Arise and Abide Curtis Perea

Reading 1Kings 19:9-18. The Lords question, “What are you doing here?”, reminds Sally of Jesus asking the people who came to Him what they wanted Him to do for them. God gives people opportunities to share their hearts with Him.  God displays His power to Elijah but speaks to Elijah through a gentle whisper, gives him encouragement and renews his mission. The Lord’s question, “What are you doing here?”, reminds Curits of when God asked Adam and Eve, “Where are you?”. Elijah was in a place of discouragement because he was living in fear having taken his eyes off God. Elijah was afraid of people, and God reminded Elijah who really has the power. Elijah’s reply was all about himself. People tend to forget that God is at work. He is working is ways we know nothing about and in ways we can’t see. Elijah believed a lie we are all susceptible to: You are all alone and it is all up to you. That is a lie. God is enough. Go and make disciples, go and train your replacement, go and duplicate what you have been given. We are all replaceable, in the best possible way. We grow and we move onward. God is not just telling Elijah to go and pour into anther person, God is giving him a partner, and a helper to continue the mission with. When we're in a place of discouragement. It's hard to see the Lord because all we can see are the things that are discouraging to us. God listens, the way God hears us, understands the heart we're coming from, and encourages us in the way that we need to bring our eyes back to the truth that God is at work. God is doing things that we aren't paying attention to. He's at work in ways that we don't see, even when our eyes are on God. 

Reading Psalms 89. The Psalmist recognizes the faithfulness of God through hard discipline. Speaking about the anointed king, it says “you have renounced your covenant with him and thrown his crown in the dust.” So there's definitely this shift at the end of the Psalm where the psalmist is really feeling that separation from God and the lack of God's favor in the current circumstance. Deuteronomy 8:5-6 reads, “Think about it, just as a parent disciplines a child, the Lord your God disciplines you for your own good. So, obey the commands of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and fearing Him.” Job 5:17-18, read. “But consider the joy of those corrected by God, do not despise the discipline of the Almighty when you sin for when He wounds, He also bandages, He strikes, but His hands also heal.” God sent Jesus because we desperately needed a savior because we mess up all the time. When we are experiencing God's discipline, how do we respond? The books of Kings and the story centers around this truth that the one who deserves to sit on the throne is God. Think about discipline as this opportunity for refinement and self-awareness. Take that opportunity to listen and be self-aware of what God may be trying to say and teach. We need a savior. God gave us a savior. We need discipline. God gave us His Holy Spirit to correct us and convict us every moment of the day. 2 Samuel 7:14 “I will be his father and he will be my son. If he sins, I will correct and discipline him with the rod like any father would do.”

Reading 1 Kings 18:41-19:9. In 1 Kings 18:16-40, we read about a dramatic showdown between Elijah and the prophets of Baal. This portion of scripture (verse 41) starts with Elijah telling Ahab to go get something to eat and drink for I hear a mighty rainstorm is coming and Ahab immediately goes. It’s almost as though Ahab is displaying some faith, but it’s disappointing because Ahab sides with Jezebel. Elijah knew how and when to offer a sacrifice pleasing to God because Elijah spent time with the Lord and in the Torah. All the Prophets of Baal are killed just like the prophets of the Lord were executed. Now the story is full circle as Elijah is once again running and hiding because Jezebel wants him dead.
The rain is coming, but it doesn’t happen right away. There’s this time of prayer, consistency of prayer. Seven times he prayed and sent his assistant to look for the clouds. It's frustrating when you give everything you have and then you look and even when God shows up, it looks like it hasn't made a difference because people's hearts are so hard. Despite how great of a prophet and how much confidence Elijah had in God and how fervently he prayed, he still found himself discouraged in his circumstances. And what I love about this story is he's not rebuked because of it. He's comforted. God shows up and feeds him, gives him strength. Why does God call us into all these things that are beyond us? So that we will draw close to Him. So that we will learn to rely on God. So that we will learn that God is good, that we will learn, we can trust God to carry us through all these things. We have to remind ourselves that God is the common denominator in every victory of our life. God is the one who strengthens us to go through it. But we must pick up our feet and go. God gives us strength because He has a journey ahead of us.

Reading Psalms 88. The last line in the Psalm, “darkness is my closest friend”, reminds me of that old song, Sound of Silence. The psalmist is experiencing the sound of silence. He's not hearing from the Lord. Quite a few psalms in this book express times like this when they feel desperate. It still starts with remembering who God is and where its salvation comes from. When we're in this heart place, cry out to God and share that with God. The Psalmist’s questions show the need for Jesus as Jesus raises us from the darkness. I see Jesus coming as an answer to this call to be saved. The Psalmist recognized that without God's presence, he was as good as dead. how this Psalmist felt lines up a lot with what Jesus went through and felt for us. He went through the same pain this time of isolation from God and literal death so that we could live. God's light is so freeing and life giving. We have to surrender the things that we might be holding on to that are keeping us in darkness or those things we don't want to be exposed to the light. Jesus is challenging people to step into His life that gives life and freedom.

Reading 1 Kings 18:16-40. We have this picture of the people of Israel who are wavering, hobbling back and forth between: Is it the Lord that is God, or is it Baal? We also have this picture of a God who hears and a God who answers, versus these idols who obviously can't do anything because they're manmade. We see that the heart of God in this contest is to bring the people back to Himself.  They're wobbling, they're back and forth and He is calling them back into that relationship because that's the heart of God. If you only look at the miracle you miss the heart of God behind the miracle, God is a God of love who is wooing His people back to Himself. God responds with such quickness because of his great love for these people who have been faltering. There are two opinions, and we know that Jezebel has led a lot of this other opinion. Jezebel saying, “is the Lord really God, my God is Baal.” I think people make idols. An easier way for us to think about it sometimes is thinking about how we put ourselves or somebody else on the throne that belongs to God, that we follow somebody else or follow our own selfish plan for our life. God is a God who answers. and God is a God who hears us. He sees us, He's moving, He's working. God is answering his people when He has their attention and they're listening. I think we know that God always sees and hears. God is always moving and working, and He has a plan and He's answering. But sometimes it requires us to listen and give him our attention.

Reading Psalms 87. The imagery of foreign and oppressive nations being counted as citizens of God’s Holy city is prophetic. Reminiscent of the account in Acts 10 Peter’s vision and God telling him not to call unclean what God has made clean. Being told to kill and eat was to prepare his mind to go to the gentiles and participate in what God was doing. the place where God's name would be known where everybody would come to worship. It was the place that the Lord picked for them to come and worship Him. He loves Jerusalem. It's this place dear to His heart that he establishes the place where his name would be known. It shows God's heart how He wanted everyone to know Him. Acts 11:15-18. “Who am I to get in God's way?” To receive something, I need to have my hands available to receive it. God’s Holy Spirit is not a physical object that we're receiving. However, to receive the Holy Spirit, we must let go of our way, whatever selfish temperament we might be in. Being citizens of Jerusalem, it's our life source, our source of joy. We're left with this promise. And this image of the joy that comes from God that He gives to all his citizens of Jerusalem.