(1 Kings 17.) notes of an address by B. C. G.

Elijah was of the inhabitants of Gilead ("the heap of witness"), a city noted for wickedness, and thus a solitary witness he stood for God and rebuked the throne on which sat one of the most wicked of Israel's kings (1 Kings 16:33).

He had the strength to do this because the Lord had commanded him. And it is necessary to be thus dependent on the word of the Lord if we do His will. After speaking to others and exhorting them to obey the word of the Lord only, the preacher is (and ought to be) exercised himself. The Lord takes him aside and asks:Are you dependent on Me as you have been telling others to be? Do you believe I will supply all your need? Are you troubled in, these trials, or do you cast all on Me? So the Lord speaks to the speaker.

After Elijah's public testimony the word of the Lord sets his face "eastward to hide, himself by the brook Cherith which is before Jordan." And the Lord promised to sustain him by extraordinary means – by impossible means, as we should say-for the brook was fed by rainfall which had been stopped as Ahab's punishment, and the ravens were the most unlikely birds to bring him food. Some commentators have tried to explain that these ravens were a tribe of Arabs, both words coming from the same root word, meaning "to bear." The word of God says "ravens," however, and it is they who are meant, because God takes up the most unlikely things-"things which are not"-to accomplish His purposes. Ravens have not enough for themselves-witness our word, ravenous-and so were fit objects by which He might show His power. They are specially spoken of as crying for meat in Job 38:41; Psalm 147:9.

But the Lord had sent Elijah to dwell by the brook Cherith which is before Jordan. Here is a test of faith for him; by the brook Cherith-separation, alone-which daily grew smaller, and in view of the Jordan, and yet he must stay here and must not go there because it was the word of the Lord. Do you realize what it means to us? Just to stay where the Lord would have us, in separation from all, alone, beside a brook which must dry up, for its sources have been cut off, the necessary of life which must fail, in full view of the Jordan which speaks of judgment. Have we a brook on which we depend? It must dry up and fail, but the Lord who placed us there knows this, and will make provision when it does. Are we content to be thus waiting for "the word of the Lord" when it looks foolish to stay?

When the brook does dry up the Lord puts Elijah's faith to further testing, and sends him to Zarephath, "the place of refining of metals," and a city of the Gentiles, to a widow woman, who, as we should think, has not enough for herself. Indeed when Elijah asks her for food her need is revealed; she says she has only "a handful of meal in a barrel and a little oil in a cruse" and is about to prepare her last meal and die. But Elijah says:"Make me thereof a little cake first and bring it unto me… for thus saith the Lord God of Israel, The barrel of meal shall not waste neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain."

The widow does this; she has faith to provide for God's representative first, and her own needs are satisfied, not only for the present but for the immediate future also. Notice that she speaks of "an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse," but "Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, The barrel of meal.. .the cruse of oil." Do we put the Lord's interests first like this widow? Do we? Then He will look after our interests.

Read Haggai 1:6-9; Malachi 3:10; Matt. 6:33. "Seek ye first."

A little boy once said to his mother when things were at a low ebb:"Oh, mother, I do believe God waits till He hears the scraping of the bottom of the barrel." But He hears. All-sufficiency and all possibility are with Him. May we just trust, and make use of faith's keys, and, "The barrel of meal shall not waste and the cruse of oil shall not fail."