God comforts depression

Someone sent me a devotion on this section that I didn't read for months after she sent it. But it was in the midst of a realization that I am suffering some sort of depression myself that I read it and found some hope today. So I want to remind myself here. I want to hold onto this hope for God's provision in my worst moments.

Elijah has just finished setting up an alter for God to prove his power to the Israelites (again) by setting fire to an offering drenched in water when the prophets of Baal could not rise a spark after hours of prayer. He KNOWS God is real. He knows he was going up against the gods of the government and the majority of the people. He had all those prophets killed. (Why couldn't they just be exiled?). Yet, when Jezebel (queen?) orders his death, he not only runs and hides (which is pretty prudent in such a situation, really), but he despairs. He abandons his servant (his support system) and travels a day alone to find isolation. He sleeps. And he prays not to wake up. And even when God provides a meal for him in the wilderness, he only wakes up long enough to eat it and then goes back to sleep.

That sounds like a pretty intense depression. Elijah does not cry out to God for mercy or life or justice. He sleeps. God wakes him up. God provides 2 meals that give Elijah the strength to travel 40 days! God doesn't promise anything about lifting his mood or even saving his life. But He gives him the strength to wake up and to keep moving.

Then he comes to Elijah in another cave, and Elijah recognizes the whisper of the Lord so he can come to meet Him and be given more instructions. God whispers to those who know Him. We have to listen to hear it, and we have to know His character to recognize it. But He will always speak. He will always guide us.

God, please, please quiet all the nonsense in my mind that drowns You out and muffles Your voice. Please keep waiting for me as I wade through the mess I've made of my own little cave. Maybe most of all, help me to follow You when I do hear Your voice again.

1 Kings 19:1-8, 11-13, 15 ESV

Ahab told 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, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and 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, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers." 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 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... 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. 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 came a voice to him and said, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" ...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.

Created over 1 year ago