““Love is layered throughout this passage and the dominant theme. But none of our core samples of love are the same. In fact, the prayer passage itself suggests God’s diversity. The further away from the center of God’s fullness, the love textures become more dimensioned with reason and truth. They all have love in them but the closer we get to God’s fullness, the more dense is the love surrounding ‘fullness’.””
“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, … … … … … …
What is the breadth and length and height and depth,
And to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,
that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”
““Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.””
““There he (Elijah) came to a cave (Horeb) and lodged in it. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and he said to him,
‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ (First time!)
He said, ‘I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your alters, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away’
And he said, ‘Go out and stand on the mount before the lord.’
And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind passed and tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake. But the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper (a thin silence).
And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave.
And behold, there came a voice to him and said,
‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ (Second time!)
He said, ‘I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your alters, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away’ (Second time!)”
I was trapped! Trapped in my own cave, I couldn’t see how to get out of this passage. It’s a cave carved by Elijah’s scriptural experience and his human boundaries. How could this man experience God in such extreme, demonstrative ways, personally and graciously subjected to God’s power with the wind, earthquake and fire, go to the front of the cave, in response to God’s personal presence, and repeat the tripe justification of fleeing for his life after abandoning God’s station for him in Jezreel? This is the “Elijah Complex”, and ours as well! It is being loved beyond our comprehension even though standing comfortably in our wobbly reasoning.
How often do we interpret our reason as God’s light? How often do we use God’s blessings to confirm our own desire? Even as we drill down within our own humanity, exposing frail vulnerabilities, we layer a veil over our heart, hardening against the effects of God’s wind, earthquakes and fire, His righteous love is administrating. Without God’s mercy, without God’s grace, we are lost! We have no means to see God’s righteousness and even more blatantly, we are powerless to walk in His truth without continuous and constant grace.
Consider what it was like for Elijah during his first four years in Samaria. He spent intense time in faithful obedience and experienced God in dramatic circumstances. Not only did he have direct access to king Ahab, he confronted the king with bold warnings and ultimatums Ahab was compelled to respect. He was fed in a cave by birds twice a day for probably two years. He brought back to life the death of the widow’s son in Zarephat. He witnessed the undiminishing supply of grain from the windows pantry and he saw Ahab assemble the whole of Israel by his, Elijah’s, own command. And then, the miracle event on Carmel. God not only honored Elijah’s obedience and faith with his presence and miracles but delivered all Jezebel’s priests of Baal and Asherah into his hand. He saw the answer to his prayer for no rain and then an abundance of rain. Elijah is faithful through all these events over the course of three to four years.
Elijah had one thing in view, the return of Israel to God. He was affirmed by God through all these steps, expecting the northern tribes to repent and acknowledge God “before whom Elijah stood”. It was all going according to plan except for one thing. Israel did not repent. Israel did not change their ways. God opened the door for Israel’s repentance while simultaneously preparing Elijah for a test of faith demonstrating God’s love and faithful nurturing.
Elijah subtlety shifted to a human mode, which we all naturally do (We explore this in a separate setting). Jezebel was in control and promised to kill Elijah. Elijah subjects himself to circumstances rather than his sovereign. Elijah is running, responding, not to God, but Jezebel!
This absolute reversal in Elijah’s mind-set produced fear. It became a new threshold for Elijah’s faith, a new level of testing for Elijah’s spiritual capacity. He ran south toward the holy mountain of God’s law given to Moses. He dropped off his servant, acquired in Carmel, at Beersheba, continuing into the desert until he collapsed under a broom tree where God nurtured him with food and rest. Elijah was not in violation of God’s direct word to him, he merely left his post responding to a natural inclination to run. Our human frailties provide visual proof of God’s love.
This illustrates what it means to be “in Christ”, the only place a person can totally be complete is in agape love. This is the New Testament theme, for the whole Bible for that matter. It is summed up in this two-word New Testament phrase, “in Christ”. It is the essence of Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians. Elijah was “in Christ” while he was in the cave!
Even when we disappoint, when we complete less of God’s fullness than grace allows, while standing naked in our bare spiritual necessity, God’s love is affirming, addressing our human condition while ministering through us into our shortcomings. This happens when, and only when, we are in Christ.
God nurtured Elijah under the broom tree as we have already seen. He provided him with the strength and time to finally arrive to Elijah’s safe place, another cave “and lodged there.” This is not God’s place for Elijah, this is Elijah’s side trip but God faithfully addresses his needs.
God waits for Elijah to arrive at “his safe place” which was a cave then God asks, in love, the question:
‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’
Briefly notice the scriptural description of this cave scene. God instructs Elijah to go out of the cave onto the mount. Apparently, Elijah did not go or he just moved more closely toward the entrance, because it was only after he “heard it” he moved, not to the mountain, but to the entrance of the cave wrapping his face into his cloak to protect it from the wind. Elijah made no attempt to engaged God or expose himself to God’s provisions of grace. Elijah’s reluctance to comply didn’t evoke God’s emotion; God simply restated the same question.
‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’
Remember the story of Jesus loving Peter on the beach after the resurrection in John 21. Jesus had a fire on the beach with bread and fish. A few of the disciples, off shore fishing, have caught nothing. Jesus calls out to them telling them to cast their net on the other side of the boat and they haul in 153 fish, straining but not breaking the net. Then Jesus invites them to join him and bring the fish “they” caught.
After breakfast Jesus and Peter go alone for a walk on the beach with John trailing behind. Jesus asked Peter if he loves Him (agape) more than the others. Peter responds with, “Yes, Lord; you know that I have love (affection) for you.”
Jesus responds with, “Feed my lambs.”
Jesus asks a second time using the same agape word for love and Peter responds with the same phileo word for affection.
This time Jesus responds with, “Tend to my sheep.”
A third time Jesus says to Peter, “Do you love me?”
But this time Jesus uses Peter’s word for love, phileo. In other words, Jesus is saying to Peter do you even have affection for me?
Peter responds with indignation, “You know everything, you know that I have affection for you.”
Jesus responds, “Feed my sheep. … Follow me.”
This is not the end of the story. Toward the end of his life, Peter wrote two epistles and in the first one (1:22) we find this:
“Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love (phileo), love (agape) one another earnestly from a pure heart.”
The Lord gave spiritual responsibility to Peter before he was ready to use agape love in his own experience. But Jesus led Peter also into his own personal experience of agape love through his own spiritual responsibility. Jesus’ last recorded words to Peter were, “Follow me”. Peter did!
Elijah also followed God back into the desert. God put into Elijah’s hand not only Elisha but also the honor of anointing kings and teaching the Lord’s lambs and sheep. It was Elijah who taught the prophets Obadiah hid in caves, 1Kings 18:4. It was Elijah who fed the sheep and tended to their needs while teaching Elisha.
The Lord, our God, is faithful. He is righteous and we are in Him. Even the righteousness of Jesus in heaven is the righteousness of our being because we are in Him. 1John 4:17b. His righteousness coming out of us in His agape love leads us into the fullness of God.
This is why Romans 8 opens with “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Judgment is past for the person in Christ because he now stands in agape love, the source of grace in which every believer stands, Romans 5. We have already been made holy, we have been partakers of God’s own nature and as John tells us, “as he is, so are we in this world.”
These dimensions of “what is the breadth and length and height and depth” of Christ’s love goes beyond our knowledge. These are physical expressions within the realm of our perception so that we can become tangibly connected to what, is in fact, eternal so that what is not seen becomes visible. We are God’s agents serving His purpose on earth.
We are now eternal, living in a tangible world with temporal things. We are complete in Christ, our body is not! But in “that day,” which Joel describes, our redeemed souls will also have redeemed bodies and we will be singing new songs with people who are already there waiting for us to arrive!