1 Kings 19:3-8 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. 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 forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.

God’s response to Elijah’s despair was to offer him comfort in the form of rest and food, not once, but twice. God touches Elijah through the angel, and if you read further in 1 Kings 19, you will find that God also offers Elijah his presence as a gentle whisper.

In Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations, author Cole Arthur Riley shares this, “I find it beautiful that in the face of terror, God doesn’t bid us toward courage as we might perceive it. Instead, he draws us toward fear’s essential sister, rest—a sister who is not meant to replace fear but to exist together in tension and harmony with it. For fear’s origin is not evil, though evil certainly wields it against our souls daily…”

When you feel that the world is too much, rest. Replenish. Otherwise the journey will be too much for you.

Lord Jesus, I come to you, weary and carrying heavy burdens, asking for the rest You offer. Teach me Your ways so that I can find rest for my soul. Amen. (Based on Mathew 11:28-39)