Standing At Practice

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Turn your Bibles to 1 Kings chapter 17.

1 Kings 17 · chapter mention

There's a picture that you'll be seeing come up, and I wondered, as you're turning to 1 Kings 17, if anyone recognizes the photo.

I think I heard somebody say it.

I did not expect that.

1983, Mr.

Basketball in Indiana.

For some of you saying still nothing.

I hearing some rumbles in the back.

Played in the 1984 Summer Olympics.

Some of y'all are like, what?

Hard to believe.

I hear it.

I hear it.

Fourth, that's, see, Indiana natives.

That's what it is.

I knew.

Fourth highest scorer in the 1984 Olympics.

Most of us, most, would say, I don't recognize this guy.

Fourth under names like Chris Mullins, Patrick Ewing, and Michael Jordan.

He was fourth under those guys.

And Steve offered, what you see of him, his records, all those are pretty incredible things, but what I have been told and remember most is a quote that he gave about the greatest basketball player that ever lived.

The quote about Michael Jordan.

He described Michael Jordan and those Olympics, and he said, the difference in that basketball player than other Olympic players, the gap.

He said the gap was tremendous.

He said, and the difference that I felt like was this.

And going through all of that with Michael Jordan, Michael was always the first on the practice floor, and he was always the last to leave.

So today I want to talk to you about standing at practice.

Standing at practice.

Would you pray with me?

Father, Lord, we're here seeking you.

God, in 24, we want the glory of God, the voice of God, and the touch of God at CCW.

And so, God, we pray, Lord, that you would do that.

Draw people to yourself.

God, hide us under your blood.

We ask for your presence, your power, your blood, Lord.

And ask that, God, we we don't need to just be here.

God, we need to meet with you.

And so, God, I pray that you take us to that place in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Look at verses 1 through 3 in 1 Kings 17.

It is the place of development.

It says, And Elijah the Tishbite of the inhabitants of Gilead said to Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel is before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years except at my word.

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, Get away from here, and turn eastward and hide by the brook Cherith, which flows into Jordan.

As we open up, we see letter A, Elijah was an unknown person.

It starts the story with one simple word, and there is a huge story from that word.

If you see a chapter that starts with the word and, it's telling you this is in continuation of something.

In one word alone, you have to go back to chapter 16 and try to understand what is the and of Elijah showing up.

At the end of chapter 16, there's the rapid spread of idolatry.

Look at chapter 16, verse 30, and we'll read verse 33 just to kind of hit a, I'll say a low light, not a highlight.

Chapter 16, verse 30.

Now Ahab, the son of Omri, did evil in the sight of the Lord.

Listen to this, more than all who were before him.

And they were pretty evil bunch of people.

Verse 33, it continues, and Ahab made a wooden image.

Ahab, listen to this, did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him.

That's a big statement.

So pretty much it's setting that and is saying, this is like the most evil time in the history of the world up to date.

He did more evil than any king before him, at least through the period of the kings.

And so Ahab was an evil man.

Well, to help, Ahab married a woman.

And her name was Jezebel.

Interesting, if you hear anybody use the name Jezebel, usually it's a descriptive adjective behind it is that evil Jezebel.

How would you like that?

Look at Revelation.

I just want you to see, just as we unpack a little as we start, Revelation 2.20.

And it talks about this spirit of Jezebel in the church.

Nevertheless, I have a few things against you because you allow that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, to teach and seduce my servants to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols and give her time to repent of sexual immorality.

And she did not repent.

So the key attributes in Revelation talk about the church with the spirit of Jezebel.

Here's the key attributes to Jezebel: sexual immorality, idolatry, and vengeance.

This is not a good profile for her Tinder page.

Nonetheless, Ahab marries her, and together they incite the anger of a holy God.

Alright, that was and.

Y'all with me?

1 Kings 17, that was and.

The next word in a story, the next word is Elijah.

And we need to break that down for the future of this study, but Elijah, the word Elijah means Yahweh is my God.

God is my God.

What a name.

What a great name.

And I would say Elijah, for me, falls in the category of one of the greatest men that walk the face of the earth.

Elijah was a prophet.

And Leonard Ravenhill said that prophets are God's men for times of crisis.

They're God's miracle men for times of crisis, emergency men.

Well, he shows up, and Elijah, out of obscurity, out of nowhere, right?

It says Elijah the Tishbite, if you to give you a little bit of background of who, where did this guy come from?

Because he just shows up and he has a pretty weighty message for someone who just shows up.

Elijah the Tishbite of Gilead.

Well, what's Gilead?

Gilead is wilderness country.

Gilead was a place full of hills and mountains.

Imagine, church.

A prophet, God's man for the hour, coming from the mountain.

Isn't that interesting?

Elijah from Tishbi is probably a woodsman, low maintenance, maybe a herdsman, but we know this.

He was a man unencumbered by the need for civil people to look on him as somebody.

He wasn't hampered by the ostentatiousness of the system.

That wasn't Elijah.

So, therefore, Elijah, without all of that dragging him back and without all that care of the world and who to impress, Elijah was a great mouthpiece for God.

The ideal mouthpiece.

You would say, what in the world would give this underdressed, underclassed, uncivilized, dirty backwoodsman to come in here and have time with the king?

What would give him the idea that this is okay?

I know this.

Elijah wasn't concerned about Ahab because he was concerned about Yahweh.

He wasn't concerned about offending Ahab.

And I've heard this statement been made.

If you'll kneel before God, you'll never have to kneel before men.

Elijah didn't feel that weight.

Basically, a nobody from nowhere pronounced quite a bold statement to the well-known king.

And here's the thing about the story: the principal actors of the story, all of the background, were behaving as if Jehovah wasn't going to show back up on the scene.

Never again would Jehovah assert his power.

Ahab thought it, Jezebel thought it.

The 450 prophets of Baal that we'll get to thought it.

And maybe even the 700 Israelites that are hiding thought it.

And yet, this would prove to be quite a mistake because God can take a nobody with his mighty hand and wrench the plans of evil and turn it for his glory.

You see, God doesn't need somebody, church.

He needs an empty vessel, a clean vessel.

That's what God needs.

And so Elijah shows up on the scene and he proclaims to King Ahab a pretty bold statement.

Did you see it there?

He said to King Ahab, there the word of the Lord came to him and said to him, There will be no rain these years, except at my word.

He says, There's not going to be rain unless I say so, King.

That is a bold statement from some guy out of the backwoods.

And that's a problem for Ahab because Ahab worshipped Baal, and Baal is the God of land fertility, sun and moon.

And so when he says to Ahab, there's not going to be any rain, you got to understand the boldness of this proclamation.

But I want to tell you today, church, if I do God's work, God's way, I can speak with bold authority to the strongest man walking the planet.

I want you to look over at Psalms 27.

Psalms 27, 1 through 3.

Says this the Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?

When the wicked came against me to eat up my flesh, my enemies and foes, they stumbled and fell.

Though an army may encamp against me, my heart shall not fear.

Though war may rise against me, and this I will be confident, one thing I have desired of the Lord, that I will seek and that I may dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

See, David said, There's not an army that's going to come against me.

There's not a government that's going to come against me.

If I live for God, I can live boldly.

And Elijah was able to do that.

Elijah's orders didn't come from earth, they came from God.

See, we'll see later that Elijah in fact does come against an army, the 450 prophets of Baal.

And he stood his ground and he was able to do so.

Listen to me, church, not because he was a known person, because he had a known God.

He had a confidence in his God.

It's interesting how Elijah just shows up on the scene.

I watched Weston the other week.

Basketball has started, CYC, and why it's been in uh CHS.

And so we've been watching a lot of basketball.

Anyway, there was two minutes left in the game.

The game was over.

And I watched Weston look up at his coach with yearning in his heart.

232.

He had already played a lot.

He looked at his coach, he said, subcoach, sub, subcoach.

And his coach, it broke my heart over there on the other side.

He said, nope.

Game's over.

But he was so wanting to get in.

I watched Wyatt the other day.

The game was ending.

And there was about a minute and a half left.

And Wyatt said, Coach, I think he said this.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think he said, center?

Like, can I go in as center?

I'm like, listen, look, five foot six ain't centered.

But the coach sent him in.

And I was like, oh man, he's jumping up plays.

He's putting in the post.

And he went in for a few moments as center.

But I was thinking about this.

God said, Elijah, you're in.

And Elijah, scrappy like the flash, all of a sudden he was on the scene.

I believe Elijah was all hustle.

He got in there, never missed a beat.

I mean, he was in the king's grill in a flash with a message.

No rain.

Unless I say so.

I mean, just like that, that's what we're told.

And then interesting.

Then God gave Elijah an authentic Alabama Southern command.

Look at what it says in verse 2.

Then the word of the Lord came to him saying, Get! Did you see it?

He said, Get! You better get, boy.

He came up in his face, and then God said, You better go.

You better get.

Where's Renee Neely?

She's got a good get.

She says, get.

I didn't grow up in the South, but some of y'all got that.

When you say to your kids, God said, Get Elijah.

Let her be.

We see that.

Elijah was sent to an uncertain place.

That's important.

The word uncertain is important.

I want you to think on that.

God sent him to uncertainty.

You see, some of our cultural upbringing teaches us elsewhere.

We believe certainty is the most important thing.

We idolize certainty and comfort.

God said, get to uncertainty.

And I need to explain here, and Dave helped me there.

The mountain last week that we defined, those disciples got to go up a physical mountain and see the glory, voice, and touch of God.

Absolutely.

I want you to know I'm not stating for 24 that we say, stand on the mountain.

Everything is going to be amazing.

Everything is going to be great.

I'm not talking about some prosperity gospel.

This is the year where the millions are falling down.

It's not what I'm saying.

I'm saying those disciples got to go to a place where the glory, voice, and touch of God came to them.

And that is the mountain.

It's not a physical peak, it's a place of God.

And so the mountain happens in valleys.

The mountain, you're gonna see here, the mountain happens in a crazy, dried up, sad place, an uncertain place.

God said, run and hide.

At brook, the word is spelled C H, but it's pronounced Kareth.

At brook, Kareth.

Kareth, you need to know.

This would be good to write down.

By the way, I didn't say this when we started, but those in connect groups, it would be good if you had your book and you went through week by week as we do the sermon.

The questions are drawn from the sermon.

You'll have a lot to talk about in group.

Kareth means cut down.

God, you want me to do what?

You're sending me to cut down?

It means cut down.

I wonder if Elijah thought to himself, this is a waste of my time.

I just came from nowhere.

I came from the wilderness.

And God said to him, Go east.

And Elijah said, I God, I know what east is.

I came from east.

God, I know what you're saying.

And he sent him into the wilderness.

He got on the scene for a moment.

He got in the game, pinch hit, bam, home run.

And he said, Get! You're back out.

He pulled him, yanked him.

And he said, son, you gotta go to practice.

You gotta go to practice.

If you're gonna be better, let me tell you what has to happen.

You gotta go to practice.

My professional little league career started at age nine.

Didn't even own a pair of cleats that year.

I got pictures of me in some high-top tennis shoes.

That's how good it was.

By age 10, I had started to pick it up.

And by age 10, I made the area all-star team, and I was so pumped, excited.

We won the state championship.

It is still on a field today in Newark, Delaware.

Okay, we won that championship.

We went on to regional play, and we continued that season.

That was age 10.

My career continued, age 11.

You switched teams, 11 and 12.

And so I got back in the draft, and it was a great, great year personally.

But here's the problem.

I was the best player on the worst team.

Best player on the worst team.

I was thinking what I was doing.

There were some good things.

I was hitting the ball, everything was going well.

I had developed into some pitching.

Great year.

All-stars came around, and I couldn't believe it.

They cut me.

I made the All-Stars the year before, and I was better.

And they cut me.

Y'all, I was heartbroken.

I was seriously heartbroken.

I seriously had for real tears when this happened.

And I watched the rest of that summer, all my friends who I had played last summer with play baseball.

All I wanted to do was play baseball.

They stole my dream.

Took it right from me.

Age 12, I continued on.

Things got better, and back to All-Stars that year, never missed from there.

I traveled all over playing baseball up until I was about 17.

But let me tell you what happened when that cut happened and I never missed an all-star again.

I started to learn the value of 50 cents.

50 cents would take me down to Vince's batting cages, and I get 12 pitches.

If I had 50 cents, I had to ride my bike, y'all hear me?

Y'all kids that don't like listening.

Two miles, I ride my bike to Vince's out of breath, dead, so I could go bat and bat and bat and bat.

Let me tell you what had to happen in my life.

I had to get cut to get good.

I had to get cut to put a fire in this person.

I got cut.

And I hated that because I still can't believe they cut me.

I'll call one of them coaches today.

I was good.

But I was uncertain about baseball in that cut.

We must be able, hear me, to see God in uncertainty.

We have to be able to trust God in the hidden things of life.

We all say it's the stuff we don't like when we're waiting, in the waiting, when we don't have an answer.

You see, careth.

We have to trust God in the careth in the cutoff, in the karath of sickness, or the karath of mourning, or the kareth of solitude, in the careth of, I don't know how this is gonna work.

I want you to know God's not asking you to know how it's gonna work.

He reveals his glory often.

Hear me, church, often through our inadequacy.

Corinthians 12, 9 says, My grace is sufficient for you.

In your weakness, he's made strong.

What your faith truly needs, maybe today, hear me, some people are not gonna like this much, but maybe what your faith really needs is an uncertain place.

Pastor Rick, what do you mean?

Do you want me to be cut off?

Do you want me to go through hardship?

No, I want you to go through faith.

Life requires examination.

And maybe you're just stale spiritually.

So here's a question you need to consider.

God, am I doing your will with my life right now?

Am I satisfying all that you have for me?

It'd be a good question, husbands and wives, for the ride home.

How do you feel with your occupation?

Are you able to share your faith?

Are you able to impact the kingdom of God with what you're doing?

On a scale of one to ten, how much glory is God getting?

How much kingdom building is happening in the life that I'm living?

In your ministry, in your marriage, in the community.

You see, the overwhelming sense from our culture is the opposite to this.

We're taught at an early age, seek comfort, seek ease.

One day, when you've got it all figured out and there's piles in the bank, you can sit back on your hammock with your umbrella drink.

And then you will have arrived.

And then what?

What's the next wrong on that ladder?

I'm telling you, purpose starts in practice.

Purpose starts in carriage.

Might need for some of you to go back to school in 24.

Figure out a new pathway.

Some people say, Pastor, but I'm in my 50s, 60s.

Maybe need to seek a new job.

Some it could be a move.

Some it might be some part of the daily routine that we've fallen in love with that's not about God.

Let me tell you what I'm getting at.

Things wrap us up, but Hebrews 11 6 says, Without faith, it is impossible to please God.

The Greek for that word, impossible, is not possible.

To please God without faith.

Let that marinate a moment.

You cannot please God.

You can't glorify God without faith.

And Hebrews 11 1 tells us the faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

That is uncertain.

Can you be certain and not see things?

No, that's uncertain.

So faith has to be challenged.

God is not against your comfort.

He wants good for you.

He knows the hairs of the head on your head.

God knows everything about you, He cares about your thoughts.

But be assured, His number one goal from heaven is glory, not your comfort.

So sometimes God directs us to a place of development.

For Elijah, that was Kara.

Point number two is this it was a place of demonstration.

Look at verse 4 and 5.

Place of demonstration.

Says this, and it will be, which I'm sorry, and it will be which flows into the Jordan that you should drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there, is an important word.

So he went and did according to the word of the Lord, for he went and stayed by the brook Kareth, which flows into the Jordan.

Letter A is this Careth was a practice in looking.

It was a practice in looking, looking for God.

There, back in obscurity, back alone, back needing daily supply, needing God.

1 Chronicles 16.11, David said, Seek the Lord and his strength, seek his face forevermore.

Proverbs 8.17 says, Those who seek me diligently will find me.

Jeremiah 29, 13 said, You will seek me and find me.

When you seek me with your whole heart, are you seeking God?

Are you looking for God?

Isaiah 55, 6 says, Seek the Lord while he may be found.

Giving an idea that there may be a time that we grieve the Holy Spirit that there's a time where maybe we won't find him.

Seek the Lord while he may be found.

Psalms 34, 4 says, I sought the Lord.

We sang it.

Great job today, worship team.

Man, trusting God.

He said, I sought the Lord and he heard and he answered.

In Caroth, there was this secret.

It was a secret place.

It was a quiet place.

You see the WOW CD 2000.

Anybody remember this?

And y'all Christians, when the contemporary music took a change, I should take you to a place.

It took me to a place, the early 2000s, where there was this song on the WOW 2000 CD.

There's about 50 songs.

It's awesome.

I'll listen back through it this week.

But one of them started out bop bah bop bop ba doot doot doo doo.

In the secret, in the quiet place.

In the stillness, you are there.

Sonic flood.

Made me think of this song in this quiet place.

Looking.

Do we have that in our life?

Man, Careth was that.

It had to be that.

It also reminded me early 2000s of when I started dating Heather.

I mean, there was no too much time for that, I can promise you.

I was looking for that girl.

I was looking for her in the LRC, the Lee Robertson Center.

I was looking for her in the girls' dorm.

I was looking for her in the library.

I was looking for her at chapel.

I was looking for her at the courtyard.

I was looking for her in between classes.

I was looking for her at work at Ryan's buffet.

We made that money.

I was looking for her.

I was looking for her anyway I could look for him.

I was looking for her and looking up mountain.

And that's none of y'all's business.

And after all that, hours on the phone at night.

We spent 25 times a day possibly together.

And then for hours.

What in the world do we talk about?

How can we have any more words?

Right?

Hours, sometimes two, three in the morning talking on the phone.

I was looking for her.

I knew how to look for her.

Are you looking for him?

Do you know how to look in that secret in that quiet place?

You see, Elijah had to prove at Kareth, he had to prove that away from everything in private, that he was going to look for God.

Are you looking for God?

You know, character, they said character is who you are in private.

When everything else is quiet, when all of it fades, are you looking for God?

Are you looking for God when no one is looking at you?

Well, Careth letter B was a practice in listening.

We declared 24, glory, voice, and touch.

Are we listening for that voice of God?

John 10, 27, 28 says, My sheep know my voice and I know them and they follow me.

The voice of God.

If God told you to go to an uncertain place, if God told you to make a move, would you be aware?

Because you're looking for him in all the places of your life.

In the car ride, at the breakfast table.

Are you looking for where God's at work?

Are you listening?

He said, My sheep know me.

Before 2020, nobody that I know of really knew the term social distancing.

And all of a sudden we're presented with this thing that took over.

And I remember in the driveway during one part of that, Callie drew out in big bold pink letters because we're outside doing stuff, right?

Families ain't outside again.

Psalms 46, 10, she wrote on the driveway, big letters.

Guess you'd like to know what that says.

Be still and know that I am God.

And we watched through 2020 as all of a sudden people in the neighborhood started walking in the evenings.

And uh we did puzzles galore.

Oh heavens.

Our family spent time together, is the point.

We were still.

I hate a puzzle.

I think I put together 15 pieces of 15 puzzles.

But we did puzzles.

We read.

We were together.

And we hated the distance.

We we didn't want any distance.

People drove up one time, somebody came to the edge of the driveway, and we had a conversation from the top of the driveway.

Like, you know, we can't get near each other, but oh, thank God.

People oh, people.

Remember all those things and and lawns.

Y'all remember everybody's lawn?

Whew! I mean, you couldn't get toilet paper, but you could get mulch.

Boy, everybody's lawn looked good in the stillness of things.

You know, God stopped everything.

God showed that this system that we call life, the thing that we maybe rely on, he can stop and turn on a dime.

Before Jesus entered the public ministry, Jesus understood this term.

For 40 days before he entered public ministry, Jesus went off, secluded, away from everything, fasted.

I hope that you're involved in the 21 days of prayer, but Jesus went off and he got alone.

He wasn't just in sight of the disciples praying to God the Father.

He got to himself.

He'd slip away privately.

He would distance himself often in Scripture.

Why?

To hear God's voice.

He wanted to hear God's voice.

He was able to boldly go to Ahab.

And now we see him in a place where famine has come.

How did he know?

Interesting.

So how do we know that Elijah was this type of person and Elijah was able to get along with God?

Look, turn your Bible to James chapter 5 for a moment.

James 5 · chapter mention

In practice, Elijah was a man of prayer.

I got thinking about that scripture.

Well, what told Elijah that there was going to be a drought?

There was going to be a famine?

How did Elijah get to that place before he got to the king?

And I want you to see James 5, verse 16.

James 5:16

We'll start through 18.

It says, Confess your trespasses.

This is a verse on prayer to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.

Then it says, the effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.

She's saying, Elijah was like you and me.

And he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.

And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.

Elijah was a man of prayer.

Elijah could go boldly because he had already spent time in prayer.

Elijah was a man who, it says, fervently, his quiet time, his alone time was with God.

And he says to Ahab, even in his greeting, he's very confident.

He says, as the Lord lives, before whom I stand, like I'm not standing before you, Ahab.

I'm bringing you a message from God.

And as the Lord lives, this message is coming out of his mouth before whom I stand.

I stand before God.

He knew God's voice.

How do we know that, church?

I hope that this church will know the voice of God in prayer.

I'm hoping we'll stand on the mountain, and that is a place that we find God in prayer.

Point number three this morning is this a place of dependence.

Look at verse 6 and 7.

Place of dependence.

It says the ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the brook.

And it happened after a while that the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land.

Letter A, we see this.

Cherith was a place of power.

Place of God's power.

He was able to see something that probably nobody really gets to see.

He saw ravens that brought meat and bread, important word, there.

I said this earlier.

There.

He said, I will provide there.

If you go, hear me, church, there, are you there yet?

Are you there yet?

He said, if you go there, I will provide.

With a clause in my mind, if you don't go there, I might not provide.

And so Elijah had bread and meat, the power of God, the hand of God in the drying brook.

The power of God was showed to him in a bad place if he would go there.

Now I want you to hear that.

Some want and they want the power of God, but we're not willing to go there.

He said, if you go there.

Well, the word of the Lord came with that clause.

He said, Get away, get away from here, and then you can be fed if you'll go there.

Well, I need you to see that there were other ways Elijah could have been fed.

Look at 1 Kings 18, getting ahead, but in verse 3 and 4, we are introduced to another prophet, and Ahab had called Obadiah, who was in charge of his house.

Look at this next phrase.

Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly.

For so it was while Jezebel massacred the prophets of the Lord that Obadiah had taken 100 prophets and hidden them, 50 to a cave and had fed them with bread and water.

So there is another there.

And it's possible that Elijah could have got up with another believer, Obadiah, and went that way and maybe could have got bread and water.

He could have gone there.

There were yet, we see later, 7,000 faithful Israelites who had not bowed the knee to Baal.

He could have found that group and went there.

And said, God, well, the other Christians are going this way, then I should probably do what the others are doing.

But God said, Elijah, your mission is go there.

And if you go there, meat and bread will follow.

Through a raven.

Think about that.

This is crazy.

God uses all kinds of things, but night and day, day and night, ravens are bringing Elijah by the brook.

Meat and bread.

He could have used Obadiah, he could have used another person, but God used an omnivorous bird.

A mammal, a bird that feeds on plants and flesh.

Y'all think about that.

Miraculously, day after day, they did not eat the meat.

The word ravenous contains the word raven, and it means extremely hungry.

I say it often to Heather, feeling ravenous.

Y'all, if you put some meat in front of me, I'm just gonna tell you, I'm gonna struggle not to eat it.

Okay?

I'm just gonna struggle.

David Reeves is in our connect group, made some brisket the other week.

Oh my soul.

Greg Wood, I don't know what is this redneck roadkill, is that what you call it?

Some venison wrapped in bacon.

Oh, heavens.

Made the whole house smell good.

Some of y'all are salivating right now.

I see it.

Like, Pastor, wrap it up.

It's lunchtime.

It would probably be a miracle if you put that in front of me and expected me not to eat it.

Right?

Heaven's gonna get mad at me.

But look, I gotta confess.

We made, we made some a meal for a family one time, and uh I got some fried chicken family in need, and I'm taking it down the road.

I couldn't take it.

That family that day, I can't look at her, they got an 11-piece instead of a 12-piece fried chicken.

I have to confess, Lord, I feel better.

Look, I couldn't take the smell.

Lord forgive me.

A ravenous raven dropped off a seasoned and seared 12-ounce heaven filet day after day, untouched, didn't eat it, and some of Amy's sourdough bread.

Can you think on that?

Every time that God was on time, which was every time, Elijah was reminded of God's hand.

He brought food.

And Elijah went, look, there goes a raven.

I mean, like clock, here comes a raven.

Oh, look, another day, there comes a raven.

It's evening, there goes a raven.

Listen, it wasn't a bunch of bells and whistles.

Don't hear me wrong.

If you go there for God, it doesn't mean he's going to provide everything you've ever wanted.

Philippians 4, 4, though, says, My God shall supply all your needs according to his riches and glory.

He said, I will give you meat and bread there.

By the way, Obadiah, who was hiding people in the caves, they got bread and water.

I think this is a little bit better.

There was meat and bread.

He followed God.

And it's a display of God's power and control over nature.

I bet anytime after that, if Elijah saw a raven, well, I bet he'd tear up.

Man.

I don't know if Elijah had grandkids or kids in his life.

He wanted to tell a story.

Let me tell you, son, about ravens.

If he was watching football, he'd be watching the ravens.

He taught Elijah through a display of his power.

Dependence on God was found in an uncertain place.

Well, Karah was not just a place of power, it was a place of protection.

God sent him there for protection.

It seems strange a little bit when we think about that that God sent him to a brook that was going to dry up, subject to the drought.

It wasn't like this brook was an unquenchable brook.

It wasn't a geyser.

This brook was a brook that would be drying.

And Elijah was in a practice of watching the gradual decline of his sustainment.

Anybody feel like that?

Things gradually declining, you're watching difficulty, and it's right before his face.

You ever been faced with a drying brook?

F.

B.

Meyer said the drying brook was much harder to face than the 450 prophets that he would face later.

In practice.

Elijah had to get good in practice because God wants to teach us here this.

You might not have come for anything else, but you came for this.

He wants to teach us in practice at the drying brook not to trust in his gifts, not to trust in God's blessings, but trust in the blesser.

We don't trust that mountain feeling.

We don't trust that.

We trust the God of the mountain.

You see, a brook for him was a creeping paralysis.

Can you imagine?

Knowing it's coming.

The brook was filled momentarily, but who fills the brook?

God taught Elijah this paramount principle.

And for you and I, sometimes we look at the brook.

We're seeing the brook.

The brook of diminishing health might threaten.

The hand of some blessing fades.

Sometimes the brook is diminishing fun.

Sometimes a business begins to take a turn in our life, and things weren't what we used to think.

Matt Redman wrote a song that I love when I think about this.

There's a song called The Heart of Worship.

It says these words.

So you search much deeper within through the way things appear.

Don't we live on appearance?

But you're looking into my heart.

And he says, This is the heart of worship.

You see, Jesus was protecting his prophet by building up a fortified heart through the drying brooks of adversity.

He was teaching him true worship.

It feels impossible, but I want to say to you, church, those today who are facing adversity, hear me, please.

You might just be God's chosen.

God doesn't mess around with adversity.

It might just be a calling to true worship.

God wants to build in you something because the Bible says that He is a refiner of gold.

That gold is purified through the fire.

And some today are saying at the end of 23, or you started this year and you said, God, why?

God, why is this this way?

What is happening to the brook in my life?

God, there's not much left.

God, I'm gonna give out.

God, I'm weak.

God, I'm poor, God, I'm scared, God, I'm so sad.

God, I need your help.

This brook is so hard and it's so quiet.

You see, God dried the brook because he acts according to his good pleasure and to display his glory.

Hear me, church.

God is not tied to the brook.

If God closes one door, God can certainly swing open another.

Now he doesn't have to.

But God can.

And he often does.

And he taught Elijah that his protection and his trust was not in Kareth.

It was not in the brook.

Our trust 24 church is not in the blessing of the mountain.

It's not in the victory.

He told Elijah later, it's not in the fire, it's not in the earthquake, it's not in the wind.

All which God has his hand on and can do, it's not in the brook, it's not in the raven, it's not in the food, it's not in the bread or the hiding place.

It is the God of all of those things.

So find him.

Glory, voice, and touch of God.

He says, God will never leave you or forsake you.

Those who trust in him.

At the Kara, the drying brook, Elijah met with the hand of God, the voice of God, and the glory of God.

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