DIVINE PROVISION
I was impressed by this expression that the Spirit of God uses, that Elijah “went in the strength of that food forty days”. It is a wonderful thing to think of God’s provision, even in the face of such difficult conditions – you might say evil in its fullest combined expression in Jezebel and Ahab. Yet in the face of that, God provided food, and Elijah went in the strength of it forty days. He had been involved in exposing what was against God, what was counterfeit in the prophets of Baal. Through the word of Elijah, the jealously of God had been expressed in His anger against this counterfeit. These are very negative circumstances, but they help us to see that as we depend on God, and have an understanding of divine truth, power from heaven is available to us, no matter what may be against us. The word is “If God be for us, who against us?”, Rom.8:31. These are great and encouraging words.
Sadly, Elijah became discouraged and self-occupied. Each of us is prone to these things; we may begin to look around rather than draw our resources from heaven. It is like the time when Peter walked on the water; he had said “Lord, if it be thou, command me to come to thee”, Matt.14:28. The Lord told him to come, and he obeyed. But then it says of Peter “seeing the wind strong”. It was a power similar to this power which was against Elijah, expressing itself in the wind and the waves. Peter began to sink, but he cried “Lord, save me”. I take great courage from the simplicity and yet the reality of the experiences through which the Lord passes us. There is nothing that the eye of heaven misses, nothing happens by accident or by chance. But Elijah was discouraged; he left his servant and went on alone. We need to be careful about this, because there may be a tendency to become independent; we may say, ‘What is the use, we will go on alone’. Elijah went to the broom bush, and rested there, he fell asleep, but God had His eye upon him. It is rather like Jacob. Elijah did not wrestle with God as Jacob did, but nevertheless he was under the eye of heaven. There is something being taken account of by heaven of the reality of the work of God in persons, something which heaven will protect, which God will provide for and sustain in the face of difficult conditions.
So the angel of God came and woke him, and told him to arise and eat. I was thinking of Paul, when he said “Ye ought, O men, to have hearkened to me” (Acts 27:21), then he encouraged them to take food, “for this has to do with your safety” (v.34). Let us feed on the true food with which God has provided us, which is Christ. There was at Elijah’s head a cake baked on hot stones, and a flask of water. He woke up and fed himself, but then he lay down again. It is easy to become lethargic, to drift into a situation where we might think that we will just have a little here, and a little there. But the angel of God comes back, and says the same thing, “Arise, eat!”. It is heavenly food, producing spiritual capacity and providing spiritual power to journey. “Arise, eat; for the journey is too great for thee”. Heaven knows what we are going through, and what is before us. Why do these difficult circumstances arise? I believe that God allows them to test His own work in us. He knows how easily we turn aside, and He means it to be personal. Barzillai was one who had cared for David, but there came a point when David was crossing over the Jordan, and he wanted Barzillai to go with him (2 Sam.19:33), but he would not go. We sometimes speak about the young brethren, but some of us are older now, and we need to be careful. We need to be sure that our links with divine Persons and with one another are solid. The enemy will do what he can to disrupt, to bring in disagreement and distance, and to bring in doubt in our minds. The tendency might be to say ‘Let me be, I am happy enough in these circumstances’. But the angel said to Elijah that the journey was too great for him, and “he arose, and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights”. God sustained him.
We need to take courage. I am not saying that the brethren are discouraged, but we know what is in our own hearts. We might wonder how things will turn out, but God provides us with the resources to continue. It says “the journey is too great for thee”; the angel knew what was before Elijah, so he provided the cake of bread and the flask of water – beautiful allusions to something of Christ and something of the Spirit. Divine provision is sufficient to see us through. After the Lord went up into heaven, what was constitutional in the disciples was preserved. The Lord had His eye on these persons, in the same way that He has His eye on you and me, on persons who love Him and are prepared to remain faithful to Him. The work of God is something about which divine Persons are very jealous, and which They will sustain and strengthen and encourage if we remain faithful.
There was much that had to be learned by Elijah. It is as though he said to the angel, ‘I am disappointed because I am on my own. I have done all this for God, I have stood for God when things were difficult’. But then God gave him a taste of divine power. God was not in the whirlwind, He was not in the earthquake, He was not in the fire. God was in the soft gentle voice. It is a beautiful thing to experience the Spirit of Christ helping us through the difficulties which may come before us, which may seem insurmountable. Then God said “Yet I have left myself seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth that hath not kissed him”. It is a wonderful thing to prove that God has secret resources. Mr Darby wrote of these expressions of divine support:-
‘Garments fresh and foot unweary
Tell how God hath brought thee through’. (Hymn 76)
God told Elijah that He still had seven thousand persons that had not bowed the knee. We may think that we shall have to go on alone, but Paul tells Timothy to pursue, “with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart”, 2 Tim.2:22. Such persons are divine provision for us and we can be bound together, we can walk together. If we are feeding on Christ, if we are trusting, if we are dependent, God will see us through. May we be encouraged for His name’s sake.
Word in meeting for ministry, Kirkcaldy
19 August 2014
G.A. Coull