From his throne, hear from his lips my child well done. Help me to serve thee more and more. Help me to praise thee oar and go. Live in thy presence day by day, never to turn from thee away. Would you kindly turn in your Bibles please to First Kings chapter seventeen. We're finding it rather difficult to get out of even these first few verses. Only because there is so much there which I believe speaks to us as those who are children of God. Chapter seventeen and verse two. And the word of the Lord came unto him, that is, Elijah, saying, Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the book of Cherith, that is before Jordan. And it shall be that thou shalt drink of the brook. And I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. So he went and did according unto the word of the Lord. For he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith that is before Jordan. And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening. And he drank of the brook. It came to pass after the while that the brook dried up because there had been no rain in the land. Now we've already looked at the first verse or so of this chapter on Tuesday night and we learned first of all something about divine communication and how important it is for us as children of God as we read his word as we meditate and study upon it for it to bring message to our hearts that too often what we get we get in a second-hand way from servants of God who preach the Word or from others who bring Bible studies or what have you, rather than we going to the Word ourselves and finding it sufficient to speak to us and our needs. I think part of our problem today with respect to following tradition is that we have accepted what men have said that we respect without, first of all, going to the Word and finding it for ourselves. and divine communication is possible and divine communication is absolutely necessary if there's going to be growth and development and maturity in our Christian walk and this is what we learned concerning Elijah Elijah after he had made that tremendous statement before King Ahab now instead of having to go seek the mind and the will of God the Word of God comes to him because he was in a place of communion with God and where God could speak. Then we also learned something about the fact that of the type of communication that he was given, the fact that here was a commission that was given to him and that he was not told what was going to happen next year or the following year. He was only told one step at a time what to do. And we've learned from this that The Christian needs to know something about the walk of faith. The walk of faith is something that progresses a little bit at a time. It is what we would call in mathematics an arithmetic progression. It's not a geometric progression. When it comes to the need for grace or mercy or peace, beloved, you can have all the grace and mercy and peace that you need tomorrow. It's a geometric progression. Two times two is four, times two is six, two eight times two is sixteen, times two is thirty-two, times two is sixty-four, and in five areas there you've reached all the way to sixty-four. But an arithmetic progression is one plus one is two, plus one is three, plus one is four, plus one is five, plus one is six. And that's the way faith develops. It's a walk. It's a step-by-step process. And we aren't allowed to go along according to what we used to do with children. And Simon says, take three giant steps. Faith doesn't come in that way. It's added to a little bit at a time. Peter made that very clear to us in his second epistle. When he tells us that grace and mercy and peace are to be multiplied to us. You need a thousand, a million times more grace tomorrow. Praise the Lord, the opportunity is there, and the grace is there. There's enough grace for whatever the need is. I recall my father telling a story about Joseph when he was the governor of Egypt and how he had put aside for seven years all of the grain that could possibly be put aside for the seven lean years. And in one of those huge granaries, there was a little mouse. And he started to eat away at that tremendous load of grain. Of course, he couldn't see the load of grain. All he could see was where he was. And the story goes that he came to Joseph, and he was concerned about whether there would be enough for him in those seven years of real difficult time and it is said that Joseph spoke to the mouse and said eat on little mouse my grain is sufficient for thee that's exactly what the grace of God is all about but faith is something that must be appropriated step by step you know if we would just learn to take those steps of faith too often I believe the Christian life is looked at as sort of a place of plateaus that we start out of the Christian life on the bottom and we have our questions and problems and difficulties and we sort of learn something and we get to a certain place and there we sort of stay. And there's such a thing as a plateau in the Christian life and that many of us seem to think we're at that plateau. We almost sit as we listen to the Word of God and defy the servant of God to try to tell us something new. And we think that we've reached this area and we're sort of the kind of nice Christians we should be, and I don't see that any place in Scripture at all. To me, the Christian life is one of an ascent. And if you're not actively ascending, then you're sliding back, if ever so little. It's a backsliding situation, even though we think we're holding our own. And the aspect of the Christian life is the step-by-step walk of faith. We should be making steps of faith in our Christian life today and this week that we didn't take last week. And this is the kind of development, beloved, that enables us to know what our God is willing and able to do for us. We sort of like to have the kind of Christian life that has very little change and absolutely no problems. I remember Brother Robert Little talking about that verse in Proverbs, I think it's twenty-four verse ten. If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small. He said that was a great help to him early in this Christian life. And he said, you know, we tend to pat ourselves on the back when we're going down an absolutely straight road with a sunshiny day and absolutely no detours and our pockets are full and our stocks and bonds are put away and our saving account is taken care of. And all of our bills are paid and we say, my, we're walking in the Christian life. Aren't we doing a good job in living for God? And then when we come across the detour, we tend to fall apart. if thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small. But, beloved, the only way that we can learn something about maturity in the Christian life is in allowing the problems to come to us with thanksgiving and then taking the steps of faith by the help and strength of the Holy Spirit so that, beloved, we begin to work against the difficulty that's there, we become strong. A miler never becomes strong by sitting and watching other milers run around the track on television. It's the actual pain, the horrible pain that they have to feel from running twenty-five miles a day. I recall a young man from Australia who for quite a long time was one of the world's top milers. I forget his name. It was Peter something, but some of you may know better than I do. Anyway, this young fellow would wear army boots and run in Australian sand on the beaches for mile and miles after mile in order that his legs would actually be in horrible pain when he finished. No, that's Roger Bannister from England. This was a fellow by name of Peter, but I can't remember his last name from Australia. He would run with these boots on in the sand. I don't know of anything worse, the soft sand of Australia trying to run. Now on the beach in Daytona Beach, that's no problem. It's nice and hard and you can run, ride bicycles, anything else from the sand. But this soft, hard sand, what for? He was creating the problem so that he would be strong in the day of adversity. And, beloved, we need to have these problems to come to really help us in our Christian lives, to have the strength, to have the discernment, to know what to do as we grow up in the things of God. I believe that the gift of discernment to me is not something that's so much evident in the church today because the Lord wants every one of us to have discernment. And discernment comes as a base, is based on the maturity that we have in the Christian life. So that our senses are exercised to discern what is right and what is not right. And beloved, as Andrea Crouch wrote in one of his numbers, modern numbers, who has some fine words for us. Sometimes we don't care for the musical. The music of that one is beautiful through it all. And he has the answer when he said, if we didn't have a problem, we wouldn't know that he could solve them. And it's that kind of experience which enables us to walk the kind of life that he would have us walk. And it's a step of faith and it's a moving forward for God. We also learned something about the fact that Elijah was to be removed from Israel rather than to go around with a with his gospel team with his crusading team to tell people all about their sin and calling them back to God and we noted that this was divine chastisement on Israel itself that God is removing our men and maybe he is removing the men from among us because we are not willing to be obedient to that which we know. Now that brings us to where we are today. And I want to speak about the next point that I would like to bring to your thinking. First of all, divine concealment. The message in verse three was, get thee hence and hide thyself. Get thee hence and hide thyself. Now I see a few things here that I'd like to share with you. First of all, I believe that this was a call to separation. And if there's something that's very unpopular in the teaching of the Word of God today, even among us, is the call to true spiritual separation. We have taken the ultimate of this, and it's called isolation. I see nothing in Scripture that speaks about isolation except from every form of evil. That's isolation. We are to be in the world, but we are not to be of the world. We should not let our railroad track isolate us from the people around us. It's so easy for that to happen, to be so happy with our fellowship. that we have little or no interest in those around about us, so that even if they came among us, they would not feel at home because we have our fellowship. We are separated. No, we're isolated. And that suggests to me if it's isolation, it might be kind of icy, kind of cold, except for those on the inside. If we're going to be outside of the world, we're not going to be of any use for God. We're showing you pictures of the Logus. And I think at this very moment, the Logus is in Dry Dock. You know it's a beautiful ship. Just to look at it, it's lines and all of the things concerning that ship, I just enjoy looking at it. But in Dry Dock, it might be a beautiful ship. But right now it's of absolutely no use for the purpose for which it was bought. It's in isolation. But then when the ship is put into the water, there is a separation between the inside of that ship and the water. But it's in the water doing its job, carrying the books, the literature, the vans, the young people, the crew, to its destination and to what it set out to do. And if we as Christians are like the boat, we're supposed to be in the ocean. We can only be used of God when we're in the ocean. The problem is when the ocean gets into the ship. And that's when indeed we're not in a place of separation. Now we're trying to mingle the thing together. And pretty soon we start sinking down deeper and deeper, and that's what's happened to our moral standards, I think, in the assemblies today. We've let enough of the world come in that the ship has just dropped down little more and more into the ocean. This message that was given to Elisha was a message of separation, to separate himself from the evil that was around him. Ahab was an apostate. His mate, indeed, was a heathen princess, as you know. idolatry abounded in the land of Israel at this time. Jehovah was publicly dishonored. And isolation from evil, participation in evil, was an absolute essential. We're told in James chapter one that we're to keep ourselves unspotted from the world. Ephesians chapter five and verse eleven speaks about us having no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. But the question comes, where should Elijah go to? He's told to hide himself. Is he going to be left to his own devisings and his own choice? No, God doesn't do that for you, and he doesn't do it for Elijah. He tells him what to do. First of all, get thee hence, and hide thyself, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the rook's charist. that is before Jordan. Eastward, that's where the morning light arises. That's a good place to be turned to. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of light. Eastward always speaks about the rising of the sun. Suggestion of the resurrection and even the return of the Lord Jesus Christ. Turn towards that. Always recall that the tabernacle. when it came to a landing place was set up so that the front of the tabernacle faced eastward. Remember that. Then it was by the brook Cherith. And I'm told, according to Kromacher, the word Cherith has the idea of drought in it. It was a drought brook. It was a brook that easily dried up when there wasn't any rain. That the source of the brook was the deluge that would come down from the mountain after a time of heavy rain. And then after the water had passed, the brook would be dried up. Seems a rather difficult place for a person to be told to go, isn't it? We'll talk a little bit more about that later. And then it was told that it was before Jordan, which were the very limits of the land. And Jordan, as you know, speaks of death. because spiritual death indeed rested upon Israel. But you and I are asked to be on the other side of the Jordan, aren't we? And suggest to us that we are on resurrection ground with death and judgment behind us. That's what basically the whole book of Joshua is about. that we have our inheritance, which is in the heavenly places, and God wants us to put the old nature that is to reckon ourselves to be dead indeed unto sin and to be living in a victorious life in joy and in possessing our possessions before God. This is where this man was to go. But then he's told to hide himself. Now, beloved, this is the hardest command, especially that any energetic, enthusiastic servant of God is called upon to do. It's the hardest thing in the world to be set aside for a period of time. It's something that I don't know whether I could have taken. Here was a man who was called upon, beloved, to spend one whole year without ever seeing a human being or communicating with a human being for a period of a year. Now, I realize it would seem to me that you would have to evaluate Elijah's temperament in the terms of Tim LaHaye as being a melancholic, no doubt, one who didn't mind being by himself, you might say, or one who was more of an introvert than an extrovert. But I would find it very difficult, as much as I love people and as gregarious as I am, to have to go for one whole year to hide myself because God told me to do it. You know, there might be someone here that God has put in this position, and we chaff under it. And we are nervous and we are upset about it. And there's the unwillingness to accept the fact that maybe God has a very important reason in our life, even as he did in the life of Elijah. Because after the time of quietness was a time of great blessing in the life of Elijah on Mount Carmel. Elijah had to know the hiding place of Cherith. before he could know the blessing of Mount Karma. And this, I think, is the most difficult aspect that I can think of, to have to be set aside, to really do nothing, to not be there for what I think I'm capable of doing or the gift that God has given me. I think of Joshua, and this is something I've never heard anyone speak about. But you know Joshua went with Moses up unto the mount when he received the Ten Commandments. Now you have to go to two or three verses to understand this, but it's nonetheless true. And while the people were down enjoying themselves in immorality and idolatry, they at least were enjoying themselves although they were away from God. And Moses was up on the Mount fulfilling his responsibility of talking to God and receiving the Ten Commandments and a face-to-face confrontation with God. There in limbo for a period of forty days and forty nights, and I get the idea that it was sort of halfway up the mountain, not all the way to where Moses was, and not down where the people was. And for forty days and forty nights, without food, or maybe only what he could get while he scrounged around in that area, there stood Joshua. What was he useful for? What could he be used for? He couldn't help Moses, although he was Moses' lieutenant. He couldn't be down there helping the people in the midst of their declension because that's where God had chosen to put him. And he was there for forty days and forty nights. You don't hear one word of complaint in Joshua's from Joshua's mouth concerning him. Lord, what are you going to have me to do? What are you going to call me for? You told Moses to set me aside and he sort of seems to be training me and here I am for forty days and I don't know what I'm doing. But it was the preview to the kind of leader who would be able to think things through. He had forty days and forty nights to think about the future of Israel, didn't he? And to think about what God might have for him, knowing that Moses had been set aside and that he was going to be God's man eventually to lead them. I wonder if you realize this. that the period of time under Joshua, as far as the children of Israel was concerned, was really the most spiritual time that Israel ever spent in all of their history as Jews, as a nation. There isn't any other time in history when the people as a whole collectively were truly following the Lord, as they should. They made mistakes. as we do. But it was the best time of spiritual communion and fellowship and following God in the whole history of the children of Israel. And who led them? That man who was hidden away for forty days and forty nights in limbo, waiting for God's time and God's purpose, and not chaffing and not complaining. and not asking, Lord, what are you doing with me here? Hide thyself. Now why? Well, I'm going to give you a few ideas, which I think why this man was asked to be hidden away. First of all, when a man receives the kind of answers to prayer that Elijah received, it could be a great source of pride to a man of God. I had one woman come up to me in a place where I was seeking to get started. She told me, God answers every one of my prayers. And she met in an affirmative way. I doubt that. But she was really proud that he could say, God answers all my prayers. She had a good bit of money, still does, I suppose. And she could parade one of her dear friends past a Continental Mark IV window and say, the Lord's going to give me that. I've just been asking him about it. when we get signal answers to prayer special answers to prayer I think sometimes they can be a great source of pride and maybe the Lord had to take Elijah and move him back and say now remember Elijah I put the desire in you for that request to begin with and then I gave you the answers of that request and don't you get any idea that this request is because you've done something secondly we find that Elijah must learn from God for one whole year his own nothingness, his own unworthiness. How easy it is to be sort of caught up and to have a bit of a haughty attitude about the fact that, well, the words roll out easily and people just fall at my feet when I speak. And I'm really a servant of God that's doing a wonderful job. and we really don't have a sense of our own nothingness. Sometimes we need to be set aside for a period of time to learn how really we are nothing of ourselves. Said Paul, under the work of the Holy Spirit in his life, what dost thou have that thou hast not received? You're nothing. He's everything. I'm sure Elijah needed to learn that too. I can see Elijah sort of, I could think if I were Elijah, I would be, here's what I would be saying to a Lord, I'm a palace man. Don't you know I've had the privilege of going into the palace and speaking boldly to the king and I brought your message and it's had tremendous impact. Lord, I'm a palace man. What do you mean putting me out here by the brook? Lord, I think maybe that IBM card got rumpled a little bit. In fact, possibly the PBX operator, she got plugged into the wrong number. That wasn't my number you really wanted to talk to, was it? Brethren, sisters, when he puts us in that kind of a place, we need to be carefully submissive to him. And this is the third thing that this man was taught. He was taught the value of the hidden life. that further secret training needed to be personally fitted so this man could be able to speak again for God. I need to have the quiet secret time with God before I become a public representative of God. And beloved, the hidden life is the hardest aspect of Christian living, especially for a man of God. I believe it's an unchanging principle in the ways of God that he sets us aside if he really is going to be able to use us for his glory. Joshua had to know the suffering of the pit and the prison before becoming governor of all of Egypt. Moses spent one-third of his long life on the backside of a desert. Didn't that seem like a waste of time? one whole period of forty years being nothing but a mean shepherd. But what was he going to be for the last forty years? A shepherd. The Lord taught him the backside of that desert so he knew it like his back of his hand. He had to prove by faith, by a walk of faith, the faithfulness of God for forty years in the backside of the desert, before he could take a million people through that desert and prove that God was going to take care of their needs. It was a great teaching school for Moses, wasn't it? Paul spent three years in Arabia before he was out in his ministry. and if you would put those down you cannot put down the fact that our Lord spent thirty years in obscurity that was a hidden life wasn't it thirty years in obscurity how we're so anxious to get our young people out to the field train them and get them out there as fast as possible we've been talking a little bit, Bill Jellie and I about these things, for both of us very much concerned about missionary emphasis and the missionary call. But when I see these things in Scripture, I see that there maybe needs to be more than just the official training of L.C. or some other place. the backside of the desert is important for us to prove God for ourselves before he sits us in a very difficult situation and we have to prove him there it can become very discouraging it was a severe testing to Elijah's submissiveness to the divine will he was a robust service with a very zealous disposition and he would find it very hard to spend one whole year actually you'll know that with respect to the widow with respect to even the three years he spent all three years in seclusion didn't he difficult time difficult time then i want you to notice the divine compass Verse three and four, hide thyself by the brook charis. It shall be that thou shalt drink of the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. Two aspects of this compass. Number one, by the brook. It was by a brook. It wasn't by a river. That's difficult to understand, really. except that you might say why a brook a brook might dry up at any moment but it's rare beloved for God to place his servants in the midst of luxury when he sets them aside why does he place him by a brook that seemingly speaking and humanly speaking and logically speaking could dry up at any moment well I suggest first of all Because if we're put in a place of luxury, it's going to draw our affections away from Him. We are all subject to this. Luxury and ease can so easily draw our thoughts and minds about what God has supplied for us. And He wants to teach us when He places us by a brook to rest not in our blessings. but in the blesser himself and if things are not so easy and the blessings are not coming so easily as they might it keeps us on our knees before God and being completely occupied with the blesser himself and one thing that I'm convinced of in my own life the need of being more and more and more occupied with the blesser rather than the blessings. I appreciate the blessings. Don't get me wrong. How could one not appreciate the blessings that God provides for us? But how easy it is to be occupied in thanking God for our blessings and not be thanking God for Christ. You know, of course, Brother... I guess it's Alph Gibbs' differentiation between prayer when you talk about a request and thanksgiving and praise and worship. Thanksgiving is when you're asking for the supply of your needs. And thanksgiving is when you're grateful when they're supplied. And praise is when you're occupied with how well God does something for you. and worship speaks of when I'm occupied with him himself. I illustrate that with a very homely little illustration. I worked with the camp here in Florida for a number of years and we were in one place that we were renting and they said they would supply the food and it was terrible food, frankly. In fact, it was rather dirty food because roaches were rampant all over them at night, and it wasn't too palatable to be eating it during the day. My wife knew about this, and when I came home, she said, honey, what would you like for supper tonight, Saturday night after we got back? Oh, I said, fix me a good chuck steak. I would really enjoy that. That was request. That was prayer of a request, wasn't it? And as only she can do it, for she is a very fine cook, she fixed me a marvelous meal that I thoroughly enjoyed. I said, honey, thank you so much for that good meal. That was Thanksgiving. I was still not so much concerned or, you know, taken up with her as I was the fact that what I had received and how wonderful it fell on that old stomach of mine. As we did the dishes together, I turned to her and said, honey, I think you're the best cook in all the world. That's praise, isn't it? You know, I'm getting a little bit away from myself. Thanksgiving still is quite self-oriented, beloved. Think about that. When we finished, I took her in my arms and gave her a big hug. Sometimes it's too hard. She's my China doll. And I said, give her a big kiss. And I said, honey, I love you. That's worship. How much do we take the Lord in our arms and say, Lord, I love you. Lord, I love you. Beloved, the hidden life can teach us to be occupied with the person instead of the provisions that he makes for us. And then notice the second aspect of this divine compass. Not only was it by the brook, but it was there, just the simple word, there. Elijah might have preferred some other hiding places, but Cherith was the place where he was to receive divine supplies. God had pledged to Elijah to supply his needs only as long as Elijah was there and no other place. How important it is for me to learn what God's place is for me. And when I learn it, beloved, God's going to supply my needs. I often kind of smile at my brethren, especially out in the other groups, who pastoring one church are receive a call to what is called about a much wider sphere of service and always a larger salary. They never seem to be called to a lower salary and a smaller scope of ministry. Does God always call me to a larger scope of ministry? It's very easy to be unhappy with a small place. I've had to learn that in my life too. We must be in the way of God's appointing to receive God's supplies, do we not? We speak of the Lord's prayer. Lord, our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done in heaven as it is in earth. Now that comes first and then he says, give me this day. our daily bread. It's so important that we be where God wants us to be and not to be, you know, have itchy feet to get someplace else where the grass always seems greener. We had a dear friend who stopped, who was living in this state of Florida and they stopped by on their way to California. And he was telling me, you know, things will be so much better. I can get a job out there with a greater amount of money. And do you know that the kids can go to school free? And the education is so much better for our children. And he had all kinds of ideas of what would be helpful to him if he went to California. I said, are you sure you know what you're doing? are you sure that the spiritual help that you've been receiving here you'll get there oh i'm sure this is right and and he's a man who is basically quite has been quite itchy as far as his feet are concerned wherever he's been and i remember talking to him quite seriously about this move although he was right in the middle of going i knew i couldn't change his mind he went out to california He got his free education. He had his larger salary. He had his large, more beautiful home and swimming pool and cars. But his wife met another man out there. And they are separated today and divorced. That obviously wasn't the place that God wanted him. It wasn't there. It must have been here. I can't sit in judgment on the dear brother, but it's been a great source of sorrow in his life. God said by the brook Cherith, it's not a luxurious place, but it's there you're going to be helped and it's there you're going to be fed. And it's there I'm going to bless you. It's there I'm going to speak to you. Then notice the divine commissary. That's what I like to call it. Verse four. shall be with thou shalt drink of the brook, and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. Ah, Elijah has just been called to go to Cherith Bible Conference. You question that? Do you know what your Bible conference is? Bread and flesh in the morning? And bread and flesh in the evening, isn't that right? you have your meetings at ten o'clock and then your meetings at seven thirty bread and flesh in the morning bread and flesh in the evening beloved that was a good place for him to be he could count upon god's provision and the god's servant must learn to trust God, absolutely. Well, do you realize what he was saying that he was going to do for Elijah? He was going to take an unclean bird that he was told not to touch, and that unclean bird was going to supply his need for a year. Sometimes without solicitation, I've had those that are in the world that have ministered to my needs, and I wondered, should I take them or not? I've heard so much in days past of taking nothing of the Gentiles. I'm sure you've heard that statement. Something I did not solicit, did not ask for, and yet God seemed to place it on someone's heart to minister to our needs. And then I thought of Elijah's situation where an unclean bird was used by God to minister to his needs for one whole year. Tremendous, isn't it? It's interesting that although he was promised bread and flesh, he had to go down to drink at the brook. He didn't open his mouth. Lord, rain hard. I'm thirsty. Had to get down on his knees. He had to drink the water. He had to get it for himself. Maybe he even had to fix the meat after he got it. No doubt it was raw. And he maybe had to cook it. I think in Isaiah thirty-three sixteen our promise for provision says, bread shall be given him and his water shall be for sure. That's a good promise, isn't it? And he says, I've commanded the ravens to feed thee there. I see three things here, briefly. I see the absolute sovereignty of God in his pleasure. God is a law unto himself and God can even break his own laws if necessary to carry out his own plans and purposes. He prohibited his people from eating ravens and unclean animals, considered it an abomination. Leviticus eleven fifteen. Yet he makes use of them to feed Elijah. Wasn't it Pharaoh's daughter? an evil, idolatrous woman who succored Moses. Was it not Balaam who was called upon to utter one of the most remarkable prophecies concerning Israel? Who was an evil man of himself who only thought of the money he might get by prophesying wrongly against the children of Israel? And then trying to, in some way... earn that money, do whatever he could to earn that money, even to persuading the children of Israel to follow Baal, if possible, that he might get the money that he thought would come to him. But God used him. God used even a sling and a stone to conquer Goliath. The absolute sovereignty of God and his pleasure to take care of us. Then I think of the absolute supremacy of God's in his power he could move fowls or fish or beasts or winds or seas or ravens to obey him marvelous I think of how the Lord often brings us to a place of testing as he brought this man Elijah in Mark chapter four you recall the Lord began to teach by parable to his disciples and he taught them much about the life of faith And he learned something, the Lord knew something that we don't know too much of, that once you've learned that, you must be tested on it. Every time I go to school and when I have, they've always given me a test at the end of the period. The teacher has been very diligent in trying to teach me that subject, whatever it is. And then she would give me a test at the end to see if I really learned what I was supposed to learn. Well, God's testing is always experiential testing. And after he had taught the disciples concerning the life of faith in Mark four, it says that they entered into a ship and the Lord said, we're going to the other side. And there he sort of got the disciples to start writing their blue book exam. And the winds began to blow. You recall the story. And the water began to get into the ship. And they couldn't seem to get the water out fast enough. And the Lord sat on the sleep in the back end of the ship. Lord, care if thou not that we perish, can't you at least get a can and help us bail out the ship so that we can get to the other side? Why was that a test of faith? Because the Lord had said at the very beginning, we're going to the other side. Don't you believe me? He said, O ye of little faith, and that word is in the emphatic, that word ye. O ye of all people! I've just taught you about what the life of faith is. And here I am giving you a little simple test in nature, if you please. And you're failing me. O ye of little faith, couldn't you not believe? Could you not exercise that faith that I just taught you? And they got an F on their test, believe me. God always tests people when he teaches them. He taught Abraham to depend upon himself and he sent a famine in the land, didn't he? And Abraham got an F on his test, too. You know, it's wonderful that Elijah, at least at this point in his life, didn't get an F. That F didn't stand for faith, by the way. It was something else. Then notice the absolute wisdom of God and his provision. Not only bread and flesh in the morning, but how he sent it. That's where the wisdom was. Supposing there were some people that were taking a liking to Elijah and decided to feed him. You know, there's a lot of commentators that think that this is what happened, that that word idea of chariot really speaks about a little village called Ober, which was an Arab section, which they said he went to see these Arabs, and they felt sorry for him, so they fed him. I think that's rubbish. It's an absolute denial of the flat-out statement of the word of God. Supposing a dog from somebody's house had been called upon to take food to this man, Elijah. Well, with the posses that were out trying to find this man in order to bring some air between his head and his body when they found him, it would have been a simple thing to have followed the dog right to the place of concealment. But who is going to think about a raven who is a carnivorous bird who we know would take some flesh back out to his youngins in order to feed them? This is something you see all the time. They thought nothing about a raven flying over with bread and flesh in their beaks. and the absolute wisdom of God. Why in the world should a raven pick up bread? You can understand why he would pick up flesh. He's carnivorous. But you don't hear of ravens eating bread, but here's the wisdom of God. And I want to suggest to you that he got better fair than the hundred prophets that stayed in the land and didn't take up a stand for God. They only got bread and water in the cave. He got bread and flesh in water. That's how God takes care of his own. Then notice divine compliance here. And this is always causes my heart to leap a little bit because I don't think I can identify with it like that. Verse five, he went and did according to the word of God. No complaint. You know, I think I have a running argument with my Lord. I'm always telling the Lord what I recognize and what I realize and what I know. And my Lord's always trying to impress on me what I don't obey. You know, the opposite of ignorance in the Christian life is not knowledge. The opposite of ignorance in the Christian life is obedience. As we said Tuesday night, then shall we know if we follow on to know the Lord. And the reason that we're ignorant is not because we haven't studied the Scriptures and come to the Bible conference and learned from God's servants. It's because we have not obeyed that which we already know and therefore we really never learn anything until first we are obedient to what we already know. Abraham had a, or rather, Elijah had a severe test here of humility, great humility. Some of his commands, it seems, are quite humiliating to haughty flesh and blood. But if God's there and God's in it, it's the greatest place and the only place to be. Elijah's social life was tested today. Nobody for one whole year. There was no hesitation or delay on the part of Elijah. He knew something about blessed subjections of the divine will of God. He went and he did. There was no doubting God's ability to supply his needs. And he was a man who practiced what he preached. Because he went and did. what he tells others to do. Finally, I want you to know the divine conclusion. The ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening and the drank of the brook. Hebrews ten, twenty two says he is faithful that promised. And all nature should change its course rather than one of the promises of God to fail. Do you believe that? My God shall supply all your need, not your wants. I like that word according to. That's a measurement term. He's going to supply your need on the basis of the abundance of his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. By the measure of the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. That's tremendous. Then cannot my need be met? Beloved, it can, and it will. And it's profitless to come to Him and to say, Why? Or how? How are you going to do that, Lord? God has ten thousand ways in which to meet our needs. Let's believe that He can do it and not ask Him why. So what God promises He certainly is able to perform. Here's the divine conclusion, isn't it? Now, just something about what He received. First of all, it was plentiful. Bread in water and flesh. Tremendous. No lux, nothing luxurious, but all that was necessary so that that man came out of that situation, a healthy man. really taken up with his God. He had no one else to detract him. Beloved, I think one of the problems when I speak to my own heart, very much, the busyness of our activities for God often keep us from knowing something of the still small voice of God. The hiding place that He may put us is for us to learn something about that still small voice. and to receive his training and his teaching and his communion so that when he does see fit to use us again it's to a greater extent for the blessing of those to whom we minister the provision was plentiful secondly it was regular morning and evening morning and evening as long as the as long as it was ordered by God As long as it was needed by Elijah, it was there, it was there, it was there. Do you believe it? He didn't have enough for the evening meal. He couldn't even be sure of the evening meal as far as being able to see it. But he could see his God and he knew his God wouldn't fail him. And he had enough for the morning meal and he had, you know, the Lord, you know how wise the Lord is. Supposedly he'd given him enough for a week. Where in the world by the brook cherished would we have kept a weak supply of meat? There were no frigidary refrigerators out there. God was his refrigerator. Enough for the day, enough for the evening. Isn't that great wisdom? Finally, it was miraculous. It came in a supernatural fashion. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And may I say to you, we mentioned this a little bit before, I think that we do not experience enough of the supernatural of God in our lives. And maybe that's why we don't know enough about the reality of Jehovah and of us his representatives. Sometimes he has to place us in these situations so that we learn something of the miraculous of God in our life. And more than that, that others would see the supernatural of God in their life so that they would want him to. May God speak to us of this place of the Brook Cherith. You know, the Brook Cherith is very difficult to sit beside. It might breathe a drying brook of failing health. It might breathe the drying brook of failing financial situations. It might breathe the failing brook of a lack of popularity, but it'll always be there, where the provisions of God come. Let us learn it. Let us learn the lesson of the book, Cherith, so that when we come to our Mount Carmel, we have met God in private before we meet his people in public shall we pray thank you Lord for showing us a little bit at least only skimming as it were the top but that which speaks so eloquently because it's your word not because of a speaker speaks so eloquently to our lives and of the need that's there And Father, help us to learn experientially these truths so that we can learn more about new truths and can go on in a real, intimate, deep communion with thyself. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.