Where is the God of Elijah? part 8 

When Your Faith Fails?  1 Kings 19:1-14

--Sermon by Pastor Dennis Gleason -- October 15, 2006

1When Ahab got home, he told Jezebel what Elijah had done and that he had slaughtered the prophets of Baal. 2So Jezebel sent this message to Elijah: “May the gods also kill me if by this time tomorrow I have failed to take your life like those whom you killed.”
3Elijah was afraid and fled for his life. He went to Beersheba, a town in Judah, and he left his servant there. 4Then he went on alone into the desert, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”
5Then he lay down and slept under the broom tree. But as he was sleeping, an angel touched him and told him, “Get up and eat!” 6He looked around and saw some bread baked on hot stones and a jar of water! So he ate and drank and lay down again.
7Then the angel of the LORD came again and touched him and said, “Get up and eat some more, for there is a long journey ahead of you.”
8So he got up and ate and drank, and the food gave him enough strength to travel forty days and forty nights to Mount Sinai,? the mountain of God. 9There he came to a cave, where he spent the night.
But the LORD said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
10Elijah replied, “I have zealously served the LORD God Almighty. But the people of Israel have broken their covenant with you, torn down your altars, and killed every one of your prophets. I alone am left, and now they are trying to kill me, too.”
11“Go out and stand before me on the mountain,” the LORD told him. And as Elijah stood there, the LORD passed by, and a mighty windstorm hit the mountain. It was such a terrible blast that the rocks were torn loose, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12And after the earthquake there was a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. 13When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.
And a voice said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
14He replied again, “I have zealously served the LORD God Almighty. But the people of Israel have broken their covenant with you, torn down your altars, and killed every one of your prophets. I alone am left, and now they are trying to kill me, too.”

A MOPED DRIVER STOPPED FOR A RED LIGHT BESIDE A NEW CORVETTE. "GREAT LOOKING CAR," HE SHOUTED. THE PROUD DRIVER OPENED THE PASSENGER DOOR SO THE MOPED OPERATOR COULD ADMIRE THE INTERIOR. JUST THEN THE LIGHT TURNED GREEN, THE DRIVER SLAMMED THE DOOR AND SPED OFF. ALMOST IMMEDIATELY THE MOPED CAUGHT UP AND PASSED THE SPORTS CAR. THE DRIVER COULDN’T BELIEVE THIS HE JUST PAID $50,000 FOR THIS CAR AND A MOPED WAS OUTRUNNING HIM, SO THE DRIVER QUICKLY ACCELERATED AND PASSED THE MOPED. THEN THE BIKE ZIPPED AHEAD AGAIN, TURNED ON A DIME, CHARGED BACK IN THE OTHER DIRECTION AND FELL OVER. THE SPORTS CAR BRAKED BESIDE THE BIKE AND THE DRIVER ASKED THE MOPEDER IF HE WAS HURT. "NO THANKS I’M FINE." "IS THERE ANYTHING I CAN DO?" "YES!" GRASPED THE MOPEDER, "YOU CAN OPEN THE DOOR AND RELEASE MY SUSPENDERS..."

As we consider our text for today we need to be reminded of the fact that Sin is a fundamental relationship—it is not wrong doing, but wrong being—it is deliberate and determined independence from God. Oswald Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, Oct. 7th.

We know that Evil cannot tolerate Righteousness.
Darkness is opposed to Light.
Death attempts to destroy Life.
Hatred is set against Love.
Deception is determined to obliterate Truth.
The battle between Right and Wrong continues on and until Jesus returns will never relent.

According to our text, Ahab goes home after his encounter with Elijah on Mt. Carmel and on the way back to Jezreel. It is there that Ahab tells Jezebel what has taken place. Now, Jezebel is the champion of wickedness and evil. She is determined that she will once and for all win the day. She will put an end to this prophet, this thorn in her side. Elijah has made a fatal mistake in her thinking. Elijah is now in Jezreel where she can get at him. “How convenient.” She must think. She takes matters into her own hands and determines to have him killed. It is that simple. Elijah will just have to die. She puts out a contract on his life and then writes him a letter to let him know that within 24 hours he would be dead.

We know that God did not send Elijah to Jezreel. There is no indication in our text to support that idea. We don’t know exactly why he went down to Jezreel, but the fact is that at this point he is in Jezreel and vulnerable to Jezebel’s plans to have him killed.

Elijah’s response to the note from Jezebel was to become afraid. The threat was real, and Elijah knew it. She was ruthless. She was motivated. Her desire was both spiritual and personal in nature. She had the means to accomplish it and Elijah knew it.

And the man who for years had patiently waited upon God to work, who had courageously stood with God against the evil of this woman and her wicked husband, Ahab, suddenly bolts. He is so afraid that he runs from the threat to his life.

All he can see at this moment is the danger she poses for him. At this moment of great peril to his life, he no longer sees God as he once did. All he sees is himself and the danger he is in. And he runs away. Some people believe that he had become prideful, seeing more of himself than of God. Perhaps that is correct. But whatever the reason, Elijah took his eyes off God and what God could do and his faith failed him.

We look a man like Elijah and wonder how it is possible that this could happen. If there was ever a man of God who was able to do great and powerful things for the Lord, it was Elijah. He simply believed God and the results were amazing:  No rain for 3 ½ years, God sending the ravens to feed him by the brook, the widow at Zarephath to care for him and the miracle of the flour and oil to sustain them. And then there was the raising of her son back to life, and of course the fire falling down on Mt. Carmel in the contest with the false prophets. This is a running story of one victory after another in which the love and power of God is displayed for all to see.

And suddenly, in spite of all of this, all Elijah can see is the danger of the threat Jezebel has made on his life. He is overwhelmed and engulfed by this fear and he runs. He no longer believes what he did before. This is an obvious conclusion, because if he did believe, he would have been able to stand up to her and her threats in the power of God’s Holy Spirit. But for some reason his confidence in God has been shattered. His focus is no longer on God or what God could do about her threat but upon himself and what he must do to save his own life.

Once again Elijah embarks on a journey that God has not planned. John Knox translated 1 Kings 19:3 in this manner:  “Elijah took fright and set out on a journey of his own devising.”

Whenever we set out on a journey of our own devising, the results will be the same as what Elijah encountered. He ran away. And the man who had outrun the chariot of King Ahab all the way to Jezreel now runs in his own strength and it wears him down. There is no reference to any special strength from the Spirit of God here. No, it is just the physical strength of a man running for his life; running with a heaving chest, with a dry mouth parched from the dry desert air; with lungs felling as if they would simply burst from the strain. That is how he ran.
And finally, utterly exhausted, he sees a small tree with a little bit of shade, a scraggly desert tree, and he stops beneath it and rests. And once he stopped there, he prayed and asked God if he could just die there.

Look at what he says to the Lord: ““I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”  And then he lay down and went to sleep. Elijah is in the ditch of despair. He is depressed. He is ready to quit. He doesn’t even want to go on living. Elijah has forgotten the fact that God is with him under the Juniper tree every bit as much as he was with him on Mt. Carmel.
God begins working in his life in exactly the same way he works in ours. Remember, Elijah was a man just like us. And the God of Elijah is the same today as He was back then. God will not leave him there under the Juniper tree. All of the sudden, an angel touches Elijah and wakes him up. “Get up and eat!” the angel of the Lord tells him. The writer of our text makes something very interesting quite clear to us. The angel here is referred to as the “angel of the Lord.” This is a title given to the second person of the Godhead…the Son of God…in his pre-incarnate existence. The Son of God will become one of us, one with us through the virgin birth, but this is how he appeared before Elijah…as an angel.
Elijah eats the bread that was prepared for him and drinks of the water in the jar. And then he goes back to sleep. I am not sure that I can picture this adequately. Here you have the Angel of the Lord waking him up, feeding him and he just goes back to sleep. Elijah is really depressed. But God will not let him stay that way. A second time the Angel of the Lord wakes him up and tells him to eat. He must have enough to sustain him for the journey he is about to take.

He is going to go from Jezreel to Mt. Sinai. This is a journey of over 200 miles. He is going to be on foot in one of the most desolate deserts in the world for 40 days and 40 nights. The Angel of the Lord commands him to eat and drink for the journey.
Even as he runs away, God is faithful to provide for him. Even if Elijah has forgotten God and his faithfulness; God has not forgotten Elijah.

What does Elijah need?  He needs a new touch from God in his life. So God wakes him up, tells him to eat and lets him rest under that Juniper tree. But notice this:  God never once rebukes Elijah here. There is no condemnation for running away. God does not bring him up short because of his lack of faith at this juncture of his life. God does not even reproach him for being depressed, or for forgetting how faithful God has been to him in the past. No! God simply restores him and refreshes him. Almost 950 years later, Jesus will prepare breakfast for a group of discouraged fishermen disciples who need a special touch from God every bit as much as Elijah needed it here. And there is no reproach for those disciples either! God simply steps in to encourage us in times like these.
Elijah has blindly fled Jezebel and her threat to his life. And now God is now going to redirect Elijah’s flight so that it becomes an opportunity for a great encounter with God.
Notice where that encounter takes place. It is in the same place that God had hidden Moses in the cleft of the rock, when God passed by so that Moses might see His glory. Elijah goes all the way to Mt. Sinai and he goes into a cave and spends the night. He has come here to Sinai to see God. He didn’t need to, but he does.
And then the word of the Lord came to him:  “What are you doing here, Elijah?” Do you think God doesn’t know why he is there? He just wants Elijah to voice it to Him. And Elijah’s response reveals just how depressed he is: 10Elijah replied, “I have zealously served the LORD God Almighty. But the people of Israel have broken their covenant with you, torn down your altars, and killed every one of your prophets. I alone am left, and now they are trying to kill me, too.”

God commands Elijah to go out of the cave and stand on the mount of God in his presence. And Elijah does. The message to him is this:  See once again what God can do. Suddenly a violent, rushing wind swept across the mountain ridges. The wind was so violent that it ripped apart the rocks of the mountain itself. It was an awesome display of the power of God, but God was not in the wind. And then there was an earthquake. Earthquakes are very frightening things. The one, solid thing in our lives is the earth beneath our feet. And when it begins to shake, it can be terrifying. And God was not in the earthquake, as powerful as it was. And then there was fire on the mountain. It was a furious fire that was not confined to a bush as with Moses. It raced over the face of the mountain consuming everything in its path. But God was not in the fire either.

When the wind stopped blowing, and the earth stopped quaking and when fire quit burning there was nothing but silence on the mountain of God.  And in the intensity of that quietness there came the still, small voice of God. It was a gentle whisper. When he heard it he left the cave and went outside.

The message was the same as before:  “What are you doing here, Elijah?” And his answer was exactly the same. Did you notice that God was very patient and sympathetic with Elijah? He doesn’t condemn him. God doesn’t interrupt him, even though Elijah is saying things that are not true and is making things worse than they really are (something depressed people do).
You see, God knows that depressed people are fragile people. They need to be listened to more than they need advice. It doesn’t help to slap them on the back and say, "Come on get with it, snap out of it. It is not so bad..... you know, you really have it pretty good."

God didn’t say "Elijah you should be ashamed of yourself.. acting this way....." Rather, God just listens to him. God essentially says to Elijah "I called you to be faithful my servant, not successful -- it is I who bring the increase, relax and just serve me with all our heart mind and strength... and don’t worry so much about results."

And then God redirects him and gives him an assignment. This is something God can do for Elijah:
“Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus ( a 300 mile journey). When you get there anoint Hazael king over Aram. Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. That is something he will do for us too.

Oh, and by the way, I reserve seven thousand people in Israel, people who have not bowed down to Baal, whose mouths have not kissed him. You are not alone. You are not the only one left who trusts me.

 God gave Elijah a new assignment, a new challenge. Often what depressed people need is not pity but a new goal, not exemption from responsibility but a new assignment. Fear may intimidate them to reject the challenge, but what they need is not security but the stimulation of a new assignment.... THEY NEED TO GET UP AND GET BUSY FOR THE LORD.

Ultimately, it is a choice we make. We can stay depressed or not; the choice is ours. Look for that new assignment God will give you to help you out of those periods of depression that can come into our lives. His call to us is that we might be faithful…not successful. Did you notice that God was very patient and sympathetic with Elijah? He doesn’t condemn him. God doesn’t interrupt him, even though Elijah is saying things that are not true and is making things worse than they really are (something depressed people do).

When we get depressed we need listen for the still, small voice of God once again. When we hear his voice, we can believe once again. Our faith can be restored. He loves us and in that love he will restore us to usefulness to His Kingdom. Perhaps, you need a new touch from God today. Let him do it. He will if you let him. He will call you to it if you will simply listen for his voice. Where is the God of Elijah when your faith fails? Right where he has been all the time…ready to show you his love, mercy and grace.

--Dennis Gleason