When the brook had dried up, Elijah was sent to Zarephath to be sustained there by a widow woman (1 Kings 17:9). In Luke 4:25, 26 he is sent to the widow to sustain her. Both these things are true and our account proves this. God had a double purpose: to sustain His servant and to bring a message of grace to the widow by him. The Lord, speaking in the synagogue, compares this message to the gospel spread among the nations beyond the borders of Israel. The evangelist finds his own sustenance in bringing the good news of grace to others. But we find a third thing in Luke’s account. If the message is carried to the nations, personified by a Zidonian widow, the widows of Israel are set aside. Judgment upon Israel’s state opens the door to the Gentiles to receive grace, and this, remarkably, in the very territory from whence Jezebel, that great corrupter of God’s people, came (1 Kings 16:31). In Matthew 15:21 The Lord withdraws to this same territory, but though He was still being sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, He could not be hidden to faith; and faith finds in Him much more than crumbs fallen from the children’s table.
Here then Elijah is sent in grace to a widow of Zarephath who is dying of hunger, and just as much as Israel under the weight and consequences of the judgment God had pronounced. This woman was going to die, and she knew it. Elijah’s words stirred up the faith that lay in her heart. “And she went and did according to the word of Elijah” (1 Kings 17:15). Instead of doubting something that would happen in a way incomprehensible to human reason she accepted this impossibility and found salvation therein for herself and for her son. The king of Israel, too, felt this imminent death weighing down upon himself and his people, but instead of being sure about his lot, he sought means to escape it. This is the opposite of faith: it is unbelief. Ahab thought he could have or find human resources against famine and death; this woman had none; “That we may eat it, and die” (1 Kings 17:12).
This widow’s faith is of the same kind and quality as that of the prophet; consequently she follows the same path he does. It is always so: “And he went and did according to the word of Jehovah” (1 Kings 17:5). “And she went and did according to the word of Elijah” (1 Kings 17:15), but the word of Elijah was “the word of Jehovah which he had spoken through Elijah” (1 Kings 17:16). It is the same word, whether it comes directly to the prophet or whether it is addressed to men through him. So it is today with the gospel.
This poor widow came to know the divine resources for a dying soul. She is called to make experiences even more profound and blessed. Her son dies; she now has to deal with the reality of death. At the same time she acknowledges that which is right, that death is the wages of iniquity. “Art thou come to me to call mine iniquity to remembrance, and to slay my son?” (1 Kings 17:18). To know that death awaits us and will overtake us is not everything; it is necessary besides to realize the actual power of death upon us, sinners. The widow needed this experience to learn to full extent of the power of grace. How, if her son had not died, would she have been able to know the power of resurrection that delivers from death? The same was so for Martha at the tomb of Lazarus.
This whole scene speaks to us of Christ. Elijah is a picture of Him. In sympathy he entered into all the consequences of man’s sin. Just as Christ wept at the tomb of Lazarus, Elijah “cried to Jehovah and said, Jehovah, my God, hast thou also brought evil upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by slaying her son?” (1 Kings 17:20). Then he brought the dead child to life again, taking his place. “And he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried to Jehovah and said, Jehovah, my God, I pray thee, let this child’s soul come into him again!” (1 Kings 17:21).
The meal and the oil were a great blessing for the poor widow. They kept her from dying. A soul, still ignorant of all the riches of Christ, may be conversant with the Word and find nourishment for its life therein. At first the widow was a bit like the man left for dead by the thieves, to whose help the Samaritan came, pouring oil and wine onto his wounds. The oil and the wine answered to his needs, just as the oil and the barrel of meal answered to the woman of Zarephath’s needs. But resurrection answers to death. “Being dead in your offenses and sins... God... has quickened us with the Christ... and has raised us up together.” Elijah stretched himself upon the child three times; Christ spent three days in death. But Elijah did not depend upon himself to raise the dead any more than did Christ. “Father,” said the Lord at the tomb of Lazarus, “I thank Thee that Thou hast heard Me,” and as for His own resurrection, “For Thou wilt not leave My soul to Sheol, neither wilt Thou allow thy Holy One to see corruption.” In the same way, as we have already remarked, here Elijah expresses his dependence by praying.
The prophet delivers the child to his mother. “And the woman said to Elijah, Now by this I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of Jehovah in thy mouth is truth” (1 Kings 17:24). She had learned two things by the resurrection of her son: First, that God had come to manifest Himself here below in a man—“Thou are a man of God.” And so Christ was “marked out”—much more than a man of God—“Son of God in power... by resurrection of the dead.” Previously God had revealed Himself to her as providing for her needs, now, as giving new life, resurrection life, there where death had entered in by the “iniquity” of man. The second thing is that through resurrection she gained the assurance that the word of the Lord in Elijah’s mouth was the truth. The truth of the word of grace is proven by resurrection. Christ has not only died for our offenses; He has been raised for our justification.
This seventeenth chapter has occupied us with a time when Elijah was hidden from the eyes of his people and from the world. We have seen him exercise a ministry of grace during this period. In the following chapter he is going to manifest himself publicly at the time for executing judgment. Do we need to point out how much the prophet in this respect is a remarkable type of Christ? We are in the day when the Lord is hidden, but when the grace that brings salvation is appearing to all men, when the power of resurrection is being announced to the nations. The days are coming when our rejected Lord will again appear, when every eye shall see Him, and they which have pierced him, and all the tribes of the land shall wail because of him. Yea, Amen!