hymns (which I accompany on a piano which is missing the notes from middle C to the C above)
and study the Bible together.
As I drive home, I realize that I have just been with Jesus and some of God’s angels and I
had seen a desert in bloom.
Now on to Elijah.
Elijah is one of those larger-than-life characters we meet in the Old Testament - so much
larger, in fact, that he never died but was taken up to heaven in a chariot. He had an enormously
successful ministry that included the miracle of bringing a dead child back to life. He was not
afraid to confront Israel’s wicked Kind Ahab and his Canaanite wife Jezebel and speak the truth
to power. And when he fled to the desert after having done so, he experienced God’s miraculous
providence through the ravens that brought him food.
When we meet Elijah in the story we read today, he has just come from a spectacular
scene on Mount Carmel during which he has challenged the followers of Baal and left not doubt
about who is the true God of Israel. He has killed hundreds of Baal’s prophets and even outrun
King Ahab’s chariot in a seventeen mile race to the city of Jezreel.
It’s hard to know what Elijah expected after all that. And if he thought all the people in
the city, including its evil king and queen, would repent and turn to God, that’s not the way it
was. When Queen Jezebel learns of the public humiliation and execution of her personal priests,
she is beside herself with fury and decides to get revenge by killing Elijah who must flee for his
life.
Now we see another Elijah, no longer the faithful, authoritative, prayerful, confident hero
of Mt. Carmel. Out there under a solitary desert bush in the far reaches of the southern kingdom
we find a fearful, grieving, burnt-out servant of God who tells God he’s had enough, asks to die,
and lays down to sleep. How in the world will God reach him?
I must say, if I was God, I would wanted to talk some sense into Elijah. But I'm not God,
which is a good thing. God has other ways, often involving angels as his messengers who help in
more practical ways, like the one who comes and touches Elijah and invites him to eat the cake
of bread and drink the water that has appeared by his head. Without so much as a thank-you,
Elijah does that and goes back to sleep. The angel comes back a second time to tell him to get up
and eat - otherwise the journey will be too much.
So you see what has happened - Elijah is stuck, but God hasn’t forced Elijah to do
anything. Instead God has given him some rest and some practical help in the form of food for
the journey, and Elijah is ready to move ahead.
Which he does for 40 days and 40 nights (the Bible’s way of saying a long time),
traveling to Horeb, the mountain of God (a.k.a. Mt. Sinai) where he holes up in a cave, still
feeling alone and abandoned. He’s not "there" yet - but God isn’t done with him yet, either.
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