Have you ever had one of those days where it seems everything goes wrong? You push forward but around each corner, there lies another obstacle to cause us to feel defeated. I have had many of those and I’m sure I’ll have many more. So, how do we handle those to keep us from wallowing in self-pity?
Self-pity is a sin illness that is self-inflicted, easy to catch, and hard to get rid of. It will linger as long as you allow it to reside within you. If you are physically sick, usually you can go to a doctor and if you follow the doctor’s orders you will get better. Self-pity is tricky it can convince you it is gone, but can hide out in your mind until another seemingly bad thing happens, and you are back to square one. Like any other illness unless you use the right medicine you will not be able to eradicate it. Bible Study and prayer are the chief medicines for self-pity.
In Philippians 2:3-5 “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, (ESV) These verses teach us that we are to forget about ourselves, and with humility, we are to seek to serve others. We are not to be ambitious in the church, to cause strife because we want to be noticed or think we have better ideas. We are to seek to maintain unity and truth so that it may glorify God.
Elijah was a good example of how a godly person can allow feelings to override the truth. He witnessed so many miracles God had performed through him. In I Kings 17:1, we have our first mention of Elijah. In verse 3, God is sending him to the brook Cherith to have water to drink and He would have ravens to feed him. God was teaching Him to completely depend on Him. It would prepare him to be bold when he challenged the prophets of Baal. When the brook dried up God told him to go to Zarephath, where he would meet a widow who had a son. As she was gathering sticks for a fire to bake a little bread with the meal and oil she had left, Elijah ask her to bake it for him. She tells him she only has enough for one meal for her son and herself, but Elijah insists she feeds him first. She exhibits her faith by doing exactly what Elijah asks her to do.
I Kings 17:13-14 “And Elijah said to her, “Do not fear; go and do as you have said. But first, make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the LORD sends rain upon the earth.”
Later, her son dies, and she tells Elijah. She was distraught and ask Elijah in I Kings 17-18 “And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!” Elijah asks for her dead son, and he takes him to a private room and prays over him 3 times and God restores life to the son.
Over and over Elijah was led by God, and God worked on his behalf. In I Kings chapter 18, we find Elijah being bold and challenging Ahab to bring his 450 prophets of Baal and 2 bulls to sacrifice on the altar. One was for the Lord’s altar that Elijah rebuilt and the other for the altar of Baal. They were to lay the pieces of meat on the altar and call on their God to light a fire under it and consume it. At noon, the prophets of Baal had cried out to their god, jumped on the altar, and cut themselves to get the attention of their god until the blood gushed out. In I Kings 18:37, Elijah mocked them and said, “Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleeps, and must be awaked.” After all their attempts failed, Elijah lays 12 stones on the altar he built for God, to represent the 12 tribes of Israel, then the wood and meat. After this he has them soak everything with the 4 barrels of water and he calls on the Lord God. I Kings 18:37-39 Hear me, O LORD, hear me, that these people may know that thou art the LORD God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again. Then the fire of the LORD fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, The LORD, he is the God; the LORD, he is the God.”
In I Kings 18:40, Elijah has the people take all the prophets of Baal to the brook of Kishon and kill them. God has worked mightily on Elijah’s behalf. When queen Jezebel hears of the massacre of the prophets and how Elijah mocked them, she sends word to Elijah that she will have him killed. Elijah begins to run and hide. He is tired and feels sorry for himself. He was experiencing one of those days! For a day or so Elijah was having a pity party. He was tired and scared. God had never failed him, but when it didn’t play out the way he thought it should he began to doubt and question God.
I Kings 19:14 “And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”
God again comes to His rescue and Elijah follows. I guess we all would have felt the way Elijah did, but we shouldn’t. We must learn to trust in the good and the bad. When we have had “one of those days” we need to see through scripture, through our hearts and minds how God will work on our behalf. It may not be the way that we think it should be, but it will be what it is best. God will never fail us or forsake us. Just like the song says we must “trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey.” This is our marching order no matter what kind of day, week, or year we are having.
