Lessons from the Life of Elijah

Hello, it's so great to be with you today, and why don't we pray and ask God to use this time. Dear Lord, we're so thankful that we can come together to worship together as a family, as a community of believers. We thank you for your presence, and we look to you now as we open your Word. I pray that you would guide us with your Holy Spirit. I pray that you would speak to our hearts, so give us open hearts and open ears to receive.

We pray that through your Spirit, we might be restored, healed, become whole, and we thank you for what you're about to do. In Jesus' name, amen.

I don't know if this has happened to you, but as I read the Bible, during certain periods of time, It seems that I either find a passage or a Bible hero that I keep going back over and over and over again. Has this ever happened to you? There's so much to learn and I'm needing in many ways, and this helps, I'm going to put my glasses on. Otherwise, I'll be squinting and I'll look weird. Right.

Here I am. I'm in. Okay. So during this season, I keep going back and reading about Elijah because there's so much to learn about his life and that I think applies to our own life. Elijah is a frequent figure in the Bible from the Old Testament to the New Testament, from 1 Kings to the Gospels, where he is part of the Mount of Transfiguration vision and experience to the book of James, where we are going to find our central passage today.

Now, if you're not familiar with Jesus or the Bible, it's very significant to be mentioned in both the Old and New Testaments. This alludes to the importance of Elijah. Elijah's ministry happened around the 9th century before Christ. And in the Transfiguration, where Jesus is transfigured or transformed formed before three of his disciples, his face begins to shine like the sun, his clothes become dazzling white, and Moses and Elijah appear, and they are speaking with Jesus.

These three disciples get a quick glimpse of Jesus's future state of glory and resurrection. And of course, as we read the Gospels, we find that Jesus told them not to tell anybody because Jesus had yet to go to the cross and to be resurrected and to be in glory. But they caught a glimpse of Jesus's glory way, way before. So the appearance of Elijah here in the Mount of Transfiguration points to his prominence in the Scriptures.

So now let's look at a central passage for today. It's found in In James chapter 5, verses 17 and 18, you can read it on the screen, or you can follow along on your device.

It says, I'm reading from the NIV translation, Elijah was a human being. Even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops. Now tell me how many people can do that? Pray, and it would stop raining for three and a half years, and then pray again, and rain would fall, and the fields would produce the crops.

Now, there's two things that stand to me right away that are very obvious. Number one, Elijah was human. Number two, he was just as human as we are. And I like the way the King James Version puts it. It's up on the screen again. This is another translation of the Bible. Elias was a man subject to like passions. Now, Elias is another name for Elijah. In Spanish, we call him Elias. So it makes total sense to me, right? Right. But Elias was a man subject to like passion as we are.

And he prayed earnestly that it might not rain. And it rained down on the earth by the space of three years and six months. Now, here it says he was subject to passions as we are. The root word here for passions also means limitations, feelings and sufferings. Elijah was not a spiritual Superman. He was just like us. He had his highs and he had his lows. He had struggles and problems, too. I say this because many of us, many times, put Bible heroes up on a pedestal.

But if we look closer, we find that they were just like us. So there is hope for us. There is hope for you and me. He was just as weak, just as many struggles, just as many problems, if not more. Now, what this means for us is that we are all, all of us, you and me, no matter your background, no matter where you come from, no matter what you experience, we are all capable of significant ups and significant downs.

We may find ourselves in the valley of the shadow of death one day, and we might be on the mountaintop of victory the next day. We can go from one end to the other and God can use each one of us in powerful ways. And then we can turn around and sink into depression. Now you might be thinking, yes, Luis, but this is Elijah you're talking about. This is a big figure. Look at me. Have you ever felt small? Have you ever felt insignificant?

Have you ever felt your own limitations and all the stuff that you have lived through, let me remind you about what Jesus said of all of us, of all his followers, that includes you and me. And let's look at John 14, verse 12. It says, very truly, I tell you. Whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I'm going to the Father.

This is a promise from Jesus for all his followers, including you and me, right now in San Diego, in July 2024, God wants to use every one of us in powerful ways for His glory. Do you believe this? He does. Not one exception. It's not too good to be true. It's a promise, and God is faithful to His promises.

So, we're going to do a couple of things today. We're going to look at Elijah when he's at the very top, and we're going to look at Elijah when he's at his lowest point and take away, hopefully, the Spirit will speak to our hearts and take some lessons from it. Now, we already know that he prayed earnestly and it didn't rain for three and a half years. And then he prayed again and it began to rain and the fields yielded the crops.

Again, who does that? Number two, God used Elijah in bringing down And I mean literally. This is not allegorically speaking, figuratively speaking. This actually happened. And he did this. He called down fire from heaven not just once. Let's look at one of these examples, one of these instances. In 2 Kings 1, verses 9 and 10, it says, He says, then he sent to Elijah a captain. Who sent it? We will see that he... This person who was sent, this captain who was sent, was sent by the king of Israel.

And we will find out why, why he sent him. Then he sent to Elijah a captain with his company of 50 men. So not only does the king send a captain, he sends him with 50 men to get Elijah. The captain went up to Elijah who was sitting on top of the hill and he said to him, Man of God, the king says, come down. Elijah answered the captain, if I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50 men. Then fire fell from the heavens and consumed the captain and his men. Wow.

Now, I know in 2024, being in San Diego in Southern California. Passages from the Old Testament like this are hard to swallow. But please remember, please keep in mind that these are different times. These are different cultures. And as we will see, the king was an evil king. And instead of him leading God's people to God, he was worshiping Baal. He was worshiping idols. And idol worship in those days, pagan worship, was basically demonic worship.

They were worshiping demons. And these people, the priests and the prophets of these idols were not Boy Scouts. And these kings, when they were reminded by people like Elijah, they would get vengeance. Prophets, true prophets, would often be persecuted and jailed and killed. So this is a bloody time. This is a horrific time. But this was reality. We might not like it, but this is reality.

And so the Bible here is talking about Azazel, I don't know how to pronounce it, the king of Israel, but he was a wicked king, so I don't feel bad about mispronouncing his name. On this occasion, King Azariah had fallen and was injured. He fell from the window and was injured. And instead of consulting God, he sends messengers to consult with the prophets of Baal to see if he will recover from his sickness because he was bedridden.

But God tells Elijah what has happened and sends Elijah to meet the messengers before they even get to the prophets and to say. Elijah comes out and says to this messenger, Is there no God in Israel that you are going to consult Baal? Now, we see here that Elijah is jealous for God. He's jealous for God because God is jealous of his people. God wants the heart of his people drawn back to him instead of getting misled and abused by these false religions and by these false idols.

The Lord says, Elijah continues, you will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die. This king is a wicked king, of course, and he sends his captain and his men to get Elijah. And now we know how Elijah greets them, right? So, yeah, I'm a man of God. Well, let's see about that.

If I'm the man of God, fire is going to come down. And it did. Now, Now, we need to know that the king was not inviting Elijah to have coffee with him and to have a nice chat. The king was calling Elijah probably to jail him and possibly kill him. And these were terrible times for the people of God. And God was about to do something miraculous and bring the heart of his people. Another thing to consider here is God's jealousy.

Jealousy god's jealousy which is purer than human jealousy is as real as his love our individualistic prideful culture sees jealousy as a weakness but elijah does not because god does not elijah here is demonstrating god's love in a very counter-cultural way he is jealous of god and he's he's he's had it with with all the spiritual abuse and all the people being misled and oppressed by all these false idols.

But perhaps one of the most famous episodes from Elijah's life comes when he challenges the prophets of Baal to figure out once and for all who is the real God. So he sets up an appointment with them on Mount Carmel, and Baal's prophets are on one side, and they build an altar, and they put a sacrifice, and so does Elijah on the other side. He builds built an altar, rocks, puts a sacrifice on top of the altar.

And he says, okay, prophets of Baal, do your thing. Of course, they're dancing, they're cutting themselves, they're doing all these pagan practices. By the way, the pagans' practices were pretty nasty, pretty bloody, pretty violent. So please don't feel bad for the prophets of Baal. So they're dancing and they're waiting. And of course, Elijah didn't have a watch back then. But if he did, he would probably say, all right, well, it's been 30 minutes. It's an hour and no response from Baal yet.

And he's laughing at them. He's making fun of them. And we get here to our passage in 1 Kings 18, verses 37 to 40. And Elijah is praying. The prophets of Baal had had their chance and nothing has happened. Of course, nothing was going to happen because he was a false idol. He was a false god. Answer me, Lord. Answer me. So these people will know that you, Lord, are God and that you are turning their hearts back again.

Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the woods, the stones, and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench. Because Elijah wanted people to know how powerful God was. So not only did he put the altar, but he basically poured so much water on the sacrifice and on the altar that there was water around the trench. So when the fire comes down, it consumes even the water. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried,

The Lord, He is God. The Lord, He is God. Then Elijah commanded them, Seize the prophets of Baal. don't anyone get away. They seized them and Elijah had brought them down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered there. Wow. What a demonstration of God's power. What a demonstration of God's love to call his people back to him. Because of the love for his people, God wanted to turn their hearts back to him. This is probably the highest point in Elijah's life.

But then immediately after After this comes the lowest point in Elijah's life.

He goes through this massive history, massive victory, where a fire comes down and he proves who is God. And then Jezebel, the queen, when she hears about this and that the prophets of Baal are slaughtered, he sends a message to Elijah and says, you are going to die. I'm going to hunt you down and I'm going to kill you. So this powerful man of God who just called down fire from heaven, such a miraculous occurrence, such a big victory, is now afraid and running for his life.

This is Elijah at the very bottom. him. Let's look at 1 Kings chapter 19. It says, Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there while he himself went away a day's journey into the wilderness. He came to a broom bush, sat under it, and prayed that he might die. I have had enough, Lord, he said. Take my life. I am no better than my ancestors. Then he lay down under the bush and fell asleep.

What a drastic change, huh? From one end to the other. From being a victorious prophet and man of God, to being depressed, running for his life, to being afraid and wanting to die. Three things happen here. Number one, Elijah is afraid and he flees. Number two, Elijah is depressed and he wants to die. Have many of you ever been depressed? I have, many times. Number three, Elijah is exhausted and he falls asleep. Now, it doesn't say that Elijah was tired.

When you're tired, you can sleep and that's fine. But when you're exhausted, sleep helps a little bit, but it doesn't really cure it, does it? Exhaustion needs a little bit more. Have you ever been in spiritual warfare, in a spiritual battle in your life? And you come out victorious. Did you find that you were exhausted? Has anybody here experienced that in your life? And when you come out of it, you're so grateful, you're so happy, but you're exhausted.

And then you're very vulnerable. We're very, very, very vulnerable to attack, to discouragement. And this is what happens to Elijah. Basically, Elijah has ran into a wall, and the blow was hard. Hitting a wall is a normal thing in the Christian life, and even in ministry. We all hit walls in our lives as we follow God, and not just one wall.

We hit many walls. I believe that one of the best illustrations of the Christian walker journey comes from a book called The Critical Journey by Janet Bennett Hagberg and Robert Gulick. And in it, it refers to the six stages of faith. And many people, many books, Bible colleges and seminaries have also quoted this book and quoted this particular illustration, including the book that many of us are studying, a book called Spiritually Healthy Spirituality by Spitz Cazero.

They quote these six stages of faith. And I would like us to take a look so we get a little bit better understanding. I don't know if they can put up the slide up there. There we go. The six stages of faith. So please bear with me. Number one, stage number one is when we encounter God and our life changes. And that doesn't mean that we know about God. Many people know about God, but they don't encounter Him. They hear about God, but their life doesn't change.

This is when somebody actually encounters God and their life changes. What is your story? Have you had your encounter with God? Is there a before and after in your life? There can be if you're open to God's voice. In my case, I remember I was 10 years old. I was in a children's summer camp, Christian camp, in Tecate, Mexico. I grew up in Tijuana. And so in Tecate, somebody here from Tecate? All right. It's good. Good. And it was Friday night. It was the final night of the camp.

And I remember the teacher to this day, the preacher who was giving the message. And he said, all right, boys and girls, I know that many of you have grown up in church and all the Bible stories. I know that many of you know that Jesus died on the cross for our sins. And then he said, but it's not enough to know. You need to respond. There's two ways of responding. Number one, you either reject Jesus, or number two, you accept Him. And I'm going to give you a chance to respond right now.

Those who want to respond positively, please come up for prayer. Next thing I knew, I was all the way to the front. I don't even remember how I got there, but I was all the way up there. Because I know that I needed to encounter God on a personal level, and I did. And I opened my heart, and I trusted Jesus with my life, and He became my Savior. He became my Lord, and there was a before and after since then. Stage two, discipleship. That's when we learn and we grow spiritually.

After our first encounter with God, we are spiritually hungry. And we begin to read the Scriptures. We begin to pray. We begin to develop our faith. It's a wonderful time. It's a wonderful time of growing and learning. Do you remember that stage, many of you, when you first encountered God, how hungry you were, and how you couldn't get enough Bible, enough prayer, and what a joyful time that was in your life. Stage three. Stage three is service, when we begin to serve God and others fully.

This stage is where we discover our gifts and talents and put them to use in the service of God and others. And as we serve, we are filled with joy and we continue to grow. Old, there is nothing like the feeling of knowing that God can use you and He will use all of us if we allow Him to. Now, I need to point out here that most Christians get stuck in these first three stages. Many believers don't go past that. The third stage. They remain in the basic. They, of course, believe in Jesus.

They read the Bible. They pray. They go to church, and they start serving, but they never make it to step four, five, and very, very few ever get to stage six on this side of heaven. So, what happens on stage three? Why do people get stuck? There is something called the wall. We hit the wall. Elijah has hit a wall. The mighty prophet of God is fearful and is running for his life. But we all hit the wall a number of times, not just Elijah.

When do we hit the wall? Well, we hit the wall when we face a crisis, when we face death, pain, disappointment, health problems, marriage problems, family problems, financial problems, you name it. All of those unexpected crises cause us to hit a wall. And when we hit a wall, you begin to have doubts about your faith, about God and the church. Has anybody else been there? I've been there. I've been there a few times.

Many people on stage three that are serving suffer injustice, disappointment, betrayal, or other painful situations of that themselves. If it's even worth it to go to church. When many people hit the wall, many leave church. Many have been hurt or suffered disappointment by a church leader or pastor or somebody else in the church. Many get stuck here. Many don't recover.

God has allowed me to live in a number of countries. And in each country, I have met too many believers that are no longer part of a Christian community because they were hurt, because they hit a wall, and they have never recovered. In my own life, when I read about hitting the wall, it made total sense to me. I had never seen it like this, about the crisis that I had faith in my own life. I have hit a number of walls.

Erica and I have during the past 30 plus years in the ministry, you name it, dissolution, disappointment, betrayal, trails. It is painful and confusing, filled with doubts. We had even asked if there was actually just one healthy church in our time, because many had been so dysfunctional and so disappointing.

Anybody else been there? Let's move on to stage four. In stage four, we look inward. Amid the obstacles and pain, we begin to allow God to work in us. It's painful. We're confused. Too many questions. Too many doubts. But if we allow God to work in us and we look inward, the result is health, maturity, and depth. But this maturing requires our participation. If we are open to God's work and His process during this time, He can help us through the doubts, the pain, and the many questions.

We will see how God worked in Elijah when he hit his wall shortly. But hitting the wall shouldn't be the end. Hitting the wall shouldn't keep us stranded or stuck. Hitting a wall is part of the process of growing in our faith and deepening our faith and growing in our experience in knowing God so much deeper and so much better. So let's go into stage five. After we look inward and God works through us, we go through the wall renewed and we begin to serve again.

We discover God and His great love and that is what drives us. Sure, we see all the junk still, but we are somehow more mature. It doesn't knock us over. We are able to move beyond it. With grace, with compassion, as we become whole and healed. I still see the dysfunctionality in the church and others, and especially in me. But because of God's work in me, it doesn't stop me. It doesn't throw me out of the race.

Because I have been through the wall. And you can too. It still grieves me. It's still painful. But we can now, when we go through the wall, have the maturity and the wholeness to endure it and to move forward. Even though I was disillusioned by the church, I knew God was more than a church, and I came to realize that God's plan to save the world is through His church.

You and me, we are His church, and He will use us to reach our neighbors, our friends, our family, our community, San Diego, and the whole world if we're able to move forward. word. In the ministry that I work with, we have a slogan that says, the local church is the hope of the world. I believe that because we are plan A. And you know what? There is no plan B. As messed up as we are, as hit as we are, there is no plan B. We are God's plan, and God wants to use us.

There's also another saying that a Christian writer once stated. He said this, there's nothing Nothing like the local church when it is working right. There is nothing like the local church when it is working right. The problem is many times it isn't working at all. But that doesn't mean it can't, right? So let's go on to stage six. Stage six. In stage six, we are transformed to love. We mature in love and we move in it. It is a life totally surrendered, full of gratitude and joy.

This is where I want to be when I grow up. I would love it somehow to make it to level six, to stage six. I have heard veteran pastors share about this, about their mentors and how they have seen it in their life. Mature believers, people who have been around and have been through many walls and somehow not only crossed the wall, but flourished through the wall and encountering God's deep love. One pastor specifically talked about Eugene Peterson, the author of the Message Paraphrased Bible.

And he talked about how when he was around Eugene Peterson at the end of his life, he sensed God's love and presence around him. He said, just to be around Eugene was such an encouragement. He radiated Christ's love in a palpable way. Wouldn't that be wonderful if people could say that about us? Oh, when I'm around her. Oh, when I'm around him. I sense God's presence. I sense God's love. This person is pure love. He's so filled with God.

Wouldn't that be wonderful if they could say that about you and me? So as we look at the six stages, the question is, where are you? You don't need to tell me, but really, where are you? Are you fearful? Are you insecure? Are you depressed? Are you exhausted? Are you fleeing? Where are you?

Elijah has hit a wall. where is the great prophet where is god's mighty man again let me restate it we are all capable of great victories and great lows god can use us to do mighty things but we are essentially weak it reminds me of a verse in second corinthians chapter 4 it says but we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. The great treasure is God's love and God's message in our lives that we can share with others.

But at the same time, we are really broken vessels. We are really jars of clay, and we are pretty fragile. That is why we need to depend and rely on the power of the Holy Spirit. Have you ever hit a wall? Have you ever been depressed? Some of us have been told in the past, or some of us think that we are not supposed to show weakness, or to be vulnerable, or to get depressed. We have somehow believed the lie that that is sinful or that it is lack of faith.

I remember a conversation a long time ago between a young pastor and an older pastor who was very traditional. And this young pastor was in awe of the older pastor. And so he really admired this older pastor. So he looks up to him and he goes up to him and he says, Sir, how are you? And the older pastor turns around and says to him, How is a child of God supposed to be? Really? Strong, victorious, and determined was his answer.

There was not a lot of room for weakness or vulnerability in this older pastor's life. He was taught that he needed to be a spiritual superman. But the reality is that we are weak, and we desperately need God. And it is a healthy thing to admit our weaknesses and to show our vulnerability. So let's get back to Elijah. He's depressed. He's fearful. He's tired. He's exhausted. He wants to die. How does God respond? Put yourself in God's shoes. How would you respond? On. Here is a great prophet.

Here's a man that God has used in a powerful way. And he turns around after a great victory, becomes afraid and loses it. How would you respond to Elijah?

Let's look at God's response in 1 Kings 19. You still with me? 1 Kings 19 verse 5 through 9 says all at once, of course, we have heard that Elijah runs away. He's basically run for 24 hours. He's exhausted.

Exhausted he runs by a bush and falls asleep this is where the story picks up all at once an angel touched him and said get up and eat he looked around and there by his head was some bread baked over hot coals and a jar of water he ate and drank and then lay down again he fell asleep again in other words he was exhausted the angel of the lord came back a second time and touched him and and said, Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you. So he got up and ate and drank.

Strengthened by that food, he traveled, look, hear this, forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. There he went into a cave and spent the night. And this is fascinating. And the word of the Lord came to him. What are you doing here, Elijah? What are you doing here, Elijah? I find that God responds in three ways. Number one, God responds with love and tenderness. Here's the great prophet who's fearful, who's depressed, who's running away,

who wants to die. And how does God respond? With great love and tenderness. I am so moved by the way God responds to him. He doesn't cut him down. He doesn't say, okay, you know, I shouldn't have picked you. He doesn't say that, right? What does he do? He sends an angel, taps him on the shoulder. Here, have something to eat, have something to drink. What a gracious, loving, tender God we have.

God sends an angel, Elijah eats and drinks. Number two, and this is what amazes me too, two, not only God's great love and tenderness, but God actually gives him the space to flee and to hide. God is not threatened by us when we flee or when we hide. That's being human. That's being normal. That's a very human response. And God lets him process his depression. He doesn't know, oh, you're supposed to be a great man of God. Why are you doing depressed? No.

God gives him the space. God lets him process. And number three, God confronts Elijah lovingly. And this question is asked in love and with great tenderness. What are you doing here, Elijah? Basically, God is saying to Elijah, let's talk about this now. Let's have a conversation. Let's deal with this. Let's process this. Let's see how we can get you through this, Elijah. God doesn't confront until after he cares. He cares for him.

He sends an angel. He feeds him. He sustains him. He protects him. And he says, let's deal with your depression. Please know that if you have hit a wall or are in pain or fleeing or hiding or doubting or not seeing clearly, please know that God loves you. Please know that you can experience the same great God with such a loving heart, with such tenderness, with such care as Elijah did.

This is what God wants you to know, that he loves you. He knows that we've all been hit somehow, one way or another, and he wants you to know that he's there for you. He's beside you to help you work through what you are facing. And if you hold on to him, you will get through the wall. Now let's see how God works in Elijah's life.

Let's go back Back to 1 Kings 19, now verses 10 through 13. So the conversation starts because God asked, what are you doing here? And of course, Elijah begins to have this conversation with God. He replied, I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. That's true. He was very zealous. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with a sword. I am the only one left, he says.

And now they're trying to kill me too. The Lord said, go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by. And here comes a series of wild events. Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind. And I would love for somebody to make a movie about Elijah.

Wouldn't you like to see the scene? I would love to see Elijah in the cave and this whole scene working, playing out, you know, the wind starting and rocks flying all over the place and noise and a great manifestation of God's power. But it says here, the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake. I hope the movie comes out sometime. time. After the wind, there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake.

After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire comes what Elijah really needs. After the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Elijah said, now we're talking. Yeah. The heavy wind, the earthquake, the fire, that was nothing for Elijah. You know what Elijah needed, you know what moved Elijah? Was God's presence.

Was God's voice. And in the middle of our struggles, in the middle of whatever we're going through, that is what we most desperately need. We need his presence. We need to hear his voice. A conversation then begins in the cave. And what happens here is that Elijah has believed a lie. He tells God, I am the only one left. That is a lie. Now the question is, are you in a cave? As you hit a wall, have you believed any lies?

Because when he had hit a wall, people tell us things. The enemy tells us things. We tell ourselves things. And most of the time, a lot of the time, they are lies. They're not true. But we somehow believe them. And of course, it doesn't help. It takes us even further down. Elijah thinks he's the only one left, but he is not. What are the lies that you have believed? Who are you listening to? So a conversation begins, and God asks him to come out of the cave and stand in his presence.

His presence is where the healing begins. ends. God reminds him of his great power, but it isn't until the voice that Elijah recognizes this is what he needs. He needs to spend time in God's presence. He needs to hear his voice. This is a conversation. Now, I have another question for you. Do you have conversations with God? Because that's what we need. And in a conversation, we not only talk, we listen. Are you listening?

Because God wants to speak if you're able and willing and available to listen. Because as He speaks to our heart, as He ministers to us through His presence, that is where the healing and restoration and wholeness comes to us. Then after that, God gives him these next steps. They have this conversation. God speaks to him. And he says, okay, now I need you to get up and do this. Another question is, are you willing to go through the God's process of healing,

restoration, and growth? Are you willing to? When I look at the gospel, I remember that Jesus once asked a man who was very sick and who had been sick a long time if he wanted to be healed. This happens in John 5, verse 6. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, do you want to get well? Sometimes we stick around the valleys too long. Sometimes we love misery. Sometimes we love self-pity.

But there comes a time after God does His work that we need to get up and we need to move on. Don't get stuck. Move on. Elijah knew that the time had come to move on after going through God's process and care. In 1 Kings 17, verse 5, we find that Elijah had been in the wilderness before. So this experience after the prophets of Baal and running away wasn't the first time that Elijah found himself in the wilderness. He had been there before.

Here's another place where God really takes care of his servants. It says, So he did what the Lord had told him. He went into the Kareth ravine east of the Jordan, and he stayed there. The ravens brought him bread and meat. How is that? Huh? Ravens. The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the brook. Here we see God lovingly and tenderly taking care of a servant in another crisis.

So God does only not just once, but a number of times, and he will do it with us too. But then comes this last sentence, sometime later, sometime later, sorry, the brook dried up.

Eventually, the brook dries up, God finishes the process, it's time to move on. Where do you find yourself today? Wherever you are, God loves you and He wants you to be whole. Sometimes it takes time to go through the wall. If you find yourself there, meet with God there and spend the time you need. Go through the process of healing, restoration, and growth. You can't do this alone. You can't do it in isolation. This is where the importance of a community comes in.

And that's why Park Hill Church stresses so much the importance of being a part of a community group and for believers to be part of a larger community in a church. Because we can't grow, we can't heal by ourselves. Of course, God does the healing, but he does that through his presence, number one. And number two, he does it through his church.

Through us opening our hearts to one another, crying with one another, laughing with one another, growing together in love. This is also where having a mentor or spiritual father or mother comes in. In my personal life, I've been blessed with a number of mentors throughout my life. Mentors who have been sent by God, I believe, to help me along my journey. Some of them have passed on or are in heaven. and some of them are still here and I'm so grateful for all of them.

Spiritual fathers and mothers, do you have any mentors?

Do you have a spiritual father or mother? If not, ask God for one or for several and God will send them your way. Be open to them. Look for them and ask God for them. They are such a blessing. People who have followed God for longer times than we have. People who have greater experience who can really help you along and embrace you and give you good counsel. And number three, this is also where we're going to a spirit-led counselor is very valuable.

One of my mentors is a theologian, but he's also a psychologist, and he has an amazing gift of discernment. Oh, my goodness. He would say, Luis, this is what you're saying, but this is what I sense. And boom, he was right on. I mean, he would cut straight and hit me right in the middle of where I was. But he was also very gracious.

The Spirit led. And I needed counseling several times. I probably will need it again. But yet when I grew up, that was taboo. Oh, you can't go to a psychologist. They would say, well, I have been to one. And they've been very helpful. So maybe if you do need counseling, please go. Please go. Please go through the process. And you will come out with greater maturity, grace, and wholeness, you will be changed.

And as I said before, you will still see a lot of junk, but it will not affect you like the first time that you saw it because you will have changed. You will have moved through it.

At the same time, it is important to remember that we don't spend our whole life at the wall. We go through it. You need to go through it. When we are there, God will provide a brook, but there comes a time when the process is completed and the brook dries up. Some of us are in the wall. Some of us are in stage four, still processing the pain and asking questions. Good. Don't stop there. Some of us, God has gotten us through the process and we're ready to move on.

And the brook has dried up, but we love it there where we are. We want to stay there. But if the brook has dried up, it's time to move on. It's time to move forward. God is not finished with you.

There are greater things to come in your life. We need to move forward.

Would you close your eyes, please? I would like to pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for Elijah's life. We thank you for the transparency of his life, faith that we're able to see him at his highest peak, but we're also able to see him at his lowest point, depressed, fearful, running away, hitting a wall in that beautiful process of healing and restoration. Lord, I realize that there are some of us here that are just on the wall. They have just hit it, and they're in pain. They're doubting.

There are unresolved questions, confusion, confusion, disappointment. I pray that through your Holy Spirit, you would begin a work of healing. Restoration, that you would make us all whole, that we would experience your love in a way that we have never done before, that we will be able to get a glimpse of how great your love is and how tender your heart is.

I pray for those that need healing today, that you would heal them in Jesus' I pray for those who are almost at the end of that process of healing, but they're afraid to move on. The brook has dried, but they're afraid to move on. I pray that you give them the courage to stand and to take steps of faith and to continue on their journey with greater maturity, with greater depth. Ready to tackle even greater battles and experience greater victories.

And I pray for those who haven't even begun their spiritual journey, that if they're ready to meet you, that they would have the courage to open their heart and put their trust in you, Jesus, that they would know you, that there would be a before and after.