Elijah Raises the Widow’s Son

Children’s message:

God fed Elijah with ravens

God multiplied oil for widow and her son

God can take care of you even in really sad or scary times

Intro: 9/11

Context:

Wicked King Ahab and Jezebel - generations of wickedness and idolatry have caused God to put a curse of drought upon the land

Elijah was sent to announce that the drought was coming and he went away. King Ahab had people searching high and low for Elijah to try to get him to lift the curse of drought.

Elijah is fed by ravens & then by a widow who is about to starve

Widow had seen god miraculously provide for her and her son

3 Things today:

When Tragedy Strikes

Crying Out for Help

The Answer

1. When tragedy strikes

This woman lost the only thing/person she had left. Her husband and source of provision and protection was gone. Now her future was gone. Her family ended.

Why? Assumes God is judging her/punishing her/is cruelHave you ever felt like you lost all your past? Death of a loved oneYour future? Heartbreak? Divorce? Dreams? Expectations?We always ask “why?”

2. Crying out for help (prayer) (What to do?)

A prayer of panic/whining/weakness

Stretched himself over the boy 3 times (compare w/ Elisha resurrection in 2 Kings 4)

This was beyond Elijah’s ability to help

Do you need to be a great miracle working prophet like Elijah? (Here or later?)

A prayer to the right One/the True God

An appeal to God’s merciful character

Prayer:

i. The Lord commands us to pray (He initiates prayer with this command)

Exodus 20:7 ESV

“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

Isaiah 55:7 ESV

let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

ii. The Lord promises to hear those who cry out

Matthew 7:7–8 ESV

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

3. The Answer/the Help (From where does help come?)

The Lord answers Elijah’s prayer

Psalm 121:1–2 ESV

I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

God raised the widow’s son from the dead

God had promised to care for her and her son until the rain came

God graciously gave back the life of her son even when she blamed God for the tragedy (grace)

God created faith in her heart through this miracle. She now trusts the Word of the Lord.

Jesus raised a widow’s son by His own authority, by His Word

Luke 7:14–15 ESV

Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.

Jesus who is the resurrection and the life has overcome His own grave and the grave of all men.

John 11:25–26 ESV

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

Acts 2:24 ESV

God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.

Conclusion

When tragedy strikes.

Why? We don’t know the specifics. Sometimes our prayers don’t get answered in exactly the way we expect or in the timing we ask for.

Why? John 9 So that God may be glorified. That you get what you need and not necessarily what you want. That God would get to display his glory, give his grace and mercy, create faith in the hearts of sinners, and work his great plan of deliverance

God wanted this widow and her boy to not just have food until the famine ended, He wanted them to cry out to Him in prayer, to trust in Him, to believe His Word, and this receive His gift of salvation and eternal life.