It is well at this point to answer a question that might come to some of the readers. Why did the Lord wait for the brook to dry up before he directed Elijah to go to Zarephath, for he could have caused the widow to care for Elijah the whole period of the drought?
It takes extreme care to answer questions such as this. God is free, and he acts according to his good pleasure (Daniel 4:35). Yet something may be said in response to the question. Previous to this point in the drought, the widow and her son would not be in the extreme distress that the following verses show that she was experiencing. The miraculous nature of God’s preservation of his servant might not have been so clearly displayed.
As the word of the Lord had first directed Elijah to the brook Cherith, so now it directs him to the town of Zarephath in the country of the Sidonians. We may ask, why here? There are several answers. First, Ahab had no power in Zarephath. It was outside of Israel and therefore safe from Ahab’s soldiers. Second, sending Elijah here displays to us that the drought was effective—not only where Baal (the god of rain) was a foreign god—but in a country where Baal was worshipped as a local deity. The Lord was taking the battle directly to Baal’s home territory. It is also a matter of note that Ahab’s wife was a Sidonian, but she, unlike this poor widow, received no help from the Lord.
The Lord told Elijah that he had commanded a widow in Zarephath to feed Elijah. Did he do this face-to-face with this woman? Probably not. The following verses seem to show that at the time when Elijah first spoke to her, she had no idea of such a command. We suggest that the language means that God was providentially directing her that when Elijah addressed her, she was responsive to his directions.
8 Then the word of the LORD came to him,