Some nine centuries before the time of Jesus, there lived a
great prophet of God. This was Elijah the Tishbite, who stood against the
incursion of foreign religion into Israel. Elijah, who defied King and royal
court in defense of the historic faith of his people. Elijah, who denounced Israel's foreign Queen
and emerged victorious from a deadly contest with over 400 priests of the
fertility cult of Baal.
You no doubt have heard, or even read these stirring, and
rather bloodthirsty stories. You’ve probably noticed how in all of these
stories, Elijah is the very personification of the stiff-necked Old Testament
faith in Yahweh, the Sovereign God of Israel. Indeed, by the time of Jesus,
Elijah had come to be regarded as the greatest of the Prophets— the standard by
which all other prophets were judged
Today we encounter, however, not the victorious prophet, not
the miracle worker, not the seemingly fearless defender of the faith. Rather,
we meet Elijah the refugee fleeing from the terrible vengeance of Queen
Jezebel. We see Elijah the man, beset by
fears and doubts. We see the prophet as
a very human instrument, consumed by self-pity and loneliness, prepared to
chuck it in, all-too-ready to give in to fear and despair and hopelessness.
Yes, Yahweh God had defeated the priests of Baal. Yes, the
fire of Israel's God had come down from the sky and consumed the bonfire. Yes,
the crowd of onlookers had slaughtered those 400 pagan priests. But now the arm of the state had been
stretched out against Elijah.
The people of Israel have seen the mighty works of their
God. And yet still they persist in idol worship. Elijah has failed.
The task is simply too great. It was and it is hopeless. Now all that Elijah can do is try and keep
one step ahead of the avenging soldiers of that pagan, idol-worshipping Queen
Jezebel-- who has sworn to kill him.
So Elijah flees. Like a homing
pigeon, Elijah flees into the wilderness. The wilderness-- where Abraham and
Sarah followed the command of God to seek a promised land. The wilderness-- where Moses and Miriam led
the refugees from Egypt. The wilderness-- where Jacob wrestled with God’s angel
and won the name “Israel”. The
wilderness-- where the prophets and holy men and women of God throughout
History had always found refuge, found retreat, found renewal, found their God.
There in that desolate place, Elijah is ministered to by an
angel, who feeds him with food that sustains Elijah for forty days--a holy
period of time. Yet still haunted by his sense of failure and despair, Elijah
continues to flee from the battlefield of his God. Deeper and deeper into the Sinai he flees,
until at last Elijah reaches the Holy Mountain of God- -Horeb.
Horeb-- where Yahweh spoke to
Moses from the burning bush. Horeb-- where Elijah expected to find, what?
Comfort? Sympathy? Perhaps an army of angels he could lead against the pagan
followers of Jezebel?
We can't know for sure what he
expected to find there, but the text makes clear Elijah’s mood-- black, bleak
despair-- a mood of profound hopelessness. Today we would call it clinical
depression-- but Elijah has no Zoloft, no Prozac, no Wellbutrin and no Paxil.
Elijah has hit bottom-- and Elijah has no twelve step
group, no shrink, no support system.
Nothing has gone right. The covenant between Israel and the
God of Hosts has been forsaken. The altars of Yahweh have been destroyed and
desecrated. All of the priests and prophets of the Holy One have been slain, or
have gone over to the pagan baals.
Only poor old Elijah is left. Only he has remained faithful. Only he has carried on the fight, (or so
it seems to Elijah). And now, he finds himself hunted-- a fugitive, feeling utterly alone in his zeal and his
faith. (Or so it seems to him.)
What a strange mixture of self-pity and arrogance we can see
in Elijah at that moment! Yet it's the
very same mixture that you and I indulge ourselves in during our times of doubt and despair. Right
now, a lot of people in our world, a lot of people in our churches seem to feel
like Elijah.
Just listen to them. They’ll tell you. They're the only ones at work who really believe in God. They're the only
ones at school who really believe in
God. They're the only ones who really
understand the Bible.. and the Christian faith. They're the only ones at church
who do all the work. They’re the only
ones holding the congregation together. The efforts and prayers and fruits of
everyone else in the congregation are invisible to them. All those other people
who say they're Christians are
self-deceived or heretics or hypocrites, or just not quite up to snuff.
It’s almost as if Elijah has come to Horeb to demand an
apology from God, or to receive an award, or at least to gain a little
sympathy. Elijah has forgotten that our God is a God who challenges and calls
us. Our God is a God who supports and strengthens us. Our God is a God who
walks beside us and weeps with us. But
our God is never a God who coddles
us.
There's a story about Sam Jones, a Methodist preacher in
Georgia in
the 1920s.
He visited a sick man in the hospital for a pretty minor
problem. As it happened this fellow was known for being something of a
reprobate. When he saw Rev.
Jones, he exclaimed, "Oh, Brother Jones, pray for my healing. If God will only heal me I'll straighten up
my life. I'll quit drinking and smoking and I'll get back to church every
Sunday. I'll start tithing and quit running around on my wife, etc. etc.
etc..."
Rev. Jones took the man's hand, kneeled at his bedside and
prayed: "Lord, you've heard Brother Brown's promises. If he means it, cure him. If he doesn't, kill
him. Amen."
There on the mountain, the prophet enters a cave. Elijah
sleeps, and in the morning comes a voice.
"Why are you here,
Elijah?"
"Because I've been faithful!
I've been loyal and now no one but me is left. Do something, will you! You
called me, and it's all over. We've lost
and they want to kill me. You've got to do something!"
But even as Elijah tries to wheedle his God into apologizing
for a dearth of support and guidance, the hand of the Divine interrupts. Just
as God will unexpectedly intrude into our own private caves of despair and
blame and doubt, God breaks into Elijah's self-pity and complaining.
"Go
out and stand on the mountainside."
Comes the reply. And out on the mountain Elijah encounters all the spectacle,
all the grandeur of nature.
First comes a mighty wind, howling through the mountains,
tossing boulders around like children's toys. What a wind it must have been!
Scripture tells us that it rendered mountains and shattered rocks. It must have
been a wind to belittle tornadoes. It is in such a wind that Job is supposed to
have encountered God. But for Elijah, the wind is empty. God is not there.
Then came an earthquake. The very ground under the prophet's
feet must have shook with the violence of it. It is the same sort of earthquake
that is supposed to have destroyed Sodom. 10, 12, 14, who knows how many points
it would have been on the Richter scale? But for Elijah, the earthquake is
empty. His God is not there.
Then came a fire-- scorching and burning. A blazing inferno.
The same sort of fire from heaven that consumed the 400 priests of Baal right
before Elijah's eyes not so very many weeks previously. But for Elijah, the fire is also empty. His
God is not there, either.
Throughout the Old Testament, the presence of Yahweh the God
of all creation, the Maker of the Universe, the God of untamable,
uncontrollable power and might was often felt in thunder, quaking earth, searing flames. But
while this is the face of God that
Elijah had looked for to teach Israel a lesson, it is not the face of God that Elijah's
frightened inner self really needs. At that moment, for Elijah, God was purposefully not to be discerned in all
those easy images of power.
At last, there is a sound. or at
least the lack of sound. It is the sound of utter silence and stillness. A low
murmur. A subtle, still, small voice that could only be heard within. And then
Elijah knew. And Elijah hid his face and slowly walked out onto the slope of
the mountain. For God was there. Again God spoke. And Elijah listened.
"Why are
you here, Elijah?" And Elijah,
his face muffled in his cloak, repeats his complaints. He again opens his heart
and lets out all the pain and despair, all the anger and frustration, all the
doubts and worries that he has been carrying around inside him for so many
weeks.
And then at last God responds:
"Go out and anoint me a new
Ruler of Israel. Go out and anoint me a new Ruler of Judah. Go out and anoint
me a new prophet. Pass the torch on to a new generation of believers. And
Elijah, know this. Understand this.
They shall be victorious. They shall
defeat the unbelievers. And know this as well. You were never alone. There are many in Israel who have always remained
faithful. You were never the last of
my servants
Now go! Get up off your knees. Go. Get up and get
away from this place and get back down into the world. Return to the fray.
Return to the struggle. Go!"
Cowering in the darkness of his
cave, Elijah heard something completely
unexpected.
From deep inside this cave, from deep inside this soul, Elijah heard a voice, small in size yet great in
strength. It was a voice that pierced
the shrillness of his fruitless whining and despair. Wrapped in soothing
silence, this Divine inner word gave Elijah the courage to creep out of his
hiding place and once again face his God and his responsibilities.
No pat on the back. No promise that
"it'll be all right" for Elijah. Rather, a new challenge. A renewed
vocation. A task to perform, a nation to build, a cause to give himself to, a
call, a ministry. And in that call lay Elijah's spiritual renewal. In that call
lay his new hope. In that call lay his comfort, his purpose, his possibility,
his growth, his healing, his reason to get up and go on.
Not in the wind, not in the earthquake, not in the fire did
Elijah find his God. But after the storm, in that most profound quiet, the
still small voice calling him to action. In the midst of his deepest despair,
in the very moment of pain and loss and grief. In his darkest hour Elijah the
prophet of Israel encountered his God-- a God who called and challenged him to
pick himself up and carry on. A God who
promised, not rest, but strength. A God who promised not reward, but hope in
the on-going struggle. A God who provided not retreat, but
vocation—call—service—a sense of purpose—a reason to go on living.
A lot of people in this world like to think that faith or
religion is simply about being good, and denying temptation, and thereby
earning your way into some sort of celestial Paradise after our life on this
plane of existence is done. Others think that all religion, especially
Christianity, is about material, earthly rewards for our piety. A lot of people
think that Christianity is about feeling good—excitement, emotional highs, and
self-satisfaction. None of these views are particularly Biblical. The truth is,
they all miss the point.
Listen! Our faith is
centered in the here and now. And yet it also
transcends this earthly realm. Our faith promises us no earned rewards-- not in this life and not in the after-life.
Instead, our faith promises us no more than the free and sufficient grace of
God-- present in the here and now.
That's what Divine Grace is-- unmerited favor--it is nurture and
comfort,
strength and energy and enthusiasm. And all of those are
freely given to us— not necessarily because we ask for them and certainly not
according to our desire or our worth. The gifts of the Spirit come to you and
me strictly according to our need
for encouragement, to our need to
bear the cross, our need to complete
our ministry, to our need to
faithfully and joyfully respond to the call, the vocation we have received.
Listen! Like Jesus himself, we each and every one of us have
a vocation-- a personal ministry as a believer-- a place in God’s plan. And the
truth is, no matter what else we may ever do in this world, no matter how much
money or prestige or power or earthly security we might manage to acquire, none of them
will ever be
enough. You and I will never be satisfied if we walk away from
our call to follow .
All of us find the
greatest part of our vocation in the very living of everyday lives of faith. We are those called to witness to all
we encounter in this world. We are
called to inspire others by the wordless testimony of a life lived in integrity
and joy-filled, discipleship. For all of us, our vocation will be found as
well, through the service we give to our church, and to our community. Many of
us will find our vocation in the principles and ideals we find ourselves
motivated to stand up for and live out.
But that’s not all.
Listen! For some of us, another part of our ministry will be
found within the context of home and family-- God calling us to Christian
parenthood or other care-giving. Another
part of our vocation lies in the workplace-- we're called to be the best
Christian farmer or teacher or car dealer or CPA or homemaker that we can
possibly be.
There are as many ways to serve, as
many vocations, as there are believers.
A key part of your and my task as Christians is to discover where
exactly it is that God wants us to be ministering in this world. To do that, we must first learn how to listen for God's
call to us—listen and discern and follow.
In Shaw’s Saint Joan, her captors ask Joan of Arc if
it isn’t possible that the voices she hears, calling her to free her county,
could not be coming from her imagination?
“Of course
they are.” She replies. “How else do you suppose God speaks to us?” Listen! Our God chooses to speak to us in many
ways-- as many ways as there are Christians.
Our Maker speaks to us through the beauty and wonder of
Creation, and to some in the earthquake, wind, and fire! God the Holy Spirit speaks to us and calls us
through the gifts and talents we discover within ourselves, through the love of
other people, in the face of needy strangers, or loved ones, through strength
in times of suffering and pain, even through the challenge of life’s harsh
circumstances confronting us. And God in Christ Jesus speaks to us, through not
so random happenings, through meaningful coincidence, unexpected opportunity,
serendipity, necessity, surprise, challenge, joy, conscience, disaster. We see His face in the faces of those in
need. We hear His voice calling us, through the seemingly unreasonable, but
still undeniable demand of Christian conscience.
But there is one thing that you and I can always be sure of. If we ever dare to stop and listen-- truly
listen-- our God will always speak
to us in the still, small voice, after the storm. Pray with me this prayer
written by Thomas Merton:
My
Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road
ahead
of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact
that I think that I am following your will does not mean I am actually doing
so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I
hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never
do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead
me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore
I will trust you always, though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow
of death, I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave
me to face my perils alone
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