Lessons For Recession…

07/27/2010 in Featured Leave a reply

You don’t know that God is all you need until God is all you’ve got. That’s why God often allows a shortage, a deficiency, a lack in your life.

If I were to ask you, “What are you lacking today?” you might say, “I need more energy… I need more money… I need more emotional support… I need more creativity… I need more opportunity… I need a job.” All of those things that happen in your life happen really for a reason.

In this series Help Lord I Need A Miracle we’re going to look at the things that cause people to feel hopeless. Today we’re going to look at three incidences in the life of a man named Elijah.

Elijah was about nine hundred years before Jesus Christ. He went through three experiences. They’re all in 1 Kings 17, that teach us lessons on how God wants to do miracles when there are things that are happening in our lives that cause us to lack what we need.

Let me give you a little background of this story. There were three kings in Israel that united the kingdom – Saul, and then David, and then Solomon. But after that the place fell apart. Israel was divided into two kingdoms – the northern kingdom called Israel and the southern kingdom called Judah.

In the northern kingdom for the next sixty years they had a string of terrible leaders. Nineteen different kings in northern Israel and every one of them was a rotten apple. They were terrible politically, terrible economically, and most important terrible spiritually. Then as you think that everything is falling apart, the government is now bankrupt and the nation is in recession. The Bible tells us that the current king and queen were the worst of all the previous nineteen. The worst king and queen in Israel’s history were named Ahab and Jezebel. You’ve heard of her probably. Ahab and Jezebel – they were the worst king and queen in all of Israel’s history.

The reason why they were so bad, not only were they terrible leaders politically, economically, but spiritually they got rid of the worship of God and they brought in a false god, a pagan god, an idol called Baal. And they established Baal as the official religion of Israel, the Jewish nation!

So God sends Elijah as a spokesman, as a prophet, to go confront King Ahab. Elijah says to Ahab and to Jezebel, because of your wickedness, because you’ve led the nation to worship false gods, it’s not going to rain any more in this country until I, the prophet of God, say so.

We later find out this actually ends up being three and a half years. Three and a half years without rain in the nation of Israel which meant they were in terrible drought, terrible dryness, terrible famine. But Elijah says because of your sin, leader, the nation is going to suffer for three and a half years.

This message did not sit well with Ahab. In fact he and his wife Jezebel were furious. They were ticked. And they put a price on Elijah’s head. They said, we’re going to kill you. They authorized bounty hunters and assassins to find Elijah and kill him.

The Bible says in 1 Kings 17 “Now Elijah confronted King Ahab, ‘As surely as God lives, the God of Israel whom I worship and serve, there will be no dew or rain during the next few years unless I give the word.’” And as I said the Bible says everything in the country dried up for three and a half years.

Maybe you feel that way in your life. Maybe you feel like the joy has dried up in your life. Your savings have dried up. Your job has dried up. During this time of spiritual and emotional and economic dryness, God did some miracles for Elijah and he taught some lessons to Elijah that you and I need in this current recession. God wants us to learn the same things.

So my question for you is, Are you ready for a miracle?

During this time of dry period, which maybe you’re going through right now, God took Elijah to three different places and they represent three different phases that you go through in your life. You’ll go through them over and over again,

For the first year of the three and a half years of drought, God took Elijah to a place called Kerith. Kerith was a place and a time of obscurity.

The Bible says this in 1 Kings 17 “Then the Lord said to Elijah, [this is after Ahab had said I’m going to kill you] ‘Go east and hide in the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan. The Kerith brook will give you fresh water to drink and I’ve commanded ravens to bring you food there every day.’ [That’s unusual.] So Elijah obeyed what the Lord said to do. He moved to the Kerith Ravine and lived there. The birds brought him food each morning and evening and he drank from the brook. But after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain.”

The first stop in Elijah’s journey of faith is the ravine, the Kerith Ravine.

What is a ravine? A ravine is a natural rut. It is a narrow, long gorge. The Grand Canyon started out as a ravine but it got bigger and bigger and wide ravine is called a Canyon. A ravine is long and narrow.

How would you like to live there for a year? You wouldn’t. A ravine is dark. It’s narrow. It’s cold and it’s lonely.

Some of you are in an emotional Kerith right now. You’re going through a time that seems dark and cold and deep and lonely.

Elijah is an extrovert. He’s not used to being alone. God says I’m going to put you in a ravine for a year. I want you to hide there.

Do you know what Kerith means in Hebrew? It means “cut off.” And Elijah is cut off from everything. Cut off from all of his friends, cut off from social interaction, cut off from what’s happening in the world. He’s cut off from the limelight. He’s cut off from attention. He is literally all by himself.

What is going on here? God takes an extrovert and makes him a hermit for a year. What’s happening here? God had great plans for Elijah. This is at the very beginning of his ministry and God did incredible miracles through this guy, amazing things through this guy in the years ahead. But first he said “You need time alone with me. I need to narrow your focus. You need to focus on me. You need to develop your inner life. You need time alone with me and nobody else. I want your undivided attention for a year. So I’m going to put you in a ravine.”

And what is a ravine? It’s a rut. That’s what it is. It’s a rut. And it’s dark and deep and it’s narrow. God says I want you to have a time out of a year for reflection.

God often uses private darkness in your life to prepare you for public ministry in the light of day later on.

During this time that he’s in this rut, and some of you are in a rut right now, God supernaturally provided for him – in a very unusual way. He has ravens – birds – bring food over the top of the ravine and drop it. This is not exactly gourmet food, friends. Because where do birds get their food? Off of other people’s plates. They find a little piece of meat here and a little piece of bread there and they pick it up and take it. Then God would have them drop it down in this ravine. So for a year, Elijah’s eating leftovers at the best. On the other hand he may be eating a dead carcass that they picked up somewhere. So this is not exactly a Club Med vacation here. But he’s in this pit and his only support is from God. There’s no food there. So the birds have to bring it. He’s got water that God has provided in this brook. His only support is from God. Remember: you don’t know God is all you need until God is all you’ve got.

Then in 17:7 it says “The brook dried up.” This is such an important concept, an important principle in your life. The brook is going to dry up in your life many, many times. So I want you to remember this phrase. In fact I want you to remember where it is in the Bible. We’re going to memorize it.

The hard part…. “The brook dried up”… is not hard to remember. But the hard part is remembering the address – where is it in the Bible. So whenever you want to memorize a verse, you say the address before and after: 1 Kings 17:7 “The brook dried up” 1 Kings 17:7.

Some of you right now are in a situation where the brook has dried up in your life. The money’s not there. The friend isn’t there. The support isn’t there. The energy isn’t there. Your health isn’t there. Things have dried up in your life.

The Bible says in 1 Kings 17:7 “The brook dried up” 1 Kings 17:7. What does that mean? You’re going to need this verse, because many times in your life the brook is going to dry up. What does that mean? When something good is all of a sudden gone in your life. When something that was enjoyable is now empty. What was refreshing to you is no longer there. Something that delighted you – a job, a relationship, what brought you delight is now disappointing you. And the brook dries up in your life. 1 Kings 17:7.

What do you do when the brook dries up in your life, relationally, emotionally, economically or whatever? You do three things. You remember three things. There are three reasons why brooks dry up in your life and you need to know this because it’s going to happen over and over.

1. Brooks dry up to keep me from depending on the brook.

That’s the first reason. Brooks dry up in your life to keep me from depending on the brook instead of God.

Elijah was in this ravine, in this rut, for a year. It would have been very easy for him to just
forget God and focus on the birds and the brook; because they are supplying his needs. He doesn’t have to work; it’s all right there. The birds bring the food and the brook gives the water. Pretty soon if you depend on a bird every day to drop food down to you, then week after week, month after month for the full year, pretty soon you’re not thinking about God. You’re thinking about, is the bird on time?

Some of you, the bird is late in your life right now. And you’ve got a pile of bills at home. And you think the bird’s late. And if the water’s coming down the brook, you might just start to assume it’s always going to be there.

So God says whatever you’re trusting in if it’s not me, I’m going to turn it off. I’ve been trusting in my job for my security – we’ll just turn that off. I’ve been trusting in my health – we’ll just turn that off. I’ve been trusting in a friend of mine – we’ll just turn that off.

God says you must trust in me. Anything you put before me is a false god. It’s an idol.

It’s human nature for us to trust the brook and the birds. What’s the bird and the brook in your life? It’s whatever you’re looking for to give you happiness. Maybe your husband, maybe your job, maybe your sports. It may be your health. You’re looking to something besides God to meet your needs.

We have this thought that if God ever gives us a gift, and by the way everything in your life is a gift from God – your brain, your ability, your freedom, your life, your next heartbeat, the air that you breathe, it’s all a gift from God. That if God gives something to you, he has no right to take it back. That’s nonsense. Because God is God and he has the right to give and to take away. He has the right to give it to you and to take it away if he wants to. God is sovereign.

Sometimes when God gives us something and then it’s taken away, maybe not even by God, but it just vanishes, like a job; then we start getting mad at God. I don’t have the job I used to have! What’s wrong with you, God? I don’t have the health I used to have! I’ve lost my husband! I’ve lost my child!

That was a gift to you. And no gift on earth is eternal except eternal life. No gift is going to last forever on this planet. It’s all just a gift and God has a right to give it or take it away if he thinks you’re depending on it for your source of joy instead of on him.

There’s a second reason the brook dries up.

2. The second reason is to move me to a better place.

God had no intention of leaving Elijah in the ravine, in that rut, for the rest of his life. It was simply a one year temporary retreat for reflection. He was protecting Elijah while there was a bounty on his head and the assassins were out to get him. But God didn’t intend for Elijah to be born to live in a rut for the rest of his life; and God doesn’t intend for you to live in the rut you’re in for the rest of your life.

We get very complacent about the ruts and routines in our life. Let’s admit it. The rut and routine and ravine that Elijah was in wasn’t that good. He’s eating leftover food and drinking water out of a brook, and he’s in a little narrow space. But it was comfortable. He knew it. He’d gotten comfortable and complacent with the rut he was in, when there was a whole wide world out there that God wanted him to see. As long as the brook was bubbling and the birds were bringing food, Elijah wasn’t going to move.

We don’t change when we see the light; we change when we feel the heat, when all of a sudden we’re forced to change. And sometimes God dries up stuff in your life to move you. God wants to move you to a new place in your life.

Often what we think is bad – the brook dried up! I lost my job! – could be the best thing that happened to you. How many times has something you thought was bad actually turned out for the good in your life? You could think of a lot of times that’s happened. The things that you thought were going to destroy you are actually developing you. They’re making you the great person you are. They’re building your character. They’re developing you. What you thought was going to destroy you actually develops you.

Sometimes God turns off the water supply, the supply of whatever we’re looking for to trust, because he’s saying, I want to move you to a new place, I want you to focus on a new way, I want you to try new things. There’s nothing that gets you in shape faster than having your health go bad. All of a sudden you say, maybe I ought to start eating right. Maybe I ought to start exercising. Those kinds of things get your attention.

STORY: In Alabama there was a group of farmers who grew cotton – Enterprise, Alabama. They grew cotton there year after year. But every year the boll weevil would destroy the cotton. It happened two or three years in a row, and all of the farmers were actually going bankrupt because the boll weevil kept destroying the crop.

So in their bankruptcy the farmers got together and said, we’ve got to get another crop. This one isn’t reliable. So they started planting peanuts. The peanuts were so much more productive, and so much more profitable that it made all of those farmers incredibly wealthy. They built a statue in Enterprise, Alabama to the boll weevil, because if it hadn’t been for the boll weevil destroying two or three years of crops, they never would have switched to a more profitable one. They never would have switched to something that was more productive and profitable in their lives.

God often dries up the brook in your life to keep you from depending on the brook instead of him, to move you to a better place, and…

3. Three, to prove that he has not forgotten you.

To prove that God has not forgotten me, God often dries up the brook. God could have left Elijah in that rut. He could have left him there. If God didn’t care, he could have put Elijah in that ravine and left him there the rest of his life. But God did care about Elijah. For that reason he dried up the brook so that Elijah could have something better.

When things go wrong in our lives, we often think God’s forgotten me. No. It means God is paying attention to you. He’s paying attention because he wants to move you to a new place.

That brings us to the second place. First he’s in the ravine, the rut.

The second place we see Elijah is in the next verse – he’s on the road.

The second test of Elijah’s faith is a dangerous journey. I call this a time of insecurity. 1 Kings 17:8-9 says “So then the Lord said to Elijah ‘Now get up [out of that rut you’re in, that ravine] and go to Zarephath and live there. I’ve prepared a widow there [in Zarephath] to take care of you.’” So Elijah obeys. He went to Zarephath. Circle ‘get up and go” and circle the word “prepared.” God had prepared in advance the widow where he was going to take him next.

What’s happening here? God said I want you to move. Get ready to go on a journey, Elijah. But who and where Elijah is being sent to does not give Elijah a lot of confidence, for a number of reasons.

Here is a map of Israel. At the bottom of Israel, down by the Red Sea in this northern kingdom is Kerith, that brook where he was in that gorge, in that rut. Zarephath is at the very top. It’s not even in Israel. It’s in modern day Lebanon. It is a small town on the coast of the Mediterranean. It wasn’t even a Jewish city. It was a pagan city. For Elijah to get from Kerith to Zarephath he is going to have to go through dangerous territory.

There are a number of problems with this journey. Number one, it’s over a hundred miles. It’s going to take him days to walk. And remember he’s a marked man. There are wanted signs for Elijah all over Israel. He’s going to have to walk right through the heartland of Baal worship where everybody there wants to kill him.

It’s in the middle of a drought, so there’s no water. He’s going to walk for days without water.

Zarephath is not even a Jewish town; it’s a pagan town with false worship.

In fact, Zarephath, it just so happens, was the home town of Jezebel. And Elijah says, “You’re sending me to Jezebel’s home town? You’ve got to be kidding, Lord! All of her friends are there. I’ll be a sitting duck!”

Then God says, When you get to Zarephath, I’m going to have a very poor widow to take care of you, the least likely person to take care of Elijah, a poor widow. She couldn’t defend him or protect him, much less even feed him likely. She’s a poor widow. Of all the people, God says, I’m sending you to Jezebel’s home town to a poor widow. Now he’s going from bad to worse.

Are you there? Some of you are in the journey phase right now of life. You’re on the road from Kerith to Zarephath and it seems like things are going from bad to worse. And as I said, you’ve got a pile of bills sitting at home, stacked up, unpaid, and you don’t know where the money is going to come from. Bad to worse.

When you’re on the road, when you’re on the journey phase of the test of faith, what do you need to remember? When you’re scared to death and God’s got you on a journey and you don’t know where you’re going, you don’t know how long it’s going to take and you don’t know what’s going to happen when you get there. And you’re kind of a marked person and anybody could attack you from any side because you’re out in the open and you’re very vulnerable. What do you do when you’re on a journey in life and you’re scared to death? You do the three things and remember the three things that Elijah did.

Three things to remember when you’re on the road.

1. One, the path to a miracle is always through uncomfortable territory.

Miracles never happen in your comfort zone, when everything’s going great, when everything’s copacetic, when everything’s comfortable, when everything’s convenient. You don’t need a miracle when everything is settled in your life. You only need a miracle when you’re on the edge, when you’re scared to death, when you’re insecure, when you’re out there and you can get hit at any angle. The path to a miracle is always through uncomfortable territory. Elijah is going to have to walk right through the area of Samaria and Megiddo [where we get the word Armageddon – from Megiddo, the valley there]. He’s going to have to go through all that with people wanting to kill him in order to get to where God wants him to go.

When Moses led the Israelites out of Egyptian bondage, out of slavery, to the Promised Land, they had to go through the Red Sea first. That was scary.

For David to slay Goliath he had to walk out onto the battle field before the victory could happen.

You may have to go into battle first.

When God wanted Jehoshaphat to win a victory, he had to put the choir before the army. These are scary things.

Are you at a place right now in your life where things are a little uncomfortable – financially, emotionally, relationally, physically? You’re just a little nervous, a little on the edge, a little insecure. Congratulations. You’re on the path to a miracle.

Miracles don’t happen when things are comfortable. Miracles happen when things are uncomfortable. Elijah didn’t say to God, “God, this is a great plan. There are only three things wrong with it. One, you’re sending me in the wrong direction. You’re sending me right through my enemies’ territory. Wrong direction. Two, you’re sending me to the wrong location. Jezebel’s hometown. I’ll be a sitting duck there. And three, you’re sending me to the wrong protection. A poor widow can’t take care of me.”

No. He just obeyed.

The second thing you need to remember when you’re on the journey and it’s a little scary:

2. The source of a miracle is always unexpected.

In your life the source of a miracle, where it comes from, will not be where you think it’s going to come from. It’s always unexpected.

Why does he do it that way? So that God gets the glory. That’s why you can’t figure it out. So stop trying. Some of you, you’re out of work, you’re unmarried, you’ve got a major need. You’ve got some need in your life that you want met. Whatever it is I don’t know. And you’re trying to figure it out. You’re looking around saying maybe God could do it that way… maybe God could do it that way… maybe I could help God along with this… maybe I could drop a few hints… maybe I could manipulate the situation…maybe I could give a suggestion here.

What you’re trying to do is you’re trying to manipulate God. It doesn’t work.

When God told Abraham, you’re going to have a son, and that son is going to be the father of a great nation, Abraham is old in years – eighty, ninety, finally he doesn’t even have a child and he’s ninety-nine. There is no baby and he’s supposed to be the father of great nation. So he takes matters into his own hands and he has sex with a woman who’s not his wife – Hagar – and has a child named Ishmael and says, “Here’s my son, God. You promised me a son. Here he is!” God says, “No! Wrong answer. That’s not the one I promised. That’s the one you came up with, with your plan, but that’s not my plan. My plan is I’m going to use your wife Sarah and do a miracle long after she’s incapable of having children.”

Look! God does miracles in illogical ways. Why? God says in Isaiah 55 “My thoughts are completely different from yours. My ways are far beyond anything you can imagine.”

The way you want to meet the need in your life is not the way God wants to meet the need in your life. Your way is second best. God’s way is best.

So the journey is often illogical. If you could understand God, you’d be God. But you’re not. Let me give you a little stress reliever. Repeat this ten times: God is God, and I’m not. That will reduce the stress in your life significantly. God is God and I’m not. When you start trying to figure out, where are we going to get the money? Where are we going to get what we need? And you’re all worried and frustrated. No. You just say God is God, and I’m not.

The path to a miracle is always through uncomfortable territory. The source of a miracle always comes in an unexpected way.

So what do you do when you’re on this road? You don’t fret. You don’t fear. You don’t forget. You don’t try to figure it out. You don’t try to formulate.

You just have faith. You just trust God. I don’t know how God is going to do it but he’s going to do it. If God tells me to do it, even if it doesn’t make sense, even if it’s illogical, even from a human standpoint it doesn’t make sense for me to go that direction, to that location, and talk to that person, I’m going to do it. Because God said do it; and then you’re being set up for a miracle.

3. The third thing you need to remember on the journey, the pattern for a miracle is always CPR. Command – Promise – Risk.

This CPR will really get your heart going. Command – Promise – Risk. You need to realize that every time God does a miracle, anywhere, it always comes in this format. God gives you a command, he tells you to do something. Then he gives a promise and says, if you do it here’s what I’ll do. There’s command and then there’s a promise. Then you take the risk. You step out in faith, cause this does not make sense. This is illogical. I can’t afford to do this. It doesn’t make sense at all. But God says here’s the command, here’s the promise. Now you take the risk.

Then comes the miracle; then comes the fulfillment; then comes the answer. God always works with CPR. It’s how he starts your heart spiritually.

I could take you all through the Bible and give you example after example how God gave a command to Noah to build an ark. He said I promise I’ll save your family. Noah takes the risk. Then that’s what happens.

Gideon, David, I could give you over and over – so many illustrations where God says to somebody, Do this. It doesn’t make sense. But I promise I’ll take care of you. If you do that, if you take the risk, then you’ll see the fulfillment. And that’s what happened.

Now we come to the third place of Elijah in the test of his faith. First he’s in the rut, the ravine; then he’s on the road. Now he comes to Zarephath. Zarephath, when he arrives in the city, this is a time of scarcity.

“When he reached the town gate, Elijah saw a widow gathering firewood. He asked her, ‘Would you please bring me a drink of water?’ As she was going to get it, Elijah added, ‘and please bring me a small piece of bread, too.’”

This is absolutely hilarious. Can you imagine walking up to a total stranger who’s obviously poor like some homeless person on the street saying, “Can you give me a drink of water? And by the way, bring me a Subway sandwich. Or bring me some bread and if you don’t mind put a little of that garlic sauce on the top of it. Bring me some oil and vinegar, I like to dip it.” Would you say to a stranger who is obviously poor, a homeless person, I need you to help me? No. You wouldn’t.

Why would Elijah do that? Because God did CPR – I’m going to command you to do this and I promise if you do it it’s going to work out. I’ll take care of you. So Elijah takes the risk. It did not make sense for him to say to a poor widow, Can you help me? Can you do something for me? That just did not make sense.

But now he’s in the place of scarcity.

“The woman answered, ‘As surely as your God lives, [Notice she said “your God”. It wasn’t her God because she wasn’t Jewish. She was an idol worshipper. She said as surely as your God lives] I swear I have no bread. I only have a handful of flour left in a small jar and a little olive oil left in a jug. [All I’ve got is a little handful of flour and a handful of oil. I don’t have any bread at home.] I came here to gather some wood so I could go home and cook our last meal. My son and I will eat it and then we’re going to die of hunger.’”

Elijah’s thinking, “This is who you sent me to, God? You’re sending me to a woman who doesn’t even have food for her own family. She’s got one meal left and you’re asking me to ask her for it?” This is illogical. This is a test.

The test is do you believe God or do you believe yourself. Do you believe you’re smarter than God or do you believe God wants to do a miracle? She says, “I’m telling you! I’ve just got a little bit of oil and a little bit of flour. I came out here to pick up some sticks. I’m going to make a pancake dinner for me and my son and we’re going to die. Because we’re like everybody else. We’re in the recession! And there’s nothing left. So we’re going to eat our last meal and then we’re going to starve to death.”

Then here’s what Elijah says, “‘Don’t be afraid! Go home and first make a small loaf of bread from what you have, [Whatever you’ve got, you make a loaf of bread] and bring it to me. Then cook something for yourself and your son. [Hello! This does not sound right does it? It just does not sound right. This is a test of your faith. You go home and you take whatever you got and you don’t have much left and I want you to give it to me. God wants you to give it to me. Then he says, then cook something for yourself and your son.] God says, [here’s the promise] ‘I assure you that jar of flour will never be empty, and the jug of oil will never run out, until the day I send rain to the land.’ [He says God will supernaturally replenish it. That bowl and that jar, you’re going to make stuff out of it and supernaturally it’s going to fill up again. You’re going to make some more and it’s going to supernaturally fill up again. You’re never going to run out and you’ll always have reserve. If you’ll do what I tell you to do on the promise of God, you’ll never run out until the day I send the rain to the land.]

What is Elijah doing here? He’s doing the very thing God did with him – CPR. God didn’t just want to bless Elijah. He wanted to bless this widow too. So she had to go through the same steps of faith he did.

God had said CPR – Elijah I command you to go to Ahab and I want you to tell him this and if you do I promise to take care of you. And he did. Then God said, I command you to go to the brook Kerith and if you do, I’ll take care of you with birds and the brook. And he did. Then he said, I command you to go on a journey through the worst part of the nation where they want to kill you. If you do it I promise I’ll take care of you. And he did. And God said I command you to go to Zarephath and find this little widow and say this. And he did it. And God took care of him.

So now what’s he doing? He’s giving the widow a chance for a miracle. He gives her a command that seems impossible – I want you to go home and I want you to make whatever you’ve got left and I want you to bring it and give away your last meal. Hello! You’re asking me to give away my last meal? Yes, I am. This is a test of faith. I want you to give away your last meal. Don’t eat it yourself. If you do God says, I promise you’ll never lack. I’m going to take you through this recession. I’m going to take you through this dry spell. I’m going to take you through this famine, if you put me first. And that’s exactly what the widow does.

“So the widow did what Elijah told her to do, and she and her son and Elijah had enough food every day. [Elijah went ahead and lived with her the next couple of years] The jar of flour and the jug of oil never ran out, just as God had promised.”

This is the third place Zarephath. Do you know what Zarephath means in Hebrew? It means the refinery. God is refining his faith – Elijah’s, and her faith – the widow, and the son’s faith in the refinery.

What is a refinery? A refinery is a place where they take heat and pressure to purify and shape raw metal into something useful.

Some of you are in the refinery phase right now, where the pressure’s on in your life. The heat’s on in your life to purify your motives, and to shape you to be used by God in ways that you cannot even imagine.

The refinery is the exact opposite of the ravine rut. In the ravine rut, it’s cold, it’s dark, it’s lonely, it’s freezing. In the ravine you only see the sun in the middle of the day. You don’t see the sun in the morning. You don’t see the sun in the afternoon and evening. You only see the sun when it’s straight overhead.

When you’re going through a rut in life, everything seems dark. You get up in the morning you feel bad. You go to bed at night you feel bad. Maybe in the middle of the day you might feel ok. But the other times you don’t. You’re in the ravine.

Now he’s gone from the cold place to the exact opposite, where it’s extremely hot. In the refinery of life the heat’s on and the pressure’s on. And you’re going where am I going to get the money? Where am I going to get the time? Where am I going to get the energy? Where am I going to get the help? Where am I going to get the creativity? Where am I going to get the support? And the pressure’s on.

God had prepared a widow.

It’s interesting that when God plans a miracle in your life he works both ends at the same time. He was working on Elijah’s end, but he was also already working up in Zarephath on the widow’s end. Because she had to be out there picking up sticks at the exact time that Elijah arrived. God’s timing is perfect.

And God is working in your life. While you’re waiting for the miracle, God is working. And right now the person who’s going to meet or the situation that’s going to meet that need in your life, God’s always working on that end, while he’s working on your end. He’s giving you the CPR while he’s giving the other person at that end, God wanted to bless both the donor and the donee. He wanted to bless both ends at the same time. Both the need and the supply. He works all the angles.

During this time of three and a half years of famine in the Middle East, there were thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of widows who did not have a miracle. Only one got a miracle. Why? Because she practiced CPR. She did something that seemed totally illogical, totally unnatural. Give away what little I’ve got. It did not make sense. But she did.

What do you need to remember when you’ve run out of resources? What do you remember? You need to remember three things.

1. One, whatever I need more of, give what I have to God.

In fact, give it all. She didn’t just give a little. She gave it all. Whatever I need more of, give what I have, all I have to God. She needed more flour and oil. She gave flour and oil to God.

From a human standpoint we would have said, “Woman, you’re poor. Keep your oil. Keep your flour. You can’t afford to give it.” There is a myth that sometimes I cannot afford to be generous. Wrong! You can always afford to be generous. You can always give something. It may be your last meal. But you can give something. It is a myth that says I cannot afford to give. You can’t afford not to give.

If you want a miracle, you’ve got to do it God’s way. If you don’t want a miracle, just do it any old way you want to. Do it any way you want to. Keep your things. She was going to die anyway after one meal. She was going to die anyway. Why not just go ahead and give it to God? So she did this. There’s a myth that you can’t afford to give. You can always afford to be generous.

This reminds me of a story of another widow in the New Testament that Jesus talked about. Jesus said this in Luke 21 “Jesus saw a poor widow put two very small copper coins. [into the offering there at the temple] He said, ‘I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put in more [with just her two copper coins] than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; [in other words] but she out of her poverty gave all she had to live on.” He said I don’t care if someone put a million bucks in the offering. This woman gave the bigger offering.

God wants to teach you to be generous because it teaches you faith. God doesn’t need anything from you. He doesn’t need your time. He doesn’t need your money. He doesn’t need your effort. God has everything. He doesn’t need it. He wants to teach you to be like him. He wants to teach you to trust him.

The point is, when God says I want you to put whatever you’ve got and give it away and then I’ll multiply it – this is a test of faith. He praised the widow. We think that God looks at the amount we give. He doesn’t. God does not look at the amount you give away – time, money, energy. He looks at what’s left. He looks at what you gave in relationship to what’s left over. You can give a million bucks to help the poor but if you’ve got two million bucks in the bank it’s not a bigger gift than the woman who had five cents and gave five cents but that’s all she had. It’s not equal amount, it’s equal sacrifice. God’s saying I want your heart.

So whatever I need more of I give it to God. She needed more oil and more flour.

2. Two, the second thing, whatever I have the least of I give to God.

Why? It’s a test. What I’m trying to teach you is the exact opposite of what the world teaches, what you grew up learning. Because we are taught whatever you have extra of give it away. That’s the world’s way of thinking. If I’ve got extra time, I’ll give a little time to help my community, I’ll give a little time to help my church, give a little time to volunteer. I’ve got a little extra time so I’ll give a little away.

If I’ve got a little extra money, I’ll give some extra money to the church, I’ll give some extra money to charity, I’ll give some extra money to my relatives, whatever … because I’ve got a little extra. If I’ve got a little extra energy, creativity, whatever I’ll volunteer to tutor.

We’re taught to give out of our extra. We’re taught to give out of our leftovers. That’s better than nothing. But God says if you want a miracle, you give what you don’t have to give. You give when you really need to hold on to it.

That’s what puts you in the CPR line for a miracle – command, promise, risk.

So there are some people who are very wealthy who can give real easily. They can give a lot of money to help the poor. But what they really need to give is not their extra money. They need to give their time. Why? Because they don’t have enough time. So they need to give their time.

On the other hand, I know some people who are flat broke and they’ve got plenty of time because they’re out of work. They’ve got little extra time. Fine, give that. But if you really want a miracle you give what you don’t have. You give your money. You mean when I don’t have money, that’s when I give it? Yeah. Because that’s when you want God’s miracle in your life. This is what the Bible teaches us. Whatever I have the least of, I give it to God.

3. The third thing I need to remember is, I don’t give to get a blessing, but to be a blessing.

If I am generous will God bless me? Of course he will. There are more promises in the Bible about giving than anything else. But that’s not why I do it. I don’t give to get a blessing. I give to be a blessing. If I am generous with my time, with my money, with my energy, with my tithe, if I become a generous person and I’m a giver instead of a taker in life, will God bless me? Absolutely. But that’s not why I do it. I do it in order to be a blessing.

I want to help you out of the rut and the road and the refinery, for your benefit. I want to see you experience miracles.

Let’s go over these three. Which of these three are you in right now?

Some of you are in the rut and it’s cold and dark and lonely. Some of you are on the road and it’s scary and insecure and you have no idea where you’re going and you don’t now how long the journey’s going to take. And some of you are at the refinery, and the heat’s on and the pressure’s on.

Let me close by giving you some advice. I’ll call this Lessons for Recessions. Because we don’t know how long this recession is going to take. That’s why I’m teaching on this. Because it could be six months, it could be a year, it could be another year, it could be three and a half years. We don’t know. But in this recession in the tough times financially for everybody, here are some things you need to remember.

1. One, God is all I need.

I don’t need the government. I don’t need the economy. Shoot! I don’t even need a job. If God wants to he can have ravens drop food on me. He can do it any old way he wants to. If he turns off one job opportunity he can turn on another just as easily. If one door closes God can open another or open a window. So my trust is not in my job or in my bank account which is a lot less than it was a year ago, or whatever. My trust is in God. God is all I need. And I need to draw close to him. Maybe I need that private time with God and alone time with God and focus on him.

2. Two, where God guides, God provides.

If God tells you to go to Zarephath leave now! Don’t pass go, don’t collect two hundred. Just go directly to Zarephath. Where God guides he provides. And when he gives you direction he will provide provision. God won’t send you to a place he’s not going to provide for you. Where God guides, God provides.

3. Three, the third thing to remember is I must trust him one day at a time.

Why? Because the recession isn’t going to come at you all at once. It’s going to come one day at a time.

4. Four, the last thing you need to remember. God’s promises hinge on my obedience.

Command-Promise-Risk. Take that step of faith. It doesn’t seem logical. But you do what seems illogical and you follow God. And God says I’ll take care of you. CPR.

Why? The Bible says this “My God will meet all your needs…” Notice it doesn’t say God might, God hopes, God maybe. “… God will meet all [not some, all of] your needs…” This is a promise from God. God does not lie. Here’s the promise – Command-Promise-Risk. “My God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”

If God meets all our NEEDS (not wants). Then we NEED more NEED.

Notice he doesn’t say God will meet all your greeds. God has not promised you a Bentley and a nine million dollar home. God has said I will meet all your needs in Christ Jesus.

Do you know Christ Jesus? If you don’t, you need to get to know him right now.