Hi! Dave here. Welcome back to Stories of a Faithful God for Kids. The Podcast where we see what God is really like.

But… How do you know who the real god is? How can you know? Sure, I might say it’s the God and Father of Jesus Christ… the God of Israel… but lots of other people think differently. Some say there’s a different god… some say there are heaps of gods… some say there’s no god! Who’s right? Maybe nobody! How would you know?

In our story so far in 1 Kings… we’ve seen the king of Israel give up on the God of Israel and chase after a couple of other gods… Baal and Asherah. He thinks they’re more important. And lots of people in Israel agree with him.

God’s not going to just take that though… this is too significant.

First… he’s sent Elijah to tell King Ahab that he’s stopping all the rain. There isn’t even any dew on the ground in the morning. This is really big… because people believe that Baal’s in charge of the rain and lightning. So after a while you’d hope they’d start to think… “AAHHH… Baal. What are you doing?”

Now… in the third year without any rain… it’s time for a show down between the God of Israel and Baal. There’s only room in the universe for one of them. Which one’s the real one? How about you sit back and get ready for our next episode… of Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

Ok. Are yeh ready for the showdown? Here it goes.

Elijah’s called a meeting at a place called Mount Carmel. King Ahab’s there. The 450 prophets of Baal are there. 400 prophets of Asherah are there. And all the people of Israel are there.

Elijah gets up in front of all the people. And he gives them a really simple speech. He tells them to stop flopping around between Baal and the Lord. Work out which one is God and go with him.

This is what he says in verse 21:

He says, “How long will you try to serve both Baal and the Lord? If the Lord is the true God, follow him. But if Baal is the true God, follow him!”

It’s pretty simple, isn’t it. Its like if you were standing in front of two things… on one side you’ve got chocolate ice cream. On the other side there’s a lump of wood. And its dessert time and you’re sister’s like… “Look, work out which one you want to eat… grab it, and go!” But you really want to eat both… the ice cream AND the wood. Its craziness!

But that’s what the people of Israel are like. And you can tell from their response. Elijah’s put things really simply and obviously… and how do the people respond? With silence. They say nothing.

Like when you’ve been caught doing something really silly, and you stand there looking guilty… but you really want to keep doing the silly thing.

Elijah says… “ok ok ok. Let’s have a competition to work this out once and for all. We’ll even make sure that its much easier for Baal than for the Lord. I mean… there’s only one of me. Baal has 450 prophets. This should be easy for Baal.

“Here’s what we’re gonna do. You bring two bulls, one for each team. The prophets of Baal can choose first so I can’t sneakily get the better one. We’ll both sacrifice the bulls, chop them up and put them on an altar for our god. You prophets of Baal, you pray to Baal, and I’ll pray to the Lord. And which ever god sets fire to the wood… he’s the real god.”

And all the people say… great! We love that idea.

Again, Elijah wants to make it as easy as possible for Baal… so he says to the prophets of Baal… “Look. There are SOOOOooo many of you, how about you go first. Get your sacrifice ready… pray to Baal… but don’t set the wood on fire. No cheating.

Verse 26 says:

So they took the bull that was given to them and prepared it. They prayed to Baal from morning until noon.

Aaaahhhh… What? They’re praying from morning until the middle of the day? That feels like a long time. They’re obviously really into it. They’re dancing around the altar… they’re shouting out “Baal, answer us!” “Baal, answer us!” “Baal, answer us!” For hours and hours and hours. And the Bible tells us:

But there was no sound. No one answered. How different is that to the Lord God of Israel? Remember when Elijah prayed and asked God to raise a dead boy to life? That’s much harder than starting a small fire. But God answered.

For the prophets of Baal, this is starting to get a little bit embarrassing. And Elijah wants to help that along to show how silly it all is. He starts making fun of them. He says… “Pray louder! He’s a god, after all. Maybe he’s too busy thinking, or he’s gone on a long trip or he’s sleeping. Maybe… Maybe he’s on the toilet.”

He’s saying… “perhaps you’ve just got to bang on the door of heaven really loudly for Baal to hear you.” He’s just being silly… But that’s exactly what they try and do. They work really hard to make Baal notice them.

Verse 28 says this:

So the prophets prayed louder. They cut themselves with swords and spears until their blood flowed. (This was the way they worshiped.)

Ouch. Isn’t that sad. They think they have to hurt themselves to get Baal to pay any attention to them. It’s so different to God who sent Jesus to die for us… so we wouldn’t have to suffer any punishment.

These prophets rave on for hour after hour after hour, yelling louder and louder. Cutting themselves, dancing wildly right up until the sun’s going down. Verse 29 tells us:

But no voice was heard. Baal did not answer. No one paid attention.

Now it’s the Lord’s turn.

While all the prophets of Baal are still shouting and dancing, Elijah says to the people of Israel… “Come over here to me”. So they come over to his side.

It turns out there used to be an altar to the Lord here… but its been smashed and knocked over. It’s a sign of how God’s been treated.

Elijah rebuilds the altar exactly how God had told his people to build it. He obeys God’s word. So far so good.

Then things get a little bit… strange.

I don’t know if he uses a shovel, or just his hands… but Elijah digs a ditch all the way around the altar. There might be a few people there scratching their heads saying… “what’s that about?”

But then he gets on with the job like you’d expect. He puts wood up on the altar for the fire… sacrifices the bull and puts the meat on top of the wood. And then again… things get just a little bit… more strange.

Elijah tells some of the crowd, “fill up four jars of water.” What? Why does he need four jars of water? He doesn’t need that for the fire. But… they do what he says. There’s a river at the bottom of the mountain that still has water in it. They get four jars… carry them down the hill… fill them up… (water’s really heavy)… they carry them all the way back up the hill. And if they thought it was weird before, that’s nothing on what Elijah says now. He says, “Put the water on the meat and on the wood.”

WHAT! Doesn’t he know we’re in the third year of no rain? Doesn’t he know how precious water is? This seems like a complete waste. And also… doesn’t he want it to catch on fire? You don’t put water on wood to START a fire… You use it to put a fire out!

But they do what he’s asked. And then Elijah says, “Do it again.”. So they take the jars back down the hill… fill them up with water… carry them all the way back up the hill… and again… pour the water all over the meat and the wood.

And all the people are staring at Elijah… wondering what he’s gonna do next… And he looks into the eyes of the water carriers… and he says… “do it again.”

Down the hill they go. Fill the jars. Carry them up and pour the water over the meat and wood and altar. Remember that ditch Elijah dug? Well there’s been so much water poured on the altar that its run through and even filled up the ditch. This stuff is soaked! Again, this is not how you normally start a fire.

This seems like its impossible. The prophets of Baal couldn’t get fire when they had dry wood. Plus… there are 450 of them! What’s one tiny prophet… with a soaking wet altar… gonna do?

Well Elijah steps forward to pray. Do you remember how long the prophets of Baal have prayed? They’ve been praying all day, desperately trying to get Baal to pay attention. Elijah’s prayer seems really weak compared to that. It only takes about 30 seconds. But in that 30 seconds he covers everything he needs to. He asks God to prove that he’s the real God, and that Elijah really is his prophet – not some fake. Let me read it to you from verse 36.

It was time for the evening sacrifice. So the prophet Elijah went near the altar. He prayed, “Lord, you are the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel. I ask you now to prove that you are the God of Israel. And prove that I am your servant. Show these people that you commanded me to do all these things. Lord, answer my prayer. Show these people that you, Lord, are God. Then the people will know that you are bringing them back to you.”

Then fire from the Lord came down. It burned the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the ground around the altar. It also dried up the water in the ditch.

There is nothing left. The Lord’s made it SO obvious who the real God is. And verse 39 says:

When all the people saw this, they fell down to the ground. They cried, “The Lord is God! The Lord is God!”

I asked you at the beginning… how do you know which God is the real God. Well the Lord’s made it pretty obvious here. But as amazing as it is… there’s an even better example.

You see… the people there with Elijah… they didn’t actually get to see God. But a few hundred years later God the Son, Jesus, came into the world as a human. And he showed us that he really is God.

God miraculously fed Elijah and the widow and her son. Jesus miraculously fed 5000 men, plus lots of women and children.

God controlled nature by stopping the rain and sending fire from the sky. Jesus controlled nature by stopping the wind and the waves.

God raised the widow’s son to life. Jesus also raised a widow’s son to life. He raised his friend Lazarus to life. He raised a 12 year old girl to life.

You know what else he did? He turned around the hearts of people who hated God… so that they’d love God. They stopped doubting God and realised that he’s a faithful God. You can trust him.

If you want to know the real God… The same God who sent the fire on the altar… the same God who made the earth… get to know Jesus. He really is God in the flesh.

Back in Elijah’s day… everything seems to be fixed. The people have realised who the real God is. God’s about to send the rain. Everyone sees Elijah’s been telling the truth.

But everything’s not quite as good as it seems. There was one person who wasn’t at the mountain that day… Jezebel. And she’s gonna be reeeeaaallly mad. But that’s a story… for next time.