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Explore scripture through the lens of Love. Period. Clergy and lay teachers create a safe space for asking the questions in our hearts, and seeking answers for a life of faith today.
Scripture notes for Sunday August 8
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The wonderful Rev. Darrell Hamilton is preaching on “This Ain’t Oatmeal.” His text is from the Hebrew Scriptures, 1 Kings 19.4–8.
The books of 1 & 2 Kings tell the stories of (you guessed it) the kings of ancient Israel. The books of 1 & 2 Samuel told us the story of the rise of kingship in Israel, which began with Saul and was followed by the extremely skillful (if deeply flawed) David. At the beginning of 1Kings, David dies, leaving his son Solomon a united, relatively stable and financially secure kingdom. Solomon builds the first permanent Temple to Yahweh, which is fabulous and awe-inspiring.
It’s all downhill from there. While David had been deeply dedicated to Yahweh, Solomon not worshipped other gods as well as Yahweh, even constructing worship sites for these other gods.
Though Solomon had managed to hold the united kingdom together during his lifetime, it broke into two after his death: the Northern Kingdom (which retained the name “Israel,”) and the Southern Kingdom (which was known as Judah). The books of 1 & 2 Kings tell the stories of the kings of both North and South, and it ain’t pretty. Mostly, they aren’t very loyal to Yahweh, or don’t worship Yahweh properly, and everything is a constant mess.
In the days of the kings, God raises up a number of prophets to counter the evils of rulers. These prophets give witness to God throughout it all. One of these prophets is Elijah. He operates in the Northern Kingdom, and has quite a task on his hands. King Ahab is particularly bad, and his queen is the notorious Jezebel. She not only worships other gods, but actually wants to purge Israel of the worship of Yahweh.
In chapter 18 of 1Kings, Eijah had just made a show of force against the priests of “the Ba’als” (the Canaanite gods). In fact, much to our distress – but the Biblical author’s delight – he had had those priests slaughtered. So Jezebel was threatening to slaughter all the priests and prophets of Yahweh, including Elijah.
That’s where we find Elijah in this passage – escaping from the wrath of Jezebel.
This showed up in my FB today. Thought it was appropriate for this morning’s conversation
https://www.facebook.com/thesadjesus/photos/a.698347796860554/4671936956168265/
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