“fountains abounding with water” (Prov. 8:24, NKJV)
Now that we understand how Obadiah fed the hundred prophets in the cave, the history recorded in 1 Kings 18:5-14 is an interesting follow-up. In verse 5 king Ahab says to Obadiah: “Go into the land to all the springs of water and to all the brooks; perhaps we may find grass to keep the horses and mules alive, so that we will not have to kill any livestock.”
Initially this merely seems like a practical assignment, as the fountains and springs will offer enough green grass in their vicinity for the poor, hungry animals. Yet we now know from the preceding teaching that the fountains of the hundred prophets in the cave started opening because they had been fed with the correct bread and water: pure cave water from God, and uncontaminated bread from the mouth of God (Matt. 4:4)!
Thus, what does Obadiah have to go look for? Not grass, as “All flesh is grass” (Isa. 40:6; 1 Pet. 1:24). He has to go look for the “blessings of the deep that lies beneath” (Gen. 49:25), the inheritance prophesied over Joseph (whose name means “God will add another son”). As the fountains of the sons of God are opened, the earth will be flooded with truth form the throne of God, “a pure river of water of life” (Rev. 22:1). The fountains are “abounding with water” (Prov. 8:24), pregnant with the Christ (Gal. 4:19; Rev. 12:2), and its release will provide food and water to the movement of God (= horses – Joel 2:4) and to the livestock [typologically pointing to those people who still have a beastly nature (Prov. 12:10), an unregenerated nature].
God directs Obadiah’s path, we read in verse 7, and from the nothing the man of the moment suddenly appears: Elijah! The world is looking for something to eat and drink, and God sends his prophet son as the potential source.
One can understand poor Obadiah’s predicament when Elijah gives him the following assignment: “It is I. Go, tell your master, ‘Elijah is here.” (verse 8). In the following couple of verses he argues nervously: “How have I sinned, that you are delivering your servant into the hand of Ahab, to kill me? As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my master has not sent someone to hunt for you; and when they said, ‘He is not here,’ he took an oath from the kingdom or nation that they could not find you. And now you say, ‘Go, tell your master, Elijah is here!” And it shall come to pass, as soon as I am gone from you, that the Spirit of the Lord will carry you to a place I do not know; so when I go and tell Ahab, and he cannot find you, he will kill me. But I your servant have feared the Lord from my youth.”
Obadiah already understood what Jesus said in Luke 17:23: “And they will say to you, ‘Look here!’ or ‘Look there!’ Do not go after them or follow them.” Unfortunately he did not yet have the full revelation of the verses that follow it: “For as the lightning that flashes out of one part under heaven shines to the other part under heaven, so also the Son of Man will be in His day.” Here Elijah becomes a type of Jesus the Saviour who will appear again, but in another way than the world is expecting.
- Selah: Are you finding it easier to understand the new Testament in typological terms?
- Read: Luke 16:1-17:10.
- Memorise: Luke 16:16.
