Sermon for Pentecost Sunday, May 5th, 2022:
(Read Psalm 104; Joel 2: 28-32; Acts 2: 1-21; 2 Kings 4: 1-7)
William Booth: “God has had all there was to have of me. There have been men with greater opportunities, but I made my mind up that God was going to have all there was of WB…”
God loves his people and he sometimes works in ways which go beyond our wildest expectations…
On the day of Pentecost God decided to pour out his Spirit upon all flesh. That day God (good as His word) began to fill vessels; with the coming of Jesus (his DRA) the Holy Spirit is offered to all flesh (you/me), not just a chosen few prophets like Elisha. Yes, Pentecost was the birth of the church of Christ, but it was an experience of spiritual renewal for individuals too. At Pentecost the tongues of fire separated and rested on each of them and all of them were filled with the Holy Spirit. (Acts 2: 3,4a)
All who have received the Lord (those who have called on His name & been saved) have received the Spirit from God; HE has been given freely to you; He is given so you now know you are special; the Spirit marks you out as belonging to God; the Spirit helps you to pray; gives you power, teaches you about the things of God; convicts you of sin; the Spirit of God breathes life into dead things and situations; He transforms lives sometimes immediately/radically & often slowly.
When you received the Lord you were each gifted and the gifts are to be used. A gift is not forced open us – it can be unwrapped and opened or it can be left. God wants us to exercise faith – to “put it out there”; how often the Spirit of God prompts us and we squash Him – little things which he has given us we ignore; you have received the mind of Christ no less.
Elisha was an amazing guy – for all the miracles he was able to do he did not seek fame; as well as being a very powerful man he was helpful and compassionate to rich/powerful and poor alike; he was really up against it to – he lived in times of poverty and moral degeneracy in Israel – little time for God’s word or God’s people. To a tee the leaders of the time were corrupt. Times like today…
Elisha’s whole ministry was about being filled by God; he asked for a double-portion of the Spirit given to his mentor, Elijah. It sounds a bit greedy but Elisha wanted and expected to do great things for God; his prayer was that God would fill him and use him and he did, perhaps in ways which exceeded even his own expectations. Elisha was empty of all other ambitions…
The widow: we are told that she had been married to one of the prophets; the chances are she has learned to trust God of Israel, but times are very hard now her husband had died; debts would force her into servitude, to have to sell her sons (Lev 25:39); the situation seems hopeless – no money, food, income, SS benefits – she had 2 sons and the bailiffs were about to come get them. But she knew where to go; she went to God who works through a vessel called Elisha. “What do you have in your house?” he asked the woman. Her first instinct is to say, “Nothing, I have nothing!”
But then, “I know, I’ve got a little olive oil left in a small jar!” The woman had attitude of faith. Elisha didn’t give her cash to solve her problem but gave her some instructions and put the woman (and her resources) to work. Elisha’s requests seem odd, but she would see that God would supply her needs if she did her bit. She is exercising faith. She listens to Elisha for he is the vessel for the Word of God. I believe she starts in the right place.
Elisha enables her to use what little she does have and it proves to be more than enough – enough to keep the wolf from the door, enough to keep her boys under her roof, and enough to have a little left over. (This is not an argument for the prosperity gospel); here is faith in action.
Just a little oil in the jar to start with; the widow learns what God can do with very little; she learns God will take what little she does have! What do you have in your house? The Lord asked Moses, “What do you have in your hand?”
God is always at work; he is more than capable of doing miracles but he wants us to offer what we have; it might not seem like very much but he has always been in the multiplication business! God can create something out of nothing, but he always intended to use men and women to do his work; at the Wedding Feast (Canaan) they had to fill the jars, on the mountainside the disciples had to bring the bread and fish; at the graveside it was men & women who were used to roll away the stone before Lazarus was raised from the dead.
Why does God choose to restrict himself to such imperfect vessels? This was and is and always will be God’s MO. God wanted a man to stand in the gap (Ezekiel); when Saul was knocked off his horse the Lord tells him that a man (Ananias) will tell him what to do next…
The Apostle John wept because he could not find a man to open up the scroll of salvation, so God himself took on the form of a man to bring salvation. (Examples of vessels):
God is not asking us to use the things which we do not have! This is where we get things wrong so often. The gifts are here; the jars are here! We place limits on God all the time. The only thing that stops God working is the LACK OF A VESSEL. In our story we note the oil stopped only when there were no more jars to be filled.
The woman is available to God and she trusted God: such trust is never misplaced!
We hear from God very often & ignore him; we would like him to solve the problem (lottery God) for us, rather than use what he has already given us. How often we say, I have nothing to give but this story (as well as the parables of Jesus) tells us that the Lord will take what he has already given to us – our talents, our gifts, our bodies, our finances, and he will increase these if we have the faith to trust him to take what we have and multiply it. These are promises. The Lord doesn’t like it if we bury our talents in the ground!
The lady who wrote letters to prisoners telling them about her faith; all I can do is to write a letter! Then write one! She had a great ministry, because she trusted that the Lord had spoken to her and could use what she had already been given…
“As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead!” (James 2)
Do it (like the widow) even if you don’t know how it will work. In faith the widow got the jars; in faith they closed the door behind them…
“Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and it becomes a tree...” (Matthew 17:20) “Who despises the day of small things?” (Not the Lord!)
God gives the work to human vessels but it is by God’s Spirit/Power that His work is accomplished. (Zech 4)
Jeremiah 2:13: my people have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water!
Quote: “I was never of any use until I realised that God never intended me to be a great man!”
God supplies the water – all the plumbing can be in place, the pump but without a tank to store the water and a tap to direct/dispense it, all that power goes unused. What the widow discovered was what we too discover: the oil is not in short supply but empty vessels are.
“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us!” (2 Cor 4:7)
Though we are one Body, “we have different gifts, according to the GRACE GIVEN US…” it is not about the vessel but about the one who fills the vessel…
Billy Graham was asked why, as the most Spirit-filled of his generation, why he had to pray for the Holy Spirit, and he said, “Because I leak! Sometimes I am all dried up and need I always need to be filled”.
The disciples were concerned because they were unable to cast out the demon: Jesus said this one needs prayer. It is through prayer we receive the power. Jesus was not a magician! He had to pray too. He submitted himself…
If the church has a problem it is not with a lack of provision from God but a lack of submission from us. God wants to fill us but we need to be emptied to be filled; what is filling your life? God will work if we allow him enough room for God. Don’t ask yourself, “How much of God do I have but how much of me does God have?”
On this Pentecost Day:
- Remember the gift of the Spirit to you
- Remember that God is asking: what do you have in your house
- Remember by his grace and power God will bless even the little you do have
- Remember you are vessels & to ask not how much of God you have but how much of you does God have?