Ver. 1. After many days,] i.e., After three years and six months’ time of famine: which to the distressed Israelites seemed a long while. In the third year.] Of his abode at Zarephath. And I will send rain.] Heb., I will give. Rain is a gracious gift of God. See on Zechariah 10:1.
Ver. 2. And Elijah went to show himself unto Ahab.] Though a bloody persecutor of the prophets, and to Elijah a professed enemy. Faith quelleth and killeth distrustful fear.
Ver. 3. And Ahab called Obadiah.] Who was neither the prophet Odadiah, as some have thought, nor that good captain over fifty, who begged his life of Elijah, (2 Kings 1:13) but another, a good officer, under wicked Ahab; such as was also Jacob to Laban, Joseph to Pharaoh, Naaman to Benhadad, Mordecai to Ahashuerus, Nehemiah to Artaxerxes, some good people in Nero’s house, Trajan to Valens, Cromwell to Henry VIII, &c. Now Obadiah feared God greatly.] And God bore with him, though he hazarded not his life and liberty for the legal ceremonies.
Ver. 4. When Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord.] Who declaimed against her idolatry, and proclaimed hell fire, &c. Who can stand still to have his eyes picked out Obadiah took a hundred prophets.] This was a sure sign of the true fear of God in him, [see Job 6:14] quitting his heart of carnal fears, and quickening it to help God’s persecuted prophets not without the hazard of his head, if once it had been noticed. But he was as secret as good; else he could not have done so much service to the Church. Policy and religion do as well together, as they do ill asunder; their match maketh themselves secure, and many happy. With bread and water.] Which though but mean fare, yet—to them that had the continual feast of a good conscience within—it was as brown bread and water was to the martyrs in those Marian times, better than the fine bread and wine would have been at Jezebel’s table.
Ver. 5. And Ahab said unto Obadiah.] Goodness carrieth away trust, where it cannot have imitation. Peradventure we may find grass.] Which groweth best in locis irriguis, in low and moist places that lie by water sides. To save the horses and mules alive.] These were his delight and confidence; and for this more care is taken than for those “precious sons of Zion,” the prophets, whom he suffered to be cut off by his wicked wife Jezebel. That we lose not all the beasts.] The loss of their souls, meanwhile, is never thought on; though our Saviour—who only went to the price of souls—showeth that the loss of a soul is, (1.) incomparable, (2.) irreparable. (Matthew 16:26)
Ver. 6. And Obadiah went another way by himself.] Ahab had found him faithful; and therefore trusteth him in this weighty business, rather than any other. Of a man that truly feareth God it may better be said, than of Cato, that he never did well that he might appear to do so, but because he could not do otherwise.
Ver. 7. And he knew him.] They were of old acquaintance, doubtless, so good a man, and so great a prophet. Mr Fox, when a great lord, and wicked, met him in the streets, and asked him, How do you, Mr Fox? he said little. When the great lord said, Do you not know me? No, not I, said Mr Fox. I am such a one, said he. Sir, I desire, said Mr Fox, to know none but Christ and him crucified. At another time being asked whether he knew such a godly poor man, he answered, I remember him well: I tell you, I forget lords and ladies to remember such.
Ver. 8. Behold, Elijah is here.] Not ashamed to show my face; but of his mind who said, Malo miserandum quam erubescendum. Memorable was that speech of John Frith to the archbishop’s men that would have let him go and shift for himself; If you should both leave me here, and go to Croyden, declaring to the bishops that you had lost Frith, I would surely follow as fast after as I might, and bring them news that I had found and brought Frith again. Do you think that I am afraid to declare mine opinion to the bishops of England in a manifest truth? Act. and Mon., 1927.
Ver. 9. Into the hand of Ahab, to slay me,] sc., For not laying hands on thee, to bring thee unto him, for whom he had so long, so anxiously sought.
Ver. 10. There is no nation or kingdom.] And yet the prophet, by the widow’s industry, lay hid no farther off him than was Zarephath, a city of his father-in-law Ethbaal’s. This was God’s own doing; and the like was done for good Athanasius, who, for the space of forty-six years—so long his troubles lasted—is said to have found no friend but God and death: the one a defender of his innocency, the other the finisher of all his miseries. Some report of him, that he lived six years in a well, without the light of the sun, forsaken of friends, and everywhere hunted by enemies.
Ver. 11. Behold, Elijah is here.] Whereupon he shall slay me, as 1 Kings 18:14 18:9.