Oil

And Elisha said to her, "What shall I do for you? Tell me; what have you in the house?" And she said, "Your servant has nothing in the house except a jar of oil."
2 Kings 4:2 ESV
https://bible.com/bible/59/2ki.4.2.ESV

I love Elisha's questions of the widow. They remind me of Jesus's blank cheque to blind Bartimaeus: 'What do you want me to do for you?' It seems obvious. But Jesus was stirring up faith in Bartimaeus to follow Him within a hostile environment (on the road to the cross).

I love Elisha encouraging the widow that her little jar of oil was enough to miraculously get her through famine, and it did! Maybe at the start of the lockdowns, you wondered how God would provide, but if you're reading this, He has done. The only appropriate response is joyfully thankful worship.

As we long for God to miraculously feed spiritually starving people, what do we have within the 'houses' of our hearts? A little oil, symbolizing the Holy Spirit in residence in the hearts of His people. How can we meet the needs of a lost and dying world?

We might only have a little oil. We might be leaky jars of clay who constantly need to be filled with the oil of the Holy Spirit. We might be finite, but He is infinite and there's nothing that He cannot do through even you and I.

'Lord, we long to bless this world in the spiritual famine it languishes in. Please pour out Your Spirit upon us so that we might help quench people's spiritual thirst, and satisfy their hunger for You. For the glory of Your name, amen'

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