A LITTLE OIL IN THE HANDS OF OMNIPOTENCE

The woman said to Elisha, “Your servant has nothing at all, except a small jar of olive oil.” (2 Kings 4:2)

The woman had suffered the loss of her husband, and now a creditor was coming to take away her two boys as slaves. In desperation, she cried out to the prophet Elisha, who asked how he could help. When she told him she had only a little oil, he instructed her to go and ask her neighbors for empty jars (“Don’t ask for just a few,” Elisha cautioned) and to pour what oil she had into the jars. The woman kept pouring and pouring and pouring . . . until there were no empty jars left. Immediately, the oil stopped flowing. Elisha then told the woman to sell the jars of oil, pay her debts, and assured her that she and her sons could live on what was left.

The biblical principle is clear, and it should be a source of great encouragement to you, regardless of where this message finds you: a little in the hands of our Lord is a lot! Here we see that a little oil in the hands of Omnipotence become more than enough for this widow and her two sons . . . and the same is true for me and you today.

As I read through the Scriptures, it never ceases to amaze me just how incredible our God truly is in meeting us in our deepest places of need. From manna from heaven to water from a rock, Omnipotence sustained the children of Israel in the wilderness for 40 years. Two loaves and five fish in the hands of Omnipotence fed more than 5,000 people, with twelve baskets of leftovers!

The poor widow could not see her abundance, yet it was all around her, and the same can be said of us today. Our God is not impotent; He is not incapable of meeting our needs. In fact, He has promised to meet every single one of our needs (Matthew 6:33), and there is no power in this universe that can hold back His hand.

But we must remember that He will meet our needs in His time and in His way. We need only to trust Him, even when we cannot trace Him. When we find ourselves in lack, we must remember that the lack is never with our God, for He owns the cattle on a thousand hills (Psalm 50:10). God owns everything (Psalm 50:12), and has promised to give to us everything we need when we need it.

The key to living in “times of need and times of abundance,” as Paul said in Philippians 4:12, is to take our eyes off our circumstances and fix them on our Savior. Oh, to have the spiritual eyes to see God’s storehouse of infinite supply! Then we would not shrink back from any storm wind that blows our way. In fact, we would do everything within our power to “nest in the gale,” knowing that our God is in the gale with us, growing us into the person He is calling us to be.

There is no such thing as scarcity with our Savior. There is no such thing as lack with our Lord. We simply need to fix our eyes on things above, and Omnipotence will take care of all things below, right up until that day He calls us home.

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!