A Story Still Being Told

When Elijah told King Ahab, "...there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word..."  (I Kings 17:1), the King likely dismissed both the prophet and the message as the rantings of a lunatic who had been in the sun too long.   Perhaps, he forgot about it for a time, but after the cisterns and wells which provided water at the palace started drying up, he surely remembered.  What we do know is that he did his best to find Elijah during those years, but Elijah was not in Israel.  He was in the Gentile region of Sidon living with the widow of Zarephath. 

 

When Elijah chose to reappear before the King, Ahab said, "Is it you, you troubler of Israel?"  (I Kings 17:17)  Maybe in the beginning, Ahab dismissed Elijah, but before it was over he came to understood that the prophet was a man of such power that he could cause the rain to be withheld turning the land into an unlivable place.  Elijah was no longer a man to be ridiculed, but a man of power.  Such it the only explanation for the prophet's safety in the presence of an antagonist who could have had him killed.  And, as the story continues to unfold it is not the King who dictates the future, but the man of God. 

Of course, what is clear to us as we read the story and what must have broken into the consciousness of King Ahab as a terrible thought was the reality of the power of the Lord.  What Ahab really feared was the God of Israel.   The power of God is more than just a amazing thing to consider.  It is beyond amazing that God takes ordinary people like you and me and then empowers them in such a way as to accomplish things which would be impossible if it was all about human strength and ingenuity.  Elijah was as flawed as the most of us, but God used him to write a story that is still being told.  Long after we are gone, our story of faithfulness will surely linger in the hearts and minds of those we have touched for the sake of Christ.