Before Elijah did anything else, he cried out to the Lord. His prayer began as a question rather than a request. Was there no separation in the mind of God, he was asking, between the widow who granted him hospitality and others upon whom the life-threatening drought had come? Was the rescue that was given to her temporary and uncertain?
The way Elijah spoke indicated that he was not accusing God of injustice. Instead, he was faced with a situation in which what he knew about the character seemed inconsistent with the reality that confronted him.
Elijah’s prayer also indicated that he did not share the woman’s doubt concerning whether she had found the Lord’s forgiveness. She concluded from the circumstance that she had found no favour with the God of Israel. He prayed as if he was convinced that she had found favour with the Lord. His problem was that he could not reconcile his belief in God’s mercy toward her with the death of her son.
There is one thing that both of them shared, and that was the belief that the son’s death was not a chance occurrence. She thought it came in judgment of her sin. Elijah didn’t know why the Lord caused it, but affirmed that it was from the Lord.
20 Puis il invoqua l'Eternel, et dit: Eternel, mon Dieu, est-ce que tu affligerais, au point de faire mourir son fils, même cette veuve chez qui j'ai été reçu comme un hôte?