The God of Comfort

This week, you may have heard the story of a young pastor by the name of Jared Wilson, at the age of 30, pastoring a megachurch of 15,000 people, having a loving wife and two small children, having written several books, published author. But his crowning success being a ministry he started called Anthem of Hope, a Christian organisation dedicated to, and I quote, amplifying hope for those battling brokenness, depression, anxiety, self-harm, addiction, and suicide. Five days ago, Jared Wilson took his own life. Now over this week, tributes have flown in for this man who wrestled for most of his adult life with the brokenness of chronic depression. In this same week, we in Australia have had the R U Okay Day, an awareness campaign that encourages us to check in with our friends, check in with our loved ones, our family members, and have important conversations around mental health.

And so in the spirit of are you okay day and checking in with one another, having those conversations about depression and anxiety, having heard the sad news, heartbreaking news of this high-profile pastor ending his life, I want to reflect on the comforts and the hope that we as Christians have even in the midst of those struggles. This morning, we're going to read the story of a moment between a man of God called Elijah and the moment God met him at the lowest point in his life, where he wanted to end it all. The scene is candid. It's raw. It is warts and all.

If you know the story of Elijah, you know that he was a mighty man of God, a prophet, used powerfully by God to speak a true word into a rebellious generation in the history of Israel. But this morning, we're going to just pause on this vulnerable moment that he had with God, before God, and I want us to also see how God, even in that, gave comfort and hope and peace and healing. So let's turn to First Kings, and it's in the Old Testament. First Kings, chapter 19. We're going to read from verse 1 through to verse 18.

First Kings, chapter 19, verse 1. Ahab, King Ahab, told his wife, Queen Jezebel, all that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. 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. Then he was afraid, Elijah, and he rose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah. And he left his servant there.

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, Lord. Take away my life, for I am no better than my father's. And he lay down and slept under a broom tree. And behold, an angel touched him and said to him, arise and eat.

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. And the angel of the Lord came 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. There he came to a cave and lodged in it, and behold, the word of the Lord came to him and said to him, what are you doing here, Elijah?

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. And He said, go out and stand on the mountain 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. And after the earthquake, a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper. 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 was a voice to him and said a voice came to him and said, what are you doing here, Elijah?

And 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, am left. And they seek my life to take it away. 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.

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. And the one who escapes from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu put to death, and the one who escapes the sword of Jehu shall Elisha put to death. Yet I will leave 7,000 in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him. So far, our reading.

So we come to the moment in the life of this man, Elijah, after a very famous event at a place called Mount Carmel. That is all that chapter 18 is about. In chapter 18, there is a wicked man by the name of Ahab, the king of Israel at this time. And on Mount Carmel, God is going to speak very loudly to Ahab and to Israel. You see, up until this point, God had made a judgment against Israel for their rebellion against Him, their idolatry, their love for all the other gods of the surrounding people.

And God had said to Israel through Elijah, there's going to be a drought and a famine because you have not kept that promise, that covenant that you have made with Me. But Ahab and his even wickeder wife, Jezebel, and that's where we get the English idiom, she's a Jezebel, that's where we get this from. Ahab and his wife, Jezebel, organised this great event on this mountain, Mount Carmel, where they would offer sacrifices to their gods in order to appease these gods to send rain. And Elijah turns up to this event, and he tells them that he will show that there is only one living God. It is Yahweh, the Lord of hosts.

And so Elijah on this day and the false prophets have this little experiment. The prophets of Baal will set up giant piles of wood on which they will burn sacrifices to their god, but they won't light these fires. They will pray to their gods to send fire down, to light them, to show that they are true gods. Elijah promises to do the same, but for a whole day, these prophets pray. And Elijah seemingly is just standing on the sidelines.

The whole day, he's just watching all of this going on, and these prophets, they are wailing and crying and pleading. It's not hard for us to imagine that they are beating themselves. Commentators say that they may just be heard by these gods. And Elijah, in a great funny moment in the Bible, keeps taunting them and saying, well, louder guys. Your gods are obviously hard of hearing. They're kind of deaf.

Keep going. Another point, he says, maybe your god has gone out to the loo. Keep going. But nothing happens. As the sun is starting to set towards the end of the day, Elijah then goes and he gathers a pile of wood, and then, a grand display of showmanship, gets someone to douse the wood in water.

Not just once, not just twice, but three times. This wood is saturated. The sacrifice, the bull that has been put on this pile, is saturated, and then he prays this simple prayer. He doesn't have to beat himself. He doesn't have to yell.

He says, oh Lord, let it be known this day that You are God in Israel, and that this is Your people, and that they may know that You, oh Lord, our God. And after this simple prayer, the Bible says fire falls from heaven, consumes the saturated wood, burns up the offering. And at the sight of this, all the people that had gathered over that day to watch what was happening fall on their faces. They repent of their rebelling against God. And Elijah gets up and he chases down these prophets, these false prophets, and he puts to the sword 800 of them.

It is a mighty day of victory. It is a day of incredible vindication. And then Elijah says, well, to his servant that was standing there, go out and look towards the west, towards the sea, and tell me what you see. And the servant goes and he doesn't see something, he comes back. Seven times, Elijah sends him back and forth.

Go and check now. Go and check now. On the seventh time, he returns and says, there is a little cloud over the ocean. And Elijah then goes to King Ahab and says, King, the storm is coming. The rains are here.

And boy does the storm. The sky goes black. The wind is of hurricane force. It's starting to rain cats and dogs, or in those days, camels and donkeys. And for a moment, God's judgment over Israel has been abated, at least for a while.

Water has started falling on the parched soil again. But then we see just how weak this little man, Ahab, is. He runs back to his wife, Jezebel, who is at home, and he immediately dobbed in Elijah and what he's done. And in that instance, we find out just how domineering and scheming this woman, Jezebel, is, and we started reading that this morning. She immediately takes matters into her own hands.

She turns on the intimidation tactics, sends Elijah a threatening message. She says, may the gods deal with me severely if I don't kill you like you killed my priests, my prophets, today, by this time tomorrow. Right now, we're thinking, do your worst. You were just taking on a man of God that has sent fire down to consume saturated wood.

Do your worst, Jezebel. Elijah's God's man. But surprisingly, we read in verse 3, Elijah is afraid, and he runs for his life. Not only is he afraid and runs, he flees all the way down to Beersheba, the southernmost tip of the kingdom of Israel. It's in Judah, actually.

Not in the northern tribes. It's in Judah, the southern part of the kingdom. He couldn't go any further. And not only does he get into Beersheba, but he leaves his servant in the town there and he goes a day's walk into the bush, into the wilderness, and goes and sits under a tree.

And the Bible says in verse 4, he says, God, I want to die. I've had enough. Take my life. I am no better than my father's. If this is not depression, if this is not a mental health issue, then I don't know what is.

Just end it, God. I don't want to go on living anymore. Now how does Elijah get to this point? Well, let's have a look at three things that resulted in this situation. Three causes for Elijah's depression.

Firstly, Elijah's caught up in the aftermath of a great victory. Our most vulnerable moments often come on the down side of a spiritual high. The other side of the mountain where we're starting to climb back down again. Elijah had been training and leading up to this moment on Mount Carmel for years. God had been developing him, growing him, moulding him for that time.

He achieved it. But now what? Who is he? It's the same for Christians. So often, after this mountaintop experience, a moment where we witness God, we see God act and do incredible things in our lives and people's lives, it's always at a low.

Secondly, we see Elijah is physically exhausted, physically and emotionally exhausted. Elijah had been hunted, not just for this time, but for years, really. I mean, this was a very big threat, but for years, he had been the enemy number one because he was the speaker of this judgment. It is going to be a famine and a drought in Israel.

Constantly aware that the king and the queen are looking for him. On top of that, he has just had this unbelievable confrontation with the people of Israel, the priests, the prophets of Baal. He had stood toe to toe with King Ahab. He had been involved in the execution of hundreds of prophets. There is an old Greek saying, you will break the bow if you always keep it bent.

In other words, if you're living under that constant, relentless pressure, you're gonna break down. Pastors know this well. You might be surprised that pastors are very vulnerable on their spiritual decline of a Monday. We call it the Monday blues. All week long, we're building up to Sunday.

We are prepping. We are praying. We're getting ready. And then on Sunday, we produce. We share something of us.

In that week as well, we're dealing with pastoral issues. We're dealing with tensions. We're dealing with all sorts of stuff. On Sunday, hopefully everything comes together. Sometimes it doesn't.

Sometimes it's a bit rocky. But Monday comes and there is just a dryness, an emptiness. Mondays are the days where pastors are just a little bit vulnerable and weary. But also, ironically, it's a day those emails or those phone calls complaining about Sunday come as well. Guess what day Jared Wilson took his life?

Now this is not meant to be a pity party and not meant to be about pastors. It is to explain those natural lows that happen to all of us after the spiritual highs. And so it's helpful for us to remember to know the rhythms of our life. It's helpful for us to know that there's gonna be ups and downs. These things are just part of what life is about.

To be wary that, okay, Monday might be hard, but it's gonna get better. But we see here Elijah, and you can understand he has just had this massive experience. He is physically absolutely exhausted, but emotionally, spiritually, just so dry. But thirdly, we see Elijah finding himself in this place of depression through the spiral of self-pity. Now self-pity is a killer.

It lies to you. It exaggerates things. It will drive you to that mentality of victimhood in your head. Self-pity is a pathetic emotion. And in the worst situations, scenarios, it can bring you to that point of wishing to die, which is exactly where we find Elijah.

He says this, let me die because I am no better than my forefathers. Well, Elijah, who told you that you had to be better than your forefathers? Was that part of your calling from God? No, it wasn't.

God never said that to you in the biblical account. The story doesn't insinuate at any point that this is what God was expecting of Elijah, that he somehow had to be, I don't know, better. He had to simply communicate what God wanted him to communicate. I think it's probable that this is his conclusion about who he is and who he is meant to be, and that is the danger. When we open our minds to that sort of, I want to call it pride, those proud standards for ourselves, when we fail to reach that, that's when self-pity speaks up.

I don't deserve this. I'm better than this. I expect more of myself than this. I expect more of my life than this. How can God do this to me?

How can my friends do this to me? How can my husband do this to me? I don't deserve any of it. How is it we have to ask, how is it that western countries like Australia still have some of the highest levels of suicide in the world? How can people who seemingly have it all still succumb to that drive to end it all?

I think partly, and I know it's complex, partly because somewhere deep down, we think we need something more, something else, that something should be better about our situation. Now it's very complex and it's very deep, but even that drive to commit this final act of suicide is the desire to end the pain. We want to end it. Why? Because I deserve to be pain free.

Elijah has a misplaced idea of what he should be, who he should be, where he should be at. And when things don't go to plan, he prays, God, let me die. Friend, I want to tell you, if you are ever in a situation where you are experiencing long, hard periods of time that would make you consider ending it so you could be free of it, please remember. Please remember that there is a purpose in it. There is a meaning in it, and that, I promise you, is the strength to endure.

To hold on to the ideal of deserving something better, deserving to be somehow struggle free is to hold on to a hope that we won't ever have here. We won't ever be struggle free. That is an ideal that none of us will ever arrive at. But these are the promises that God gives us that you can hold on to. Philippians 1:6, that He who started a good work in you is going to finish a good work in you.

Romans 8:28, that all things in our lives work for the good of those who love God and who have been called according to His purposes. These are the promises. All things work, even the tough times, for the good. And so those are some of the reasons we see Elijah in this type of hopelessness. But then we see also three ways or three actions of God to comfort and restore Elijah.

God is so gentle here in this story, isn't He, with Elijah? He doesn't rebuke. He doesn't shame Elijah. There's no sermon here. Instead, God does three things.

Firstly, God gives Elijah a bit of bread, a snack, a bit of water, a bit of rest. God provides for the physical needs of Elijah. Now He knows Elijah's absolutely exhausted. He knows he's been running nonstop. Jesus says to us that God the Father knows our needs before we even recognise them in ourselves.

Before we even ask them, God knows. God knows what we need, including our physical needs, and they are important to God. And so an angel comes and he gives Elijah a little tap in the ribs, wakes him up. There's a bit of bread. There's a jug of water.

Eat and rest. Now Elijah does this twice. He is so strengthened by that food that he starts heading to a place called Mount Horeb. And Mount Horeb was the place where God met with Moses and the Israelites after the Exodus. It was the holy site where God had come to the Israelites with the Ten Commandments.

But Horeb isn't in the geographical bounds of Israel. Horeb is actually part of the Sinai Peninsula. So from the southern tip of Israel, Elijah has to start walking into the Sinai. He travels for forty days. I think that forty days is representative of this sort of pilgrimage, this spiritual pilgrimage that he's going on.

For forty days and nights, he travels and he reaches a cave in the mountain. When he gets there, God does a second thing. He provides for Elijah's spiritual need by giving him an experience of the nearness of God. Elijah walks into the cave and God asks, what are you doing here, Elijah? And Elijah gives him the sob story that's been partly to blame for the depression.

I have been very zealous for You, God, but the Israelites, they are so stubborn. And these prophets, these false prophets, they are so conniving. They are so manipulative. They own all the TV channels and I'm the only one left. Again, God doesn't rebuke.

He doesn't correct. He doesn't say, Elijah, that is a very simplistic way to understand it. It is so wrong. He simply listens to Elijah's frustration, then tells him to go outside. When he gets outside, Elijah witnesses a terrifying thing.

A huge wind rises up and tears through the mountain peaks. Rocks break off from the side of the mountain, hurtling down the slope because of this wind. The Bible says Elijah doesn't sense God in that wind. Then an earthquake comes, and after the earthquake, a fire rips through the valley. Yet Elijah senses that God wasn't found there either.

After these three things, a gentle breeze comes. Our ESV translated as a whisper. The Hebrew here simply says a wind. Now interestingly, in Hebrew, the word for wind is the same as the word for spirit. Ruach.

They are synonymous. And I think beautifully what is being done here is a play on words where God is none of these mighty things, these terrifying forces of nature. Instead, God's spirit, ruach, is in the gentle wind or breeze, ruach. And Elijah senses God's nearness and His presence in the gentlest of forces. There are moments where this happens, isn't there?

You might just be sitting on that back veranda on a quiet, gentle afternoon, and you're listening to the birds playing in the trees, and you just sense God is there. In that moment, everything is alright. God has ministered to your heart in that moment. Now God comforts Elijah by giving him that moment. Elijah had seen God at His most powerful.

He had seen Him at His most terrifying on Mount Carmel. He had seen fire fall from heaven, burning up saturated wood, swallowing up stone and water alike. He had seen it all, but what he needed was a quietness of God's presence in his heart, and that is what God gives him. And then thirdly, God provides for Elijah by providing a way out. And it's not the way out that Elijah was asking for. End it.

This is my way out. God asked Elijah again outside when the gentle breeze comes. God asked Elijah, what are you doing here, Elijah? And Elijah hasn't learned yet. He gives him the same spiel. It's too hard, God.

I've been so jealous for You. I've been so zealous. My enemies are strong. Your people are stubborn. And God says, okay.

I'm sending you to anoint new leaders. You're going to anoint a few enemies to Israel that I'm gonna use, and I'm going to anoint a new king over Israel. And they are going to help purify Israel, but also I'm sending you to anoint your replacement, Elisha. He's gonna be taking over from you. He's gonna carry this burden.

And God gives him this final bit of encouragement, which may have made Elijah feel very small for his self-pity. God says this final bit of encouragement, there are still 7,000 in Israel who have not bowed down to Baal. I think in a very sort of calm, but nice, gentle way, God is saying, Elijah, this heaviness that you experienced, it's not the full objective reality. This heaviness is in some way self-induced. You have believed that you are hopeless.

You have believed that you are the only one, the only faithful one in all of Israel left, but there are others, and they are on our side. So don't believe the self-talk. Don't believe that voice that's telling you these deceptions. What you might think is reality for your life may not be entirely true. And that is really important for us to remember.

Whether it is anxiety or depression, whether it's just a sense of hopelessness, be mindful that what you are telling yourself may not be the whole truth. You may have very skewed understandings of what is reality, and it would be wise to hold those statements, those moments of self-talk very lightly, very lightly indeed. 7,000, Elijah. 7,000 have not bowed the knee to the false gods. And so what I want to finish this morning with is that this story of Elijah, despite his flawed perspectives of the situation, because he was tired, because he was emotionally drained and vulnerable, God provides.

He gives him rest. He gives him emotional need. He gives him spiritual nourishment, and then he provides a way out. And so what I want to finish with is saying that mental health is a complex thing, and it's not gonna be solved in one sermon. But this is general advice that is really, really good for us to know, to remember, to return to again and again.

What we know and heard this week with Jared Wilson is that even the spiritual ones amongst us are immune. Immune. And as we hear that story again, I want to encourage you that if you struggle with those thoughts, if you are ever tempted to think of going down that path, stop. Call me. Call a loved one.

Speak to someone about that first. There is help. There is always help. There is a sharing of that burden that is available to you. You don't have to go through this process alone.

But then I also want to tell you that depression and anxiety doesn't have to be the final word. It does not have the final say. Jesus has the final say. So you can go to Him. You must go to Him.

You have to go to Him to correct your false perspectives because they might be false. You have to go to Him so that He may offer you rest. He said of Himself and to us, come to Me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. That is His promise. Go to Him for rest.

Go to Him and tell Him this, that even in your deepest struggles, You know about this. You know about this, Lord Jesus, but I know that You love me, and You have shown this love to me objectively with the work of the cross. That is not up to me. That is not up to discussion or interpretation, thinking that somehow, you know, if I believe enough, then it happened. No.

It's happened. And it was for you. That is the promise. And that gives us an anchor. That gives us an objective reality in the mixed-up-ness of mental health to go, yes, that is mine.

That is the final say on this. So I want to encourage you, be kind to yourself, be kind to one another, but be encouraged. Always have hope and courage in our hearts that we don't have the final say. Our mental health does not have the final say. Jesus is the final say.

Let's pray. Father, we thank You for this wonderful moment in history. This just intimate, vulnerable, precious insight that we have of You relating so personally with one man. We thank You that in this we see a little bit of Your character. We thank You that You are so gentle.

We thank You that You know what our needs are and You can provide for us. We thank You that You offer us rest. And Lord, when we are going through times where we feel that it's going on for so long and we read stories like this in Elijah and we just feel that his situation was turned around so quickly for him. Well, we also kind of forget that this happened over months.

Forty days of walking to Mount Horeb, months. But Lord, You are so wise in Your timing. Lord, You know what You are trying to bring out of us, and there is a purpose and there is a meaning. And so this morning, I also just want to pray for all of us that we may have in our hearts this firm belief that You are not finished with us, that You are not giving up on us, and that You are producing something in us that will shine, that will be strong, wonderful, and be an encouragement, if not for ourselves, for others.

So we pray, Lord, for every single person here in our church, connected to our church, wrestling with these thoughts, wrestling with these challenges. We pray, Lord, that You will give them today especially a sense of Your nearness. Touch them that they may know, they may be strengthened, and keep Satan and his temptations and his deceptions so very far from us even on Monday morning. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.