(They changed the way blog music is played through Blogspot.

If you want music playing while on my blog, go to my "IPod" on the right just below my photo and click the arrow to play music.)

This morning, I scrolled down to my post about Elijah on June 13th and realized that with my writing about the drying up of the brook, I dried up too!

As I reread that particular post and read my words, "I'll share more about this story tomorrow, because it gets even better...," I cringed.

There was no tomorrow's story.

There was silence for six days.

I am so sorry.

Not that your world was hanging on my next post, but my integrity was!!

I'm finding it incredibly "ironic" or maybe "Providential" that the next part of Elijah's story seems almost as confusing as my failure to continue with my writing last week.

God sent Elijah from a dried up brook to the home of a starving widow and her son.

As a matter of fact, when he arrived and asked for a drink and a piece of bread, this is what the widow said to him,

 "As surely as the Lord your God lives," she replied,

"I don't have any bread-only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug.

I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son,

that we may eat it-and die."

Does this story strike anyone else as unusual?

It seems like God sent Elijah from one place of desertion to another.

From a dry brook to a starving widow.

Every time I read this story, I am reminded that life is so much like this.

We try and try and try to do God's will.

We live for Him, work for Him, and trust in Him.

But eventually, because we live in a fallen world, our brook dries up.

We realize we've reached a place of barrenness.  Maybe it comes from working too hard and becoming burned out.  Maybe it comes from God's nudging us to move on to another chapter in life.  Maybe it comes from significant loss that leaves us empty and broken.  Maybe it comes from our own lack of turning to God for our daily strength.

Whatever the reason, I think all of us can point to moments in our lives when the brook seemed dry.

In these moments, we finally reach a point where we are fully aware that in order to survive something is going to have to change.

But often, when we turn to what we think is a solution, we find that even that source of hope and strength is weak and floundering.

I think about my grief, because (for me) that has been the driest brook in my life.

I think of how it was impossible for me to turn to family or friends for what I needed, because grief was consuming them too.

I think of how church was often not the answer because so many people just don't know what to do with a grieving mom.

I think of how support groups online couldn't provide what I needed (even though they did help me feel somewhat normal in my sadness, anger, confusion etc.), because many of the people in the support groups didn't believe in eternity so their grief left them flailing in despair and anger......I knew I could never make it through life if I landed there in my heartache.

Honestly, looking back, I realize that every single one of the places I turned and felt some sense of disappointment was actually a "starving widow" God longed to use and eventually did use to help me.

I believe God knew exactly what He was doing when He sent Elijah to this pitiful, desperate woman who was preparing what she thought would be the last meal for both her and her son.

God knew that in order for Elijah to know that He was supplying his every need, He had to send Elijah to someone else who needed Him desperately too.

That's how God works.

He is the ultimate source of our strength, our hope, our restoration.

But He uses weak, desperate people along the way.

Today, I'm feeling as if I need to say three things:

First, if you are sitting at a dry brook hoping for water, you might need to get up and start looking somewhere else.

Second, if you have gotten up and started looking, but all you can find are more and more people with what seem to be their own kind of "dried-up brook" lives, then you are probably heading in the right direction.  See how God can use you to help them and I believe you're water will appear more quickly than you could ever imagine.

And finally, if you're feeling weary and another weary soul appears looking for help, allow God to use you even in your weariness........You never know how God is longing to supply your needs by your act of selflessness in a time of spiritual drought.

I've been wordless lately, but I'm thankful for a God who restores and replenishes when a well runs dry..........even when He sends me from drought to drought.

He longs to replenish and restore you too!

Drink from His Living Water today........read His Words.

They are the truest source of refreshment for a weary soul!

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy-laden and overburdened, and I will cause you to rest.

Matthew 11:28