Slide 2:
In order to understand the plight of this widow one must understand she was a Phoenician and not an Israelite.
In Israel when a woman’s husband died she had advantages not given in the rest of the world.
If she had an older son he was required to care for her.
No son, then she was given in marriage to her brother-in-law.
No brother-in-law or son, or opportunity to re-marry, then the community would care for her needs, not so in the Gentile world.
The widow of Zarephath was a Gentile, in a Gentile community, and had none of the protections provided widows of Israel, if she could not remarry or refused prostitution then she would die of starvation because of her inability to create an income.
Slide 3:
The widow of Zarephath’s story is found in 1 Kings 17:8-24.
Elijah was told to tell Ahab the king of Israel, “As the LORD, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, during these years there shall be no dew or rain except at my word (1 Kgs. 17:1).”
God then tells Elijah to hide “east of the Jordan” and eventually to move to Zarephath just outside the northern boarder of Israel in Sidon where God had chosen a widow to care for him. When he arrived at the entrance of the city, a widow was gathering sticks there; he called out to her, “Please bring me a small cupful of water to drink.”
Slide 4:
11? She left to get it, and he called out after her, “Please bring along a bit of bread.”
?12? “As the LORD, your God, lives,” she answered, “I have nothing baked; there is only a handful of flour in my jar and a little oil in my jug. Just now I was collecting a couple of sticks, to go in and prepare something for myself and my son; when we have eaten it, we shall die.” What must have been in the thoughts of this widow?
Both she and her son were starving to death.
No one cared enough for either of them to provide food.
She was probably very thin not only because she didn’t have much to eat but probably because as a mother she would have been giving most of what she had to her son.
Slide 5:
She probably felt like a failure not being able to provide for her son and was faced with watching him die the slow and agonizing death of starvation.
She felt she could no longer protect him, she couldn’t take care of him, she felt she had failed as a provider.
Now a stranger, and a Israelite not even a countryman, appears at the city gates and asks her to get him water and the last of her food. This destitute Gentile woman did what many in Israel, including the king, refused to do, she trusted and believed the prophet of the Lord.
Because of her faith both she and her son were saved from starvation but then the worst of all happened to this loving mother, her son died.
This heart broken the mother feels that her son was taken from her because of her past sins.
Slide 6:
Again, God provided her what she needed when she needed it.
She would be the first woman to see God’s power to raise the dead, which was done in response to Elijah’s prayers on behalf of the child.
She was a woman who endured extreme hardships but like so many women through out history she was saved by her faith.
Slide 7:
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