Sermon Tone Analysis
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What Are You Doing Here?
Pray: Heavenly Father, help us to find You and hear Your voice today.
Amen.
I want to talk to you today about overcoming real challenges to your faith.
I want to talk to you about overcoming feelings of heaviness, loneliness, weariness, and even depression.
I want to talk to you about finding God in the midst of the problems and pains of life.
Have you ever felt defeated, discouraged or depressed?
Have you discovered that it can be difficult to hear from God or even find energy for faith when life is overwhelming?
Have you ever felt like you were a failure, or not good enough, or not capable enough to do what God called you to do?
James 5:17 (NKJV)
Elijah was a man with a nature like ours...
Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.
He experienced all of these things.
Think about this for a moment:
Elijah the prophet — one of Israel’s greatest prophets.
His ministry begins with prophesying to the king that it would not rain.
And God stops the rain.
God provides for him miraculously with meat and bread by the Brook.
He does miracles for the widow and her son, first for provision during the famine and then even resurrecting the boy.
Then he confronts false prophets in front of the king and the nation and God responds to his faith with fire from heaven.
The people choose God and the false prophets are killed.
Then he prays for rain and God responds by sending rain.
And then after that, Jezebel threatens him.
And suddenly he feels defeated, discouraged and depressed.
Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.
Like Elijah, I suspect that even if we have had public victories, we have also had private struggles.
Just like Elijah’s mortal enemy Jezebel, the enemy of our souls will not stop coming after us (cf.
Psalm 143.3).
The world, flesh, and devil will continue to conspire to bring problems and pain into our lives ( cf.
Ephesians 2.2-3).
The good news is that we can know and experience the truth that we are not alone.
God is with us.
God is for us.
And we can find Him even in the silence.
The Cave
There are a lot of things that we might use to try to overcome these feelings.
We could use medications or some other substance to dull our senses, make us numb to our experiences, or bring a moment of ecstasy in an otherwise dull or deadened life.
We could distract ourselves through busyness or religiosity.
We could immerse ourselves in entertainment and fantasy.
But none of these things will work to address the needs of our souls.
What if we could find something that does work?
What if we could learn to walk with God even in the midst of our struggles?
What if we could learn to find Him and hear Him even when the pain is deafening?
What if we could find our way out of the darkness and into the light (1 Peter 2.9)?
You need to know today that God is for you in every circumstance and in the face of everything you are confronted with.
God is with you.
And God has made a way through every valley and dark place (Psalm 23.4).
Out of the Cave
There are a number of things that we can learn from Elijah’s experience with God.
Be Honest About Your Situation
Elijah was honest about how he felt.
He wanted to quit.
He wanted to die.
He felt that his situation was hopeless.
He felt that he was a failure.
He went into the cave at the mountain and when God asked him what he was doing there he didn’t withhold his feelings before the Lord.
He told God that he was zealous—passionate, jealous—for Him.
But he felt let down because people turned their back on God, dismantled worship, and persecuted and killed His true followers.
He felt alone as though he was the only one who was trying to live right and do right.
Though he was in the cave, he did not hide in the darkness (cf.
Genesis 3.7).
He spoke from his heart.
And God received him.
God did not rebuke him.
God sent an angel who comforted and strengthened him.
God gave him strength for forty days and forty nights while he traversed the wilderness toward the mountain of God.
This phrase and this place points us back to another significant moment in Scripture.
Moses spent 40 days in the presence of God on this mountain, not eating nor drinking, waiting to hear and receive the Law of God and the Old Covenant (Exodus 24.18; 34.28; Deuteronomy 9.9-11, 18).
It points us forward to the 40 days and 40 nights that Jesus spent fasting in the wilderness as he was preparing to declare the gospel of a New Covenant (Matthew 4.2).
These wilderness periods and times of dryness and difficulty often preceded a new season or significant event.
Miracles happen in the face of impossible situations.
In the hands of God our struggles become opportunities for Him to move.
Illustration: Whatever we hold on to we are responsible for; whatever we give to Him, He will be responsible for.
If you are struggling, don’t hide.
Share it with God.
Be honest with yourself.
This is the first step towards freedom and healing and wholeness.
Move Towards God
Though he needed encouragement, Elijah chose to move towards God.
Drawing near is often pictured by prayer.
And it is Elijah who is given as an example of drawing near and moving toward God in prayer.
And God responded.
We are reminded that Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.
If we are going to overcome the heaviness and depression and burdens we carry, we mustn’t avoid God.
We need to move toward God.
We also can’t avoid the pain through medicine.
Medicine can be helpful but it can’t restore the soul (cf.
Isaiah 38.21).
We can’t avoid the pain through busyness, distracting ourselves with work, activities, or religious practices.
We can’t avoid the pain through entertainment and escape into a false reality.
But we can move toward God.
We can keep pressing on until we find Him and hear His voice.
He will help us along the way.
He will give us bread—a word—to encourage and strengthen us as we keep moving forward.
God was not in the wind.
He was not in the earthquake.
He was not in the fire.
But He was in the sound of silence, the gentle whisper of the still small voice.
Move toward God.
As you do, you will find that He is right there with you, even if you can’t recognize it initially (cf.
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