WHEN WE CONFRONT OUR IDOLS, WE’LL SEE THEY ARE POWERLESS TO SAVE US. 

SCRIPTURE | 1 Kings 18:20-26,30-39 

CENTRAL TRUTH 

God’s people wavered between the one true God and a false one. We often waver when we feel like God isn’t hearing us or helping us. We turn to other people, status, sports, money, and so on as we search for comfort or identity. We make them our gods, but they can’t give us what we need. 

KEY QUESTION 

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO WAVER? WHY DO WE STRUGGLE WITH WAVERING BETWEEN GOD AND THE WORLD? 

KEEP IN MIND 

Our students sometimes fight hard for attention. Maybe it’s a guy or a girl they like, or maybe it’s a coach. Some of them fight for a parent’s attention because they feel neglected. It’s tiring, though— striving to make someone notice you. Sometimes, we even do the same thing with God. Students may think they need to check all the right boxes—like attending church, praying, reading the Bible, or making godly decisions—for God to notice them or for Him to care about them. And while these spiritual disciplines position students to know God and to hear God’s voice, they don’t earn His attention. Instead, when students love God, then they’ll desire to do these things and more. We can remind our students that God’s attention is already on them and has been since before He created them (Ps. 139:1-16). He knows them—their heart and their motives. The God of heaven and earth sees them, and they don’t have to strive for His attention. 

APPLICATION 

ELIJAH STOOD AGAINST 850 FALSE PROPHETS. WHAT KEEPS YOU FROM STANDING FOR GOD? 

THE WIN 

FOR THE STUDENT: We can’t ignore the fact that standing for the Lord sometimes means our students stand alone. But the truth is that even when they feel like they’re standing alone, they’re not. The Holy Spirit—the same power which raised Christ from the grave—is with them! Even when their family and friends may not go with them, God will never, ever leave them. 

FOR THE LEADER: As leaders, we still sometimes waver between allegiance to God and allegiance to the world. We can show our students what it looks like to be devoted wholly to the Lord. In the same way that our own wavering affects those around us, our devotion impacts people too.