When the water supply of Cutoff Creek is cut off, it creates an opportunity for a shift in spatial setting, and Elijah’s sojourn to the Sidonian widow dovetails with a number of broader themes in the story (17:7–16). The widow, vulnerable in the present, acquainted with grief and loss in the past, is gathering sticks for a last supper amid arid sterility. But she submits to the (counterintuitive) prophetic word and experiences life, as a substitute for death. Elijah’s journey deep into Sidonian territory demonstrates God’s sustaining power in a situation akin to “exile,” an…