1 Kings 17
8 And the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, 9 Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee. 10 So he arose and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, the widow woman was there gathering of sticks: and he called to her, and said, Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water in a vessel, that I may drink. 11 And as she was going to fetch it, he called to her, and said, Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of bread in thine hand.
12 And she said, As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die. 13 And Elijah said unto her, Fear not; go and do as thou hast said: but make me thereof a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and for thy son. 14 For thus saith the Lord God of Israel, The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth.
15 And she went and did according to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days. 16 And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake by Elijah.
1) We will never fathom God’s mind in His choice of vessels that He uses to glorify Himself.
- Elijah was one of his select servants – Elijah and Moses were chosen out of all the Old Testament saints to appear at the mount of transfiguration and discuss the death of Christ with him.
- It was an extraordinarily perilous and dangerous time for Elijah where he was vulnerable.
- God did not choose a rich man or a great king or warrior to care for Elijah but an insignificant poor needy widow who was needy herself.
- God chooses to glorify Himself by the weak and poor and despised of this world – what is foolish in the eyes of the world.
2) God had “commanded” this widow to take care of Elijah even when she was totally unaware of it.
- She was only aware of her own crisis.
- The devil would like to keep from our eyes the good thoughts and plans God has in stall for us and focus our eyes on the hopeless crisis we are in.
- God did not just plan to save her out of her dilemma, but was even planning to use her
- Little did she realise, while she was in the hopeless situation and so totally insignificant, that God was intensely aware of her situation and that generations to come were going to know about her and read about her.
- We never deserve to be used by God e.g. when God said that He gives the promised land to Israel not because of their own goodness but because of His grace
3) God often comes to us at the times when we can least afford it.
Right from the word go when He comes to the sinner when we have:
- no self respect
- we are bankrupt
- we are weak – drug addict, marriage on the rocks or financial crisis because of the sinful life we’ve lived.
4) God appeared loveless.
5) God’s man appeared egoistic and selfish.
(Some people have hosted angels without knowing it) Some might be tempted to ask, “What kind of man of God was he for He seems the opposite of the Good Samaritan”, who gave to the victim, but here Elijah seems to make selfish demands from the poor woman.
6) She nearly `blew it’ both physically and spiritually.
She nearly destroyed her whole future.
Often we do not realise the spiritual implications of the decisions we make. Woe to the person that is so caught up by the temporary that he looses perspective of the eternal things.
7) Euthanasia.
This woman would have been the ideal candidate for euthanasia, according to modern thinking, because of her awful situation and depression. If she was in Holland she could have been given the choice to `die with dignity’. Unbelief is the root cause of the idea of euthanasia.
8) God stretched her to her very limits.
Actually she had to be willing to lose her life in order to save it.
9) Bake a little cake for God.
Be willing to use your last strength and resources not to save ourselves but to serve His kingdom.
10) The normal and natural reaction in times like these is to save yourself.
God calls us to resist the temptation to save our own skins and fight with tooth and nail to regain our self respect and well being.
Worldly people can use all their resources to save themselves but the children of God should always have God’s kingdom and its needs first in their lives. Even when they are experiencing a personal crisis.
11) If she had not gone all the way she would have never experienced the realisation of her faith and experienced the saving grace of Christ.
She would have been justified in the eyes of the whole world to say that God is a loveless God and His servants and selfish people who are so insensitive to the guidance of the Spirit that they were not even aware of the need of the person next to them.
To prove God faithful we must be obedient to the end.
11) That is what Christ did, He thought of us to the very last.
12) This is the kind of faith that can save us.
We must not just have the faith in our heads but be willing to act on it and obey.
13) God will never test us above what we can bear
He gave her those few words of comfort: “fear not…” to hold on to.
14) After the rain God was stopping the oil and flour to multiply because now she could plant and reap and work again.
We should not make a law if God has done a miracle to try and force him to always do it.