Obedience Revisited . . .

Well, hello all!! Ahh yes I do realize it is not Wednesday; it is in fact Friday and where is Wednesday's post? Hmmm . . . yep still in my head. But lets get it down on the Internet-superhighway shall we?

I think that perhaps you are sensing a theme with Elijah . . . yep you guessed it obedience. But it is not just Elijah that was asked to be obedient, but also the people whose lives Elijah touched. You see we do not live in a bubble. We were meant for living our lives with others. (Comes as a shock to all introverts everywhere . . . you know who you are:).

So let's open up the Word and see what in the world I'm talking about!! I Kings 17:7 is where we pick up our story and Elijah is now at a dried up brook. Remember God led him to this place after the whole, it's not going to rain for years, announcement to King Ahab. So the very place that God led Elijah for food, water and safety is now empty and he must move on. A very good point to interject here is that circumstances change. We are not meant to be changeless in our lives. We are an ever-changing people who serve a never-changing God. We can change when He leads us to, with confidence, because He never changes ~~ He's got it all in control!!

So we find Elijah staring (okay my interrupretation :) at a dried up brook and wondering (again my interp) what to do. So God tells Elijah to go "at once" to Zarephath to stay. He told Elijah He'd commanded a widow in that place to supply him with food. So I looked up the word commanded and in the Hebrew it means appoint. So God appointed this widow to help Elijah.

So we are going to stop at verse 9 and park a moment in these verses. (At this rate we'll be through Elijah's life by the time some of you graduate :)!! God has a plan for our lives. We were not just put on this planet to live unto ourselves. This widow had a son and they were in a dire situation which we will find out more about next time, but she had no husband, living in a drought stricken land, and yet God was about to use her in a mighty way, but she must trust Him. So do you? Trust Him I mean. If He says go here, talk to that person there, buy their lunch (a total stranger), do you get involved in what God is saying to you in your life or are you content to sit on the side lines and let others "more equipped" do the work?

God called this widow to obedience. He placed Elijah in her life and it seemingly saved her and her sons life, but she had to trust what God was saying through Elijah. No where in this story does it say that the Word of the Lord came to the widow, no it came through Elijah. Sometimes God will speak through our circumstances and sometimes through someone in our lives. It is very important that we stay close to God; reading His Word, praying, getting into a real relationship with Jesus the Author and Perfecter of our Faith is crucial to our growth and being able to hear God's voice clearly in our lives.

Let me encourage you today to spend sometime alone with Jesus. Tell Him all that is on your heart. He can take it, in fact He took it, all of it and nailed it to the cross He bore for you. You are not going to shock or surprise Him. He loves you; He gave all He had for you; you are safe with Him.

I love you all and encourage you to share the love of Christ with someone this weekend. Walk in obedience to the One who died for you.

In Christ Alone,
Dawn