sphere in which others might s.h.i.+ne. This was Elijah the Tishbite, whom we now behold, in heavenly power and light, breaking into the very stronghold of Baal, upsetting Jezebel's table,[18] writing folly upon the whole system of Baal's wors.h.i.+p, and in fact, by G.o.d's grace, effecting a mighty moral change in the nation--bringing the many thousands of Israel down into the dust in real self-abas.e.m.e.nt, and mingling the blood of Baal's prophets with the waters of Kishon.
[18] False religion has always sought the suns.h.i.+ne of this world's favor, whereas true religion has always been more pure and genuine when the world has frowned upon it. ”_The prophets of the groves eat at Jezebel's table._” If Jezebel had had no table, she would have had no prophets either; it was _her table_, and not _her soul_, they sought.
How gracious of the Lord to raise up such a deliverer for His deluded people! And what a deathblow to the prophets of Baal! We may safely a.s.sert they never offered a more unwilling sacrifice to their idol than that which our prophet suggested. It was the sure precursor of his downfall, and of theirs also. What a sad aspect they present, ”crying and cutting themselves with knives and lancets till the blood gushed out,” and crying out, with unavailing earnestness, ”O Baal, hear us!” Alas, Baal could not hear nor answer them! The true prophet, conscious in his inmost soul of the sinful folly of the whole scene, mocks them: they cry more earnestly, and leap with frantic zeal upon the altar; but all in vain. They were now to be unmasked in the view of the nation. Their craft was in imminent danger. Those hands which, through their influence, had so often been lifted up in the diabolical wors.h.i.+p of a sinful absurdity, were speedily about to seize them and drag them to their merited fate. Well, therefore, might they cry, ”O Baal, hear us!”
How solemn, how immutably true, are those words of Jeremiah, ”Cursed is the man whose heart departeth from the Lord”! It matters not on whom, or on what, we place our confidence: whether it be a religious system or a religious ordinance, or anything else, it is a departure of the heart from G.o.d; a curse follows it, and when the final struggle comes the Baal will be invoked in vain; ”there will be neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any to regard.”
How awful is the thought of departure from the living G.o.d! How dreadful to find, at the end of our history, that we have been leaning upon a broken reed! O reader, if you have not found solid and abiding peace for your guilty conscience in the atoning blood of Jesus, if you have a single emotion of fear in your heart at the thought of meeting G.o.d, let me put the prophet's question to you, ”How long halt ye between two opinions?” Why do you stand aloof when Jesus calls you to come unto Him and take His yoke upon you? Believe me, the hour is coming when, if you have not fled for refuge to Jesus, a greater than Elijah will mock at your calamity. Harken to these solemn words: ”Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out My hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at naught all My counsel, and would none of My reproof; I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; when your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you” (Prov. i. 24-27).
Awful words! inconceivably awful! How much more awful the reality!
Reader, flee to Jesus. Betake yourself to the open fountain, and there find peace and refuge, ere the storm of divine wrath and judgment bursts upon your head. ”When once the master of the house has risen up and shut to the door,” you are lost, and lost forever. Oh think of this, I implore of you, and let not Satan drag your precious soul into everlasting perdition!
We now turn to another side of the picture. The prophets of Baal were signally defeated. They had leaped, cut themselves, and cried to no purpose. Their whole system had been proved a gross fallacy; the superstructure of error had been trampled to the ground, and it only now remained to rear the magnificent superstructure of truth in the view of those who had been so long enslaved by vanity and lies. ”And Elijah said unto all the people, Come near unto me. And all the people came near unto him. _And he repaired the altar of the Lord that was broken down._ And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, unto whom the word of the Lord came, saying, Israel shall be thy name: and with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord.”
It is always well to wait patiently, and allow evil and error to find their own level. Time will surely bring the truth to light; and let error array itself ever so carefully in the venerable robes of antiquity, yet will time strip it of these robes, and display it in all its naked deformity. Elijah felt this, and therefore he could stand quietly by and allow all the sands of Baal's gla.s.s to run out ere he began to exhibit the pattern of a more excellent way. Now it needs a very real apprehension of divine principles to enable one to adopt this patient course. Had our prophet been shallow-minded, or badly taught, he would have been in much greater haste to display his system and raise a storm of opposition against his antagonists. But a spirit gifted with true elevation is never in haste, never perturbed; he has found a centre round which to move, and in revolving round that he finds himself carried out of the region of every other influence.
Such an one was Elijah, a really elevated, independent, holy man--one who in every scene of his extraordinary career maintained a heavenly dignity which is earnestly to be sought after by all the Lord's servants. When he stood on mount Carmel, beholding the fruitless bodily exercise of Baal's prophets, he presented the appearance of one who was fully conscious of his heavenly mission; and not only in his manner, but also in his principles of acting, he acquitted himself as a prophet of the Lord.
What, then, were those principles on which Elijah acted? They were, in a word, those on which the unity of the nation was based. The first thing he does is to ”repair the altar of the Lord that was broken down.” This was Israel's centre, and to this every true reformer directed his attention. Those who seek to carry out a one-sided reformation may rest satisfied with merely throwing down that which is false, without proceeding further to establish a sound basis on which to erect a new superstructure: but such reformation will never stand; it will carry with it too much of the old leaven to admit of its being a testimony. The altar of Baal must not only be thrown down, but the altar of the Lord must be set up.
Some there are who would sacrifice to the Lord on the altar of Baal; in other words, they would retain an evil system, and rest satisfied with giving it a right name. But no; the only centre of unity which G.o.d can recognize is the name of Jesus--simply and exclusively that.
The people of G.o.d must not be looked at as members of a system, but as members of Christ. G.o.d sees them as such, and it should be their business to reckon themselves to be what G.o.d tells them they are, and manifestly to take that blessed place.
And we may further remark that Elijah in his actings on mount Carmel does not stop short of the recognition of Israel's unbroken unity. He takes _twelve stones_, according to _the number of the sons of Jacob_, unto whom the word of the Lord came, saying, ”_Israel shall be thy name._” This was taking high ground--yea, the very highest. Solomon could have taken no higher. To recognize the twelve tribes of Israel at a time when they were divided, and weakened, and degraded, evidenced true communion with the mind of G.o.d in reference to His people. Yet this is what the Spirit will ever suggest. ”Our twelve tribes” must never be given up. True they may, through their own weakness and folly, become scattered and divided; yet the G.o.d of Israel can only think of them in that unbroken unity which they once exhibited, and which, moreover, they will exhibit again when, having been united by the true David, they shall in holy fellows.h.i.+p tread the courts of the Lord forever.
Now the prophet Elijah, through the Spirit, saw all this. With the eye of faith, he penetrated the long, dreary time of Israel's humiliating bondage, and beheld them in their visible unity, no longer Judah and Israel, but _Israel_, for the word is, ”_Israel shall be thy name_.”
His mind was occupied, not with what Israel was, but with what G.o.d had said. This was faith. Unbelief might say, ”You are taking too high a stand; it is presumption to talk about twelve tribes when there are but ten; it is folly to speak of unbroken unity when there is nothing but division.” Such will ever be the language of unbelief, which can never grasp the thoughts of G.o.d, nor see things as He sees them. But it is the happy privilege of the man of faith to rest his spirit on the immutable testimony of G.o.d, which is not to be nullified by man's sinful folly. ”_Israel shall be thy name_.” Precious promise! Most precious! Most permanent! Nothing could for a moment interfere with it--neither Rehoboam's childishness nor Jeroboam's cunning policy; no, nor yet Ahab's vileness could hinder Elijah from taking the loftiest position that an Israelite could take, even the position of a wors.h.i.+per at an altar built of twelve stones, according to the names of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Now in Elijah the Tishbite we have an example of the power of faith in the promise of G.o.d at a time when everything around him seemed to stand opposed. It enabled him to rise above all the evil and sorrow around him, and to build an altar of twelve stones with as much holy confidence and unclouded a.s.surance as did Joshua when, amid the triumphant hosts of Israel, he erected his trophy on the banks of Jordan.
But I must bring this section to a close, having already extended it further than I had intended. We have seen the principle upon which our prophet desired to carry out the reformation. It was a sound one, and G.o.d honored it. The fire from heaven at once confounded the prophets of Baal, confirmed the prophet's faith, and delivered the people from their sad condition of halting between two opinions. Elijah's faith had given G.o.d room to act; he had made a trench and filled it with water; in other words, he had made the difficulty as great as possible in order that the divine triumph might be complete: and truly it was so. G.o.d will always respond to the appeal of simple faith. ”Hear me,”
said the prophet, ”O Lord, hear me; that this people may know that Thou art the Lord G.o.d, and that Thou hast turned their heart back again.”
This is intelligent prayer. The prophet is engaged solely about G.o.d and His people. He does not say, ”Hear me, that this people may know that I am a true prophet.” No; his only object was to bring the people back to the G.o.d of their fathers, and to have the claims of G.o.d established in their consciences, in opposition to the claims of Baal.
And G.o.d harkened and heard; for no sooner had he concluded his prayer than ”the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it they fell on their faces: and they said, 'The Lord, He is the G.o.d; the Lord, He is the G.o.d.'”
Truth triumphs! The prophets are confounded! The prophet, in holy indignation, mingles their blood with the waters of the Kishon, and thus, evil being judged, there remains no further hindrance to the communication of the divine blessing, which Elijah announces to Ahab in these words, ”Get thee up, eat and drink, for there is a sound of abundance of rain.” How do these words convey to us Ahab's true character! ”_Eat and drink._” This was all he knew, or cared to know.
He had come forth to look for gra.s.s, and nothing more; and the prophet conveyed to him that intelligence which he knew he desired. He could not ask him to come and join him in thanksgiving to G.o.d for this glorious triumph over evil, for he knew well he would meet with no response. And yet they were both Israelites: but one was in communion with G.o.d, and the other was the slave of sin; hence, while Ahab found his enjoyment in getting up to ”eat and drink,” Elijah sought his in retirement with G.o.d. Blessed, holy, heavenly enjoyment!
But mark the difference between Elijah's bearing in the presence of man and in the presence of G.o.d. He had met Obadiah, a saint in wrong circ.u.mstances, with an air of dignity and elevation; he had met Ahab in righteous sternness; he had stood amid the thousands of his deluded and erring brethren with the firmness and grace of a true reformer; and lastly, he had met the wicked prophets of Baal with mocking, and then with the sword of vengeance. Thus had he carried himself in the presence of man. But how did he meet G.o.d? ”He cast himself down upon the earth, and put his face between his knees.” Thus he carried himself before G.o.d. All this is lovely. Our prophet knew his place both before G.o.d and man. In the presence of man he acted in the wisdom of the Spirit, as the case demanded; in the presence of G.o.d he prostrated himself in unfeigned and reverent humility. Thus may all the Lord's servants know how to walk in all their complicated relations here below.
We must now accompany our prophet to widely different scenes.
_SECTION V._
THE PROPHET ON MOUNT h.o.r.eB
There are few who have taken a prominent place in the history of the Church of G.o.d whose course has not been marked, in a special manner, by vicissitude: of such, as of ”those that go down to the sea in s.h.i.+ps, that do business in great waters,” it may be said, ”They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths; their soul is melted because of trouble.” They are sometimes seen on the mount, sometimes in the valley; at one time basking in the suns.h.i.+ne, at another beaten by the storm.