And Elijah said unto her [This looks at first like a further test. But it is pretty clear that the prophet now knew that the widow of whom God had spoken was before him], Fear not; go and do as thou hast said [Heb. according to thy word] but [Heb. only, however]: make me thereof [Heb. thence, i.e; of the oil as well as the meal. The former took the place of butter. Bread was sometimes baked in oil] a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and thy son. [The "first" and "afterwards" are emphatic by position. When Bähr says that Elijah would never have made this demand, and that still less would the widow have paid any attention to it, had she been a heathen, he appears to forget the words that followed (verse 14). When one in the garb of a prophet swore, as this man did, by the sacred name, a heathen, with the belief of the heathen in miracles, might well be persuaded that the word was truth. Elijah's manner alone would carry conviction with it.]
1 Kings 17:14
For thus saith the Lord God of Israel [The words, "God of Israel," if anything, favour the supposition that he was speaking to one who was not of Israel. See on 1 Kings 17:1. There the words were addressed to one who was denying the God of Israel] The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fall, until the day that the Lord sendeth [Heb. giveth. For תִּתֵן see note on 1 Kings 6:19] rain upon the earth. [Heb. on the face of the ground. Like expression 1 Kings 18:1; Genesis 2:5. It has been said that there is not a syllable here to imply a miracle, and it has been contended that this Sareptan household was sustained for over two years simply by the blessing of God on the use of natural means. But clearly, if there was nothing else, there was supernatural knowledge on Elijah's part. And it cannot be denied that the literal construction of the words points to a "supernatural and inexplicable multiplication of food" (Rawlinson), similar to those of which the Gospels tell. It is just possible that this was a figure of speech, which practically meant no more than the necessaries of life should somehow be provided, directly or indirectly, by God. Nor is this view effectually negatived, as Bähr contends, by Luke 4:26; but, in view of 2 Kings 4:44, Matthew 14:15-21, Matthew 15:32-38, it is extremely improbable. It is curious how many miracles of Elijah and Elisha foreshadowed those of our blessed Lord.
1 Kings 17:15
And she went and did according to the saying of Elijah [the echo of 1 Kings 17:13, "Go and do according to thy saying"]: and she, and he, [or he and she, according to Chethib] and her house [probably her friends or poor relatives who came to partake of her plenty (Bähr)], did eat many days. [Heb. days, i.e; an indefinite period. See note on verse 7. The word does not refer to the first baking (verse 13), but it is to be explained by the next verse.
1 Kings 17:16
And [Omit. This verse is explicative, not additional] the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fall, according to the word of the Lord, which He spake by [Heb. by the hand of] Elijah. [Having received a prophet in the name of a prophet, she received a prophet's reward. (Matthew 10:41, Matthew 10:42). Stanley suggests that our Lord, when He spoke of the "cup of cold water," may have had this incident in his mind.
1 Kings 17:17
And it came to pass after these things, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, fell sick; and his sickness was so sore, that there was no breath left in him. [Does this mean that he was dead? Keil thinks it perfectly clear that it does. Bähr is as firmly persuaded that it does not. He justly remarks
(3) Daniel 10:18, Daniel 10:20 do not necessitate the belief that he was dead (see below).
1 Kings 17:18
And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do with thee [Heb. what to me and thee. Same formula, 11:12; 2 Samuel 16:10; 2 Kings 3:13; Matthew 8:29; John 2:4. It means, "What is there between us?" or practically, "What have I done?" "Is this the result of my association with thee? Must such sorrow befal me because thou art with me?" Bähr], O thou man of God? [This woman, if a Phoenician, was evidently familiar with the titles borne by the Hebrew prophets (1 Kings 12:22; 1 Kings 13:1-34. passim; 13:6, 13:8). Nor is this to be wondered at. The intercourse between the two nations had been very considerable] art thou come unto me to call my sin [not necessarily any "special sin in her past life,"] to remembrance [her idea evidently is that the prophet by residing with her, seeing her life, etc; had become acquainted with her sinfulness, and had called it to the remembrance of the Almighty. She does not mean that he had recalled it to her mind, but that he had been the מִזְכִיר or remembrancer of God. Cf. Genesis 40:14; Ezekiel 21:28; Jeremiah 4:16] and to slay my son? [Observe, she does not speak of him as slain.]
1 Kings 17:19
And he said unto her, Give me thy son. And he took him out Of her bosom, [the age of the child may hence be roughly inferred] and carried him up into a loft [Heb. הָעֲלִיָּה the upper chamber. LXX. τὸ ὑπερῷον. Loft is most misleading. The upper room, was often [rather, always] the best apartment in an Eastern house" (Rawlinson). It was sometimes the guest chamber (Luke 22:11, Luke 22:12), and, from the uses to which it was put, must have been large (Acts 1:13; Acts 9:39; Acts 20:8; 2 Kings 1:2). Thomson (L. & B. 1:235) infers from the fact that the widow's house had an upper room, "that the mode of building in Elijah's time and the custom of giving the 'alliyeh to the guest were the same as now; also that this poor widow was not originally among the poorest classes (who bare no 'alliyeh), but that her extreme destitution was owing to the famine"], and laid him upon his own bed. [It may be doubted whether the verb יַשְׁכִבֵהוּ lit; made him to lie down, would be used of a corpse.]
1 Kings 17:20
And he cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, hast Thou also [i.e. in addition to the misery and suffering brought through me upon my country] brought evil upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying [Heb. to slay. Words. worth partly bases his conclusion that the child was dead on the inexact translation of the A.V.] her son?
1 Kings 17:21
And he stretched himself [marg. measured himself, but Gesenius holds that stretch out is the primary meaning of the root] upon the child [cf. 2 Kings 4:34. The commentators are again at variance as to whether these words imply the use of natural means or not. Those who hold that the child was dead naturally adopt the negative, and some (Keil, Rawlinson, al.) compare with it the action of our Lord in the case of the blind, deaf and dumb (Matthew 9:35; Luke 7:14; John 9:6, John 9:7). But surely the circumstances and the purpose alike, in these latter eases, were entirely different. The object of the touch, of anointing the eyes, etc; in these cases of healing, appears to have been to awaken a sufficient faith—without which "He could do no miracle" (Matthew 13:58)—in men whose infirmities of blindness, deafness, etc; prevented their attaining faith through the ordinary channels of seeing and hearing the merciful and gracious Son of man. But here the child, if not dead, was senseless. We are driven, therefore, to the belief that the prophet "used rational means for warming and revivifying" the child, "not with the hope that of themselves they would prove effectual, but in the sure confidence that God, in answer to his weeping supplication, would impart supernatural force to the natural human agencies," Bähr] three times [Not only in his prayer but also in this triple repetition do we recognize Elijah's profound conviction that only by the Almighty power of God could the child be restored, and that whatever means were used, God alone could make them effectual. For three is the number and signature of the Godheads" die eigentlieh gottliche Zahl, die Signatur des gottlichen Wesens" (Bähr, Symb. 1:143). Hence it is, inter alia, that "the calling upon the name of Jehovah in the old covenant"—he might have added, "and in the new;" cf. Mark 14:39, Mark 14:41; 2 Corinthians 12:8—"was a threefold act:" Psalms 55:17; Daniel 6:10, Daniel 6:13; Numbers 6:24-26; Isaiah 6:3 (Bähr). The correspondence with 2 Corinthians 12:8 is very striking] and cried unto the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, I pray Thee [Heb. now] let this child's soul come into him [Heb. upon his inside עַל is here, as elsewhere, used for אֵל] again. [Though נֶפֶשׁ, here translated "soul," constantly means "life," yet it by no means settles the question whether the child was really living or dead. For,
1 Kings 17:22
And the Lord heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again and he revived [or recovered. Cf. 2 Kings 1:2; 2 Kings 8:8].
1 Kings 17:23
And Elijah took the child, and brought him down out of the chamber into the house [Probably the עֲלִיָּה. was reached by an outside staircase, and did not directly communicate with the lower rooms. Cf. Matthew 24:17; Mark 2:4; 2 Kings 9:13] and delivered him unto his mother: and Elijah said, See, thy son liveth.
1 Kings 17:24
And the woman said to Elijah, Now by this [Heb. this. Gesenius interprets עַתָּה זֶה just now. Similarly Bähr, nunmehr] I know that thou art a man of God [not that she had doubted it before. See verse 18. In the face of what Elijah had done for her, she could not doubt it. All that she means is that this is a great fresh proof of his mission], and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is truth. [This last word אֱמֶת from which Amittai (Jonah 1:1) is formed, perhaps gave rise to the tradition that this boy was afterwards known as the prophet Jonah. Amiitai was held to have been this widow's husband.
HOMILETICS
1 Kings 17:1
The Mission and Ministry of Elijah.
The appearance on the arena of Israel's history of such a champion as Elijah, armed with such high credentials, wielding such supernatural powers, marks a crisis in the history of God's ancient Church. We have but to see him, to hear him for one moment, to know that a great struggle is impending. God, like Nature, which is but a name for God, "does nothing in vain." Such high powers as his foreshadow great issues. Four points consequently may well engage our attention, viz; the man, his mission, his message, his ministry.
I. THE MAN.
1. He was a wild man (Genesis 16:12; Heb. a wild ass man). Abraham has been called an "Arab sheykh." We have in Elijah a veritable Bedawy, if not by birth or tribe, by training and in character. The rough sheepskin (1 Kings 19:13), the shaggy hair (2 Kings 1:18), the marvellous bodily endurance (1 Kings 18:46), the careful avoidance of the city, the flight into the desert (1 Kings 19:4), the whole bearing of the man suggests to us the child of the wilderness. He, the greatest of the prophets, one of the "first three" of those born of women, has the exterior, the instincts, the heart of an Ishmaelite. He was thus a fit successor of Moses, the shepherd of Horeb, who in the very haunt and home of the Bedawin, was trained for his high vocation; he was meet to be the forerunner and pattern of the Baptist who was bred in the desert, clad in Arab dress, and fed with Arab food (Matthew 3:1, Matthew 3:4). It is impossible to understand the man and his work unless this be borne in mind. The gaunt dervish who one day strode into the presence of the king and lifted up his sinewy arm and denounced the great drought; the shaggy, long haired sheykh, who single-handed faced the hierarchy of Baal, and knew no fear, his were the asperities, the privations, the scant fare, the primitive, semi-nomadic life of a Gileadite. The sweet uses of adversity had moulded this man for the crisis. Our great chancellors, it has been said, come to us from the garret: the desert has ever been the school of the greatest prophets. The rugged, unsettled pasturages of Bashan were a meet nurse for a prophetic child. This champion was cast "in the clay ground".
2. He was a man of like passions with ourselves (James 5:17). An "earthen vessel" (2 Corinthians 4:7). "In all points tempted like as we are," and not "without sin" (Hebrew 1 Kings 3:15). The Bible never pictures men as perfect. The phronema Sarkos remains even in the regenerate.
II. HIS MISSION. Consider—
1. Whence it was derived. He was not taught of men (Galatians 1:12, Galatians 1:17). He was ἰδιώτης καὶ ἀγράμματος. The God who separated him from his mother's womb called him by His grace (Galatians 5:15). He was an extraordinary messenger for a great emergency. But observe; when God employs such messengers, men whose mission is derived directly from on high, the "signs of an apostle" are wrought by them. We are not to listen to an angel from heaven, unless he shows us his credentials. We have a right to ask of those who run without being sent to show us a sign. When the missionary Dr. Wolff told one of the Eastern bishops that the "Lord had sent him," the prelate not unreasonably asked him for a display of his powers. If God should send us an Elias again, He will give us at the same time a sign from heaven.
2. When it was conferred. It was
III. HIS MESSAGE. It was a denunciation of immediate drought, one of the most terrible calamities that can befal an Eastern land. In Palestine, animal as well as vegetable life is directly dependent on the rain. Not only do the showers which irrigate the laud feed the springs, but they are carefully stored up in cisterns for daily use. It is only as compared with the arid wastes of Egypt that the Holy Land could be called "a land of brooks and waters, of fountains and depths," etc. (Deuteronomy 8:7). And it is also described by the same writer as a land that "drinketh water of the rain of heaven" (Deuteronomy 9:11). Consequently rain, everywhere a prime necessity of existence, is doubly indispensable in Palestine. The rainfall of Jerusalem is on the average three times as great as that of London. It is clear, consequently, that this message threatened a terrible plague, that it portended long and protracted suffering. There are some who will not hear of the "terrors of the Lord," who would never have them mentioned in the pulpit. Yet pain and privation are among the first sanctions of God's law, and we have the authority of many eminent divines for saying that more men are won to God and right by fear than by love. It sounds fine and philosophic to speak of fear as an unworthy motive, but men forget what an unworthy animal is man. Besides, this drought was a part of the punishment, and was admirably adapted to serve as a punishment for apostasy. It was meet that men who practically denied the living God should be practically reminded of their dependence on Him. It was well that those who held Baal to be lord of nature, should be left to discover his impotence (cf. 10:14; Jeremiah 14:22). "Are there any of the vanities of the heathen that can give rain?" And it was a punishment this, which penitence might avert. Moreover it was the penalty foretold in the law (Deuteronomy 28:23). Elijah was not left to scatter plagues at his pleasure. Like an earlier prophet, he could not "go beyond the word of the Lord to do less or more" (Numbers 22:18). Of himself, he could do nothing (Numbers 5:1-31:33). His message was, "As the Lord liveth." If the rain should only come "according to his word," it was because his word was God's word. If his prayer for the drought had been answered (James 5:17), it had first been inspired. He speaks here as the minister, not the master. He is the willing, patient slave of Jehovah. "Before whom I stand."
IV. His MINISTRY. From this initial message let us turn to his ministry as whole. And it presents to our view these broad features—
1. It was exercised in silence. How few are Elijah's recorded words, and those few are the utterances of but five or six occasions. He was not "mighty in word." He had no sooner delivered his first brief message than he disappears, and for three years and a half Israel hears him no more. He speaks for a moment: he is dumb for a triennium. And when he reappears, it is but for a day. That one day's ministry ended, he is again hidden from our view. Thrice more he reappears in the history, but each time it is but for a day, and then he goes into the silent heavens, and save on the night of transfiguration, speaks to men no more. How like to the revelations of God to man. He "keepeth silence (Psalms 1:3). He too hideth Himself. "He spake and it was done." How unlike the everlasting chatter of some of our later prophets. "Ministers," it is sometimes said, "are mere talkers." Elijah proclaims the dignity, if not "the eternal duty, of silence.'" "All real work," some one has said, "is quiet work." How many of our sermons, full of sound and fury, leave not a trace behind them. But the silent Elias accomplished the regeneration of his country.
2. It was a ministry of deed. There was no need for him to speak. The works that he did bore witness of him. Declamation, argument, remonstrance, would have been absurd. The time for that was past. And he had actions to speak for him. Surely there is a lesson for Christ's ministers here. It is true they cannot work wonders like Elijah; and it is also true that they are sent to "preach the Word," to reprove, rebuke, exhort, etc.; but we are reminded here that a fruitful ministry must be one of action. Words, however eloquent, in the long turn count for less than a holy life. The age, however it may hanker after sensationalism, is nevertheless suspicious of all talk. Why is it that our holy religion has but such an indifferent hold on the masses of our countrymen? One reason is that while we "point to heaven," we do not always "lead the way." "Cujus vita contemnitur, ejus praedicatio despicitur." The life of their parish priest is the only Bible many Englishmen ever read, and alas, what a smeared and blotted page that sometimes is. And those who do hear our sermons have learned to discount them. They know full well that words are cheap, and that emotion, and even unction, can be simulated. They often wonder how much of our discourse we really believe and practise ourselves, and they turn to our lives for an answer. That familiar paradox, consequently, is full of truth and meaning, that, "in preaching, the thing of least importance is the sermon.' It was well said that actio—action in the truest sense of the word, not gesture or manner, but conduct—is the first, second, and third great essential of eloquence A French ecclesiastic, the Abbe Mullois, has laid it down, as one of the canons if preaching, that "to address men successfully, they must be loved much." "Nothing influences others so much as character. Few people are capable of reasoning, and fewer still like the trouble of it; and besides, men have hearts as well as heads. Hence, consistency, reality, everpresent principle, shining through the person in whom they dwell, and making themselves perceptible, have more weight than many arguments, than much preaching" (Heygate, "Ember Hours"). It is Baxter who speaks of clergymen who "cut the throats of their sermons by their lives;" but there are many who, without doing this, invalidate their words by their actions. It is well for us to remember that personal character is the best preparation for the pulpit. "Facta, non verba;" this is, and will be increasingly, the demand of the age upon the prophetic order. "Non magna eloquimur sed vivimus." This must be more and more the response of the ministry.
3. It was brave and fearless. On three occasions this court preacher took his life in his hand (1 Kings 17:1; 1 Kings 18:2; 1 Kings 21:19). On one occasion he seems to have quailed (1 Kings 19:3), but even then it does not appear that he fled from any present duty, or, like Jonah, declined any commission. His ministry as a whole was boldly discharged as in the presence of the Eternal, "Before whom I stand." He saw none other than his Master. Like another preacher before royalty, Massillon, he spoke as if he saw Death standing at his elbow. Like Daniel, he knew that his God could deliver him. The fear of man is cast out when we realize the presence of God (Isaiah 51:12, Isaiah 51:13).
4. It was seemingly a failure. If others did not think so, he did. We know that no work, really and truly done for God, can be wasted (Isaiah 55:11); but we are often tempted to think it is. But it must be such work as will stand the trial by fire (1 Corinthians 3:13). It has been strikingly said, "If any man's work is a failure, the probability is that it is because he is a failure himself." Still, it is for our comfort to remember, in times of depression, that the greatest of the prophets saw little or no fruit of his labours. He was persuaded that even the unexampled miracles that he wrought were of little or no avail (1 Kings 19:10). We find that when there were seven thousand secret followers of the Lord God, Elijah thought himself left alone. And indeed the state of Israel, even after the ordeal of Carmel, might well lead him to take the gloomiest and most despairing view of the situation. Jezebel pursues her infamous way. The son of Ahab sends to consult a foreign oracle, and ignores the God of Israel. The fire must come down a second time and burn up the idolaters instead of the bullock and the altar. But all the same, we know that his work was not in vain. Nor can ours be, if done like his. We have nothing to do with immediate successes. "One man soweth, another reapeth." Nor is success in any shape mentioned in our instructions. That is God's part, not ours. We have but to sow the seed, He must make it grow. The world worships success—or what it calls success—and the greatest of ministries—Elijah's, Jeremiah's, Ezekiel's, our blessed Lord's—were all failures from a worldly point of view.
1 Kings 17:3-7
The Solitary Place.
We have just seen that it was from the wilderness that Elijah went forth into the busy, wicked world, and to the anxious, dangerous work of a prophet. He, like his antitype, was in the desert "until the time of his showing unto Israel" (Luke 1:80). There, in secret communion with God, he had gained strength for the encounter; there he had meditated over the grievous apostasy of his people, and had "vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their evil deeds" (2 Peter 2:8). And there, as he "prayed earnestly that it might not rain," the word of the Lord came to him and burned in his bones (Jeremiah 20:9), and bore him into the presence of the king (Amos 3:8). But it is now for us to observe that no sooner had he entered upon his ministry, and delivered his first brief message, than he was sent into the desert—it may be, the same desert—again. The word of the Lord straightway bids him turn eastward and hide in the brook Cherith. Now the word Cherith means separation. This section consequently may fittingly speak to us of the need of separation, of the uses of solitude and retirement in the discipline of the saints. From Elijah's separation from his work and the world we may glean some lessons as to our own. Observe—
1. Solitude was necessary to Elijah's safety. He must hide or lose his head. When Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord (1 Kings 18:18), we may be sure he would not be spared. Was it not because of him indeed that the others were attacked? Had his dwelling been with men, the messengers of Ahab would assuredly have found him and slain him (1 Kings 18:10). So it is sometimes necessary, for the life of our souls, that we should flee into the desert. It is at our peril that we stay in Sodom. We must "escape to the mountain." It may be from some enchantress, whose whoredoms and witchcrafts are as cruel as Jezebel's; it may be from companions whose snares are more perilous than Ahab's sword; it may be from a society hardly less pestilent than that of Israel. There are times when our only safety is in flight. Those hermits who buried themselves in the Thebaid, or who burrowed in the rocks of the Wady Feiran, the world has only a smile for their folly, and it is no doubt true that God wound have us leaven the world, not leave it, But it would have been well if some had, for a time at least, followed their example. How many souls have perished because they would not enter into their chambers and shut their doors and hide themselves until the indignation be overpast (Isaiah 26:20); because they had not the courage to disappear for a while, if only into their closets. "He that wilfully stands still to catch dangers, tempteth God instead of trusting him."
2. Solitude was necessary to his soul's health. It is remarkable how God's elect messengers, each in his turn, have been sent "apart into a desert place to rest awhile" (Mark 6:31). Moses must spend forty years in the great and terrible wilderness; must spend forty days and forty nights in Horeb, the Mount of God. Elijah himself only emerges from the Cherith to go to another hiding place at Zarephath, and from Zarephath he passes almost directly to the same wilderness and the same mount where Moses was. The Baptist's life was almost divided between the desert and the prison. St. Paul must learn his gospel in Arabia. And our Holy Lord, He must begin File ministry by a forty days' fast, and from time to time must seek a quiet place to rest and pray. All men who are much before the world need their times of retirement. In the "loud stunning tide of human care and crime" it is difficult to hear the whispers of God in the soul. Now the voices of nature, such as men hear in solitude, are among the voices of God. Nature has been called "God's great green book."
"One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can."
"There are two books," says Sir Thomas Browne, "from whence I collect my divinity. Besides that written one of God, another of his servant nature, that universal and public manuscript that lies expensed unto the eyes of all." And is not every tree, every leaf, in its way a mute witness for God and purity? It is remarkable that the greatest crimes and brutalities are committed in those districts of this country where men can have neither nature nor solitude—in the dens of Liverpool, amid the cinder heaps of the Black Country, in the dingy pit villages of Durham It is only in quiet, under the silent stars, amid the purple heather, by the murmuring brook, or in the inner chamber, that we can know ourselves and our God. The "Ancient Mariner's" conception of his "wide, wide sea"—
"So lonely 'twas, that God Himself
Scarce seemed there to be,"
fine though it is, contradicts the experience of the saints, who have found that it is precisely the profoundest solitude that is instinct with His presence.
And now let us consider how God calls us all in turn to a brook Cherith.
3. Elijah's retirement was for the ultimate welfare of Israel. So long as he remained amongst them, the people would have looked to him as the author of their calamities, or would have cried to him to avert them. His disappearance afforded them leisure to examine themselves and face their sins, and left them only God or Baal to cry to. It is sometimes well that the prophet should keep silence. Deus habet suas moras. It is not always that He stretches out his hands all clay long to the disobedient and gainsaying. Having spoken by Elijah to Ahab and Israel, now He and His prophet must withdraw into the darkness, and the drought must do its silent work. And there are times, too, when Christ's ministers must he silent. When the Gadarenes besought our Lord to depart out of their coasts, He straightway took them st their word (Matthew 8:34; Matthew 9:1; cf. Matthew 23:38, Matthew 23:39). The apostles were to shake off the dust of their feet against the city that received them not, and to depart from it (Matthew 10:14), and they did so (Acts 13:51). When the Jews counted themselves unworthy of eternal life, Paul and Barnabas turned to the Gentiles (Acts 13:46). When the churches of Asia fell and repented not, their candlestick was removed out of its place (Revelation 2:5). Their loss is our gain. "These things were written for our admonition."
1 Kings 17:4-7
The Food of the Saints.
We have just seen the prophet in his solitude. Let us now consider the manner in which he was sustained there. His needs were supplied in two ways, partly by natural, partly by supernatural means. No miracle was wrought to give him water. He must make his home in the wady and drink of the rivulet that flowed past his feet. It was there, and he must help himself to it. But with his food it was quite different. He could not find that, and so it was brought to him; it was provided him by God. For even if it was not laid at his feet morning and evening by ravens—and we have seen reason to think that it was not—even flit was furnished him by the villagers of Orbo, his tribesmen and friends, or by the loyal and hospitable Arabs who roamed over the adjoining region, still it was supplied by the ordering and special Providence of God. For it is as much a supernatural work to control, by an unseen Power, the minds of men as the instincts or habits of birds. If we get rid of the ravens we do not get rid of the miracle. It is clear, consequently, that he was sustained in part by natural, in part by superhuman agency. Now our food, like his, is, though in a different way, natural and supernatural. We use the terms in the popular sense, for who shall say that all food is not supernatural. True, it comes to us by what we call "natural processes," in what we call the "order of Nature;" but it is obvious that the so called "laws of Nature" are only "statements of the observed course of Nature, or the uniform results of known physical causes ending in some prime cause or causes not merely physical" (Sir E. Beckett, "Origin of the Laws of Nature"). Nature only means what is fixed, settled, uniform (Bp. Butler). But, using the words as they are used in common parlance, part of our sustenance, the supply of our bodily wants is, for the most part natural; and another part, the satisfaction of our spiritual necessities, is for the most part supernatural. Our needs, that is to say, are supplied something like Elijah's were. Let us trace the resemblance a little more in detail, and let us see first how it holds good of our
I. BODILY SUSTENANCE. We learn from this history—
1. That we must use the means within our reacts. Not even for His elect messenger, the greatest of the prophets, does God work an unnecessary miracle. "Dieu n'agit pas par des volontes particulieres" (Malebranche). No doubt God could have supplied his drink just as easily as his daily bread, in an extraordinary way, but He would not. No; in a valley debouching into the Jordan was a stream, fed from some hidden source, such as the snows of Hermon, or springing from the roots of the hills of Gilead, and the prophet must seek it, and take up his abode near it. What do we learn from this but that God "will have our endeavours concur to our preservation," a truth somewhat roughly, but strikingly, put in the Puritan mot d'ordre, "Trust in God, and keep your powder dry." It is no real kindness to do for Elijah what he can do for himself. There are lands where daily bread is to be had without care or labour; where a man has but to put forth his hand and take the bread-tree fruit and eat and be satisfied, but that is said to be a doubtful boon. It is found that the natives of those lands will not work, and their life, which should be full of high endeavour, which should aim, if at nothing more, at "making two blades of grass grow where only one grew before," is wasted in basking in the eternal sunshine. The primaeval law, "In the sweat of thy brow thou shalt eat bread," though we call it a curse, is really a blessing. "Six days shalt thou labour" is as much a Divine command as the command to rest on the seventh. It is God decrees, "If any man will not work, neither shall he eat" (2 Thessalonians 3:10). The imperious necessity to provide our daily bread is one of the springs which keeps the world in motion: it is the salt which keeps our life from stagnation and corruption. It is in vain we cry to Jupiter for help. God has given us fields and seed. He gives us rain and sunshine; it is for our good that we should do the rest.
2. That then God will supply what is lacking. When we have done our best we may justly look to Him to give what we cannot get. And this He will do. "Thy bread shall be given thee, and thy waters shall be sure" (Isaiah 33:16). "Never have I seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging their bread" (Psalms 37:25). In the barren wilderness, He gave bread from heaven. "In the days of famine, they shall be satisfied" (Psalms 37:19). What a commentary on these words does this history furnish l Elijah had "called for a famine on the land" (1 Kings 18:2; Luke 4:25), and had "broken the whole staff of bread" (Psalms 105:16); but he himself had enough and to spare. God spreads for him "a table in the wilderness" (Psalms 78:16), and almost "in the presence of his enemies" (Psalms 2:5). The stars shall fall from their courses, but he shall have enough. It has been thought by some that the ravens brought him bread and flesh from Ahab's own table. It would have been so, had it been necessary. If he was with food by human instrumentality, it was none the less by God's command. And this is God's ordinary way of hearing "the prayer of the poor destitute;" he puts it into the hearts of others to help. "God works by means, and the chief means is man" (Bossuet).
3. That God gives us our bread daily. Elijah only received a small supply of food at once. Though he had no lack, he had no profusion. He had "daily bread"—for "morning and evening are one day" (Genesis 1:5)—and no more. Even he must walk by faith and learn to "take no thought for the morrow." And daily bread is all that is promised us; all that we are taught to pray for (Matthew 6:11). And that, perhaps, because a day is a life in miniature; each day is rounded by dawn and dusk, by sleep and darkness, into a perfect little life. Whether the birds brought him food or not, he and they received it alike, τὸν ἐπιούσιον ἄρτον, the bread of a day in its day. The lesson of the manna (Exodus 16:20) is taught us again by the brook Cherith.