“Then the word of the Lord came to him: ‘Go at once to Zarephath in the region of Sidon and stay there. I have directed a widow there to supply you with food.’ So he went to Zarephath. When he came to the town gate, a widow was there gathering sticks. He called to her and asked, ‘Would you bring me a little water in a jar so I may have a drink?’ As she was going to get it, he called, ‘And bring me, please, a piece of bread.’ ‘As surely as the Lord your God lives,’ she replied, ‘I don’t have any bread—only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil in a jug. I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat it—and die'” (1 Kings 17:8-12).
God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. But when we allow fear to control our obedience to the voice of God, then we can know that unbelief is present. Whenever Jesus was on the earth, and He appeared to the disciples, it was often in an unusual setting, and it would cause them to fear. Jesus would then tell them to be at peace and to fear not. For example, when the disciples were alone on the boat, and Jesus came walking on the water, they were filled with fear . . . and later we read that Jesus told them that their fear was a result of their unbelief.
It’s one thing to have unbelief, but it becomes sin when we allow unbelief or fear to prevent us from obeying the leading of the Holy Spirit. In the story of the widow of Zarephath, we read that God had already spoken to her before He sent the prophet there and instructed her to take care of his needs. It wasn’t that God wanted to take something from the widow, but that He wanted to bless her obedience in the face of a famine and great fear.
Elijah asked the woman for a drink of water, and the woman seemed more than willing to fetch it for him. But as she was going to draw the water for him, he asked her to fix a cake that he might eat. Although God had instructed her to supply the prophet’s needs, and she was willing to give him water, she was reluctant to offer him a cake. The reason for her hesitancy was the lack of meal and oil in her kitchen. Isn’t it just like God to ask of us the very thing that we are in short supply? Yet, this is what He required of this widow woman, who by the way, happened to be a gentile and not of the house of Israel.
Because this woman decided to obey the voice of God, instead of the voice of fear, God blessed her provisions for the remainder of the famine. As humans, we all struggle with unbelief, and God knows this. But He doesn’t want us to allow unbelief to control our lives, so He will challenge areas in our lives where we have lack. It’s not that He wants to condemn you, but through your obedient faith He can free you to be blessed.
Why did God choose a Gentile when there were widows who were Jewish? Gentiles were outside the Jewish covenant and weren’t privileged to participate in the Jewish blessings. But God used this gentile woman to represent that part of us (our unbelieving flesh nature) that is controlled by lack and fear. If we will believe in our hearts and confess the Word or act on the Word, then we shall be saved, or in this case, delivered from the spirit of fear controlling our lives. —submitted by Asa Dockery, US
mike wittmer on February 16, 2011 at 7:04 am
Asa, thank you for this reminder that fear is not the opposite of faith, and that we all know enough to obey God. I wonder how often we feign intellectual doubts when really our problem is, as you say, disobedience.