1 Kings 19:4

Return of Elijah to the Desert.

It is well for us to recognize that the great servants of God are men like ourselves, that they were formed of the same clay, and that they share our infirmities. Elijah had no time to magnify himself after his triumph on Mount Carmel. It was at this very moment God allowed him to pass through the most terrible mental conflict. Led into the bare and arid solitudes of Horeb, he fell into a state of depression bordering on despair, and, throwing himself down under a juniper tree in the wilderness, he cried, "O Lord, now take away my life!" ( 1 Kings 19:4 .) spiritual crisis like this comes in the life of most men of God, and may be explained by two reasons.

1 . There is a spiritual necessity for it. The man of God who has gained the first great victory is apt to think that it is decisive and final, and that he may now cease to fight. And behold, the evil that was vanquished yesterday lifts up its head again, and the conflict has to be begun anew. "I hare been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant" ( 1 Kings 19:10 ).

2 . This painful crisis is permitted by God, who will not have His servants uplifted in their own eyes, even by the most splendid triumphs of the cause which it is their honour to maintain. This is the explanation of the mysterious thorn in the flesh with which St. Paul was buffeted ( 2 Corinthians 12:7 ). This is the cause of the momentary despondency of John the Baptist, which prompted that utterance of a faltering faith, "Art thou he that shoed come?" ( Matthew 11:3 .) To the same source we may trace the anguish of Luther in the Wartburg. He who is pleased thus to exercise the soul of his children is Himself their only efficient Comforter. God raises His downcast servant Elijah by means of a glorious vision. The Lord is not in the wind, not in the earthquake; these are but the symbols of His awful majesty. He is in the still small voice, which whispers the name afterwards to be proclaimed to the whole world by the beloved disciple, and written in letters of blood upon the cross: "God is love " ( 1 John 4:16 ). Let us not forget, however, that if God is not in the stormy wind and earthquake, these manifestations of His severity necessarily preceded the manifestation of that love which is His true essence. It was needful that the reed which had presumed to lift up itself against God should be bent, that the hard heart, like the stone, should be broken in order that the still small voice might gain an entrance to it. Repentance must come before the deliverance and joy of pardon. It is by this path through the desert that God leads every soul of man; it was thus that He led His servant Elijah. His overwhelming anguish of soul was like the whirlwind which prepared the way for the soft whisper of heavenly peace. This desert of spiritual desolation is to be made to blossom like the rose under the re. riving breath of the Lord ( Isaiah 35:1 ). Elijah comes forth from it with renewed strength and courage, after the wholesome discipline of humiliation, a witness to us of the truth of the Divine assurance uttered by the lips of Christ Himself: "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted" ( Matthew 5:4 ).—E. de P.