Main Idea: Courage to keep your integrity comes from a life that refuses to conform.

On this Father’s Day morning we begin a new sermon series called "The Days of Elijah." In this series we are going to examine the life and times of the prophet Elijah, whose stories are found in the Old Testament books of I & II Kings. Elijah was a "high impact" person in a critical time in the history of Israel. He was as well a significant person referenced in the New Testament because John the Baptist’s ministry was very much like Elijah’s. He was also someone who, along with Moses, miraculously appeared to Jesus on a mountain to encourage him just before Jesus went to the cross. There are some great stories about this mighty prophet of God that are bridges into our world today. Over the next seven weeks we’re going to travel back to the days of Elijah and discover places where our lives today can connect with his life then.

The first place of connection I want us to explore is the courage that Elijah had to keep his integrity when everyone else seemed to have lost theirs. Integrity is often defined as the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles, which is true. The root form of the word comes from French and Latin words that mean intact, integrate, integral or entirety. Dr. Henry Cloud says the concept of integrity means the "whole thing is working well, undivided, integrated, intact and uncorrupted." (Integrity, p. 31). It means that when you talk about integrity you are talking about the whole person, a person where everything fits and because everything fits they are able to be effective in life.

A person with that kind of character doesn’t come along every day. A few hundred years before Elijah ever lived David wrote in Psalm 12:1, "Help, Lord, for the godly man ceases to be, For the faithful disappear from among the sons of men." That was true for David, it was true for Elijah, and it is true today. One corporate investor said that they would give millions only to a person who did not have a gaping hole in one side of the boat. Far too many people give the appearance of looking good but when you look on the other side of their character, they have places where their integrity has been compromised and their life is ready to sink.

Keeping our integrity isn’t easy for us and it wasn’t easy for Elijah. It isn’t easy for us because we are constantly pressured to conform to the lifestyle and values of those who are opposed to our faith as believers and by those whose walk with Christ is anything but faithful. Whenever you chose as a follower of Christ that you will keep your integrity intact that is the place you can be assured that you will be attacked. Elijah was a man who courageously kept his integrity because he refused the pressure to conform.

One thing you discover about keeping our integrity is that the courage to keep our integrity is determined in our circumstances (I Kings 16:29-34). Every courageous stand for integrity is shaped by the reality of the demands of our daily life. Elijah’s boldness for God was molded during the most decadent days of Israel‘s history. In order for us to understand Elijah’s impact we must understand the circumstances of his life. In 926 B.C. the kingdom that David and his son Solomon had established had been divided by a brutal civil war. The two tribes of Judah and Benjamin had set up their kingdom in the south and made Jerusalem their capital. The remaining ten tribes had called themselves Israel and established their kingdom in the north and over time made a new capital called Samaria. This new kingdom began in rebellion and stayed in rebellion against God throughout most of its history.

The first king of the new kingdom was Jeroboam. As soon as he became king he started his own religion using two bulls made out of gold as the focus of his devotion and idolatry. It gave the appearance of being religious but it wasn’t. In fact the bull was a symbol of lust and power found in all the other religions that surrounded Israel. Jeroboam’s "spirituality" and everyone that followed it was nothing but a sell out to compromise. Following Jeroboam was his son Nadab, who was murdered by Basha, who was then murdered by the descendents of Jeroboam. Basha’s son Elah succeeded him but he was murdered while he was intoxicated by Zimri. Zimri ruled for about seven days until the people arose and appointed their own king whose name was Omri. This distressed Zimri so much that he committed suicide. Omri had a son whose name was Ahab. When Omri died Ahab became king and would rule over Israel for twenty-one years.

The kind of king that Ahab was is what makes Elijah’s courage that much stronger. I Kings 16:30 and 33 records that while every other king before Ahab was bad, he was the worst! Notice what it says in verse 30: " But Ahab did what was evil in the Lord's sight, even more than any of the kings before him." and then in verse 33: "He did more to arouse the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, than any of the other kings of Israel before him." What did he do that was so horrible? The first thing that is mentioned is his compromising marriage to a woman named Jezebel who was from Phoenicia (v.31). Her name and her father’s name were tied to the pagan god of fertility and agriculture named Baal. This marriage was trouble from the beginning because her name meant, "Where’s the prince?" implying that she was a forceful, assertive and intolerant woman.

Ahab allowed his wife’s influence to cause him to begin worshipping Baal (v. 31) and eventually building a temple and an altar to Baal in his capital Samaria (v. 32). Worship of Baal involved imitative magic, the performance of rituals, including sacred prostitution, which were understood to bring vitality to Baal in his struggle with other pagan gods. The final blow of the nation’s rebellion was his setting up an image of the earth-mother goddess named Asherah. Asherah's worship involved sexual excesses intended to stimulate rain and quicken the ability of animals and people to reproduce. It doesn’t leave much to the imagination to realize that these two directions of spiritual focus were wholly immoral and perverted.

What impresses you is that Ahab was the one who took the initiative or leadership in these actions. It wasn’t that the people were pressuring him but that he was leading the way for the people to follow him further into a descent into decadence. The evidence for this is found in verse 34, which records the story of the man who rebuilt the city of Jericho at the cost of the lives of his two sons. Reading that verse leaves you with the impression that they died somehow accidentally. What the text doesn’t tell us but archeology does is that the way his sons died was through child sacrifice! Archeologists have found ruins of buildings with the remains of child sacrifice in the foundations. Ahab’s influence was so corrupt that it filtered down to the people and enticed them to participate in horrible behavior themselves.

What you see here is that this was the kind of climate that a man like Elijah found himself. He couldn’t turn the clock back to the times of David when there was at least a heartfelt attempt to serve God. No, he was faced with the choice to live out his days in a time of corruption unparalleled anytime before. The courage that Elijah had to keep his integrity was determined in the circumstances of his days.

Just like Elijah, we cannot escape our days or circumstances. As a parent, you wish that your children were not pressured by their peers or their culture to conform to the lowest levels of immorality. As a student, you wish that the temptations to compromise your beliefs were not always so relentless. As a person in the market place you would give anything to work without your character and ethics being challenged daily. Sure, you could try to escape any of those situations but integrity isn’t formed in a vacuum. It is formed in the white hot furnace of pressure after pressure that asks you, "Will you be courageous or will your confirm?" The courage to keep our integrity is shaped and determined in our circumstances.

Another thing that Elijah’s story tells us is that the courage to keep our integrity is defined by our character (I Kings 17:1). I Kings 17:1 announces Elijah’s arrival in one simple, short sentence, "Now Elijah, who was from Tishbe in Gilead, told King Ahab…." Seemingly out of nowhere comes a prophet of God who is brave enough and bold enough to confront the key figure in the depravity that faced the nation of Israel.

What was it that gave Elijah the courage to virtually go it alone? The answer is that it was the way that God had shaped his character. Our character is not something we are born with naturally. Our character is something that is shaped over time as we face the demands on our beliefs and values in the real world. Henry Cloud says that character equals the ability to meet the demands of reality. (Integrity, p. 24). Think about it this way: When an airplane manufacturer builds a new plane he considers the type of metal used in the plane based on what that plane will do. The same metal used on a jet fighter is not going to be the same that is used on a cargo plane. Why? Because the demands on one plane are different than the other. So the manufacturer designs the metal’s "character" to meet the demands that are placed on it. In the same way, God defines or designs our character based on the demands we will have placed on us.

This is what God did in Elijah. For instance, Elijah’s name was a combination of two Hebrew names for God: Elohim and Jehovah. His name was shortened to El and Jah and then combined. In the middle was the small letter "i," which in Hebrew refers to "my" or "mine." You put the name together and you get "My God is Jehovah" or "the Lord is my God." It may have seemed to everyone else that the pagan god Baal was in control but when Elijah stepped onto the stage of history he declared just by his name that as far as he was concerned, "My God is Jehovah!"

Another thing that shaped Elijah’s character was the land or area of the country he came from: Tishbe in Gilead. Honestly, a placed called "Tishbe" cannot be found on any ancient map or known location. What we do know is that the word is similar to a word for "settle," implying that Elijah came from a land that was wild, forested and largely unsettled. That is a perfect description of Gilead, which was on the eastern side of the Jordan River. It was a place known for being rugged, barren and uncivilized. It was a hot, barren, desolate place that shaped the people who lived there to be just as rugged and determined to survive. It may have been that Elijah’s living conditions had caused his appearance to reflect that—"course, crude, rough and rugged" (Swindell, p. 12). Elijah was so used to the harsh realities of his lifestyle that the luxuries of the king held no attraction for him.

Elijah’s name, his location, no doubt formed his character. There is one more thing, though, and that was his message that he carried from God. Without permission or protocol, Elijah steps into the throne room of Ahab and announces, "As surely as the Lord, the God of Israel, lives—the God whom I worship and serve—there will be no dew or rain during the next few years unless I give the word!" (I Kings 17:1) Elijah just suddenly appears and pronounces the equivalent of divine judgment on the land. The message was clear, concise and needed no interpretation. No one could mistake what he was saying, why he was saying it or who sent him with the message.

Each one of these factors shaped Elijah’s character. Whatever demands that were placed on him, he met those demands and succeeded. Elijah’s integrity was defined by his character and so will ours. If our character has been formed by the demands that we have had placed on us then our integrity is going to be strong and able to survive and succeed. If, instead, we have to run from our demands or shrink from our circumstances, then that will show in our character! Our integrity is defined by the character that we have allowed God to shape in us.

There’s one more thing I want us to discover here and it is this: the courage to keep our integrity is developed by our commitment (I Kings 17:1b). Elijah’s statement about the rain being withheld was evidence of his commitment to God and God alone. As we will see in the coming weeks, it was not just a drought on the land controlled by Ahab but on all the land. It would affect not just those needing punishing but on innocent people as well, even on Elijah himself. What you see is that even though it was going to cost Elijah personally, he was committed to keep the integrity of his commitment before God.

I realize that we use the word "commitment" often in Christian speaking or teaching. Yet regardless of how often we use it or talk about it, it is still so very rare. Regardless of how rare it is, God never tires of calling us to live out our commitment before him. The Bible says, "The eyes of the Lord search the whole earth in order to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him." (2 Chron. 16:9) One place that he looks for commitment is our commitment to obey him in difficult times. It is when times are hard and it appears that everyone else has abandoned what he or she believes that our commitment really shines. Elijah was committed to obey God in unbelievably hard times. That same opportunity is ours.

Another place God looks for commitment is the commitment to surrender to his plan even when we don’t understand. I am sure Elijah wondered many times why he would be chosen to be God’s voice in such hard days but he was. You may think that you would be the last person God ever would want to use, but he does. What he may be asking you to do may seem totally incomprehensible to you. Yet what he wants is your surrender, not your excuses. It will be your commitment that might be the only clear thing in front of you but yet you still surrender.

There’s one more place where our integrity is developed and that is the commitment to follow God’s leading when it seems we are alone. As we have said, Elijah spent most of his life before this time and after this time alone. Yet he was committed to following God’s leading in his life. While it may have seemed to him at times he was alone, he always stood before God. Can we do that? Can we say that even though no one else appears to join me as I follow God leading, I will still follow? That’s the place where our commitment is tested the most. It may seem that the voice you hear is nothing more than the echo of your own but if we listen we hear his voice giving us courage and strength. Through our obedience our integrity is developed by a continual commitment of saying, "yes" to the leading of God.

Earlier in the month of May a British climber named David Sharp had attempted to climb Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world. Climbing Everest has become somewhat routine since Sir Edmund Hillary did it in 1953. Sometime after David Sharp had reached the summit of Everest he began to lose oxygen and collapsed and died along the path leading from the summit. What makes David Sharp’s death so tragic is that approximately forty climbers passed him by, ignoring his need for help. Why did they not stop? Some felt Sharp was beyond saving but many chose to pass him by because to share their oxygen would have compromised their ability to achieve their personal goal of getting to the literal "top of the world."

Two weeks later on May 26 another climber named Lincoln Hall collapsed near the summit of Everest. It appeared to other climbers that he had died so they left him. About that time an American climber named Dan Mazur found Hall and had to make a choice: sacrifice his own oxygen, maybe his life and his goal of reaching the top of Everest and help Hall or go on and ignore a dying man. Mazur and his team chose to help. Because he helped Lincoln Hall is alive today. Mazur said, "We just all felt like we knew that’s what we had to do…How could you leave a person like that? The summit is still there and we can go back. Lincoln only has one life." (www.seattletimes.com, Tuesday, May 30, 2006, by Jack Broom)

Forty people passed by a dying man and he lost his life. They may have gone back and boasted of their success but what they lost on Everest can never be returned because they lost their integrity. Dan Mazur and his group may have missed the chance of a lifetime but what they will always keep is their integrity. You see courage to keep your integrity comes from a life that refuses the pressure to conform. As we recall the days of Elijah they remind us that the courage to keep our integrity is determined in our circumstances, defined by our character and developed by our commitment. The demands of your reality ask you, "What you are willing to pay to keep your integrity?" because once you have lost your integrity you rarely ever get it back.

Sunday, June 18, 2006

Dr. Bruce Tippit, Pastor

First Baptist Church

Jonesboro, Arkansas

btippit@fbcjonesboro.org