THEME TEXT: 1 Kings 17:1 “And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab, 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.”
LET US PRAY.
Returning to our theme from last week on “A Great Start”. Last week we talked about the importance of a great start, because it poises you for a win! When you have a powerful, quick start in a race, BAM!! Right at the shot of the starting gun, it puts you in good position. Sets you up to be a contender for the prize! But if you get off to a sluggish start, a dragging start, if your shoelaces become untied and you falter at the start, it makes it much more difficult, and sometimes impossible to win the race.
The Apostle Paul likened the Christian walk to a race.
1 Cor. 9:24-27 (NLT) “Don’t you realize that in a race everyone runs, but only one person gets the prize? So run to win! All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. So I run with purpose in every step. I am not just shadowboxing. I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified.”
I don’t think too many people would argue about the fact that the Apostle Paul was a great Christian. The Lord entrusted him to write most of the New Testament, thereby setting doctrine for the entire church of Christ. That’s a pretty great testimony by anyone’s standards. And he likened the Christian’s life to that of a race. He said that we have a prize to win, just like an athlete. He called it an eternal prize – one that will not fade away. That means that we should be living our lives with our eternal reward in mind, just like an athlete trains with his prize – the gold medal, or the Superbowl ring, or the World Series trophy, or the World Cup, in mind.
· Paul said to RUN TO WIN! Notice that he didn’t say to take a leisurely walk around, but to RUN towards the prize. If you’re not aiming for anything, any shot in the dark will do. This is not the kind of life that God has called us to.
· With purpose in every step! We have purpose as the body of Christ. We are not sent into the world to be floundering around, tossed with every wind of doctrine, like the chaff which the wind driveth away. We have a purpose. To win souls. To destroy the works of the devil. To heal the sick. In Luke 10, When Jesus sent out the seventy disciples, not the apostles, but just the laypeople who were following Him, he told them to heal the sick and to tell people “the kingdom of God is come unto you.” And when they came back, they told Jesus that even the demons were subject to them through His name. This speaks to the fact that the job of every believer is to carry the power of God and the name of Jesus in such a way that he can bring the kingdom of God to anyone he meets. What do I mean by this?
· Turn in your Bibles to Mark 16:17-18 “And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”
· Now look at Matthew 12:28 “But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you.” So, when Jesus talked about the kingdom of God, one of the things He was talking about specifically was the casting out of devils.
· Mark 4:30-32 “And he said, Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? or with what comparison shall we compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the earth: But when it is sown, it groweth up, and becometh greater than all herbs, and shooteth out great branches; so that the fowls of the air may lodge under the shadow of it.” We see here Jesus explaining that the kingdom of God comes to people in stages. You grow into it. And if you stay in the kingdom and don’t waver and flip flop, but earnestly learn of the Lord, then at some point, when you are mature, you will be a blessing and a covering for many.
I was in a revival meeting a few days ago, and a pastor of a healthy, growing church got up to give greetings. And he told how he met the Lord. He had been a drug dealer. And he got caught with a good deal of heroin on him at some point, and was thrown into jail. And there, in his rock bottom state, he met the Lord. And because he ran so hard for the devil, when he met the Lord, he had a true fire for God. When he got out of prison, he went to Bible college and was mentored by some of the most effective soul winners in the nation. He went on to found a church, and is now providing a safe spiritual home for many, nurturing souls and healing people’s lives in Fitchburg, MA. He's getting people OFF heroin now. That is an example of the kingdom of God operating in a person’s life.
If you are a Christian, and you are not growing spiritually, with some kind of fruit in your life, then you know that the kingdom of God is stunted in your life. The kingdom of God causes forward movement. It causes growth. Even if you don’t have much fruit showing right now, it’s like the seed Jesus talked about a few verses up, in Mark 4:26-29 “And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.” So, there are stages of growth in the kingdom of God, and it is characterized by continuous growth. When you are operating in the kingdom of God, you are always moving forward. If you are stagnant, and you are not growing in God, there is something about your spiritual walk that needs to change. Seek God’s face about what that is.
· Discipline your body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Continuing with the Apostle Paul’s analogy of a race, he states that we are to discipline our bodies like athletes do, training our bodies to do what they should. This is no small thing, because the lust of the flesh is real. It could be a lust for sex, a lust for attention, a lust for money, a lust for things, a lust for perversions, a lust for power, or any other number of things. But one thing is for sure, if you are going to live the Christian life with any modicum of success, you will HAVE to discipline your body. And not just your physical body, but your spiritual body as well. It takes discipline to pray. It takes discipline to make time to read the word of God on a daily basis. It takes discipline to turn away from shows that you might like to watch because the show is promoting sinful behaviors. It takes discipline to not get onto internet porn, or internet gambling. It takes discipline not to click on those salacious ads that can pop up on the side of your screen sometimes, or those random junk emails inviting you into sin. Come on, it takes discipline. “Be careful little eyes what you see…”
And so, a legitimate question is why? Why would I limit myself? This is something I am naturally drawn to, so why would I limit myself in these ways? Paul put it very plainly. In 1 Cor. 9:27, he says, “I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified.”
The fact is, there is a potential to be disqualified for the prize. In the KJV, it says. “I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection, lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” Looking up the literal meaning of that word “castaway”, it means “unapproved, i.e. rejected; by implication, worthless (literally or morally):—castaway, rejected, reprobate.”
In other words, as great a Christian as Paul was, he recognized that if he played around with sin, it could not only kill his Christian witness, but it could disqualify him altogether and cause him to be cast completely away from God as a reprobate. As super holy as Paul was, he was clear about the fact that if he let sin in, it could destroy him altogether and make him miss his eternal reward altogether.
So, he wasn’t super holy by accident. He strived to be that way to keep himself clean and unspotted by the world, not only so that he could be an effective vessel for the power of God, but also just to save his life spiritually.
Let me tell you something. Sin can KILL you. You can mess around with sin and play around with sin, and it can turn around on you and KILL YOU DEAD. A pastor friend of mine has this saying, “Get rid of sin before it gets rid of you.”
So, we have established how important it is to RUN TO WIN.
1. We want to win the prize.
2. We want to have purpose in our lives. We don’t want to live an aimless life that is void of purpose.
3. We want to carry the kingdom of God within us, so that we can be the used of God in the way we were ordained to be. Constantly moving forward, Constantly growing, and able to administer God’s grace to others, casting out devils and healing the sick.
4. We want to be disciplined, bringing our bodies into subjection, turning away from sin so that we are not disqualified altogether, being cast away from God as a reprobate. Or as a person who is totally and completely separated from God.
If we want a great start, the first thing we have to do is to set our focus on RUNNING TO WIN! Not just running to be running. Paul said “I’m not out here shadowboxing.” This thing is REAL. And I WANT MY PRIZE!!
Somebody say, “I want my prize! And I’m gonna GET my prize!!”
So, keeping in mind that we want a great start…It’s the beginning of the year; we want a great start!... We’re going to begin to look at the story of Elijah the prophet. He was a guy with a REALLY great start. The moment he pops up in the scriptures, he is full of power and authority. He is shaking things up. He is changing the face of the entire nation. He is really an example of someone who came out of the gate SMOKIN’!!!
So, let’s look at the life of Elijah and see what made him have such a great start!
The first time the prophet Elijah is mentioned in the Bible is in 1 Kings 17:1. It says, ““And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab, 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.”
So the first time we see Elijah, he is standing before the king of Israel, and telling him that he has just pronounced a famine on his nation, and there is nothing he can do about it. And. that that famine will continue until he tells it to end. Superbad! Super bold!
And, in the next verse, he’s not getting his head chopped off. He’s not getting grabbed by the guards. He’s not being thrown into the dungeon. He’s receiving another word from the Lord IN TOTAL SAFETY.
You gotta admire this guy’s boldness. And his authority. And his walk with God, right from the very first verse. I mean, wow. Who DOES that?? And GETS AWAY WITH IT?? Elijah?? He was quite a man of God!!
The only way to have that kind of boldness and that kind of authority is from having a truly close walk with the Lord. We see this kind of boldness many times in the scriptures: Moses, when he went right up to Pharoah and told him God said, “Let My people go!” Several times. Walked right up to the king and told him that doom was coming, and walked away without a scratch every time.
David, a 17 year old kid, looked a 9 ft giant in the face and told him that he was going to cut his head off and feed his dead body to the birds. AND DID IT.
And Jesus, in Luke 4, when he went to preach in the synagogue in his hometown, and the people got so angry with him that they tried to throw Him off a cliff, and He just walked right through the crowd, and went straight to Capernaum and started preaching again so strongly that the Bible says the people marveled that he taught with such power.
I’m talking BOLD.
This boldness and authority ONLY comes from having a close relationship with the Lord. The Bible says in Proverbs 28:1 “The wicked flee when no man pursueth:
but the righteous are bold as a lion.” The lion will go after ANY animal when it’s hungry. It knows no fear. It will go after a giraffe. After an elephant. After a rhino. He doesn’t care. If he’s hungry, he’ll go after ANYTHING. That’s why people don’t want to mess with lions.
In Rev. 5:5, Jesus is called the Lion of Judah. No one bolder. The Bible says in Colossians 2:15 that Jesus straight thugged the devil – spoiled principalities and powers and made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it. Straight ROBBED them of their power. In front of everybody.
So, when we are bold, we are acting like Jesus. When we refuse to back down to the devil, we are acting like Jesus. When we take a stand and will not compromise righteousness, we are acting like Jesus. The Bible says in Philippians 2:5, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.’
So, if we are going to have a great start, we’re going to have it by acting like Jesus. Being bold. Being righteous. Standing in our authority. And being purposeful about our journey in the Lord. AMEN! Let’s purpose in our hearts to have a great start this year, in Jesus’ name.