Text Study for Sunday, November 1, 2026
Series Theme: People and Promise
Reading: 1 Kings 19:9-13
CONNECTING QUESTIONS
What are you carrying?
PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
Loving God, by covenant promise and enduring mercy you have joined us to yourself forever. By your Spirit may we join with all your faithful people in trust and hope, through Jesus Christ, our true King, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
CONTEXT
Our sermon series, People And Promise will focus on the ways God shows up!
Throughout history, God’s people have celebrated God’s goodness and trusted in God’s mercy. However, God’s people have also fallen short of what God desires, leaving behind suffering and pain. Scripture reminds us that God still loves and claims us! Just as God met people of the Old Testament where they were and worked through them to fulfill God's promise. A promise to be in relationship, to be life affirming, to defend, especially to remain with us even when we stray. God is with us today, in the joys and struggles, praise be to God!
From Dr Kathryn Shifferdecker at EntertheBible.org:
First Kings is a story of kings and prophets told for a purpose. Rather than chronicling the royal events as they happened, 1 Kings uses the history of the kings of Judah and Israel as a tool of education, warning, and comfort. The authors of 1 Kings attempt to explain the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE to those experiencing exile in Babylon. With these stories, the authors encourage a new national self-understanding. There are stories of the failure of Israel’s kings and other power players. With their failure came deserved divine judgment, according to 1 Kings. But the tale also offers a story of God’s unrelenting, loving commitment to God’s people. Through divine words of hope, judgment, summons, and warning, God seeks to maintain the deep and meaningful covenantal relationship with God’s people. We, too, need to hear that a patient and merciful God awaits our response, delights in our attention, and listens to our prayers.
LOOK AT THE BOOK
How is it with your spirit this week?
What was one take-away from listening to the Carry On Cast podcast that connects with this Grow Guide?
Open to 1 Kings 19:1. Who are the three main characters in this story? What do you know about them?
1 Kings tries to make meaning of a terrible national catastrophe. What was an early memory of some negative world event that lives in your memory? Why?
Mr Rogers, the TV personality and Christian pastor, felt part of his work was to help explain hard things in a way anyone could understand. What have you learned about doing that important work?
1 King 19:9 is a conversation between whom? What is the first question that gets asked? What question do you wish people would ask you?
What does Elijah bemoan in verses 9-10?
What happens next?
List all the natural disasters in this passage.
Recently, there has been terrible flooding in Guatemala that have affected our covenant partners. Crops washed away. Livelihoods washed away. Please stop and pray for them right now.
What happens after all the natural disasters?
Do you like stillness? Why or why not?
Notice that verse 13 is symmetrical to what other verse in this passage? Why do you think that is?
Would you like God to speak with you, like God did with Elijah? Why or why not?
How does it look when the Easter community experiences God’s “stillness” together? Why might that be construed as a threat in our culture?
What is the Third Commandment? How might God be helping Elijah also keep this commandment?
How is Jesus good news for us this week?
What would you like to talk about that we have not yet?
TAKING IT HOME
Elijah was carrying a lot of fear and worries. What might you need to stop carrying right now to live more fully as a follower of Jesus?
Are you familiar with Easter’s new multimedia study, Together: The Spiritual Practice of Life in Community? Visit easter.org/together to check it out!
Sending Prayer
O God, you made us in your image and send us into the world you so love by your Spirit’s power. As you have called all people to you, make us one in your name. Through your grace, let us live in community to the glory of your Son, for we pray in Christ’s holy name. Amen.