{"id":4731,"date":"2023-05-01T12:13:36","date_gmt":"2023-05-01T17:13:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nazareneblogs.org\/pastorscott\/?p=4731"},"modified":"2023-05-01T12:13:36","modified_gmt":"2023-05-01T17:13:36","slug":"devotional-on-1-kings-24","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-1-kings-24\/","title":{"rendered":"Devotional on 1 Kings"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure style=\"width: 1600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/2.bp.blogspot.com\/-i-ZgksWhpa8\/Xk6WuS4gygI\/AAAAAAABD0Y\/zwD4qkCsi1gnyeWsSi57-t1od1SI5-B9wCKgBGAsYHg\/s1600\/PHOTO_20151020_153758.jpg\" width=\"1600\" height=\"902\" class=\"size-large\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">2015 &#8211; Mammoth Cave, KY<\/figcaption><\/figure><br \/>\nSitting on a barbwire fence<br \/>\n1Kings 18: How long are you going to sit on the fence?<br \/>\nNo doubt, Elijah has everyone&#8217;s attention. The drought and resultant famine has seen to that. Now he calls for a meeting and a confrontation. Their divided loyalties have created a pitiful situation. Historically, they\u2019ve worshipped Jehovah, but for generations now worship of Baal has grown like a cancer in their number. Now, it appears that Jehovah worship is going to be only seen in the history books as they align themselves with Baal. Yet, somehow, they\u2019re having a hard time committing themselves to Baal. The recent drought has caused some doubts. Why couldn&#8217;t this fertility god answer their prayers for the rain necessary for them to grow crops? The result of their doubt is that they\u2019re terrible followers of Jehovah God and not very good followers of Baal either. Elijah says it is time for a decision to follow the God who answers prayer, who has power in this world. Our nation has more in common with these ancient Jews than we might think. We too are on the fence. We sing &#8220;God bless America&#8221; and put &#8220;In God we trust&#8221; on our currency. We open sessions of Congress and the Supreme Court in prayer. At the same time, we ignore God&#8217;s Law and seek to isolate him from secular society. We tip our hat to God but really want to serve, not Baal, but ourselves, and in so doing, adopt a religion of materialism, secular humanism, and pleasure. Will God send an &#8220;Elijah&#8221; to challenge our nation? Does the Church even want that to happen?<br \/>\nTake Away: It\u2019s rather unreasonable to sing \u201cGod bless America\u201d while at the same time attempting to isolate him from all but a few corners of our lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sitting on a barbwire fence 1Kings 18: How long are you going to sit on the fence? No doubt, Elijah has everyone&#8217;s attention. The drought and resultant famine has seen to that. Now he calls for a meeting and a confrontation. Their divided loyalties have created a pitiful situation. Historically, they\u2019ve worshipped Jehovah, but for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1471,7],"tags":[113,192,301,342,772,1108],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4731"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14423,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731\/revisions\/14423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}