It's certainly good to see you and to see your faces after Irma and the serious threat we endured. We were very fortunate by God's grace in not suffering what others have suffered under the same winds. And I'm certainly happy to be here this morning with you. Hurricanes are God's design for Earth, which is a huge capacitor, to transfer heat. We have the source, which is the sun. Earth stores it, but like anything that stores heat, it needs to be dissipated. And God arranged nature to create these hurricanes and cyclones to transfer heat from south to north, And as they go in their whirlwind, they also fix ecosystems and clean things that we do not even imagine. Even the Everglades are benefited by the strong force of hurricanes. So it is not the devil who sends them. It is not a bad thing. But yes, when they impact our lives and destroy our property, they are bad. or maybe they are not, and they remind us that we owe nothing. There is a merengue, horrible to quote a merengue in the pulpit, that says coffins do not have pockets, and we keep forgetting that we came naked from our mother's womb, and we will go back to the earth naked, and we will be dissolved, and only treasures, in heaven are everlasting. And indeed, God uses those things to remind us of the brevity of life and the transient nature of what we have. But when hurricanes come, I mean, I don't know you, but I always wonder, what is God up to? What is God trying to tell us through these strong winds? And this morning I want to talk to you Not about God's message in the hurricanes, but about God's message in the soft, gentle blowing of a breeze, as he did to Elijah. I would ask you to please turn in your Bibles to 1 Kings 19. The book of 1 Kings chapter 19. We will read the first 18 verses from that chapter. 1 Kings 19, 1 through 18. The Word of God reads in my version, the New American. Now Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done. and how he had killed all the prophets with a sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, So may the gods do to me, and even more, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time. And he, that is Elijah, was afraid, and 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 juniper tree. And he requested for himself that he might die, and said, It is enough now, Lord. Take my life, for I am not better than my father's. And he lay down, and slept under a juniper tree. And behold, there was an angel touching him, and said to him, Arise, eat. Then he looked, and behold, there was at his head a bread cake, baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. So he ate and drank, and lay down again. And the angel of the Lord came a second time, and touched him, and said, Arise, eat, because the journey is too great for you. So he arose, and ate, and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mountain of God. Then he came there to a cave, and lodged there. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him, What are you doing here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the sons of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, torn down thine altars, and killed thy prophets with a sword. And I alone am left, and they seek my life to take it away. So he said, go forth and stand on the mountain before the Lord. And behold, the Lord was passing by, and a great and strong wind was rending the mountains and breaking 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, a sound of a gentle blowing. And it came about, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face on his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entrance of the cave. And, behold, a voice came to him, and said, What are you doing here, Elijah? Then he said, I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the sons of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, torn down thine altars, and killed thy prophets with a sword. And I alone am left, and they seek my life to take it away. And the LORD said to him, Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you have arrived, you shall anoint Hazael king over Aram, and Jehu the son of Nemshi, you shall anoint king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah, you shall anoint as prophet in your place. And it shall come about, the one who escapes from the sword of Hazael, Jehu shall put to death. And the one who escapes from the sword of Jehu, Elisha shall put to death. Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not hissed them. And thus ends the reading of God's Word. Let us pray. Father, we thank you once again for allowing and enabling us to be here this morning and to greet one another and see one another having been spared from the storm. And now we pray, O God, that as you did with your servant of old, that we may hear your voice in the pages of Scripture, that you give a blessing to those who hear, and a blessing to the one who speaks, that by your Holy Spirit we may hear what you have for us. And we pray it in Jesus' name, our Savior. Amen. The context of this history is to understand Where are we in redemptive history? This took place during the time when Israel was already split into two kingdoms, the kingdom of the north and the kingdom of the south, which happened after the death of Solomon. The kingdom of the north was basically the one whose capital was Samaria. And in that kingdom, there were succeeding dynasties of different people. They were not connected to David. All of them, with the exception of Jehu, were not worshippers of Yahweh. The kingdom of the south, those were the children of David. They had one dynasty, the dynasty of David. Many of them worshipped the Lord. Now at this specific point in time, when Elijah appears in the sin of Israel, things are pretty bad. Because Elijah is ministering in the kingdom of the north, in Samaria, where Ahab was the king and he was married to the worst, in my understanding, woman ever mentioned in all of scripture, Jezebel. And Jezebel was a worshipper of Baal, and she had killed and exterminated the servants of the Lord. And in their place she had instituted and put to minister priests and prophets of Baal. Now, in the south you had Jehoshaphat, who was a God-worshipping king. However, Jehoshaphat had married the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel. So things were pretty bad. You have in the north an idolatrous, wicked woman married to a man who waffled between two thoughts, Ahab. And then in the south, you had a God-fearing man, but his wife was the daughter of these two who reigned in the north. And that is the scene where Elijah appears. Things were turning really, really dark in Israel. Now in the context of our narrative in chapter 19, Elijah was already recognized as a prophet of Yahweh. He had already decreed the drought. For three years it didn't rain until he decreed the rain. He had already raised the dead of a widow in Zarephath of Zidon. He had already fed that widow and himself with a little flask of oil that was left. And Elijah had had this portentous, amazing display of God's power when he challenged the prophets of Baal to this rodeo of God's. He prepared a sacrifice and an altar. He says, let you go first. And they were screaming and cutting themselves and chanting to Baal to send water. And then Elijah comes and he prays to God. And God sends fire and burns the sacrifice and even licks the ground. And he makes a tremendous display of God's power and glory. And Elijah had challenged the people saying, if Baal is God, Serve him! But if it is Yahweh who is God, then worship him. And then Yahweh proves himself to be the true and living God. And all the people claims and is dazzled at this amazing sign that was done. And immediately Elijah sees the prophets of Baal, about 800 of them, and he killed them. He slaughtered them. This was not an act of cruelty. Elijah was doing what the law said, what the Torah said needed to be done with false prophets, which was basically to kill them. That's what Deuteronomy 13, 15 said. So this is the context of this story. This man just finished, just came from an amazing display of God's power and what would be the potential of a revival in the land. But then we come across chapter 19 and what do we find? We find the faithless praying of Elijah. We find the faithless fleeing of Elijah. But we find the faithful God of Elijah. His faithless fleeing was that Ahab goes home and tells his wife, you don't want to know what Elijah did today. This guy called fire from heaven, he burned the sacrifice, the altar, the ground, and then he took all your prophets and he slaughtered them. And Jezebel sends messengers to Elijah. And they basically told him, Elijah, Jezebel says that at this time tomorrow, you'll be dead. She'll slit your throat just as you did to her prophets. When Elijah, this great man of God, I just told him what he had done, hears that, he flees, he runs. And he decides to go south to the land of Jehoshaphat. Why? Because Jehoshaphat was a God-fearing king. However, when he arrives in the south and he arrives in Jerusalem, he says, wait a second, Jehoshaphat's wife is the daughter of Jezebel who wants to slit my throat. So he keeps running and goes into the wilderness. So this great man of God, Presumably disappointed at the king's inability to stop his wife from killing him. Presumably, and this is not in the text, I'm saying presumably disappointed that no one in the king's court could have stopped Jezebel. Presumably disappointed even at God, that after this great display of his power, Jezebel is still honoring death threats. He runs away faithless and goes into the wilderness. And then we find not just his faithless fleeing, but his faithless praying. Verse 4 says that he came to the famous juniper tree. And sitting down under that juniper tree, he requested for himself that he might die and said, It is enough, Lord. It is enough. Take my life from me. I am not better than my father's. Completely disappointed. Completely lifeless. He actually, the only thing he could muster to ask God was, kill me. I'm sick and tired of this. I'm sick and tired of this idolatry. I'm sick and tired of this rampant running of evil. And you do not want to do anything about yourself. You send the fire. The people remain the same. Enough. Kill me. I'm not any better than them. So that is his faithless prayer. As a side note, after great spiritual victories, it is not uncommon to go through these types of slumps, of real times of disappointment and depression. Some of us want to live in a hide. Like if we are in some kind of alcohol or drug, we're excited and always in victory. That doesn't happen. Sometimes you find good Christians and they greet you. How are you? In victory. Good for you, but I doubt it. Perhaps you live always in victory. But I'm not sure that if I would ask for a raise of hand here, all of you would say yes. I'm always in victory. We're always in victory in Christ Jesus, but not according to how we feel or how we fare. So Elijah had this pity party because reality is that past victories and triumphs do not guarantee future ones. Have you not seen great men and great women of God who fall miserably, who even fall into scandals? And you say, but why? Why they were doing so well? Why they had this great ministry? Why did they have to fall for that? Because past victories do not guarantee future ones. Never rely on the past to be assured that you will fare well in the future. This week, I had the experience of giving marriage counseling to a business associate. I don't know if the person is a believer or not, but he says, yeah, I need to talk to you, I need to talk to you, come meet me at this restaurant. I went and talked to that person, and basically, he's contemplating divorce. And I looked at him straight in the eye and said, let me tell you something before we start. What you're contemplating is not strange to me. I have seen the contemplation of divorce in the face too. And he opened his eyes wide open. And it was like, even you? Those things happened to you? I says, oh yes. Because God designed to put the treasure in earthen vessels. that the surpassing glory may be of God and not of ourselves. Our stories are not to be told so we are the heroes in our stories. The older I get the least or the less attracted I become to these famous celebrity blogs where they tell you how throughout all their lives they had never ever even considered being unfaithful to their wives. Well, wonderful, brother, if you are that way. I congratulate you. My Bible is full of weaklings who struggle with all kinds of passions and of lusts. and I'm not justifying sin, but we are not the heroes of our story. Jesus is the hero of our story. And the story of Elijah is not there to exalt Elijah and to tell us and show us how to moralize with the life of Elijah. The story of Elijah is one of those many little portraits and redemptive history that paint the big picture of Elijah's savior. So that story points not to faithless fleeing Elijah or faithless praying Elijah. That story points to Elijah's faithful God. Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 2nd Corinthians 7.6 that God is the God who comforts the depressed. I love that statement. The older I get, the more I love it. because you don't speak depression in Christendom. That is sin. Christians don't get depressed. Well, Paul told the Corinthians, God who comforts the depressed comforted me because I was depressed when I came to Macedonia. The little Bible stories are there to point to the Savior of those who go through them. And this is exactly what goes through in this chapter. The God of Elijah who comforts the depressed. And actually that's the title of my sermon. Comfort to the depressed. The God who comforted or who comforts his servants. And what happened here? Well, the first thing that God did is that he provided for Elijah's needs in spite of his faithlessness. In verses five through six, it says that Elijah lay down and slept under a juniper tree. And an angel came and touched him and said, hey Elijah, wake up, arise and eat. And Elijah found this bread, cake, baked on hard stones. I've always wondered, what would it taste like? to have one of these heavenly cooked meals. What would manna taste like? Or when Jesus prepared this fish in the shore for the disciples after the resurrection, what would Jesus' fish taste like? And I love it that in this passage, Elijah eats and drinks and he lays down again. No Thanksgiving. We don't read any thank you for our meal. We don't read it, oh great, thank you Lord for this diet or this provision. No repentance, nothing. The guy, an angel wakes him up, oh sure, yeah, eats and goes back to sleep. He was depressed. He was really in bad shape. God provided for him in his tiredness, in his depression, in his hunger. And you know what God gave him? Carbs. I don't want to make a theology of nutrition here, but when he was in brook Cherith, he was staying there in the brook. He had to remain there because the drought was going on earth and the ravens brought him meat and bread. Now God just gave him carbs. You're really so down that you need a good dosage of sugar in the system to get you up and going, Elijah. Arthur Pink in his book, The Life of Elijah, writes something that I found fascinating. Pink writes, In the hour of his despair and need, the Lord did not forsake his poor servant. First he gave him sleep to rest his jaded nerves. Then he sent an angel to minister to him. And then he provided refreshment for his body. And Pink says, this is grace indeed. And then God doubles his provision even more. Elijah takes off it. He doesn't say anything to God in gratitude. But again, God, in verse seven, comes a second time and awakens him a second time and says, arise, eat, because the journey is too great for you. Now, I'm not sure if this journey is the one that he had just taken or the one he was about to take. I cannot decipher if the angel is coming and he's saying, Elijah, you've walked a lot, man, you came from a long distance, you need more. Here, more food for you, my friend. Or the angel knew that he was going to take another long walk. He says, let me give you some more food for your walk. Whatever the circumstances, we do not know. It is just God's grace providing for this man in distress. But in verse 8, it says that Elijah ate, and in the strength of that food, he walked 40 days and 40 nights to Horeb, the mountain of God. Now, I have to be honest with you exegetically here. This could be a miracle that the food was made in such a way that God allowed this man to endure 40 days and 40 nights without eating. It is perfectly possible. There's no limitations to God's power. But it could also be that the writer of the story wants to make a connection with Moses. And he's using a literary device to hook Elijah going to Mount Horeb, where Moses was, and also adding the 40 days and 40 nights that Moses spent in the same mountain. Because perhaps the writer wants to pitch Elijah against Moses, putting Elijah as the restorer of what the Israelites had lost that was given by Moses. Either of the two do not bother me. Whether it is a literary arrangement of the writer or if it was a miraculous feeding of Elijah, it doesn't change anything in the story. At this point in the narrative, what seems obvious is that there is no change in the heart of Elijah. He is still walking and living and we do not hear or read that he had any interaction with God whatsoever. Now let me ask you, how many gave thanks or shouted hallelujah when power was restored? Or did you pull a Dominican thing? You know, in the Dominican Republic, when power is restored, because you hear this, wah! It seems like you're in a stadium. And it's just people shouting of gratitude and of joy, because the energy came back. Is that what we did? That's fine. I'm not saying that's wrong, but how many of us gave thanks when we noticed on Saturday evening that the winds subsided and that the roof had not caved in as we thought it could have. Did we stop and gave thanks or we just said, go check outside and see what happened? Were you not extremely holy on Thursday night? And on Friday night, because I remember being very, very holy those two nights. Praying a lot, meditating a lot. We laughed, but I feared for my life. I even had an emergency plan. The roof would cave and how we would run into the garage and have food and clothing in the two cars, et cetera. But I remember being very holy. For some reason on Saturday and Sunday night, I was not as holy as I was on those two previous nights. Because that's our nature. But do not despair. If you were like me, you're not alone. Listen to Pink again, and I'm sorry that I'm reading too much, but I could help. I read Pink's Life of Elijah when I was 22 or 23. It is one of those books that sticks with you, and I could pull my copy, and this is what Pink says. There is no intimation that the prophet was moved at heart. No mention of him bowing to worship. Not so much as a word that he returned thanks. Merely that he ate and drank and lay down again. And then pig says, alas, what is man? What is the best of men apart from Christ? How does the most mature saint act in the moment the Holy Spirit suspends his operations and ceases to work in and through him? King says, no differently than the unregenerate. For the flesh is no better in the Christian than in the unbeliever. You see, when my printer gets stuck and the paper jams, I hit it as hard as the unbeliever hit this printer when that happens to him in the midst of a project. Because at that moment, I'm acting in my flesh, and my flesh is no better than that of the worst sinner. Nor is yours, by the way. And if you have any fancy that because you've been professing the faith so many years, now you've become a holy person. I have news for you, my friend. Pray that you may not be led into temptation. Jesus did not leave that petition there for free. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. So here's Elijah. dealing with God or God dealing with Elijah's faithlessness and anger. And it's interesting that God took the initiative to restore him. Pink says that while grace does not make light of sin, and it is true, true grace never ever makes light of sin. Somebody preaches grace to you and they take sin lightly, That's not grace. But if sin were able to thwart grace, then grace would not be grace. And that is the amazing blessing of grace. That you and I cannot disappoint God. We do not have the power to sin enough to disappoint the work of Christ in us, in our Father. So here's Elijah, and God visits him where he was at. He was at the cave, God came to the cave. Because the Lord does not forsake his own. And Elijah could have run all he wanted, But God is omnipresent. He could not hide. Elijah could have kicked and fight all he wanted, but he could not exhaust a God who is omnipotent. And then God gave him directions. God comes to him in the cave and tells him, now you go to the foot of the cave, or to the foot of the mountain, and get yourself to the place I will show you. For the ancient mountains were the place where the gods dwelled. You find that expression repeatedly in the Old Testament, the mountain of the Lord. You find Mount Olympus for the Greeks, because for them, because mountains were high and were close to heaven, that's where the gods dwelled. Well, the scripture uses that kind of language to illustrate the same point. Elijah went to Horeb, and that was the mountain where Moses encountered God. And that was the mountain where the law was given. In Psalm 15, we hear, who will ascend into the mountain of the Lord? Who is righteous enough to make it? Of course, only Jesus can, and those who are in Him. But that expression is that of one who is expecting to meet God where he's at. So God comes to Elijah and pulls him out and tells him, you go to where I tell you. And Elijah goes. Now, God dealt with Elijah in grace. He did not deal with him as Job's friends. He did not deal with him as we do with one another. God did not speak harshly to Elijah. Actually, he did not speak to Elijah in the hurricane. We were afraid of Irma. Can you imagine a hurricane that is cutting stones? I cannot imagine that kind of wind. The wind that is able to cut through the igneous rocks at a mountain. That's the kind of wind that Elijah saw. Then an earthquake. then fire, but God was not in any of those things, only in the soft blowing of a gentle breeze. And when Elijah heard that, he covered his face with his mantle. He says, now this is where God is coming to meet me. Now, do you notice the question he asked? Elijah, what are you doing here? Of course God knew what he was doing there. But he wanted to bring Elijah to his senses. So in the most tender and kind and treaty, and I imagine, if I could imagine that, God with a smile saying to Elijah, what are you doing there? What are you doing here, Elijah? And Elijah was honest in verse 14. He says, I have been very zealous for the Lord. The God of hosts. For the sons of Israel have forsaken your covenant, and torn down your altars, and killed your prophets with a sword. And I alone am left, and they also want to kill me. We bash Elijah over these words, don't we? We even have coined the term Elijah's complex. You think you're the only one. You think you're the only one who serves God. You have Elijah's complex. It's funny that none of that stuff is in the text. Do you find God rebuking Elijah in the text? Because honestly, I don't. He was depressed. He was consumed. And he tells God, why? I am jealous for you. I'm zealous for you. I'm zealous for your glory. The children of Israel are worshiping Baal. And nobody cares about you. And I'm sick and tired. And I want to die. Because I'm no better than them. God doesn't rebuke him for that. Reminded me of Psalm 119, 136 when David says, rivers of tears shed through my eyes because they do not keep your law. Don't you have a sense of wanting to weep when you see rampant wickedness? I hope you don't feel like a Pharisee. Oh, look at these Miami Beachans. The hurricane should go through South Beach and destroy those wicked. I hope you don't have that heart because if you have it, you have no idea who you are, my friend. You have no idea what you're made of. That's us. That's who we are. Last week I learned about a young man who Our family suspected he was gay, and now it was proven that he was gay. And I just wanted to cry. Do you think that he sat down one day, this nice young man, good kid, and one day he sat down and said, let me be gay because I'm a pervert. No, that's simply what happens when you don't have grace in your heart. Do you think you're any better than that? No, you're not, and nor am I. That's life. So here is Elijah consumed and depressed because God is not honored in Israel. And then God in His kindness shows Elijah, Elijah don't be depressed. It's not over. My redemptive plan has not stopped. And that's what you find in verses 15 through 18. I need you to go to Damascus and anoint Hazael. And then I need you to come back to Samaria and anoint Yehu. And then I need you to go back to your town and anoint Elisha, your successor. And by the way, Elijah, I have 7,000 for me who have not bowed to Baal, nor have kissed his image. Hazael was going to be the instrument of judgment from Syria to Israel because of their idolatry. So much so, when Elijah saw him, Elijah wept. And Hazael asked him, why are you weeping, Elisha? Because I know the evil you're going to do to my people. It was God's rod to Israel. And then Jehu was going to avenge the house of Ahab and the house of Jezebel and all the blood they had shed and all their wickedness. Jehu was going to be the king who will revenge that. And then Elisha was going to be God's prophet in the place of Elijah when he would be gone. and then the 7,000, and here comes me again. Don't think I'm turning liberal, but I don't think these were 7,000, one, two, three, four, five, 600, 6,999, 7,000. Seven is a number of perfection in scripture, and thousand is a number of plenitude. Thousands upon thousands upon thousands, worshiping the Lamb in heaven. This is, in my understanding, a number of, I have a remnant. I will have a people who will always worship me, Elijah. And Pink writes, the Lord therefore sets before his servant an object lesson. He reminds Elijah that he is not confined to any one agent in the carrying out of his designs. Elijah was just but one among several. And we need to remember those things. When we get depressed and discouraged about the state of things, about the state of the church, about the exodus of the young people from churches, about the secularization of society, don't worry, China is becoming more Christian every day. And so many other countries in Latin America. And the gospel is prospering in other lands. God's kingdom continues. It doesn't matter who's in the White House, and who is in Capitol Hill. Don't despair. This is not the center of the universe. The United States is not the New Jerusalem. The kingdom goes. And even if our church becomes smaller and more irrelevant every day, that's okay. God is in control. His kingdom comes and His kingdom will continue growing. And that is the lesson he taught Elijah to lift his spirit up. Now, How do we end? I have several things to end. One of them is, Elijah went to Mount Horeb. This is where Moses received the law. But do you remember what happened when Moses received the law? God said, do not even an animal can touch the mountain. And if an animal touches the mountain, that animal should be dead. A person, whomever touches it. And when the Israelites saw the mountain, it was quaking and shaking and smoking and thundering. They even heard the sound of horns. And Moses himself says, I am shaking and trembling. But that's not what Elijah meant. Elijah met God in the gentle whistle of a soft breeze, because he met God in grace. Do you notice that it was the angel of the Lord who spoke to Elijah? I don't have time to prove it to you, but the angel of the Lord is a pre-incarnate Christ in the Old Testament. He spoke to Jesus. You know what Hebrews 12 says about Mount Horeb in light of Jesus' work? It says, You have not come to a mountain that may be touched, and to a blazing fire, and to darkness, and gloom, and whirlwind. And so terrible was the sight that Moses said, I am full of fear and trembling. The writer of Hebrews says, no, because of Jesus. You have come to Mount Zion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, and to the general assembly, and the church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirit of the righteous made perfect in heaven, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood which speaks better than the blood of Abel. You see, Jesus knew the likes of those he was going to save, even before coming. So he drew near to his faithless, fleeing, faithless, depressed, discouraged, and angry prophet, and dealt with him in kindness and in grace. Because this is the way Jesus is described in the Gospels. He does not break the bruised reed. What are we doing in our backyards now? We go to the backyard and saw all these fallen trees and all these fallen hedges. We're just breaking bruised reeds, taking them away, those palm branches out, put them in the trash can, get them out. Jesus doesn't do that with us. When he sees a bruise read in his garden, he patches it back. He tightens it. He fertilizes it and he keeps it. That is the Savior we serve. The Bible stories exist to show the flows of those who are part of them. Isn't Elijah the great mighty prophet? Isn't Elijah the man who prayed for a drought and three years heaven closed? And then he prayed for rain and the rain came? Well, this story is not about Elijah. It's about Elijah's Savior. It's about Elijah's God. King says, when God begins to deal with grace or in grace with one of his own, he continues dealing with them in grace. and nothing in the creature can hinder the outpouring of his mercy. Nothing. You know what's one of the most freeing things to a believer? That you can't, you cannot be separated from God, even if you wanted to. And guess what? You and I want many times to be separated from God. and do our own wills. But it doesn't let us. And that is the blessing of being sanctified and justified and preserved in Christ. God spoke well of Elijah after all, in spite of this. Do you know who was Elijah? The mighty prophet who would come before Messiah. Do you know where was Elijah? In the Mount of Transfiguration. Guess with who? with Moses and with Jesus. That's the God of the Bible. You know what James 5 says? That he was a man subject to lusts like ours. I find it funny when Christians try to justify Bible characters. But what about Abraham? What about Abraham? He lied. Yeah. What about David? What about David? He committed adultery. He had many wives. He lied. He did all kinds of things. Yeah. God says that. What about who? The Bible is not about them. The Bible is about their Savior. That's the true hero in the story. And that's why Elijah appears as a hero in spite of who he was. because of his savior who justified and sanctified him. So God comforted his servant who was depressed by feeding him, by giving him instructions, by commissioning him, but most importantly, by reminding him that the work of the kingdom is his and continues and will never stop. because the kingdom is the Lord's. Are you downcast and depressed and discouraged? Then be of good cheer. Jesus said, in the world, you will have tribulation. Make no mistakes. Sorry, young people, happiness does not exist. I'm sorry to say it. I've had every desire, everyone, made and then about a gazillion more topped and topped and added to the pile. Happiness does not exist but it does because Jesus says in the world you will have tribulation but be happy I have overcome the world. And He says, I have come that you may have life and may have joy and may have it abundantly. Amen. Father, bless Your Word to our hearts and help us to consider Your grace and Your kindness and Your tenderness, even when we are faithless and distraught and depressed. And may you draw near to those who today are down and suffering. And may you show them that your kingdom will come and continues to expand because it is your kingdom. And you have promised that the gates of Hades will not prevail against the advances of your church. Be glorified, we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen.