“… there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath.” – Luke 4:25-26 

Scripture reading: 1 Kings 17:7-16

These words of Jesus highlight the point of our passage in 1 Kings. Its purpose is not just to show us that apart from heeding the Word of God there is want, nor that wherever the Word of God is, there is blessing, but that these blessings can only be enjoyed by faith. Thus, while God reveals His wrath upon Israel, He reveals His covenant of grace to a pagan, but believing, widow. She is poor; she didn’t even have fuel for a fire! She and her young son have just enough food for one meal, before they die. And all they have is exactly what Elijah asks of her, promising that according to God’s Word, she will be supplied.

In the covenant of grace, God asks for everything! All we have and are. Like this widow, we either entrust everything to the Lord, receive back 100 fold, and with it eternal life, or we hang on to what little we have, die soon after, and lose everything. As the martyr missionary Steve Elliot said, “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” Thus, in the midst of famine, this widow and her son were miraculously supplied.

Eternal life and the blessings of a covenant relationship with the Lord are not assured by anything but by exercising faith in the Word of the Lord. For as Jesus says, “Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, whoever believes in me will never thirst” (John 6:35). 

Suggestions for prayer

Pray that regardless of your circumstances, you may by faith, commit your life and future into the hands of our faithful Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Rev. Barry Beukema is a graduate of Calvin College and Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia. He has pastored the Christian Reformed Churches in Burdett, Alberta and Smithers, British Columbia. He then pastored the URCNA churches of Smithers, BC, Thunder Bay, ON, Lacombe, AB, Neerlandia, AB, and is now pastoring the United Reformed Church of Taber, Alberta.Get this devotional delivered directly to your phone each day via our RP App. This devotional is made available by the Nearer To God Devotional team, who also make available in print, for purchase, at NTGDevotional.com.