Choices

⁸ The LORD’s word came to Elijah: ⁹ Get up and go to Zarephath near Sidon and stay there. I have ordered a widow there to take care of you. ¹⁰ Elijah left and went to Zarephath. As he came to the town gate, he saw a widow collecting sticks. He called out to her, “Please get a little water for me in this cup so I can drink.” ¹¹ She went to get some water. He then said to her, “Please get me a piece of bread.” ¹² “As surely as the LORD your God lives,” she replied, “I don’t have any food; only a handful of flour in a jar and a bit of oil in a bottle. Look at me. I’m collecting two sticks so that I can make some food for myself and my son. We’ll eat the last of the food and then die.” ¹³ Elijah said to her, “Don’t be afraid! Go and do what you said. Only make a little loaf of bread for me first. Then bring it to me. You can make something for yourself and your son after that. ¹⁴ This is what Israel’s God, the LORD, says: The jar of flour won’t decrease and the bottle of oil won’t run out until the day the LORD sends rain on the earth.” ¹⁵ The widow went and did what Elijah said. So the widow, Elijah, and the widow’s household ate for many days. ¹⁶ The jar of flour didn’t decrease nor did the bottle of oil run out, just as the LORD spoke through Elijah. ¹⁷ After these things, the son of the widow, who was the matriarch of the household, became ill. His sickness got steadily worse until he wasn’t breathing anymore. ¹⁸ She said to Elijah, “What’s gone wrong between us, man of God? Have you come to me to call attention to my sin and kill my son?” ¹⁹ Elijah replied, “Give your son to me.” He took her son from her and carried him to the upper room where he was staying. Elijah laid him on his bed. ²⁰ Elijah cried out to the LORD, “LORD my God, why is it that you have brought such evil upon the widow that I am staying with by killing her son?” ²¹ Then he stretched himself over the boy three times and cried out to the LORD, “LORD my God, please give this boy’s life back to him.” ²² The LORD listened to Elijah’s voice and gave the boy his life back. And he lived. ²³ Elijah brought the boy down from the upper room of the house and gave him to his mother. Elijah said, “Look, your son is alive!” ²⁴ “Now I know that you really are a man of God,” the woman said to Elijah, “and that the LORD’s word is truly in your mouth.”