Your First

Background Story: The Israelites continued to live in rebellion against God worshipping the gods of the people around them. God raised up Elijah to tell the people that a great drought would be coming on the land in response to their disobedience.

Read 1 Kings 17:7-24

Some time later the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land. Then the word of the Lord came to him: “Go at once to Zarephath in the region of Sidon and stay there. I have directed a widow there to supply you with food.” 10 So he went to Zarephath. When he came to the town gate, a widow was there gathering sticks. He called to her and asked, “Would you bring me a little water in a jar so I may have a drink?” 11 As she was going to get it, he called, “And bring me, please, a piece of bread.”

12 “As surely as the Lord your God lives,” she replied, “I don’t have any bread—only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil in a jug. I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat it—and die.”

13 Elijah said to her, “Don’t be afraid. Go home and do as you have said. But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and your son. 14 For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘The jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain on the land.’”

15 She went away and did as Elijah had told her. So there was food every day for Elijah and for the woman and her family. 16 For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry, in keeping with the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah.

17 Some time later the son of the woman who owned the house became ill. He grew worse and worse, and finally stopped breathing. 18 She said to Elijah, “What do you have against me, man of God? Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?”

19 “Give me your son,” Elijah replied. He took him from her arms, carried him to the upper room where he was staying, and laid him on his bed. 20 Then he cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, have you brought tragedy even on this widow I am staying with, by causing her son to die?” 21 Then he stretched himself out on the boy three times and cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, let this boy’s life return to him!”

22 The Lord heard Elijah’s cry, and the boy’s life returned to him, and he lived. 23 Elijah picked up the child and carried him down from the room into the house. He gave him to his mother and said, “Look, your son is alive!”

24 Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God and that the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.”

Big Idea: Give God your first.

God sends Elijah to a woman for food whose cabinets were bare. She was down to nothing yet God chose her out of all others to supply Elijah’s need. She was out gathering sticks to make her last fire so she could bake her last loaf of bread. And out of her emptiness, she was told to, “first make a small loaf of bread” for Elijah.

The pattern of the first is seen throughout scripture. God asks for our first. Our fear prompts us to give God our extra, to take what we need, and then give God the leftovers. But God asks for our first. This pattern of faith is built on dependency, trust, and reliance on God that He is more than able to meet all our needs.

In Matthew 6: 25-26, Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” Instead, Jesus tells us in verse 33 to, “seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”

Because God is good. Because God loves you. Because God is faithful. Because God never fails and keeps His promises. Because I am His child, fully known, loved, and valuable to Him. Because ALL of this is true… we can give Him our first and trust that He will provide all that is needed. This is true with our money, our time, our dreams, our day, our future. If we continue day after day to give Him our first, we can trust Him to be faithful to meet “all these things” as well.

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