Ever been caught in a disaster? Chances are that all of us will be at some point, whether it’s a personal crisis or something more widespread such as a tornado or an earthquake.
Doesn’t it seem we’re used to hearing about disasters every day? Some, like the oil spill, or the sudden flood in the Arkansas campground are more disastrous than others. And in truth, mostly we don’t expect that they’ll ever happen to us. But, how do we, how might we react in a life threatening crisis?
Say you’re traveling in a Third World country and get caught in the crossfire of a coup attempt or you’re hiking in the back country and are suddenly surrounded by walls of flame from a lightning-struck wildfire, or a sudden flood as did the poor folks in Arkansas, or get him by a tsunami.
Maybe because we’ve gotten a taste of some of these scenarios in the past year or so, National Geographic Adventure magazine has put up a Web site to help us out with some tips on how to survive almost anything.
If you’re suddenly confronted with whizzing bullets and masked gunmen in a foreign country, for example, the best thing to do is make your way to the airport or the embassy. If you get captured and held for ransom, security experts say to try to relax and go along because 95 percent of international kidnappings are resolved with a payoff.
Are you watching the water on the beach recede unusually fast? Run for high ground or the tallest building you can find before the impending tsunami wave hits or, if you get caught in the water, ride it out by keeping your feet up and in front of you as if you had just fallen out of a whitewater raft. Power grid crashes? Make sure you have a good survival kit before the fact. Caught in a wildfire? Ditch your synthetic pack and clothes, which will melt under the heat, and head for the nearest body of water or a clearing while covering your nose and mouth with a wet cotton cloth or even some dirt.
Granted, you aren’t likely to be running from terrorists or tsunamis. On the other hand:
• You might suddenly face the loss of a job.
• You might suddenly discover that your marriage is in trouble.
• You might suddenly face the loss of your health.
• You might suddenly lose a loved one.
These events are low probability, but they’re high impact if they happen to you!
In truth, a lot of the advice for surviving a low-probability, high-impact event is just common sense; for example, if your GPS stops working, go old school and use a map (duh).
Problem is, though, common sense is often one of the first things we lose in an instant emergency. When confronted with a survival scenario, often we panic, and loose the ability to calm down and work the problem step by step that eludes us. And that can mean the difference between life and death. Thinking positive can be a lifesaver, while negative thoughts of hopelessness can be a killer.
Elijah and the killer queen
Elijah could have used this advice in his crisis. After Elijah just kicked tail in the contest with pagan prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18), Then, a messenger comes to him with a life threatening message from the evil pagan queen and Baal worshiper Jezebel. She plans to have Elijah killed within 24 hours.
Almost overnight, Elijah goes from being triumphant to being a target. Instead of confronting the queen with the help of God, who had just demonstrated some pretty serious firepower, Elijah panics and flees for his life out into the desert (1 Kings 19:1-3), where fear and despair bring him to the point of wanting to die (v. 4).
Move
Elijah’s crisis scenario can teach us a lot about our own spiritual survival, especially when we evaluate it in light of several important survival skills that have more to do with character, wits and even worldview than with having the right equipment or the ability to determine the right kinds of bugs and tree bark to munch on. When hit with crisis of faith, we need to remember some things that will help us “return on [our] way” (v. 15).
The first thought we need in a crisis is about doing the next right thing. Survivors of emergencies, life threatening situations again and again express how they were able to break down the emergency into small, manageable tasks. Each step, each chunk must be as simple as possible. … Simple, directed action is the key to regaining normal psychological functioning. I can remember the strongest lesson my flight instructor ever gave me. If I find myself lost, or disorientated, or suspect something is wrong with the airplane, the first step is to “fly the airplane!” Rather than fast-forwarding our thoughts out to all the potential negative outcomes, we need to be able to break the problem down into manageable parts.
MOVE
Elijah panics and runs when Jezebel’s messenger confronts him.
But think about this: If she were really serious about knocking off Elijah within 24 hours, why didn’t she just send a hit man to rub him out or some of her husband Ahab’s cops to arrest him? Or could it be that just maybe she feared that the God who torched the altar on Mount Carmel would smoke her, too, if she killed Elijah outright, so perhaps she just wanted to scare him off instead.
I grant you that may be reading something into the text, but it’s clear that Elijah goes immediately to the worst-case scenario in his own mind and bolts instead of asking the right questions of himself and, perhaps more importantly, of God. Had Elijah thought it through, he may have realized that his situation wasn’t as dire as it first appeared.
Confronted with an instant crisis, we need to be able to break the problem down into its component parts. You’re confronted with a life-threatening illness: What’s the first thing you need to do today? What information is helpful right now? You’ve just received a pink slip: Where do you need to go first? Who do you call? Thinking “chunky” enables us to move forward by degrees and think clearly instead of becoming overwhelmed by panic.
A second helpful skill is to develop and use a mantra that you can live by before you need it. Steve Callahan, adrift in a raft for 76 days, just kept repeating the word survival. Over and over during the ordeal, he’d say things such as “Concentrate on now, on survival.” Yossi Ghinsberg, a hiker who was lost in the Bolivian jungle for three weeks, repeatedly used the phrase man of action to motivate himself. A positive message can keep your spirits up and your mind focused on doing the next right thing.
By contrast, a negative perspective can lead you down the road of despair and death. Notice that Elijah’s mantra is focused on death. “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life for I am no better than my ancestors” (v. 4). When confronted twice by God while hiding in a cave on Mount Horeb (“What are you doing here, Elijah?”), Elijah offers the same response each time: “I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away “(vv. 10, 14).
What kind of self-talk emerges naturally from you? What kind of positive mantra can you begin to develop now that will help you in the midst of crisis? (FYI, Scripture is full of them!)
Another important skill in the midst of a crisis. Surrender, but don’t give up. It may sound like a paradox; the concept of surrender is at the heart of survival. Fear, especially fear of death, can be a paralyzing force that keeps you from doing what’s necessary to survive.
Iraqi journalist Ahmed Abdullah has learned about the concept of surrender in the midst of years of combat experience. “If you are afraid, then you have to lock yourself inside your house,” he says. “But if you want to keep on living, then you must forget about your fears and deal with death as something that is a must, something that’s going to happen anyway. Even if you don’t die this way, you can (will) die normally, naturally. … Whatever [you] do, [you’re] not going to change this.”
Once you come to terms with the possible outcomes, even the ultimate outcome of death, you are more able to keep moving toward survival. Good survivors realize that they may die, but they’re going to keep going anyway. I love the line from Braveheart: “Every man dies; not every man really lives.”
MOVE
Elijah ran into the desert and wanted to give up — just sit under the broom tree and die. We might look at him sitting there and recognize some of the classic signs of depression and burnout. But God won’t let him quit. An angel feeds him there in the wilderness (vv. 5, 7), and he gets some time to rest and even a cave to hide in. Then God meets him there and challenges him to push through his fear and continue with the business of being God’s prophet, dangerous as that profession may be.
The lesson here is that even when we’re ready to give up, God is still with us, feeding us, prompting us, challenging us. It’s only when we surrender to God’s call that we can begin to move past our fear and despair and get at the business of living boldly into the future.
Here’s another possibility.
When we first look at this morning’s scripture Elijah may even appear to be in control of this encounter. He is the one with grievances to air. But even if it would seem Elijah has forced God into admitting to a shortage of support or guidance, the theophany interrupts the flow of the narrative… Just like God may unexpectedly intrude into our own private caverns of despair and self-pity.
The story of God’s visitation on the mountain breaks into Elijah’s complaining. The God of all creation, the God of untamable, uncontrollable power and might is felt in the thunder, the quaking earth, the searing flames. But while this is the God Elijah’s expectant Super-Ego has looked for to teach Israel a lesson, it is not the God Elijah’s frightened inner self really needs. So God is purposefully not in all those easy images of power.
Still cowering in the darkness of his cave, Elijah now hears something different. From deep inside this cave, from deep inside his soul, Elijah hears a voice, small in size yet great in strength. This voice pierces the shrillness of his Super-Ego’s accusations of failure and despair. Wrapped in soothing silence, this interior word gives Elijah the courage to creep back outside of his cave sanctuary and once again face his God and his responsibilities.
God lifts Elijah out of his self-indulgent victimhood by commanding him to go and anoint several new kings and, perhaps most importantly, to train his replacement, Elisha (vv. 15-17). It’s the difference between moping and having a mission.
Another lesson. If you’re feeling like a victim or you can’t work out your own problem, one of the best solutions to getting unstuck is to pour your energy into helping someone else.
In this morning’s text, we’ve seen the multifaceted nature of God’s presence demonstrated dramatically before human beings.
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Editors of the Bible have taken tremendous pains to set up a correlation between Moses and Elijah. Yet, the experience of God is profoundly different for Elijah then that of Moses. If we were to try to neatly separate, and segregate these differences, we might be tempted to conclude that there is a Torah of Moses and a Torah of Elijah
-the Torah characterized by divine might and thundering mountains ...
- and the Torah of the "still, small voice."
Nevertheless, the text itself, even with its convoluted, interwoven, interrupted narrative, testifies that God is both.
Moses’ experience of God was the genuine eternal truth about the Lord. Elijah’s experience of God was the genuine, eternal truth about the Lord.
God is both inside and outside - in the mountains and the thunder, and in the dark, quiet interior of our souls. To Moses, God spoke through the mountains with a roar; to Elijah, God spoke in a cave, in a soul-centered whisper.
God is both inside and outside - in the mountains and their thunder and in the quiet caves of our souls. To Moses God spoke through the mountains with a roar. To Elijah God spoke through the cave in a still small voice.
It is the same God, only different manifestations
God still speaks to us in various ways today.
CLOSING PRAYER: Holy God, we sometimes find ourselves, like Elijah, weary, discouraged and afraid. We have given of ourselves, responded to you in faith, done that which we felt led to do, and the results haven’t been what we hoped for or expected. In these moments, we long to hear your voice speaking to us a word of comfort and encouragement. Like Elijah, we need to separate ourselves from the busyness of doing so we may be in your presence — quiet, still, open and expectant. We thank you that you continue to make your presence known; that your still, small voice continues to speak to us; and that you provide nourishment and refreshment while also sending us out again with renewed mission and purpose. Amen.
