Elijah felt that no one was standing with him and sharing the burden he was carrying. Elijah had been used by God in a magnificent way. He had stood against the wickedness of King Ahab. He had been used of God to declare a rainless period of three years. Then at the end of that time he had appeared suddenly to arrange a confrontation with the priests of Baal.
Elijah had the false priests build an altar to their god while he built a similar altar to Jehovah. There were to be stones, wood and offerings, but no fire. The true God was to provide the fire. Elijah invited the priests of Baal to go first. They sang and chanted and called for fire. But, of course, none came. Elijah taunted them. “Shout louder. Surely he [Baal] is a god! Perhaps he is in deep thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened” (1 Kings 18:27). Still no fire! At last the prophets of Baal gave up, and Elijah called on Jehovah. Immediately fire fell from heaven and consumed, not only the sacrifice, but the wood, stones and soil, and it even evaporated the water in a trench around the sacrifice, which Elijah had also constructed and filled. After this the prophets of Baal were killed, and the period of drought in Israel ended.
There are few greater stories of a victory over evil in Israel in the entire Old Testament. We would expect that the triumph would have left Elijah thankful and exhilarated. But this was not the case. Like so many of us after the end of some great struggle of our lives, Elijah felt let down and discouraged. Ahab and his evil wife Jezebel threatened to kill him for having killed the false priests, and Elijah had to flee. The next we see him he is in a cave at Mount Horeb in Sinai where he had fled for his life.
Elijah prayed to God: “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me” (1 Kings 19:10). God showed himself to Elijah, appearing as a powerful wind, a mighty earthquake, a raging fire. Elijah was unmoved.
He repeated the same self-pitying complaint: “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too” (v. 14).
At this point God revealed that He had chosen another king to replace Ahab: Jehu the son of Nimshi. He had chosen another man to help and eventually succeed Elijah himself as Israel’s prophet: Elisha the son of Shaphat. Elijah was to anoint both to these roles. Then God said: “Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him” (v. 18).
Today you may seem to be alone in your determination to live for God in this wicked and spiritually hostile world. You may believe that everything and everyone is against you. But this is not the case. You are not alone. God is with you. He alone is greater than any opponent you may face. And in addition to God Himself, there are also thousands who have not and will not bow their knees to the pagan gods of our culture. Let that encourage and lift your spirits. Instead of saying, “No one loves me,” say:
Jesus loves me, this I know. Forward then to battle, go.
