Day 81 — Even I Can Chat With God
1 Kings 19:2-9, The Message
Jezebel immediately sent a messenger to Elijah with her threat: “The gods will get you for this and I’ll get even with you! By this time tomorrow you’ll be as dead as any one of those prophets.”
When Elijah saw how things were, he ran for dear life to Beersheba, far in the south of Judah. He left his young servant there and then went on into the desert another day’s journey. He came to a lone broom bush and collapsed in its shade, wanting in the worst way to be done with it all – to just die: “Enough of this, God! Take my life – I’m ready to join my ancestors in the grave!” Exhausted, he fell asleep under the lone broom bush.
Suddenly an angel shook him awake and said, “Get up and eat!”
He looked around and, to his surprise, right by his head were a loaf of bread baked on some coals and a jug of water. He ate the meal and went back to sleep.
The angel of God came back, shook him awake again, and said, “Get up and eat some more – you’ve got a long journey ahead of you.”
He got up, ate and drank his fill, and set out. Nourished by that meal, he walked forty days and nights, all the way to the mountain of God, to Horeb. When he got there, he crawled into a cave and went to sleep.
Then the word of God came to him: “So Elijah, what are you doing here?”
Last summer I cycled from London to Paris with a group from work. On our last day, as we rode through Paris, two pedestrians stepped out in front of me. I swerved, hit a tram rail and crashed, busting my shoulder. It was excruciatingly painful as I was scooped up by an ambulance, was stabilised in A&Es in both Paris and Birmingham, had reconstructive surgery, and did physio to recover. I had the stuffing knocked out of me. I felt frail and very human. Do you feel frayed or knocked for six?
In this story Elijah feels very frail and human. He is terrified before Jezebel, he runs for his life and dissolves into a mass of righteous self-pity. He was human, like you and me. And yet he talks with God. Our frailties, our fears and our humanity do not prevent us from knowing and interacting with God, just as Elijah did.
Our experiences can be the same as Elijah’s experiences. We can have a conversation with God like Elijah did even if we are at the end of our tether or dejected or exhausted. The experiences of the characters in the Bible can be substantially like our experiences. How we deal with life events can be like how Biblical characters deal with life’s ups and downs. You may want to read the Bible as if you were in the story. What would it be like if you were Moses by the bush (Exodus 3:2); Deborah under her palm (Judges 4); Ananias receiving his vision about Paul (Acts 9:11) or the Ethiopian eunuch being baptised by the side of the road (Acts 8)?
Prayer — Lord, please give me the faith and the experiences that will enable me to believe that the things that happened in the Bible can happen to me.
Jonny Pearson