You have to love stories like this. It was one of those great stories that make you feel good all over.
It starts on a bit of a sad note; a widow lady comes to the prophet Elisha and proceeds to tell him her problems. First of all this was not Elijah this was Elisha and Elisha is no more Elijah then Dan is Denn. Last week we looked at the prophet Elijah in the book of 1 Kings, this morning we sang about him in Days of Elijah and the Puppets sang about him in their presentation. But Elijah is gone, he was taken away to heaven in a chariot of fire and Elisha who was his student and protégée is the focus of our story this morning.
So the widow comes to Elisha and bares her heart, her husband who had been a student of Elisha’s had passed away and now she was in financial straits. She has no money and no source of income and her creditors are now seeking payment and she can’t pay them. As a result the creditors are demanding that she release her two sons to them to work as slaves, to work off her debt. Now I don’t know if she thought that Elisha might have the money to help her, or perhaps he knew someone who might have the money to help or perhaps he would speak to the creditors or maybe she wasn’t really looking for answers she just needed someone to talk to.
Regardless of what she was looking for somehow I doubt that she could ever have imagined what she ultimately received. She was looking for a crust and she got the entire loaf, no she got the entire bakery.
After she had told Elisha what her problem was, he asked her “what can I do to help you?” but before she even had time to reply he asked “Tell me, what do you have in the house.” To which she responded, “Just a little bottle of olive oil”
“Ok” he said “This is what I want you to do, you listening? I want you to go to all of your neighbours and relatives and borrow every container you can put your hands on, Tupperware, Rubbermaid it doesn’t matter you can even use the cheap ones you get in the dollar store. And then I want you to bring all the containers back to the house, go inside with your sons, close the door and start pouring the oil from your jar into the containers. Just set them aside as you fill them up.”
I’m sure that she just looked at him; “like, are you in your right mind? I said that I had a little bit of olive oil not lots of olive oil.” But there must have been something in his words or his look or his attitude because she sent the boys out to collect all the containers they could find. I don’t know what they told their friends and neighbours they needed the jugs for, the truth would have sounded a little far fetched. And when they had all they thought they needed the brought them home, closed the door and she tipped up her little jar of olive oil and started pouring. And the first container was filled to the brim and the second container was filled to the brim and the third container was filled to the brim. And she kept pouring and they kept filling until finally she ran out of containers to pour the oil into and then and only then did she finally run out of oil.
I’m sure that as she rushed to tell Elisha the news that she could hardly believe what had happened. There was only one way to describe it and that was a Miracle. When the man of God heard the news he smiled and said “I’m glad for you, now go and sell the oil. There will be enough there to pay off your debts and support you and your sons.”
The story is found in the book of 2 Kings which is the 12th book of the Bible. 1 and 2 Kings were originally one book, however around 300 BC they were translated from the Hebrew into Greek and because the Greek alphabet uses vowels it required two scrolls instead of one. Thus 1 and 2 Kings.
Jewish tradition has long held that the prophet Jeremiah was the author and even though we have no evidence to confirm that we have no evidence to contradict it either. The book was written around 550 BC and covers approximately 400 years of the history of the nation of Israel. 2 Kings picks up the story at Ahab’s death and continues through to the slightly beyond the point that Jerusalem was destroyed.
So why was it written? To show us that we need to obey God’s commands and believe God’s promises.
You’ll remember Elijah from 1 Kings and his confrontation of the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel we looked at that story last week. When God spoke to Elijah in the Wilderness of Sinai this was part of the message; 1 Kings 19:16 Then anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel-meholah to replace you as my prophet.
Now I love the account of how Elijah announced the news to Elisha.
1 Kings 19:19-21 So Elijah went and found Elisha son of Shaphat plowing a field with a team of oxen. There were eleven teams of oxen ahead of him, and he was plowing with the twelfth team. Elijah went over to him and threw his cloak across his shoulders and walked away again. Elisha left the oxen standing there, ran after Elijah, and said to him, “First let me go and kiss my father and mother good-bye, and then I will go with you!”
Elijah replied, “Go on back! But consider what I have done to you.”
Elisha then returned to his oxen, killed them, and used the wood from the plow to build a fire to roast their flesh. He passed around the meat to the other plowmen, and they all ate. Then he went with Elijah as his assistant.
Did you catch what he did? He killed his oxen, broke up his plow, built a fire with the wood and had a BBQ. Why? He was saying for everyone to hear; I have started a new life and the old life is finished. Perhaps there are some oxen that need to be killed and some plows that need to be burned in your life.
Well you know the story, in 2 Kings we read that Elijah was swept up to heaven in a chariot of fire, have you ever wondered about the song “Swing Low Sweet Chariot coming for to carry me home”? And it was to Elisha that the widow came. This morning we need to take a look at the widow and what we can learn from her story.
2 Kings 4:1 One day the widow of one of Elisha’s fellow prophets came to Elisha and cried out to him, “My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the Lord. But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.”
First of all 1) She Knew What She Didn’t Have. The widow didn’t try to fool herself and she didn’t try to fool Elisha. She came right out and told him she had no money, no husband, possibly no children and no hope. She knew what she didn’t have. And in that regards she may be a step ahead of some of us.
What are you missing in your life? Maybe it is a financial need although it’s doubtful that anyone in this group goes home to a no heat and no food. Theodore Parker was an American pastor in the 1800’s and he once commented “As society advances the standard of poverty rises.” And so what constitutes poverty today would have been unimaginable 50 years ago. But sometimes our needs are financial; it was Woody Allen who said “Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.”
Often times though are needs are much more serious then mere finances. Perhaps your needs are physical maybe sometimes you think “I would give everything I have if only I didn’t have to suffer with. . .” and you can fill in the blank. Or perhaps it’s an emotional need, you’ve been estranged from a loved one, you’re harbouring unforgiveness or resentment toward someone.
Maybe it’s a spiritual need either you’ve never invited Jesus to be a part of your life or you are struggling with the entire Lordship issue: who’s in control of your life, you or God?
2 Kings 4:2 “What can I do to help you?” Elisha asked. “Tell me, what do you have in the house?”
“Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil,” she replied.
At BCC today we probably have several needs, most of you might be able point to an area where you feel that we are lacking but we probably all agree that we need to have a permanent church home.
2) She Knew What She Did Have. When Elisha asked her that question “what do you have?” She knew the answer right away “I have a little bit of oil.” She had probably gone through the inventory process many times. That wasn’t all she had, she had her health, she had her sons, I presume she had a home. But for all intensive purposes all that she had to barter or sell was a little bit of oil.
Now to us it seems a little bizarre that she would bring that up, I mean if someone asked you what all you had you probably wouldn’t mention the bottle of Crisco oil you have in the pantry. Different time and different circumstances. 3000 years ago in the Middle East Olive oil was a staple of the economy. Now I know that you are scratching your heads thinking: Olive Oil?
Understand all the different needs that olive oil fulfilled in that culture. It was used:
(1) As a Cosmetic.
(2) As a Medicine.
(3) As a Food.
(4) As a source of light.
(5) In Religious Rites. (a) Consecration (b) Offerings (c) Burials:
So you can understand that Olive Oil had a whole different value 3000 years ago then it does today so that lent itself to the last thing it was used for.
(6) As a Commodity of Exchange. When Olive oil was prepared and stored properly it had an incredible shelf life and so it could be traded and bartered
Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary: Olive oil was one of the most important products in the economy of Palestine and in the daily life of the people. It became a symbol of peace and prosperity ( Jer. 31:12 ), and was looked upon as a blessing from God
And so it wasn’t that she didn’t have anything, it was just that she didn’t have enough of what she did have. Isn’t that the way it is in our life when we are lacking, we have some just not enough.
We have some health, or else we’d be dead, we have some self control or we’d be living in an alley, we have some capacity for forgiveness or we’d be a tower with a gun. We just don’t have enough health, self control or forgiveness and there’s only one place to get more and that is from God.
As a church we have a facility, we’re not worshipping in the street but it doesn’t allow us to be everything that God wants us to be. And I would suspect that there isn’t one of us here that could whip out their cheque book and build a church.
Let’s carry on with the story. 2 Kings 4:3-4 And Elisha said, “Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbours. Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you. Pour olive oil from your flask into the jars, setting the jars aside as they are filled.”
That’s seems a little strange. But at this point she really doesn’t have many options, she can sell her sons into slavery, an option that didn’t seem all that viable, although I’m sure if she was like most parents there would have been times. Or she could do what Elisha asked her to do. Let’s keep going with the story. 2 Kings 4:5-6 So she did as she was told. Her sons brought many jars to her, and she filled one after another. Soon every container was full to the brim!
“Bring me another jar,” she said to one of her sons.
“There aren’t any more!” he told her. And then the olive oil stopped flowing.
3) God Used What She Did Have to Provide What She Didn’t Have.
God could have simply provided her with gallons and gallons of olive oil. That wouldn’t have been a problem for God. Elisha could have said “Go home and there will be more Olive Oil then you can ever use.” But most of the time God works through people. Noah actually had to build the ark, Moses had to stretch out his rod for the Red Sea to be parted, Joshua and the Israelites had to march around Jericho before the walls fell.
When Jesus feed the five thousand, it was after the little boy gave his lunch.
God did his part when the widow did her part. And that’s the same in our life. What are you struggling with? Have you got a habit you just can’t control? God wants you to do everything you can do and then ask him to do the rest. Oh sure he could just take away the urge but he doesn’t.
I’m convinced that in most cases of healing God wants to use Doctors and when they have done all they can do then sometimes God steps in, and sometimes God doesn’t but think of how crowded earth would be if everyone was always healed.
God could have forgiven everyone, but he wants us to ask for forgiveness and accept forgiveness and live for him. God could take away our will and replace it with his will, but he doesn’t he wants it to be our choice.
And God could zap a church into being for us, he created the world, creating a church shouldn’t be that much of a stretch. But that isn’t how it works, he looking down and asking the questions “What do you have? How bad do you want a church? What are you willing to give?”
I want you to know as your pastor and as your friend the Building on Faith campaign is not meant to be a pressure tactic. I don’t want it to be a strong arm approach to fund raising, please don’t perceive it that way. All I’m asking of you over the next few weeks is to pray about what God would have you to give. He doesn’t want you to starve your children or default on your mortgage but maybe he’s asking you to hold onto your car for another year before you trade it or skip a trip south or not get a new motorcycle.
Here is the secret of the entire story: She was only limited by her faith. When she got to the end of the containers that she had collected she ran out of oil. Had she collected fewer containers she would have had less oil and had she collected more containers she would have had more oil. I wonder if when the oil ran out she said “Darn!” What would it have taken for her to have found more jugs and bottles and jars. Would she have had to walked a little further and asked a few more people? Would it have been worth it? Only she would be able to answer that question.
So here is my question for you today, how much do you want to be blessed? Because here is the truth.
If you :
· Give little
· Pray little
· Attempt little
You will:
· Get little
· Hear little
· Accomplish little
Listen to this promise for you from God’s word Ephesians 3:20 Now glory be to God! By his mighty power at work within us, he is able to accomplish infinitely more than we would ever dare to ask or hope. Can you say that with me?
Here’s what we can imagine, I wonder what He will be able to accomplish?
What is it you are lacking in your life today?
Hope you enjoyed the message, PowerPoint is available at www.Powerpoint4preaching.com
