Transcript
Have your Bibles handy. Turn to First Kings chapter 18.
Now it came to pass after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, “Go, present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the earth.”
So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab. And there was a severe famine in Samaria.
And Ahab had called Obadiah, who was in charge of his house. Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly.
For so it was, while Jezebel massacred the prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah had taken one hundred prophets and hidden them, fifty in a cave, and had fed them with bread and water.
And Ahab had said to Obadiah, “Go into the land to all the springs of water, and to all the brooks. Perhaps we may find grass to keep the horses and mules alive, so that we will not have to kill any livestock.”
So they divided the land between them to explore it. Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself.
Now as Obadiah was on his way, suddenly Elijah met him. And he recognized him, and fell on his face, and said, “Is that you, my lord Elijah?”
And he answered him, “It is I. Go, tell your master, ‘Elijah is here.’”
Then he said, “How have I sinned, that you are delivering your servant into the hand of Ahab, to kill me? As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my master has not sent someone to hunt for you. And when they said, ‘He is not here,’ he took an oath from that kingdom or nation that they could not find you. And now you say, ‘Go, tell your master, “Elijah is here.”’ And it shall come to pass, as soon as I am gone from you, that the Spirit of the Lord will carry you to a place I do not know. So when I go and tell Ahab, and he cannot find you, he will kill me. But I, your servant, have feared the Lord from my youth. Was it not reported to my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord? How I hid one hundred men of the Lord’s prophets, fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water? And now you say, ‘Go, tell your master, “Elijah is here.”’ He will kill me!”
Then Elijah said, “As the Lord of hosts lives, before whom I stand, I will surely present myself to him today.”
So Obadiah went to meet Ahab, and told him. And Ahab went to meet Elijah.
Then it happened, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said to him, “Is that you, O troubler of Israel?”
And he answered, “I have not troubled Israel, but you and your father’s house have, in that you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and you have followed the Baals. Now therefore, send and gather all Israel to me on Mount Carmel, the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal, and the four hundred prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel’s table.”
The story that we have just read introduces us to one of the strangest men in the entire Bible. His name was Obadiah, and he is not to be confused with Obadiah, the writer of the little book of prophecy that appears toward the end of our Old Testament.
This is the only place in the Bible where we meet this particular Obadiah. And very frankly, after reading this story, our first impression of Obadiah is that he doesn’t have all his marbles. He’s not playing with a full deck. He’s a couple sandwiches short of a picnic. This is a really, really strange guy.
If you didn’t pick it up as we read, I hope I will be able to show you what I mean. But may I suggest to you that God holds up a little mirror to each of us, and we can see in Obadiah something rather strange that sometimes happens in the Christian mind and which can be, in fact, very, very detrimental to our relationship to God.
Now please don’t think for a minute that Obadiah was a man totally without talents. On the contrary, he apparently had some very outstanding talents because he was in charge of Ahab’s household. And even though we don’t know whether Ahab was by this time living in the splendid ivory palace that he eventually built for himself, we know that it was a royal palace of some kind. And Obadiah was in charge of everything.
There must have been several dozen servants in the household. All of the activities of the household were under Obadiah’s oversight. He probably hired and fired all the help. He had to see to it that everything ran smoothly. He had to see that all of the needs of the royal family were met. And so, in all probability, the man we meet here is a man of outstanding administrative talents. He wouldn’t have risen to this position in Ahab’s household if he hadn’t been talented in that way.
But there is even something else about Obadiah that’s more impressive than that. You see, Obadiah feared the Lord. In fact, according to the text of Scripture, he feared the Lord greatly. Now you remember, and I think Bob quoted it in the message this morning, according to Psalm 111 we’re told that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. We’re told the fear of the Lord is the beginning of understanding. The real starting place for all true spiritual wisdom comes with a reverence and respect for the greatness and majesty and power of God. And this is something that Obadiah, the head of Ahab’s household, had in abundance.
And one of the proofs of this is that he even dared to cross Queen Jezebel. Now you remember Jezebel, of course. She was the daughter of the king of Sidon whom Ahab had married. And if there were any such title as the most wicked woman in the Word of God, Jezebel would probably be the winner of that title by a long shot. Now her closest competition, ironically enough, is her daughter Athaliah, about whom we will read later in the book of Kings. But I think really that Jezebel holds the undisputed crown here.
You see, not only was she a pagan, but she was a promoter of paganism. She promoted in Israel, to the people of God, the worship of Baal in the many forms in which Baal was worshiped. She promoted the worship of the goddess Asherah. And she did a remarkable thing according to this particular chapter. Every day at her table there were four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and four hundred prophets of Asherah who ate at Jezebel’s expense. Can you imagine that? She is promoting idolatry big time.
Now in addition to being a promoter of idolatry, Jezebel was also completely ruthless when it came to people standing in her way. And we shall see a classic example of that in the near future. But it is obvious that in the pathway of worshiping Baal and Asherah were all the prophets of God, who obviously were all united to condemn this false worship. So what did Jezebel do? She started wiping them out. She started killing them. She would have killed every prophet of God in Israel if she could have gotten her hands on every prophet.
But Obadiah had such a fear of the Lord that he took a hundred of these prophets. He took fifty and put them in one cave. He took fifty and put them in another cave. And then he saw to it that bread and water was smuggled in to these prophets to sustain them while Jezebel was on this rampage.
Now I guarantee you that Obadiah knew perfectly well that if Jezebel had found out what he was doing, she would not only have terminated his employment in the palace, she would have terminated him. And when Obadiah does this for the prophets of God, he is taking not only his position but his life into his own hands. And so obviously Obadiah had some very positive traits, and he is to be admired for his fear of God.
But then comes this strange part of the story. Please understand, about three and a half years have passed since the moment that Elijah has been gone. Through three harvest seasons, Obadiah and Ahab are out trying to keep the livestock alive. And Ahab says to him, “You go that way and I’ll go this way.” He’s on this search. All of a sudden he runs smack dab into the man that Ahab has been looking for for all these years. And he recognizes him immediately, falls down before him, and he says, “Is that you, my lord Elijah?”
And Elijah replies, “It is I. Go tell your master, ‘Elijah is here.’”
Now folks, God has just handed to Obadiah a remarkable privilege. I mean, this is the man that Ahab has been looking for all these years. This is the man who can bring rain back onto the land. And God is giving Obadiah a chance to announce to his master that Elijah wants to meet with him. And Obadiah could have said to Elijah, “Thank you, thank you very much for this privilege. I will hasten to my master Ahab and I will say to him, even though I haven’t found any pasture land, I found something much better. I have found the prophet who can make rain come back on this earth.” I say he could have said that back to Elijah. But that isn’t what he said.
You see, when I go tell your master that Elijah is here, the first words out of Obadiah’s mouth now are, “How have I sinned?” Hey, what have I done? Who said anything about sin on the part of Obadiah? But it gets worse.
He says to Elijah, “As the Lord your God lives, there isn’t a nation or kingdom where he hasn’t sent someone looking for you. And when they said he’s not here, he made that nation, he made that kingdom swear that they didn’t know where you were. As soon as I’m gone, one thing you got to say for Obadiah, he does believe in miracles. But this is not the right kind of miracle to believe in. God’s gonna snatch you away and I’ll be stuck, and I’ll look like a fool to Ahab, and you’ll be somewhere else. That’ll be the end.”
And the rest of Obadiah’s speech is full of self-pity. Shouldn’t happen to a guy like me, he says. Your servant has feared God from his youth. Didn’t someone tell you what I did for the hundred prophets when Jezebel was killing all the other prophets? How I took these people, fifty in one cave and fifty in another, and fed them with bread and water? Didn’t anybody tell you about that? And you’re telling me go tell my master Elijah is here? You gotta be kidding. This is weird. This is strange, my friend.
Before we roll off our chairs laughing at the stupidity of Obadiah, may I suggest that we hold him up as a mirror. What’s wrong with Obadiah? It’s very simple folks, listen closely. The problem is very simple. Obadiah fears the Lord but he doesn’t trust the Lord. May I repeat that? Obadiah fears the Lord but he doesn’t trust the Lord. And he figures that in this whole process, at the critical moment, God is going to let him down. God is going to pull the rug out from under his feet. God is going to leave him holding the bag. That’s how he thinks.
Does that remind you of anything? Isn’t it true, my friends, and I speak to all of you who are Christians who know your own heart, may not be true of all of us, but isn’t it true that it is possible to have reverence and respect for the greatness and power of God and deep down in our hearts somewhere, you know what we’re thinking? We’re thinking, in the critical moment He won’t come through for me. I don’t think He’ll help me.
If something ever happened in your life that was kind of strange, it wasn’t harmful in itself, but you could see that it might lead to something very problematic, very difficult, and when that thing happened, did the thought cross your mind, “I wonder what I’ve done wrong?” And wonder why God’s giving me this problem? And it wasn’t even any trouble. Yeah, but you kind of suspected that, you know, God’s gonna do something here that I’m not going to like.
Some of you will remember Bea Arthur, one of the comedians who played in the sitcom called Golden Girls, and in an earlier sitcom whose title I don’t remember, Maude. Thank you. In Maude, Maude is a very liberal woman married to a very liberal man. They have a very liberal daughter. But almost every episode, somewhere in the episode, someone would do or say something that Maude, this liberal, didn’t approve of. And she would pause with that masterful comedic pause that everybody is so capable when they do comedy, as she would say, “God will get you for that.”
Do you know it’s surprising how many people think of God as primarily out there getting people for the things they do, out there trying to even the score with people for their sin? You know, it is possible to have an image of God where you think of God as a kind of a stern, righteous, judgmental father. And He’s kind of sitting there to slap you down if you get out of line just a little bit.
Don’t you see that the fear of the Lord, which is a respect for His greatness and majesty and glory, and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. But it’s not the end of wisdom. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but to mature in wisdom one understands the grace that God has for us even in the most critical moment of our life and experience.
So this leads to the remarkable conclusion of this story. Elijah could have said to Obadiah, “Look, I’ve come here to tell you I’m going to meet Ahab and be lying to you. Do you actually think that God is setting you up? That God is going to pull the rug out from underneath you? That God is going to leave you holding the bag? Is that what you think, Obadiah? If that’s what you think, I think your brains have fallen out onto the ground. I wish you would pick them up and put them back in again.”
Elijah could have said something like that. And if I’d been there I might have said something like that, and maybe you would have said something like that. But I want you to notice the simple, uncomplicated, direct answer that Elijah gives to this man who is so uncertain about God’s good intentions toward him.
And Elijah says, “As the Lord of hosts lives, before whom I stand, I will surely present myself to him today.” In other words, he gave Obadiah God’s Word.
Obadiah, to his everlasting credit folks, he doesn’t say one word more. Not one more objection, not one more doubt, not one more fear. He goes and gets Ahab. And of course when Ahab does meet Elijah, he’s none too thrilled by meeting Elijah. “Is that you, O troubler of Israel?” Well, when it’s really you, Ahab, you’re the one who’s abandoning God and you’re following the Baals.
Oh, nothing happens to Obadiah. He’s out of there. Nothing bad happened to him at all. And all of this fear was for nothing. But to his credit, when God says this is what I say through my prophet, Obadiah believed it.
And if you and I are troubled by that kind of deep down fear that maybe God is going to do things that are kind of bad for us, maybe He won’t stand by me in my real hour of need, you know what we need? We need the reassurance of the Word of God. We need the reassurance of the Word of God.
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
And it is on declarations like that, my friends, that we can build a life that is confident of God’s compassion and love for us. Isn’t that one of the reasons we’re here every week? Isn’t it true that every week we are reminding ourselves of the matchless love of God for each and every one of us?
Herein is love, not that we loved Him but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation, the satisfaction for our sins.
And if you got nothing out of these meetings every week except a reminder that God loved you with a generous and sacrificial love, you would have gotten the most valuable thing you will get all week long.
We need the reassurance of the Word of God that God is on our side, that God is seeking the best for us in every circumstance of life.
We often sing the very beautiful hymn, The Love of God. And I think I have said at various times there is a story that the third stanza of that hymn came from an insane asylum. I can’t verify that story but if that’s true, the man who scribbled those words on the inside of an insane asylum had more sanity than a lot of people who have never seen the inside of it.
Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made, were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade, to write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry, nor could the scroll contain the whole though stretched from sky to sky. Oh love of God, how rich and pure! How measureless and strong! It shall forevermore endure, the saints’ and angels’ song.