Will you please turn to 1 Kings 17? We will begin with verse 1. Actually, it would be good if we could read the whole chapter.
And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the sojourners of Gilead, said unto Ahab, As the Lord, the God of Israel, liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.
And the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith, that is before the Jordan.
And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there.
So he went and did according unto the word of the Lord: for he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith, that is before the Jordan.
And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening; and he drank of the brook.
And it came to pass after a while, that the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.
And the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Sidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee.
So he arose and went to Zarephath; and when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow woman was there gathering sticks: and he called to her, and said, Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water in a vessel, that I may drink.
And as she was going to fetch it, he called to her, and said, Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of bread in thy hand.
And she said, As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but a handful of meal in the jar, and a little oil in the 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.
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 forth unto me, and afterward make for thee and for thy son.
For thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel, The jar of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth.
And she went and did according to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days.
The jar of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord, which He spake by Elijah.
And it came to pass after these things, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick; and his sickness was so sore, that there was no breath left in him.
And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do with thee, O thou man of God? Thou art come unto me to bring mine iniquity to remembrance, and to slay my son!
And he said unto her, Give me thy son. And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into the chamber, where he abode, and laid him upon his own bed.
And he cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, hast Thou also brought evil upon the widow, with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?
And he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, I pray Thee, let this child’s soul come into him again.
And the Lord hearkened unto the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived.
And Elijah took the child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house, and delivered him unto his mother: and Elijah said, See, thy son liveth.
And the woman said to Elijah, Now I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is truth.
God willing, we would like to fellowship together this time on the life and ministry of the prophet Elijah.
As we read the Word of God, we find Elijah the prophet coming upon the scene suddenly. We hear nothing of him before. We know almost nothing of his past. Then suddenly, Elijah came upon the scene. He went to King Ahab and declared the judgment of God over the nation of Israel to the king.
Now, who was this Elijah? At what time did he live? We know that King Ahab was king over the nation of Israel. He was a wicked king. In the preceding chapter, you will find that God said he was more wicked than any of the kings who preceded him in the nation of Israel.
Why? Because the other kings only followed King Jeroboam in worshiping golden calves in the name of the Lord. But King Ahab, under the influence of his wife Jezebel, the daughter of the king of the Sidonians, introduced foreign gods into the nation of Israel.
Instead of worshiping God, the Lord God of Israel, he led the whole nation away from their own God to worship Baal, a foreign god, into idolatry. So he was more wicked than any of the kings who were before him. And Elijah lived in that time.
You know, the very name Elijah is a testimony, because the name Elijah means, “Whose God is the Lord?” When the whole nation went away from the Lord, Elijah bore a name that declared the truth.
The Lord is the name of God in covenant with His redeemed people. You remember when Moses was in the wilderness: God appeared to him and sent him back to Egypt to deliver His own people. Moses said, “What is Your name?” And God said, “I AM THAT I AM.” The Lord is the memorial name, the covenant name, of God with His redeemed people.
But at that time, the whole nation went away from the Lord, their God. Yet Elijah took the name, “Whose God is the Lord.” You can understand the difficulty that Elijah must have been in. He was alone, as it were, among the multitudes, among the people of Israel.
He was the one who stood up and declared, even with his name, that he was not in any way a hidden believer. He was very open. He even, in his name, declared that there is no other God but the Lord. The Lord is God. God is the Lord.
Now, that was Elijah. The Bible says, “Elijah the Tishbite.” We know Tishbe was in upper Gilead. In other words, he was born and reared in the nation of Israel. He was under the dominion of Ahab.
Yet the Bible says again, “of the sojourners of Gilead.” He was a native of Tishbe, and yet he dwelt among the inhabitants of Gilead. If you study Bible geography, you will find that Gilead is on the eastern side of the River Jordan. It was not under the dominion of King Ahab.
Why? It must be that his public testimony was such that he could not live in his native land. He had to flee for his life. He crossed the River Jordan and dwelt among the inhabitants of Gilead. He was an exile for the sake of the Lord, the God of Israel.
We do not know how many years he spent among the inhabitants of Gilead. But one thing we are sure of: even though he had escaped to the eastern shore of the River Jordan, he had not forsaken his own people.
It must be that during the time of his hidden life in Gilead, he gave himself to prayer. We know that Elijah was a man of prayer, not only from the Old Testament, but even when you read the New Testament. In the book of James, you find Elijah prayed, and God did it; Elijah prayed again, and God did that.
Elijah was a man of prayer. Now, a man of prayer does not come by accident. A man of prayer comes by practice. We often say, the best way to pray, the best way to know how to pray, is to pray. There is no other shortcut, no other secret. If you want to be a man of prayer, what you need to do is pray, and pray, and pray.
Elijah was such a person. Even though he was not able to remain in his native land to testify against all the people, including the king, that only the Lord is God, yet in exile he was still standing on that ground. He did not give up that ground. He was still praying and standing for the right of God over His own people.
How did he do it? He did it by prayer. Brothers and sisters, how much more can be done through prayer than even through speaking. Elijah, as it were, was silenced, and yet he prayed.
We do not know how long he prayed. He must have loved his own people dearly. He must have loved God dearly. He was zealous for the honor of God. He was jealous with the jealousy of God for His own people. Having such a spirit, he could only discharge it in prayer.
He prayed, and prayed, and prayed, until the Word of God came to him. The Word of God was to send him back to the nation of Israel, to speak to King Ahab, to deliver a message to King Ahab.
The message was: “As the Lord, the God of Israel, liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, except by my word.”
Tremendous! Elijah did not go back on his own. Elijah did not proclaim the judgment of God on his own. He went because God sent him back.
He was willing to sacrifice his life in going back to face Ahab, because a prophet of God has no consideration of himself. A prophet of God is one who obeys God to the uttermost. If God says, “Go,” he goes. If God says, “Hide,” he hides. There was absolutely no self in this man Elijah.
He prayed until God’s mind was revealed to him. When God’s mind was revealed to him, he did not hesitate to declare it. He was sent by God to declare judgment upon the nation.
You know how he did it? He went back and said to Ahab, “As the Lord, the God of Israel, liveth.” Even though you, King Ahab, did not recognize the Lord; even though the whole nation of Israel did not acknowledge the Lord; yet the Lord is still the God of Israel.
Now, that is faith. Not because of the circumstance, not because of the change of situation, had the right of God changed. Not at all. Israel might rebel against God, but God was still the God of Israel, and Elijah stood on that ground. He did not give in.
Brothers and sisters, this is not easy. How often we are governed by what we see. How often we are influenced by our circumstances. The reason is that we do not see God.
If we see God, no matter how the circumstances may change, no matter what we see, God remains the same—yesterday, today, and forever. That is the truth. When Elijah went back, he did not give in an inch to Ahab. He told Ahab that the Lord is the God of Israel, and the Lord, the God of Israel, lives. He has not died. He is still living.
Elijah knew that God lived out of his personal experience. It was not just a bookish knowledge to Elijah. He had a hidden life with God. He had a prayer life with God. In that hidden life of prayer with God, he knew that God lived. God spoke to him. God revealed His mind to him. God sent him out on a mission.
So when he declared to King Ahab, “As the Lord, the God of Israel, liveth,” he was saying, “You think God has died. He has not died. He lives. He has not changed a bit.”
“Before whom I stand.” Elijah was a true servant of God because he stood before the presence of God. You know, you cannot stand if you have not sat. You have to sit before God first, and then you will be able to stand before God.
You have to sit before God—that is to say, you have to commune with God. After you have communed with God, then you will be able to stand before Him, to wait upon Him, and to serve Him.
You know, the problem today is that people do not sit. Neither do they stand, but they run. They think that they are doing God’s service, and in doing God’s service, they have to run hither and thither and run all over, without really knowing what God’s mind is, where God wants to send them, and what He wants them to do.
A true servant first sits before God, and then stands before God, waiting upon the Lord. Because he has waited upon the Lord, the Lord’s command comes to him. He will not move before God gives the word. A true servant of God waits upon God.
It was not easy for Elijah to bring such a message. We all like to bring good tidings. If you bring good news, not only will people be happy, but they will be happy with you too. If you bring bad news, people will be very unhappy, and somehow it reflects on you. Nobody likes to bring such a severe message.
“As the Lord, the God of Israel, liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain all these years.” What a judgment!
You know, the land of Israel is so made by God that it is not like Egypt. In Egypt, you have the River Nile. Every year the River Nile overflows and brings rich soil upon the banks of Egypt, and there they can sow and reap. Even when there is no rain, they can draw water out of the River Nile.
But not so in the land of Israel. God created that land in such a way that it depended entirely upon rain and dew. If there were no rain nor dew, the earth would become powder, and nothing would grow upon it. It would be completely barren. It was a land that depended upon heaven, and God brought His people purposely to such a land.
When Elijah brought that message to Ahab, that there would be no rain nor even dew, no moisture whatsoever over the whole land, that meant drought. That meant famine. That meant starvation, barrenness, and death. Who would like to bring such a message?
Humanly speaking, Elijah certainly would not like to bring such a message, because he loved his people dearly. Yet, as a servant of the Lord, he was faithful to God.
Do you think that God brought such judgment upon the nation of Israel because God hated them? Not at all. God had tried every means to restore them to Himself in order that He might bless them, but they would not listen.
After God had exhausted everything, He had to resort to judgment. Even His judgment is out of love. The Bible says, “In judgment, there is mercy.” God used judgment upon His people in order to awaken them, for the sake of restoration, not for the sake of punishment. Oh, if we only knew the heart of God.
Elijah brought that message to King Ahab: there would be no rain nor dew all those years. How many years? Nobody knew. But there would be years, except by his word.
Is that not presumptuous—for a man to say, “Without my word, heaven will not give rain, nor will there be dew; but when I give my word, there will be rain and dew”? What kind of person are you? Is that not presumptuous?
Not at all. Elijah could say there would be no rain nor dew all those years except by his word because he had the Word of God. Because he was one with God. He was a person in full sympathy with God. There was absolutely no self in that person. He represented God fully.
As the Bible says in 2 Corinthians 10, he was powerful before God. There is such a thing as being powerful before God. What does it mean? It simply means that God hears you. That is powerful before God.
Why does God hear a person? Because that person hears God first. If we want God to hear us, there is a prerequisite: we must hear God first. If you do not hear Him, you cannot expect Him to hear you. If you do not commit yourself to Him, how can you expect God to commit Himself to you?
Every time God hears a person, when that person is powerful before God, you know that behind it is a life—a life of obedience to God. You know that this person is fully committed to God, and to such a person God commits Himself.
When Elijah brought that message to King Ahab, if he had been a little conscious of himself, if he had been a little considerate of himself, he could not have done it. Why? Because if there should be no rain or dew upon the land, what would happen to him? He too would suffer, and he certainly was not a man of means.
When Elijah declared the judgment of God, he forgot himself altogether. Dear brothers and sisters, this is the one condition: if you want to bring God’s Word to His people, you have to forget yourself.
If you do not forget yourself, you will dilute God’s Word. You will have to change God’s Word. Either you change it or you refuse to bring it. But a person who is totally and utterly committed to God, selfless as Elijah was, is a true prophet of God.
Dear brothers and sisters, we are living at a time when there is apostasy, a falling away. Even though people name the name of God, yet in the very center of such systems there is the theology that God is dead.
But is God dead? Who is able to stand up and say, “God lives”? Who is able to bear the testimony of Jesus in a time of general falling away?
You will be alone. You will be persecuted if you want to stand for the full right of God. If you will not give in an inch, not for yourself but for God, if you want to declare that Jesus lives—He has died, but He has risen from the dead and lives forevermore; He is Lord of all—you will find it difficult, even among God’s own people.
Not only is it difficult to say such things to the world, which does not know God, but even if you want to stand for the right of God, the full right of God, and bear such a testimony among God’s people, you will find people who say that you are a fanatic.
People will use God, but who can be used by God? God needs people like Elijah. God needs prophets. God needs people who stand with God absolutely, without consideration of themselves.
God needs people willing to sacrifice and lay down their lives for the right of God over His people; people willing to declare the whole counsel of God without reservation, without dilution, without consideration of whether they will be popular or unpopular.
Brothers and sisters, in our days God needs people like Elijah, who are so utterly abandoned to God. I have no better word than the word abandonment. God is looking for people who are abandoned to God.
You abandon everything, as it were, and are abandoned to God. Only with such people is God able to speak. God is able to reveal His mind, and God can use such people to recover His testimony. That was the spirit of Elijah.
After Elijah declared such a judgment, where did he go? You will find that his movements were completely governed by God’s Word.
He had been hidden for we do not know how long, and God sent him into the limelight, to the king’s palace, to declare to the king the judgment of God. After that, God took him away and hid him by the brook Cherith.
Humanly speaking, if you live a life of hiddenness long enough, you will not like to be exposed to the world again. You would rather live in the wilderness, tending a few sheep like Moses. When God came and wanted to send Moses to Egypt, he had lived in the wilderness for forty years in seclusion. He loved the silence and the seclusion. He did not want to leave the wilderness anymore.
That is human nature. Or, if God should expose you to prominence, you may not want to hide again. You want to continue under the limelight of the world. That is human nature. It is very difficult to find one who can change so quickly and without murmuring.
When God took Elijah out of seclusion, he came into prominence. After he had shone as a light, immediately God took him away and hid him for another three years and six months. What a prophet! Perfect obedience to God.
God’s Word came to him and said:
Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith, that is before the Jordan.
And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there.
Dear brothers and sisters, if we obey God, we do not need to be afraid. What shall we eat? What shall we drink? And with what shall we be clothed?
Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
How? God knows. God sent him to the brook Cherith. Cherith was in the north, beyond Jordan, one of the sources of the waters of the River Jordan. It was a small stream, and yet many rivers come from small streams.
Instead of sending him to the River Jordan, where there was an abundance of water to begin with and where people would usually go, God sent him to a little stream, to the brook Cherith, hidden in the hills. God sent him back to the source of water.
You know, this always happens. Whenever God does anything, He always leads us back to the source. People look for great rivers, but God sends us to the little stream, to the brook Cherith, because that is the source.
Ahab was very angry with Elijah because he delivered such a severe message. When rain did not come, he became even angrier. Through all those years he tried to find Elijah in order to kill him. He thought Elijah was the troubler of Israel, and he wanted to get him.
He tried to find him all over the land. But where would he look for Elijah? Probably at the great waters, because he thought that would be where people should be. But Elijah was at the little stream of Cherith. Ahab did not look there. That is the wisdom of God.
God sends us back to the source. Dear brothers and sisters, every time we come to a drought, God will send us back to the source.
Then how was Elijah to be fed? God said, “I will send ravens to feed you.” Is that not strange?
In the time of Elijah, even though he thought he was the only one who stood for God, God had His seven thousand hidden ones. Among the seven thousand, one was actually in the palace. You know Obadiah, Ahab’s steward. He was the closest one to Ahab, and strangely enough, he was among the seven thousand.
Obadiah was a person who feared God from his youth. When Jezebel wanted to kill the prophets of the Lord, he hid one hundred of them in two caves and fed them with bread and water. Just as in Caesar’s household, God had His own saints there.
But the stranger thing is this: God allowed Obadiah to feed one hundred prophets, but God found that Obadiah was not fit to feed Elijah, the anointed of God, because Obadiah himself was a compromised person, while Elijah was utterly for God.
No one in the whole land of Israel was fit for God to use to feed God’s prophet. Think of that. God usually uses His own people as His instruments, but no one was fit in the whole land of Israel to feed Elijah without compromising God’s testimony. What a pitiful situation.
But was it because of that that Elijah had to starve to death? Not at all. If God’s own people were unusable, God could use what we consider impossible instruments: the ravens.
Ravens were unclean birds. Ravens are, as we say, very greedy. In a time of famine, if a raven found food and meat, certainly the raven would devour the whole thing. Yet God could control the appetite of a raven to bring food and meat to Elijah—not just one raven, but ravens, morning and evening, for a long period.
God can use the most unlikely instrument. Oftentimes we think that when God’s people are so unusable, then there is no way. There is a way. God has His ravens.
I remember one brother wrote a couplet. In China, we have this kind of contrast. He wrote:
Ravens fly everywhere;
Manna falls every day.
God has His ravens everywhere. Why should we be worried? If we walk in the Word of God, God can send His ravens to feed us. God can use the most unlikely things to supply the needs of His prophet.
God fed Elijah, and he drank of the brook until even the brook, the source, was dried up. Then God sent Elijah away.
Elijah did not make the move himself. He saw the brook becoming drier and drier, the little water becoming smaller and smaller, but he stayed there. He stayed there. He did not move until it was completely dried up. At the right moment, God’s Word came.
“Go to Zarephath, to the city of Zarephath. There I have prepared a widow to supply you through the famine.” Most unusual.
You know, Jezebel was the daughter of the king of the Sidonians, and yet God sent Elijah to Sidon. Why? Because Ahab had looked everywhere—not only in Israel, but among the nations. If any nation said they could not find Elijah, he had them take an oath that they could not find him. But certainly Ahab would never think that Elijah would go to Sidon.
That is the wisdom of God. God sent Elijah right down where Ahab would never look, because that was the source of evil. Yet God sent him there, not to a wealthy person or a person of resources, but to a widow.
There were many widows in Israel, but none was serviceable to God. When Christ mentioned that, the Jews were so furious that they wanted to kill Him. There was no widow in Israel who was usable. God had to send His prophet to a widow in a foreign country.
We would think, Sidon being the source of idolatry and apostasy in Israel, where could you find a godly woman in that kind of situation? But God had His hidden ones. This woman, even though she was a Sidonian, a foreigner, feared God. She knew the Lord, the God of Israel.
You could see her faith. God knows where His hidden ones are. God knows whom He can use. Dear brothers and sisters, we often look in a natural way. If we feel that there is a need somewhere, we probably look to people with means and resources, or to those who seem to be very active.
Who knows? Only God knows. Only God knows who is usable and who is not usable. Some people may be serviceable in some things, but they may not be serviceable in others. God knows exactly whom to use, and often you find it is beyond our expectation. God surprises us all the time. He is God. You never cease to be amazed.
God used a Sidonian widow. Did Elijah argue with God and say, “God, You are sending me to a widow?” No, he went. He went.
When he came into the city of Zarephath, he met that widow woman. She had come out to pick two sticks to cook her last meal for herself and her son. Elijah said to the woman, “Give me some water to drink,” and she gave him water to drink.
Elijah said, “Make me a little cake.” The woman said, “As the Lord thy God liveth.” You see, she knew the Lord. She knew the prophet. She said, “The Lord thy God liveth. I have only a handful of meal in a jar and a little oil in a cruse. I came out to find two sticks to cook my last meal for myself and my son, and then we die.”
Then Elijah said, “Make me a little cake first, and then you will make your own cake.” The Word of God says that the meal in the jar will never fail, and the oil in the cruse shall not be wasted until the drought is over.
Look, that widow had faith in God. When you come to your last handful, when you come to the last oil in the cruse, that is more precious than all the silver and gold in the whole world.
If you give out of abundance, something extra, it does not affect you too much. But when you only have a handful and a little oil, that handful and that little oil are worth much more than what a rich person may have, because it is your last meal.
Even though it was the last, she was willing to part with it. That woman had faith. This is the spirit of giving. She was willing to give out of her poverty to God, and to give God first.
Oh, dear brothers and sisters, if we do not give until it hurts us, we do not know what giving is. The true spirit of giving, on the one hand, gives cheerfully; yet on the other hand, it hurts. It really hurts.
But this woman had faith in God. She knew that if she gave to God first, God would keep His promise.
You know, it was not only hard for the widow to give; it was really hard for the prophet to receive. Sometimes you think receiving is easier than giving. Not at all. It takes grace to give. It takes grace to receive.
For a prophet to say to a widow who had only a handful of meal, who was cooking her last meal, “Give me a little cake”—what kind of person are you? What kind of prophet are you? You might say he must be a false prophet.
Yet, being a true prophet, it must have been very hard for Elijah to say that. If he were a false prophet, he would say it, because he was a false prophet. But if he were a true prophet, it would be most difficult for him to make that request.
But Elijah had the grace to receive. A great prophet was humble enough to receive a little cake from a widow. You find these two things work together, work together for the glory of God.
Had that widow kept that handful of meal and little oil in the cruse and cooked her last meal, it would have been her last meal, no doubt. If Elijah had been too proud to receive from that widow and said, “Thank God, I cannot do that. You had better send a raven,” God would not have sent one.
But because both of them were obedient to God, both of them had enough grace to obey God, God was able to work out His wonders. For a whole year, that handful of meal and that little oil in the cruse supplied all the needs of Elijah, the widow, and her son. Thank God for that.
Oh, dear brothers and sisters, the whole thing actually comes down to one thing: are we utterly dependent upon God? If we are utterly committed to God, there is no end to God’s working.
But the strangest thing was that while Elijah sojourned with that widow, the widow’s son died. Now, that was really embarrassing. God sent Elijah to that widow, and that widow was gracious enough to give Elijah hospitality. Yet the widow’s son died.
So the widow came to Elijah and said, “O man of God, has your presence here made God remember my iniquity, so that my son was killed?” What could Elijah say? Instead of bringing blessing to this house, Elijah seemed to have brought a curse to this house. It was most embarrassing.
But Elijah knew God. He took the boy and went to his room on the roof. You know the way they built the house: there was a stairway from outside, and you went up to the roof. Elijah lived in a chamber there on the roof. He took the boy to his room and put him on his bed.
Then he prayed, “O God, why do You do that? You cannot do that. Let this child’s soul come into him again.” He stretched himself upon the child three times, crying to the Lord. The Lord heard the voice of Elijah, and the soul of the child came into him again, and he lived.
You know what? God was teaching His prophet a deeper lesson. Here was Elijah. He was so jealous and zealous for God. He knew that God is the God of judgment. You cannot play with God. If you play with God, there will be no dew and there will be no rain.
He knew that God was the God of judgment, but Elijah had yet to know that God was also the God of resurrection. Sometimes you know that God is a God of judgment, yet fail to know that God is a God of resurrection.
This is not a bookish knowledge. This is something you have experienced yourself first. Unless you experience in your own life that God is a God of resurrection, Elijah was not fit to be sent back again to bring blessing and rain upon the nation of Israel.
God was going to send Elijah back to send rain to the nation. That is resurrection. But Elijah knew nothing about resurrection. He only knew judgment. So God used this incident to teach both Elijah and the widow that God was not only the God of judgment and the God of supply, but God was also the God of resurrection. What a lesson!
Sometimes, when things happen, we draw our conclusions too quickly. Whenever we see something happen, immediately we give our verdict. We say, “Now this is because of the iniquity of this widow. No doubt about that. Otherwise, how could it happen?”
We say that the holy man of God exposes the hidden iniquities of the widow; therefore, judgment came upon that house. Oh, how quickly we pass judgment upon people, and sometimes upon ourselves. Not necessarily.
One day, when our Lord Jesus came out of the temple, the disciples saw a man born blind. The disciples turned to the Lord and asked, “Who sinned, this man or his parents?” They thought either his parents had sinned, or he had sinned in his mother’s womb, because he was born blind.
But the Lord said, “Neither this man nor his parents.” Not because his parents had never sinned or because he had never sinned, but it was not because of their sin. It was for the glory of God.
Here, the widow thought it was her iniquity. If she was a God-fearing woman, certainly that would be her first reaction. But God said, “No. It is for the glory of God, that the prophet and the widow should know God as the God of resurrection.”
With this experience, immediately after this experience, in the next chapter you find God sent Elijah back with a second message. The second message was not judgment, but restoration.
Dear brothers and sisters, we need to know God. We cannot declare God to His people. We cannot bring God’s message to His own people if we do not know Him first ourselves.
If God is to use you to bring the message of judgment to God’s people, brothers and sisters, and you do not know God’s judgment in you first, you are not fit to bring such a judgment. People who are quick to bring judgment to others are those who are most unfit.
If you know judgment in your own life, it will be very difficult to bring judgment to other people. But you will, if God wants you to.
The same thing is true if you want God to use you to bring the message of restoration, of resurrection, to God’s people. You have to know resurrection in your own life. Otherwise, it is a theory, a word; it will not work. It does not operate.
God must first work in us His message. Then He will send you to bring His message to His people. That is the basis of prophetic ministry. The life of a prophet is the basis of the ministry of the prophet.
May the Lord use these words to help us. We believe that in our days God needs many Elijahs—people fully committed to God, whom God can use in whatever way He wants, to bring whatever message He wants to send. There will be no alteration, no dilution, but faithfulness.
Shall we pray?
Our heavenly Father, we do praise and thank Thee for Thy servant Elijah, whom Thou hast apprehended in such a way that Thou couldst use him in whatever manner Thou wantedst, whether it be a message of judgment or a message of blessing.
Lord, have mercy upon us. Do lay Thy hands upon us. Use us as Thy vessels, as Thy voice in these last days.
If Thou dost desire to bring judgment, Lord, help us that we may bring Thy Word faithfully. If it is Thy will to bring the word of comfort, of encouragement, of resurrection, enable us to do that.
Lord, it is only by Thy grace. We just give ourselves to Thee and invite Thee to work in us that which Thou dost desire to work through us, and bless Thy people. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.