Have you ever thought about how God is present to you? Do you have highs and lows where He has been with you? Have you felt His comfort and experienced His protection? If you sit quietly with Him giving thanks for everything His peace will surround you.

For me His Presence has been a gentle awareness like the tide reaching forward and receding and changing me with deposits of understanding like shells each one different and unique.

For Elijah in 1 Kings 19, his experience of God is dramatic and so needed given what is asked of Elijah: trust the Lord God.

Jezebel has found out from Ahab that all of her prophets to her false gods are dead. She wants Elijah dead. Even with all God has done through Elijah, he’s terrified and runs away. He runs to the wilderness and lays down under a bush and gives up asking God to take his life. I can’t help but think of all the people who were impacted by the miracle God did with the sacrifice and the giving of rain. Yet here is Elijah spent.

At once an Angel touched him and said, “ Get up and eat.” He looked around, and there by his head was some bread baked over hot coals, and a jar of water. He ate and drank and then lay down again. v. 5-6. It happens a second time. A miracle of comfort and provision.

In the strength of that food he travels 40 days and nights to Horeb…Mt. Sinai, the mountain of God. He enters a cave and stays the night.

God asks Elijah, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they’re trying to kill me too.” v. 9-10.

So God tells Elijah: “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” v. 11. Can you imagine? The Lord is about to pass by in the very place Moses also talked with God. And what does Elijah experience? A great and powerful wind tearing the mountain and shattering rocks; an earthquake; a fire…and God is in none of those things. He was in a gentle whisper asking Elijah the same question. Elijah pulled his cloak over his face and gave God exactly the same answer. Do we do that? Do we replay the same woe to God over and over? I’ve done that!

God gives Elijah his marching orders. Anoint his successor, Elisha; and 2 other men. In the notes below: God asked Elijah to anoint three different people. The first was Hazael, as king of Aram. Elijah was to anoint an enemy king because God was going to use Aram as his instrument to punish Israel for its sin. Aram brought Israel’s external punishment. Israel’s internal punishment came from Jehu, the next man Elijah was to anoint. As king of Israel, Jehu would destroy those who worshiped the false god Baal (2Kings 9;10).

And… 7,000 have remained faithful to God. Elijah was never the only one left. Neither are we.

Elijah finds Elisha and throws his cloak around him. He became Elijah’s servant and followed him. A tide is moving for Elijah and Elisha.

Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 1 Corinthians 13:7. God is love. We are never alone.

In Luke 9:28-36, Jesus, Peter, James and John are on a mountain to pray when two men, Moses and Elijah, appeared in glorious splendor, talking with Jesus. And what did they hear from the cloud surrounding them but Gods voice saying, “This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him.”

His love will lead us. Always.