Why do I need to take care of myself in the wilderness?

Here's the Precious Prodigal post: August 15, 2014: Why do I need to take care of myself in the wilderness? #selfcare #strengthforthejourney Please "Share" using this "ShortLink" = http://bit.ly/1

1 Kings 19:7 "Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee."

1 Kings tells the story of Elijah’s victory over the prophets of Baal, and what a victory it was! One solitary man was facing 450 prophets of Baal and doing it in the power of God alone. I love it when God shows up and the fireworks begin, don’t you?

However, that’s not the entire story. 1 Kings also tells how Elijah ran away when Jezebel said she was going to take his life. I understand Elijah was frightened and discouraged, but let’s not minimize what he did. He abandoned ship and ran away; and he did it immediately after God had given him a great victory. Why would he do that?

Elijah had an expectation that God was going to do things in a certain way. He thought the Israelites would have a “wake up call” and begin doing the right thing. He thought he could, in the strength God gave him, produce a certain result. Instead of doing what was right and trusting God with the outcome, he gave up because the results weren't there.

But don’t be too hard on Elijah. You and I have been there too, haven’t we? We’ve tried to do what’s right ourselves, and we’ve prayed and wept before the Lord, sometimes for years. We’ve seen God show Himself powerful, and we’ve said to ourselves, “This is certain to get our prodigal’s attention.” The disappointment and discouragement that comes when that doesn’t happen can be overwhelming. That’s where Elijah was.

There he was in the wilderness, so discouraged he didn’t want to live anymore. So he went to sleep under a juniper tree, exhausted and overwhelmed. But God wasn’t finished with him any more than He is finished with you and me. And God didn’t rebuke Elijah or tell him to “get over himself.” Instead, He sent an angel to minister to his broken-hearted prophet.

Elijah needed to attend to the basics like eating and sleeping so while he slept, God’s angel prepared food for him to eat and provided a cruse of water for him to drink. After Elijah had eaten and slept again, the angel woke him a second time and told him to eat again. This time the angel told him why: “because the journey is too much for you." (1 Kings 19:7)

That prophet certainly had a spiritual need, and God would address that eventually. However, the time to do that wasn’t when Elijah was at the end of himself physically. The journey was too much for him, and sometimes the journey is too much for us as well. That’s the very time we need to pay attention to our physical needs.

I’m not suggesting there aren’t spiritual needs too. Elijah certainly had some things he needed to learn about relying on God and doing the right thing without expecting a specific outcome. But neither he nor you and I are going to be able to do that if our basic physical needs aren’t met. And taking care of ourselves, especially in the wilderness, is something we need to hold fast.

Challenge for Today: Can you, just for today, pay attention to your basic needs regardless of the chaos around you?