Incredible Associations
1 Kings 17:10-16
10 So he arose and went to Zarephath, and when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks; and he called to her and said, “Please get me a little water in a jar, that I may drink.” 11 As she was going to get it, he called to her and said, “Please bring me a piece of bread in your hand.” 12 But she said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have no bread, only a handful of flour in the bowl and a little oil in the jar; and behold, I am gathering a few sticks that I may go in and prepare for me and my son, that we may eat it and die.” 13 Then Elijah said to her, “Do not fear; go, do as you have said, but make me a little bread cake from it first and bring it out to me, and afterward you may make one for yourself and for your son. 14 For thus says the Lord God of Israel, ‘The bowl of flour shall not be exhausted, nor shall the jar of oil be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain on the face of the earth.’” 15 So she went and did according to the word of Elijah, and she and he and her household ate for many days. 16 The bowl of flour was not exhausted nor did the jar of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord which He spoke through Elijah.
Elijah had walked into a situation that was, from all human perspective, impossible. But the good news is that he saw beyond the difficulty. He handled the problem with faith, not fear.
Elijah was determined that those initial first-impression blues were not going to get him down. The widow had her eyes on the impossibilities: a handful of flour, a tiny amount of oil, a few sticks. Elijah rolled up his sleeves and focused only on the possibilities.
How could he do that? Because he was an emerging man of God.
He had been to Cherith. He had seen the proof of God’s faithfulness. He had survived the dried-up brook. He had obeyed God, and, without hesitation, he had walked to Zarephath.
You can’t talk the talk if you’ve never walked the walk. You can’t encourage somebody else to believe the improbable if you haven’t believed the impossible. You can’t light another’s candle of hope if your own torch of faith isn’t burning.
When Elijah saw the near-empty flour bin and oil jug, he said, almost with a shrug, “That’s no problem for God. Get in there and fix those biscuits. And fix some for you and your son too.” Then he told her why. Listen to these confident words of faith: “The bowl of flour shall not be exhausted, nor shall the jar of oil be empty, until the day that the LORD sends rain on the face of the earth.”
What a promise! That woman must have looked at Elijah, this tired, dusty stranger, with wonder and bewilderment, as she heard words like she’d never heard before.
Have you ever spent time in the presence of a person of faith? Ever rubbed shoulders with men and women of God who don’t have the word “impossible” in their vocabulary? If not, locate a few strong-hearted souls. You need them in your life. These are the kind of incredible associations God uses to build up our faith!
Is your faith slumping? Locate a strong-hearted friend to help build up your faith.
— Charles R. Swindoll
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