For 40 Days – Day 24: Man’s End: Conclusions

Key Episode Scripture: 1 Kings chapters 18 and 19 and 2 Kings chapter 2

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.” 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. (1 Kings 19:7-8 ESVUK)

Rollercoasters are not the only things full of ups and downs. Following God’s way involves a lot of mountains and valleys, and Elijah’s story features those. Sometimes, the greatest heights can be followed by the lowest depths. Such an incident gave tremendous insight into how God interacts with those on the mission for Him.

We’ve considered the episode’s context and outlined the content of Elijah’s close encounter of the divine kind. In the previous entry, we looked at a few concepts to help us understand what was going on. Here are a few points of conclusion to be reached.

God’s Concern – The Individual, The Community, The Country

The Creator of the universe operates on a scope that can be as microscopic as feeding a man who wants to die, to the larger perspective of a group of prophets seeing how the mission continues, to the larger view of a town that has water issues, to a country that has rebelled against Him. Appreciating this should give us pause to consider our personal struggles, relationship issues, community matters, and national and international factors.

Communication is Crucial for Commitment

One thing that can never be said about God’s interactions with His people is that they were left without evidence of His efforts to express His will. He communicated through answering the challenge on Mt. Carmel, through a community dedicated to seeing His word expressed and applied, and through a man who, though he came to his wits’ end, still devoted himself to following what was said. That communication was crucial in establishing commitment from those who sought Him and Him alone.

There Are No Guarantees of Success Other Than Obedience

There’s nothing wrong with hoping for the best. Elijah clearly hoped that the brilliant display of God’s power would bring people back to God. God had given no such guarantee. God informed Elijah that the rain would return. Elijah’s subsequent despair after getting Jezebel’s text message promising he was going to get killed reveals the weight of disappointment at the lack of permanent change in the nature of the people he reached. We must remember that the only marker of success that matters to God is our obedience – everything else from there is His responsibility. Linked to this …

Trust God for the Mission

It’s wonderful to see good results from the efforts. Good news reports can work wonders in motivating faith. Elijah highlights that even the best of us can be dismayed by the overwhelming sense that our efforts are not making lasting, profound changes. So, we must put our trust in God. Trust Him to know that He knows what He’s doing, even in the most trying of situations. Trust Him to lead and direct the mission far beyond us even as we feel we’ve reached the end.

Next, we will consider the consequences and how we should operate on God’s mission in light of everything we’ve considered in this episode.

For His Name’s Sake

C. L. J. Dryden

Shalom