Finding Strength in Despair: Elijah’s Journey from 1 Kings 19

Dick Lucas focuses on the story of Elijah in 1 Kings 19:1. He explores Elijah’s fear and despair after his victory over the prophets of Baal and his subsequent flight from Jezebel. Lucas emphasizes God’s response to Elijah’s situation, highlighting themes of divine provision, encouragement, and the importance of rest and spiritual renewal. He encourages believers to trust in God’s faithfulness during times of fear and exhaustion.

The following unedited transcript is provided by Beluga AI.

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¹ Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. ² Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” ³ Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. ⁴ But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.” ⁵ And he lay down and slept under a broom tree. And behold, an angel touched him and said to him, “Arise and eat.” ⁶ And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. And he ate and drank and lay down again. ⁷ And the angel of the Lord came again a second time and touched him and said, “Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.” ⁸ And he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God. ⁹ There he came to a cave and lodged in it. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” ¹⁰ He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.” ¹¹ And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks 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. ¹² And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. ¹³ And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” ¹⁴ He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.” ¹⁵ And the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Syria. ¹⁶ And Jehu the son of Nimshi you shall anoint to be king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your place. ¹⁷ And the one who escapes from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu put to death, and the one who escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha put to death. ¹⁸ Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.” (1 Kings 19:1-18, ESV)

All right. Lord, please draw near to us now as we draw near to you and hear your word. May it find a ready entrance into our hearts and minds and be translated into life. For Christ’s sake, amen.

Now, those of you who are old-timers or have been here during the summer will know that when I’ve been here on Sunday night, I’ve been looking at the story of Elijah. It’s a story that I studied many years ago and preached on, but I haven’t studied it and preached on it for a long time.

So I thought I would make the journey again, and it has been a very fascinating journey for me, and I hope some of that excitement has passed on to you if you’ve been here during the summer breaks in the times when we’ve looked at him. We’ve been taking really small bites out of the story of Elijah, and this Sunday night and next Sunday night, we’re going to be looking at this 19th chapter of 1 Kings.

It’s in rather uneven form, I’m afraid, because I’m going to do 18 verses now, which means we’re going to go at rather the speed of an express train, and then next Sunday night I’m going to do the call of Elisha, which you’ll find at the bottom of the right-hand column. Only three verses, but a very important chapter about how God calls people to service, calls people to particular activities and so on, and the principles of course remain true today as they were then, though the details are very different.

I’m going to say a word as I begin about this matter of biography and the wisdom of God in teaching us through biography. It must surely occur to you when you read the Bible that the Bible is largely taken up with history and the people who made it. If you know the story of Moses and Joshua, well you know the story of Joseph and Joshua, you know the story of the early part of the Bible, and then Samuel and Saul and David and Solomon take you right through halfway through the Old Testament.

They’re great biographies of fascinating interest. God knows our interest in people, that people are more interesting than abstract truth, and so that’s why he teaches us in this way. I’ve been very interested to see in recent years how interest in biography is much greater. Some of you will have noticed if you read the Times-Telegraph Guardian or Listener carefully that all of them have revolutionized their obituary page, so it’s now far more interesting.

Instead of telling us a small amount about certain great ones, there are at least four or five people they tell you about every day who wouldn’t ever have made the obituary columns in the past, because they realize that people are interested in all sorts and conditions of man and not just the great people. That’s been a step forward. I may seem rather macabre, but I always turn to the biography page, the obituary page first, to see what people have been up to. So God does it this way. I’m fascinated in biography myself.

I was telling him in the early service of a great discovery I made this morning. I went to preach at the tenth anniversary of Donington Evangelical Church in Harleston. The minister there has an outstanding library. I’m sorry I’m telling you really, because you may get there before I do. But it’s very precious, and he doesn’t readily lend them out. I saw the biography of R.S. Candlish there. you’ll have never heard of him, but he was an important man in mid-19th century Scottish history.

So I managed to get him to lend it to me, and I probably won’t go to bed tonight, because I shall be reading it all night. It’s a fascinating story of the disruption in Scotland, and the best way to learn what was happening is to read the biographies of the great men involved. Now God knows that, and that’s why he uses biography to teach us in the Bible.

Please don’t think on these two Sunday nights that this is a slightly antiquarian story of a strange man quite apart from us, because you will find, in fact, that in this biography there’s a great deal for us to learn.

The second thing to say by way of introduction is that the history of God’s kingdom in the world is not the history of movements or church synods and the like, although there is one synod in the Acts of the Apostles, so there is a place for them, but the history of God’s kingdom in the world is the history of great men.

I’ve been in Holladay and Wales, I spent one day with a friend, we wanted to go and see the grave of Martin Lloyd-Jones, and we travelled on Newcastle Emlyn to see it there, because we recognise that he’s been one of the greatest figures in the twentieth century as a leader. And it’s these leaders that actually make God’s history and bring in the kingdom. It’s not only true of the great ones like Martin Lloyd-Jones, it’s true even in your small corner.

Marcus is starting in student work, well I could tell you the stories of some remarkable times of spiritual life in some of the Christian unions in the different colleges of London, hospitals and so on, and nearly always the stories of great advance have been associated with a strong executive committee and often with a strong president. I can think of one or two at this moment where things really happened because of one or two people truly dedicated to the Lord Jesus Christ.

It was men and women that made it, not just abstract ideas. Well, so it was with Elijah. Now in this chapter on Elijah, we’ve got a very strange situation because this man, who is such a giant, who did such great things in the ninth century B.C. for Israel, I suppose he’s the greatest of all the voices God called at that time, this man who was chosen to be translated into heaven, who appeared on the Mount of Transfiguration with Jesus, you remember, we see him here at a great disadvantage.

We find Elijah here right down in the dumps, at the end of his tether, absolutely depressed, almost suicidal. Charles Spurgeon, the great Baptist preacher of the last century, has got a lecture to ministers called The Minister’s Fainting Fits. It’s a rather delightful title, and it’s a hilarious lecture. And he talks about all the things that get ministers down. I won’t tell you what they are, they’re mostly you, but we won’t go into that now.

And church buildings too, there are a lot of things that get ministers down, and also of course their own faults as well. And so it’s rather interesting to come to a great figure like Elijah and find that he also had fainting fits. He also was down in the dumps. And as the Apostle James says in the New Testament, Elijah was a man like us. He wasn’t cast down, he was a human being, and we find him here really hard pressed.

Now on this chapter, as I read the commentaries, a lot of people spend a lot of time in the commentaries on God’s great graciousness to Elijah. I want to touch on it because I don’t think it’s the meaning of the chapter, but it is very delightful, isn’t it? He’s running for his life in verse 3, he sits down under a tree in verse 3 and 4, and then God draws near to him through one of his messengers, an angel, and gives him a meal. It’s a really delightful little part of the story.

And then tells him to sleep, he has a good meal, he sleeps, wakes up the next day when the angel touches him and wakes him up, gives him another meal, tells him to go on a long walk. It’s a delightful picture of God’s great care for his servants. I’ve actually heard some remarkable talks on this. I remember at Keswick, George Duncan, saying about some of the missionaries who’d come to Keswick, that they really ought to stay away from me to the meetings. He said, “Many of you need a good rest.”

So enjoy the food, enjoy the beautiful scenery, enjoy the company of other Christians, enjoy some long outings and long walks. Probably that will do you more good than all the hymn singing. A lot of people on the platform were rather shocked, I think. Felt that the missionaries ought to come to eight talks a day. But I think George Duncan was right. Elijah didn’t need talks at this moment, he needed rest to get over this depression he was in.

Having said that, I do not believe that this story is told rather as a biography in the twentieth century to humiliate the man. You will know there’s a long history in the twentieth century in our literature of what I would call debunking biography. It started by a particularly unpleasant man called Lytton Strachey. You may have read his Eminent Victorians. He was a very mean and malicious man. He took some of the great Victorian heroes, Florence Nightingale, General Gordon. Incidentally, after that, people put these people back in The Truthful.

But John Pollock has told me he’s writing a biography of General Gordon that’s going to be in the shops in October. So start saving your pennies because it’s going to be a very interesting biography of one of the great Christian heroes of the last century. Lytton Strachey, all he wanted to do was to pull them down and show the horrible things in their lives. And that streak of biography has gone on ever since, as you probably know.

It’s part of an industry of biography in this country to strip people down and show you all the horrible things in their lives, but we won’t go into that now. Now, I don’t think that this story is intended to show us that Elijah was particularly weak. He’s just a man like us. I think this chapter stands here for one particular purpose. So, if you haven’t been listening until now, will you please sit comfortably and give me your ears? Strength of apostasy in the church of God.

Remember, the nation Israel stands for the church of God today. The nation of Israel does not stand for the nation of England or Britain. You can’t cross over the border like that from the Old Testament into the New Testament. Israel in the Old Testament stands for the church of God today in our world. Here is a picture of apostasy in Israel, which is meant to be a picture by analogy of apostasy in the churches of today. And if you think that’s very far away, let me tell you I think it’s very close at home.

If you look at Latin America, if you look at Africa, if you look at the Far East, there are many wonderful signs of God at work. If you want to know where apostasy is to be found in the big denominations, look at Europe. That is the black spot, missionary wise, in our world today. You read a book like Operation World, it’s in Europe, Germany, and France that the great un-evangelized areas are. It’s in Europe, Western Europe and Eastern Europe, that the church has often been guilty of apostasy in the last century.

It was from Germany that the great rationalistic liberal theology, or non-theology, came in and destroyed the life of the people of God. So if we’re going into Europe, we better know what we’re going into. Not that we’re any better. Most of the major denominations in our country have been going through a period of apostasy. There is life, but there’s a lot of unbelief and rebellion against the Bible. Now tonight’s chapter tells us two things about apostasy in the church.

If you don’t know these things and can’t measure your life up against them, you’ll find it very hard. First, the tremendous tenacity of apostasy in the church. I want to spend most of my time on that. How hard it is to get rid of this once it has come in. Once apostasies find a lodgement in a denomination, in a national church, like the Church of England, for example, once it’s come in, it’s as hard to get rid of as dry rot in a building, a malignant cancer in a body, or bindweed in a garden.

I’m not a gardener, but people tell me that once these things come in, you can never get them out again. I haven’t even tried. So we’re going to look at that, but then just to encourage you before you go home tonight, I’m going to say a word or two about the certain collapse of apostasy in the church because of the faithfulness of God. So first a warning, its tenacity, and then secondly an encouragement, its certain collapse. First of all then, the tremendous tenacity of apostasy amongst the people of God.

Apostasy had come into Israel, as you know, through the prophets of Baal, through Queen Jezebel, but in chapter 18, and I guess you know this well even if you weren’t here some Sundays ago when we looked at it, a marvelous victory for the truth is celebrated on Mount Carmel. And as you look at the end of chapter 18, you’ll see that Elijah is on top of the world, Verse 44, he sees that God is going to answer their prayer for rain:

⁴¹ And Elijah said to Ahab, “Go up, eat and drink, for there is a sound of the rushing of rain.” ⁴² So Ahab went up to eat and to drink. And Elijah went up to the top of Mount Carmel. And he bowed himself down on the earth and put his face between his knees. ⁴³ And he said to his servant, “Go up now, look toward the sea.” And he went up and looked and said, “There is nothing.” And he said, “Go again,” seven times. ⁴⁴ And at the seventh time he said, “Behold, a little cloud like a man’s hand is rising from the sea.” And he said, “Go up, say to Ahab, ‘Prepare your chariot and go down, lest the rain stop you.'” ⁴⁵ And in a little while the heavens grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode and went to Jezreel. ⁴⁶ And the hand of the Lord was on Elijah, and he gathered up his garment and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel. (1 Kings 18:41-46, ESV)

Well, I’m not sure that he needed the power of the Lord to do that. Don’t you think he was so uplifted he could have run all the way to the capital without… thinking about it? But actually, scripture says that God is with him. And as he was conscious that God was with him, leading the king back to the capital where apostasy had been entrenched, he must have been triumphant. Soaked to the skin but full of joy. Now at last, the national life is going to change.

Now at last, in the royal household, there’s going to be truth rather than error. Now at last, they’re going to listen to me. I’ve been in hiding for all these years. Now at last, I can come out into the open and stand on the balcony of Buckingham Palace and proclaim the name of the Lord to the people, and the royal family will be behind me. Ahab goes into the palace. I don’t know what he said to Jezebel, one not told. I suppose he said, “Well, the game’s up. Elijah’s won. your prophets are dead.”

Look at the first two verses. Now Ahab told Jezebel everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. So Jezebel sent a message, all right, I admit defeat. Is that what your bible says? I would say somebody’s dead, somebody’s awake. Mine doesn’t either. Jezebel sent a message to Elijah, may the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like that of one of the prophets that have been killed.

¹ Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. ² Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” (1 Kings 19:1-2, ESV)

It seems unbelievable, doesn’t it? It can’t be true. Jezebel has not retreated one inch. She hasn’t shifted a bit. She’s just as implacable as ever she was, just as determined to fight Elijah. And at that point, he cracks just a little. Something from the Israel food, who, in case you haven’t got a copy at home. Jezebel was the daughter of the priest-king of Tyre and Sidon, that’s next door to Israel, a pagan country. She married Ahab; he should never have married her, but it was one of these political alliances.

She made arrangements in Israel to be able to have her own priests, 850 of them to look after her. She was a strong domineering character, self-willed and forceful, a fanatical devotee of Melchart the Tyrian Baal, and so, as you can see, she was a pretty formidable character. I was saying in the early service that I can’t help having a sneaking admiration for her implacable determination.

Even at the end of the story, when two of her servants throw her out of the window and she’s eaten up by the dog, some of you may remember the rather gruesome story. Before she’s thrown out of the window by her servants, she goes to her dressing room table and puts on all her fineries, all her lipstick and everything before they throw her out. She’s determined to die with dignity. But, it’s too much for Elijah. Such high hopes he had, suddenly dashed.

I suppose we might be there, if I open a letter tomorrow from the Chancellor, and we know that we won every day in the court, and I open the letter and I’m expecting full permission to go up ahead to St. Helens, and it says, you have permission to do nothing new at all. I should be pretty dashed, I can tell you tomorrow if that happens. you’ll have to come to my rescue. I won’t run into the desert, but I should be pretty depressed.

There’s Elijah, lifted up after the experience on Carmel, feeling at last that my whole national life is going to be changed, and the people are going to come back to God, and suddenly meets this absolutely black, this wall of brass. I want to apply this immediately. You must learn this lesson, if you’re ever to survive as a Christian. Let me give you a number of applications. First.

In the church, as we know it today, though we may try to reform the church and bring back the Bible, we shall find it a sort of a menace battle. Some of you will know that we’ve been involved in the founding of this new organization in the Church of England called Reform. We’ve got into a lot of trouble because of it.

And some good Christian people have said to us, well look, there are lots of organizations since the war trying to bring the Church of England back to the Bible and back to the Gospel, why have you got to start another? Well the answer is that there are many people who have fought hard in the 40 years since the war, and though there have been advances, there have also been many, many, many defeats. If anything, we are further back in certain areas like ethics in the church today than we were 20 years ago.

Somebody’s got to take up the cudgels. You think you’ve had a victory, and then you find that everything has been taken away from you. So, in this matter of reforming the church, we shall constantly find Jezebels around. We think we’ve won a victory, and then suddenly find no, desperately disappointing, we’re back at square one again. It’s the same with indwelling sin. Indwelling sin will be with you in your heart as long as you live. It’s important to know that.

Maybe some young Christians from our congregation went back home for the first time in the summer, and they wanted to show their parents at home a completely new life, and I guess they did. But do you know what happens? Halfway through the long vacation, you come back perhaps from some holiday, you’re at home, you’re wanting to live the Christian life, but suddenly everything goes wrong. The old failures at home come back again, something quite childish, like being horribly rude to your parents. And you fall.

And you go back to your room, and you go out for a walk, and you say, “Lord, I can’t believe that I could have gone back to that after having come to know you. I was just behaving like a baby. I had no idea of the power of those things in my life. I may be nothing quite as simple as being rude to parents, but it is very humiliating, isn’t it, when some sin that we have conquered comes back like a flood into our lives? We feel utterly depressed. Like Elijah, we want to give up; we want to go into the desert and die. Say, ‘Well, I’m just no better than anybody else. I can’t live the Christian life.’ you experience it.

I see one or two of you nodding. What about youth work? You went away to camp. I’ve heard some lovely stories of camps. I heard some done at Donington today, some wonderful stories of young people whose lives have been transformed. Maybe you’ve been away at camp, and there were one or two young people that you helped, and you promised, you gave them a Bible, and you promised to write letters, and they promised to write to you.

Well, that may not happen, of course, from school, and so perhaps you follow this young person up, right back into the world, giving it all up, you’re ready to go on in Christian work after that. It’s terribly, terribly disappointing, you know. All your hopes have been on those young people that you’d want camp, and then suddenly the whole work seems to crumble in your hands.

Is it worth it? That was true, wasn’t it, in our Lord’s life, in His earthly ministry. He’s lifted up at His baptism. The very next story after His baptism is that battle with Satan in the wilderness. It must be terribly disappointing to hear the voice of God, to feel the power of the Spirit on His life, and then be plunged into the wilderness and to hear the appalling temptations of the devil.”

I just want to warn you. I think this story is warning us that Satan is very strong and never gives up. That indwelling sin is very strong and will not be removed until the end of your life. And temptation never stops. That disappointments will always come. Question is, can we stand it? Well, I think we have to say that all of us, at times, will be like Elijah. We shall want to give up. Look at verse three. Faced with this complete refusal of Jezebel to give way, Elijah is afraid and runs for his life.

He comes to a broom tree, sits down, and prays that he might die. “I’ve had enough, Lord. Take my life away. I’m no better than my ancestors.”

³ Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. ⁴ But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord , take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.” (1 Kings 19:3-4, ESV)

I guess, you know, he may have thought he was. Well, the past generation of prophets, they weren’t much good, but we’re going to change things. I think also, wrapped up in this, there is a great turmoil in his life. What’s God doing? God gave me that great victory on Carmel. Can’t God deal with Jezebel? Is Jezebel too strong for the Lord? Tremendous turmoil going on in his mind.

The tremendous tenacity of apostasy. Well, I want to finish by saying there’s no future for apostasy in the church of God. God is going to maintain his cause, so I’m going to finish by pointing to the certain collapse of apostasy. Now, we haven’t got time to go into the whole of the second part of the story. It’s a very remarkable story. Elijah is taken all the way to Mount Horeb, which is the traditional name for Mount Sinai.

It is on Mount Sinai that God had met Moses long before and revealed himself, and I’m not going to read that passage tonight because of time, but I do want to urge you to read it when you get home tonight, if you will, before you go to bed. Some of you are very late night owls, you’ll have plenty of time, it’s only twelve verses. All right?

Exodus 34:1-10, it’s a wonderful passage, one of the very greatest passages of the Old Testament, and it comes at a time of great apostasy, when Moses is not quite sure if the Lord’s going to give them all up. And then he says, “Lord, you see how weak the children of Israel are, how weak they are; will you please come with us, and will you please tell me who you really are, so that I may tell them?”

And in that marvelous passage, God reveals himself to Moses in two ways, as you will find when you read it. As a gracious God, that’s the chief thing, a God who’s slow to anger, a God who maintains his cause, and secondly, as a God who will, in the end, visit people with punishment if they go on rebelling. Well, you can read that for yourself in Exodus 24. Now, I suggest to you that what we’re seeing here in this story of Elijah is a reworking of the same thing.

God is revealing himself to Elijah in these two ways, as a gracious God, and as a God of judgment. Now, remember, Elijah had known God only as a God of judgment. His particular ministry was a ministry of condemnation. He had been told to bring judgment and condemnation to the people. So it is very interesting that when God draws near to him on Mount Horeb to reveal himself, he begins by revealing himself through the three great symbols of judgment in the Bible, wind, fire, and water. Earthquake, fire. And he does this in the most terrifying way.

A powerful wind that tore the mountain apart and shattered the rocks. That must have been an incredible experience, wasn’t it? After the wind and earthquake, somebody came up to me in the middle and in between and said that they were in an earthquake. It was only one, I think, percent on the Richter scale. I think this earthquake was probably a bit higher than that. And then after the earthquake, a fire. But notice what is said three times: The Lord was not in the wind. He was not in the earthquake. He was not in the fire.

¹¹ And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the Lord .” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks 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. ¹² And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper. (1 Kings 19:11-12, ESV)

So God is saying, that is not my primary work, Elijah. I do judge, but that is not my primary work. As Martin Luther used to say, judgment is God’s strange work. And then after this tremendous manifestation of God’s awesome power in judgment, after the fire comes, well the old famous translation is, a still small voice, verse 12. But the proper translation is, a gentle whisper or a breath. Quiet breath. And nobody is quite sure what that means. You may have your solution. I asked the people in the LA service to give me their solution.

I got 150 different solutions given to me over coffee. I haven’t been able to assess them all. I had to feed them into a computer. But nobody is absolutely certain what it means. I’m going to suggest to you tonight, as I close, that this is interpreted here in the story. You see what happens immediately when he sends Elijah back and recommissions him in verse 15. First of all, he says, go back and anoint Hazael, Jehu, and Elisha, and they, at the right time and in the right place, will execute judgment for me.

Do not think, Elijah, that I have stopped controlling, condemning, punishing, where it is necessary. And as you, if you know the story, you’ll know that there were some terrible judgments still to come. So that’s going to happen. But the most important verse is verse 18. Elijah, yes, I am going to go on judging Israel, I will look after Jezebel, I will deal with this rebellion, but, verse 18:

¹⁸ Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him.” (1 Kings 19:15-18, ESV)

Seven thousand may well be symbolic there, seven is the whole number in the Bible, the number of completeness. It certainly means all God’s elect, all God’s people. Not one is lost, I love, I reserve all my people, I’ve kept them, they’re there. Have you noticed them Elijah? Talking like that as though you’re the only one left?

Now, it may be that the gentle whisper is simply God’s way of saying that his normal way of sustaining his people, his hidden people, the church in the world, that the world hardly ever notices, the normal way is not through wind and earthquake and fire. Yes, I like the old translation, and I don’t see why you shouldn’t say it: a simple, still voice, a gentle whisper, that is how God speaks. That’s how God speaks to me, isn’t it to you?

I actually, God has never spoken to me through an earthquake, a fire, and a wind. Is He to you? My next-door neighbor is my favorite author of Farsi. We did; it was that kind of noise every morning when I got up and read my Bible.

What on earth’s going on, they might say. Mind you, I think that about them; they play their music appallingly loud, and the noises and bumps in the night in my next door neighbor on the right are quite extraordinary. I really don’t know what’s going on, and I’m not going to ask. But if every time I opened my Bible and began to pray in the morning and God appeared in an earthquake, do you think my neighbors would be very pleased? Hasn’t happened to me once, and I’ve been a Christian for 40 years more. Perhaps I’m odd.

But the gentle whisper, the still small voice, that happens to me nearly every day of my life. Doesn’t it happen to you? Does God speak to you? Does he not touch your conscience, your heart, your mind? Doesn’t he urge you forth? Doesn’t he restrain you? If you’re walking with the Lord, that’ll be happening to you every day of your life. That’s the normal way God deals with us. It’s not very impressive, is it? It’s very important.

See, Elijah was looking only for the impressive at this moment, because his ministry had been so impressive, and so what God has to say gently to him is, “Elijah, you perhaps are forgetting that I am maintaining my people. They’re all around you, and they’re not very visible. 7,000 have not bowed the knee to Baal.” It’s rather lovely, that, isn’t it? That’s so of the churches, isn’t it? It may be a very apostate church, but there are those who have not bowed the knee to Baal. It’s happening all the time, isn’t it?

You see a church that has shadowed its former self; unbelief, rationalistic theology has been preached, the church has gone down and down and down, until there are just two or three people left. God’s people. It happened at the city temple up the road a few years ago. The Congregational Union wanted to close it. Said there are only a handful of you, we’re going to close it. But the handful were God’s people, all that was left. They prayed, and God sent them a new minister. God is always doing that.

So God is saying here, yes, I will judge. Yes, I will eradicate rebellion, yes, I will deal with Jezebel, yes, I will deal with apostasy in the church, and I will maintain my cause. You may not always realize who these unsung heroes, these unsung Christians are, but I reserve them to myself, and no one can pluck them from my hand. That’s a tremendous comfort, isn’t it?

On my holiday in Wales, just a fortnight ago, we had Quinlan Terry with us, who is going to be our architect for St Helens, he’s a very distinguished architect, and I had been telling him of some of the wonderful Welsh chapels, the beautiful architecture that you’ll find in the country areas. So we decided to leave the rest of the house party and go off for a day in the car to try to discover them. We had a great day.

We traveled over the Preseli Mountains, we looked in many of the villages and towns around that part of Wales, and from time to time we came across these buildings, some undistinguished, but one or two really delightfully built buildings. But because we were both Christians and not just interested in architecture, I could see him becoming more and more depressed, and so was I, because most of them were boarded up. If they weren’t boarded up, the notice board told you it hadn’t been painted for years.

And the iron gates were closed, and clearly most of them were hardly used. At last we arrived in a town, just as we were going to go home. We had a cup of tea, we’d almost given up hoping to see some life, and we came across a lovely church with the word Herman on the top, which is the Hebrew for sanctuary. And it was all bustling and full of life and clean.

And so we went in, and there was a great meeting of women from all over Wales, called Some Sister or Other, and they were all meeting there, and there were the three elders of the church, obviously, looking after them outside, all in shining faces and very smart suits. So we said to them, is the gospel preached here? Oh yes. Has anybody come? We have fifteen in the evening but no young people. That’s what apostasy means in the church, doesn’t it? It means in the end that the life of the church is squeezed to nothing.

There were dear Christian people seeing their church dying, really, and knowing it. But we mustn’t lose heart. Apostasy is a deadly thing in the church. It squeezes the church to death. But God is looking after his people. But we have, as Hugh said, what was that phrase you used here at the beginning? Not only to seek the Lord but to work with all our hearts if we are to see the tide turned.

Let’s pray for that this term, this autumn, as we meet him. Let’s pray together.

Heavenly Father, we know that many of the young people coming up to London for the first time this autumn come from towns and villages where apostasy has squeezed the very life of the churches out. Where all there is is an old building, a derelict notice board, and signs of decay. Lord, we see that in many parts of the countryside of Wales. We cry to you for Wales today. We pray for the return of life into many of those chapels and villages. We pray for it for the whole of the United Kingdom.

We pray that you will turn the tide of apostasy in many of the mainline churches of our country. We pray that as we face the brazen refusal of Jezebel to give way, that we may not run for our lives but stand firm in the faith. Give us courage. Give us the power to pray, and the desire to pray, and speak to each one who is here, who belongs to you and your family, with that gentle breathing, that still small voice, day by day, controlling our lives, maintaining our lives, nudging us into your pathway. Please continue to do that, we pray, for your Namesake, Amen.