Chapter 12
Putting Faith to the Test
The Reading: 1 Kings 17:8-16
The Problem:
After the brook dried up, Elijah was told to leave his secluded paradise and head for the town of Zarephath of Sidon. Remember, Jezebel by this time, had already slaughtered many of the Lord’s prophets, and I’m sure that she was searching diligently for Elijah. In her mind, not only had Elijah caused this famine in the land, but he had also greatly embarrassed her by making her god Baal seem powerless, because obviously he was unable to bring the much needed rain.
There’s no doubt that Elijah was number one on her hit list, and as a result, he was the most wanted man in all of Israel. In fact, if they had post offices back then, I’m sure his picture would have been the biggest one on the wall, offering the highest reward.
When God told Elijah to go to Zarapheth, I wonder if the prophet, at least for a second, questioned the wisdom of obeying God and going to that particular place. Zarapheth was a Phoenician city on the Mediterranean coast between Sidon and Tyre. God was essentially sending the most wanted man in Israel to hide out in Jezebel’s backyard! Remember, before she married king Ahab, this was her home. And she surely still had many friends and informants in that place. In fact, her father, Ethbaal, was still the reigning king of Sidon.
The truth is, sometimes God sends us places that we don’t want to go - places where we are uncomfortable and maybe even feel we would be in serious danger. But, like the prophet Elijah, we need to go where the Lord sends us regardless of how unwise or illogical it may seem to us at the time. When God is seeking to give us a particular task, we need to say with Isaiah; “Here am I Lord, send me” (Isaiah 6:8).
So, Elijah got up and began his 80 to 90 mile journey from the Kerith Ravine to Zarapheth. I wonder how many starving people he might have encountered along the way, how many children begging on the street whose stomachs were distended from lack of food, or how many funeral processions he saw making their way down the dry dusty roads.
It was indeed a terrible time throughout the land, and there was no end in sight. Certainly, the prophet must have shed many tears as he made his journey, seeing first-hand the relentless misery that he himself had prophesied would come. But yet he faithfully continued on.
After a few days, Elijah finally reached the town and there, just outside the gate, he saw a poor widow woman walking around almost as if in a stupor, scrambling around picking up as many twigs and sticks as she could find. She was probably frail and weak from malnutrition. As any good mother would, she had probably given most of her share of their meager rations to her son. But the emptiness of her belly was nothing compared to the thoughts of having to see her only child slowly and painfully die from hunger.
The Turning Point:
The Bible tells us in verse 10 that Elijah called to the woman and asked, “Would you bring me a little water in a jar so I may have a drink?” Even though the drought was at its peak, the woman turned to go and get this stranger a little water that she now had very little of. But Elijah’s request didn’t stop there for, as she was walking away he called to her and said, “... and bring me please a piece of bread as well.”
Notice this Phoenician woman’s reply; “As surely as the Lord (Yahweh) your God lives …” By this statement it is evident that she recognized two things:
- Yahweh is the “living God.”
- Elijah was his servant. Perhaps she had hear his name and recognized him as the Lord’s prophet who first brought word of this famine.
What faith it must have required for this non-Israelite woman to trust so much in a God that she had never really known! To give her son’s and her own last meal to a seemingly well-fed man would most definitely be a very hard thing to do. We have to wonder why God didn’t allow the widow to bake the food for herself and her son first and then cook for the prophet. I believe it was for the same reason that the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant across the flooding Jordan River had to first “put their feet in the water” before the Lord opened the way. Faith and obedience are the key to opening miracles.
The Miracle That Followed:
In the end, it was the widow’s faith and obedience that saved her own life and her son’s. She believed the words of the Lord, the God of Israel that came to her through Elijah who said, “The jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain on the land.” And it happened exactly as the prophet Elijah had foretold.
The Bottom Line:
The widow was instructed to give something that had the potential to lead to her own death, but her willing obedience led to abundance. The widow gave food to the man of God first, and God multiplied the supplies that remained so she and her son did not run out while the famine continued.
God asks us to do something similar that many believers today are not willing to to do. But our simple obedience can lead to many blessings from God. In Malachi 3:10 we read, “Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.”
Why can’t we all have faith like the widow, and invest financially into God’s Kingdom with the first fruits of our income? It’s really God’s money, and His rewards will certainly outweigh the cost of the offering. “Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is
