Of course, Elijah never answered the question. What was he doing there? He was running away from a long list of problems. He had been called to confront one of the most evil kings in Israel's history. He had offended the king by predicting a famine - which came true - which Elijah himself only barely survived by living on the bread and water that God provided (not exactly deluxe) - then God led him to challenge 400 (!) prophets of the false god Baal on a mountaintop, and he won a huge victory and ran a long distance - and then Queen Jezebel turned around and promised that she was going to hunt him down and kill him!

It was all just too much.

Do you ever feel that way? Go ahead and make your list. Write it out, if you've got enough paper, all the stuff that is wrong, all the stuff that you can't handle, all the stuff that you don't know what's going to happen, all the bad things that you are afraid will happen one of these days soon. Then write down the prayers that God didn't answer (or he said "no"), and the things he could have done to make your life easier and more pleasant, but he didn't. And you can write down some of the nice stuff that your neighbor or friend got but you didn't. (God is always so hard on you.) And finally, while you're at it, you can make a list of your own sins, the reasons for your guilt, the stuff you should have done but didn't, the stuff you pretended to do but didn't really do. (I hope you have a LOT of paper.)

It's too much, isn't it?

So we run away. We cut loose. We lose our temper. We get drunk. We shut down. We leave the church. (Me? I get a book and bury myself.) And God says, "What are you doing here?"

He listens to Elijah's complaints (which suddenly sound so much smaller). And he calmly corrects him. (No, you're not the only one. I still have 7,000 in Israel.) And then he gives him a new job to do. Anoint a new king (a hint that his enemies are going to be defeated) - anoint an assistant prophet (a hint that he will soon get to retire) - and then jump in this flaming chariot and come home.

Isn't that cool? God even sends a taxi to pick him up.

I needed to open God's Word today and read this. But now I need to apply it too. I need to take a few minutes to acknowledge to God that I'm hiding away here in this cave because of my small faith. But he, with his still small voice, is here to remind me that it's going to be OK. He's got it all in hand.