MESSAGE BY PASTOR ROB INRIG
FROM BETHANY BAPTIST IN RICHMOND, BC.
I invite you to pray with me, Father God hear our prayer, and we humbly cry before you as it's written, "Whatever you ask for in prayer, believing, you will receive" (Matt: 21 -22) and yes! we believe in you, we trust in you, and we believe you are the maker of miracles. we are asking for healing for our dear members of our family and also dear friends who are suffering from illnesses in their lives fighting and suffering under a lot of pain, You know them by their names; (Gaby, Vicky, Nancy, Tere, Liz , Stevie, Les, Miguel, Socrates, Kate, Sara's mom, Gloria) as your precious children, strengthen them their faith in you with a miracle in their lives oh! Father God hear our prayer, and we also pray for all the people around the world special the children, who are suffering with wars, devastation, hunger, pain, hate and disbelieve in you, we ask also beloved Father God to strengthen their faith in you, we know that you love them so much oh Father God hear our prayer, we ask you in the name of Our Lord of Lords and King of Kings you beloved son Jesus Christ. AMEN!
When we ended last week, our last view of Elijah was him waiting beside a dried up brook. Prior to that, his accommodations were stellar - a safe hiding place, twice a day fresh food delivery, a cooling stream. And a tree covered, sheltered from the sun, canopy. Given the weather forecast coming, he couldn’t have wanted anything better but after a while of enjoying the surround, his wait growing longer, I wonder, did his 5 star retreat begin to feel more isolation than celebration?
Truth is, we’re not wired for waiting. It’s just not in our DNA. Our predisposition is to DO. To alter our situation. To change what needs to be changed. To get things done.
Sure, some are more action oriented than others but few are comfortable with waiting too long. Some good for a week or two, perhaps a month, even two but waiting for much longer? that becomes really hard. Admittedly, IF we can see a purpose in the wait and know it is soon coming to an end, okay but when we are left in the dark, with little sense of what’s ahead, that’s a very different story. And from what we know about Elijah, he is one who needs to act, to do.
The truth is, it’s hard to wait – especially when what’s waited for isn’t wanted, it’s needed. To be clear, this morning no easy answers to why you are in the time of waiting that you are.
And yet often God places us in those times, sometimes to test but more often to work in us a greater understanding of Him. Sometimes by stripping away the things on which we rely – our strengths, our resources, our skills and sometimes by stripping away the opposite, the things we allow to disqualify – our insecurities, our inadequacies, our injuries. God’s intention whether that comes through testing, stretching or stripping is for us to see Him more clearly.
One challenge we have when we read Scripture is that we are often taken from event to event without giving some consideration to the in between times. The in between times where we are called to trust – during the unseen, in the unknown. In our waiting.
:3 tells us that the Lord speaks to Elijah and tells him to go the brook Kerith, where He has commanded ravens to bring him food. His care plan, as we considered last week was extraordinary. Then in :8 we read, Then the word of the Lord came to him: ‘Go at once to Zarephath in the region of Sidon and stay there. I have directed a widow there to supply you with food.’ 1 Kings 17:8,9.
Note the words - Then the word of the Lord came to me… Did the Lord speak to Elijah in between the time we read of in :3 and when we read :8, a span of what was likely 2+ years? He might have but we’ve no indication of that. Wha we do know God communicated His love and care by doing what He promised. The daily delivery of food proved that but was there more? Can’t say but I’d guess not.
Which is to say, sometimes God places us in times of extended silence, His plans unknown to us, not because He doesn’t care, not because He has forgotten us but because He wants us to trust in His character not just His works. If we only trust God based on His works, we soon have a ‘vending machine’ God who we trust IF He comes through as we wish. But the Bible tells us, His thoughts are not our thoughts, His ways not our ways, As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts Is 55:8,9. The truth is we will never understand all God is doing, why He allows what He does, why He acts as He does, why He acts when He does but we can understand and trust His revealed character. The LORD saying, I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness Jer 31:3. Praise the Lord! He is good. God’s love never fails Ps 136. The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is His faithfulness; His mercies begin afresh each morning Lam 3:22,23. I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings Mtth 23:37.
Those verses state who He is and who He is dictates how He acts – that He is Good. That He loves us with an everlasting, never failing love. He is Kind, Faithful, Merciful, Protective. So while His works aren’t always clear, His character is certain even in the times we cannot see or understand.
It’s by the brook, God takes Elijah deeper into these aspects of His character and so much more before He will say to him, Go to Zarephath where I the LORD have commanded a widow to provide for you
Equipped in that understanding, God tells Elijah to get up and go - to act in accordance with who he is, to do what he’s meant to do.
In making this journey up to Lebanon, I’m certain Elijah is unconcerned about Ahab and his soldiers who have put a price on his head. After all, if God told him he was going to meet a widow in Zarephath, he is going to meet a widow in Zarephath. Of that he is certain.
What he’s not certain about is what was he, a Jew is doing, going into Gentile country? Especially to Zarephath which was the center of Baal worship where idols were made. He understood why Ahab needed to be confronted but his call to go into Gentile country, is entirely different. More than that it was Jezebel’s birthplace, where her father still lived.
But God had already led in the strangest of ways. He had taken his food from creatures God had called an abomination to Him so should he now be surprised he was being told to go to one of the high places of abomination?
Not just to go but to stay just as he stayed by the brook. Only this time he is going into Baal’s furnace, with no shade from the heat and no brook for comfort.
THE JOURNEY
By now the drought has taken a firm hold, people barely hanging on and no doubt many who’ve already died. Most with little hope that things would soon change. One look at the horizon told them that. No clouds. No haze. No distant rumblings. The only thing in view – emaciated people, living emaciated lives. People just trying to survive.
I would guess that when the situation really started taking hold, many strangers came to places like Zarephath on search, looking for any trace of water and vegetation. Not now. Now very few passing on the roads. The uncertainty of food and water had seen to that - word soon getting out that supply was no better here than anywhere else. Now no one came. Better to stay in place with the scarcity you knew rather than wasting energy and resource only to find scarcity everywhere else. At least at home your name would be known by those burying you.
Which is why the sight of Elijah walking by would have been unusual. Unusual he was there – yes but far more unusual because of his appearance. He strong, different than everyone else. Well nourished, full of vitality. The only ones close to anything like this were those who received food from the king’s table. But Elijah’s appearance far exceeded theirs.
THE ACCOMMODATION
When he came to the town gate, a widow was there gathering sticks. He called to her and asked, “Would you bring me a little water in a jar so I may have a drink?” As she was going to get it, he called, “And bring me, please, a piece of bread.”
“As surely as the Lord your God lives,” she replied, “I don’t have any bread—only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil in a jug. I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat it - and die.” 1 Kings 17:10-12
As Elijah’s been told, his food and accommodation needs will be provided for by a widow, but what his mission was is still a mystery. No different than the mystery of a widow looking after his needs but he had learned not to question. If ravens could provide food, a widow could do the same, as unlikely as that was.
We see how unlikely in God’s strong warnings against how widows were viewed and treated.
God says, You shall not abuse any widow or orphan. If you do abuse them, when they cry out to me, I will surely heed their cry, my wrath will burn ... Ex 22:22-23 Cursed is anyone who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow Deut 27:19 .
Jesus warns, Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces .... THEY DEVOUR WIDOWS’ HOUSES .... These men will be punished most severely. Mk 12:38-40
These verses illustrating how widows were abused, treated as less than, their possessions often taken. So the likelihood of a widow having any significant resource was almost impossible. Elijah was even more convinced of the impossible when he met her. A widow who is gathering sticks, preparing for her child and her to eat then die, providing anything made no sense.
But as Elijah was learning again and again, there are many times God doesn’t make sense in any way we think He should.
Elijah said to her, “Don’t be afraid. Go home and do as you have said. But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and your son. :13
Don’t miss the incredible disconnect. A vigorous, physically fit man asking of a skeletal, ready to die woman, Give me some bread. She planning to die. She had little to live for? Though young, tragedy has aged her. A husband, far too young, dead. Her young and likely only child, hours from death. The child no more than a toddler because later we’re told, she holds him in her arms. Given that she’s at the point of death, it only makes sense that she would have no strength to hold a child of any size.
So our picture - the physically fit asking the emotionally dead, first make a small loaf of bread for me.
What an audacious request - Elijah asking her to give all she has. And the one asking only needing to satisfy some small degree of hunger. Appetite not need. Can you imagine her thoughts? 1st the astonishment. Then the, did I hear what I think I just heard? Then the anger. Emotions wanting to erupt but so long dead, there is no fuel left to ignite.
But Elijah’s ask is also paired with a promise, For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘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.’ :14
It’s an invitation actually – an invitation into faith that is only accessed by an action of faith.
She went away and did as Elijah had told her. So there was food every day for Elijah and for the woman and her family. For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry, in keeping with the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah. :13-16.
Actually the trade-off is small. The little she has – to eat then die for the bounty that is ahead – ‘flour that will never be used up and oil that will never run dry’.
That discovery is no different than what God puts before us. Hold on to the things we cling to for value, popularity, success, happiness and it’s not long before we find that what we’re holding gives us nothing. Haggai says, You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it. Haggai 1:6
But we continue hanging on because of what it promises – hoping that it will come through, thinking we are in control, that we can determine the outcome. But we can’t. But still unconvinced, we just increase our efforts, experiment with different things, explore different beliefs. And the outcome, just the same. Discovering what Pascal said, ‘Inside all of us is a God shaped vacuum that only He, through Jesus Christ can fill’.
But in letting go, she found the miraculous. The trade-off of a Baal that could not answer - but in whom everyone around her believed, for the Lord God who in Jesus offers all the answers any of us will ever need. This widow given new life because she believed and accepted the invitation she was offered.
THE MISSION
I wonder how long it took for Elijah to discover what his mission was? No doubt he was thrilled being able to provide for this woman and her son as he had. God doing the amazing, providing her needs bountifully. What a gift to them but surely there had to be more to his mission than just what was happening within the walls of this house. Coming to Zarephath was a long ways to go and a long time to stay just for some home cooked meals. But for what purpose?
As he settled in, waiting to see what was next, Elijah would have watched as she cared for her young child. He would have listened as he heard her stories of sorrow and memories of joy of a young husband who has recently died. Finding out how her life had turned upside down in a moment and what all that meant. Listening to her struggle as she did her best to support herself and care for her child. Her tears because her son had no father to look up to. Hard enough when life was good but unbearably hard when everything changed. Do I know this? I don’t but can you imagine their time together being anything different given what the two of them had been through? Do you think them different than you or I?
The stories told and in those times, Elijah tenderized to the broken and the hurting. Seeing the tears. Hearing the sobs. Feeling the brokenness experienced by those who were running after other gods God. Only to find what? Idols that cannot talk? Beliefs that have nothing to offer?
Lifestyles that don’t deliver what they promise to give? People chasing after wealth, reputation, achievement that only left people wanting more? In this place, Elijah learning that this widow WAS the mission. Elijah STAYING IN THIS PLACE for her.
Sometimes God calling us to do the same, wanting us to see that we’ve been placed in the immediate we now find ourselves. And in that place being fully there – not looking at what may come next but fully present at this time, in this place. Where you currently are. With those friends. At that workplace. In those difficulties. In that home. God’s person. Present. Not rushing off to do but waiting on God, BEING the Jesus others see.
God doing in us and through us what He wants. Not looking to what’s next but waiting on Him
Had Elijah looked past where he was and moved on, looking for the greater, he would have missed the miracle God had sent him to do. Some time later the son of the woman who owned the house became ill. He grew worse and worse, and finally stopped breathing. She said to Elijah, “What do you have against me, man of God? Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?”
“Give me your son,” Elijah replied. He took him from her arms, carried him to the upper room where he was staying, and laid him on his bed. Then he cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, have you brought tragedy even on this widow I am staying with, by causing her son to die?” Then he stretched himself out on the boy three times and cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, let this boy’s life return to him!”
The Lord heard Elijah’s cry, and the boy’s life returned to him, and he lived. Elijah picked up the child and carried him down from the room into the house. He gave him to his mother and said, “Look, your son is alive!”
God sending Elijah to become part of His resurrection story - a resurrection we first see with a son and a ‘resurrection’ in days soon to come in which God will use Elijah to bring a dead nation that’s forsaken God back to life. Look, your son is alive!”
Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God and that the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.” 1 Kings 17:17-24
Have you ever considered that your story is what God wants to use to bring new life to someone He has put you alongside? Your story about a Son that brought resurrection to your life. Your story, not necessarily of the spectacular but of the real, told or written so others may discover Jesus. Your story made available that God will empower to do His miraculous. His promise, You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Acts 1:8.
Don’t believe it? Not with my story. Nothing special about it. But the truth is, in God’s power, there is. Just as God used seemingly, not good for much throwaway twigs and branches to put a widow at just the right place, at just the right time, He wants to use you to do the very same.
What you and I are called to do, is believe and step out in faith. The truth is, there are too many unbelievers among us. Notice I didn’t say, unsaved I said, unbelievers.
Unbelievers, because we don’t truly believe the God we serve, who does, Immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His Power at work within us Eph 3:20. In the little we think we have to offer – His spectacular in our small.
Shortly after it began Dallas Seminary found itself in a financial crisis where it was on the brink of closing its doors. Despite all they had done to make things work, creditors were circling the financially strapped school to foreclose at 12 noon.
On the morning of that day, the founders of the seminary met in the president’s office to pray for God to provide. One of those in attendance, Harry Ironside, prayed in his practical and somewhat unusual way, Lord we know that the cattle on a 1000 hills are your yours. Please sell some and send us the money.
As they were praying, a tall Texan dressed in the stereotypical cowboy boots and Stetson hat, came into the office and said to a secretary, I just sold 2 carloads of cattle in Fort Worth. I’ve been trying to make a business deal go through and it won’t work and I feel God is compelling me to give this money to the seminary. I don’t know if you need it or not but here’s the cheque.
The secretary knowing the critical time they were in, took the cheque in hand and went to the door, interrupting the prayer meeting and timidly knocked. When she finally got a response, Dr Chafer took the cheque, glanced at the cowboy’s signature on the cheque, also seeing that his donation was for the exact amount of the debt.
He then turned to Dr Ironside and said, Harry, God just sold the cattle.
"Praise the Lord! He is good. God's love never fails" Ps 136
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