Can you imagine being one of the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18? You just spent an entire day calling out to Baal to send fire down on your bull. When that “didn’t work,” you leaped about the altar you made, cried aloud, cut yourself until blood gushed out and continued to call out to Baal all day. You did this from morning until the evening sacrifice, but there was no “answer.”
Then, imagine. You sat down in exhaustion. You watched Elijah build an altar of 12 stones, dig a trench around it, lay the wood and bull on it, then pour 12 pots of water on the altar, filling up the trench. “What a crazy guy!” Then you heard his short prayer to his God (kind of pitiful next to your day-long petition). All of a sudden you saw the fire coming. “Oh yeah? Big deal!” It consumed the entire sacrifice and the wood. “Oh yeah? Big deal!” It consumed the stones and the dust. “Oh yeah? Big deal!” It licked up the water in the trench. “Oh yeah? Big deal!”
Yes, it was a big deal! “…All the people saw it…fell on their faces; and they said, ‘The LORD, He is God! The LORD, He is God!’” (1 Kings 18:20-40). Not a good day to follow Baal!