Mercy Doesn't Count

After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him.  And she said to Elijah, “What have you against me, O man of God? You have come to me to bring my sin to remembrance and to cause the death of my son!” – 1 Kings 17:17-18

This widow to whom Elijah had been sent lived in Zarephath, in the country of Sidon.  She may have been a righteous gentile believer in the God of Israel, but she was certainly not of the nation of Israel.  This is emphasized when the Lord Jesus uses her as an example alongside Naaman the Syrian leper as an example of an outsider who was chosen and blessed:  But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.  (Luke 4:25-26)

In the better known part of the widow’s story, she is down to her last cup of meal and her last bit of oil when the prophet arrives at her home.  She had gone out to gather sticks for a fire to prepare the last of her bread for herself and her son.  Then they were going to die.  Whether she meant they were resigned to dying of starvation or, perhaps, by more active means is not made clear.  In any case, Elijah asked her to feed him first, and her response of faith had resulted in supernatural provision for her household.

When her son fell ill and died, the widow’s grief caused her to regret her kindness in providing a place for Elijah.  Since she was an outsider, she may have felt inferior and unworthy of the goodness of God.  It reminds us of the children of Israel, freed from Egyptian bondage, complaining – so frequently – to Moses that God had brought them out into the desert to kill them.  I am no better.  I have done the same thing.  I suppose it must be the natural rebel in so many of us that wants to strike out against the one we perceive to be in authority.  When we face what appears to be an insurmountable obstacle, when we think ourselves beaten and humiliated, we ask why we ever tried to do better or have better.  We should have been content to accept the lower quality life of a reject and a slave.  Now our failures are exposed to ourselves and to the world. 

The widow had tried to do the right thing by trusting this word of God’s man.  She had acted against her natural inclinations.  All that had transpired in the interval between first seeing the prophet’s face and now, looking down at the cold, ashen face of her dead son, was compressed into a meaningless lump.  All that mattered was that her boy was gone and God’s representative remained. 

Her sins had not been forgiven and covered.  The Lord had exacted His retribution. 

The truth was, though, that the Lord had sent Elijah not to punish but to deliver.  His presence had already extended both her life and that of her son.  He had saved them from a lingering death by starvation.  Apart from that, had they survived by some other means, there is no reason to think that the son might not have fallen ill under other circumstances.  He lived only because Elijah was present.

Then he stretched himself upon the child three times and cried to the Lord, “O Lord my God, let this child's life come into him again.”  And the Lord listened to the voice of Elijah. And the life of the child came into him again, and he revived.  And Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper chamber into the house and delivered him to his mother. And Elijah said, “See, your son lives.”  And the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”   (1 Kings 17:21-24)

We should never think that God’s mercy is overextended.  Lamentations 3:22-23 reminds us that even in the worst of situations, The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 

God has brought me out of some dark pits.  Much of it was my own fault.  I would get sick and tired of pulling the same stupid lamb out of one hole after another.  Mercy, though, does not keep a tally.  While the Lord does not encourage us to jump off cliffs, He never seems to tire of pulling us out when we are in over our heads, no matter how stupid we were in getting ourselves there.  

 I do wonder sometimes, though, if a person can get tired of being pulled out.