1 Kings 16-18 - Part 1 — Leonard Ravenhill

Oh, wonderful to have you. How many are here for the last time? Well, that's the only way to live. You should live as though this were your last day on earth. What if you die tonight? Would it be okay to go straight to heaven?

Nothing to put straight? No apologies to your parents for your bad manners and all that kind of thing? How are you? Nice to see you. We've got some new friends along too. Do we have a hymn book? Bethany, I should sing better out of this now.

Oh, I see you've gone on tape now too. That's great. I saw your tapes advertised, your videos. Great. My prayer this week has been this. In this session, which begins obviously tonight, till it finishes, which may be Easter, I don't know when.

I mean, not this meeting tonight. That won't last till Easter. My one prayer is that this series of nights that we have together will give us a new revelation of the majesty of God. If I could reduce the problem of the modern church to an irreducible minimum, it's this.

Knowing the God of the Word

We do not know God. We know about him. We know theology. We know something of the Word of God, but we don't know very much about the God of the Word. And it really is my intense desire that this, what we call winter session, the winter weather's here already, will be to me at least, and I hope to you, a new revelation of the height and depth and length and breadth of the love of God which passes knowledge and the personality of God himself.

A lot of this is captured in the 20th hymn here, and I want us to sing this with our hearts as well as with our lips. The trouble with so many of these hymns, again, is they're only half of what they used to be.

You'll have to reprint another one, another hymn book. Number 20, I'll worship the king. You better stand and sing. Please. Let's pray. Lord, as we sing this majestic hymn, we're reminded of our own frailty.

We acknowledge we're frail children of dust. From dust we came, to dust we return. We're very frail in our understanding of thee. We think of your glorious majesty as this. Him has declared it that whose robe is the light and whose canopy space.

And as Isaiah says, the earth is his footstool and the clouds are the dust of his feet. Lord, I want to invite you, and I trust all of us do. I'm sure Melody and these others do, and I pray the students do.

We want you to invade this sanctuary Friday night by Friday night. Maybe it will be shattering for us in some experiences. As you expose us to ourselves as well as to your glory and your majesty. As you expose us to your light, we realize that we still in a measure walk in darkness.

As you expose your strength, we realize again our weakness. As you expose us to your majestic revelation in your word, we shall realize our ignorance. For your word comes to our rescue because you have said it's the lame that take the prey, not to the strong.

This race is not to the swift. This battle is not to the strong. Our frailty is an advantage. It casts us more on yourself. Our ignorance is an advantage because we plead, almost grown in your presence for wisdom, all that one night you may baptize us with a spirit of wisdom such as we have never had before.

But we don't want you to say to us, when we stand before the millions around your throne, we do not want to say, I have many things to tell you down there at last days that I couldn't tell you. You are too immature, too preoccupied, too diversified even in your thinking.

Grant that we may be able to say with the apostle Paul, this one thing I do, and that one thing be to pursue the holiness of God. Lord, I do not believe the world has yet seen the mightiest power of the church.

I don't believe as many do that it finished with the New Testament or the days of the apostles because you've told us that your Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. Never more did we need a baptism of strength than we do this day.

Never before were our enemies so arrogant, so wealthy, so dominant, so projected on the press, in the press, the newspapers, on the TV screens, in the radio, in the schools, in the colleges. It seems there's almost a conspiracy to try to de-deify the Lord Jesus Christ, to tell us how little of the world we can believe instead of how much.

Lord, I believe I express this out of all our hearts tonight. We're candidates for all the fullness of God. We don't know what all that means. We may have to stretch our hearts to contain more and stretch our thinking.

But Lord, we pray that just as in the tabernacle of old there was a pillar of fire by night and a pillar of cloud by day, that there's such a pillar of fire over last days, whether I'm teaching or anybody else is teaching, that it will throw its light not just to the boundaries of America but to the ends of the earth.

Lord, if we put it in modern, simple language, you would ask you to make this room, I would ask you each night to make this room the workshop of the Holy Ghost. Conform us, shape us to the image of your Son.

We don't want to be famous people, we want to be holy people. We don't want to be known by men, we want to be known by God. And it seems all to be settled in the word, Lord Jesus, that you gave us. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.

As a poet said, O fill me with thy fullness, Lord, until my very heart o 'erflow. In kindling thought and glowing word, thy love to tell, thy praise to show. O strengthen me that while I stand firm on the rock and strong in thee, I may stretch out a loving hand to wrestlers in life's troubled sea.

As we open your word, we pray, you'll open our eyes, open our minds, and then open our mouths to declare the revelations you give us and the purpose you have for each of our individual lives. Lord, I don't believe that the redemptive work of God in Christ or through Christ was to get us into heaven or escape hell or save us from vicious sins.

Those are fringe benefits and beautiful, but Lord, I believe it was the whole redemptive program that blood and sweat of Gethsemane and the agony of Calvary and the glory of the resurrection and the gift of the Holy Spirit that marvelous day was all that we may be conformed to the image of his Son.

That's what you've told us we're elected to be, conformed to the image of the Son. We remember all the students who have been here and have come out from this fellowship. Wherever they are tonight, bless them.

We pray for the literature as it goes out. Sanctify every piece, particularly in this horrible day of abortion. We pray you'll bless this ministry that particularly you've given to dear Melody. As the tapes go out, the audios and the videos, as this issue of the paper goes out, Lord, make it a terror to the devil.

Let's sing again. We must sing one. I never feel we've been here if we don't sing. It's hard for me to sing it. That's number one. Only one man that ever lived could play this. Now, Bob, don't get angry with me here.

Nobody ever played Holy, Holy, Holy, right, Keith? Keith, listen. Maybe he is. Maybe he's playing it up there. How do you know he isn't? Don't look so incredulous, you know. I preach long and strong, but never wrong.

So let's sing it. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, courteous. So to Melody and the, what I call the senior staff here and others, I want to thank you for the facilities using this lovely place again.

The Growth of a Soul and the Growth of a Work

It's home to some of us. If it isn't to you, well, come more often. Okay, let's look at the epistle of James. James, the fifth chapter. And I guess you'll guess what the subject is. There are many, many, many great biographies and autobiographies of Christians written in two volumes.

A very classic work on Hudson Taylor. The first volume, the big thick thing, is called The Growth of a Soul, which shows you the growth of the boy that got saved to a time he became a lonely missionary in central China.

He founded the China Inland Mission. All the other missions went on the coast, but he penetrated into the center. The second volume is called The Growth of a Work. A remarkable thing. That man never asked for a penny, never took an offering in a meeting.

Now, it's no good you doing that. If your faith hasn't stretched that far, you better not try it. But maybe it will stretch so far. Verse 17, Elias. Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are.

Now, that cuts away all the excuses we make that we're not kind of angels or half cherubims or born with a super intellect or something. He was a man of like passions as we are. If you doubt that, he stood up to 850 men and ran away from one woman.

Isn't that amazing? So he must have been as nervous as we are. What does it say? He was a man subject to like passions as we are and he prayed. That's volume one. Volume two is verse 18 and he prayed again.

Now, I don't know how you were raised and what background you have. I'm very glad that I wasn't raised in a day when my Sunday school teacher brought muppets or puppets or something like that along. We were taught, properly, of course, in England, that...

I still remember many of those wonderful Sunday school stories. You know, the favorites were then the altar and now David and Goliath. Oh, we loved that. You know, the odds are so different. Or Samson.

But as I've read the background of this story with Elijah, I wonder why Elijah isn't listed with the same kind of persons. I don't know any man more heroic in the whole of the word of God until Jesus himself came than Elijah.

Elijah's Authority Under the Word of the Lord

Turn back to the 18th chapter, pardon me, the 17th chapter in the first book of Kings. Now, in case I forget, you know, I do forget sometimes. Martin, you're too young to forget, I know that. Do you know the law that there are three things about old age?

Do you know that one? The first is loss of memory. I can't remember the other two. But it wasn't until I read this, I must have read this 70 years, it wasn't until this week I realized this is a classical example, this story, if ever there is one, it's a classical example of a man that shut up heaven, and what he bound on earth, bound in heaven, was bound on earth.

And what he released in heaven was released on earth. So why didn't anybody ever tell me that? You can't plead ignorance, I've told you tonight. Let me look at my watch, I don't use it much. At the end of the first, in the first book of Kings, chapter 16, beginning at verse 30, let me tell you my old joke again here, I read, of course, from the living Bible, King James Version.

The NIV, how many of you have an NIV? Good, burn them. Do you know what the NIV is? It's exactly the same text as the Jehovah Witness Bible. It has 500 less words than the King James Version. Some of them should be omitted from the King James, but not all that anyhow.

But, verse 30 of 1 Kings 16, 16 verse 30 says, Ahab, the son of Amri, did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him. Now, 58 years before this, there'd been a dividing of the kingdom.

Then you have a whole succession of kings. The last king that we mention here is Ahab, he was the seventh. Now, the second king did more evil than the first, the third did more evil than the second, and you go right down until you come to Ahab, and he does more than all the aggregate iniquity of all the kings that were before him.

Verse 33, or verse 32, He rode an altar to Baal in the house of Baal, which he built in Samaria. And Ahab made a grove and did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him.

In his days did Heor, the Bethelite, build Jericho. He laid the foundation thereof in Abiram, his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son. Why did he rebuild Jericho? Well, why did it fall down?

Some men that walked around it. How many times? How many? Right. You've got a new version. This lady just made a new version. She says seven. They marched around seven days, and then on the last day, they marched around what?

How many times? Oh, I'll leave. I'm going to do your homework for you. You're lazy enough, apparently, without me encouraging you. Okay. He rebuilt Jericho, which God said should never be rebuilt. And it says what?

He rode up an altar to Baal, and then he raised groves. You know what that word there really means? The nearest we can get to it is a totem pole. It's a place where they assembled to worship, but they did not assemble to worship God.

Okay. Elijah the Tishbite, chapter 17, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said unto Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, there shall be no before whom I stand. You know, if you stand before God, you'll never kneel before anybody else, for sure.

There shall not be dew nor rain these years according to the word of the Lord, according to my word. The reason this man was so courageous was he had a deep, deep set of conviction that you and I have to have if we're going to serve God.

And that was that the word of the Lord came to him. You know, when Satan came to Jesus, what did Jesus do? In modern language, he threw the book at him. Every time Satan came, Jesus said, It is written, it is written, it is written, it is written.

Well, that's what God wants us to do. The word is a lamp to our feet, a light to our path. His conviction, courage was established in his convictions. All right. Verse 2, The word of the Lord came unto him, saying, Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the book Kirit, that is before Jordan.

Now, this man is going to stand up against a multitude of people. Do you remember the Proverbs? Proverbs, what, 28, 1 says, The wicked flee. It doesn't mean that little thing, the badger is a wicked flee.

It means the wicked flee, they fly. I think those little things are wicked, sure. But, The wicked flee when no man pursueth but the righteous are as bold as a lion. What's it say in the, what psalm is it there?

Psalm 3, I think, in verse 8. I will not be afraid, though a horse should encamp against me. Montgomery, an old English hymn writer, said that prayer is the Christian's vital breath, the Christian's native air.

His watchword at the gates of death, he enters heaven by prayer. O thou by whom we come to God, the life, the truth, the way, the path of prayer thyself hath taught, Lord, teach us how to pray. There is no ministry more searching than the ministry of prayer.

Prayer, Dependence, and the Drying Brook

You can get by in other things. You know, I didn't realize until yesterday, you smart folk have thought this often, I'm sure, but you know, Jesus said to his disciples in Gethsemane, Watch with me. But he never said pray for me.

The disciples said, Lord, teach us to sing. No? What? Or it was Paul who said, Men ought always to sing and not to faint. No? Two struck out twice. Oh, James said, When you're sick, sing to one another.

That would make some of us sick if somebody sang to us, wouldn't it, sometimes? You know, the self-sufficient do not pray. The self-satisfied don't want to pray. And the self-righteous cannot pray.

There are men going around these days doing all kinds of miracles. What have they got? And they're living in adultery. And they get by with it. Some are frauds with money, and they get by with it. But you see, in prayer, essentially, the psalmist says, Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?

He that hath clean hands. That's significant of our dealings with the world. And of pure heart, which is our relationship with God. There's nothing more demanding. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?

Which means, of course, again, into the presence of the Lord. The psalmist was an amazing man. Tragic in some ways. But even though he was wealthy, and he sat on a throne, he had armies. Can I say this?

He was on the top of the charts singing. Yeah, he got up there, and he said, In the streets they're singing, Saul has slain his thousands, but David his tens of thousands. He had an army. I guess he lived in a palace.

He had all the accoutrements of a king. And yet his language is, Bow down thine ear and hear me, for I am poor and needy. Prayer is the language of the poor. Again, he says, This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him.

When do you cry most to God? When you're at the end of the line. When you've no patience left, or when you've no grace left, or when you've no resources left. You cry in your poverty. Why shouldn't we cry in our riches, as well as in our poverty?

The word of the Lord came unto him, and said, Get thee hence, and hide thyself. Notice there, that's chapter 17, and verse what? Verse what? Verse 3. Hide thyself. If your Bible's big enough, if it isn't, to look across the page, turn to chapter 18.

And verse 1 says, It came to pass after many days, that the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, Go and show thyself. The secret of his life, again, is obedience. I said it often, I'll say it again.

Some of you haven't heard this wisdom, so I must share it with you. Trust and obey. For what? And if you don't trust and obey, you rust and decay. So do one or the other. That's right, put it down, you may never hear that again.

But it's true. I got that from an old, old, old Nazarene preach in England. He used to quote that over and over again, to young people. Trust and obey. It's no good having profound theology, it's no good having a lot of knowledge of the Bible, if we don't trust and obey.

Go hide thyself. So what did he do? He went and he hid himself by the brook Kirith, that is before Jordan. And it says, You shall drink of the brook, and I've commanded the ravens to feed thee there. Now, I hate to say this, but a raven is a carnivorous bird.

We've got a lot of their family around here, not my family, their family. Those big ugly birds, you know, that fly on the road and they dive down and eat the corruption, that somebody's knocked over a stinking skunk, but they still eat it.

I suppose that's their particular flavor, they like it. Then up the road, somebody killed a deer at the top of our road a while ago. All the birds were there eating, devouring. Now an eagle will never eat corruption, never eat carrion.

That's where we're lacking to eagles, I suppose. We should never eat it either. Reading junk and watching TV junk. But you see, the scholars get by here, they say, Well, do you know that word, raven, is there, it's capable of being translated two ways, you can translate it as a bird, or the same Hebrew word is used for Arab.

Well, mercy on us. Doesn't that increase the miracle, an Arab feeding a Jew? I've commanded an Arab to feed thee there. What? No, no, no, I believe it came, you know. Now what do you think he did every morning when he got up?

You think he climbed up the tree and said, Lord, don't let anybody shoot my bird down, he's bringing my breakfast right now. Maybe this means we should only have two meals a day, that would help us out a lot down there, wouldn't it, Melody?

Bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening, and no snacks in between. I understand now around here, they don't eat between snacks anyhow. Bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening.

Go hide thyself. Do you think he left his mailing address? Send my mail on? The hardest thing in the world is to get away from people. You can't tell me one man inside of the Word of God or outside of it who hasn't been a loner.

That doesn't mean he just goes on an island, Isle of Patmos or something, but it does mean he knows how to separate himself from people. I'm just reading the Word of Jesus today. Come ye apart and rest a while.

Get ye hence and hide thyself by the root Kirith. I've commanded the ravens today, feed you there. So here's his obedience, verse 5, He went and did according to the Word of the Lord. I've told this story often, let me abridge it.

Faith Tested Through Obedience and Provision

Dr. Tozer, one day when I went to his office, was reading a dog-eared letter to a little man that died about two years ago now in Africa called Duma. That little man got saved in a Baptist church. I used this in South Carolina and a man at the back was smiling and he came up afterwards.

I liked the story on Duma. I said, did you? He said, yeah, because my daddy was the pastor of that church and I was in the church when it happened. The little guy ran to the front at the altar call, got wonderfully saved.

Going out, the pastor looked at him, he never saw black people in their meetings anyhow. And he said, what can I do for you? The little fella said, give me a church. Give you what? Give me a church. Oh, oh, you're the man that was kneeling at the front a few minutes ago.

No, I'm not. Yes, you are. I know the color of your suit. Nobody else has a suit like that. You were kneeling at the front, you're the man that was kneeling. No, he said, I'm the man that came from there.

He said, that man you saw died down there. Wouldn't it be nice if everybody knew that when they got saved? And that's what, that's what Romans 6 is all about, buried with him in baptism. If you go in there unbroken, unrepentant, all you do is go in that water a dry sinner and come out a wet sinner.

Won't save you. Well, when he couldn't have a church, to cut the long story short, he went outside of Durban in South Africa, walked up the road, found a footpath, followed the footpath, found a stream, went by the stream, found a cave, took a rock and he marked on the outside of the rock and he stayed there 21 days and 21 nights and didn't eat any bread, didn't eat anything, he just drank water.

At the end of that, he said, Lord, I want to preach and that preacher said, I couldn't preach, so you tell me that I can preach. And he labored and prayed and God revealed himself to him and said, you're going to preach and you're going to have a healing ministry, which is unusual for a Baptist, I guess, all due respect.

But anyhow, that's what happened. What happened? He went to Durban. They gave him a shack across the tracks, just a tin building that held about 10 people, there were about 10 or 12 going. He built it to a congregation of about 2 ,000 every Sunday morning.

Not only did white people go, government officials went to hear him. God had told him he would have a miracle ministry and he believed God. Everywhere he went, people were healed. He called some deacons one night and said, can you come to a hospital?

Yes, so they went to a hospital. He reported in to the lady at the desk there and she said, yes, his number is, what, say 22 in room 13. Oh, deacon went as white as death, he said. Did you hear that for the other deacon?

Yeah. You heard what he said? Yeah, room, number 22, room 13. But that's the morgue. He said, yes, that's right. Pastor, do you know that it's the morgue you go into? He said, well, it was a morgue Jesus went to when Lazarus was in it and if he's the same yesterday and today and forever, what's the problem?

Well, they went in the morgue, he looked at number 22, you know, everybody was quiet in the place and so on. He just pulled a curtain on one side and then he pulled a cover and there's a guy laying like this, you know.

And Dume was just a little guy so he climbed up on the body of the man and laid on top of him. I wouldn't dare do that. And he just said, in the name of Jesus Christ of Naper's rise. And the corpse went, oh, now if he'd done that with me on him I would have hit the ceiling and killed him.

Water, what happened? I got this book, I wish we could get permission to reprint it. Did you read it? Wasn't it wonderful? It's the only copy in America as far as I know. I understood that there was a lot made and they got burned or something, some fire in Africa.

But we still have that copy. And subsequently he had a ministry like that. You see, he dared to believe God. Got on a limb, sure, he got the word of God. God told him in that cave. Now, the wonderful thing to me is not that he went to that cave and stayed 21 days and nights without eating, just drinking of the stream.

It's that he went back the same day every year for about 20 years. Said goodbye to his wife, goodbye to the deacons, and went in the cave and stayed 21 days and 21 nights. You know, some people go, oh, I remember that.

I've written it in my Bible, you know, in case you forget when you got through with the Holy Ghost. Well, if you forget it I don't think you ever had it. I don't believe we have to put it down on paper, at least I don't have to put it down on paper.

But he went back anyhow, stayed 21 days and 20 nights. If you buy a new car you don't expect to fill, you know, if it's 25 gallons it holds, you don't expect to fill it up once and run it for the rest of your life, do you?

Are there repeated baptisms of the Spirit? Mr. Finney said that, didn't he, Martin? I started using the illustration, I forgot the other Sunday. If you came in this room and it was dark and you walk in and you say there's nothing in that room, there is, there's air, otherwise you'll fall down.

There's no light, you switch the light on, it's full of air, you fill it with light, you fill it with people, you fill it with song. You can fill what is full over and over and over again without emptying it.

What about a glass of water? Well, fill it with water. Then what do you do? You drop one spot of ink in it and it colors the whole glass. It's full of water now it's full of color. You fill a room, it's full of air, then it's full of people, you turn on the heat, it's full of heat.

Some lady visited the Avon lady and she comes down the island, everybody smells. And she fills the room with fragrance so that the room is filled with light, it's filled with people, it's filled with song, it's filled with heat, it's filled with air, it's filled with perfume.

Do you think that you've got everything that God had for you the night you were filled with the Holy Ghost? If you do think that, you're wrong. Why does Paul pray for people who are filled with the Holy Ghost?

Number one, that they may be filled with the knowledge of his will. Or that they may be filled with joy and peace in believing. Some of those things kind of evaporate. They're subject to change and decay.

And so, if you don't, I do, I know I need repeated anointings or what we call them, baptisms, if you like, of the Holy Spirit of God. I think most of us would do a baptism of wisdom. Wouldn't that help most of us?

Just you and I, Melody. Okay, dear. Yes, that's what we need. Okay. What do you think he was thinking about while he was in that cave? Do you ever think of that? Do you think he took a big scroll like this, first book of chronicles and, you know, asked for delivery of the second edition or something?

What was he thinking about? He was a man of light passions. Don't you think the devil assailed him? You fool, what are you doing here in this dark, dusty, damp cave? You could be home eating good meals.

You haven't had a meal now for two weeks. Come on. You know, faith that he's going to be trusted is going to be tested. Your faith and mine is not real until it's proved. You can have a theological faith that does nothing.

You can believe in the fundamentals as we say and do nothing. But faith has to be tested. And then when it's been proved, we have a new strength, a new realization that we're not standing on something flimsy, that actually we have a hold on God and by the grace of God he has a hold on us.

He did according to the word of God. Verse 7, It came to pass after a while that the brook dried up. Well, isn't that what always happens? There's nothing supernatural about a brook. There's something supernatural about a raven coming twice a day and bringing you bread and flesh in the morning and bread and flesh in the evening.

But the natural thing is for the brook. And the natural things always dry up first. Our courage dries up. What seems to be our inspiration dries up. Sometimes our vision dries up. There are areas in our lives which dry up.

But wait a minute. By the same token, the supply of God's wisdom, the supply of inspiration from God does not need to dry up. What do you think he felt like the first morning when he just came out of his cave and said, Oh, the air is so lovely.

Boy, the stream this morning, this fresh water from the mountains, you know, it came down from the snows. Oh, it isn't there. Now what do you do? No 7-Eleven stores around here or anything. No, it is God said, I've commanded the ravens to feed thee there.

Didn't say, did he? I don't remember. Maybe check me here. Didn't say, the book is going to last forever. He fully expected that. It was normal. That book will be there in the morning like it's been every morning.

But it just wasn't there. You know, that's something when your source of supply dries up on the human level, isn't it? God has to do that sometimes. Hudson Taylor, I mentioned recently, recently, earlier, he said that he and his people used to pray and a rich lady in America, every time they prayed, they got into a bind financially about every three months and every time they did, this lady in America sent them a big fact check.

One day they were in a real bind, they prayed and nothing happened and they prayed and nothing, oh, they prayed more than a week, nothing happened. Maybe she died. The book dried up. So what? Well, let's do a bit better.

Let's pray and fast. Let's do some heart searching. Are you holding the power up? Is it you? Not me, of course. Someone else. Well, Lord, it's getting critical. The demands for money are flooding us and we've no money.

And you supplied our needs until now. And he said, the Lord said, have I supplied your needs? Ask the people how many, come on, ask the whole of your staff. How many of us are expecting this woman in America to send us money?

Every hand went there. You're not trusting me, you're trusting that woman in America. So, they had a nice little time of repentance and a few tears and apologies to God and said, Lord, we'll never look to America again.

But they still prayed. A nice check came from Australia. Of course, God had touched the heart over there. What's the problem? So, if you get tied up to a method or a person you're not going to. Hmm? But the Lord, by God, is a jealous God.

Keep that in your mind. He is jealous. He's jealous about the time we spend on other things that don't serve him time. Very often, the book doesn't dry up with us. We let the thing get away from us. We know where our supply is, but we feel, well, oh, we were in a good class this morning, we had a good time.

Now, thank God for all you get in being taught here. But by the same token, you've got to keep a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. You can't live on theology, you can't live on emotion, you can't live on zeal.

They all evaporate. They're all the brooks that dry up. And God will make you as dry some days. My goodness, you think, good, what's ever going to happen? You've never had a time like that, do you? You do occasionally.

Oh, lodge this in your mind. There are seasons in the Christian life that God gives us. You may go through a spell that would last a week, or maybe a month, when it looks as though God's closed down altogether.

The heavens are like brass. It seems as though God isn't getting through to you. I love that old hymn that says, His wisdom never faileth, his sight is never dim. He knows the way he taketh, and I will walk with him.