Audience of One: Why Divided Worship Always Fails
The Bible doesn’t really talk about sports. Hopefully that isn’t a huge surprise for you. Occasionally, the Apostle Paul, who wrote 75% of the New Testament, uses athletic type imagery to make his point. But organized sports have come a long way since the Isthmian games (the first form of organized sports in Corinth and potentially the backdrop for much of Paul’s athletic imagery in scripture).
Despite this reality, there is a story in the Old Testament that has many elements of a classic sports rivalry—even if it has nothing to do with sports.
It can be found in 1 Kings 18:20-40. Before we parachute into the story, let’s get caught up to speed on the context proceeding it. In the book of Genesis, we learn a few foundational truths that are essential to the story God is telling in his Word:
God created everything. And it’s good. (Genesis 1-2)
Mankind sins and fractures everything, including our relationship with God and the world around us. (Genesis 3)
God tells Abraham that he (God) is going to bless everyone through his lineage (Abraham). (Genesis 12)
Abraham has a son, Isaac. Isaac has two sons, Jacob and Esau. Jacob, who is renamed Israel, has 12 sons and becomes the patriarch of the Israelites, God’s chosen people. (Genesis 21-36)
Biblical Context
As God’s plan begins to unfold—to fix what we screwed up through our sin—we see God using the Israelites as his chosen people to bless the nations.
God’s method has always been to use people to reach people.
But Israel often failed. Instead of influencing surrounding nations, they became influenced by them—crying out for kings, worshiping foreign gods, and compromising their allegiance. By the time of King Ahab, Israel had turned far from God. His wife Jezebel promoted idol worship, and the people followed. God doesn’t like divided worship, so He intervened and sent Elijah to announce a devastating drought—a catastrophic occurrence for people who depend on regular rain in order to eat and drink everyday.
This is a big deal. This is bigger than Amazon ceasing to exist. This is no Amazon delivery, no grocery stores, no restaurants. This is “I hope you have everything you need to survive on your property because nothing else is available for a long time.”
The Israelites didn’t see rain for three years. God finally tells Elijah to go meet Ahab. And this is the context as we enter into 1 Kings 18:20-40 (It’s worth pausing here and reading those 20 verses!). A showdown is about to take place between the prophets of the god that Ahab serves, and the one true God.
This is a story about competition.
More specifically, it’s about whatever is competing for the number one spot in your life. Is it sports? A relationship? A career or money? Sex, food, screens, knowledge? It’s a story about the dangers of our full trust in anything other than God himself.
Divided Worship Back Then = Idolatry
1 Kings 18 reads like an anecdotal tennis match where the people of God keep going back and forth between choosing the living God or counterfeit gods. The people of God want to follow him. But when God doesn’t show up on their timetable, they put their trust in the god called Baal instead.
So Elijah does what any good prophet should do. He challenges the people to do away with their idols and make a choice to follow the one true God. Stop using God when He is convenient and backing out or turning to other “gods” when things get difficult. Are you all in or all out? When God doesn’t provide the rain for them immediately, then they jump back to trusting Baal to provide.
They ignored Deuteronomy 6:5 which calls the Israelites—and us—to “Love God with all your heart, soul, strength.” All the time, not just when it’s easy.
And the result is a half-hearted, divided commitment to God. It's lukewarm, lacking conviction. It’s a spineless, nerf ball faith. And because of it, their worship is misdirected.
Divided Worship Today = Idolatry
Before we look down on the Israelites lack of trust, we might look in the mirror and recognize this uncomfortable truth: we do the same today. We trust God to provide our needs for a short time and quickly shift to trusting our sport or something else the next.
Why do we divide our worship? One potential answer: we want to get the most out of life, so we diversify our worship portfolio. Another answer: we fear what God would do if we gave every area of our life fully to Him. So we keep a few worldly side-hustles just in case we perceive God is letting us down.
Do you remember walking through the line at the cafeteria with your compartmentalized lunch tray? One section for your vegetables. One section for dessert. One section for the main course. One section for a roll (or more dessert if you could sneak it). If we’re not careful, we can treat God like another item at the buffet line. We’ll give him a spot, because we know we should or maybe even because we really want him. But we position him as an equal to everything else going on in our lives. Our life ends up looking like an old-school lunch plate that positions God as one option among many. He becomes just another spoke in the wheel of your life where each area is conveniently compartmentalized. If one area lets us down, we have other areas to compensate for it. It feels safer, because it gives us the illusion of control.
In reality, the idols on our plate control us. And they paralyze us from moving forward.
In sport, divided worship could look like:
Always praying for a win or success instead of “Thy will be done.”
Giving God attention during the pre-game and post-game prayer, but neglecting His presence during competition.
Ignoring your role as a witness (through words or action) to your teammates.
Filling your social media with faith filled content, but filling your mind with music that draws your heart away from God.
Can you hear the silence?
Athlete, what’s our endgame? How long will we continue to give God a portion of our lives instead of all of it? When will our worship shift from an audience of many to an Audience of One?
If you struggle to answer those questions, you’re not alone.
It says in 1 Kings 18:21,
“And Elijah came near to all the people and said, ‘How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.’ And the people did not answer him a word.”
The people did not answer him a word.
Elijah challenges the people’s divided worship and they respond with silence. There’s significance in the silence. Like us, they want the answers before they commit. Baal is the Canaanite god of fertility, promising to bring life to bodies and seeds in the ground and to water the earth so it can grow. So the people want to know: who is the safer bet? Who will provide the rain they need for crops to grow? Elijah's God, who they can't see but who claims to be the creator and sustainer of all, or Baal, an idol they can see, who promises to bring fertility to the earth?
The people are silent because they want proof that they can trust in God before they actually decide to trust Him. Their posture is “Show me, and then I’ll trust.” But there is no risk in that. And where there is no risk, there is no faith.
Athlete, God often requires us to trust Him first and He’ll show us second.
This is what He did with Abraham, saying He would make a nation of people out of Abraham, he just had to trust God and leave everything that was comfortable behind.
This is what He did with Joseph as he endured hardship after hardship and stayed faithful to God despite not knowing what God was doing behind the scenes.
This is what He did with Noah. And Moses. And Jonah. And Gideon. It's the way the God of the Bible operates.
It’s important to note that this is not advocating for a blind-faith type of decision. It’s recognizing that God has given us enough already to trust Him, even when we don’t have all of the answers. Remember, this is the same God who created the mountains, and the oceans, and life as we know it. It’s the same God who entered into the world in the form of man (Jesus) to fix what we royally screwed up. It’s the same God who gives us his Holy Spirit to help us better align with his image on a daily basis. He has proven trustworthy if we take a few minutes to think about who He is and what He has done.
God deserves wholehearted worship directed to Him alone, not a divided worship that shares His glory with idols we create or lean on. Worship always begins with where we give our attention. We can say all the right things about playing for God. But if our heart and head are obsessing about what everyone around us thinks, it shows we may more likely be worshipping others’ opinions. This is the entire perspective built around the mantra “Audience of One.” It’s a mantra that says “Even though there are competing voices all around me, screaming for my attention and identity, I’m going to choose to live and play as if God is the only One watching.”
The Showdown
In 1 Kings 18:22-24, Elijah calls the prophets of Baal—all 450 of them, to a showdown. The rules are simple. Each side gets a bull. Cut it into pieces and lay it on some wood. Then, call to the god you serve, and ask him to ignite the sacrifice on fire.
The terms have been set. Pick a side. Are you with the one true God of Israel or with the god of baal? No more wallowing back and forth.
Commit.
Elijah gave the people a choice. Stop limping back and forth. Choose today whom you will serve. God gives us a choice too. We may not feel the urgency to choose right at this moment, but that’s what He wants us to do. The time to choose God or continue following other idols in your life is not next year. It’s not next week or even tomorrow. It’s right now. Before you decide, know this: there is great danger in defaulting to a back and forth allegiance. If you choose that route, a route that elevates a trust in things besides God, you are actively choosing idolatry.
Again, the real issue is not abandoning God outright, but giving Him partial allegiance—making Him just one option on the tray. Athlete, be certain of this: God’s never shown any interest in sharing His throne.
Elijah didn’t allow that. He forced the question: Who will you serve?
And God still asks the same today.
Areas of Allegiance
What does that mean practically for you? If this entire article is alluding to the idea that there may be areas in your life where you are trusting the god of sport more than the God of the Bible.
Here are five potential areas worth monitoring:
1. Performance Based Identity: The god of sport preaches that success, statistics, wins, and playing time are the true measure of worth, causing to believe their identity is rooted in performance rather than in Christ
2. Wrongly Aimed Ambition: The god of sport disciples us into giving a disproportionate amount of attention to scholarships, professional opportunities, championships, or records—crowding out eternal priorities. When we over obsess with earthly metrics, our ambition can subtly shift from glorifying God to glorifying self.
3. Audience of Many: The god of sport pressures us to bow to the expectations of teammates, coaches, fans, and even family. Ultimately, the fear of disappointing others ends up competing with obedience to God.
4. Full Schedules: The god of sport demands that we give all of our extra time to training, competition, travel, and recovery, often pushing aside time for worship, Scripture, prayer, and fellowship. Our faith risks slipping into the margins of a sports dominated the schedule.
5. Image Management: The god of sport encourages us to curate, market and commodify our name, image and likeness, even when it conflicts with the call to holiness and discipleship that following Jesus requires.
Athlete, this is your moment. Not next season. Not after college. Not once you’ve “made it.” Will you keep limping between divided loyalties—or will you worship the one true God with all your heart? And He isn’t looking for half your worship. He wants your whole life. Not because He’s a joy-robber. Quite the opposite. He knows that a life lived in pursuit of His glory above all else will lead to the joy and contentment we all long to experience.
Choose today whom you will serve.
