THE POURING ONLY STOPS WHEN YOU STOP Part 2
I completed my last Blog which was Part 1 with these questions: What is it that you are in need of? What’s weighing on you today? What do you need to do for the Lord that He has called you to do, that you have not yet done? And finally, what do you have in your house?
Let’s continue from where I left off on the last Blog with Elisha and the Widow’s Oil. Here are the verses that I want to focus on as we continue to see the hand of God move to settle a debt for the wife and children, the family of a faithful yet deceased man of God.
2 Kings chapter 4 verses 5 thru 7
5 So she went from him and shut the door behind her and her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured it out.
6 Now it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, “Bring me another vessel.”
And he said to her, “There is not another vessel.” So the oil ceased.
7 Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debt; and you and your sons live on the rest.”
This is the part that made me come to realize the intimacy of what the Lord does and wants to do in our lives. The number one problem with the world that we live in today isn’t the storm that’s going on all around us, which is a problem when you are consumed by the storm. The real problem is what’s stifling the Body of Christ which has been prophesied for thousands of years: that men and women would become lovers of themselves. I know that seems harsh, but nevertheless it’s true.
In the book of 2 Timothy chapter 3 verses 1 thru 5, I’ll be taking this from the New International Version. You can see for yourself how amazingly accurate this prophesy truly is:
1 But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.
2 People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,
3 without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good,
4 treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—
5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.
When I think about the Widow in 2 Kings, I cannot begin to imagine the embarrassment, the shame, but also the self-control that she carried, the strength to somehow hold it all together for the sake of her children. To the point that she reveals that she had nothing but that is when God, Jesus, Holy Spirit gets to do His greatest work.
SHUT THE DOOR BEHIND YOU!!!
We are all so enamored with the doors that God opens and never really understand the power and provision that can come from God through the DOORS HE SHUTS! Not everything Jesus wants to do in and through you needs to be on public display. Not everyone needs to see all the time what Jesus is trying to do for you!
More people are consumed with self-promotion, want to have their voices heard, care more about “their followers” than the people they don’t care about stepping on or over to get where they think they need to get. The thing we need to come to realize, that we really need to grasp is that Jesus sees it all. He’s up in everyone’s business, even when they think they can get away with what they are doing. Remember that Jesus is everywhere, omnipresent, always with us even when we think we can go off and do what we want when no one is looking.
Some of the greatest breakthroughs and blessings come when we are alone with God, that is also where Satan tries to come to steal, kill and destroy you. See, the widow went from him, meaning in verse 5 that she and her sons separated themselves from the man of God. So God would be glorified, the Prophet Elisha was just the messenger, not the provider. 5 So she went from him and shut the door behind her and her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured it out.
The pouring began when the separation took place. When no one was watching, the Spirit of God moved, multiplied and flowed through the nothing she had but the jar of oil. I believe that is what the Lord wants all of us to do. We must identify the little that we have, the mustard seed, the crumb, the amount that seems so irrelevant, less than, the thing we feel is impossible so that He can make it possible.
In the very next verse, I want you to see through the lens of where we are today, throughout society. The sickness, disease, helplessness, hopelessness, homeless, jobless, addictions, overdoses, the looting, the violence, the countless murders, rapes, the number of innocent children abducted into sex trafficking, the suicides, the attempted suicides, the Afghanistan disaster, and now the war in Ukraine.
Think about every single person and family that has been affected by any of the horrific things I listed. Think about how these people and families feel because of what I listed. Think about how lost, broken, empty, tarnished, tired, scared, desperate and afraid they are, not knowing where to turn or who to turn to. Now that all these situations and emotions are in our heads, as we read this next verse, picture these people as lost souls when we see the word Vessels in verses 3, 4, 5 and 6.
In verse 6 it reads: 6 Now it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, “Bring me another vessel.” And he said to her, “There is not another vessel.” So, the oil ceased. This is where the Spirit of God fell on me that I began sharing in Part 1 of the Blog I wrote on April 7th, 2022. So, as I wrote in the 1st part of this Blog, I do believe that Holy Spirit will fully speak to you, just as He did when I was preaching over a week ago. I pray that the revelation that the Lord was downloading in me that was too much to understand at the time begins to come alive in you and increases in you as it has in me.
When the Prophet Elisha spoke to the widow and her sons and said “Go, borrow vessels from everywhere, from all your neighbors—empty vessels; do not gather just a few. These vessels were revealed to me as people, the same as the people that I described that are empty because of what life has done to them. The vessels that the widow’s sons borrowed, and not just a few, these vessels were never described as a certain type. The vessels that were borrowed were most likely different shapes, sizes, colors and made of different materials. Some of these vessels were most likely tarnished, smelled from the residuals of what they previously held or had in them, scratched, dented, dusty, rusted, what have you.
The point that I’m making is that the only description that was given for the vessels was that they needed to be empty. The revelation that I received was that one jar of oil, the only thing the widow had was enough for God to do the impossible. Regardless of the conditions of the containers that were about to receive the pouring in, did not matter, God filled them regardless of their condition.
I believe that we have all given more time and attention to our conditions and situations than to the emptiness that God could fill in us. Satan always delights in whatever keeps us from receiving what the Lord has for us. I will never forget the two men that poured into me for over 13 months, that at 33 years old the void, the emptiness that I had focused on for almost 17 years was finally filled. I can no longer identify with that emptiness because I choose every day to pour it out into others. It doesn’t matter if I feel that I only have a little left or not enough, I pour regardless of my circumstance or condition!
Will you receive what the Lord wants to pour into you today? And will you continue to pour out into others?
Please make sure you read Part 3, the final Part of this Blog that will be released in a couple of days.
Carmine Azzato
April 13, 2022, Hitting The Pavement