1 Kings 19:9

Unto a cave. It was from a “clift of the rock” on Sinai that Moses had been given a view of God (Ex. 33:22), and it may have been the same cave where Elijah now took up his lonely abode.

What doest thou here? The question must have cut Elijah to the quick. But it was precisely the question that he needed to consider. Why, after all, was he there? Who had called him there? Was it duty? What was there now to do? Why was he not in Israel, instructing and encouraging those who had so recently turned their backs on Baal? There was great need for his ministry at home, but now Elijah found himself alone in a foreign land. However, this was no time for remorse, but rather for earnest searching of heart.

Not until Elijah had regained control of himself, until he had learned to take courage in God and to undertake Heaven’s tasks in Heaven’s ways, would he be ready to return to his homeland to carry on the work from which he had ran away. There were many lessons for him to learn. The cave would be his schoolroom, and the Lord, his teacher (see PK 168).