Dear readers, Through this book I wish to share with you the Word of 1 Kings, chapters 18 through 22. These words begin with the event at Mount Carmel in which the hearts of the people of Israel, who had been faltering between God and Baal, turned back to God; they go on to record the course by which Elijah, losing heart before Jezebel’s threat, was raised up again by God’s still, small Word; the disobedience of Ahab, who followed his own will even after receiving victory from God twice; and the greed that seized Naboth’s vineyard, and the death of Ahab, who rejected the Word Micaiah delivered. In all these events is contained the important truth that only the gospel of the water and the Spirit is the true Word of salvation that brings sinners to life, and that we must not use the gospel and the souls God has entrusted to us for our own private desires.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

1 Kings chapter 18 records the process in which, while the long drought continued, Elijah met Ahab, confronted the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel and revealed who the true God is, and then a heavy rain fell again. The heart of this chapter lies in the people of Israel abandoning the state in which they had been faltering between God and Baal, and turning their hearts back to the living God.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

1 Kings chapter 18 is the chapter in which God sets Elijah before Ahab again and turns Israel back to the true God. The long famine was the result of the sin of Ahab and Israel, who had forsaken the commandments of the LORD and followed Baal. Baal was believed to give rain and abundance, but God, by shutting up the rain, revealed that this idol was an empty thing without any power. And now He said, “I will send rain on the earth” (1 Kings 18:1), opening the time of restoration.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

When Israel had set up countless idols before God and sinned greatly, God raised up Elijah as His servant. He also gave a heart that feared God to Obadiah, who was serving under Ahab as the governor of his palace. When Jezebel seized and killed the prophets of God, Obadiah hid one hundred prophets, fifty to a cave, and kept them alive by feeding them with bread and water. In this way Elijah and Obadiah lived through that dark age.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

A great famine came upon the nation of Israel. When the prophet Elijah prayed to the LORD that it would not rain, no rain fell for three years and six months. Because of this, the whole land of Israel suffered from the drought; the crops withered, and the people groaned in famine. Even drinking water was very hard to find, and the whole nation was gripped by the worry that it might perish through this famine.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

The passage we have read today is, as we know well, the Word about Elijah fighting against the eight hundred and fifty priests of a Gentile religion and the god they believed in. Elijah was the prophet who turned the hearts of the people of Israel back to God. But what we must know is this: it was not that Elijah was great, but that God held on to Elijah and, by His almighty power, caused the hearts of the people of Israel to return to God.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

1 Kings chapter 19 records the process in which Elijah, who had won a great victory on Mount Carmel, fled in fear before Jezebel’s threat and fell into deep discouragement, but God fed him and gave him rest, and then entrusted him with his mission again on Mount Horeb. When Elijah thought he alone was left, God had reserved seven thousand who had not yielded to Baal, and He established Elisha as his successor so that the work of God would continue.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35

1 Kings chapter 19 is the chapter in which, after the great victory on Mount Carmel, Elijah falls into deep discouragement and fear. God had answered by fire on Mount Carmel, the people of Israel had confessed that the LORD is God, and after the long famine a heavy rain had also fallen. But the house of Ahab and Jezebel did not truly turn around. Instead, Jezebel threatened to kill Elijah. When false faith collapses before the truth, it can oppose all the more stubbornly rather than repent.

https://www.bjnewlife.org/
https://youtube.com/@TheNewLifeMission
https://www.facebook.com/shin.john.35