1 Kings 17:1–24

17:2–7 God now addresses his spokesman directly: “And the word of the Lord came to him.” Already it is apparent that the word of Yahweh continues to be the driving force behind both the history of the nations and the lives of his servants. Elijah is directed to leave the royal court, to “turn eastward and hide yourself by the brook Cherith, which is east of the Jordan,” in Gilead. This watercourse is a wadi, a seasonal water channel that does not promise long-term protection from drought. Elijah is sent to his relatively remote home region, some way from the reach of Ahab, presumably to prepare for what will happen next.

Like Moses many years before, Elijah starts off his career with exile in the middle of nowhere. Commentators often assume that this is simply because of mad-dog Ahab’s and Jezebel’s bloodthirsty pursuit of any orthodox worshiper. While it is true that there are many times when Jezebel would happily strangle Elijah or worse, as we shall see, there is nothing in the text here to suggest that the prophet is running scared. This is not Yahweh’s prophetic protection program. There is a theological reason for the prophet’s withdrawal: God is making a clear statement to his people. He is going silent. God is acting in judgment against his people by withdrawing his prophetic spokesman. This chapter starts with God’s withdrawing his word from his people. The speaking God stops speaking, as he draws the attention of this people to the perilous state of the nation.

As the drought begins to bite, God provides for his servant in this wilderness setting: “You shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there.” As one might expect, Elijah responds obediently “according to the word of the Lord.” The overtones of the provision of God for Moses and the Israelites in the wilderness are evident, as birds provide a daily ration of “bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening.” The problem here is that the delivering ravens are unclean animals. Even though Elijah receives a wilderness diet that has twice the variety of his forebears’ in the exodus generation (bread and meat both morning and evening), receiving this food from an unclean bird would surely be problematic for a faithful OT believer. However, the attention is soon shifted to another problem, as “after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.” The effects of the covenant curse are now being felt in the entire region, and a confrontation between Yahweh and his people (and particularly Ahab) is inevitable.

17:8–9 As the tension mounts, one might expect Elijah to return to Samaria to confront Ahab, but events take another unexpected turn. God sends his agent deep into enemy territory. Once again “the word of the Lord came to him,” but, rather than directing him back to meet the king, Yahweh instructs Elijah to relocate to Sidon, which is Jezebel country: “Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and dwell there.”³ According to Obadiah 20, Zarephath is part of the restored land after the exile, which may imply that it never should have been under pagan control in the first place.

17:10–12 Once again Elijah obeys without question and gets up and moves on to Zarephath, and “when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks.” No explanation is given as to how Elijah knows she is a widow, let alone the widow that the Lord mentioned (v. 9). It is also odd that she is scraping around looking for sticks near a busy area like the city gate.⁴ The drought has presumably “spilled over” into the territory of the rain god Baal, and chaos has ensued. Even allowing for the nature of this clipped narrative, Elijah’s opening words to her seem abrupt at best, outrageous at worst: “He called to her and said, ‘Bring me a little water in a vessel, that I may drink.’” God’s insistence that he has everything arranged plays out in her ready response. However, Elijah’s next intervention is similarly blunt: “And as she was going to bring it, he called to her and said, ‘Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand.’” One can only guess at the personal dynamic between this disadvantaged pagan woman and the demanding foreign prophet! In this brilliant little exchange, the abrupt prophet makes ridiculous demands. Like everyone else in the ancient world, Elijah knows that widows are hard up. But God has said that he will use a Gentile, Baal-worshiping widow to feed him, and this is what he does. The pathos is only increased by what she says next.

It turns out that this widow is not lacking in theological awareness. She starts by echoing Elijah’s own words to Ahab, saying, “As the Lord your God lives, . . .” How she knows that Elijah is a prophet of Yahweh is not explained, nor is the extent of her grasp of the truth, but the point is clear that Yahweh is directing this encounter as well as the affairs of the nation, and that even this pagan woman has grasped something of this truth. However, her primary concern is, not surprisingly, her own impending death, as well as that of her son: “I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die.” The situation is critical, and, understandably, she is hard pressed to see how she can possibly follow Yahweh’s instructions when she is on the point of starvation. After the abruptness of his contributions up to this point, Elijah’s response is as tender as it is remarkable.

17:13–16 The words “Do not fear” in the Bible are often the precursor to God’s pouring out his blessing on those who trust in him. In this context, they are remarkable in large part because, in the preceding chapters of 1 Kings (from Solomon onward), there has been little sign of anyone trusting Yahweh, and yet this pagan widow shows the way. In doing so, she provides us with a microcosm of God’s determination to bless not only his people but his entire creation. Elijah instructs her to do as she has planned, “but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterward make something for yourself and your son.” The small portion (of the little she has) functions as an acknowledgment that Elijah’s God can be trusted.

Elijah then conveys to her a direct word from Yahweh: “For thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’” Even though the covenant curse will stay in place for some time, in this little pagan outpost in an occupied corner of the land promised to Abraham God remains in the blessing business and will not renege on his promises. Like Elijah himself, the widow accepts this message, and “she went and did as Elijah said,” with the result that “she and he and her household ate for many days. The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Elijah.” This summary statement underlines the key lesson of this incident (which is central to the unfolding message of the book): day after day, Yahweh demonstrates his utter superiority to Baal. Not only does the drought continue, but every day there is food to keep Elijah and his two new best friends alive.

The quiet daily miracle of the jar and the jug shows that Baal cannot compare to Yahweh. And the woman seems to grasp this truth. She trusts God—trusts him enough even to give his prophet the first piece of bread on day one. And the outcome is clear: Yahweh’s word can be trusted. This God is clearly superior to Baal (and every widow should have a prophet come to stay!). The divine word, which directed events through the chaotic narrative of 1 Kings 12–16, is now front and center through the personality of Elijah the prophet. All very simple. But not for long.

17:17 This tale of the unexpected continues with a completely unanticipated downturn in the fortunes of the widow and her family: “After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him.” In other words, he dies. The description of the widow as “the woman, the mistress of the house” may imply that she is a woman of some means (which has enabled her to accommodate Elijah) or may simply highlight that her husband has died and she is facing this trial alone.

17:18 The widow’s response is entirely understandable: “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!” She interprets the death of her son as an act of God in response to her sin. This reaction is in marked contrast to the silence of Ahab when the curse of drought was announced. While the text itself does not affirm that her son dies because of her personal sin, this pagan shows a greater sensitivity to spiritual realties than do the people of Yahweh.

17:19–22 Elijah gathers the dead child in his arms, takes him to “the upper chamber where he lodged,” lays the body down “on his own bed,” and then turns to the Lord in prayer. By this act, Elijah does what Israel has seemingly failed to do for generations, as “he cried to the Lord.” The language suggests both a deep emotional connection with this family who has cared for him and also a desperate plea for God to intervene. Elijah shares the widow’s basic conviction that God is entirely responsible for this action: “O Lord my God, have you brought calamity even upon the widow with whom I sojourn, by killing her son?” Indeed, the phrase “even upon the widow” shows that Elijah sees a connection between this action and the withholding of rain; in other words, this too is part of the curse of the covenant. But he will plead for mercy nonetheless, perhaps especially in light of the fact that a prophet of Yahweh is staying with her.

It is unclear why Elijah “stretched himself upon the child three times,” though it clearly builds narrative tension, as Elijah pleads with God, “O Lord my God, let this child’s life come into him again.” This is clearly a request for God to bring the boy back to life. And, astonishingly, Yahweh hears his cry, and “the life of the child came into him again, and he revived.” This is the first occurrence of the dead being raised to life in the Bible—and it is no accident that Yahweh does so in Mot-country. Mot was the god of death. He was believed to show up every so often to wrestle Baal and take him off to the underworld for a while. This was the pagan explanation for why it sometimes did not rain. Mot was also the god believed to kill off bad people. But in this text it becomes clear that Yahweh can defeat any of the Canaanite gods, whether Baal or Mot. It is Yahweh who is the true God!

17:23–24 Elijah’s response to the boy’s return to life seems slightly understated, as he brings the child downstairs and makes the rather obvious statement “See, your son lives.” The widow’s response once again underlines the key concern of this chapter: “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”

This woman is now utterly convinced that Yahweh’s word can be trusted. Yahweh has overcome Baal. And now he has overcome death. This chapter is all about the victory of Yahweh. These first miracles of Elijah are explicitly designed to make it clear that Yahweh’s word is powerful, and that word is brought to Israel through the words of Elijah the Tishbite.

The end of this chapter ties back to the chapter’s beginning, as a comparison of verses 1–2 and verse 24 will show. “Now Elijah the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, ‘As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word.’ And the word of the Lord came to him: . . .” (vv. 1–2). And then via verse 5 and verse 16 we come to verse 24: “And the woman said to Elijah, ‘Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.’” This chapter is about listening to the word of Yahweh. The God of Israel stops speaking to his people but starts speaking to Baal worshipers and, in doing so, shows that he is the God of the nations. Chapter 16 ends with an Israelite king ignoring God’s word. Chapter 17 ends with a Gentile woman listening to it. This might not be what one would expect, but this is exactly what takes place when Yahweh is on the move. First and foremost, this chapter is about the exceptional God, Yahweh, and the way in which he works.