Disclaimer: The following is what I personally take away from my study of 1 Kings 19. I am not a counselor or a psychologist and I am not giving counseling advice here. I am not a mental health professional and I am not trained to deal with depression. These are simply the lessons I take away from this story and that I have found personally helpful.

This is the final post in my Becoming Elijah series. I encourage you to read and/or listen to the other posts but this one stands on its own.

Quick Overview

• Elijah shows up and tells the king there will be no rain or dew except at his word. (Part 1)

• God tells Elijah to hide by the Brook Cherith. Elijah is to drink from the brook and God will send ravens to feed him. (Part 1)

• The brook dries and God tells Elijah to go live with a widow in Zarephath. (Part 2)

• Elijah lives with the widow and God miraculously provides for them by not allowing the flour or oil to run out. (Part 2)

• The widow’s son becomes sick and dies. Elijah prays and God restores life to the boy. (Part 3)

• God tells Elijah to present himself to King Ahab. (Part 4)

• Elijah, King Ahab, all the prophets of Baal and Asherah gather at the top of Mount Carmel and all of Israel come to witness the showdown. Elijah and the prophets of Baal each will prepare a sacrifice but no one is allowed to set it on fire. Each is to pray and cry out to their god and the god who answers with fire from heaven is the true God. (Part 4)

• Nothing happens while the prophets of Baal jump and shout but when Elijah prays fire comes from heaven and consumes his offering. proving to all that the LORD is the only true God, and all the prophets o Baal are put to death. (Part 4)

• Elijah then prays and it rains again. (Part 5)

Expectations

What would you expect to happen next?

Elijah prayed and fire came down from heaven.

Elijah prayed and it sained after three and a half years of drought.

Baal was not able to make it rain, Baal was unable to save his prophets. Meanwhile, the LORD clearly demonstrated, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that He is the real God, He controls the weather and He was able to keep Elijah alive when Jezebel wanted to kill him. I would expect spiritual revival to breakout throughout Israel. I would expect Jezebel to apologize for promoting the worship of a false god, and for trying to kill Elijah for all those years. I would expect Elijah to be promoted, to have a nice job, a decent income that would allow him to live comfortably, and a happy a prosperous remainder of his life as spiritual leader of the nation.

Reality

And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, also how he had executed all the prophets with the sword.
- 1 Kings 19:1 NKJV

From the way the writer begins the account maybe you get a slight hint of where this is going. Notice how the execution of all the prophets with the sword is mentioned. He could have talked about the fire, the rain, how Elijah had run ahead and from Mount Carmel to Jezreel (approx. 25 miles). There was more than enough evidence for anyone to believe. This just goes to illustrate that those who choose to reject God will do so even in the face of overwhelming evidence.

The biblical text does not go into details but I can imagine Jezebel was not very happy about the execution of all the false prophets. And I say this based on the very next thing the text does describe Jezebel doing.

A Message from the queen.

Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time.”
- 1 Kings 19:2 NKJV

I am no expert in trying to kill someone, but I am pretty sure sending a messenger to announce they have 24hrs is not the best approach. It’s almost as if Jezebel knew she could not do anything beyond that but was hoping her threat would be enough to cause Elijah to flee. This reminds me of a Bible passage.

Be on your guard and stay awake. Your enemy, the devil, is like a roaring lion, sneaking around to find someone to attack.
- 1 Peter 5:8 Contemporary English Version

I remember going to the zoo as a child in Brazil and hearing the lion roaring. Even though I was in a safe place the roar of the lion still made me want to move away, it was like my body was very much aware of the danger that a lion presents. I can’t imagine the fear that would grip someone who runs into a lion in the wild.

So here is how I see this. Satan is not only looking for someone to attack, he also tries to intimidate those he can’t attack. I have no doubt that God would have protected Elijah from Jezebel and that it would only give the people more evidence of God’s power. Similarly, when you are walking with God, and Satan cannot take your life, it does not mean that he will not try to scare and intimidate you. If Satan can cause you to doubt, to run away, to give up, he can count that as a victory.

I am sure that Satan could not touch Elijah at that point in Elijah’s life. So he did his very best to scare Elijah, he used someone to discourage Elijah, to take his focus away from God and what God had done for him. Do we ever allow that to take place in our life? Do we allow someone who is against God to succeed in planting doubt in our hearts and robbing us of the joy and assurance of salvation we have in Christ?

Think about this with me.

If Jezebel was really interested in who was the real God, whether Baal or the LORD, she would have been at the top of Mount Carmel along with everyone else in Israel. Could it be that sometimes we are blinded to all that God is doing in us and through us just because of a comment from someone who does not even show up? By someone who is not even trying to help? By someone who is not even interested in what God is doing?

Running for his life

And when he saw that, he arose and ran for his life, and went to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there.
- 1 Kings 19:3 NKJV

I bet you didn’t see this coming!

In three short verses the writer has totally changed the flow of the story. Victory seems to be transformed into defeat, the brave prophet into a cowering refugee, and the victory over death and Baal into an opportunity for death to reassert itself through Jezebel’s oath to take Elijah’s life.
-House, P. R. (1995). 1, 2 Kings (Vol. 8, p. 222). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

Elijah’s previous victories had opened the doors for still greater victories, but he was turned away by the threats of Jezebel. God had placed Elijah on vantage ground yet he ran away and placed himself in a position of weakness.

How will the Lord prove to be God now?

I want to die?

But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he prayed that he might die, and said, “It is enough! Now, Lord, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers!”
- 1 Kings 19:4 NKJV

I am so glad that I am not God. If Elijah came to me asking to die I would have said that if that was indeed what he wanted, why did he run away from Jezebel? She was eager to help him with that request.

Elijah did not really want to die, at least I do not think so. I believe Elijah just did not want his life efforts to be a waste. Elijah wanted to know that his life’s work was not meaningless, that he had not just wasted all those years. I believe that Elijah longed for a meaningful life and it all felt worthless. I imagine he expected revival to begin, for Jezebel to convert or at least to finally leave him and the prophets of the LORD alone. But it feels like nothing changed, everything continues the same.

What hope is there? When you do your very best, when God comes through and works a miracle, but it feels like no lasting change has taken place. I too would feel like giving up. Elijah was faithful, he had faithfully done what God asked every time up to now. But the frustration of feeling like it had all been for naught just drove him to run away and to not want to live, not if life was going to be like this.

I admit that it is difficult to continue to move forward when things don’t turn out the way we expect. How do you handle failure? Better yet, how do you identify failure?

Was Elijah a failure? Does the behavior of one woman define his ministry? Should we measure success in ministry strictly by numbers?

Jesus’ disciples fled when He was taken to be crucified, was Jesus a failure?

I have tried to define success in ministry by faithfulness to God and not by visible results. Elijah did not see any immediate results to his faithfulness to God, so he felt like a failure.

I wonder how many parents and people in different circumstances feel like a failure when the results of their correct and good actions are not immediately visible. Can we be content with faithfully doing God’s will for years, going through difficulties, feeling alone and invisible, never being properly recognized… how long can you last like this?

Before we rush to criticize Elijah, he had been living a difficult life of loneliness and quiet service for three and a half years. Not to mention the past 48 hours or so must have been extremely stressful and exhausting. This can be surprising but it seems like we are very vulnerable to depression after a great victory or success.

What will God do next?

What would you expect God to do?

His best prophet just ran away and now is asking to die. Elijah’s flight hurt the cause of God in Israel. Jezebel is seen as a powerful figure if she can cause the mighty Elijah to flee. Elijah faced hundreds of false prophets, he prayed and fire fell from heaven, he prayed and it rained again after a drought that lasted over three years. But he fled from Jezebel. Should the people of Israel fear God or Jezebel? Elijah abandoned them, is God really as powerful as He seemed? Has God indeed won the victory? Or is Baal, Jezebel’s god really more powerful since Elijah was the one who fled and Jezebel the one who remained in power?

Is God angry with Elijah?

Will God punish Elijah?

What will God do next?

Then as he lay and slept under a broom tree, suddenly an angel touched him, and said to him, “Arise and eat.” Then he looked, and there by his head was a cake baked on coals, and a jar of water. So he ate and drank, and lay down again.
- 1 Kings 19:5-6 NKJV

When Elijah was at his lowest point, feeling like a failure, completely alone, God showed up and offered him a freshly baked cake! And a jar of water, perhaps Elijah considered asking for cold milk but decided water worked too.

God showed up to provide for Elijah. Even when Elijah had run away, even when Elijah felt like a failure, Even when Elijah was all alone and scared and tired and depressed, God showed up and brought cake! That’s the God we worship! That’s the God of the Old Testament, the God of the Bible, my God. The God who shows up with cake!

The journey is too Great for you

And the angel of the Lord came back the second time, and touched him, and said, “Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for you.” So he arose, and ate and drank; and he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights as far as Horeb, the mountain of God.
- 1 Kings 19:7-8 NKJV

God provides Elijah with more cake and tells him that the journey is too great for him. We are not meant to go on this journey on our own. We need God’s help. When God offers you cake, take it, enjoy the moments of joy and find in them the strength to push you through the next leg of your journey. On the long journey remember that God fed you cake, God is there for you, you are not alone, you are not a failure, you are a child of God!

Elijah went on to travel 40 days covering roughly 250 miles from Beersheba to Horeb.

What are you doing here?

And there he went into a cave, and spent the night in that place; and behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and He said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
- 1 Kings 19:9 NKJV

When our decisions are based on fear and not love we find ourselves outside of God’s plan for our lives. If God asked you why are you where you are in life, what answer would you give him? Are you here because of the mission God has called you to?

Your career, your area of study in school, your use of your time and resources, what brings you here, wherever “here” is for you is it based on love? Passion? Sense of mission? Personal calling? Or are you here because of fear and attempts to run away from discomfort?

God asks Elijah what he was doing there because God had directed every move before this point.

• Elijah presented himself before the Ahab to deliver a message from God (1 Kings 17:1)

• God told Elijah to go hide by the Brook Cherith (1 Kings 17:2-3)

• God told Elijah to go stay with the widow in Zarephath (1 Kings 17:8-9)

• God told Elijah to present himself before Ahab again (1 Kings 18:1)

But God never told Elijah to go to this mountain. So why was Elijah there? you could argue that Elijah was seeking God and wanted to go to Horeb, the mountain of God. But God does not work that way, the God of the Bible comes to us, we don’t go to Him. Could it be that Elijah was afraid, and burned out, and used seeking God as an excuse for running away from his problems? But I guess if you’re going to run away from anything might as well run in the direction of God.

I am all alone

So he said, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I alone am left; and they seek to take my life.”
- 1 Kings 19:10 NKJV

Elijah feels alone and wants to feel sorry for himself. To be honest, it makes sense for Elijah to feel sorry for himself, he has led a challenging life. Elijah feels alone, but that does not mean that he is alone. But God does not reply to what Elijah said. Instead, God reveals Himself to Elijah.

God’s revelation

Then He said, “Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice.

So it was, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him, and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
- 1 Kings 19:11-13 NKJV

Do we expect God to reveal Himself in destructive forces of nature?

Do we recognize Him when He shows up as a still small voice?

Are there enough quiet moments in our lives for us to hear God, to recognize His presence?

Perhaps we could benefit from cultivating quiet time with God, from creating space to listen to His leading.

What are you doing here?

And he said, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God of hosts; because the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I alone am left; and they seek to take my life.”
-1 Kings 19:14 NKJV

God repeats His question to Elijah and Elijah doubles down on his answer. Elijah is trapped in a narrative where he is a victim. Did he forget so quickly how God provided for him miraculously? Did he forget that it is the God he serves who controls the rain, the wind, the earthquake, and the fire? Elijah has nothing to fear, he is on God’s side. How often do we feel sorry for ourselves about how difficult it is to be a faithful follower of God? In reality, our hearts should break for those who do not know God. We are the ones who are saved (Ephesians 2:8), who have hope (1 Peter 1:13), we are told by the God of the universe to not be afraid (Isaiah 41:3), we know that Jesus is coming again soon (Revelation 22:20). We are the bringers of good news (Mark 16:15)!

When we begin to feel sorry for ourselves we lose focus of the mission and instead focus on ourselves. Whenever I spend too much time thinking about how difficult life is I begin to feel sorry for myself. I begin to feel powerless and want to be helped. It is okay to want and to need help, but not lose focus that we are called to help those around us. I find joy and meaning in doing what God called me to do in His strength! My life must be all about Him otherwise I begin to lose the desire to live.

God’s Reply

Then the Lord said to him: “Go, return on your way to the Wilderness of Damascus; and when you arrive, anoint Hazael as king over Syria. Also you shall anoint Jehu the son of Nimshi as king over Israel. And Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel Meholah you shall anoint as prophet in your place. It shall be that whoever escapes the sword of Hazael, Jehu will kill; and whoever escapes the sword of Jehu, Elisha will kill.
- 1 Kings 19:15-17 NKJV

God does not join Elijah in his self-pity party. God gives Elijah a mission. God still has plans for Elijah, if Elijah is still willing to live a meaningful life. God does not give up on us, even when we give up on ourselves.

God also tells Elijah to begin to disciple, to train and prepare his successor. When you’re tired and worn and feel like you can’t go on for much further, find someone to train, someone who will be able to go farther than you have ever gone because of your willingness to equip and empower them in the Lord! We need to invest in the next generation!

You are not alone

Yet I have reserved seven thousand in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.”
- 1 Kings 19:18 NKJV

When you are faithful to God you are not alone, you are a member of the remnant! Revelation 12:17

Takeaway

The following is what I personally take away from this story. I am not a counselor or a psychologist and I am not giving counseling advice here. I am not a mental health professional. These are simply the lessons I take away from this story and that I have found personally helpful.

Whenever I feel discouraged and burned out I step back, slow down, spend some time in nature and listen for the still small voice of God to speak.

I ask myself “What am I doing here?” Did I arrive here pursuing a mission and a calling? Did I follow my heart here or was I running away from discomfort and difficulties?

I pray for God to reveal to me what He would have me do.

I remind myself that I am not alone and that I am with God, and He is more than able to provide for all my needs (Philippians 4:19).

I look for someone to invest in! Someone to disciple, coach, encourage and equip.