The Resting Place of Elijah: Lodging in Prophetic Times

In the days of the prophets, when the word of the Lord came unto men with fire and thunder, the prophet Elijah the Tishbite walked among kings and widows, in palaces and in caves. He was a man clothed not in the robes of splendor but in a mantle of rough hair, and his dwelling was not fixed, for the Spirit of the Lord led him whithersoever He pleased.

As it is written: “Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly...” (James 5:17). And yet his bed was often the wilderness, his pillow a stone, and his covering the heavens. When he fled from the wrath of Jezebel, queen of Israel, he wandered into the desert of Judah, and finding a juniper tree, he laid himself down and slept. And behold, the angel of the Lord touched him, saying: “Arise and eat” (1 Kings 19:5).

Here was his provision—bread baked on coals and a cruse of water—and the wilderness became his table. For where the prophet of the Lord lay, there the Lord also ministered.

Yet there were times of shelter. In Zarephath, beyond the borders of Israel, Elijah found rest in the house of a widow and her son. Though they had but a handful of meal in a barrel and a little oil in a cruse, the prophet spake, and the Lord multiplied their store. So the humble abode of a Gentile woman became a sanctuary of miracles. And the child that once lay dying upon the bed was raised by the prayer of the man of God (1 Kings 17:22).

In the time of Elisha, who walked in the spirit of Elijah, there dwelt a great woman in Shunem. She perceived that he was a holy man and said unto her husband: “Let us make a little chamber... and it shall be, when he cometh to us, that he shall turn in thither” (2 Kings 4:10). So they built a resting place upon the wall, with a bed, a table, a stool, and a candlestick. And that upper room became a place of peace and prophecy.

Thus, even as prophets carried the burdens of nations and the words of judgment, they found rest by the mercy of those who honored the presence of God among them. Their lodging was not marked by gold nor ornament, but by the fear of the Lord and the kindness of strangers.

Let it be remembered: those who made room for the prophet prepared a place for the Lord. For the resting place of Elijah was not merely a shelter of clay or wood, but a space where heaven touched the earth.

Blessed is the house that receives the messenger of God, for therein dwelleth light and truth.