Alright brethren, let's go back
here now to 1 Kings 17. The subject is provision by God's
Word. In this chapter we see over and
over the Word of the Lord. According to the Word of the
Lord, thus saith the Lord. God provided for Elisha and this
widow and her house by His Word. Everything our Lord did here,
He did by His Word. He provided for Elijah, provided
for the widow in her house by His Word. Now God's Word is concerning
Christ Jesus, His Son, our salvation. He is the Word. He is the Word
who became flesh. And through the Word, through
the Word of the Lord, He regenerates us. He gives us faith. He sustains
our faith. He provides all our needs in
this world. He protects us from all our enemies
by His Word. He preserves us until the end.
All of this by His Word. By His Word. Now this is the
introduction here of Elijah. He just comes on the scene and His name is a compound of Eli
and Jah, and it means God Jehovah. God Jehovah. He is the Son of
God. He comes forth to Israel when
they were full of sin and idolatry, the same as Christ when He came
the first time. They were in the same shape then. And His genealogy is not given. Elijah's genealogy is not given.
We're not certain where he came from. And in the end, he's taken
up in a whirlwind. God's Son is God Jehovah without
beginning or ending of days. He was sent from heaven by God,
came into this world and accomplished the redemption of his people,
and then he ascended up in a cloud to heaven. And he shall return
in like manner as he went. Now Elijah was sent here in the
opening verse to declare judgment upon Israel due to Israel's sin
and idolatry. They had hired a multitude of
false prophets and they were worshiping under every green
tree and Jeroboam had made it to where they didn't have to
go up to Jerusalem anymore. There was too much trouble for
them and it just made it easy for them to bow down to an idol
wherever they were. And Elijah came here and it said
in verse 1, And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of
Gilead, said to Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before
whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years,
but according to my word. And God withheld rain for three
and a half years. And worse than that, God removed
his word by removing Elijah the prophet. Now, in the scripture
here, he says, there shall not be dew nor rain these years. It's three and a half years.
And in the scripture, the gospel is compared to dew and rain. It's called dew and rain. And
it was this way in Elijah's day, it was this way when our Lord
came the first time. And if you read old preachers
and their writings, in every generation men have described
it this way, as a famine of the Word, a drought of the Word. And God promised this. He said
in Amos 8.11, Amos 8.11, he said, Behold, the days come, saith
the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine
of bread, nor thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the
Lord. Hearing the words of the Lord,
famine of the Word. And they shall wander from sea
to sea, and from the north even to the east, and they shall run
to and fro to seek the Word of the Lord, and shall not find
it. And that's how it is in our day. The same judgment is upon
our nation, it's upon the whole world, and there is a famine
of the hearing of the gospel of God's sovereign grace in Christ.
But for those three and a half years, for the whole time that
that famine was, by His Word, according to His Word, God provided
for Elijah and He provided for this helpless widow of Sarepta
and her house. He provided for Elijah, He provided
for this widow and her house. And God provides for His church
in this wilderness. He provides for His church in
this wilderness. He does it by His Word. And He
has us here because He is sending us to call out His elect just
like He sent Elijah to this widow of Sarepta. And God is going
to provide. He is going to provide for His
people. Over in Revelation 12.14 it says,
to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle that she might
fly into the wilderness into her place. Elijah here is fixing
to go into the wilderness. And that's a picture of God's
whole church. We're in the wilderness. But
he said, where she is nourished for a time and times and half
a time from the face of the serpent. That corresponds to that three
and a half years that Elisha and his widow was provided for. It means a set time. As long
as God's pleased, he has a set time and until Christ returns,
as long as he has some elect on this earth, he's going to
provide for his church as he's calling out his people until
the last one's called out. He's not left himself without
a witness in any generation. But the truth of the gospel has
always been in the minority in every generation. But he hasn't
left himself without a witness, he's reserved his elect unto
himself and he's calling them out through his word and he's
going to provide for his church by his word. Now that's what
we have here typified or seen by example in Elijah. Now he's
one that's been called, he's been sent by God to bear witness
of the Lord just as we as the Lord's church are. This is so
of God's preachers, it's so of his people that he's already
called. And we see here God kept Elijah
humble. He kept him dependent on the
Lord, trusting the word of the Lord. And that's what the Lord's
going to do for his church that he's called. He says here in
verse 2, And the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, Get
thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook
Cherith that is before Jordan. Now, scripture tells us Elijah
was a man of like passions as we are. We see him several times
here, very bold and can be very hot in his speaking and he was
fit for the people to whom God sent him to. Because he needed
this, he needed to be this way. But he went there and spoke to
King Ahab, the king of the whole land, and said, God is sending
a famine on this land. And he had been put in his heart
to pray for this, and he prayed for this, and God did it. Now,
if you had done all that, that would be very easy to puff you
up. That would be very easy to cause
you to think of ourselves more than we ought, and think that
we're something when we're nothing. The Lord is going to make sure
that he keeps his servant humble. And so the Lord sent Elijah into
the wilderness. Sent him into the wilderness.
It wasn't so much for his protection as it was to send him away from
Israel. And sent him there and he told
him when he went there he was going to provide for him. Now
the servant is not greater than his Lord. We see in Elijah here
too a very A very good picture of Christ. And our Lord came
down, came down to this earth, the Son of God took flesh. And
when he walked this earth, the same sin and idolatry was in
Israel as it was in Elijah's day, as it is in our day. But
Christ trusted the Father to provide for all his needs as
he walked this earth. He took the form of a servant.
And in perfect faith, in perfect holiness of heart, without any
sin, without any wavering whatsoever, our Lord depended upon God his
Father as he walked this earth. He said, I have meat to eat you
know not of. And our Lord accomplished redemption. He accomplished making His people
the righteousness of God in Him. He fulfilled all the Law and
the Prophets. And then He sent His Word to us, and by His Word
He's given us life. He's given us faith. He's given
us eternal life in Him. Made us to know we're the righteousness
of God in Him. And He is going to sustain that
faith. But now brethren, the servant is not greater than our
Lord. He is sending us forth to preach
His Word just like He did Elijah. But He is going to keep His people
humbly depending upon Him. By the same Word that Elijah
is sent to deliver, Elijah is made to depend upon that Word
and believe that Word of the Lord. And that's the same for
you and me. He's going to keep us humble
by the same Word. And we're walking through this
world depending on our Lord, according to His Word, to provide
everything we need. Everything. God our Savior provides
by His Word in ways that's going to make it obvious that He gets
the glory. It says here in verse 4, our
Lord says here, It shall be that thou shalt drink of the brook,
and I have commanded, there's the word of the Lord again, you're
going to drink of this brook, and I have commanded the ravens
to feed thee there. And so he went and did according
to the word of the Lord. For he went and dwelt by the
brook that is before Jordan, and the ravens brought him bread
and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening,
and he drank of the brook. Now the Lord is providing for
his church by his word, just like he provided for Elijah here. And the Lord provided by means
contrary to nature. The ravens, he used ravens. It's the nature of ravens to
eat meat, not to bring it to a man. And they even deny their
young meat so they can eat it for themselves. They'll let their
young starve to death. They might have the meat. But
the Lord said this to Job. He said, Who provideth for the
raven his food when his young ones cry unto God? They wander
for lack of meat. God does. He said in Psalm 147.9,
He giveth to the young ravens when they cry. God's in control
of everything. By His Word, God made these ravens
bring Elijah bread in the morning and in the evening and meat.
I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. There's nobody
that can resist God's command. When God speaks affectionately
into the heart, Every person obeys, every beast obeys, even
a raven obeys God. And the men of this world, all
things are yours. And God uses all things that
he's created, man and beast, and he's providing for his people.
And he's able to use everything at his disposal to provide for
his people. Now, it's amazing that the Lord
used ravens to do this. But you know what's more amazing
in this than that? That God gives sinners like us
a new nature so that contrary to our nature, we actually believe
the word of the Lord. and feast by faith upon the true
bread from heaven and drink of the true brook, the true fountain
of living waters. That's what's amazing. It's amazing
that Elisha believed God and went there and trusted God to
feed him by ravens. That's the real miracle. Our
Lord said, I'm the living bread which came down from heaven.
I'm the living bread. He came down and gave himself.
He came down and laid down his life for his people. He will
certainly provide for us. He provided Himself. God provided
His Son. Christ provided His own body.
I'm the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man
eat of this bread, he shall live forever. And the bread that I'll
give is my flesh which I'll give for the life of the world. So
Christ, our living Redeemer, He's the one that's providing
all our daily needs. Everything we need. Everything
we need. You know what we need? exactly
what we have right now. Exactly what we need. That's
what He's provided. That's what He'll continue to
provide. Verse 6, the ravens brought Him bread and flesh in
the morning and bread and flesh in the evening and He drank of
the brook. God provided all He needed in
the morning and all He needed in the evening. God gives grace
for today. He gives grace for today. That's
God's promise to us. He gives us this day our daily
bread. Elijah will not be rich. God's
not going to let his preacher be rich. He's not even going
to be given more than he needs. He won't starve though. a given
bread as he needs it. And that's what Thor's doing
for us. David said, I've been young and now I'm old, yet I've
not seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread. Now that must have humbled Elijah
to go there and be fed by ravens and drink from a brook. That
must have humbled him and strengthened his faith that the Lord was really
providing for him. And that's really what humility
is. Humility is being put in a place
where we have to trust the Lord. That's what true faith is. It's
humbly trusting the Lord to provide all. The Lord told Isaac, I mean
Abraham told Isaac, the Lord shall provide. He shall seek
to it. He shall seek to it. He did on the cross and he shall
in our daily needs. And then secondly, the reason
the Lord had Elijah here, and the reason he has his church
and his earth, is he's going to provide all the need for his
elect who are yet lost in this wilderness. He's going to bring
us to all who are his. He's going to bring his elect
to hear him. He's going to do that by his word. This is why
He's providing for His church. What we need to preach His Word. What we need to spread His Word
to His lost sheep. That's what He's doing. Verse
7. It came to pass that after a while that the brook dried
up, because there had been no rain in the land. And the Word
of the Lord came unto him, saying, God works all things in providence
to dry up whatever brook we depend upon in order to keep us trusting
the giver and not the gifts. Whatever brook we're depending
on, He's going to dry it up. He's going to dry it up. He's
going to keep us trusting the giver rather than the gifts. And He will dry up any brook
He needs to dry up, to move us where He would have us to move.
To move us to do what He would have us to do. It wasn't providence
alone. It wasn't just the brook drying
up alone. It was the Word of the Lord that came to Him. The
Word of the Lord. If we discern God's will in providence,
just only by the providence. If Elijah had done that, he could
have looked at this and thought, well, God is against him because
he dried up the brook. But we discern providence by
the Word of God, by what God has done, is doing, and shall
do according to His Word. And God gives faith by His Word. Just like He dried up this brook
and the Word came to Elijah, told him, He is going to tell
him to go somewhere, and Elijah is going to do this by faith.
And then the Lord is going through His word, give faith. He said
here in verse 9, the Lord said to him, Arise, get thee to Sarepta,
which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded
a widow woman there to sustain thee. God's ways are not our
ways, are they? First, God takes him out in the
wilderness and he has to depend on ravens to feed him. Now he's
sending his prophet down to a Gentile land with people who are as idolatrous
as Israel to a widow woman to sustain him. This is more miraculous than
God using ravens. He's going to use a Gentile widow
woman to sustain him. But the Lord said, Behold, I
have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee. Who is
this widow woman? We don't know her name. We're
not told who she is. She's one of God's elect. She's
a picture of every elect child of God, whether they're Jew or
Gentile, bond or free, male or female, rich or poor, wherever
they are in this world, she's a picture of all God's elect.
A widow, who is a widow indeed, who has no way of providing for
herself and no family to provide for her, is an excellent picture
of God's elect as we come into this world. We're totally incapable
of doing anything to save ourselves. But this is one of his elect.
Look over at Luke 4, verse 25. You recall when our Lord, on
His first publicly recorded messages, He stood up in the synagogue
and He preached, and this is what He said. Luke 4, 25. He said, in verse 24, I say,
verily I say unto you, no prophet is accepted in his own country.
But I tell you of a truth, many widows were in Israel in the
days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six
months, when great famine was throughout all the land. But
unto none of them was Elijah sent, save unto Sarepta, a city
of Zidon, unto a woman that was a widow. Verse 28 says, And all
they in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled
with wrath, and rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and
led him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built,
that they might cast him down headlong. Why were they so angry? Because they heard that God passed
by all these widows that were in Israel. They were all starving
too. There was a famine in all the
land. There was no difference between the widows in Israel
and this widow in Sarepta. There was a bunch of widows in
these Gentile lands that were starving. There was widows everywhere. Famine was everywhere. And God
passed by those in Israel and went to this widow who was a
Gentile. Why? Because she was one God
chose from before the foundation of the world. And that angered
them. They thought they deserved something
because of who they were. Abraham was their natural father.
They had all these works to their credit, they thought. And they
did all these ceremonies. They had done all this in religion.
And the Lord spoke to them and made them know they were not
the children of God. Simply because that they were
born of Abraham didn't make them the children of God. There was
no difference in any of these widows whatsoever. We have all
sinned and come short of the glory of God. There is no difference
in any sinner God saved. We are sinners. We are sinners. We are sinners who have to be
made righteous by the righteousness of Christ alone. We have to be
justified by the blood of our Redeemer alone. We have to be
created anew by the Spirit of our God so that there is a new
man created in whom is no sin. who is brought to believe on
Christ in whom is no sin, so that in that union God can receive
you as being one who is totally without sin and perfectly righteous,
as righteous as God. Not all are God's elect. The difference is God's sovereign
electing grace. He chooses whom He will. Now
before Elijah gets there, he don't know who she is. He don't
have a clue who she is. But before he gets there, listen
to what God said. Behold, I have commanded her,
God said. That's grace before grace. That's
what they used to call pervenient grace. God prepared this woman
to receive His servant who's going to speak His word to her. Now God regenerates and He calls
to faith by His word, by His gospel, through the preaching
of the gospel, using the truth of the gospel. He can do that. He's capable. We're going to
see that. He's able to get the truth of the gospel to His people
and call His people through the truth. But before He ever quickens
and regenerates with the word of truth, what is it that even
makes One of God's elect paths to cross with the gospel. What
is it that makes them even willing to give an ear to God's preacher?
What is it that makes them even willing to listen? It's grace
before grace, grace before grace. God said, behold, I've commanded
her. I have, God said. Elijah's not even there yet.
Well, God always brings to pass what God has promised. He says
here in verse 10, So Elijah arose, and he went to Sarepta. And when
he came to the gate of the city, behold, the widow woman was there,
gathering sticks. The Lord directed Elijah to the
gate of the city, and behold, the widow woman was there. God
sent Philip out into the desert. He didn't know why. He didn't
know where he was going to. And God sent him out into the
desert, and behold, the Ethiopian eunuch was there. God forbid
Paul to go preach in Bithynia and send him to Macedonia, where
God had commanded Lydia, and behold, Lydia was there. God
rules all things to bring His gospel to each of His elect in
truth. And this widow was there because
God brought her there even as He brought Elijah there. She
was there because He brought her there. He was there because
the Lord brought him there. All of this by the Word of the
Lord. Now Elijah don't know who the widow is. He just sees a
woman at the gate and he don't know who the widow is. I doubt
seriously he even knew she was a widow. But he gets there and
he beholds this woman and so he calls to her. Verse 10. It
says, and he called to her and said, Fetch me, I pray thee,
a little water in a vessel that I may drink. Now when the Lord
walked this earth, he knew where his elect were. And our Lord
went to Samaria and he sat on a well and when the woman came
there to the well, remember what he said? Give me a little drink
of water. He opened up the conversation. The Lord knew where this woman
was. And He's the one who moved Elijah
there and then moved Elijah to ask her, give me a drink. And
He'll do the same for us. He'll cross your path and He'll
give you, He'll just open the door and you'll have the opportunity
to speak. And you'll speak when He's commanded
it. And that one that He's commanded,
grace before grace, to hear you, they'll hear you. They'll hear
you. Well, when he does this, what's the Lord going to do?
He's going to make us confess our absolute, total, thorough
inability. Our complete and total need.
Now she was willing to go get him some water. Just go over
here to the well and get some water. There's plenty over there.
She's willing to go do that. Verse 11, And as she was going
to fetch it, he called to her and he said, Bring me, I pray,
the morsel of bread. And she said, as the Lord thy
God liveth, I have not a cake, but a handful of meal in a barrel,
and a little oil in a cruise. And behold, I'm gathering two
sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me and my son, that
we may eat it and die. This is a famine. She has nothing. This is all she has. This is
all she has. This is where Christ finds his
elect right here. gathering sticks to kindle our
own fire. That's what she's doing. She's
gathering some sticks to kindle her fire, to eat our earthly
bread, the work of our hands, with a heart that says, I've
got to provide for me first. I don't have anything to give
to anybody. I've got to provide for me. And
then after all that, she just expected to die. Christ finds
his elect hopeless. She had no expectancy of living.
Hopeless. He finds them helpless. She had
no ability. He finds us selfish. She just
worried about herself and her son. He finds us dead, dying
sinners. If our confidence is in anything
of ourselves, some little meal or some little cruise of oil,
we're not resting in Christ. But Christ is going to make His
sheep hear Him. He said, my sheep hear my voice
and I know them and they follow me. They're going to hear His
voice and He's going to know them and by that regenerating
knowing of them, they're going to follow Him. The Lord makes
His child hear His Word. His Word. He makes us hear it
in power and He makes us believe on it. Verse 13, And Elisha said
to her, Fear not. Christ is going to speak into
the heart and He's going to say, Fear not. She's worried about
death. She's worried about dying. She's
worried that if she don't have anything, her children are dying.
And He speaks and He's going to say, Fear not. And He commands
repentance. When He speaks and He speaks
His Word, He commands repentance to give to Him first. She has
her natural mind set on providing for herself and her child. And
we understand that. That's natural. Christ is going
to change our mind to where He's going to be preeminent. He's
going to be first. Verse 13, he said, Go and do
as thou hast said, but make me thereof a little cake first,
and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and for thy son. And his word comes with a promise.
He's going to speak and He's going to say, fear not. He's
going to speak and He's going to change our mind. He's going
to make Himself first in our heart. But this Word's coming
with a promise. He says, verse 14, For thus saith
the Lord God of Israel, the covenant-keeping God of His elect Israel. Thus
says the covenant-keeping God of His elect, The barrel of meal
shall not waste, neither shall the crucible fail, until the
day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth. Now this is going
to require faith. Just put yourself in her shoes.
It's all she has. It's all she has right here.
And she's got a child to feed. And she doesn't even expect it.
This is her last meal. This is their last meal and they're
dying. I could just picture them. famished. I picture them, their
bellies all shrunk and they're shriveled and they're dying.
It's going to require faith in her. And this required faith
in Elijah too. Elijah has no power to make this
promise come to pass. Now let me ask you something.
When you read this, God-given faith is the only thing
that made this a work on Elijah's part. Without faith, this is
just a charlatan preacher trying to take advantage of a widow
woman. What made it a good work? It
was done in faith, trust in the Lord, at the word of the Lord. Faith in Christ, in the heart,
is what makes the difference in a work being a good work and
an evil work. You take Rahab. Rahab hid some
foreign spies and when the king of Jericho's men came, she lied
to them and sent these spies out another way. Now if that
hadn't have been faith in her heart and she wasn't doing that
for faith, that would have been high treason. But it was a good
work because she didn't believe in God. Take Abraham for an example.
Abraham is going up a mountain to burn his son on an altar. Do you know what the worshippers
of Moloch were doing all around? They were burning their children
to their idol God. And if you just saw Abraham doing
that, you would say, Abraham's turned into a worshipper of Moloch.
But it was a good work because God gave him faith in his heart
and he was doing what God commanded him to do. And Elisha here believed
God. This was a work of faith. He
believed God. He believed God was going to
make that cruz not run out and that bread not run out. And that's
why he told this woman what he told her. Notice this word, first. This
word, first. By nature, she wanted to do for
herself first and for her son. And Christ says, when he comes,
he says, give to me first. Give to me first. He must have
the preeminence. Give to me first. In Matthew
6 in verse 30, let me read this, Matthew 6. He said, O ye of little faith, He says, take no thought, verse
31, take no thought saying what shall we eat, what shall we drink,
wherewithal shall we be clothed. All these things do the Gentiles
seek. This is what the unbelieving
world is worried about. Your heavenly Father knoweth
that you have need of all these things. But seek ye first, preeminently,
the kingdom of God and His righteousness. His righteousness, Christ our
righteousness. And all these things should be
added to you. Take therefore no thought for
the morrow, the morrow take thought for the things of itself. He
has given us today our daily bread. Now unbelief said this,
I only have enough for me and my family. That's what unbelief
says. I only have enough for me and
my family. Unbelief says, I bought a piece of ground. I must need
to go and seek to it. I pray thee have me excused.
Unbelief says, I bought five yokes of oxen and I got to go
prove them. I pray have me excused. Unbelief
says, I've married a wife. I can't come. Unbelief says, Lord, suffer me
first. Go bury my father. Those excuses are the same as
if she held on to that meal and that wool for herself. It'd be
no different than a man trusting his own works for salvation. When God gives faith, God's word
makes Christ preeminent in the heart, so that you say, though
he slay me, yet will I trust him. Not just when times are
good, when this is it, when you got one meal left, And the Lord
says, trust me, give it to me first. You think of that widow
with the two mites. The Lord said she gave more than
all of them. Why? They gave out of their abundance.
She gave everything she had. This woman gave up trusting her
carnal reason and she believed God's able to do what's impossible
with men. Pink said, where God gives faith,
God's words the end to the carnal reasoning of unbelief. Unbelief
puts circumstances between the soul and God. Faith puts God
between the soul and circumstances. That's a good statement. That's
a really good statement. Unbelief puts circumstances between
the soul and God. Faith puts God between the soul
and circumstances. Repentance comes with faith so
that we give up trusting ourselves. We give up reasoning and it seems
only reasonable to trust the Lord rather than our own wisdom. We have to forsake all our fleshly
confidence and cast all our care on Christ. That's what the Lord
said. He said, Whosoever be of you
that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. Our wisdom, our understanding
of things, We have to forsake it all and trust the Lord. And by God's Word, when He comes
in power, we'll believe Him. She believed Him. By God's Word,
she believed Him. Look here in verse 15. And she
went and did according to the saying of Elisha. And she and
he And her house did eat many days. And the barrel of meal
wasted not, neither did the cruise of oil fail according to the
word of the Lord which He spake by Elijah." You see, it was more
than that she believed Elijah. She believed the word of the
Lord which the Lord spoke by Elijah. The Lord said to Martha,
if you believe me, if you would just believe me, thou shouldest
see the glory of God. And by believing God, this woman
found it to be exactly according to the word of the Lord. By believing
God, Elijah found it to be exactly according to the Lord's word.
The Lord provided for him with ravens. He went down here. He believed God, he preached
the Word to her, and against all carnal reasoning, God gave
this woman faith, she believed the Lord, and both of them saw
it to be exactly according to the Word of the Lord. The cruise
of oil didn't fail, the bread didn't run out, the meal didn't
run out. Believing God, we find it to be according to the Word
of the Lord. We see God's glory, and we find that truly of God
are we in Christ. who of God is made unto us wisdom
and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. And we begin
to glory only in the Lord. And believe in God, we're going
to find that God shall provide when it looks like that it goes
beyond, it's contrary to nature, it's contrary to all reason,
we're going to find that God shall provide all our lesser
needs, all our days, so that we can take the word to his poor,
starving, elect widows scattered throughout this world. And he's
going to quicken them by this word until he's saved every single
one. Why is this so certain? Thus
saith the Lord." The Word of the Lord has spoken it. That's
why it's certain. We either believe the Word of
God or we don't. We either cast it all on Christ,
giving up our little bit of meal that we have and our little bit
of oil we have some confidence in, give it all up for Christ
and trust Him. Or we hang on to that little
bit of meal and that little crucible of oil And we go through this
life eating just what these carnal things and then die. Believe
God and it shall be even as it was told to you. I believe that. I believe that. Against anything
you see with these eyes, God shall make good on his word.
He gave his son. He shall. Amen. Father, help us to believe you.
Help us to look above things below. Help us to see
you provide, using things like ravens and
ways we could never even imagine. Lord, keep this Word alive in
our hearts and keep us believing You and looking to You. Feed us the living bread. Lead
us to the fountain of living waters. Give us, Lord, an entire change
of mind concerning everything that's of us. Keep us trusting You alone. Lord,
we thank You for this Word. Thank You for Your blessing.
Thank You for all that You've done for us. Lord, make this Word, by Your
will, according to Your good purpose, Lord. Prepare the heart. Command the blessing. Make your poor children hear. Make us believe. Forgive us, Lord, our unbelief.
Forgive us our sin. There are many. They're multiplied. They're far worse than we think. Lord, help us to see that about
ourselves. Put us so in the dust that all
we can do is look to You. And Lord, be with Your suffering
people. Be with those that are suffering over loss of brethren,
loss of loved ones, and be with those who are Brooke is dried up by their physical
health or their money. Or make them trust your word.
Know that all is well. You're ruling, you're reigning.
Your word shall come to pass. Lord Jesus, we trust you. Trust you. Won't let us be ashamed
for trusting you. Thank you, Father. We ask it
in Christ's name. Amen.