
The purpose of this exhibition was to convince King Ahab and Queen Jezebel that they needed to acknowledge the one true God and repent. Well, that didn’t happen. Instead, the queen vowed to kill Elijah. I guess she wasn’t too pleased with the sacrificial results.
Elijah then goes and hides, utterly depressed. After Elijah is ministered to by an angel, God tells him to stand on a mountain and see the glory of the Lord. Elijah witnesses a destructive wind, an earthquake, and a fire, but God was not in any of those three. After the fire, Elijah hears “a still small voice,” and that is how God came to him (I Kings 19:12).
There is much we can take away from Elijah’s experience. First, God makes Himself known to everyone in a powerful way. The Baal prophets witnessed God’s power just as Elijah did. Likewise, we are reminded in Romans 1:20 that no one has an excuse for not believing in God “For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities––his eternal power and divine nature––have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.”
Likewise, He also comes to all of us through a still small voice.
Even before a person comes to know Christ as Lord and Savior, God is speaking to him through his conscience. Romans 2:15 speaks of those Gentiles who did not have Jewish law but followed a similar moral code and says that “They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.” Though the Gentiles didn’t know the one true God yet, they did know what was right and what was wrong.
We don’t like our conscience “accusing” us. That makes us uncomfortable and indicates that what we are doing is not right. So what do we do? Do we listen and obey? Sometimes, but other times we go looking for those who will affirm and validate what we want to do. 2 Timothy 4:3 says “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but having itching ears, they shall heap to themselves teachers in accordance with their own lusts.”
Not only is seeking out approval for immoral behavior a personal danger, but it is also a cultural danger as well. For when enough people desire to have their “itching ears” scratched and others listen and agree, then the world’s foundation shifts, its plumb line changes, and there is a further departure from God’s truth.