Deep Depression Under a Broom Bush

Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword.  Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, ‘So may the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.’ 

Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life, and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there.
But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree.

1 Kings 19: 4a (NRSVA)

For the first three studies in this series "Beneath Biblical Branches" we have focussed on important and influential women in the Hebrew scriptures. However (and this is a dangerous thing for a man to say in the week of International Women's Day) not every woman leader is necessarily good. 

Remember that description of the

“timidity and delicacy which belongs to the female sex”

by Justice Joseph Bradley that I quoted last time, well in the background to tonight’s encounter is a woman who did not exhibit "timidity" or "delicacy." Queen Jezebel (and again Clare Hayns offers a really interesting short reflection on this woman, who is too often treated as a pantomime villainess) was the wife of King Ahab and had been responsible for the import of Phoenecian deities from her homeland. She subsequently persecuted prophets and priests loyal to YHWH. Then in that famous standoff on Mount Carmel, Elijah humiliates the prophets of Baal and Asherah and subsequently massacres the 450 prophets of Baal (we aren’t told whether he spared the 400 prophets of Asherah).

Had a Hollywood director been telling Elijah's story they would probably have ended the movie at this point, but life isn’t like that, even for Biblical heroes. Immediately after this highpoint things take a turn for the worse. Threatened by Queen Jezebel, who didn't tend to make empty threats, Elijah hightails it south, and having left his servant behind in Beersheba, he heads into the wilderness, where he crawls under a solitary broom bush.

Had we been reading this story from the Authorised version we mighthave had another debate on our hand as to what tree is being referred to... The plant named there is a “juniper” thanks to Jerome and his Latin translation of the Hebrew scriptures. But even that “juniper” is not the coniferous plant we call “juniper” which gives the flavour and name to “gin” distilled from its berry-like fruit. The NIV and most modern translations refer to it as a “broom” bush... Again, not quite the same as the broom that we are familiar with in the UK and Ireland, but white broom, which is dotted across the arid landscape of southern Israel and the Gaza strip (those that haven't been concreted over for the dense housing, blown up by bombs or crushed under tank tracks in the current heartbreaking conflict). It is one of the few plants that grows sufficiently tall and dense to provide any shade in that terrain, and so not only is it believed to be the type of bush under which Hagar abandoned Ismael expecting him to die, but early legends also suggest that Mary, Joseph and Jesus hid from their pursuers in a broom bush en route to Egypt.

But with what comes next we begin to realise that this isn’t just Elijah having a rest in the shade while he is running away from Jezebel... something more is happening.

 
He asked that he might die: ‘It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.’ 

Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, ‘Get up and eat.’ 

He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, ‘Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.’ 

He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food for forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.

1 Kings 19: 14b-9a (NRSVA)

Even great Biblical heroes and heroines get discouraged. Moses did. David did. Jeremiah did. John the Baptist did. Even Jesus, in His humanity, groaned, sighed, wept and  prayed “ntake this cup away from me” in the garden of Gethsemane. Great men and women of God are still men and women. At times, even they are not immune from low mood, depression, fear and anxiety. We are all human. We are all subject to such emotions. Crawling in under the shade of this broom bush, Elijah had had enough. 

“I’m finished!”

Elijah was not only in a physical wilderness but a spiritual/psychological one too. And we may find ourselves in a wilderness like Elijah for all sorts of reasons... External pressures... Wrong decisions... Opposition... And it can be physically, mentally and spiritually devastating.

This passage has been used many times in Christian and Jewish contexts to talk about depression and suicidal thinking... But it isn’t just, or even primarily about that. Although, all the symptoms are there. The “running away”; isolating himself from support, sleeping (crawling under a duvet if not a broom bush), the desire for death (a long term solution to a short term problem).

As Elijah sat lay under the broom bush, discouraged, depressed and depleted, he fell asleep. An angel of the Lord touched him and told him to arise and eat the miraculously provided food. He did this, then fell asleep again. The angel touched him a second time and told him to get up and eat again because the journey was going to be too great for him without it. Elijah ate again (or finished the meal). He then went on the strength of that touch and meal for forty days and nights. That was quite a meal!

I have written and spoken before about my own period of very serious depression and anxiety about 15 years ago, and if it hadn’t been for a couple of earthly angels, messengers of God who were no less angelic for their lack of wings, whom God sent at just the right time to check up on me, I don’t know whether I would be here today either as a minister or indeed as a living person. And there are lessons from this story that echo with my experience at that time. 

First, everyone breaks down at one time or another. Elijah is one of the great heroes of the Hebrew scriptures. It is he and Moses that Jesus is seen conferring with at his “Transfiguration.” His exploits make our everyday walks of faith seem literally pedestrian in comparison. And yet here he is, discouraged, depressed and depleted. Every great leader has had times like this, indeed every single human being if we are being honest, and some are more prone to them than others. If it happens to you it is not a sign of failure... It is a sign of your humanity in all its limitations.

Second, we need others. Elijah, as we will go on to read, complains that he is on his own... yet he left his servant behind in Beersheba, isolating himself further. He needed someone else to break in to his "Broom bush depression" and shake him out of it.

Third, we need to take care of basic physical needs. What did God’s messenger tell Elijah to do? Go for a counselling session? Pray more fervently? Study the scriptures? No. To eat the food that he had provided. Mental and physical exhaustion probably contributed to his current state of mind. Rest and food was essential for the ongoing journey. 

But the journey out of depression is not always a straightforward u-turn... In Elijah's case having crawled out from under the broom bush he continues further into the wilderness...

Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ 

He answered, ‘I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.’
He said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces 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 a sound of sheer silence.

1 Kings 19: 9b-12 (NRSVA)

If things were bleak for Elijah under the broom bush, what does this image of him sitting in a cave 40 days walk into the wilderness speak of?

But here we find Elijah directly dialoguing with God without an angelic intermediary, and God’s first question is ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ at which point Elijah descends into a pity party, pouring out a diatribe of complaints that have clearly been bubbling under the surface for some time.

It is good to "analyse" what brought us to the point of breakdown and to vent our feelings about it. A willing and perhaps professional ear is important at this point. But God doesn’t immediately answer his complaints... Instead he invites Elijah to take a look at the world outside the cave he had crawled into... And God doesn’t (on this occasion) reveal himself in the devastating hurricane, earthquake or wildfire (and we have seen plenty of those in the news in recent years), but in the “sound of sheer silence.” This phrase has not only inspired Simon and Garfunkel, but more sermons than I could care to mention...

It is important that we get out from under the broom bush or the cave in which we find ourselves and take a look at the world around us. To focus on the big picture and an even bigger God rather than ruminate on recent defeats or listen to the negative voices in our heads. All Elijah could hear was Jezebel’s threats echoing in his mind. That had to be supplanted first by the words of the angel and then by sitting in the silence.

At the worst of my depression the Christian counsellor I was working with introduced me to mindfulness and centring prayer... which if anything, made things worse for a time, but eventually, sitting with my pain in the silence allowed time for the other voices to subside, eventually enabling me to hear God clearly.

When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
The Lord said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu. Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not kissed him.”

1 Kings 19: 13-18 (NRSVA)

God asks the same question again and Elijah gives the same answer. But God now lays out what he wants Elijah to do next... and it is future focused. 

I'm not going to try to unpick the somewhat bloodthirsty aspects of this command, but Elijah was reminded in all of this that not only was he NOT alone, but also that he was not indispensable, a lesson we could all do with learning, because it is not and never is all about us. Elijah had developed a martyr mentality, a common phenomenon where we as Christians are told to pick up our cross and follow Christ. But as Father Gerry Reynolds once told me, pointing at a crucifix on the wall of the Clonard Refectory “There is no room on that cross for you, David!” 

God later reminded Elijah that there were 7,000 other capable believers in Israel. God wasn’t dependent on Elijah. He could easily have raised up someone else to do the job. Indeed the next part of his ministry was to be about preparing others to take over from him... Succession planning.

God isn’t dependent on us... we should be dependent on him. As Paul was later reminded:
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
2 Corinthians 12: 9 (NRSVA)

There are those who might think that being told that we are not indispensable would make someone who is depressed feel even more worthless. How many times are we told “Oh we couldn’t do without you!” But that’s not true. And the depressed person knows it in their bones. We might prefer not to do without the other person, but the world will keep turning. Actually learning that weare not indispensable relieves all sorts of self-imposed pressures...

But what is true for us as individuals is also true for us as churches and congregations.

The church in the west, and the Methodist Church in Ireland is in a perilous position. Due to internal weaknesses and external pressures (but NOT persecution, at least not yet) we are not in the dominant position we once were within the Christendom era. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross famously wrote about the “stages” of grief, not, primarily as some have interpreted her work, about bereavement, but the response to impending death, either of oneself or a loved one: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.  Some looking at the state of the church are clearly in denial, but many others have sunk into Depression.

Yet just because we are fewer in number than we once were it does not mean that the God we worship is smaller.
In that too we need to

recognise the human frailties and temporary nature of our denominational and congregational structures and memberships.

admit how much we need each other. If lockdown didn't teach us that nothing will.
focus on the bigger picture and an even bigger God, rather than our own introspective and short-sighted agendas.
look after our basic needs - nourishing our members physically, and mentally as well as spiritually and not allowing ourselves to become exhausted by trying to do what is physically beyond us, simply because that's what we have always done or what others do.
realise that we are not indispensable... individually or institutionally God uses us (where we allow him to) but isn't dependent on us, and might just bypass us.

But I believe we still have a further journey to travel...

• Has you ever experienced an Elijah-like massive highpoint followed immediately by disaster?
• Have you ever felt like crawling under a duvet and dying?
• How good are we at looking out for the mental and physical wellbeing of others?
• Have you ever done mental health first aid training?
• What stage of grief is your local church or denomination in? Or does that not apply?

PRAYER
Lord we thank you that you are with us on victorious Mount Carmel Days,
and on wilderness days when we have crawled under broom bushes.
You speak to us through various messengers
and in the silence.
May we hear your voice over the clamouring negative voices
around us and inside our heads,
May we know your strength in our weakness,
Your grace in all its sufficiency.
AMEN