When I sat down to write this morning I had an image. An emaciated widow, her hair matted like a bird’s nest, dressed in tattered black, with ash smudged across her face. She clutches a broken jar and cries, “I have been robbed.”

This, I fear, is the present state of the bride of Christ. More a robbed widow than an expectant bride.

James 1:27 tells us that pure religion is to care for widows and orphans and to remain unstained by the world.

Yet many shepherds have become charlatans, twisting scripture to elevate themselves above the very widows they are called to protect.

They invoke the story of the widow of Zarephath (1 Kings 17:7–16) as justification for demanding the last dime from the vulnerable.

But the story is not about the prophet’s entitlement. It is about God’s compassion.

This widow’s story sits between two dramatic confrontations. Elijah rebuking Ahab’s idolatry and the sacrifice of his own son. Then Elijah faces Jezebel’s prophets on Mount Carmel.

Between these stories God turns His attention to a single widow.

The point is unmistakable.

God’s greatness is revealed not only when He sends fire from heaven, but when He sends Elijah to care for the widow, the least.

The bride of Christ is emaciated because she has been robbed.

Not only by false shepherds, but by truncated theologies that untether us from the Old Testament, the very root system of our faith.

Replacement theology, the New Apostolic Reformation, and Word‑of‑Faith teachings are incomplete constructs that shrink our biblical worldview until it becomes a tottering idol.

One that cannot bear up under storms of life, the cost of obedience or suffering.

I had a dream a few nights ago. There was a book I needed to read. I called a switchboard and a kind operator gave me a code that made every order free. And also, in that dream someone said, “The name Eunice is a key to understanding the kingdom of God.”

I take dreams as invitations, not revelations. They stir up my curiosity.

So, I followed the thread.

Eunice—eu (“good”) + nikē (“victory”).

Timothy’s mother Eunice was a Jewish woman married to a Greek man. Eunice lived in Lystra, surrounded by idols. Including the winged goddess Nikē. Timothy might have walked by these idols on a daily basis. It was in Lystra the people tried to sacrifice to Paul and Barnabas as if they were gods and then a paragraph later stoned Paul. Idolatry is as fickle as the fear of man.

Eunice taught Timothy the Torah. The law, the Prophets.

When Paul said, “All Scripture is God‑breathed” (2 Tim 3:16) he meant Torah.

Paul asserted that all believers needed could be found in the Old Testament.

Am I the only one who forgets that context?

He understood Jesus was the fulfillment of the prophecies of a Messiah who would save Israel and the world. He only had to connect the dots to show the unexpected way of the cross and resurrection.

So! The old testament scriptures have utmost importance in the Christian faith.

The Jewish people always knew their dependence on scripture was not academic but necessary for their very survival.

An 1lth century rabbinic commentary reads:  “When a boy begins to speak, his father must teach him the sacred language and the law. If he does not, he seems to bury him.”

To rob the child of his education in torah was to rob him of his future, his strength.

This is “kingdom of God’ kind of faith.

Today’s Nike runners base their name and logo, the iconic “Swoosh” on Nikē this winged goddess of victory.

That Swoosh is a stylized wing, a symbol of the stamina to win and the power to transcend.

In turn today, we want a faith that is ‘Faster, Higher, Stronger’ God’s Divine Swoosh of approval whereby we rise above our problems and can point to an outward manifestation of success.

He doesn’t offer shortcuts to success.

But the God of the Old Testament doesn’t give us wings to fly away from a widow’s plight.

Instead, He invites us to hide under the shadow of His wings.

And the Psalmist wrote, “If I take up the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me.”

We don’t need the wings of a goddess to lift us out of the world.

We need the wings of eagles that come from waiting on the Lord.

That is the strength that survives the storm.

It is the only faith that can sustain a Bride who has been neglected restore her to loved.

Faith in Him is the faith that overcomes and is the faith many Christians today have lost.

Paul confronted the idolatry of Athens in Acts 17: 16-31.

In verse 29 he refers to these idols as objects shaped by “human skill and thought.”

Today our idols are not so much physical statues but are often intellectual constructs.

We select a couple of verses like the power of life and death is in the tongue and the law of sowing and reaping and fashion them into the Western god of the American Dream.

 A God who exists to answer our prayers and affirm our preferences.

This is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

We lose so much when we have not integrated the Old Testament into our faith paradigm.

The marriage covenant God made with His people prophesying His end-times Bride.

Moses’ prophecy of another Prophet who would write the law on hearts instead of tablets of stone.

Exiles were prophesied because of disobedience and return from that exile was promised.

All these themes illuminate what Jesus accomplished.

The dangers of neglect of them and its implications are spiritual.

We are robbed and weakened.

What can we do if we feel we are lacking in our faith or feel we do not have a foundation that withstands the storms of life?

Reconnect with your roots. Reattach to the whole of scripture.

Prioritize context when reading or studying. Abandon cobbling together a faith from cherry‑picked references.

Who was the audience? What was happening at the time?

Read and study line by line, from one end to the other.

Learn to hold paradox in tension. Victory often looks like weakness.

Obedience may include suffering.

Our God is like no other. He does not value what the world values.

It is the meek who inherit the earth and the kingdom of God is given to the poor in spirit.

The reward, the crown we hope for may or may not manifest this side of heaven.

Jesus’ teachings often turn expectations upside down.

I invite you to live with the wonder and mystery of walking with God.

The dream about Eunice was a nudge to return to continue to ground my faith in the Old Testament and include it in my paradigm of God and His kingdom.

Victory in God’s kingdom might not be the most visible triumph.

The kingdom of God is not just an unseen cosmic reality.

It consists of the hearts of people that have been won by God.

One heart at a time and within the context and simplicity of family.

Raising others up in the knowledge of God and what discipleship means.

1 Corinthians 11: 3 But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

Ultimate decisive victory rests not in our faith but in the One in whom we put our faith.

The One who suffered and rose.

Overcoming faith, necessary in the kingdom of God, is anchored in the God revealed in the whole counsel of Scripture.

A God fashioned from contemporary worldview and personal desire is as futile as carved blocks of wood.

The God who sees, hears, and answers prayer is not made by human hands.

He cannot be contained in our intellect.

He is a wonder.

The Unknowable One who has chosen to make Himself known through His Word from Genesis to Revelation and through the Word made Flesh. Jeshua. Jesus.

There is no other way. No other door.

Should a teacher, book, or even an angel present you with any other path, any other mystery that you must master in order to truly know God but points you away Him?

Run.

To bring us full circle I believe God wants to restore us from our widowhood to status of chosen Bride.

He wants to pick us up in His arms, restore us with good food and clothe us with His covering.

We have been given our “free code for the book.”

All we have needed; His Hand has provided.

Answer His invitation to feed on the richness of the Old Testament.

It will be life to your body and strength to your bones.

And we will look more like Him.

All the love my friends.