One day God sent an angel on an errand into the wilderness south of Judah. Down there in the wilderness, all alone, was a man who was very unhappy, and God wanted the angel to comfort him. So the beautiful angel hurried on his errand, glad for a chance to help some one in trouble. And presently he saw a juniper tree, and under the tree he saw a man lying on the ground fast asleep. This man was Elijah, the prophet, who had run away from the angry Queen of Israel.
Now Elijah was very unhappy indeed. He had not expected that his great victory on Mount Carmel would come to such a sudden end. He had hoped that Jezebel would see how God was striking a terrible blow at her false, wicked religion; but Jezebel had not paid the slight-est attention to what God had done. She had tried to vent all her wrath upon the man who had dared to set up another God in place of Baal. And Elijah was disappointed, and very unhappy.
“Where shall I go to hide?” thought Elijah, as he ran out of the gate of Jezreel that dark, stormy night. “I can not return again to the widow’s home in Zarephath, for some one will surely find me there. I can not hide in Judah, for the King of Judah is friendly with Ahab and he will deliver me into the hand of my enemy.” So Elijah and his servant had run southward. As they passed through Judah, Elijah had left his servant in Judah, but he himself had run farther south into the great wilderness. And there, under the boughs of a juniper-tree, he had stopped to rest from his flight, and there he was, fast asleep, when the angel found him.
The angel did not waken Elijah at once. First he kindled a fire and baked a cake upon the coals. Then he touched the sleeping man and roused him, saying, “Rise up and eat.” And Elijah opened his weary eyes and saw the food upon the coals near by and a bottle of water standing at his. side. He was hungry, very hungry, and he ate the food and drank the water. Then he lay down again and slept, for he was still tired and still very unhappy.
The angel came the second time to comfort Elijah. And the second time he prepared food and awakened the slumbering man, urging him to rise and eat. And when Elijah rose up the angel said, “You have a long journey before you, and unless you take this food you will ‘not have strength enough to go so far.” Then the angel went away. Elijah ate of this wonderful food that the angel had prepared and he was not hungry again for forty days. He went on the strength of that food to the mountain where God first spoke to Loses, in the burning bush. And, finding a cave in the mountain, he crept into it to hide. For Elijah was still very much discouraged.
While Elijah was resting in the cave the Lord came near and said to him, “What are you doing here?” And Elijah told the Lord what had happened in Israel, how the people had forsaken God’s law and thrown down God’s altars and even killed God’s prophets. “I am the only one left,” said the unhappy man, “and now they seek my life.” God told Elijah to come out of the cave and stand on the Mount before him. And Elijah rose up to obey God’s voice.
Now God caused a great and strong wind to sweep across the mountain and break the rocks in pieces. But Elijah knew God was not in the great and strong wind. Then God sent an earthquake, which shook the, ground under Elijah’s feet., But he knew God was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake ceased, God caused a terrible fire to break out, and the flames leaped up toward the sky and burned up many of the trees on the mountain-side. But Elijah knew God was not in the fire. After the fire passed by and everything grew quiet on the mountain-side, Elijah heard a still, small voice. And he knew that was God’s voice, so he wrapped his hairy mantle about his face and stood in the door of the cave to listen.
God’s voice asked the question again: “What are you doing here, Elijah?” And the prophet answered as he had answered the first time, telling God about the sad conditions in Israel, and that he was the only one left who served God in all the land. But God said, “You are mistaken, for there are seven thousand people in Israel who have never worshiped Baal.” And God sent Elijah back again to do the work of a prophet in the land of Israel, and to anoint a young man named Elisha to become the next great prophet after he should die.
Elijah was not afraid to go back again to Israel, because he knew God was sending him there to work for him. And now he knew there were others living in Israel who loved and served the true God. He found the young man, Elisha, plowing with oxen in his father’s field, and he anointed him to become the next great prophet, as God had commanded. Then Elisha broke his plow in pieces and killed the oxen, sacrificing them to God, and left his field to become the servant of this wonderful man who heard and obeyed God’s voice.