1 Rois 17

Elijah announces a drought

¹Elijah the Tishbite, one of the settlers in Gilead, said to Ahab, “As surely as the LORD, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the years ahead unless I give the word.”^a

²Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah: ³“Leave this place and turn east. Hide by the Wadi Cherith, east of the Jordan. ⁴You will drink from the stream, and I have ordered the ravens to bring you food there.”^{b 5}So Elijah did as the LORD had told him. He went and stayed by the Wadi Cherith, east of the Jordan. ⁶The ravens brought him bread and meat every morning and every evening, and he drank from the stream. ⁷After a while the stream dried up, because there had been no rain in the land.

The widow of Zarephath

⁸Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah: ⁹“Get up and go to Zarephath, a town of Sidon, and stay there. I have commanded a widow there to provide for you.” ¹⁰So he got up and went to Zarephath. When he came to the town gate, there was a widow gathering sticks. He called to her, “Please bring me a little water in a cup so I can drink.” ¹¹As she was going to get it, he called after her, “Please bring a piece of bread with you too.” ¹²She said, “As surely as the LORD your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of flour in the jar and a little oil in the jug. I am gathering a couple of sticks so I can go home and prepare it for my son and me. We will eat it, and then we will die.” ¹³Elijah said to her, “Do not be afraid. Go and do what you said. But first bake me a small loaf from what you have and bring it out to me. After that, make something for yourself and your son.

¹⁴For the LORD, the God of Israel, says this: ‘The jar of flour will not be emptied, and the jug of oil will not give out, until the day the LORD sends rain on the land.’” ¹⁵She went and did as Elijah had said, and she and he and her household had food to eat for many days. ¹⁶The jar of flour was not emptied, and the jug of oil did not give out, just as the LORD had said through Elijah.

Elijah raises the widow’s son

¹⁷Some time after this, the son of the woman who owned the house fell ill. His illness grew so severe that at last there was no breath left in him. ¹⁸She said to Elijah, “What do you have against me, man of God? You came to me to bring my sin to light and to kill my son!” ¹⁹“Give me your son,” he said to her. He took the boy from her arms, carried him up to the upstairs room where he was staying, and put him down on his own bed. ²⁰Then he cried out to the LORD, “The LORD my God, have you brought disaster even on this widow who has given me a place to stay, by causing her son to die?” ²¹Then he stretched himself out over the boy three times and cried out to the LORD, “The LORD my God, please let this boy’s life come back into him!” ²²The LORD listened to Elijah’s cry, and the boy’s life came back into him, and he lived. ²³Elijah took the boy, brought him down from the upstairs room into the house, and gave him to his mother. “Look,” Elijah said, “your son is alive!” ²⁴Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know you are a man of God, and that what the LORD says through you is true.”