Before you start looking outside …. search inside you first - Story of The Widow, A jar of Oil and Elisa -

Before you start looking outside …. search inside you first

We can learn a lot from the story of The Widow, A jar of Oil and Elisa. If you are not familiar with it or haven’t been to Sunday School for a while let me summarise the story.

But first, let me set the scene….

We are obsessed with the need to self-develop. There is a constant yearning for something that we don’t have to make us feel better about ourselves or to find something outside ourselves that would improve us in various ways.

Many of us however live in this state of perpetually looking outwards for that extra something, yet we hold so much skill and talent within us, that is unused. Sometimes the key to the solution is already with you but we spend a fortune-seeking something out there that will make us better.

Many years ago, I had the opportunity of delivering a sermon. I made reference to the story of the Widow and the jar of oil referred to in The Bible (II Kings 4, in case you want to check it out)

She was in crisis when she got to the house of Elisha. Her deceased husband has left her and their two sons in debt. Unable to repay these debts, the creditor had turned up at her doorsteps to take her sons into servitude as repayment for the debt. She knew letting them go was to subject them to a lifetime of sadness and ruin. She went to the only place she knew she could find a solution.

We would never quite know what was on her mind as she sat there and poured out her heart to the old prophet. His response though was to have a profound impact on her and even now as I think about it, I get goosebumps.

He asked her a simple question “What do you have at home”

“…a jar of oil…” she replied. He then gave her specific instructions on what she needed to do with the resource she had.

The rest is history...

What is the relevance of that story you ask?

All the while, and as she ran perhaps bare feet towards the house of the prophet, she didn’t think for one minute that the solution to her problem was sitting/waiting back home. 

All that time, she had what she needed to resolve her problem but she just didn’t recognize it.

To her it was just “a jar of oil” but to Elisha, it was what she needed to raise her to the next level.

So, my question to you today is 

“What do you have, in your hands, that can change your life and your destiny this year?”

Don’t always believe that all that you need is outside of you. You are a person of great talent, skill, and potential.

Learn to look inside .... like the Widow, you may just be surprised at the “jars of oil” you’ll find