“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 gives rain on the land.”
– 1 Kings 17:14
Hi James and Ellen,
Are you proactive emissaries for God on planet Earth? How does a kid – or a guy or gal, comport himself or herself as an ambassador for God on planet Earth? What does a kid – or a guy or gal, do as a representative for God on planet Earth? The assignment that God – as God the Father, had for Elijah during Elijah’s vocational tenure on planet Earth – which was 875 B.C. to 848 B.C., was to be His designated itinerant emissary, ambassador and/or representative among His specially chosen guys and gals – the Israelite people group guys and gals. Elijah’s name means ‘the Lord is my God’. The charge that God – as God the Father, had for Elijah during Elijah’s planet Earth duration entailed Elijah being a vigorous oppositional force through words and actions to His specially chosen guys and gals who had discontinued worshipping only Him to adulate instead a false idol god that was dubbed Baal. When Ahab – who had become king over God’s specially chosen guys and gals who were living in the northern kingdom in the land that God gave to His specially chosen guys and gals to always have to live in as their very own land if . . . purposively promoted Baal idolatry, Elijah was instructed by God – as God the Father, to go to Ahab to inform Ahab that for the next few years that there would be no dew and no rain in the land area that he ruled over. God used the drought punishment to be His divine judgment on His specially chosen guys and gals for deliberately disobeying the laws and regulations that He gave them through Moses – when He met with Moses on Mount Sinai, for them to devotedly obey. God also used the famine timeout as a visible way of proving Baal’s utter incompetence and powerlessness to His specially chosen guys and gals. Baal was considered by its worshippers as being the god of fertility and the lord of the rain clouds. After Elijah did what God – as God the Father, specifically charged him to do – which was to pass on to Ahab what was going to take place because . . . God – as God the Father, then told Elijah to head eastward to the Kerith Ravine where he was to hide. God ordered ravens each day to go to Elijah in the morning and in the evening with bread and meat for Elijah to eat. Elijah drank water from the brook that ran through the Kerith Ravine.
When the Kerith Ravine brook dried up for a lack of water from no rain falling, God – as God the Father, told Elijah to head for the town of Zarephath. Zarephath – a Mediterranean Sea coastal town, was located between the cities of Sidon and Tyre. The town of Zarephath was also a worship center for Baal. God divinely prepared Elijah’s stay in the town of Zarephath when he commanded a widow in the town of Zarephath to supply Elijah with food to eat. When Elijah arrived at the town of Zarephath’s gate, God’s appointed widow – who did not have an Israelite people group heritage – which meant that the widow would have been seen as a heathen pagan by God’s specially chosen guys and gals, was outside the gate gathering sticks. After he asked the widow – who your grandpaa thinks that Elijah may have gotten to know at some point during his meanderings throughout the land that God gave to His specially chosen guys and gals to always to have to live in as their very own land if . . . to give him water out of a jug to drink – which the widow did, Elijah asked the widow to give him a piece of bread. The widow told Elijah that she has only enough flour and oil left for just one more meal for her and her kid. Elijah tells the widow in verse 14, “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 gives rain on the land.’”’ The widow took her sticks, went home and fixed Elijah a small cake of bread. It became immediately apparent to the widow that her remaining flour and oil were not going to run out. Probably not long after Elijah arrived in the town of Zarephath and to the home of a widow who lived in the town of Zarephath, the widow’s kid got so sick that he died – leaving the widow believing that her sins led to her kid dying. Elijah took the widow’s kid from her arms, carried the kid to the upper room, stretched himself out on the kid three times and implored God – the LORD, to let the kid’s life be returned to him – which is what happened.
How would you like to live during an epoch when miraculous happenings were commonplace? How would you like to have been Elijah? How would you like to have the responsibility today of confronting God’s specially elected guys, gals and kids who deny that absolute truth exists in the name of Jesus Christ? Your grandpaa believes that inexplicable incidents are more of norm than a Christ-follower guy, gal or kid might think. Your grandmaa and grandpaa have sensed time after time that an invisible presence who has insured their safety. Your grandmaa and grandpaa have not been in a bad car accident, in an airplane crash and/or in a serious train derailment. Even through your grandmaa has had typhoid, hepatitis A, break bone dengue and hip replacement surgery and your grandpaa has had malaria and muscles torn loose from and a bone chipped in his left elbow when he was almost hit by a taxi, your grandmaa and grandpaa today are in good health. Your grandmaa and grandpaa are convinced that it is because of the persistent prayers for them by Christ-follower acquaintances that God has blessed them like He has. What your grandmaa and grandpaa have done as missionaries could only have happened because of God’s divine intervention.
1 Kings 17 (1111)