1 Kings
19:4 “but he went on a day’s journey into
the wilderness. He sat down under a broom tree and prayed that he might die. He
said “I have had enough Lord, take my life…”
I am not
sure that everyone has ever prayed that they wanted to die, but I am sure that
most of us, if not all, have been at the end of our ropes. Even Elijah the
Prophet had his moments where he was done with it. We may not have wanted to
die (we may have), but we have wanted to quit moving forward or even questioned
God’s plan for us.
Who of us
has never been so down it could be called depression? We deal with anxiety or
panic attacks and often feel that as a believer in Christ, it shouldn’t happen,
but it still does. I think it is important to remember Elijah and Job who in
Job 7:6-7 says “My days pass, they come
to an end without hope. Remember that my life is but a breath, my eye will
never again see anything good” when we come to these own moments in our lives.
Elijah
and Job’s scriptures do not sound like people who are just “down” or in a bad
spot right now. It reads as if they have entered real, legitimate depression.
Maybe you
have been victimized by the church or by yourself that you should be a better
believer, you should pray harder, etc, but it important to know that you may be
doing exactly what you should be doing. Often, especially here in this country,
we are so individualistic that we won’t allow others in, we think we can do it
on our own and when it doesn’t work the way we think it should, we begin to
doubt ourselves and our faith.
Remember.
Proverbs
3:5-6 “Trust the Lord with all your heart
and DO NOT RELY ON YOUR OWN UNDERSTANDING…”
Isaiah
55:8-9 “For my thoughts are not your
thoughts….so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts than your
thoughts.”
Because
of our selfish ways in this fallen world, we often pray to God and if our desires
are not immediately met, we think there must be a disconnect with God. We
believe that he must not be hearing us. There is a disconnect, all right, but
it isn’t God not hearing us, it may be us not paying attention to his answer
which we may not like.
