Christ the King-Epiphany, Wilbraham

The Rev. Martha S. Sipe

August 11, 2024 / Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost / Lectionary 19B

1 Kings 19:4-8; Ephesians 4:25-5:2; John 6:35, 41-51

I’m going to shake things up a bit this morning by doing my preaching now because I’m focusing on the Old Testament lesson that Nancy is about to read from the book of First Kings.  Before she reads it, I’d like to give you some context because, unless you’ve read all of 1 Kings chapters 18 and 19 (which I highly recommend, by the way – it’s a rip-roaring good story) – unless you know the context, this story will not make much sense to you.

What Nancy will read in just a few minutes is a brief story from the life of the prophet Elijah.  Elijah is the prophet who spoke the word of the Lord to King Ahab, who was known as the wickedest king of Israel.  His reputation for wickedness came largely from the influence his wife, Jezebel, had over him.  Because she was from a foreign land, she worshiped other gods other than the one true God.  And when I say she worshiped other gods, I’m not talking about saying a few prayers privately in her room in the palace.  Jezebel constructed shrines to the Baals (gods), and built a pagan temple in the palace, and kept 450 priests or “false prophets” on retainer.  Under her influence, King Ahab became lax in his own religious observance, which allowed Jezebel’s religion to influence the people of Israel.

As you might imagine, Elijah the prophet had some things to say about the people’s unfaithfulness.  And just before the lesson we’re going to hear from Nancy, Elijah had challenged the false prophets to a religious duel.  The duel was this:  both Elijah and the false prophets would build altars and sacrifice a bull on them, but they would not light the fire on the altar.  Instead they would pray to their individual gods to ignite the fire.  The Baal prophets went first.  They prayed and they prayed, and they jumped and they stomped, and they cut themselves with knives, to offer their own blood as sacrifice, which was a part of their tradition . . . they pulled out all the stops to get their gods to ignite their altar . . . and nothing happened.  When it was Elijah’s turn, he set up his altar, laid out his bull, and then with a flair for the dramatic, he had people pour water all over the altar until it was drenched.  Then he stepped back, said his quick prayer, and God totally incinerated his offering.  The people were impressed.  They could see, right before their own eyes, that Israel’s God was the only true God.  And then, I’ll add (parenthetically, because this doesn’t sit well with us moderns), Elijah ordered the slaughter of all of the prophets of Baal.

Queen Jezebel, of course, was not happy – not happy that her gods had been proven phony, not happy that her prophets had been killed.  She swore revenge on Elijah . . . who ran for his life out of Israel’s territory into Judah, and then even further, into the wilderness, to hide from Jezebel.  This is where our story picks up.

1 Kings 19:4-8

4[Elijah] went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”5Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” 6He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. 7The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.” 8He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.

You know the saying, “at the end of your rope?”  I think it’s safe to say that’s where Elijah is at this point in his story.  He is in physical despair:  exhausted from his major public theological showdown, weary from running, and afraid for his life.  He’s also in spiritual despair.  Wouldn’t you be discouraged if you had given your life to following God’s will and all it brought you was trouble and danger?  Let me rephrase that:  Don’t you get discouraged sometimes when, even though you try as hard as you can to make good and faithful choices, you still end up struggling and suffering?  I think that’s how Elijah must have felt.  He just can’t take it anymore.  “It is enough,” he cries to the Lord.  “Take my life.”  Let me die.  He’s at the end of his rope . . . and he’s ready to let go of it, ready to give up.  He lies down under a broom tree, goes to sleep, and waits to die.

But God had a better plan.  God saw Elijah in his despair, and sent an angel of the Lord to Elijah to wake him up and give him something to eat.  Elijah eats the fresh-baked loaf of bread and drinks the water, and then . . . get this . . . he lies down again and goes back to sleep.  I love that detail of the story because I think it’s so true to life.  Sometimes God has to intervene more than once in our lives to get us out of our despair.  So the angel lets him rest, and then rouses him again – a little more pointedly this time.  “Get up and eat.”  Why?   “Because otherwise you won’t make it through your journey.”  At about this point, Elijah must be wondering what journey the angel is talking about.  After all, he has given up, and giving up means “end of journey, end of story.”  But the angel knows that this is not the end of the story.  God still has plans for Elijah.  

And God still has plans for us – even when – especially when – we feel like we’re at the end of our rope.  Think of it this way:  every time we gather here for worship, we are re-enacting this story about Elijah.  We come here, week after week, sometimes, honestly, feeling like we’re at the end of our rope.  We plop down here, not under the shelter of a broom tree, but in the shelter of these walls that have been for us a place of refuge.  Most Sundays, we’re not begging God to let us die (hopefully).  And most Sundays, we don’t just fall asleep here (at least I hope not!).  Nevertheless, God sees us in our need.  God watches over us and gives us this place of rest and peace.  Then God feeds us, not with a cake baked on stones and a jar of water, but with God’s Word and with the Bread of Life and the cup of salvation.  Even if we, like Elijah, eat this miraculous meal . . . and still feel like giving up . . . this same food will be here to nourish us when we gather again next week.  And the week after that.  And every Sunday.  And when we have received rest and refreshment from God’s Word and holy communion, from prayer and song, and from our “angels,” those messengers of love and strength that God gives us in this community, then God sends us out to continue our journey.  For just as God still had plans for Elijah, so God still has plans for us.  

God has plans for us, some of which we will hear in the next lesson:  speaking truth, not lies; refraining from sin, even when we’re angry; working honestly; sharing what we have with the needy; only speaking words that build one another up; being kind and tenderhearted and forgiving; imitating Christ in everything we do.  It’s a tall order, on top of all the other things that life demands of us, and we may well become weary and feel like giving up.  But we need not despair.  For our meal is the bread of life, and we who eat this bread will live forever with Jesus to give us strength – throughout this life and also in the life to come.