18.Mar.2009 Living in Zarephath…

1 Kings 17:1-16

Now Elijah, who was from Tishbe in Gilead, told King Ahab, “As surely as the Lord, the God of Israel, lives—the God I serve—there will be no dew or rain during the next few years until I give the word!” Then the Lord said to Elijah, “Go to the east and hide by the Brook Kerith, near where it enters the Jordan River. Drink from the brook and eat what the ravens bring you, for I have commanded them to bring you food.” So Elijah did as the Lord told him and camped beside the Brook Kerith, east of the Jordan. The ravens brought him bread and meat each morning and evening, and he drank from the brook. But after a while the brook dried up, for there was no rainfall anywhere in the land. Then the Lord said to Elijah, “Go and live in the village of Zarephath, near the city of Sidon. I have instructed a widow there to feed you.” So he went to Zarephath. As he arrived at the gates of the village, he saw a widow gathering sticks, and he asked her, “Would you please bring me a little water in a cup?” As she was going to get it, he called to her, “And bring me a bite of bread, too.” But she said, “I swear by the Lord your God that I don’t have a single piece of bread in the house. And I have only a handful of flour left in the jar and a little cooking oil in the bottom of the jug. I was just gathering a few sticks to cook this last meal, and then my son and I will die.” But Elijah said to her, “Don’t be afraid! Go ahead and do just what you’ve said, but make a little bread for me first. Then use what’s left to prepare a meal for yourself and your son. For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: There will always be flour and olive oil left in your containers until the time when the Lord sends rain and the crops grow again!” So she did as Elijah said, and she and Elijah and her son continued to eat for many days. There was always enough flour and olive oil left in the containers, just as the Lord had promised through Elijah.

For months now we’ve been bringing truth out of God’s word in regards to our current economic situation. This revelation I have collectively come to refer to as living in the “God Economy.” To provide a brief overview, it is my contention that if one looks to the world’s economy as their source of security they will continue to rise with the tides and sink with the ebbs of what’s going on out there: bulls and bears and such. Conversely, one can plug into the God Economy and find peace in the stability and ever upward progression that only our Maker can provide. God, after all, is not a bull. And God is not a bear. It’s almost counter-intuitive to think in this manner, however. It takes a considerable effort, an overhaul of our psyche. We have become a society, you’ll find, that craves empirical evidence—facts and data and proofs. We require something tangible and measurable if we are to endorse it. The problem with this sort of rationale, however, is that it negates the exertion of one’s faith, that problematic practice which provides no such empirical certainty. And yet faith is precisely what God wants us to develop and perfect. For without this unique brand of what Brennan Manning has called “ruthless trust,” we are unable to fully enter into the mysterious relationship that our Creator so desires.

So, Building upon the God Economy mindset, let us look to the story of Elijah and his stay in the village of Zarephath. As we pick up in the opening verses of 1 Kings 17, the prophet Elijah has just declared to the evil king, Ahab, that there would be no rainfall in Israel until he, Elijah, said so. He then fled to the Brook Kerith, as God had commanded him, because it would be there that he would find his provision.

It is interesting that the source of the provision God provides is part natural, the brook, and part supernatural, the ravens bringing him bread. And it is similarly so in your life: there are seasons when your needs are met by natural means—when the economy is swelling, when that promotion comes, etc.—and there are seasons where God provides supernaturally—an answered prayer, a healed disease, or a reconciliation that you didn’t think possible. These are awesome times, to be sure. But then, for whatever reason, things change. The economy tanks. The drought comes. The brook dries up. This can be a period when a Christian’s faith falters and where, ultimately, one must ask himself, “Am I going to continue following Jesus? Am I going to continue looking to God as my source in spite of my circumstances?”

The Brook Kerith dries up and God asks Elijah to go to Zarephath, a Phanesian town near the border of Israel, a Canaanite village. God has promised him this time that he would find his provision through a widow. Fair enough. When Elijah turns up, however, he discovers that she hasn’t anything for herself—that she is, in fact, about to cook her last meal, lay down with her son, and die. This is not the provision perhaps that Elijah had expected. And yet he trusts. Why? Because God told him that this was the plan. And because God had proven to Elijah that He was his unwavering source, largely through former miracles, Elijah obeys. He doesn’t squirm. He doesn’t back out. He obeys.

It is interesting to note that the word “Zarephath” in Hebrew translates to “refinery.” Elijah, in other words, was moving from a place of plenty to a place of refinement. He would no doubt prefer the situation from whence he had come, the period of miraculous provision, and certainly is Zarephath an uncomfortable place in which to reside for all of us. But just as Elijah did, we must all learn to live with a lack. To trust more ruthlessly. In the end, Elijah lives in Zarephath, in refinement, for three years. And this period of time, if you think ahead, eventually enables him to enact one of the greatest miracles of the Old Testament, the delivery of Israel from the prophets of Baal in chapter 18. These years in Zarephath, then, allows Elijah to deliver a nation, which begs the question: What might your period(s) of refinement be preparing you to accomplish?

If you take nothing away from this lesson, please take this. We in America are living in Zarephath right now. And we need to sit tight and allow ourselves to be refined. We needn’t escape this season. We mustn’t squirm. We shouldn’t extract our trust from God’s hands and place it back in the feeble and inconstant things of the world, for doing so prevents God from working on us properly and in good time. Ultimately, our Zarephath moments (or days, or years) present us the choice to either place our faith in a system that works some of the time but not all of the time—and when the world doesn’t work, it really doesn’t work—or to store it in something that is Constancy, is Stability, is, then, the author and perfecter of our faith.