Better than you think.
Here’s why.
The previous LOTRW post makes the case for Elijah the Tishbite as the greatest meteorologist of all time. 3000 years ago – before satellites and radar, before mathematics and computers, before AI – he made a pinpoint interannual weather forecast, applied empirical understanding of atmospheric electricity to change history, and also made accurate short-term precipitation forecasts that verified. He did all this working in a hostile government regime where success versus failure literally meant life or death for the forecaster.
But chances are good, whether you are a veteran weather forecaster whose work spans decades or an early-career meteorologist just starting out, you’ve already enjoyed more success than Elijah. The reason? The whole of Elijah’s resume contains only two productive working days: the day he made his interannual forecast; and the day he applied his knowledge of atmospheric electricity and made his subsequent short-term forecast. His career consisted almost entirely of hundreds of days doing little more than waiting, relying on God’s providence to make it through.
What about after his Mount Carmel mountaintop experience? Did he burnish his resume further? Did he receive adulation and wave after wave of recognition? The AMS Jule Charney Medal? The Syukuro Manabe Climate Research Award? The AMS Award for an Exceptional Specific Prediction? The AGU Athelstan Spilhaus Award? Did he rule over Israel?
No. He did not.
Instead, this same man who had shown such bravery for years turned tail and fled. I Kings 19 tells the story:
Ahab told Jezebel [his queen] everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. 2 So Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah to say, “May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like that of one of them.”
3 Elijah was afraidand ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, 4 while he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness. He came to a broom bush, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” 5 Then he lay down under the bush and fell asleep.
(An angel provides him with a bit of food; thus strengthened, Elijah)
traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. 9 There he went into a cave and spent the night.
There
the word of the Lord came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
10 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.”
11 The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.”
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
God asks him once more:
“What are you doing here, Elijah?”
Again, Elijah replies “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.”
Elijah was experiencing burnout.
Seeing this, God is empathetic. He makes no more demands. He simply encourages Elijah to straighten out his affairs and then appoint his successor, saying
…and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet.
As a final word, God tells Elijah as tenderly as He can that Elijah had never been alone. BTW, God says
Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not kissed him.
Seven thousand other faithful! Any actual isolation was only in Elijah’s own head. Notice that God didn’t tell Elijah any of the stories of the other seven thousand. Who knows? Some or all may have been equally powerful in God’s calculus.
To recap: in his meteorological career, Elijah has only those two good working days, suffers burnout, and names his successor.
Each and every reader of this post can honestly tell themselves,
Hey, I’ve had more good working days than that! And I have also had those far-more-numerous in-between days, but you didn’t catch me just sitting around, doing nothing. I was always making progress.
Exactly. Remember that in our discussion of GOATS, whether in meteorology or athletics or with respect to any other human endeavor, comparison of accomplishment across gaps of history and place and circumstance may be interesting, but they should never invite any serious attempt to rank-order. Our personal contributions to making the world a better place don’t lend themselves to such analysis. That goes not just for historic figures but also contemporaries. Your circumstances, even compared with those closest to you with respect to DNA or your office mates, are always sufficiently different that comparisons are usually vain.
Have a great day – like the GOAT you are. And remember – you’re no more alone today than Elijah was back then.