God’s Dealing with Apostasy

The Lord chose Israel as his peculiar people, and designed that they should be the depositaries of his law. They were to be a distinct and holy nation, separate from the heathen nations around them. They were to preserve the knowledge of the true God, and through them, light from Heaven was to shed its healing beams to all the world. They were to be a living illustration of the superiority of that religion which acknowledges God as the supreme ruler of the universe.

But in the days of Ahab, one of Israel’s wicked kings, the people wandered far from God. The heathen Jezebel, whom Ahab married, introduced the worship of false gods,—Baal and the Zidonian goddess Ashtoreth. Through her influence the people were taught that these idol gods were deities, ruling the elements of earth, fire, and water by their mystic power. They forgot that the hills and valleys, the streams and fountains, were in the hand of the living God; that he controlled the sun, the clouds of heaven, and all the powers of nature. They forgot that in the wilderness, in the day of Israel’s need, he had listened to the prayers of Moses, and that in obedience to his word living waters gushed from the smitten rock.

The Lord sent his prophet with words of warning and rebuke. He came to the king, through whose influence the people had been led into idolatry, and asserted Jehovah’s right to be the only God in Israel. Repeated warnings were given only to be disregarded. The people were captivated by the gorgeous display, and the fascinating rites of idol worship; and they followed the example of their king, and gave themselves up to a degrading and sensual worship, and its intoxicating pleasures. Led by the king and his court, they rejected the moral government of Jehovah, and were unfaithful to their trust as the depositaries of divine truth. The clear light shone upon them; but they preferred to follow their own ways rather than God’s ways. And the worship of God, and the good and wholesome laws he had given them, were disregarded.

At length the time came when God could bear with them no longer, and he sent his prophet with a message of denunciation. Elijah came in before the king unannounced, and, lifting his hand toward heaven, solemnly declared: «As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.» Having delivered his terrible message, he departed as suddenly as he came, and was gone, before the astonished king could frame a reply.

The word of the Lord went into immediate effect. Apostate Israel should test the power of the gods to whom they had rendered homage. They had forsaken him who brought them up out of Egypt, and had forgotten the wonderful displays of his power at the Red Sea and in the wilderness; and he withdrew his gracious blessings, which they had taken as a matter of course, without gratitude, without even acknowledging them as his gifts. He cut off the dew and rain of heaven, and what a scene of desolation the parched and barren earth became! Now the people could see that he who created nature could control her laws, and could make them the instruments of blessing or destruction.

The priests of Baal have worshiped nature, and have exalted the created above the Creator. All the blessings they enjoy have been ascribed to nature and to their gods. Now they have an opportunity to prove the power of their gods, and of showing that Elijah’s words are false. They have altars and priests, and expensive sacrifices are provided to be offered to their idol gods. If nature, governed by her infallible laws, continues her course in defiance of Jehovah’s threatenings, then let nature be exalted above the God of nature. If Baal can bring showers of rain; if he can clothe the fields with verdure, and cause vegetation to flourish; if he can bring forth the harvest in its season, and thus provide food for man and beast, then let the gods of wood and stone be worshiped. Who shall fear the God of Elijah, or tremble at the words of the prophet?

The famine came with all its horrors; but the people did not learn the lesson God would teach them. They did not humble their proud hearts, but began to search for some other cause for their sufferings than the true one. They finally decided that Elijah was the originator of all their misery. He had told them that they were breaking the law of God; that all, both teachers and people, were given to idolatry; and he had announced that the Lord would bear with them no longer. If they could only put Elijah out of the way, their troubles would be at an end. The king searched for him through all the land, and there was no nation or kingdom whither he did not send messengers to seek for the man whom he feared and hated.

But at last the word of the Lord came to Elijah, «Go, show thyself unto Ahab; and I will send rain upon the earth.» The king and the prophet meet; and the king haughtily demands, «Art thou he that troubleth Israel?» The prophet casts back the imputation. «I have not troubled Israel,» he replies; «but thou and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim.»

It was disregard of the law of God on the part of Ahab and his people that had brought all their calamities upon them; and Elijah hesitated not to declare the whole truth to the guilty king. The world is full of flatterers and dissemblers, both in palaces and in the ordinary walks of life; but how few there are who have the courage that Elijah manifested,—how few who will stand in defense of the broken law of God in opposition to the great men of earth.

The character of Baal, and that of the true God, were fully revealed. In the long famine the Lord had shown himself mightier than the gods of the heathen; and then came the great test on Carmel, when fire fell from heaven, and consumed the sacrifice of Elijah. The people were now ready to admit that the God of Elijah was above every god, and with one accord they exclaimed, «The Lord, he is the God! the Lord, he is the God!» But they must be protected from those who had taught them idolatry. That they might no longer allure souls to ruin, Elijah was directed to destroy the four hundred and fifty false teachers who had led the people to transgress. When Israel had acknowledged allegiance to the God of Heaven, and the priests of Baal were slain, the windows of heaven were opened, and the blessed showers were permitted to fall on the seared and blackened earth.

The character of God has not changed. He is still the mighty God of Israel. «Behold the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance; behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing. And Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering. All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity.» And he is just as jealous for his law now as he was in the days of Ahab and Elijah.

And how that law is disregarded at the present day! It is made void by many, even among professed Christians. This is a truth-hating, Bible-neglecting, froward generation. By many it is considered as evidence of ability and learning to sneer at the word of God; and in many cases those who are simple enough to take that word just as it reads, and believe it, are subjects of ridicule. But the Lord will not suffer his law to be broken with impunity. There is a time coming «when the lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.» Then they will learn the important lesson that the «fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;» they will realize that «a good understanding have all they that do his commandments.»