1 Kings 17 (Part 2) Bible Study (Elijah Raises Widow of Zarephath's Son) | Pastor Daniel Batarseh

Father, from the bottom of our hearts, we do thank you that in Christ, we are rich with every spiritual blessing. Lord, we pray that as we come to your word, you would, help us excel in the things that you call us to mature in, including Thanksgiving. But, Lord, we pray that what we study tonight will help us soar in faith, help us soar in worship, in love to you, in love to one another. Cancel and delete everything in us that's none of you. Anything that we've accumulated this week that's outside of your will, your purpose for us.

Lord, we just pray that it would be crushed by the weight of your glory as we just sang. The glory that would shine forth through the word of life. Thank you, oh god, that we are here to meet with you and you are faithful to meet with us. For your word says, draw near to God and he will draw near to you. That's what we have come to do, and we thank you that in Jesus, we can do it freely.

We can do it in any place at any time. That grace, Lord, we do not take for granted. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Well, meet me in first king 17, please, and we will begin from verse eight.

I will not give you a introduction into this portion of scripture. I'm just hoping that you remember where we paused last week. We know that Elijah was at the Brook Kareth, and he remained there because God instructed him to remain there. And as long as he remained there, he would be fed supernaturally by the assistance of these ravens who came every day to provide breakfast and dinner. And that's where we stopped.

And now we continue from that scene. We briefly brushed on verse eight, but we'll look at it in greater detail. And I just wanna read from verse eight down to verse 16 to have a holistic picture of the scene before we dissect it together. So let's read from verse eight. Then the word of the Lord came to him, arise.

Go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you. So he arose and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks. And he called her and said, bring me a little water in a vessel that I may drink.

And as she was going to bring it, he called her and said, bring me a morsel of bread in your hand. And she said, as the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die. And Elijah said to her, do not fear. Go and do as you have said.

But first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, the jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth. And she sent and did as Elijah said. And she and he and her household ate for many days. The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.

There are two things that we can take from the opening verse of this study. Look at it again. Verse eight reads, then the word of the Lord came to him. Full stop. I want you to observe at least two things from this.

The first thing has to do with the timing of God's instruction for Elijah. Notice that it came after the brook dried up. If you need to remember that, look at verse seven. And after a while, the brook dried up because there was no rain on the land. Verse eight.

Then then the word of the Lord came. Now we would think that God was a little late. We would prefer that if God was to give instruction that in his mercy supposedly he would have done so before the resources were removed. Before, maybe just right before things would have evaporated. But the first thing that you and I have to observe from verse eight concerning the character of God is that God is never late.

God is never late. He's never late with his direction. He's never late with his providential provision. He's never late with his protection. God is always on time.

And where you and I have to be careful is being tempted to grade God's guidance from a carnally dimensional way. Because God leads us, and he guides us, and he does what he does in and through us in a way that is deeper than what we might perceive. We look at surface level things. God looks for deeper things. And God's transitions in our lives are prompted by things that we don't recognize right away.

And that's okay. That's what makes him God. What was God trying to teach Elijah by removing the brook in this way? I'm sure it was many things and I think this is predominant. That as he day by day depended on this resource, as God reminded him, no no no no no, I am your ultimate source.

I am the one that you depend on. I am the one that you lean on. And when you and I can get very comfortable in our routine, can get very comfortable with the blessings that God has given us to begin with, where we lose sight of God. We lose sight of him being the fountainhead of everything that we enjoy, of our security, of our of our blessings, of our, rejoicing. And so in this very real tangible way, the Lord reminds Elijah, keep your eyes on me.

Not that he lost focus. No. There's no indication of that. But this is an illustration of what can be if we were in that same position. Now here's the thing.

Did God, in doing this, accomplish what he wanted to accomplish in Elijah's life? Which is the second observation. I say, yes. The faith that he was looking for in Elijah, the faith that he was refining and and working on did develop, did arrive where it was supposed to be. It passed the test.

How do we know? Look at the first word of verse nine, arise. What does that imply? That Elijah stayed put even though the brook dried. He didn't panic.

He wasn't frantic. He wasn't drawing a plan in the sand. No, he was staying right there as though that brook was bubbling with water. And the Lord recognized that, and that's where he found them. So he says, Elijah, time to get up.

Time to get up because I have something else for you now. You know, there is a quality of genuine faith that we often miss. There is something that the Bible provides us in a obscure passage that is very beneficial for us concerning one of the characteristics of true trust in the Lord. We're not gonna do much cross referencing in this Bible study, but this is one place worth going to. It's in Isaiah 28 in verse 16.

I want you to see what the Holy Spirit says concerning what true believing looks like, how it manifests, how you can measure it even for yourself. Isaiah 28 verse 16. It's in the last part of this verse. Here's what the scripture says. Therefore, thus says the Lord God, behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone of a sure foundation.

Here it is. Whoever believes will not be in haste. Whoever believes will not be in haste. You know what it implies? That a person who trusts in the Lord doesn't panic.

They don't flee when there are no answers. They don't rely on the strength in the arm of the flesh. There are times in life where circumstances will demand you to act to act even promptly. But there are moments like in Elijah's case where things are happening outside of your control, and those things that are outside of your control can sometimes go out of control. And in those moments, true faith should arise, and what that looks like is this, you do not act in haste.

We sang it over and over today, waiting on the Lord. And so if God is never late, then the second truth from verse eight is that we must learn how to wait. We must learn how to wait. Again, that doesn't mean that you're passive. No.

God gives us wisdom and God is very practical. You should be able to, in certain circumstances, many circumstances, solve it with the wisdom and the principles that God has provided you. But when it comes to stuff like this, where you can't do anything to change the outcome of it, he who believes is not in haste. He's not in haste. And that's what we see with this man of God.

He doesn't erupt in doubt. He doesn't panic. He doesn't, act frantically. He's found there waiting. And the Lord says, arise.

And if you ever need comfort in those moments where you you're trying to search for answers, you're trying to kick down doors open, and you might even be questioning God's faithfulness, look again at verse nine and realize this awesome insight of God's preparedness on our behalf. Verse nine again. Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon and dwell there. Read your bible slowly, please. Look at the last part of verse nine.

Behold, I have commanded a widow there to feed you. What does that tell you? That while the brook was drying up, God was preparing another vessel to feed Elijah. And Elijah didn't even know about it, until now. So here's Elijah depending on this and his lovely I wonder if he named the ravens at that point.

He was accustomed to this. And what's God doing? God knowing because he is ahead of us. This brook is gonna dry up. I want to see if there's true faith in my servant's heart.

But I'm also making a plan. I'm also getting things ready for the next leap of faith that Elijah is gonna have to make. This is a wonderful insight to comfort your heart and mind that God has everything set up before you even walk into it. It's all prepared. Even the promised land, you're told in Ezekiel that God already spied out the land.

Ezekiel tells us that. So even though those 12 spies went in originally, God already did the work. And And it's a reminder for you and I that God is ten years ahead of you. Ten years ahead of you? No.

He's at your funeral and your birthday at the same time. He's outside of time. It's not the way you see it. You're standing on the side of the road looking at the parade chronologically. God has a helicopter view.

He sees it all. And so this is the god that we serve. This is the god that we lean on and depend on. Here we are told that he already commanded a widow. I already have it set up for you there inside on.

All you have to do is trust in me. No wonder we shouldn't be in haste. Now if you thought living by a brook and depending on ravens to deliver food to you every day was challenging, This next instruction is very challenging. Can you tell me why based on verse nine alone? You have you can share it.

You don't you don't have to give a sermon. Just tell me the points. Give me one reason why this is difficult to obey. Yes? Widows.

Widows. Widows. Widows of this time? Oh, man. They were destitute to begin with.

They needed help. And now you're telling your servant that this widow is gonna help you when? When the economy is booming? No. When there's a drought of all times.

Of all the candidates, of all the people you could have found, you're gonna get a widow to host me. That is challenging. Sure. Another point. At least one more.

Is Sidon a Gentile? Sidon is a Gentile, modern day Lebanon. So I want you to go to a country you've never been to before. Imagine that. Imagine being told one night, I want you to pack your bags in the morning, take a flight, fly over to a foreign nation that you've never been to, and I want you to wait there at the airport.

There's gonna be somebody that you've never met before that's gonna invite you to their home and take care of you. Well, you said, that sounds exciting. Less exciting for Elijah. Can I tell you why? Let me remind you how Sidon connects to this story.

Go back to chapter 16 verse 31 of first Kings. And as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebath, he took for his wife Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the where? Sidonians, and went and served Baal and worshiped him. So out of all the gentile neighboring nations, go where Jezebel is from. Go where the center go where the heart of Baal worship is.

Now Jezebel gives us a hint of how Baal worshipers feel about worshipers of Yahweh. Right? She was slaughtering the prophets of the Lord. So you would think, okay. If if that's what these people do to my people, probably go in the opposite direction.

And God says, no, I want you to go to the heart of it. Go dwell inside on. And inside on, a prince, a wealthy woman, no, a widow is going to take care of you. So put yourself in Elijah's sandals for a second and feel it. Feel it.

Don't just brush over it. Put yourself there. This is what he was called to do. And the overall observation to make from this is simple. God's guidance is often unexpected and unpredictable.

Can I tell you something heart to heart? I give up predicting how god's gonna lead my life. I gave up a few years ago. When I first came to the lord, I I was very, very specific and clear with my request, and I had expectation that it was gonna play out exactly how I thought it was gonna play out. Can I tell you how much of it played out exactly?

Zero. Zero. Never thought I would move to this country. Never thought I would do ministry in the context that I'm doing ministry. Never thought I would every aspect of who I am, marriage, where I live, the car that I'm driving, everything was beyond my expectation.

And guess what? That's okay. You know why? Because my little blueprint pales in comparison to what god has in mind. Do you think, Elijah, I wonder, I wish, I'm gonna ask him one day.

We have a lot of time in eternity. I'm gonna ask him, did you expect that out of all the things god could have told you for this next chapter for your life at this point that you would have had to move to Sidon and be taken care of by a widow, I wonder what he would have said. This is shocking, and it's supposed to be. So don't put don't put too much stock in you trying to have a forecast of how God's gonna take care of every single part of your life. Plan in your heart.

Scripture says plan, but the Lord determines your steps, ultimately. So enjoy the ride. Yes. Pray. Have expectations.

Yes. Bring things before the Lord, even your desires, but trust that whatever the outcome is, it's gonna be better than what you thought. And at the same time here, I'm comforted to know that as cryptic as the reasons for God's instructions may be here, there is one thing, one thing about this next leap for Elijah that we obviously see and we should expect for ourselves. I mean, what do what do you mean by that? Do you know what Zarephath means?

Anybody have an idea? I'll I'll let a couple people guess if you dare. Zarephath. You ready for this? This is awesome.

You can't make this stuff up. Refinery. Refinement. In the same way that you would refine metals, that's exactly what Zarephath means. How fitting for what we're about to study in Elijah's life that where he's going to go is in fact going to be more refining than where he was before.

And not only is it gonna be refining for him, it's gonna be very refining for the widow who's gonna have him at her house. Do you know what you can have certainty about no matter what season you're in? Whether it is a predictable one or an unpredictable one? You can guarantee this, that whatever it is that you are enduring, whatever it is that you're entering into, whatever it is that you're waiting on god for, it's meant to conform you to the image of Christ. Every time, all the time, it's an unending promise.

You've been predestined to that according to Romans eight twenty nine. You've been predestined to be conformed to the image of Christ, which means that no matter where you're at, because you're in Christ, the destination for you is that he's going to use everything for your conforming to that image. And that's what Romans eight twenty eight is all about. That all things work together for our good. All things.

Why? Because of verse 29. Because everything has been destined for you to be conformed to the image of the son of God. So Zarephath is where he's going. What is he to expect inside on?

What is he to expect from a widow? Very little perhaps. But one thing that is for certain is that he's gonna be refined. Even this man of God has more refining to undergo so that he can be ready for the next thing that God has in mind for him. That's what I'm comforted by.

No matter what phone call I get, no matter how things drag, no matter how things may not be going according to my preferred schedule, one thing is for certain, this is meant to conform me. When things go fast, when things go slow, when things are favorable, when they're unfavorable, God has designed everything to be for that purpose. And so let's see what happens. So verse 10, he arose, went and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks.

And he called her and said, bring me a little water in a vessel that I may drink. Look at verse 10 again. So he arose and went to Zarephath. The unquestioning obedience of this man is to be greatly admired. It's the same thing that we saw when he was initially instructed to go to the brook and to receive from the ravens.

No questions. My questions would have been very similar to the original command. How is a widow gonna take care of me exactly, lord? And how long is she gonna be able to provide for me in this drought? Are you gonna put a protective bubble around me as I am now behind enemy lines?

All these different things, nothing coming out of Elijah's mouth. He's walking in total trust in the Lord. And he goes there, and when he goes there, here's what you have to see. That when you walk with that yieldedness to the Lord, when you walk in that obedience, that full hearted trust, you can expect this reward among many other rewards in obedience. Providence.

Perfect providence working in your favor. That's one of the jewels of walking with the Lord in obedience. Notice what happens. He comes to Zarephath, and when he came to the gate of the city look at this word. Behold, like, hey, check this out.

A widow was there gathering sticks. So the moment he enters in to the the gate of the city, the very person that God said would take care of him appears on the scene. Coincidence? Providence. Providence.

And if you want to be assured in your life of God's divine orchestration working in every detail of your day to day, just walk with him hand in hand in obedience. That's that's gonna give you the ability to see everything with that wonderful lens. God is orchestrating everything here. Sometimes it's very obvious like this and other times you learn it down the road, but I love to be reminded here that this this kind of leading that God has for his servants is is yours and mine as long as you remain close. One of the things that I always think of is Ruth's example.

She was a Moabitess. She comes into a foreign land with a foreign god. She says your people will be my people, your god will be my god, and she right away walks in obedience. And as a poor person, she what? Takes advantage of the welfare system of Israel.

So she gleans. She gleans from the fields. That's walking in obedience. And where where does she find herself? In Boaz's field, and the rest is history.

When you walk in obedience, you position yourself, so to speak, you put the pen in God's hand to write out your story in providence. There's a lot of mess when you step outside of the will of God. I don't recommend it for many reasons, but all the assurance that you inherit like Elijah shows here. So he does come. And look, he he calls to her and he says, bring me a little water in a vessel that I may drink.

In verse 11, she didn't seem to have a problem with that. And as she was going to bring in, he called her and said, bring me a morsel of bread in your hand. That's where it got costly. We tend to be very attracted to the things that don't cost us much in obedience, but when it comes to things that have a price tag on it, we're a little bit more hesitant. Are we not?

So she obviously expressed this hesitation. Look at verse 12. And she said, as the lord god your god lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I'm gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son that we may eat it and die. What a sad comment.

This is gonna be the last meal that we eat before we both die. And Elijah comes and he says, can you get me something to eat actually? Complete stranger. Imagine how difficult that would be. You have your boy back at home, and he he he's just experiencing grumbles in his stomach for days, and so are you.

And with the little strength that you have, only surviving on water, you're gonna prepare your last meal to just satisfy yourselves and just lay there and die. So you can sympathize with her a little bit. Right? Yes. But it depends on how you understand verse nine.

Look again at verse nine of the second part. Behold, the lord says, I have commanded a widow there to feed you. I am persuaded that based on that verse, this widow had received the prior revelation from the lord of what was to come in Elijah arriving and what she was to do. I believe that. And I think verse 12 gives us a hint of how she had that revelation because she says to him, as the lord that's Yahweh.

She knows the covenant name of God. As the Lord, your God lives. Now just because she had received that instruction doesn't necessarily mean that she was a believer in the true and living God. And we have many instances of people who receive dreams or revelations that were not serving God, but were instructed by God, and I believe this is one of those cases. So she was prepared.

She was prepared by the Lord for this very moment, but she was still hesitant. And you can relate to that where you know what the will of God is in a particular manner, in a particular situation, and yet you're still hesitant to act upon it. Because you can feel how much it's gonna cost you, whether that be awkwardness or your job and anything else. You can feel it sometimes. You can feel the heat of it.

You can feel the consequences coming as you begin to entertain me walking in the way God wants me to walk here and now. And so we can relate to her but it doesn't excuse her. I'm persuaded by that. Somewhat explain it otherwise but I think it's very clean and clear and plain. So she's been prepared.

So she's she has this expectation. It should have been it should have been clear to her that, okay, this God that revealed this to me, it's obviously coming to pass. This is being manifest. But instead she shrivels up in her faith and what does Elijah do? This fire breathing prophet.

You know, if you have a a a silhouette understanding of who Elijah is, you would expect him to say, thus says the Lord. Because you have not shown faith and have pronounced some kind of judgment on her, that's not what he does. Look at verse 13. And Elijah said to her, do not fear. Do not fear.

Go and do as you have said, but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son. You know, I've heard prosperity preachers use this verse to tell people who who can't afford their rent to pay off their mortgage to first give them something, and then God will bless them. Here's the thing that they left out. God told the widow first. Tracking with me?

And God told one widow, not every widow in America on top of that too. Right? Just a side note. So the Lord prepares her. He says, don't be afraid.

Don't be afraid. And here here's the beautiful thing about this part of the Bible study. You can learn something from the widow. You can learn something, obviously, about the Lord, and you can learn something from Elijah's perspective. And right here, I learned something.

There's something that I gleaned from Elijah's example. He doesn't reprimand her. He doesn't, overwhelm her with condemnation. He encourages her. He quells her fears, and he stirs her up to love and good works.

And I see the absolute value and blessing it is to have a voice in your life to help you obey God better. To help you obey God with greater strength and with less fear and concern and anxiety. And this is the blessing that Elijah was up to this point that he was able to nudge her and guide her into the place of obedience. Even though she already heard and knew about it, it's amazing what community does. It's amazing how God has put people in our lives to help us love God better.

And if you think for a moment that you can do it on your own, I assure you that you will not be able to know better worship, better manifestations of the spirit, better opportunities to please God, unless you are connected to a body. Elijah here says, don't be afraid. And he says, just do it. Trust the Lord. And then he gives her a promise according to verse 14.

I wonder if you have been able to identify God's provision in your life in the same way this woman was provided through Elijah. Were you able to recognize the voices and the examples of those who are present in your life that help you obey God better? They are out there. I believe Maranatha Bible Church is filled with them. And so Elijah serves as that example here.

And before we move on, I want you to remember last week how I mentioned Elijah being a significant reference in the New Testament, and this very passage is actually quoted by the lips of the son of God himself. And I want you to turn there in Luke chapter four to see how he interprets and applies this very scene in redemptive history. Look at Luke four quickly in verse twenty five and twenty six just to get the citation from Christ. I wonder if you knew that Jesus quoted this passage. But in truth, he says, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land.

And Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath in the land of Sidon to a woman who was a widow. So he he describes this very scene that we just finished studying perfectly. But what's the context? Jesus, at this point in his ministry, early in his ministry, is in a synagogue in his hometown Nazareth. He opens the scroll to Isaiah's passage about the anointed, the spirit anointed Messiah.

He quotes Isaiah 61, at least the first two verses. And then he tells the very hearers of that passage, this scripture has been fulfilled in himself. And we're told there that people marveled. They marveled, but that amazement was short lived because it was quickly replaced with skepticism, doubt, and even scorn. They begin to say, is this Joseph's son?

Isn't this Joseph's son? And so Jesus responds to their unbelief, and he mentions how a prophet is accepted generally everywhere, definitely not in his own town. And he is ex he's exemplifying that, not just what's happening in that moment, but then he begins to go to history and pull out one of the greatest prophets by way of example of how that is true. And he goes to Elijah, and he says, you know Elijah was received by a widow, Jew or Gentile, not a Jew. Elijah, because he represented as a messenger of God, the truth of God was rejected by his own people and was accepted by the faith of somebody who did not know the covenant blessings that the Jewish people knew.

And here's what he's saying in conveying this truth to them. The same is happening with the Messiah. The same is happening with the Messiah. You, the Jewish people, not just the Jewish people, but from my own hometown are not willing to receive me. And so he is compounding on that truth that a prophet is not received from his own people, but he says something even further that would have irked them.

In fact, it did irked them big time. He takes it a step further. He goes, it was a gentile. It was a gentile who received Elijah and received a blessing from the prophet, and I'm giving you a heads up because of your rejection, the gentiles will receive a blessing. The gentiles will not just receive a blessing.

They will be grafted in. They will be accepted. They will receive me unlike you. So by giving this prediction, by going back to Old Testament truth, the people were so disturbed. And I'm sure that people did not like this story in the Old Testament because it shows again God's heart for a people who worship false gods, who, again, did not have heritage and history with the true and living God, and yet God's still willing to extend mercy.

Here's a reminder for you in first Kings seventeen eight to 16 of a gospel truth. God's heart for the Gentiles has always been there. It's always been there, and it's more than just the book of Jonah. You have it even here with this prophet who's willing to go outside of the boundaries of the promised land to bless somebody who didn't deserve it. And it's a foreshadowing of what the Messiah would do culminating in the new covenant where people from all nations would have access to the mercy and goodness of God.

So this is what Jesus is showing by coming to this text. So, again, reminder, you can find gospel in your study of the Hebrew scriptures. Now let's continue back in first Kings verse 17. After this, the son of the woman, the mistress of the house became ill, and his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him. And she said to Elijah, what have you against me, oh man of God?

You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son. And he said to her, give me your son. And he took him from her arms and carried him up into the upper chamber where he lodged and laid him on his own bed. And he cried to the lord, oh lord my god, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourned by killing her son? Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and he cried to the Lord, oh Lord my God, let this child's life come into again.

And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again and he revived. And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, see, your son lives. And the woman said to Elijah, now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.

What a shift. What a shift of themes. What a shift of experience. The key word to this next section are the first two words of verse 17. Look again with me.

After this. After what? Not just the widow's obedience to the command of God, but to the experience that she had with the outcome of her obedience according to verse 15. Look at verse 15 again. And she went and did as Elijah said, and she and he and her household ate for many days.

The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah. You gotta stop and play that through your imagination a little bit. This woman was rewarded from heaven for her faith in what god had said. And do you know what that reward looked like? You had one jar for the flour, you had another jug for oil, and they took that and they made a cake that day Elijah came, and they realized when they made it for him, there was enough for themselves.

And every time they ate for the day, went to bed, and woke up, they found those vessels full every day. And we're told that it was many days that they ate. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine going to your fridge, going to your cupboard, and what you find in there, no matter how much you ate the day before, that it was restocked by an invisible hand? This is spectacular.

This is this is awesome. This is incredible. No trips to the grocery store. Nothing. You couldn't anyway at this time.

Nothing of the sort. Just this private daily intervention from god where he was giving them exactly what they needed every single day. And with this overflowing experience of blessing comes crashing through a tragedy that was so unexpected. The son of this woman dies, young, filled with life, tasted the the goodness of God for himself. And what we see here is that this may be a strange experience for somebody who had such a quality of heavenly supervision.

This isn't really revelatory, is it? No. It's just you and I being reminded that you're confronted with something. You're you're confronted with this truth that you can never fail to forget. That you have this woman here who had experienced radical faithfulness and also gloriously favored by God, and yet she was not exempt from suffering.

She showed amazing faith, and she experienced amazing reward and yet, that did not dismiss her from knowing severe tragedy. I'm thinking of Mary in John chapter 11. I love that portion of scripture, the first five verses. Been sharing that lately. Where we're told there that Mary, the one who anointed Jesus so that description of Mary not just to signal her out as the Mary that blessed Jesus in this way because there's many Marys, but the Mary who showed such extravagant worship to the Lord, and in that same context, you learned that her brother was ill.

You would think that a woman who had a revelation that the disciples did not even have by giving Jesus that kind of treatment in preparation for his burial. You know what that tells me? Mary was listening even when the 12 weren't. Mary understood that this Jesus, he he's talking about death. He's talking about his burial.

He's talking about him being a sacrifice. Mary heard what the 12 apostles could not register. And she demonstrated her faith by giving him a ceremonial anointing, so to speak, from her heart, preparing him for burial. You would think such a woman with such caliber of insight, such caliber of worship and devotion would be saved from any peril or problems, and yet we're told it's that Mary whose brother died. Keep that in mind.

Your love for God, as intense as it might be, it might outshine the love that other people might have for the Lord, does not cancel out the possibility of you being tested by suffering. And that's exactly what this woman is about to experience. Now you think it's hard enough to lose. I can't even fathom it. I don't have children of my own.

I pray that I will one day. I have nieces and nephews. I have brothers and sisters in Christ who have lovely babies and children. I can't even entertain the thought of what kind of pain results from the loss of a premature death. But let's let's realize and remember, she's a widow.

She already lost her husband. So at this time, she didn't have government backing like we do today. She already lost her husband. All her hope for a secure future to being taken care of was in that boy, and now that's been taken from her. She has no one.

Never mind anybody to take care of her. Who's there to be just her companion? Who's there that she can enjoy life with? Who who's there for her to make memories with? All of that is taken from her.

So, again, feel it. Feel it. Imagine being the only one left in your immediate family. Everybody's been taken by death. And this is on the other side of obeying God when it was really difficult to obey God with very little foundation to work with as a gentile woman.

And yet the Lord does this. And you think to yourself, maybe honestly, what's the purpose of this? Like, wasn't it enough? Didn't she prove herself enough by what she did in the previous verses? Didn't she demonstrate that she did trust the Lord?

What what do you get from taking these loved ones from her? And as you think about it, you have to remember how God works with these things. That despite the devotion she showed and the love that she showed and the exemplary faith that she showed, there was still more. There was still more listen. Faith for her to develop, more worship for her to offer, more polishing in her character to create that can only come about through the fires of suffering.

Only. There are some things that you can never know, never realize unless you endure something. And that's exactly what she is about to experience. Can I give you a hint how I know that's to be true? Look at the last verse of this chapter one more time.

Verse 24. And the woman said to Elijah, now I know that you are a man of God. And that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth. Not that she didn't have a revelation before, but it's now more confirmed. Just like Job.

Job was a man of God who feared God. My ears have heard of you, but now my eyes see you. Isn't that what he said at the end of it all? So there's deeper revelation, deeper insight. That's the that's the consensus of the Bible.

There is always something profoundly good to come about with something that seems profoundly horrible. So this son is now taken from her. And we see here that both her and Elijah made mistakes that we must avoid when we are visited by any level of devastation. Here's the first one. Look at verse 17 again.

His illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him. Verse 18, and she said to Elijah, what have you against me, oh man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son. So something about this tragedy awakened her conscience of something that she has done in the past where she now thinks God has punished me for this past sin. We're not told what that sin was, but it was severe enough for her to be haunted by it.

Do you have like a kind of past like that? Do you? I wonder. It's okay. You don't need to tell anybody.

God knows about it though. And here's the thing that you gotta really be careful of, to always equate suffering with punishment. God is allowing this. God is doing this because I did this. And though chastisement is a a reality for the true child of God, though God can't even wound somebody for their sin to awaken them to repentance, I can tell you this guaranteed because the Bible says so.

If it's a sin that's been repented of, it's a sin that you should never be worried about again. If it's covered by the blood of Jesus Christ, if you've given it to the Lord, if you've left it at the foot of the cross, you never have to, for a waking moment, think that God's gonna get me back for that. What is the expectation of you when you forgive somebody who's hurt you? People always have these convoluted ideas of what forgiveness looks like in the Christian's life. It's very simple.

Forgiveness is a vow that you make that you will never take vengeance on someone for hurting you or causing you pain. You leave vengeance to God and you go beyond that where you're willing and you actually want them to be blessed instead. And that kind of release is stimulated by your revelation of God's mercy towards you. So forgiveness is expected of you to look like I vow to never entertain even the thought of somebody experiencing pain because of the pain they caused me. Is it any less true for God and his relation to you?

You should never fear for a moment that God is gonna retaliate against you when you have expressed your desire for him to forgive you. And so this idea to equate whatever suffering I'm going through with something that I must have done, if it's been plunged in the blood, it's done. It's in the sea of forgetfulness for a reason, and God has no intention of recapturing it and rubbing it in your face. So this is where this woman went wrong, and she thinks that this is because of something. You admire her for humility in some way.

It's like a mixture of different things that she's showing here. She acknowledges that she's a sinner, but she's applying that truth in a wrong way. Here's another thing to look here. She doesn't just talk about her sin. What does she do?

Who's she blaming here? She's blaming Elijah. It's like, it's you. You came to my house. You did this.

You caused this, implying, probably would have been better if you, you know, we never met. I look at this and I'm reminded, here you have a man who was used as an instrument of God to not just bring blessing to this woman, but to actually be the means for her survival. You wanna talk about somebody coming into your life and being a blessing? That's incredible. God used this man to help this woman not die, her and her son.

And how does she return the favor when things go bad? It's your fault, Elijah. Be prepared as a servant of God who serves God's people to be unjustly blamed for things that have no relation to you or that lightly relate to you. Be prepared for people to even in their pain when they're trying to understand the problems that they're experiencing and navigating through the hurt and the pain in their lives to project that on you. This is especially true for leaders, Especially true for leaders.

If you're a leader serving God's people in any capacity, sometimes the people that you serve will have unrealistic expectations of you. And because of those unrealistic expectations, when you fail to do what they think that you should do, they will accuse you. They will blame you. They will project their heart hurt and their injury on you. Talk to anybody who's been in ministry long enough, and they can tell you that to be true, That that is something that they often experience.

Here you have Elijah who's only done nothing but good, who's only blessed this woman, and yet what does she do in return? She blames him. And there are many reasons for that. I can tell you some interesting stories of people that I know that were heaped on with condemnation from those where it's just like, that doesn't even make any sense, but it's just human nature, is it not? There are some people who just don't know how to handle pain and how to interpret the problems that they are enduring.

So Elijah here gives me an example of how to learn from that experience. Verse 19, he said to her, give me your son. What an amazing man of great compassion. He doesn't rebuke her again. He doesn't lash out on her.

He sympathizes with her. So here's something that might be able to relate to you. Listen. If you're a Christian, you're gonna see other people suffer, especially if you're in the church long enough. You're gonna see people suffer even in the world.

The people that you associate with, you're gonna see them going through some things. And when that happens, can I give you a suggestion? It is not warranted in the presence of someone's deep brokenness where they're trying to pick up all the pieces and put it together and make sense of it for you to give a theological treatise of why that's happening to them. That makes sense? You don't have to preach to them as they are enduring their suffering.

And people for some reason have the need to do so. That while this person is shattered and broken and expressing their pain, Christians just feel like they have to explain it. You don't have to explain it actually. Sometimes the best thing you can do is just weep with them. And I've actually learned from people who have suffered tremendously that Christians have actually done more harm by trying to give them an expository reason of why what they're going through is why they're going through it.

So wisdom doesn't just look like in what you say and thinking it's gonna be profound. Wisdom actually looks like this. You know what it looks like? Not saying anything. A wise person doesn't talk all the time.

And And if you're serious about being one who comforts others, learn from that example. Just be still and be present. And one day, as time goes on, you might have a conversation with that person where they have questions and you can expound on those things with them. But learn to suffer with people. Learn to suffer with people.

Elijah here doesn't blow up on her, doesn't try to go to this great deep thing with her. He just simply is there to an extent. His words are very brief, and in this particular scene, he's actually gonna try to do something about it. And what does he do? He says, give me your son.

He took her from her arms, meaning when she said that she had him in her arms, and he went up to the upper chamber where he lodged and laid him on his own bed, and look what he does. Elijah himself is conflicted by this trial. So it's not just this woman. Elijah is not bulletproof here, and he's not just saying, you don't have faith. Give me this.

Let me take care of this. Well, I'll be back in thirty minutes. Watch. Watch. Watch what you missed out on.

He doesn't do that. He takes this boy, goes up to the room, and look what he says in verse 20, and he cried to the lord, oh lord my god. Have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourned by killing her son? You know, in James five, we're told that Elijah was a man with a nature like ours and he prayed and the heavens shut up for three years and six months and he prayed again and the heavens poured out rain. And we're like, yeah.

That's how this man of God prayed. True. But I'm so thankful that first Kings 17 includes this man's prayer in this way. It's like, Lord, what's going on? What is going on here?

I did not see this coming. And he begins to pour out his heart to the Lord. So in this brief moment, here's here's a study within a study. Elijah gives us an example here, a model of what to do when unexplainable tragedy visits you, when some kind of suffering surprises you, what do you do? He prays.

He comes to the Lord. That's his immediate reflex. He goes to the throne of grace. And I have three reasons why Elijah made that his reflex. First thing is verse 20.

He cried to the Lord, oh Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourned by killing her son? The first thing that Elijah acknowledges indirectly in asking this question is that he believes in the sovereignty of God. You wanna know how you can run to prayer something as almost a reflex? You have to first establish the sovereignty of God. So in this, Elijah is admitting, God, nothing runs by you under your nose.

Nothing is under your radar. You see all things. You know all things. You permit and allow things. And so Lord, I'm here to just bring this perplexed thing, and I'm asking you the sovereign God, how?

What what's going on here? So Elijah is able to commune with God with his problems because he believes in a big God who sees and is aware and and he's there. So the sovereignty of God. But not just sovereignty of God. Closely associated with that is verse 21.

Here's the second reason why Elijah ran to prayer as his response. Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the Lord, oh Lord my God, let this child's life come into him again. So not just because god is sovereign that Elijah prayed, but he believed god would answer prayer. You have very little motivation to pray if you don't believe god answers prayer. If you just think that's something that you should do as a mental and emotional exercise, good luck praying like this man.

But if you really believe that because he's sovereign, he's not distant, he's very much aware he can also intervene. So he brings this thing before the Lord and he says, Lord, I'm asking you here. Can you please bring life? Bring life to this young man's body again. And you know what makes this act of faith so impressive?

This is the first resurrection miracle in all of the Bible. There is no recorded miracle before this where somebody rose from the dead. So this is the first of its kind. And you're gonna see a couple more, and you're gonna see a few more in the New Testament, But this is the there is no category for this kind of miracle yet. But Elijah had such a revelation of who God was, the author of life, the giver of life, the taker of life that he's able to pray with such confidence and liberty.

Lord, I believe that you can answer this. But it's not just the fact that God can answer this prayer. Look at this, verse 22. And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. He believed that he can these are very closely associated.

He believed God was sovereign. He believed that God can do something. And lastly, he believed that God actually heard him. God actually heard him. The Lord listened to the voice of Elijah, and what comforts me is that God heard him and honored his prayer even though he came so honestly in the way he did in verse 21.

He didn't come in saying, oh resurrection and power. Oh, the giver of all life. Oh, the one who conquers death in the grave. I believe without a shadow of a doubt that you can raise this boy from the not right away at least. He comes with questions.

He spills his heart. He empties his soul before the Lord, and God still listened to him. Elijah is a prophet, a mighty man of God. But listen, Elijah is a man like you and I, and here's an example of that. He comes to the Lord with honesty.

He comes to the Lord with just raw emotion. And I read here in verse 22 that the Lord listened to him. The Lord wasn't offended by that. The Lord isn't sensitive like you and I might be sensitive. He's very understanding.

And so as this man comes before the Lord with such raw emotion, the Lord honors him, listens to him, and answers him. We read something that perhaps you wonder why didn't we stop on. Look at verse 21 again. Then he stretched himself upon the child three times. Did you catch that?

That's kinda strange. What's he doing here? Many people have made attempts to try to explain these actions. It could be that Elijah in his praying was so desperate, was so expressive that not only is he vocalizing it, but he's even demonstrating what he wants. Lord, Lord this, bring this boy to life, and he lays upon the boy and he does it again.

It's almost like a physical reaction to this request. Sometimes in desperation, you and I, we lay prostrate, we bend our knees, we lift our hands, and it's just a way for what's in our hearts to show through our limbs saying, Lord, please look down here. Lord, please see, hear me. And it could be that this man is just laying upon this boy expressing his desire. The life that's in here, would it would you impart life into him?

Could be that he's just doing something that some would do practically. And knowing that this boy was fresh still, he he just died, providing natural warmth to his body, and trying to preserve with whatever he could do in with his own body while he's seeking the Lord. If that is true, then what a wonderful example of what prayer also looks like. If Elijah is doing more than just being expressive, but he's being practical here, then you and I have to understand that when we pray and ask God, it doesn't replace being practical. Does it?

So we should seek the Lord for the impossible. We should ask and bring before the Lord all things even as the first thing, but we should also do our part. And as we do our part, we can trust and continue to wait on the Lord and ask him to do his part. Again, if that's what Elijah is doing, then what a comfort it is. To not be overly dramatic or unwise and not acting in what we can do to try to preserve or try to provide or try to make things happen.

Not dismissing prayer, but not also dismissing to be real and to be practical. It's a dance. And it's a beautiful dance when the Christian knows how to be wise and how they approach certain things. So you could equate that to anything that you need. Yes.

God can answer every prayer, but God also asks us to do stuff too. And when you do both in honor of him, he can do the miraculous in between. So here's what he's doing. He's laying he's asking three times, and he cried out to the Lord. This is desperate.

Cries out to the Lord, cries out to the Lord. And what happens? The Lord answers. You read it. Here's where we're ending.

And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, see, your son lives. And the woman said to Elijah, now I know that you're a man of God and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth. So this woman that Elijah went to, God sends Elijah to this woman in Sidon, Perhaps for many reasons, but perhaps one of them is so that this gentile woman who was surrounded by Baalism would have a chance to hear about the true and living God and be saved. God loves the lost.

He really does. And you might be wondering, why do I have the job that I have? I don't wanna be here, but it's the only opening that I got. Maybe there's somebody in there that god wants to use you to touch. I know you want better hours and you want this and you want that, and that's fine.

God will honor that, but God loves lost souls more, and you should too. So be sensitive to that. You may not be particularly happy about where you're at, but maybe because there's something there, There's someone there that the Lord wants to touch through you. So we have that, but there's something also even I believe for Elijah. Like, it's so plain.

It's it's not deep really. Right? You have, like, these episodes in Elijah's life. And and in these two episodes so far, it's all about faith stretching. And so you have him at the brook with the ravens and he passes that.

And then he comes into a new semester in the school of God. And it's what? A widow in Sidon and what else? The son dies. Never mind the bread and the oil being multiplied, but the son dies.

And so Elijah here sees what? He sees God's resurrection power. Do you think that's just random? No. No.

No. No. No. There's a chapter 18 that we're about to study. And what is gonna happen in chapter 18?

God's gonna say, arise, show yourself to Ahab. And what's gonna happen on this face off? He's gonna confront Ahab. He's gonna confront hundreds of false prophets on a mountaintop with a wavering compromised nation, and he's gonna stand alone and demonstrate devotion and trust in God, pray in their presence, and see a miracle come to pass. Well, listen.

It's very hard for you to come to zero to 100. Is it not? So what does God do? Something that he does in you and I. He builds his faith.

He stretches him. He teaches him, and then he prepares him through that to be positioned for this glorious testimony. Can I say something to somebody? Maybe you're a person who really wants to be used by God. That's a wonderful desire to have.

I can't think of a better one. There isn't a better one. You wanna know God more intimately. You wanna be used God by by God more intensely. Do not despise the days where God hides you, where God may limit you.

Like, think about it. This is a mighty prophet of God, like Elijah. K? Elijah, who in the beginning of chapter 17 prayed and the heavens shut. And after Elijah prays such a mighty prayer and even demonstrates to Ahab, hey, God is the one behind us and I'm his instrument.

God takes Elijah and he puts him in a desert. And then from the desert, where does he stick him? In a home of a widow with a son. He says, stay there. And this man with such great potential, this man with so much power, this man who can, we're about to find out, brings a nation to its knees, spends years.

Because why? We're we're gonna learn in verse eight chapter 18 verse one. After three years, he is going to go to Ahab. So for years, he's in this home ministering to one woman and her son. So don't despise the days of small beginnings.

Don't despise the days of hiddenness. You have Elijah who was tucked away in a home outside of Israel, and he served God faithfully. Serve God faithfully wherever he puts you. Wherever he puts you. And even if your ministry is to bless somebody in your household, never forget Elijah.

That's what he did, this mighty man of God, taking care of a woman and her child. So this faith was being built up in this man of God, and let me end it on this point. Not only did he witness God's resurrection power, I mean, that's gonna build up your faith to go against Ahab for sure, but his calling was even confirmed. It was affirmed by this woman. She's like, you're the real deal.

Like, you're the real deal. And God used that to speak into Elijah's life, I'm sure. If you don't know Elijah's story fully, remember that in a couple chapters, he's gonna doubt his calling. He's gonna just I'm a failure. Just Lord, take me up.

I'm no better than my father's. I'm ready to go home. And you have this woman early on saying what? I know that you're a man of God. I know that you're a man of God.

I know that what's in your that's true you're the true you're the true speaker of God. You're the true minister of God. Can I say something in closing? For this woman to come to this confirmation, you know what it required? It didn't just require a trial.

It required a man of God who was also going through a trial, but responded to it well. Do not underestimate the suffering you're enduring, child of God, because you have no idea who's watching. And you have no idea how your response to that suffering can melt the heart of a skeptic, can persuade the heart of a penitent person that can bring a person closer to the Lord, that can open their eyes in ways that they've never seen God, that that can even bring a person from unbelief to belief. You know what my favorite one of my favorite examples of that truth is? I said I was finished, but I have to open my bible again.

I'll finish here. One verse, I promise. Acts 16 verse 25. This will be a good place to end. I'm sure you agree with me.

Yes. That is a place to end. Acts 16 verse 25. About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. I love that.

Gashed, bloodied, bruised, and they're chained hand and foot, praying and singing god to God hymns to God at midnight. And the Holy Spirit wants you and I to know those criminals in that very same place, we're listening to them. We're listening to them. You have no idea who's watching you. You have no idea who's looking at your social media posts.

You have no idea who's listening to you. In the same way, Elijah who was able to gently, compassionately filled with faith, prayerfully push through this trial, this woman said in response to that, you're the real deal. May God help us to do the same. Lord, we thank you for this Bible study. We pray, lord, that we would be able to remember these things, more importantly to apply them to real life.

We thank you that you lead us step by step, and you're showing that through Elijah's life. Help us be patient. Help us not be in haste. Help us to wait on you. And help us like Elijah if we find ourselves in a limited space, in a foreign space, in an uncomfortable place to serve you.

And not just serve you, but, Lord, when things do not go our way to honor you and to trust that people will see that, and it will register well. Lord, we thank you for this time again together. We pray that you would receive our worship as we rejoice over your word. We're blessed to be fed by the truth that your Holy Spirit has given us. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen. Amen. Let's stand and worship the Lord. Yeah?