WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE, ELIJAH?
"For the kingdom of heaven
is like a householder who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for
his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent
them into his vineyard. And going out about the third
hour he saw others standing idle in the market place;
and to them he said, 'You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I
will give you.' So they went. Going out again about
the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same And
about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing; and he said to
them, 'Why do you stand here idle all day?' They said to him, 'Because no one
has hired us.' He said to them, 'You go into the vineyard too.'...... Matthew
20:1-7.
It's the eleventh hour. There's
only one hour left until quitting time. Let's suppose that the householder
leaves the market place and goes back to the vineyard.
There in the vineyard he sees a man whom he had hired early in the morning
sitting on a rock with his chin on his knees staring into space ... all bummed
out. And he says to him,
"What are you doing
here?"
And he says,
"I can't get along with
those laborers. They're all hypocrites! Deadbeats! Besides, it's been a hot day
– you don't know how hot it was out here in this vineyard – and I'm burned
out."
The householder beckons one of
the servants to go to the house and bring wine and some bread. And from the
tray the householder feeds this man with his own hands and says,
"Now, you're strengthened.
Rise up and get back to work."
And the man finds that when he
stands up he has ten times the strength he had when he
began the day. And he has within him now the power to accomplish more in this
final hour than he did during the whole day of labor.
Or, he can get up and walk away from that vineyard
and never come back.
When the Spirit of the Lord
visits this earth and brings an awakening to it, as he's doing now, the easiest
people to arouse are always the ones who are standing idle in the market place, who've never really been exposed to the
realities of the kingdom of heaven ... they've never seen God's glory. For them
this is such a wonderful and blessed and new thing they rise
up and respond with tremendous joy. The hardest people to arouse are the
ones who at some point in their lives knew the glory of God. But now their
vision is dull ... their joy is gone .... they've stepped away from the
ministry God gave them to perform ... they continue to hang around the courts
of the
no clear purpose,
no life,
no power.
What a wonderful thing it is that
God does not abandon us in our stagnation. He still cares about us and he comes
to us. He gives us the power to come back to life if we will.
Think of Elijah. After Elijah won
the battle on
Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah
had done, and how he had slain all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel
sent a messenger to Elijah saying, "So may the gods do to me and more
also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time
tomorrow." Then he was afraid, and he arose and went for his life, and
came to
But he himself went a day's
journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree; and he
asked that he might die, saying, "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my
life; for I am no better than my fathers." And he lay down and slept under
a broom tree; and behold, an angel touched him, and said to him, "Arise
and eat." And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on
hot stones and a jar of water. And he ate and drank, and lay down again. And
the angel of the Lord came again a second time, and touched him, and said,
"Arise and eat, else the journey will be too great for you." And he
arose, and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and
forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.
1 Kings 19:1-8
Here's the mighty prophet of God
who's acting like a child.
"I don't want to live
anymore. Take my life away .... what's the use."
And when Elijah begins to think
like that and talk like that, he begins to stagnate. The beautiful thing is that God does not turn his back on Elijah
and say,
"O.K., if that's how you
feel go to hell!"
Instead he sends an angel to
succor him, feed him, help him. Does Elijah say, '"Thanks a lot'? No. He
takes what comes his way and still keeps feeling sorry for himself. God continues to care for him.
Now the Lord God allows Elijah
this mighty prophet to wallow in this self-pity for a certain length of time. But there comes a point where Elijah is going to hear
a word from God that's either going to wake him up or send him away ... So we
read in verse 9 of that 19th chapter of 1 Kings:
And there he came to a cave, and
lodged there; and behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him,
"What are you doing here, Elijah?.... What are you doing here, Elijah? Why are you running away?"
Elijah has been called to be a
prophet, to stand before God, to stand before the people in the name of God and
give them a living word. But now this man isn't doing any of that ... he's
running. He's all wrapped up in himself. He's bummed out. He's enjoying
wallowing in self-pity. So God has to wake him up. Let's understand that God is
not standing behind Elijah with a whip and saying, "Get going! What's the
matter with you?" like a tyrant. No, no. All through Elijah's ministry the
Lord was feeding him and encouraging him and there was no anxiety, no frenzy.
He was never in a hurry. He could sit down and have a meal. He could cool his
feet in the
"What are you doing here?
... What are you doing here?"
And Elijah answers,
"I have been very jealous
for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the people of Israel have forsaken thy
covenant, thrown down thy altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I,
even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away." And he
said, "Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord." And
behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and
broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind;
and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and
after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the
fire a still small voice. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his
mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there
came a voice to him, and said, "What are you doing here, Elijah?...What
are you doing here?" 1
Kings 19:10-13
- I've called you to be my
prophet,
- I've anointed you with my
Spirit. Why I even sent fire from heaven in answer to your prayers. Don't you
think I can protect you from Jezebel? Don't you think I can provide for your
needs? Have I ever let you down?"
And then comes the command,
"Get up and go back to the work I gave you to do."
And the Lord said to him,
"Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; and when you
arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Syria; and Jehu the son of
Nimshi you shall anoint to be king over Israel; and Elisha the son of Shaphat
of Abelmeholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your
place. And him who escapes from
the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay; and him who escapes from the sword of Jehu
shall Elisha slay. Yet I will leave seven thousand in
As Elijah begins to do these
specific things, he revives. And the brief time left to him before he's taken
into heaven becomes the most fruitful period of his life. These acts which he
performs during this time are the most far reaching, mighty and powerful things
he ever did. And so the revival that comes to him out there at Horeb in the
wilderness is the thing that makes him far more fruitful than he was before.
Now as the Spirit of the Lord
searches the earth and revives and quickens wherever people respond in any way,
he finds most of us in the kind of shape Elijah was in. He finds us running
away or sleeping under the broom tree or hiding in some emotional cave. He
called us to be his witnesses,
"You shall receive power
when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you're going to be my
witnesses." And every time we hear that, if we don't do it we bring
judgment on ourselves. It's not a matter of sending a few more missionaries;
it's a matter of every one of us being a missionary ... everyone. And we know
this. We know that when the Spirit
of God came to us, he anointed us to proclaim the name of Jesus beyond the
walls of the church. And when we do it, we experience life. And when we don't
do it, we experience stagnation.
Look at our Lord Jesus as an
example. Jesus was never in a frenzy, never in a hurry. He had time to sit down
and talk to the woman at the well. He had time to go to a wedding feast. He
didn't say, "No, I have to save souls, I can't go to this wedding
feast." He would eat with the tax collectors. He would eat with the
Pharisees. He lived a life that was not bound, tight, tense. But, he never lost
eight of what his purpose was and he kept pressing on ... driving toward it. Every moment he saw as a moment given to him by
the Father to manifest the kingdom of God. We on the other hand, tend to
retreat into our cave. Many times it's a religious cave. And here we sit in our
religious cave and we sing hymns and say prayers. Or we retreat into a cave
which happens to be our favorite hobby, our favorite doctrinal position, or
whatever else we find as a side-trip in our own lives until the Lord brings
revival by saying to us,
"What are you doing here?
What are you doing here? I called you to be my prophet. I have given you a
message to proclaim to the world ... what are you doing here?"
And we say,
"But Lord, I've been your
servant and what good has it done? Your people have forsaken your covenant,
thrown down your altar, killed your prophets with the sword ... I'm the only
good Christian left, and they're out to get me. And besides, Lord, I'm tired,
I'm weary, I'm burned out. I deserve a break today!
I'll tell you something else,
Lord, I'm hurt. Those people you sent me to ... I poured my life out for them
and they never even said, 'Thanks.' All they do is insult me, gossip about me,
misconstrue my motives ... they don't appreciate me. I'm fed up!"
And when we get through ranting
and raving the Lord says;
"Go stand on the mount
before the Lord."
The first step to revival for
those of us who have in any way stagnated is to go stand on the mount before
the Lord. We've been sitting instead of standing.
"As the Lord God of Israel
lives, before whom I stand,"
Elijah used to say until he began
sitting down under the broom tree, or hunched over in that cave. "Go out
there and stand up!"
... and we need to do the same.
The beginning of revival for us is to stand before the Lord with our eyes open,
our heart open, our ears open, and our mouth shut. Listen! "Wait there
until you hear a word from me." You'll get a word, and that word will
bring you to life. It may not come in five minutes. You may have to wait a
while, but it will come. It may be that there will first have to be a mighty
rushing wind to blow the cobwebs out of your brain ... it may be that there
will have to be an earthquake to shake the clutter out of our lives and a fire
to burn off the dross, but there will be
a word! And when that word comes in
the voice of a gentle stillness he will say to us once more, "What
are you doing here?"
When we get through making all
our excuses he will say to us
"Go on back to the work to
which I called you. And when you begin to do it, the anointing of my Spirit
will absolutely flood your life and you will bear fruit. I've called you. I've
anointed you. I've sent you ... go ... be my witnesses in all the earth
starting in Detroit. And as you do, you'll come to life."
It's a strange thing how many of
us, not just the older ones among us, but the very young among us, seem to have
in the back of our minds this idea that the best years of our life are behind
us. The glory years are "back there." We remember when we first came
to life; that honeymoon with the Lord, but now it's downhill. And that's a lie!
First of all, how long do we think we have? Maybe we only have two more years.
But whether we have two years, fifty, seventy years or only two weeks, the time
left for each of us here to complete the work we've been given to do, brief as
it is, can absolutely be the most glorious, the most fruitful, the most
powerful, the most wonderful season of all our days, if we will respond to the
One who is saying to us, "What are you doing here? Come on, wake up, let's
go!"
Jesus had to do that with Peter.
After the resurrection Peter got itchy.
"I'm going fishing ....
enough of this."
"O.K., we'll go too,"
say the others."
They don't catch a thing. In the
morning, standing on the edge of the Sea of Galilee in the mist is a stranger
who says, "Have you caught anything?"
"No."
"Cast the net. on the right
side of the ship:" Up comes the net loaded with fish. As soon as Peter
sees this a bell goes off in his head. He
remembers the day he was called to discipleship and he hears in the ringing of
the bell, "What are you doing here, Peter?"
Jesus doesn't beat him over the
head with a club. He says, "Come and dine .... have breakfast."
After breakfast, "what are
you doing here, Peter?" "Simon, son of John, do you love me more than
these fish?"
"Yes Lord, you know that I
love you."
"Feed my sheep. Get back to
the work to which I called you."
And for many of us, the revival
we're wringing our hands waiting for will begin when we respond to the voice of
the Spirit of God already now saying to us,
"What are you doing here?
.... Feed my sheep!"
"Go and work the works of
him who sent you while it is day before the night comes when no one can
work."