Unnamed But Still Dearly Loved- 2 Kings 4:1-7

"One day the widow of a member of the group of prophets came to Elisha and cried out, 'My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the Lord. But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.'

2 'What can I do to help you?' Elisha asked. 'Tell me, what do you have in the house?'

'Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil,' she replied.

3 And Elisha said, 'Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbors. 4 Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you. Pour olive oil from your flask into the jars, setting each one aside when it is filled.'

5 So she did as she was told. Her sons kept bringing jars to her, and she filled one after another. 6 Soon every container was full to the brim!

'Bring me another jar,' she said to one of her sons.

'There aren’t any more!' he told her. And then the olive oil stopped flowing.

7 When she told the man of God what had happened, he said to her, 'Now sell the olive oil and pay your debts, and you and your sons can live on what is left over.'"

As this story begins, we see Elisha talking to a prophet's widow and her two sons. They are out of money. They are desperate. They have no means to care for themselves. They need help. The boys are about to be taken into slavery as a payment for their debt, which was a very common practice of the time. This will, however, leave the widow all on her own. It could end in her own slavery, in her entering into prostitution, or even in her death if this thing goes all the way.

I'm sure at the time, despite being surrounded on all sides by God's prophets, she felt all alone and totally helpless. Where was God? Why didn't he help her? And so she bravely tepped out and asked for help. What choice did she have at that point? It was ask for help or face the impending consequences with no hope. She chose hope.

According to www.biblestudytools.com, a widow was a woman whose husband died and she remained unmarried. The Hebrew "almana" actually goes further to define it as a woman whose husband had died and who was left without any economic or social support. It goes on to say that "the loss of husband in ancient Israel was normally a social and economic tragedy." This same site also indicated that this poor woman left behind isn't typically the legal owner of the land she and her children are on in this story, but is likely caring for it for her boys to take over in the future. Can you imagine what life was like for this woman? For any woman unlucky enough to lose their husband before them?

This woman is in desperate need of a miracle from God. She needs him to step in and we know that he will. In his own time. God's time is not the same as ours. He is infinite. Time is meaningless to him. We are finite. We want that help now. But this story proves that God is there. He is coming. It might not look the way we think it should look or play out in the way we want it to, but God will swoop in.

Look at verse 4a again:

"Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you."

This is interesting to me. This woman needs a miracle. She needs God to step in and rescue her. She stepped out in faith and hope that Elisha would help her and what does God tell her to do through Elisha? He wants her to "go inside and shut the door behind" her. He doesn't want it to be a big show. This miracle is just for her. It's not about everyone else. It's only about her.

I love that this woman, this unnamed woman, stepped out in faith the way that she did. She knew she needed help. She knew she needed prayer and intervention on her behalf. She also knew that she didn't have a clue what to do for herself anymore. And so she told a trustworthy believer who prayed with her for her miracle. And then when she knew what God wanted her to do, she didn't sit back and wait for things to happen. She didn't argue or claim that it was impossible. No! She stepped out in that faith and did what God told her to do, one step at a time.

Was the task easy? No. She had to go to every neighbor begging for jars. She had to pour and pour until her hands were numb. But she did the hard work required of her and participated in her own miracle. Because she believed and trusted then put her faith into action (just as James calls us to in the New Testament, though she wouldn't have known that then as he wrote it WAY after she was gone), she saw her God-sized miracle come into fruition!

This story made me think about my own life and my own circumstances as the Bible often does. How often have I asked God to make something happen- like he's just my genie waiting to do my bidding- and then was unwilling to do the hard work that came with it?

It also made me realize once again that God knows me. He loves me. He cares what happens in my life. He is always there, always willing to listen and to help me out. This woman from our story today doesn't even get a name but God knew it. No one knew she needed anything at all but God did. By society's standards at the time, this woman was a nobody and not worth the time or the effort. But she was worth it to him.

And so am I. So are you. You are worth it in God's eyes. No matter what you've done, what you believe, what your past holds, what is coming in your future, where you're residing in your present, what you look like, what you act like- you matter to God. We are all loved, period. It's my prayer that we can all remember this as we go through our day today.

Go and be blessed today. And don't forget to be a blessing!

Insignificant- 2 Kings 5:1-27

There are many days when I feel insignificant and unimportant. I look at what I do everyday and I wonder if anyone would even notice if I weren't here to do it. I mean, anyone can make dinner. Anyone can remind kids to do their chores. Anyone can drop a kid off at work or at baseball practice. If I'm honest, I often feel replaceable. And it's in the midst of feeling like this that I often find stories that lift me back up.

There's a story in 2 Kings 5:1-27. You can read it here as it's a bit long to post in this blog: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+kings+5&version=MSG

There are a few cool points to this story that I never noticed before. I've read it a bunch of times but somehow I missed these things before. I've been reading this book by Shauna Niequist called Present Over Perfect. In that book she reminded me that we run everything through our own filters. The filters I often use are negativity, fear, and insignificance. The one she uses in her story is shame. And I have done that over and over again throughout my life. But in reading this particular story, I asked Jesus to show it to me through His filter. And I think it was because of that that I saw this insignificant slave girl that made a huge difference.

This story starts out telling us about Naaman who is the leader of the army of Aram and who has just raided Israel, taking more slaves. In the first verse, we are told that God has used Naaman repeatedly to bring victory to Aram over Israel. This guy is valuable to his master. If you read the Old Testament, then you know that the people of Israel end up in slavery a lot. They sin, God punishes them by allowing other countries to invade them. Many die while others end up slaves. Over and over again, it happens. And the reason that we are reading about it happening over and over again is because we are meant to see God's endless, extravagant love for His people. He never gives up on them. He pursues them over and over again.

But this time, there is an insignificant detail pointed out in verse 2: "It so happened that Aram, on one of its raiding expeditions against Israel, captured a young girl who became a maid to Naaman’s wife."

There a couple of things that you need to know here to move forward and I'm going to operate under the assumption that you didn't read the verses I told you to read earlier (just in case you really didn't) so that you understand why this is so important even though it doesn't look like it is.

Remember, Naaman is the commander of the army of Aram. God has used him repeatedly to bring victory to Aram and so his master values him. The problem? He has leprosy. Leprosy was a terrible skin disease and it was so bad that people who suffered from it were typically shunned. It's pretty amazing, therefore, that his master kept him on. It shows just how important Naaman's success was to him.

So, going back to that seemingly insignificant detail. "It so happened..." This is another way of saying, "Wow! What a coincidence!" But I think by now we can all agree that there are no coincidences in the Bible. God doesn't DO coincidence. He does things on purpose.

Look at this from this girl's perspective though. I don't know who she was in her previous life in Israel, but she went from free and having a future to look forward to straight into slavery. Her future is no longer hers. She will not be living the life that her family chooses. She'll be living the life that her master chooses. She could get a great master or a mean one. She could live a decent life or a bad one. And here she is. God allowed her to be taken into slavery. And why?

We get to see that here. Look at what she says as an almost offhand remark to Naaman's wife: "One day she said to her mistress, 'Oh, if only my master could meet the prophet of Samaria, he would be healed of his skin disease.'" (5:3)

Remember that Naaman has a terrible skin disease. There is no cure for what he has at that time. Most people just go into seclusion. They die alone, untouched. He is desperate for a cure. He is willing to do anything. And so he goes straight to the King who sends him off to meet Elisha, who this girl says can heal him.

And who is she? She is just this girl from Israel. A nothing. A no one. She is, by all accounts, insignificant. But she had complete faith in who God said he was. She believed that God could and would do exactly what he said through Elisha and so she risked a lot by speaking up. She told Naaman's wife what she knew. And it was her telling that changed the entire course of Naaman's life. This insignificant girl who doesn't even get a name in the story shows total bravery and trust in the Lord by speaking up.

I just think it's amazing that this particular story is 27 verses long. This girl- this unnamed, insignificant slave girl- got 2 verses. At first glance, her part in the story looks so small but it's actually huge! She was a slave amongst her enemies and rather than sulking or keeping God to herself, she shared him with them! The world would say that she had every right to hate this guy and his family. He is the reason she is in slavery right now. It's because of his leadership that she is in Aram rather than in Israel with her family. But she chose to be bold. She chose to share God with Naaman and his family. She chose to follow God's will in her life. And it's because of her and what she did that Naaman's entire household turned around and started to worship God! God used this one small, ill-equipped slave girl to draw a man of great worldly importance to himself.

So how do we apply this to my earlier statement? I often feel like I am doing insignificant work. I feel like God could use anyone to do this job and I'm right. He could. But the fact is, he picked ME for this job. He picked me to raise these kids, to drive everyone everywhere, to be married to this man, to clean this house, to write these blog posts, to break up these fights between my children because he saw value in me. He saw something in me that was just right for this job. I don't know what it is yet, but like that slave girl, I'm going to keep doing what I feel God leading me to do. I'm going to let him use me. And who knows? Maybe I'm playing a bigger part in my story than I even realize. But it doesn't really matter. I'm playing the part that God gave me and giving it my all. That's what matters here.

Be blessed today and don't forget to be a blessing!