High Places
High Places
Elijah is Israel’s Gandalf. He is like a wizard. Elijah’s world is magical and supernatural. It is a world of close encounters with strange things. Before meeting Elijah, however, let’s enter his world (1 Kings 3).
What is the world of Elijah like? It is a world of “high places” (i.e. 1 Kings 3.2, 3, and 4). Verse 2 is an example: “The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the LORD.” High places were places of salvation, places to fill the God-shaped and God-sized hole in the human soul. High places were also everywhere – in homes, caves, valleys, mountains, Asherah Poles, and portal stones. Why? The answer is because the ancient world knew anything and everything has the potential to be a high place. They knew people will look for salvation anywhere, not just in church.
For example, there were high places for fertility in the ancient world because children were believed to possess the power to save you. Children gave women worth and meaning, the love of their husband, and a life worth living. Children gave men honor, importance, wealth, security, and a worthy life. Infertility was devastating. It was a death.
Today, parents still make their children high places. This is why we become that parent in the stands. Today, teenagers make boyfriends and girlfriends high places. This is why they get sexually involved, unhealthily smother each other, turn into someone they do not even like, and then feel guilty and anxious all the time. Today, singles make marriage a high place. Longing for that someone to “love me, heal me, complete me.”
Notice the connection between high places and worship (vv.2-4). Whatever we look to for salvation we worship. We love and adore it. We celebrate and sing about it. We trust and serve it. We gladly sacrifice for it. We eagerly tell others about it. Every human being worships, not just those who go to church.
How do we fill the God-shaped, God-size hole in our soul? “At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon” (v.5). Notice where God appears to Solomon: “And the king went to Gibeon…the great high place...At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon” (vv.4-5). God appears to Solomon amidst his high place. God appears to Solomon in his mess. Solomon has a close encounter with the strangeness of the grace of God. The God of grace is salvation.
This chapter ends with the famous account of Solomon’s great wisdom to discern the true mom from the false mom amidst the horrific loss of a child and the compounded pain of the mother swapping her dead child for her friend’s living child in the middle of the night, and then claiming him as hers. “And the king said, ‘Bring me a sword. Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other’” (v.24). The true mom says (v.26), “Oh, my Lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death!” The true mom endures loss for the sake of her child. The false gods of the high places say, “Divide her! Divide him!” And they do. The true God says, “I will divide my Son instead!” And so fills God-shaped and God-sized holes in souls with salvation.
Elijah is Israel’s Gandalf. He is like a wizard. Elijah’s world is magical and supernatural. It is a world of close encounters with strange things. Before meeting Elijah, however, let’s enter his world (1 Kings 3).
What is the world of Elijah like? It is a world of “high places” (i.e. 1 Kings 3.2, 3, and 4). Verse 2 is an example: “The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the LORD.” High places were places of salvation, places to fill the God-shaped and God-sized hole in the human soul. High places were also everywhere – in homes, caves, valleys, mountains, Asherah Poles, and portal stones. Why? The answer is because the ancient world knew anything and everything has the potential to be a high place. They knew people will look for salvation anywhere, not just in church.
For example, there were high places for fertility in the ancient world because children were believed to possess the power to save you. Children gave women worth and meaning, the love of their husband, and a life worth living. Children gave men honor, importance, wealth, security, and a worthy life. Infertility was devastating. It was a death.
Today, parents still make their children high places. This is why we become that parent in the stands. Today, teenagers make boyfriends and girlfriends high places. This is why they get sexually involved, unhealthily smother each other, turn into someone they do not even like, and then feel guilty and anxious all the time. Today, singles make marriage a high place. Longing for that someone to “love me, heal me, complete me.”
Notice the connection between high places and worship (vv.2-4). Whatever we look to for salvation we worship. We love and adore it. We celebrate and sing about it. We trust and serve it. We gladly sacrifice for it. We eagerly tell others about it. Every human being worships, not just those who go to church.
How do we fill the God-shaped, God-size hole in our soul? “At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon” (v.5). Notice where God appears to Solomon: “And the king went to Gibeon…the great high place...At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon” (vv.4-5). God appears to Solomon amidst his high place. God appears to Solomon in his mess. Solomon has a close encounter with the strangeness of the grace of God. The God of grace is salvation.
This chapter ends with the famous account of Solomon’s great wisdom to discern the true mom from the false mom amidst the horrific loss of a child and the compounded pain of the mother swapping her dead child for her friend’s living child in the middle of the night, and then claiming him as hers. “And the king said, ‘Bring me a sword. Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other’” (v.24). The true mom says (v.26), “Oh, my Lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death!” The true mom endures loss for the sake of her child. The false gods of the high places say, “Divide her! Divide him!” And they do. The true God says, “I will divide my Son instead!” And so fills God-shaped and God-sized holes in souls with salvation.
Recent
Archive
Categories
no categories