“How long will you go limping…?” - Emily Woodard

 

Each year, the Spiritual Life committee of the ARP Women’s Ministries board selects and recommends a Bible study and theme verse to the women of the denomination for use in their circles. The selection for the upcoming year is focused on the ministries of Elijah and Elisha in the books of 1-2 Kings, using the helpful series from P&R Publishing, The Gospel According to the Old Testament; this volume is Faith in the Face of Apostasy: The Gospel According to Elijah and Elisha, by Raymond Dillard. It was more difficult than usual to select a theme verse for this study given, I think, the action-packed chapters of historical narrative. Ultimately though, 1 Kings 18:21 was chosen as the theme verse, and as we read Elijah’s address to Israel, the Scripture provides a challenge to us as well. 

​When Elijah was called to minister in Israel, the people of the Northern Kingdom had lived through generations of kings who walked in the ways of Jeroboam (e.g., 1 Kings 16:2, 19, 26), leading the people in syncretistic Yahweh worship (1 Kings 13:28-33). At the time of Elijah’s arrival, the people were being ruled by King Ahab who followed in the sins of Jeroboam andinstituted the worship of Baal, the pagan god of Ahab’s Sidonian wife, Jezebel. It was a dark time religiously for the people of God in Israel and Elijah arrived with the pronouncement of covenant curses, that God would withhold rain from the land because the people turned to worship other gods (Deuteronomy 11:16-17 and 1 Kings 17:1). 

​After three and a half years (James 5:17), the Lord purposes to again send rain upon the earth, and he sends Elijah, who had remained in hiding since his initial pronouncement, to Ahab. It is interesting to think about how and why the events of 1 Kings 18 unfold, as the contest between Elijah and the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel is one of the most well-known episodes from these chapters. Yahweh will prove, through Elijah’s contest, that He is the one true God, and it seems important that this happens before the rain arrives so that when it does, the people will recognize that it comes at Yahweh’s word and not Baal’s. Baal was, after all, thought to be in control of the rain; he was called “he who rides on the clouds” and in sculptures was often depicted with a lightning bolt in his hand (1). The contest itself is dramatic and exciting, but Elijah’s challenge to the people of Israel, who are called to witness the showdown, brings its own level of intensity.

​“So Ahab sent to all the people of Israel and gathered the prophets together at Mount Carmel. And Elijah came near to all the people and said, ‘How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.’ And the people did not answer him a word” (1 Kings 18:20-21).  The Israelites ‘limping’ is perhaps a bit hard for us to relate to, but as Ralph Davis points out, the attraction of Baal worship derived from these facts: it was government sanctioned, it had the benefit of tradition (having been practiced by the Canaanites who inhabited the land hundreds of years before Elijah’s contemporaries), and it offered an appeal both to relevance and sensuality (2). Elijah’s question is originally posed to the Israelites of the ninth century B.C., but by virtue of being recorded in Scripture, it is also posed by the author of Kings to his audience, the Jewish exiles in Babylon that lived a few hundred years later. The exiles would also face thetemptation to forsake the exclusive worship of Yahweh, especially given the destruction of Jerusalem. My Old Testament professor, while discussing the spiritual needs of the original readers of Kings, asked our class to imagine being a Jew and waking up every morning in Babylon. Would we start to doubt that Yahweh was really the God of the whole world while his temple and city sat in ruins and his people were in exile? Would we wonder why the Babylonians, worshippers of Markduk, seemed to prosper? We might start to wonder if it would really hurt to pray to Marduk every now and then. Now, imagine the impact of the story from 1 Kings 18 on the exiles in Babylon, how Elijah’s (and Yahweh’s) decisive victory at Mount Carmel might have bolstered their faith and challenged them not to waver between two opinions.

Through the eternal nature of God’s word and the promise that it is all profitable for us, Elijah’s question, recorded by the author of Kings, is also directed to us. We may incorrectly assume that the Israelites were merely feeble-minded worshippers who looked only for the newest, shiniest religion, but we probably have more in common with them than we’re ready to admit. The question could be raised, ‘what is the Baal of our day that we are tempted to worship?’ We would likely answer with ideas like money, power, relationships, security, etc. But perhaps the issue is more fundamental, and addressed squarely by Elijah’s interrogative. How long will we go limping between two opinions? In other words, do we trust God alone, or do we trust something else? 

​ A number of commentators connect Elijah’s imagery of limping between two opinions with the instability of the double-minded man in James 1, who is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind (vv. 5-8). James’ exhortation, his answer to not being blown about by the wind, is to believe and not doubt (his context is asking for wisdom and trusting God to supply it). Elijah’s command is likewise simple: if the LORD is God, follow him. And the familiar story of the contest that took place in 1 Kings 18 is a solid reminder to us that the LORD is God. We must, then, follow Him. 

 

(1) https://www.britannica.com/topic/Baal-ancient-deity

(2) D. Ralph Davis, 1 Kings: The Wisdom and the Folly,(Christian Focus), pages 232-233.