The Forging of Faith
“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.’"—1 Kings 17:8-9
God’s wilderness school has many levels and many different participants. We must first learn to let God purify and hone us for His use in our private lives, but then we must gradually take the steps of obedience that reveal publicly what He has already done privately. Consider God’s directive to Elijah, “Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there” (v. 8). Zarephath was in the region of Sidon, the home of the wicked Queen Jezebel, under the rule of her father, the equally wicked King Ethbaal. King Ethbaal was a devotee and zealous propagator of Baalism, a perverse Canaanite fertility cult based on the storm and fertility god Baal, that required its followers to engage in a litany of sexual deviancy. King Ethbaal successfully raised his daughter in its perverse teaching and she became a zealous missionary for Baalism to Israel through her political marriage to King Ahab. Jezebel developed a site at Jezreel, Israel’s summer capitol, and supported its 450 priests out of her own purse.
In the midst of a drought, God directed Elijah to the port city of Zarephath in Jezebel’s home country of Sidon, to the home of a widow and her son. It was believed that the gods were localized, ruling over specific areas of land. And Sidon was considered by many to be beyond the grasp of the God of Israel. Not to mention that those living in Sidon were Gentiles and thought to be outside of God’s covenant community. The drought wasn’t just in Israel, either, but spread across the entire region, engulfing Sidon just as much as Israel.
Elijah arrived at the gates of the city not knowing who the woman was, what she looked like, or what she would be doing. He found her gathering sticks and asked her for a drink of water (v. 10). Despite the scarcity of water, she went to get it nevertheless. On her way to get the drink, he made a second request for a morsel of bread. She replied, “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 it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die."
The drought was so bad that food became scarce, starvation was imminent, and this widow resigned herself and her son to death. Elijah responded,
“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'"—1 Kings 18:13-14.
God was forging the faith of Elijah and the widow. For Elijah it was a challenge to go to Sidon to a pagan widow’s home and wait for God’s provision outside the land of Israel (see Luke 4:25-26), and for the woman it was a challenge to take care of the prophet before she took care of herself and her son. But both were encouraged and strengthened as, day after day, the flour and oil kept them fed as the drought intensified around them.
There are several things that we can draw from Elijah’s interaction with the widow at Zarephath. The first is that God is bigger than we are, and He sends us to people outside of our normal areas of influence. For Elijah, going to Sidon meant going to the heart of Baal worship. And not only that, but for God to direct him to a widow for sustenance meant going to the poorest of the poor. Nevertheless, God wanted to expand Elijah’s window to the world as he saw the widow come to faith in the one true God (1 Kings 18:24). Furthermore, he was able to see God’s power in operation in a land outside his own, among a people not his own. God wasn’t localized to a particular place or people, but He was graciously working on behalf of the Gentiles just as He was for the Israelites.
And for the widow, she learned what it means to trust in the Word of the Lord and make the Lord a priority before everything else. All too often we allow crises to override our faith in Christ, but it is exactly in the midst of crisis that our faith is most finely forged. We are able to see God at work in profound and dynamic ways that we would otherwise not see, and because of this woman’s faith and trust in Elijah’s word she was able to witness a great miracle as God sustained her, her son, and Elijah.
What about us? How is God challenging us to expand our window to the world? Are there some that you believe may be outside the realm of God’s grace or blessing? Who does God want to reach through you? Is God asking you to place Himself as the “first priority” in your life, just as He did the widow’s? It is only when we obey the Lord and do what He has called us to do that we are able to see that His plan and purpose are bigger than ours. And it is only when we place Him first in our hearts that we are able to see His hand at work. May God give us the faith to see His hand at work in the world, and to take the steps of radical obedience, so that He might receive glory and we might receive joy in Him. Amen.
God’s wilderness school has many levels and many different participants. We must first learn to let God purify and hone us for His use in our private lives, but then we must gradually take the steps of obedience that reveal publicly what He has already done privately. Consider God’s directive to Elijah, “Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there” (v. 8). Zarephath was in the region of Sidon, the home of the wicked Queen Jezebel, under the rule of her father, the equally wicked King Ethbaal. King Ethbaal was a devotee and zealous propagator of Baalism, a perverse Canaanite fertility cult based on the storm and fertility god Baal, that required its followers to engage in a litany of sexual deviancy. King Ethbaal successfully raised his daughter in its perverse teaching and she became a zealous missionary for Baalism to Israel through her political marriage to King Ahab. Jezebel developed a site at Jezreel, Israel’s summer capitol, and supported its 450 priests out of her own purse.
In the midst of a drought, God directed Elijah to the port city of Zarephath in Jezebel’s home country of Sidon, to the home of a widow and her son. It was believed that the gods were localized, ruling over specific areas of land. And Sidon was considered by many to be beyond the grasp of the God of Israel. Not to mention that those living in Sidon were Gentiles and thought to be outside of God’s covenant community. The drought wasn’t just in Israel, either, but spread across the entire region, engulfing Sidon just as much as Israel.
Elijah arrived at the gates of the city not knowing who the woman was, what she looked like, or what she would be doing. He found her gathering sticks and asked her for a drink of water (v. 10). Despite the scarcity of water, she went to get it nevertheless. On her way to get the drink, he made a second request for a morsel of bread. She replied, “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 it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die."
The drought was so bad that food became scarce, starvation was imminent, and this widow resigned herself and her son to death. Elijah responded,
“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'"—1 Kings 18:13-14.
God was forging the faith of Elijah and the widow. For Elijah it was a challenge to go to Sidon to a pagan widow’s home and wait for God’s provision outside the land of Israel (see Luke 4:25-26), and for the woman it was a challenge to take care of the prophet before she took care of herself and her son. But both were encouraged and strengthened as, day after day, the flour and oil kept them fed as the drought intensified around them.
There are several things that we can draw from Elijah’s interaction with the widow at Zarephath. The first is that God is bigger than we are, and He sends us to people outside of our normal areas of influence. For Elijah, going to Sidon meant going to the heart of Baal worship. And not only that, but for God to direct him to a widow for sustenance meant going to the poorest of the poor. Nevertheless, God wanted to expand Elijah’s window to the world as he saw the widow come to faith in the one true God (1 Kings 18:24). Furthermore, he was able to see God’s power in operation in a land outside his own, among a people not his own. God wasn’t localized to a particular place or people, but He was graciously working on behalf of the Gentiles just as He was for the Israelites.
And for the widow, she learned what it means to trust in the Word of the Lord and make the Lord a priority before everything else. All too often we allow crises to override our faith in Christ, but it is exactly in the midst of crisis that our faith is most finely forged. We are able to see God at work in profound and dynamic ways that we would otherwise not see, and because of this woman’s faith and trust in Elijah’s word she was able to witness a great miracle as God sustained her, her son, and Elijah.
What about us? How is God challenging us to expand our window to the world? Are there some that you believe may be outside the realm of God’s grace or blessing? Who does God want to reach through you? Is God asking you to place Himself as the “first priority” in your life, just as He did the widow’s? It is only when we obey the Lord and do what He has called us to do that we are able to see that His plan and purpose are bigger than ours. And it is only when we place Him first in our hearts that we are able to see His hand at work. May God give us the faith to see His hand at work in the world, and to take the steps of radical obedience, so that He might receive glory and we might receive joy in Him. Amen.
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