Unexpectedly Blessed
And Elisha said unto her, What shall I do for thee? tell me, what hast thou in the house? And she said, Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil. -2 Kings 4:2
Here’s an example of Elisha blessing a woman, and it bears a remarkable resemblance to how God blesses a believer.
The situation
First there is the situation of the woman: she is greatly impoverished. She was a widow, and didn’t have enough money to pay off her creditors, and was being forced to sell her two sons.
Now there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets unto Elisha, saying, Thy servant my husband is dead; and thou knowest that thy servant did fear the LORD: and the creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen. -2 Kings 4:1
And in many of our own situations, especially in the times when we call upon God, it is because we lack something: we are impoverished: whether that be physically, emotionally, or spiritually.
A question
Next, upon hearing of her great troubles, Elisha asks her what he can do for her. But before she can answer, he poses the question in a different way, he instead asks: what do you currently have? She was perhaps hoping or looking for a more direct solution: that Elisha would simply give her the money needed to pay off her debts and deliver her sons from becoming slaves. All she had was a pot of oil, which seemed to be utterly insufficient for the great needs that she had, yet Elisha was able to use it.
©iStockphoto.com/McIninch
God can use what we have on hand.
And in our own lives, many times we are hoping that God will directly give us something that we lack. Yet the question posed to us ought to be: what do you currently have? God doesn’t focus on what we lack, but on what we have, and how He can bless it in a tremendous way. Sometimes the smallest abilities and skills can be used in an unexpected way by God. Think of young David’s skill with the sling, and how he was able to kill the giant Goliath.
An unexpected blessing
Finally, Elisha asked the woman to borrow as many empty vessels as she could find/beg from all of her neighbors. Then, upon pouring out the pot of oil into all of the other vessels, the oil was miraculously multiplied so that it was not depleted when it was poured out into another container. Eventually every last vessel was filled with oil, and the woman was able to sell such a great quantity of the oil at a good price that she was able to pay off her debt.
Then he said, Go, borrow thee vessels abroad of all thy neighbours, even empty vessels; borrow not a few. And when thou art come in, thou shalt shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, and shalt pour out into all those vessels, and thou shalt set aside that which is full. So she went from him, and shut the door upon her and upon her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured out. And it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said unto her son, Bring me yet a vessel. And he said unto her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil stayed. Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy children of the rest. -2 Kings 4:3-7
I believe what Elisha did with the woman’s oil is exactly what God wants to do with our talents. He is not focused on all of the things that we don’t have: all of the skills and abilities that we lack. Rather, God comes to us and asks us: what do you now have? And in searching and looking, though it may seem at times that we are utterly impoverished and without hope, deep down inside we will find that pot of oil.
God has given us some small thing to always hope in, even if it is something as “small” as God’s eternal salvation of our souls. (And yet, what a large blessing this is in reality!)
What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? -Romans 8:31-32
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