Now it was after many days that the word of Adonai came to Elijah in the third year saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab; then I will send rain on the land.
Now Elijah the Tishbite, one of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab: “As Adonai God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be no dew or rain these years, except at my word.”
then hear from heaven and forgive the sin of Your servants and Your people Israel. Teach them the good way in which they should walk, and send rain on Your land which You gave to Your people as an inheritance.
When His voice thunders, waters in heaven roar. He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain and brings forth wind from His storehouses.
Can any of the idols of the nations bring rain? Or can the skies grant showers? Is it not You, Adonai our God? Do we not wait for You? For You have done all these things.
So be glad, children of Zion, and rejoice in Adonai, your God. For He gives you the early rain for prosperity, Yes, He will bring down rain for you, the early and latter rain as before.
“Also I myself have withheld from you the rain—when three months remain to the harvest, I caused it to rain on one city, while on another city I sent no rain; one piece of ground would get rain, while the portion not rained on would wither.
But with all truthfulness I say to you, that there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when heaven was closed for three and a half years and there came a great famine over all the land.
Adonai will open for you His good storehouse—the heavens—to give rain for your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hand. You will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow.
Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain. And it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months.
But do not measure the court outside the Temple—leave it out, because it has been given to the nations, and they shall trample the holy city for forty-two months.
These two have the power to shut the heavens, so that no rain may fall during the days of their prophesying. And they have power over the waters to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they wish.