to be together in the Word of God this evening. Did you all receive one of the front back handouts that were given as you came in? Does everybody have one of those? I'm going to invite you into the passage we're going to be looking at. We're going to look in 1 Kings chapter 17 this evening. Have you ever heard the story of a man named Charlie Steinmetz? Does that name strike anybody's familiarity? I graduated in the area of science from the University of Minnesota. I did not become a believer until I was in my fourth year of a five-year program there in chemical engineering. when I became a believer. But along the way, we had to study as engineers, even in the realm of electrical engineering for a semester or two. And I remember coming across the name Charlie Steinmetz. It didn't mean that much to me. And then a few years later, when I was pastoring, I came across the story of his life. Let me tell you a little bit about Charlie Steinmetz and a little bit about his expertise. Charlie Steinmetz was a dwarf. and rather pathetically deformed. Many people felt sorry for Charlie, but by and by he began to realize that God had given him a mind that was far superior to his body. And this little man, who had been pitied by many and feared by some because of his appearance, began to develop his mind until he became ultimately one of the greatest minds in the 20th century in the field of electricity. Henry Ford realized this. He had met Charlie on a cross-ocean to Europe ocean liner trip. He had met him and got to know him. And when Henry Ford was building his auto plant in Dearborn, Michigan, he hired Charlie Steinmetz to build the generators. Charlie designed them, built them, and then stood back in great delight, even though he was small in stature, and watched them whirl and move that great auto plant into one of the greatest factories in the history of America. One occasion, the generators ground to a halt. For some reason, Ford's repairmen, as fast and as hard as they worked, could not find the problem and get the generators to work again. So the assembly line was shut down. Ford then contacted Steinmetz, who came back. Charlie puttered around for a few hours and then through the master switch, everything lit up, the machinery rolled again, and he walked away. A few days later, Charlie Steinmetz sent the bill to Henry Ford. The bill was for $10,000, a lot of money in that time. Now Henry Ford, although he was eminently wealthy, was a tight-fisted man. He returned the bill unpaid with a note attached. Charlie, isn't this bill a little bit too high for just a few hours of tinkering around on those motors? Steinmetz returned the bill back to Ford. This time the bill was attached with his note. For tinkering around on the motors, $10. For knowing where to tinker, $9,990. The bill is still due, Mr. Ford. Henry Ford paid the bill. I've always liked that story. But there's a truth in there, and that is if I live to be a hundred and fifty years old, which won't happen, I will never be amazed any more than I am every day of my life. How the Lord just seems to know where to tinker in our lives. Sometimes it seems things bring us to a halt. and then God drives us into the Word of God and after a few hours he can throw again the master switch and move us back into action. Can't he? And that's what we're going to see this evening. We're going to be dealing with a theme. Remember, we're dealing with relationship matters in this conference. It's been a while since you've been able to have a conference in a facility and all, and so we're doing that. But we're starting off and doing one on relationship matters with the Lord. Knowing our God better than i hope we had before yesterday morning about how much our god loves us and not missing what he's about last evening then Knowing Him that well, how do we in turn love Him? This evening, we're going to talk about trusting our Lord no matter what, in a phrase that I'm going to call, in the crucible of God. He puts all of us there. Listen to what one preacher says. Swindoll, in one of his books, writes that people often ask, how do you face one crisis after another? As you walk through life, you soon discover that life's trials often come back to back, don't they? And he writes, if you walk with the Lord long enough, you will discover that His tests often come back-to-back. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say, back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back. Usually, His preparatory tests don't stop with one or two, they multiply. As soon as you climb out of one crucible thinking, okay, I've made it out of that one, you're plunged into another one. You know what, when you began the Christian life, and you were told, well, the idea found in Hebrews chapter 11, wherefore seeing we are encompassed by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every what? Sin and weight that does so easily beset us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, doesn't it? Who, and then it goes on to describe Him in verse three. But what is interesting is, let us run with patience or endurance the race that is set before us. You do know that that word race in the Greek, in our letters, is spelled A-G-O-N, long E, or we would pronounce it Y. And life seems like a marathon, isn't it? Not a sprint that we would describe as an agony. It's difficult, isn't it? That's the phrase that's used there. Let's talk this evening about living the Christian life. When you became a believer, and often times we hear these false promises, receive Christ, everything will be fine. No, everything's going to be different, alright? And it's going to be wonderful. The whole while, no one ever told us we're going to become alien strangers, pilgrims in this life, but that is it, because our citizenship is in heaven, isn't it? But when, it's a good thing when you're first a believer and you're being discipled and mentored, they don't pull the curtain back and show you your whole life, okay? You get to take this one, like we use the expression, you get to eat this elephant a bite at a time. Because if they pull the curtain back and showed you the whole deal, most of us would have stopped and then said, I don't think so. Because life is not going to be easy for us. It's going to be and feel like the crucible. So with that in mind, I'm going to take us to 1 Kings chapter 17. We're going to talk about those unexpected detours that catch us and our faith off guard and we're going to learn again from God's Word about facing difficulties in life. And the key tonight is not about the difficulties, it's going to be about trusting the Lord, alright? And I'm going to send these back if folks come in and we might want to put these on the back so that they can get one of the handouts to follow. Because in the introduction we're going to spend a couple of minutes to do a little theologizing if we may. I had the privilege today of teaching a theology class in seminary for three hours and so I'm in the theology mood. So we're going to do a little bit of that. And we're going to put this back in context. If we've learned one thing yesterday, it's dealing with context and understanding some of the historical context. 1 Kings chapter 17. We're introduced to an interesting character, and his name is Elijah. No doubt you've heard a lot of messages on Elijah, the Tishbite, comes from across the jordan rift area from the region known as gilead we would say today and towards the area of modern jordan and we see in verse one now elijah the tishbite of tishba and gilead said to ahab who had been the king And we're going to learn Elijah is confronting one of the worst kings in Israel's history, a man named Elijah, I mean a king named Ahab. If you remember the nation of Israel, of the twelve tribes had actually split into the southern two tribes and the ten northern tribes. The ten northern tribes becoming known as the nation of Israel. Southern two becoming known as the nation of Judah. There were nineteen kings of the north and nineteen kings of the south. During those eras of those two separate nations there was not one righteous king of the north not a one There would be three righteous kings of the south But the nation of the north will never follow God, those 10 tribes. And finally, in 722, they are carried off by the Assyrians into the Diaspora. They're scattered. One of the worst kings is a man named Ahab. You may not know him real well. You know his dear wife. Her name is Jezebel. Which pretty much summarizes not only their marriage, but the condition of the nation. God had made a promise to the nation of Israel. How many of you have had an opportunity to go and study or be over a visit to or in Israel ever? If you ever get an opportunity, Dr. Doug Bookman at the seminary in Cary, at Shepherd Seminary, has studied over there, been over there, set up study tours, but also set up study programs. Probably spent some 40 trips there, makes about four a year now. And it's a wonderful opportunity to study. One of the things, if you ever went with him, and I lived over there for a while and did some studying in the American Institute, now the American University over there. And when we live there, the one thing you'll notice in Israel is, first of all, it's location. When you have Egypt here, and I'm going to illustrate now, this is the Mediterranean Sea, okay? And Europe is, Italy is over here. This is the boot. So if I put my foot there, that's Italy. Spain off there. We come over to Greece. And then we come to the region of Turkey and all here. So you have the Mediterranean Sea. And then as you move over, you're going to start moving into the nations that we would call Turkey. And then we're going to get in towards Pakistan. Over here between here is Iraq and Iran. Pakistan and India and then China. If you want to come from that part of the world and go down to North Africa and the breadbasket of the world at that time, which is Egypt, the highway would take you across and through a small country, a sliver of a land alongside the Mediterranean called what? Israel. It's a dirt road. And if you tried to go around it, you'd have to go through the Arabian Desert, where in all likelihood you'd perish. So God's going to put right on the intersection where all the traffic, it's going to be sort of coming down at Times Square in New York. Okay? Sort of a hub of a city. Does that make sense? And I think a good place to put you where you can pass out tracks is right there. Okay? And so God puts his chosen people, I'm going to put you right there. Your whole life is a living tract. And everybody coming through, we're going to spread this good news about me to the whole world. That was their mission. They were to be a light to the Gentiles. Make sense? And you're going, as my people, now they took that my people the wrong way. Hey, we've got something nobody else has. God's on our side. And we're not going to share that with anybody. That's how they thought of themselves. And their pride really went to their head, didn't it? I mean, all you have to do is ask a Jonah. You need to go and share the good news. I'm not going to them. They were to live on that highway. Now, remember when the spies went into the land, the land that flows with milk and honey? only if God's blessing is on them. In Deuteronomy 11 and in Deuteronomy 28, God told the people, as long as you follow me, I'll make the land to prosper and I will keep you in the land. And when you do not follow me, I will take you out of the land and I will dry the land. I will withhold the rain. Literally, the land is on limestone. Eocene limestone. Holds no moisture. Okay? intentionally. It's one of the things when you go over to study, you study the geography of the land and you realize this is a shallow limestone, it'll dry up. Elijah comes before the king who has turned to follow pagan religion and he says, it will not rain. He claims the promises of Deuteronomy 11, follow along. He said to Ahab, the king is the Lord, the God of Israel lives before whom I stand, there shall neither be dew nor rain these years except by my word. He is there commissioned by God to bring that warning. And the word of the Lord came to him saying, depart from here, turn eastward, hide yourself by the brook Kareth, which is east of the Jordan, and you shall drink of the brook. And notice what else he says, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there. So he went and did according to the word of the Lord. He went and lived by the brook Kareth, which is east of Jordan. And the ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening. And he drank by the brook. Now, so as you notice here, he pronounces the drought exactly according to the formula of Deuteronomy 11 or Deuteronomy 28. And a famine will come upon the land. And how long will the drought last? For years. And he follows then the command of God, does what Elijah does now, what God told him to do, to survive. And he will go by a brook, and there in a cave, near this wadi, w-a-d-i, which is that Hebrew word for this inner ravine, small cut of creek, we would call it. He's there and God then brings to him, miraculously, food delivered by these ravens. These birds that will bring sustenance. Can't imagine it was very tantalizing when it's brought to him, but that's what it is, okay? It's roadkill, alright? And they're bringing him roadkill. And so, he's there. Then something happens. And after a while, the brook dried up because there was no rain in the land. Now, don't miss verse 7, that part of verse 7. What's important to learn here is, he's going to learn his very first lesson. You see, he's going to learn how to trust God. You see, the same God who he was obeying, that he had prayed to God Make your name honorable and holy again before this pagan nation. Israel that has turned to follow pagan gods. And he prayed that God would honor his holy name and claim the promises of drying it up. And God honored Elijah's prayer and sent him to deliver the message. There's something interesting here. The same God who gave water when he was at the brook now dries it up. And it's a direct result of Elijah's own prayer. Think about that for a moment. His suffering was a result of his own request. He prayed, I didn't mean on me. But that's what happens to him. By the way, a dried up brook in your life is often the result of God's pleasure, not his disappointment or punishment. And so now something happens. And by the way, the word kareth is interesting in the Hebrew, not to make word plays too much, but it means to cut off or to whittle down, to file away at something. And during this time, God essentially had cut off Elijah, removed him from all the involvements now of what he probably had anticipated would be his prophetic ministry. And he takes him then to this cut off, hidden life, sort of out of the action for a period of time. And that's going to be important for Elijah to learn something there about you're not going to be in the front. You're going to be sort of cut off for a while. and then something happens. Then the word of the Lord came to him. And what I'm doing in this series is sort of taking a passage now. When you and I think of Elijah, we think of calling down the fire from heaven, slaying the prophets of Baal, the pronouncement by Elijah. I'm going to take you into one of the pericopes, those paragraphs, thought units in verses 8 and following now through about verse 17. And it's one of those sort of tucked away passages that we don't spend a lot of time on, but is probably one of the, you better get this lesson before you move any further. Okay? Because I think it's really one of the hidden gems in the life of Elijah that's going to prepare him for everything else. I don't want us to look at some of the action passages in this study because the action passages are what your pastor is going to be preaching. You know what I mean by the action passages? I want you to see in order to tackle some of those, you first of all have to do, well, let's deepen our relationship with God, okay? And then we're ready for the action. And that's what this one's about. He says in verse 8, After weeks, months of staying by the brook Kerith, the word of the Lord came to him there, now when he has nothing to eat and nothing to drink. Arise, command one, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Zidon, and dwell there. Okay? I want you to stop and notice with me something before we go any further. God is going to say to Elijah a threefold command. He's going to say, I want you to rise and go to this place that is known as Zarephath. Now, Zarephath, and if you have it on your notes, is an interesting, interesting place to go. First of all, that word Zarephath, Zaraptah, how to just catch Elijah's attention. You see, it means to smelt. It means to melt. Or you and I would use the phrase refine, to refine something. The verb form is used in Judges 7 in the idea of to test, to melt down, to test. The noun form is the word crucible. Okay? I'm taking you into the crucible. Go there. It was probably some kind of a smelting operation. Some commercial smelting operation there. But God had a different kind of smelting operation to refine Elijah. Does God use that kind of imagery in Scripture? Yes, He does. I'm sure you know the idea of, it says in 1 Peter 1, verse 6, listen as I read these verses. In this you should rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, knowing that the God has tested the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, and that you may be found to be resulting in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. It's the ESV of Way saying that, what, count it all joy, as in James 1-2, when you fall into various, what, trials or temptations. And the word trial, testing, and it means to be approved, to test, to try, silver or gold. When I was in college, after I'd gotten out of the service, just before I started my school, I went to work, and while I was in college, I worked back in Minnesota for a company, Voight Plumbing and Heating, We did major construction. I operated a backhoe. Are you familiar with a crawler hoe? And it was on tracks and I operated one of those for several years. And as I did that in my college years, I was debating whether I was going to go to medical school or be a crane operator. Crane operators made a lot more money, and in Minnesota, you only had to work six months, and then you could go ice fishing and hunting. And I wanted to go on to become an oral surgeon. That's why I did chemical engineering. And I started dental school, but then got called to the ministry, I felt. But the problem with the crane operator and then operating heavy equipment, six months, earned the same amount of money. That's how the unsaved world thinks, okay? And I was doing it. But, let's go. Meanwhile, back at the ranch. My dad had owned an auto dealership in a garage. And during my high school years, one of my jobs every day after school was to install tires, Michelin tires on automobiles and balance them. I would do that every afternoon from four o'clock till nine in the evening, weekdays. And when you'd bale them, we had these, it was called an alamite balancer, you spin the tires and you bring it up to a real high speed and you can measure the balance and you put tire weights on. Tire weights are made of lead, okay. And my boss, later on, when I was doing plumbing, said, Dave, my dad, Larry, what does he do with those tire weights? And we'd have buckets of these things, five-gallon buckets full of them. I said, we just throw them. We give them to one of the tire companies that comes and pick them up and get them out of here, give them away free. He says, well, if you don't mind, I would like to take those and repurpose them. Now, when I operate and we put in pipelines, and I had a crew where I was in charge of digging and then lowering equipment and installing pipelines, but on really rainy days, what I would do is indoor plumbing. And in Minnesota, a lot of the houses, barns, and whatnot, and farmyards, used to have cast iron pipe. And then you'd put cast iron pipe together and you'd pack what looked like a rope around them, it's called oakum, and you'd stick that in. Then what I needed to do to seal that joint is I would take what we called a crucible. It's a cast iron pot and I didn't always have thermocouples so what I would do is take an acetylene torch or a torch and I would flash it, I'd heat it and then what I would do with the acetylene is I would heat that crucible of cast iron, and I would take these dirty tire weights off of a car, and they had grease and dirt and everything else, and I'd just dump them in this crucible. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to melt the lead so that I can pour it and seal up that pipe fitting. Make sense? Now my boss Frank said, so how do you tell when it's ready? He said, well, here's what you do. You heat it up, and you take a ladle. Okay, and then we had a flat ladle too. And you take that and then he says as the stuff comes and bubbles up, he said that metal is going to melt. And he says as that bubbles up it brings all that dirt and road grime off of it. And you take that ladle and you scrape off the top. and you just keep heating it up, and it'll keep bubbling, and it'll be gray, and then as you take that top skim off the top, just throw it away, get all those impurities out of there, and then you're going to see something. He says, after a little while, it's suddenly going to turn and look exactly like a mirror, just like silver. and it'll be exactly like a mirror surface, and you're going to see yourself. Don't get too close to it because it's hot, but you're going to see your reflection, and when you see yourself in it, it's ready to use. Now, in Bible times, that's what they did with gold and silver. They heated it up and put it in a crucible until God could see his reflection of you in it. Then he turns the heat off. Does that make sense? Putting us in the crucible until he can see himself in us. By the way, in James 1, and when it is approved, They used to take clay pots, okay? And they would take a clay pot, just like you do when you do ceramics, and you put it in heat. And we have found shards, broken portions of clay pots. And on the bottom, it will be inscribed the Greek word dokamas, okay? And it means approved. It means tried by fire and approved. Okay? It means it didn't crack when it went through the fire. It didn't break down. It retained its integrity. See? And God says, approved on us. That's what He's doing to Elijah. Okay? The crucibles, the testing, the trials, counted all joy when you what? Fall into Him. It doesn't say if, it says, in every one of our lives. Now, the problem is, that doesn't seem to be how it happens in my life, you say. Ah, listen. What we're gonna see in 1st Kings 17 is that you and I can go through trials and come through victoriously. God meant it that way, all right? He wants you to get an A. I'm a professor in theology, class full of students this week. Today was my final class, next week's their final day of the semester, next week's their final exam. My intention when they started that class is every student gets an A. If they do what I tell them to do through it, they will get an A. All right? And I tell them that at the beginning, and they're going, yeah, right. And I go, I'm the teacher. I can give out any A I want to. OK? And you understand what I'm saying. I'm joking with them. But the bottom line is, I have no intention of anyone failing. Because it's a reflection on me, too, isn't it? That's what God is doing in our lives. He wants to test us and give us all what? A's. So it's a reflection on Him. You can come through when you realize four lessons. Okay? So let's hurry. If you learned one thing yesterday, I can preach all night, alright? Or all day. And we don't have all night or all day. Whoops! We don't have very long. Anyway, let's hurry through this, alright? Here are the four lessons. You will come through a trial, whatever it is, for God, when you realize you are there, number one, by God's leading. Okay? You are there by God's leading. I'm going to call it divine appointment, but God's leading. And then I'm going to go back to verses 8 and 9. What a comfort it must have been at Kareth, God taking care of him, knowing he's in the middle of God's will. Comforting also to read, then the word of the Lord came to him. By the way, don't forget, God knows where we are, even sometimes when we feel like we've been cut off and set aside. That's not the case. Sometimes we feel God has forgotten us, but He comes to Elijah and says, Go, and then stay. Threefold command. Two things occur when you are facing the leading of God in your life. Go to Zarephath, into the crucible. Two things. First of all, we may experience initial shock over God's leading. I want you to go back with me for a moment to verse 8 and 9. you may experience initial shock. Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Zidon, and dwell there." As you look at that, the initial shock must have hit Elijah smack in the face. Why Zarephath? First of all, it's outside of Israel. It's between Tyre and Zidon. In order to go there, He's going to have to secondly leave and walk cross country 75 miles outside of what we would know the safety of Israel. And you're going to learn later on in chapter 18 that Ahab and all of his minions are looking for Elijah. Blaming him, the troublemaker, he will call him for what he has brought on the nation. Oh Ahab, it's you and what you have done in your heart turning from God. But no, they're blaming God's man for this famine and this drought and the death that they see. You know what's worse about this? Go to Zarephath. Do you remember that lovely woman Jezebel? Do you know what her hometown is? Zarephath. okay so when you talk about going into the crucible you're talking about well that's really the pan you're asking me not only go in the pan but possibly even jump into the fire alright and so he's going to have to leave the comfort and safety but think of the shock that Elijah will hearing that he will say behold I have commanded a widow there to feed you God was taking care of him divinely. And now man, behemoth of a man as it were, he is Elijah the Tishbite, coming across from the region of Gilead. Do you know what those from Gilead look like? Do you remember the description of John the Baptist? His hair is long and unkempt. He wears what they call a leather girdle. In other words, leather. He is covered in what we would call animal skins, and he wears a leather belt, probably barefooted, and he lives off the land, in a region you and I couldn't even survive, and that's where he lives. And like Elijah, who probably, like John the Baptist, ate locusts, honey, bugs, snakes, and other things, that's what this man does. This is a man who's going to now walk 75 miles, hasn't eaten in days, and hasn't drank water. And he's going to go cross country, thinking nothing to walk 75 miles. And when you get there, you're going to be taken care of, not by a husband and wife, you're going to be taken care of by a widow woman. Really. Now keep in mind, A widow woman in that day is virtually what? Helpless. Helpless. She has no way to make a living in that economy. All right? They didn't have jobs for women in that day. The questions that must have rolled through his mind in the multiples. And God didn't say, I have commanded you to go to Zarephath so that you might take care of and provide for this poor widow woman there, who's in real need and in distress. That's what I think would have gone through his mind. That is not what the command was. I have a widow woman who's going to take care of you. talk about humbling. Some of God's greatest appointments require a real humbling of ourselves, don't they? I really hesitate to use another illustration of me. I'd rather use illustrations about others or you, okay? Because this isn't about me. But look, can I tell you a story that happened to me? Okay. So, I finished my degree at the University of Minnesota as an engineer. I had started seminary, but the seminary that I started in Minneapolis, Central Baptist Seminary, many of my professors came out to Pennsylvania to start a new seminary. They transferred out to the Philadelphia Valley Forge area and began Calvary Baptist Seminary, where I would a few years later graduate with my Master of Divinity degree. While I was back at the University of Minnesota, the companies that came and interviewed us as engineers were places like GlaxoSmithKline, Merck Sharp Dome, and the list of companies went on and on and on. A lot of them would eventually establish their headquarters in what became known as the Triangle Region of Pitt. of North Carolina. And others then would have theirs up in the Philadelphia Valley Forge area, many of the pharmaceuticals, it was kind of there. And so chemical engineering, I thought, I won't have any problem finding a job when I move out to that area, Lansdale, Pennsylvania. There shouldn't be any problem. So we moved, and when we moved, I couldn't find a job. Nobody hired what we would call second shift or night shift engineers. Seminary was through the day. I didn't have a job. Lucy and I, and I had my son, Philip, was born at that point, and he's just an under two year old, but I have no income, and I have tuition, and I have no money. And so I went job hunting, and when I say I went out looking for jobs as the seminary began, every day, all day long after classes, and we would love to hire you if you could work during the day. I can't work through the day. I could not find a job. A friend of mine who was also a seminarian, his name is Doug, Doug Niner, pastor's now in Massachusetts. Doug and I had been friends back in Minnesota. And he too had come out, but he had a job. And he had a job at what was known as Hatfield Meatpacking, Lighty Meats, okay? Hatfield Meatpacking sells meat up and down, you know, the eastern seaboard. It's a large pig plant. Pig slaughterhouse plant. So I got a job working the night shift at Hatfield Meats. Not butchering. We were the cleanup crew of this large meat packing plant. Most of the men who worked there were unbelievers. And then there were a few of us seminarians and our job was to clean the place up during the night shift. so in the morning at five o'clock it's ready to go. I was given two jobs. One was I was in charge of a high-pressure hose, really high-pressure hose, to clean the runway. As the pigs walk in, then, and they know they're dying or something bad's gonna happen to them, the runway's not a pretty place. And so my job is to take that hose all through the night and wash the runway, okay? Now, the guy, a lot of them, and you know, When you butcher pegs, there's a lot of the fun, not fun stuff to look at, okay? Like these long worms that are in the, you know, and so they would take those tapeworms and things like that and they would throw, hey Bible boys, you know, and they would throw them and it's like, whoa, this is not what an engineer should be doing. Especially one who would start a dental school and, you know, this is not cool. And, you know, and they would throw, sometimes you'd get this mucky thing and it's, you know, it's actually brains on you, you know. That happened to us, literally. Okay, now, standing before you is not a giant of a man. Okay? I'm standing 5 foot 6 and a half inches tall when I do this, alright? And in seminary I weighed a little bit less than I do now, about 30 pounds. As a result of being big in stature, I fit in something nobody else did. Okay? When the pigs walk through and they put them to death, they bleed them out. And the blood coagulates into this huge vat, which is a drum, big stainless steel drum, about the size of that bathroom. And you come in from the top, and it's about that big of a room. Yeah, it's just about that size. And there's a hole in it. Kind of feels like going down into a tank turret or something like that. Somebody's got to go in there and clean that thing out. And then flush it out the bottom. And it's full of dried, not dried, it's jellied blood. And it's in a pretty place. I fit in there, okay, and could get down in there. So I'm doing this day after day for several weeks, and it gets to you. It's pretty demeaning. And I remember praying one morning about 2 a.m., and I'm crying. I'm a grown man in my mid-twenties, and I'm crying. I mean, I'm crying. going, what have I been reduced to? I mean, what are you doing to me, God? I prayed those kind of prayers. What are you doing to me? Now, stand there holding that hose, doing this, this isn't I didn't study statistical thermodynamics and balance Bernoulli equations on fluid flow dynamics so I can be doing this. What is this? The thought hit me as if the Lord just impressed upon my heart. I don't hear voices and you shouldn't be either. But the Lord drove home a thought. Who do you think you are? There's going to be men in your church and women in your church that this is what they do for a living. And they're going to be tithing and praising God for these jobs. And you think you're better than this? You're not even fit to pastor if you think the way you're thinking. I decided right then and there that God's teaching me a lesson no matter what you do, where you are, God knows, and whatever you do, you should really do it, because He gave you that. You ought to do it to the glory of God. And I decided, this isn't a very noble job, but I'm going to have the cleanest runway in the pig-killing world, okay? And there's nothing noble about me, but there's a pretty good lesson there, because mine's no different than Elijah's. It's like, you've got to be kidding. Go to Zarephath, into a crucible. God's trying to teach Elijah something about humility. that Elijah, it's not you, it's God's doing something to you, through you, so that ultimately you can do something for the glory of God. Amen? In all of our lives. So that takes us to this, that is, we will experience initial shock over God's leading. It's not what we thought it would be. Why? But then, B, we must realize God has a purpose in His leading. A purpose in His leading. I have commanded a woman there to feed you, to sustain you, is literally the term, to take care of you in the Hebrew. The idea here is, now you will have room to hide. There will be coastal water nearby. Things that can never happen in the desert. you will be taken care of. But God may have had another purpose in mind. To get him moving from that cut off, sequestered, secret world where he felt safe in a cave, where he was out of circulation as it were, 17th century England. Cromwell is in charge of the treasury, okay? And as Lord Protector of the Kingdom, as it were, Oliver Cromwell is responsible for what you and I would today call the Secretary of the Treasury. During that time, England is suffering from something very, very severe, and that is there is a shortage of silver and gold in the nation. Cromwell devises a plan. And that is, he sends his men. They have been taxing the people enough. So he will send the people, his troops throughout the kingdom to locate silver, to locate gold. They come back to Oliver Cromwell with these words. Sir, we have gone throughout the kingdom and we have found no silver. The only silver, the only gold we have found. is the statues, the coating, and the statues that are in the cathedral. Cromwell's reply is, go bring me those saints. We will melt them down and put them back into circulation. There's something very intriguing about all that. Too often you and I are standing idle on the side, sometimes even collecting dust. Sometimes you say, well, I'll leave that to the younger people, I'll let them do that. God hasn't taken us home yet, meaning He's not done with us at any age, right? We're never too young, we're never too old. Sometimes we sit idle and He has to put us in crucibles to do what? do some smelting, some melting to do what? To re-coinage us and put us back into circulation where we're really profitable again. So we are there by God's leading, alright? But we are there also under God's training, verse 10. Notice, So he arose and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a woman was there gathering sticks. And he called her and said, Bring me a little water and a vessel that I may drink. Do you see this? So what he does, he is under God's training. Now listen, like we said earlier, circumstances are like tests. God's planning for Elijah to get an A in this course. But in order to do so, he's going to have to learn two lessons when we are under God's training. The first is this, don't be overcome by first impressions. Don't be overcome by first impressions. You and I have experienced that. You've made a move. You've gone to a new location. You bought a new home. You've done something. You bought a new car, whatever it was. And you thought, when I get this, it's going to be great. So as we said, when we moved to Lansdale, and now you go back to that illustration, that was one of my first big steps ever for God. We come to unload the truck right there near the seminary in this big, large apartment complex. I'd never seen roaches before. The day we move in, we had hot and cold running roaches! Okay? And they were the hugest, biggest things I'd ever seen. But the day we moved in, I thought we were moving in, and we'd found the thing through some friends, some contacts. We're unloading the truck, and we're about ready to move in. We pulled in with the truck, and I'm walking up to the apartment, and there, sitting on the steps, going up, are a group of guys. And back then, tattoos are much more popular today. People didn't have tattoos in the mid-70s. I saw guys all tattooed up. and one of them's flicking a knife. Hey, man, how you doing? And it's like, I'm moving into this. All right. First impressions sometimes have a way of unnerving you, don't you? Experience that that's what Elijah is going through as he does this he think about this after walking 75 miles towards Jezebel's hometown He must have thought when I get there if God took care of me like he did at Kareth I can't wait to see what's in store here So now he encounters and he meets the widow woman and thinking, God told me she was going to sustain us. He finds out she's got what? Nothing. Nada, nine, nothing. Okay. He says, fetch me a little water. And then he says, called her, bring me a morsel of bread in your hand. And she said, as the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. And now I am gathering a couple of sticks that I may go in and prepare it for myself and my son, next class, so that we may eat it and die, okay? It's like, what? I mean, you think you've got it bad, he just walked, seriously, he hasn't had any water to drink over 75 miles and no food to eat. Thinking, I'm going to at least have provision better than road kill, flown in bird meat from dead animals. She doesn't even have that. There is no roadkill. His first impression when this is happening to him is, I must have misunderstood the commands of God. I must have interpreted what God directed me to do wrongly. I must be misreading the Word of God. This is wrong. Somewhere I took a turn. The shock of the crucible when we felt secure, settled in our homes, our jobs, our finances. It's almost, you know, back at Kareth, in this routine, that you can get along without God. And then He interrupts and says, this is what I'm showing you through My Word that you need to do. You need to trust Me." As one commentator describes it, have you ever been blindsided by first impressions? Have you ever made plans for going to a new school? Or moving to a new town to take a new job? Or taking on new challenges? Then suddenly it's different than you had planned, but it's not only different, everything is worse, he writes. The Crucible. So, as we said a moment ago in this, don't be overcome by first impressions. God's actually taking you through a lesson. In other words, seek to gain the most from the situation. I just read verses 10 and 11. He speaks to her. She says, we are about to die. Seek to gain the most from the situation. How? Well, first of all, don't become discouraged. Continue to walk with the Lord. It was a bleak, disheartening sight. Elijah could have turned, walked away, run, but he didn't. In the notes that I've given you, did I put there Hebrews 11 to reference Hebrews 11 verses 8 through? We're not going to have time. Time's running out. I'm going to give you a lesson real quickly in what I call the principle of satisfaction. Would you please read this at a later time? In Hebrews chapter 11, tomorrow night we're going to be speaking about a character in Hebrews chapter 11, but not this one. This is Father Abraham from Genesis chapter 12 and following. Okay? Abraham had lived in Ur of the Chaldees. When Abraham was in his seventies, God spoke to him. Leave Ur of the Chaldees. And I want you to go to a land. We will call it the Promised Land. And he will leave Ur of the Chaldees with his father and they will travel. It'll take many years and along the way his father will pass. He will take his nephew Lot with them. Eventually they will come to the promised land. When Abraham gets to the place of promise that was God's directed place for him and when he was there he still looked for a city whose builder and maker was God. Later on, you'll read in Hebrews, these all died in faith, not having received the promises, but they counted him faithful. When Abraham got to the place that God had said was the promised land, and he's standing in it there, he's looking at it, looking around, and he's still looking for a city with God as the maker. So the student leaves and goes to Bible college. A person sells everything they have, and the couple moves as missionaries following God. And they come, whether it be to the Dominican Republic, or Zimbabwe, South Africa, or Uruguay, or Argentina. We are in the place that God wants us to be. We moved to a new location as a church, we're sitting here and we're still kind of, well, it's different than we expected. In our life repeatedly, if I just had this job. If I just, as a missionary says, if maybe we need to come off the field and become a college teacher. The college teacher says, maybe if I would become a pastor. The pastor says, maybe if I became an evangelist. The evangelist says, maybe I should become a missionary. And we all think, if it was just something else. Here's a lesson. The college student, the seminarian, when I get my first church, he's in his first church and the average pastor then lasts 3.3 years. I'll find another ministry." And he lasts a couple years and they move on. Paul would say, I have learned whatever state I am in, therewith to be, say it with me, content. He did not say satisfied. You will never, as long as you have the Holy Spirit of God in you, and you do tabernacle the Holy Spirit of God. As long as the Holy Spirit of God is in you, the whole time that you live this life, you are going to feel like an alien stranger, a pilgrim, because we are not home. We will never be satisfied till we are in the presence of God. never, ever a day in our life. Therefore, we learn whatever state we are in. It doesn't mean North Carolina, okay, or Pennsylvania or Michigan. It means whatever situation in life I have learned therewith to be content. Okay? Because what? That's the life. The principle of satisfaction. Does that make sense? And that's why, if only this would pass, if only, and then church, if only our church was like. We'll find a different church. You know what? This is church. This is not the new Jerusalem. This is church. And church is made up of sinners. And so, Well, it's like our church has a lot of sinners in it. Yep. Yep. And that's what we are. Sinners saved by grace. And we have learned whatever state we're in, to be what? To be content. a great lesson for us to learn from Elijah and realize that God wants to meet our needs under the most adverse situations so instead of dwelling then on no food Elijah is going to use it as an opportunity to display God's faithfulness because God had given him a promise I have there a widow woman to sustain thee okay God keeps his word something sensational is going to come forth from this. And he's going to use it to display God's greatness, which means then, thirdly, we are there, not only by God's leading, not only under God's training, but we are there, thirdly, in God's keeping. And I'm going to pick this up real quickly and we should be done. To be in God's keeping, notice verse 12. And she said, As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked but only a handful of flour in a jar, a little oil in a jug. I'm going to gather that we may die. And Elijah said to her, Watch this, do not fear. Go and do as you have said, but first make me a little cake of it." Now, he's not being selfish. He's going to show her and demonstrate the miraculous power of God to take care of us. Okay? And it's not going to be in the sense, she's going to have to do something, and then she will see the provisions come later. Okay? Make me a little cake of it, what you have, and bring it to me. and afterward make something for yourself and your son. For thus says the Lord God of Israel, the jar of flour shall not be spent and the jug of oil shall not be empty until the day that the Lord sends the rain upon the earth." Do you see that? And she went and did as Elijah said. So we are in God's keeping which means that you need to trust in His ability. Summarized in the phrases in verses 12 and 13, wrapped up in the phrase, fear not. which means trust. Don't be afraid to trust in his ability. Now listen, this is harder than Kareth. He is going to command her because he is learning now to trust in God's ability. Much harder than Kareth. Kareth, there was the explanation of the birds bringing because those birds knew how to hunt animals. Okay? Does that make sense? Animals that were dead, they could spot it and bring it. There is no explanation now for provision. Even though it was roadkill, You can explain it, the animal was dumb enough to walk on, we hit it with a car, okay? So, you understand, the animals were out, and one killed another, and the birds picked it up and brought it. I mean, as gross as all that sounds, that's what's going on. And that makes explanation. These are carnivorous birds. Ravens. They brought food. They were just directed by God to bring it to Elijah. Probably because there was water for them there as well. So in bringing the abundance, He's taken care of. And it was a miraculous working of God through both the instrumentality of the animals and everything else. There is no instrumentality. Does that make sense? That tells me that every trial, remember the back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back? You and I go through little trials initially to learn that, and those are those testimonies that God brought me through that, and if He did that in the past, He can do even more in the future. We need those, don't we? We need those mile markers of faith in our life. You need them as a church as a mile marker. Is God taking your church through a lot? Can He take you through more in the future? Doesn't mean worse crucibles. It means, well, we're going to see something, what it means. But what it means in each of our lives is this. Each trial requires a little more faith. Why this crucible? Because He's... Listen. Elijah's under training for something that's going to stagger the human mind. It's called Mount Carmel. How do you train someone for what he's going to encounter? I was in the military. Many of you were in the military. You know how we trained. How do you train for combat? You simulate it and you do it. There's no way to prepare Elijah for what he's going to have to do as a faith step. Who's on the Lord's side? And then to pray and call down fire from heaven. Who does that? How do you train for that? There's no explanation for that. If you were to design Elijah's training and put him through seminary, what would you do? This is God's seminary for him. Trust in God's ability. Number two, rest upon His promise. For He says in verse 14, as the Lord God lives, For the Lord God of Israel says, the jar of flour shall not be spent. Trust in His ability be, rest upon His promises. His promises to do what? To take care of you, to provide for you. God's directions always include His provisions. Alright? Even in a crucible, God loves you. He will take care of you. He knows what's happening to you. I have given you several verses. Do you have there Psalm 119, verse 71, verse 67? Words like, it is good for me that I have been afflicted. The word for it is good for me, the psalmist writes, is T-O-V. We pronounce it Tov. It is beneficial. He will also say in Psalm 110, Until I was afflicted, I did not walk with thee. If you look in Isaiah chapter 41, chapter 45, I am the Lord thy God, I create adversity. Doesn't mean he causes it. The old King James said, I create the evil. The word evil there is actually translated the adversity. I love our God. He takes responsibility. He says, you know that crucible? I made that for you and I'm responsible. And we will say in Isaiah 49 verse 13 through 16, has God forgotten us? Can a mother forget the baby she's just given birth to? Is what God asks, rhetorical question. She's not going to abandon that baby. Neither will I abandon you." And then God says, look, I have taken all your tears, those tears you've shed, and I have put them in a bottle. Meaning every tear you've shed, He's counted, He knows, and He's keeping track of them for you. I know what you go through, and I'm doing that in your life for a purpose. And I didn't mean to cause the tears, but I needed to it's like this is a good God Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that in due time say with me he may solve to you exalt you and by the way verse seven we've turned it in the NIV and some of the other versions wrongly translate this they translate it cast all your burdens upon him for he cares for you it's a participle of means in the greek language and it's wrong when it says cast all your cares upon him it means like this it's Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you. And that's an Old Testament phrase, means he just wants to. And how do you handle, how do you humble yourself under God? And by a participle of means is an ellipsis. By means of should be inserted in there. Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God by means of, watch this, here it comes, casting all your care upon Him. Why? Because He cares for you. Does that make sense? We take that verse and use it as a promise of throwing your prayers that way. It really is the idea of just trusting in Him completely, giving Him all your burdens, And that shows how you are completely humbling yourself upon Him, and in turn, He will exalt you in due time. Okay? Beautiful illustrations in Scripture. Lastly, for God's timing. Verses 15 and 16. And she went and did as Elijah said, and she and he and her household, her son, ate for many days. You know what? The jar of flour was not spent, neither did the jug of oil become empty, according to the word of the Lord that He spoke by Elijah. Isn't that absolutely one of the coolest things in Scripture? How long? When you're in a trial, all I know is when I'm in this goofy blood vat, me out of here. When I'm in a crucible, it's hot in here. I want out. Normally I say, Lord, I think I've learned my lesson. I think I've got what you wanted to teach me. And then it doesn't end. It's like, what was that? What I've learned, okay, what lesson did I, okay, I'm checking them off, what didn't I learn yet? And I'm speaking for all of us. Because it's time to end this. This is enough suffering, this is enough, this is enough. Two thoughts. You are there for God's timing until you realize that each day is a step of faith. Every day is a step of faith. until you realize that each day is a step of faith, and secondly, until you and I learn to thank God for meeting our needs, not our wants. God's provisions are just enough, so we ought not failing Him by not thanking Him. In Matthew chapter 6, there's an interesting lesson Jesus taught. And it goes like this, and this is something we Westerners do not get. You think in terms of yesterday, as we preached on that. Did you notice that that prodigal son, when he was there, he says, my father's servants have enough what? Bread to eat. In the Middle East, they use an expression, and it's an old expression used now for some 2,000 years. Jesus was using it in that parable as well. When you and I get a job, we have a job in order to make a living. Did you catch that? A living and all that that entails. In the Middle Eastern culture, they say, I have a job in order to buy bread. They never talk in terms of making a living so I can buy bread. And they still talk that way today in Arab and in Jewish cultures. I have a job to buy bread. Why? Because in Matthew 6 Jesus said this, when you pray, pray in a manner something like this, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come and thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, say it with me, our what? Daily bread. Give us this day our daily bread. and the car, and the new iPod, and an iPhone 6, and I don't want the smaller one, I want the bigger one, so I can have a phablet, okay, and I want to be able to, does that make sense? If I have all that, I'll be a little bit happier. And I really would like a G30 driver, okay? You understand what I'm saying? And a new Scotty Cameron putter, and there's a few other things I want. Okay. Give us this day our daily bread. One writer states, maybe we don't have the job we wanted, but you do have a job. Maybe you don't have the position you planned on, but his provisions are enough, just enough. If you postpone your gratitude until all your dreams are fulfilled, you probably will turn into a cranky, unfulfilled Christian. True happiness is when you are content to praise God for meeting your needs, not your wants. Elijah would say, I've learned, Lord, he lived that way for three years. Now he's ready to go to Carmel and do some of the greatest. He's going to call a nation back to God. God will use him as he's used few men in human history. Some of God's greatest trial lessons are going to come in the crucible for you and me. The psalmist would write this in Psalm 4 verse 1, Answer me when I call, O Lord, of my righteousness. Thou hast relieved me in my distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer. Charles Spurgeon said this, I am afraid that all the grace I have gotten out of my comfortable and easy times and happy hours might lie on a penny. But the good I have received from my sorrows and pains and griefs is altogether incalculable. What I do not owe, he says, or what I do not owe to the hammer and the anvil, the fire and the file, affliction is the best furniture in my house. I love that. Or as Job would say, remember the crucible, putting them in, putting in that rock and melting it down, turning that now into something precious? Behold, And I hope you've memorized Job 23, verses 8 through 10. Behold, I go forward, but he is not there. In other words, as I look down the path, I don't see God in this. And when I look backward in the rear view mirror, I cannot perceive him. When he acts on the left, I cannot behold him. He turns me to the right, I cannot see him. But he knows the way that I take, and when he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold. I may not see my way through it, but He does. So I need to trust Him. Amen? Father, thank You for our time tonight in the Word of God. Lengthy time and a powerful passage. Teach us lessons that we can come through any trial in our life victoriously when we realize we are there by God's leading, under God's training in Your keeping and for Your timing. And when You have tried us, we'll come forth as gold. Just teach us to trust you and all will be well as we do it one day at a time. Forward planning and thinking, but always leaning on you, seeking your will in our lives, knowing that you have nothing but our best interest because you love us. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. Pastor.