Why did Ahab go up and eat and drink at the command of
Elijah? Elijah said there was the sound of
rushing rain and yet when he sent his servant to look, there was nothing at
first. There was, in fact, nothing the first six times. Finally, the seventh time there was a little
cloud and that was enough. Does that kind
of remind you of Noah sending out the
raven? Again, Elijah commands Ahab and
the king obeys. He is always, it seems,
in need of someone to tell him what to do and willing to do it. Why do they both go to Jezreel? It was a second home for Ahab but why did
Elijah go to the entrance of Jezreel?
What did he think would happen there?
Jezebel sends her murderous intentions regarding the prophet and his
reaction, even after the defeat of the prophets of Baal, was fear, running for
his life. Elijah fled to the wilderness,
forty days and forty nights to the mountain of God, Horeb/Sinai. All he wanted was for it all to end, the man
was exhausted. It seems to be a pattern
in life, you reach the height and expect it to continue and then, suddenly, reality
hits, Jezebel is still there, she still wants your life, and it’s just too much
to bear that this one thing won’t stop.
John’s mission is fulfilled, he has revealed Messiah. These two men, cousins by birth, whose
destinies were intertwined since prior to the world began, together in the
river, one whose ministry was coming to completion, the other whose ministry is
just beginning, are our exemplars. John
knew his role was to prepare a people for the coming of Messiah and now, he
recognizes in Jesus his own shortcomings, he is not fit to baptize Jesus, it
should be the other way around. John,
who has referred to the ones others believed righteous as vipers, now is
humbled before Jesus, a man no one knew.
Jesus, the only perfectly sinless man in history, now accepts a baptism
for repentance, identifying Himself with sinners at the start of His ministry
and persevering to the end in that identification. We share John’s mission, to make Jesus known and
to call the world to repent and be baptized.
We share in the Holy Spirit to show us how to do that in both word and
life. We are to be like both men,
fearless and focused in the pursuit of the kingdom and His righteousness.
It is good to remember that we have an enemy. We forget that sometimes and we get
comfortable and then when he strikes against us we get knocked down too
easily. Paul is perhaps thinking of
those here whose way of looking at Jesus is that He was an embodied spirit
rather than fully God and fully man. These
would deny that what happens in the body matters at all, that the spirit of a
man is all that is important. We are not
to make peace with the world or seek the world’s things, our citizenship is in
heaven, we are exiles here for a time and our longing should be for our true
home. If we keep those things in mind,
we will navigate this life much better, rejoicing in the Lord and not in
anything else. He is the giver of all
good things, and we are to appreciate His handiwork in this world and also the
gifts He gives us like one another.
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