April 27, 2013;

Life is one hundred different sized empty pots and containers all in one house.  Different needs and all different sizes, all of them important and yet some of them requiring more help than others.  And they're all ours, in our house, under our roof waiting to be filled.  Left to our own devices these empty pots will sit in our homes, get in our way, keep us from getting where we need to go, blocking our way and totally annoying us.  Actually, those empty containers represent everything unfinished with needs we are unable to fill on our own.  So we spend our time trying to walk around them, move them out of our way, but when you move one aside it just creates that same need in a different spot.  So really, nothing gets accomplished and you continue to get more frustrated.  Then you have friends over and they ask about the pots and containers, so you tell them one by one, and your friend tells you, oh well don't worry about it it'll take care of itself, or maybe they'll tell you to throw it out since it's empty anyway and basically in the way.

Left to ourselves our resources are limited and our needs are huge.  Some of us don't even have enough pots in our home to fill in order to have enough resources to fill our needs and some of us have so many problems or empty pots there is no way we would ever have enough resources to ever fill them. 

So, we find ourselves at the end of ourselves cornered by unmet needs with no way to meet them. 

In the old testament there was an old woman who had a cruse of oil.  She was about to use the last of it to make a cake for herself and her son and then they were going to die.  There was nothing left, they owed money to people and there was no way out.  Elijah happened along and came to the old woman who told him her story.  He told her to give him her last cake, which of course was her last meal.  She did.  He told her to gather as many pots of all sizes as she could from every neighbor possible and put them in her house.  Then he told her to take her cruse of oil go inside close the door and begin to pour out oil from that cruse until there was no more.  She did.  She filled every pot to the full.  She paid every debt she had and she had oil overflowing in her home.  There was plenty for her and her son to live on. 

God filled every single pot she found to the full.  She went inside by herself and closed the door and did what she was told.  What if she hadn't?  What if she had allowed people to watch her and tell her things like "that will never happen"  "the oil is running out, there's not enough" "old woman why are you listening to an old prophet".  Do you think as she saw the oil pour into each pot and she was by herself that her faith welled up inside her?  There was noone there to tell her any different, and as she obeyed, the oil poured until every need was met to the full with plenty left over. 

The first thing that woman did was to express her need to the old prophet, when she did that she obeyed what he told her to do and that included giving away her last morsal of food as an act of faith.  He didn't tell her give me the cake and then I'll help you, he just said give me the cake.  He then told her to get pots, as many as you can and she did.  Step by step she obeyed the Lord, without knowing what the result would be.

 However, above that God is a big God, our needs are many small and large, and he will fill every single one of them to the full and overflow.  All of our pots need to be filled, all at once and our God showed her in that story that he would fill every single pot she could find, she could not outdo God's supply for her. 

It isn't necessary for us to tell everyone our problems, it's important that we bring all of our pots to him, close the door and do what he says, step by step and he will fill every single pot we have to overflow.