“When the Brook Runs Dry” by Matthew Everhard. 1 Kings 17: 1-16; Originally preached at Hudson Presbyterian Church on June 20th, 2004. Words: 2293
My message this morning is for those whose brook has run dry. If you’ve ever experienced lasting defeat; If you’ve ever had all that you’ve come to depend on taken away for a season; If you’ve ever had to endure a seemingly endless famine in your life—this message is for you. My goal is to bring you some hope. And I am especially preaching to you, if you are going through a significant period of drought in your spiritual life, when the Lord seems far from you, and His presence seems to be strangely absent. You’ve worshipped on the mountaintop before, but now you’ve been in the desert for weeks or months. If it’s easier to squeeze water out of a rock, than to find the words to pray-- I’m here to deliver a message of refreshment for you this morning.
Spiritual deserts: they are absolutely the most mysterious and difficult times of the Christian life, but they are essential for growth in the faith. In 1 Kings 17, all of Israel is in a spiritual drought. There has been 19 evil Kings reigning over God’s people in a row. And now the worst of them all, King Ahab has taken a strangle hold on God’s people Israel. An idol-serving, pagan worshipping disgrace. Even the priests have become corrupt—or they have flat out ran for their lives. And so to counteract the spiritual drought, God’s prophet Elijah calls for a physical drought. And even the famed prophet himself will have to be subject to it. Notice that not even dew formed in the morning!
Droughts and famines happen in every area of life. In baseball, it’s called a “slump.” And even the hall-of-famers have them. One time Mickey Mantle the all-time great went through a terrible slump that just seemed to drag on for game after game. One particular evening in the 1950’s he struck out in all three at bats. Disgraced, he sat down in the dugout, tossed his helmet to the dirt and put his head in his hands. Finally a young boy walked over to him. It was Tommy Bera, the son of the great manager Yogi Bera. Tommy tapped him on the knee, looked tenderly into his eyes and said—“You stink!”
Droughts happen in every area of life, but the spiritual droughts are the worst. When the brook runs dry in your soul, the easiest thing to do is to wrap yourself in the cocoon of despair and quit. But despairing and quitting are hardly ever the godly options. I want to look closely at this passage this morning because I do believe that it can reveal the keys to survival, when your life source evaporates.
First of all, we notice that God still has a plan for Elijah. Verse 2, “Then the Word of the Lord came to Elijah; ‘Leave here, and turn eastward and hide yourself by the wadi Cherith.’”
(Wadi): I did not know this: I admit that I had to look it up in the dictionary. But a “wadi” is a small body of water that does not appear, except during the rainy season. You know what that means? It means that God sustained Elijah by a brook of water that SHOULD NOT HAVE EVEN EXISTED AT THAT TIME! Could it be, that the dry spell that you are in right now has a solution that you didn’t even know was possible? You say you haven’t “felt” God’s presence much lately: Maybe God is even now giving you strength through a deep-running spring that you didn’t even know existed.
The drought isn’t Elijah’s fault. But Elijah is called to be obedient in the midst of it. You too may be called to obey during a drought that you have absolutely no power to control. But I want you to understand this: God never calls us to endure a situation that He Himself is not prepared to sustain us through.
(Ravens): But that’s not all. The oasis in dry season was a neat surprise, but notice also that God says, “I have ordered the ravens to feed you.” And guess what? It actually happened! “The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening” Can you believe that? The Ravens! The dark, dirty scavenging birds that the Law declared “unclean.” Usually ravens are greedy robbers, snatching up dirty tidbits from carcasses. But again God uses the most unlikely source to supply His prophet. Can you imagine the utter astonishment on Elijah’s face the first time these birds dropped off a T-bone steak at his feet?
But: just when things are starting to look up again for the prophet, one morning Elijah wakes up, bends down to wash his face in the brook—and the brook is gone. The miraculous brook that should have never been there in the first place has finally dried up along with the rest of the countryside.
Let me tell you, that this is the point in the spiritual cycle where most Christians get frustrated and lose hope—when God removes His manifest presence. It’s the most frustrating moment. It’s the darkest hour. It’s the most likely point for an emotional crash. God provided some morsels in the past, but now—nothing. It’s where most Christians say, “That’s it! I’ve taken this God-thing as far as it can go. I’ve given it my best shot. It worked for a while, this depending on God thing, but now I’ve got to rely on the one person that really never lets me down—me, myself, me.”
When the brook dries up—the real crisis point has arrived. There are really only two alternatives: We either persevere in the life of discipleship, or we turn to the natural alternative—the human path of self-preservation.
I remember when I was learning to ride a bike—remember that? Some wise person invented this strange set of extra wheels that you’d attach to your back wheel when you were learning. Training wheels! That’s Elijah at the brook of Cherith! He’s got the wadi holding up one side of his bike and the ravens holding the other side. He learns to ride like that for a while, but soon God says, “Alright Elijah, if you’re ready to really ride, lets get those training wheels off!” And so the brook dries up. And then there’s this moment when you’re learning to ride-- when your training wheels are off, and your father is running along side of you, holding you up with his hands…There has to be a point of release where your father takes off one hand and then the other-- and for that split second you realize you’re doing it! You’re riding!
And the learning curve has to be that way! There’s no other way! There has to be a point where God takes His hands off of us, because only then, can we demonstrate that the training He’s given us has sunk in. Only then can prove that we are authentically on the path of Christ-likeness. Listen: It’s not “faith” if God is standing in front of your eyes your whole life!
But I promise you this: When God appears to take His hand off of you to let you live by faith, He will absolutely, unquestionably, take you back into His arms soon.
Remember: seasons of drought and doubt are just that-- SEASONS. By nature they are temporary. They may be long, but they ALWAYS END. If God kept His hands off of Elijah too long, he would have surely died. But look what happens next. God speaks to him again in verse 8, “Now (I still got my eyes on you Elijah!) go to Zerephath (100 miles away), and live there; for I have commanded a widow there to feed you.” God has another divine plan for enduring the famine years.
(Widow): In God’s discipleship school, there’s always another advanced degree. If the brook of Cherith was a bachelor’s in faith, than Zerephath is a master’s in humility. Elijah must submit to rely on a poor, starving widow. I don’t have to remind you that in this ancient culture, the widows were often the lowest on the social order. The neglected. The downtrodden.
Hey, she has her own problems. She’s at the town gate, gathering wood. Even though she is old, she is doing this physical labor herself. We know she has a son to help her, but we find out later he is physically ill and near death.
And so this proud strong prophet who has faced off with a king is now forced to plead for food like a common beggar. The last thing that she needs is to increase her burden with a third mouth to feed. In verse 12 we are told she has only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. Her plan is to use these sticks she is gathering to make a fire to cook her own last meal and then die.
And yet again God jumps in and says, “I’m going to bring these three despairing people together to demonstrate my divine compassion!” And so by the widow’s blind obedience combined with the prophet’s faith, God uses one handful of flour and one jug of oil to miraculously support these three for months. As the Bible says “the jar of meal was not used up neither did the jug of oil fail, according to the Word of the Lord that he spoke to Elijah”.
Think back to your situation now. What is the famine in your land?
Maybe it is a financial drought. God has allowed a brook that you used to drink from every day to evaporate. Don’t you know that He who provided one source can instantly provide another? It may not come until He’s trimmed you down, removed your training wheels and refocused your life; you may even have to wait on the ravens, but He knows! He knows!
Maybe your famine is in a relationship. You didn’t believe that it could ever run dry, but now that it has, your losing hope. Maybe it’s time for you to go to Zerephath and learn Elijah’s lesson of humility. Maybe you are the one who needs to break down and be the beggar. Use that handful of faith! Use that jar of trust! They can’t be exhausted!
But my heart goes out most to those wandering in a spiritual desert. When we have strived to love the Lord Jesus with all of our hearts, nothing hurts more than when He must step back for a while. Please know this—you are not alone in your struggle. It’s the necessary cycle of growth.
· David Brainerd, a missionary to the Native Americans in the 1700’s was prone to intense battles with spiritual dehydration. In his journal Friday January 14, 1743 he wrote, “My spiritual conflicts today were unspeakably dreadful, heavier than the mountains and overflowing floods. I seemed inclosed in hell itself. I was deprived of all sense of God, even of the (existence) of a God…(BUT) this taught me the absolute dependence of a creature upon God the Creator, for every crumb of happiness…”
· David the great King and Psalmist walked through the valley of the Shadow of Death—BUT survived to say “Thou art with me.”
· The Lord Jesus Himself spent 40 days in the desert of temptation. He suffered spiritual agony and loneliness at the garden of Gethsemane and then again at the cross. He saved the world!
· The disciples spent three of the longest days in history in emotional and spiritual defeat after Jesus’ death. They had no idea a resurrection was coming.
You see that’s the amazing part about wilderness times. We have no idea, how or when God is going to display His brilliance in crafting our rescue! It’s like digging a tunnel through a mountain. You have no idea when the end will come until your pick strikes a beam of light!
God’s plans of rescue are better than any a novelist could devise! Imagine, a rainy-season wadi in the middle of a drought! A bunch of ravens dropping off hotdogs! A handful of flour and a half-pint of oil! The exciting part is you need the faith to use today’s blessing to make sure tomorrow’s comes! And it will.
He’s the God of unending abundance. The God of surprise endings. Trust Him. Rely on Him. Use up whatever faith you have and see if the jar, small as it may be, isn’t full again tomorrow!
God promises you the rain will come again! It came for Elijah too! I wish we could keep reading from 1 Kings 17 and 18 to see the resurrection that Elijah performs on the widow’s son, and his massive victory over the false-prophets of Baal. I guarantee if we could interview Elijah today he would have said he could not have launched these great victories if he had not learned to survive the famine first!
It doesn’t matter how small your jar, how desperate you situation, how deep your forest. It doesn’t matter how dry your land, how dark your night, how cold your relationship, how lonely your soul. It’s the cycle of faith. It the cycle of hope: after the drought, God always brings the rain!
(Let’s stand and sing)
