The other day I was listening to a preacher, and he was talking about II Kings where Elisha came to the widow woman. The prophet asked her “what do you have in your house?”, and she responded with “Nothing……except maybe this little jar of oil.” His next instructions are really the essence of the message the Lord has given me. He said, “go borrow empty vessels from your neighbors, and BORROW NOT A FEW….”
We are believing God for abundance, and my question to Him has been, “Is there abundance that I am somehow missing…?” I felt like Father’s direction to me is, “find the empty vessels, and whatever your ‘oil’ is…begin to pour ‘that’ into ‘them’.
For the last couple of weeks I’ve been teaching a Bible Study with an Asian friend I had met a couple of years ago. She had asked me to be the “guest speaker” in her Bible Study that she hosts online. There are almost 100 people registered on that group. I taught them for an hour or so (with my friend doing the translating), and then the Lord gave me a “word” about someone with problems in their foot. One of the sisters sent a chat that it was her, and that she wanted prayer for healing right away. I ended up praying with people for another hour until my friend finally said we were out of time. I had just clicked “end” on the conference call, and the Lord said, “You have now ministered internationally….” I thought to myself….”Wow! That was pretty simple!”
After I was finished telling all of this to another friend, he just looked at me with a slight smile and said, “sounds like ‘empty vessels’ to me…” Immediately I knew what my ‘oil’ is that I am supposed to begin pouring out. Father clearly showed me that people are the ‘empty vessels’, and my anointing to preach the Gospel is the ‘oil’. The instruction to “borrow not a few” simply means to me that I should not limit it to the people I currently see in front of me (at our Charis Bible Study or other local teaching opportunities). This began a discussion with another friend that included a commitment from him to help me launch some online video teachings as well as helping me to begin writing a blog post at least once a week. It definitely felt different than I had anticipated, but “ready or not…” I think this is another way I can continue pouring out the ‘oil’.
Find the “oil” that God has given you and simply BEGIN to pour it out into the empty vessels in front of you.
