Being Zealous for the Lord—Lectionary Reflection for Pentecost 2C (1 Kings 19)

1 Kings 19:1-4, 8-15a New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

19 Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. ² 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 like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” ³ Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.

⁴ But he himself 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.”  ⁵ Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” ⁶ He 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. ⁷ The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, or the journey will be too much for you.” ⁸ He 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. ⁹ At that place he came to a cave and spent the night there.

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” ¹⁰ He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.”

¹¹ He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces 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, ¹² and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire, and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” ¹⁴ He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” ¹⁵ Then the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram.

                ************

                Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, and Trinity Sunday have come and gone. Now, we begin that long journey that is the season after Pentecost, sometimes called “Ordinary Time.” When it comes to the Revised Common Lectionary, our first readings first take us to 1 Kings and the story of Elijah. When we pick up the story of Elijah the Prophet in 1 Kings 19, he is on the run. In chapter 18, Elijah had won a great victory at Mount Carmel over the priests of Baal, whom he ended up killing. After his battle with the prophets of Baal, the drought afflicting Israel ended. All was good in Israel, except that the killing of the prophets of Baal didn’t sit well with King Ahab’s wife, Jezebel.

                When Jezebel, Israel’s queen and daughter of King Ethbaal of the Sidonians, who was a devotee of Baal, heard about Elijah’s killing of the prophets she brought to Israel, she was quite upset. She sent a message to Elijah informing him that she would do to him what he did to her prophets. The way she put it went like this:  “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow” (1 Kings 19:2). In other words, she was serious, and Elijah knew it. That scared him. He might have stared down the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel, but Jezebel was different. Her prophets may have been powerless since Baal didn’t act as Yahweh did. But Jezebel had Ahab’s army at her back. So, Elijah fled to Beer-Sheba in the neighboring kingdom of Judah, where he left his servant.

                After leaving Beer-Sheba, Elijah headed into the wilderness a day’s journey from Beer-Sheba. He sat down under a solitary broom tree (a desert shrub), feeling sorry for himself. He turned to Adonai (Yahweh), letting God know that he was ready to die. He told God to take his life because “I am no better than my ancestors.” You might say that Elijah was experiencing ministry burnout. He had given his all in his battle with the priests/prophets of Baal, but what good did that do since Jezebel had put a price on his head?

The RCL invites us to skip over verses 5-7, but they do play an important role. In verse 5, we’re told Elijah took a nap in the shade of the broom tree. Instead of letting Elijah die, an angel is sent to wake him up, telling him to get up and eat something. When he looked up, he saw a cake that had been baked on hot stones and a jar of water to drink. So, he ate and drank and went back to sleep. A second time, the angel poked him, telling him to get up and drink because if he didn’t take nourishment, the coming journey would be too much for him.  So, when we pick things up in verse 8, Elijah gets up and eats and drinks what is provided to him. With that meal, he was ready to take the journey to Mount Horeb, which would take forty days and forty nights. It is worth noting that Mount Horeb is where Moses encountered the Burning Bush. When he arrived at the site in Sinai, he found a cave where he spent the night.

It is at this point that we see parallels between Elijah’s call and that of Moses.  Like Elijah, Moses had to flee (though the reasons were different). It will be here in the desert of Sinai that God will speak to Elijah, even as God spoke to Moses  (Exodus 3:1-6).  While camping out in the cave, a word from Yahweh came to Elijah asking him why he was there. Elijah answered him: “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” He tells God that he’s been very zealous on God’s behalf—surely God remembers the encounter with the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel and how he killed all of them. Despite everything he had done on God’s behalf, the Israelites still forsook the covenant, threw down the altars to Yahweh (remember that the Temple was in Judah, not Israel, so Israel had a different set of altars), and they even killed Yahweh’s prophets. So, no one but him was left, and his enemies were coming after him.  Now he was all alone. He felt abandoned and unappreciated, even though he had done what he believed God had called him to do. He was ready to retire.

Elijah was ready to quit, but God wasn’t finished with him yet. God answered Elijah’s plea with a theophany, a divine revealing. Yahweh told Elijah to go out and stand on the mountain because Yahweh was going to pass by. So, Elijah did as he was told. He stood on the mountain waiting for God to reveal Godself. First, a strong wind passed over him. It was so strong that it split mountains and broke rocks, but God wasn’t in the wind. Then there was an earthquake and then a fire, but God wasn’t present in the earthquake or the fire. Then, after the natural forces of wind, the earthquake, and the fire, there was “the sound of sheer silence.” The sound of silence. What sound does silence make? Eugene Peterson’s The Message offers a “gentle and quiet whisper,” but I feel like it’s deeper than that. C. Melissa Snarr comments: “God is found in the sheer silence that follows the tumult. The Stillpoint of the universe, who anchors the centripetal energy of all creation, announces divine presence through an awesome hush” [Connections, 91]. It is as the Psalmist declares on God’s behalf:  “Be still, and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations; I am exalted in the earth” (Ps. 46:10). Elijah has to be still so he can take in the presence of God who comes in the midst of an “awesome hush.”

Wind, earthquakes, and fire are natural forces that reek with power. We envision God as this powerful being who does as God pleases, casting thunderbolts hither and yon. But no, God comes to Elijah amid silence. When Elijah encounters the silence, he wraps his face in his mantle (cloak). It is this same mantle that he will eventually pass on to his successor, Elisha. In other words, he covered himself because of God’s presence. At that  point, Elijah went and stood in the entrance to the cave, after which a voice spoke to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He answered with the same words he had used before. I’m zealous for you, but Israel has rejected my ministry. I’m all alone. My enemies seek my life. Things aren’t going well. God answered Elijah: “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus.” In other words, God has more work for Elijah to do. Yes, back home, he has enemies who seek his life. God wasn’t sending him there. Instead, he was sending Elijah to a different wilderness, the wilderness of Damascus. The reading ends there, but the verse continues with the assignment. I’m not sure why they cut things short, but the assignment is interesting. When he arrives in Damascus, God wants him to anoint Hazael as king of Aram. But God wasn’t finished. God also wanted Elijah to anoint Jehu as king of Israel in place of Ahab. Finally, God tells him to anoint Elisha as his successor. As for why, God would take an interest in Hazael, Jehu, and Elisha; they would be God’s instruments of vengeance (1 Kings 19:15b-18).

It's understandable why the RCL omits verses 15b through 18. This word about killing God’s enemies is unsettling. We would like to avoid such stories, but the Bible is filled with violent stories, with God as the instigator, if not the one who carries things out. I think it’s wise for us to face up to these stories, even if we have to say no to their messages. Though in our embrace of the message that God is love, perhaps it is wise to leave some room for God’s wrath to operate, if we are to affirm the message that God stands as the liberator of the oppressed.

As we ponder these words, we may be feeling like we’re on our own. The world is chaotic right now. Those of us who live in the United States are facing something we’ve seen before: a President with an authoritarian bent, who is casting off all norms. Congress is unwilling to stand in the breach, and we wonder if the courts will hold. Most depressing of all is that Christians have embraced this man, celebrating his efforts. So, what do we do? Do we run away? Or do we go back into the fight? Perhaps that is the message we hear in God’s renewed commission to Elijah. Go, stand in the breach, pursue justice (minus all the killing).