1 Kings 17:1

ELIJAH AND THE GREAT DROUGHT IN AHAB'S REIGN;

CONCERNING ELIJAH

As we may judge from the appearance of Elijah along with Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration with our Lord Jesus Christ (Matthew 17:4), the great prophet Elijah was the most important character between Moses and the Messiah himself. This chapter and the following two chapters make up what is called the "Elijah Cycle"; but, "that expression has no critical importance."[1] It is significant that at the very moment when Israel was sinking into the shocking degradation of outright paganism, Elijah was the man whom God raised up to fight it.

Elijah's place in the N.T. reveals his importance. The forerunner of Christ was to come "in the spirit and power of Elijah" (Luke 1:17). God's two witnesses (Revelation 11:6) who have the power to shut the heavens that it rain not, and the power to turn water into blood, are clearly linked to Moses and Elijah. By his abrupt appearance in the Biblical narrative, "The Jews fancy that he was an angel sent from heaven,"[2] but James tells us that he was a man of like passions as ourselves (James 5:17).

"Elijah is the most `supernatural' figure in the historical books of the O.T., but that does not make him unhistorical."[3] "This chapter is filled with miracles. If we believe in God, we must recognize His limitless power. How these things were done we do not know. If we could understand them and explain them in terms of the ordinary, they would not be miracles. God was proving His power in the worst of times. For a nation with a bad king, God sent them a good prophet, Elijah."[4] "It was the very darkest hour in the spiritual history of Israel when a determined effort was being made to stamp out the faith of God's elect."[5]

At certain religious observances of the Jews until this day, an empty chair is provided for the projected return of Elijah, as prophesied in Malachi 4:5, but Jesus Christ himself identified John the Baptist as that promised Elijah (Matthew 11:14; Mark 9:13). The Jews, however rejected that truth, on the basis that John the Baptist himself, in answer to the question, "Art thou Elijah"? had answered, "I am not" (John 1:21); and, of course, they refused to believe Jesus. They then opposed the Messiaship of Jesus on the basis that "Elijah must first come, and he has not come yet" (Mark 9:11).

The Pharisees were despicable hypocrites in pretending that Elijah had NOT come, because they certainly did know that he had come. Because Zacharias, one of their priests, had received the message from an angel of God before John the Baptist was born that, "He will go before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elijah" (Luke 1:17), using the identical words of Malachi's prophecy. Thus, through his holy angel, God had revealed to the entire Jerusalem establishment that the Elijah promised by Malachi would NOT be a literal resurrection of Elijah the Tishbite, but JOHN THE BAPTIST, who would go before the Lord (as the Herald of the Gospel Age) in the spirit and power of Elijah!

If one wonders how the Pharisees maneuvered John the Baptist into denying that he was Elijah, in all probability, the question they asked him was a crooked one. The text makes it clear that they did not ask him, "Art thou the Elijah who is promised to go before the Lord"? What they asked was, "Art thou Elijah THE TISHBITE"? These last two words are implied in the text.

Another very important element in Elijah's appearance so suddenly and dramatically in this passage is the fact that the name of his father is not given. Like Melchizedek of old, he appeared, having neither father nor mother (as far as records are concerned). "Coming from the land of Gilead in Trans-jordan near the edge of the desert ... he must have been in close touch with the old traditions of the God of Moses and the Fathers."[6] Indeed! Elijah, a Gentile, "At a time, when Israel was rejecting God for idols, here was a Gentile who was among those who had forsaken idols for God"![7] He might even have been of a strain of Gentiles who had retained the knowledge of God and had never turned to idols.

The Jews did not discover, invent, evolve or develop monotheism. The conception of the one true and only God of all creation, monotheism, existed in the Garden of Eden, in Noah's ark, in Melchizedek, in Job, in Jethro, and in this Elijah, who did not learn it FROM Israel; he taught it TO Israel!

"And Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the sojourners of Gilead, said unto Ahab, As Jehovah, the God of Israel, liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word."

"As the Lord God of Israel liveth." "This formula here appears for the first time. It asserts that Jehovah, not Baal, is the God of Israel, and that he is the LIVING God, such as Baal was not"![8]

"There shall not be dew nor rain these years." "Drought was the threatened punishment for national idolatry (Deuteronomy 11:16-17; 2 Samuel 2:3)"[9]