HOW GOD CARES FOR THE NEEDS OF HIS SERVANTS
[p. 429] HOW GOD CARES FOR THE NEEDS OF HIS SERVANTS
1 Kings 17:1 - 16; 1 Kings 19:1 - 9
These passages speak of the food provided for Elijah on different occasions, the various ways by which it was secured for the prophet, as well as the instrumentalities employed by God — first a brook, then ravens, next a widow woman, and finally an angel. The subject is rich in instruction, and the brethren will no doubt be turned to the Lord that the truth contained in these passages may be developed with profit.
Elijah is not to be regarded only as a prophet; he is also a man of God, and, by extension, he represents the testimony. He appears suddenly, no mention being made of his forefathers or of his genealogy, but speaking at once in power, saying to king Ahab: “As Jehovah the God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, except by my word”. These were not mere words; these utterances were marked by moral authority, as coming from a man who had a history with God, if not with men. He is alone as he faces the monarch, and, what is more serious still, in confronting Jezebel. What exposure! The enemy would seize every opportunity of attacking him. And so, dear brethren, if any one of us in his measure, or all of us, represent God, we are correspondingly the objects of the attacks of the wicked one. Hence, Jehovah comes in at once; His words concern the prophet himself, his maintenance. Thus, as in the divine service, we must understand that God has spoken as to us, and He will speak about us to others, but He will speak to us also about ourselves, for we must know ourselves, and above all we must know that God cares for us, as we are told: “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:7). This applies to the most honoured servant as much as to the weakest saint; God cares for all, but in a special way for those in the forefront of God’s service.
The first word addressed to Elijah is: “Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward”. The question of locality comes in at once. Where shall I go? Am I to choose my locality, or is it to be divinely appointed? Obviously the latter. And then, am I to make a show of myself, to be known as specially sent by God and an object of His special care? Am I to be occupied with my greatness? Am I to occupy others with it? No: “Hide thyself by the brook Cherith”; that is to be a provision. I am not to assert my right to the torrent. It is not mine only; it is for others also. But I am to understand that all that God has given is to be accepted with thankfulness by those who believe and who know the truth. Elijah is also told: “Thou shalt drink of the brook”. There is no question about it. “Let God be true, but every man a liar” (Romans 3:4). Let there be no legalism about it; “Thou shalt drink of the brook”. And again: “I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there”. A brook has been created by God; it is just water which flows by ordinary gravitation. But the raven was a living creature, an unclean creature, we say. But he was worthy to be taken by Noah into the ark. He did not behave well when he was set free by Noah, but he does here. Thus, dear brethren, we must look at things as God presents them to us, and not pretend that we know more than He does. He said: “I have commanded the ravens” — not just one — “to feed thee there”, that is, in the place divinely appointed, not just anywhere. The prophet is not only the object of the care of God, but of His discipline. So that whatever his previous predilections or feelings, all that concerned him was determined by God.
[p. 431] This is a most important lesson. Is it only for Elijah? No, it is for us. “Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning” (Romans 15:4). I have to learn that God is sovereign. He is sovereign in the universe and He must be sovereign in my circumstances. It is told us in verse 5: “He went and did according unto the word of the Lord: for he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith, that is before Jordan”. There is no question as to the place; it is just what God had said; at the end of verse 3 it is said: “that is before Jordan”. Let us learn, if we have not learned, to bring God into our circumstances and let Him be dominant in them. If we are to enter into what His love has so abundantly prepared for us, we must not depart from this principle. Everything here proceeds as divinely indicated: “The ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening; and he drank of the brook”. There is no modification of the circumstances to gratify nature, no human companionship; but it is the learning time, and he has divine companionship, as in the case of John the baptist in a later day. The Lord calls attention to him with peculiar pleasure: “What went ye out into the wilderness for to see?” (Luke 7:24). John corresponds with Elijah as we see him in these verses; he “was in the deserts till the day of his shewing unto Israel” (Luke 1:80).
Then we are told that “the brook dried up, because there had been no rain in the land”. This shows that God had not made the brook for Elijah. No doubt it had dried up many times before. There is no miracle accomplished here. The servant and saint must learn to accept the divine provision as it is, and he has to learn deprivation. It is part of the divine instruction. God gives us to understand that we are dependent upon Him for everything. The apostle Paul had learnt not only how to abound [p. 432] but also to suffer need, but he had also learnt, as he says, to be content with his circumstances whatever they were. Thus a saint is made suitable to God, and a servant becomes a man of God.
Nothing more is said about the ravens; it is not said that they ceased to serve the prophet. Elijah goes away when the brook has dried up. But he is going to be promoted; he is going to be found in better circumstances; he is going to have human companionship, he is going to have cakes, prepared, may we say, by a sister, for this widow belonged to God. His circumstances are going to be changed; he will not only be with God now, but with the saints. Perhaps this peculiar training in isolation is teaching us to appreciate the company of the saints.
The widow of Sarepta had not much, but she was a sister, may we say, and she had a house, and a son, and a little meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse; although this was but little, it was of value; it was a provision. There were great possibilities in these vessels and in the little that they contained; but think of the possibilities in this sister! What will be the result? What will there be for God? I think there is here, dear brethren, a most remarkable lesson for us all — to know how to value the company of the saints. Do not enquire as to their bank accounts, their businesses, or their natural connections. They are directly under divine command. Think of the greatness of a handful of saints under the command of God! Think what it is morally, the grandeur of it! God has the rivers under His hand, the clouds, all the birds, and all the animals; “the cattle upon a thousand hills” (Psalm 50:10) are His. But He has a company of saints in a town under His control; it is a matter of moral and dispensational importance. And what did He bid this woman do? If I have a house and the opportunity of receiving the saints, has God nothing to say to me on this subject? He [p. 433] will give me a commandment. He says: “I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee”. And she was to sustain him there. God had this woman in the city of Sarepta. There were many cities in the world then without a woman like this. There are many cities in this country where there is no company of saints that God can command, and it is the same in all countries. But think of a company of saints in a city like this that God can command. Are we at His disposal? We could not exactly say that this widow was ready for the service which opened up to her. She would not have said to Elijah that Jehovah had commanded her to sustain him; indeed her remarks suggest otherwise. But the prophet knew who it was; he knew long before she did. Her thought was to die when she had eaten the little she had, a most inconsistent frame of mind. If we examine ourselves, dear brethren, we often find this kind of inconsistency in our thoughts.
When the prophet reached the city he did not need to enquire where the woman was; it seems that she was the first person he met. He said to her: “Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water in a vessel that I may drink”. It is no longer a brook, but a vessel brought to the prophet by the hand of a woman. When we take our place among the saints under divine command, we come into the sphere of vessels. The thought of vessels is extremely interesting; it is certainly a predominant thought in this passage. If this woman had not had this thought of vessels previously — and it does not seem that she had — she received this instruction now. As soon as a young christian comes to this in his own mind, he begins to ask himself about his public appearance. Is he conformed to this world? Is he a pure vessel? Is he a vessel to honour, ready for the Master’s use? Evidently this woman had some feeble idea of the [p. 434] thing, and God was going to show her what use He could make of the vessels. We may ask ourselves: What do I possess that is worthy to be put into a vessel? This woman discovers that she has more than she thought she had. If I come into the understanding of command, I shall see that God brings about His commands. I say: “Here am I”. God will look after the use of the vessel if the vessel is under His command. Scripture says very clearly that our bodies belong to the Lord, and we should possess them “in sanctification and honour” (1 Thessalonians 4:4). If they are ready for the Master’s use, He will use them. Their contents depend upon the divine will.
If we realise this instruction, there will be no lack in our localities. The true difficulty lies in the state of the vessels. God has infinite resources, but He desires to make use of human vessels, and in the measure in which they are available He will use them. Thus the vessels, the barrel and the cruse, were used; they were not empty for a whole year and yet the whole household lived on their contents. Where did the meal and oil come from? They were as much under divine command as was the woman. Thus we see from this passage the answer to our local needs. It is a question of the state of the vessels — are we possessing them as vessels to honour, that is to say, sanctified?
I have spoken of the fellowship, and we see how in a locality, if we are under divine command, instruction will lead to the assembly, to an understanding of the assembly. The prophet said to the widow, “Make me ... a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and for thy son”. Thus as we are under command, the next thing is demand. “Make me a little cake first” — this is a new lesson. It may seem unreasonable, but divine commands are always reasonable. We have to learn through them. The question arises here of what is [p. 435] going to happen during a long period to come; “The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth”. So we see how divine demand following divine command leads to improved conditions spiritually. Provision is made for my needs, and I know it, until the famine is over. “She went and did according to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days. And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake by Elijah”.
In this second divine provision for Elijah we have a remarkable combination of circumstances and line of teaching. It is a question of fellowship. We are brought into the fellowship of God’s Son, which is for all the saints; we are together in this fellowship, and in this fellowship we receive the light of the assembly; this is suggested typically here in the “little cake”. It is the thought of a whole. It gives the thought of sustenance, in the cake, but typically it has the sense of the Lord’s words in connection with His supper: “Take, eat: this is my body”. Elijah and the woman — the mistress of the house, as she is later called — and her son, can be in fellowship together. There is here an appeal to young people who are not yet in the fellowship of God’s Son. It is worthy of your consideration. It is the place of divine command, for our will is not suffered there; but it is also a place of divine demands, and the demands bring out the thought of the assembly. Why should God not bring to light a hidden thought? It is in the fellowship that we find the hidden thoughts. We shall never possess these hidden thoughts until we come where they are to be found. In the assembly “are hid all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge” (Colossians 2:3). Can you rest where these things are not known? In the fellowship of God’s Son nothing is lacking. Think of the richness, the dignity, and the glory which belong to such a fellowship!
Let us consider for a moment the third kind of food provided for Elijah, as we see in chapter 19. We need human companionship; but the prophet Elijah, according to verse 3, left even his servant and went away alone. None of us can remain indefinitely alone in this world. We need the fellowship of the saints; that is why the Lord added to the church such as should be saved (Acts 2:47). But here, alas, Elijah, the great prophet, has left all this and gone away by himself into the desert. He had not been told to do it; it was his own movement; he goes at his own charges. He sits down under a juniper tree, and requests for himself that he may die. What sad language and what a sad position is Elijah’s here! So is that of everyone, young or old, who chooses to leave the fellowship. If one does it because he is worldly, he will seek and find his companionship among the ungodly, sacrificing what is of true worth; if he is in measure true, moved by fear like Elijah here, he is alone, without strength and without divine sustenance. He seems to have lost all sense of the need of companionship; he had even left his servant at Beer-sheba. He undertook a long journey without any human companionship. He had no right to count on divine companionship for this journey, but he cannot dispose of it; thank God he could not leave it at Beer-sheba! But see what a descent since Sarepta! We find him like Hagar, in the desert of Beer-sheba; she too had wandered there, driven out of Abraham’s house. Elijah is seated under the juniper tree; Hagar had thrown down her son under a tree of the same kind, that is to say she had cast her responsibility to the wind. One who does that is of no use morally. The assembly is composed of those who accept responsibility.
The angel said to Hagar: “Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand” (Genesis 21:18), as if to say: You are responsible for this lad. So it is with Elijah; see what a service had been committed to him, but he had abandoned it. Think of that — a man abandoning such a service as his! It may be that there are those here who have not accepted the responsibility of the little gathering in this city, failing to be found at the prayer meeting, for example, failing to take their part in that which concerns the testimony of God. Well, this is just what Elijah does here. He goes to Horeb to escape his mission.
God would show us that even in such circumstances He does not abandon us. To the Corinthians, who were refractory christians, the apostle three times repeats, “God is faithful” (1 Corinthians 1:9; 1 Corinthians 10:13; 2 Corinthians 1:18). Elijah proves it here. Like the widow of Sarepta, he would go away and die. How poor that is! But God said, I am going to preserve thy life. Indeed He had in mind to use him further. It is said, “An angel touched him”; this would suggest distance, but nevertheless care. Here also it is a question of a cake. Is not this a touching reminder, recalling to Elijah that he had spoken of a little cake before? It is as if God would say, I have not forgotten the cake. God had the idea from all eternity. He has hidden it through the ages, but He has never given it up. Nor has He given up what concerns this city. If any here is wandering, He would say to you, I have not given up My thoughts concerning you; you are essential to My greatest thoughts. It is thus that in the account of Elijah in the desert we find the cake again. Who had made it? Who had baked it? The angel touched him and said to him, “Arise and eat”; and the cake “baked on the coals” and the cruse of water were at his pillow. Elijah is recalled to the kind of care he had had at Sarepta. Instead of a cake prepared by the hand of a sister, it is now simply a cake “baked on the coals”; but nevertheless it is a cake and the angel said, “Arise and eat”. God would thus say to him, You are giving up, Elijah, but I am not; I have not given up My thoughts; you are essential to them and I want to remind you — I still need you. And the prophet ate and drank, then he laid him down again. Then we see that he woke a second time; the angel came again and touched him, and again he said to him: “Arise and eat”. But nothing more is said about the cake. Instruction regarding this has been given to him once; now it concerns the journey that Elijah had undertaken and of the sustenance that was required by him in order to make it. God allowed him to take this way, and furnished him with all that was needed for the journey. God proposed to meet him at the end of it, and this is what He did, as the chapter shows. He gave His servant a task to accomplish; He told him to anoint three men: Hazael, Jehu and Elisha, who should fulfil the required service. It concerned judgment, but Elisha was first anointed, and his name signifies ‘Whose salvation is God’. Grace intervenes before judgment was executed.
Thus we learn that, although God moves in grace and patience towards His servants, the result in them should be the effecting of His will.