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| Raven: "Can I Take Your Order Please?" |
Our family has been enduring Financial Setback-Fest 2012 lately with various unexpected expenses zapping up our financial means in rapid succession (I'm looking at you lawnmower and dryer.) It's been the age-old adage "one thing after another" brought vividly to life in HD and it has been a bit jarring to endure.
It's so easy to begin the pity party and begin wallowing in how hard your life is when something like this occurs in your life.
It's also easy to enjoy God's provision and encouragement.
A few years back, a friend of ours was having a similar financial setback and the folks in our children's ministry rallied together to collect money for her family to show her that God provides. When she was asking for names and wanting to know who was involved in blessing her family, I played coy and told her that these people didn't donate for the fame. They donated because God had led them to do so.
I explained to her from the divinely appointed story of the week in our K to 5 program that just like God sent ravens to provide support to Elijah in his time of need, she needed to only thank God for her blessings. We were merely God's ravens. She just needed to be blessed, grow her faith in the Lord and look for opportunities to raven-ize someone else when the time came!
This raven-laden portion of Elijah's story is from 1 Kings 17:
"1 And Elijah the Tishbite, of the inhabitants of Gilead, said to Ahab, "As the Lord God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, except at my word." 2 Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, 3 "Get away from here and turn eastward, and hide by the Brook Cherith, which flows into the Jordan. 4 And it will be that you shall drink from the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed you there." 5 So he went and did according to the word of the Lord, for he went and stayed by the Brook Cherith, which flows into the Jordan. 6 The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening; and he drank from the brook."Like us, Elijah sometimes had a woe-is-me attitude. He moped and whined with the best of them. He also saw God's miraculous provision multiple times in his earthly ministry and had a pretty awesome smack-down of those other false gods with the whole Survivor-style sacrifice-burning competition where God won immunity every time and outlasted, outwitted and outplayed the false idols to win the title of Sole God of the Universe.
In this instance God didn't break open the sky to let Elijah know He was with him. He didn't part a sea. He simply directed simple-minded scavenger birds to bring food to a person in need.
Now, as an aside, I'm not a big fan of the scavenger bird types. I previously blogged about the random predatory birds that fill the skies near our house and about the hideously disfigured turkey vulture that launched out of a random field and almost slammed into my driver's side window as I innocently drove down the street. So, I'm not entirely sure that I'd be thrilled to accept scraps of food from nasty creepy ravens. But there is something very profound in this story.
God uses often very small things to bless us, provide for us and alter the path of our lives. The folks that donated to the woman in need were not rich. They were not wizards of Wall Street with deep pockets. Many of them were struggling financially themselves. And yet God led them to share with a sister in need to bless her.
So sometimes we see ravens and we miss the great and dramatic work that God is about to do. And yet He does this kind of thing over and over again.
Not only are we in danger of missing the blessing because the vehicle isn't the chariot we always envisioned, but our attitude and receptiveness toward such blessings can pay it forward. I mentioned earlier that Elijah had thankfulness issues. We read, however, that right after Elijah was taken care of by filthy predatory birds that he spread the love around. While asking the widow to step out in faith and make him some food, Elijah brought God's blessing to her and made her little bit of flour and oil (when combined and mixed thoroughly with her own faith and obedience) into an endless smorgasbord of provision.
And so as we wait for our financial ravens to arrive in the skies above, it is fitting that God reminded me of this crucial story that I used to encourage a friend. Not surprisingly, you will be interested to know that my daily Bible reading just happened to be in 1 Kings 17 on the very day that I found myself wallowing in my own pity.
Like the wizard Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings, God is never late nor is He early. He arrives precisely when He means to and His way is always perfect. While we are still struggling with our financial setbacks and our own unbelief, God has slowly met each need bit by bit.
And we are blessed indeed.
Blessed people bless people. Be a raven for others and let God grow your faith and theirs. Also, don't look your gift raven in the beak. It might peck your eye out and that would be nasty.
