POWER STUDY - A27

[Albert Finch]

Unlocking Potential
(Read Genesis 28 & Jeremiah 15)

John 12:24-25 “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25“He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal.

(Many do not bear maximum fruit because they have maintained control over their own lives, refusing to die in the spiritual sense. Jesus called this selfishness “loving your life” which imprisons the ability God has given each one of us.)

2 Kings 4:1-2 1Now a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD; and the creditor has come to take my two children to be his slaves.” 2Elisha said to her, “What shall I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” And she said, “Your maidservant has nothing in the house except a jar of oil.”

(In her estimation she had nothing valuable enough to provide a solution to her dilemma. However she did have a small jar of oil. Elisha knew instinctively that her small jar of oil contained the potential to resolve all her problems. After indentifying our resource we must discover what to do with it. The widow knew what she had, but she neither realized her potential nor how to release it.)

2 Kings 4:3-7 3Then he said, “Go, borrow vessels at large for yourself from all your neighbors, even empty vessels; do not get a few. 4“And you shall go in and shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour out into all these vessels, and you shall set aside what is full.” 5So she went from him and shut the door behind her and her sons; they were bringing the vessels to her and she poured. 6When the vessels were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another vessel.” And he said to her, “There is not one vessel more.” And the oil stopped. 7Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debt, and you and your sons can live on the rest.”

(By divine revelation Elisha told her what to do. To obey the Lord and experience His supernatural provision we must overcome many obstacles:
1. One is the critical opinion of others real or imagined which can be enough to cause you to forsake the revealed plan of God.
2. Unwillingness to face peoples questions when no logical answer can be given. In the widows case, perhaps her neighbors said “Why would you want all of our empty vessels? You don’t have anything to put into them anyway.” How would she explain her request? How do you overcome these obstacles? You simply shut the door on them.)

2 Kings 4:4 4“And you shall go in and shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour out into all these vessels, and you shall set aside what is full.”

(According to Elisha’s instructions, the widow must first shut the door before pouring out her miracle. Shutting the door speaks of removing any hindrances from doing the Lord’s will. Examples of things that prevent us from obeying the Lord that must be shut out are:
1. Other peoples opinions.
2. Our past experiences and hurts.
3. Other good ideas.
4. Anything else.
Victory was not assured until the widow began pouring her small jar of oil into the first large empty container. Elisha did not tell the widow to close the door, but said “shut the door behind you”. On e of the most significant doors which many must close is the one that is behind them, namely their past which includes: 1. failure 2. Condemnation. 3. Humiliation.. 4. Loss. 5. Inaccurate conclusions of God’s faithfulness.)

Romans 8:35-39 35Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36Just as it is written,“For Your sake we are being put to death all day long; We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”37But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. 38For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

(Paul knew the dangers of allowing the past to endanger the future. He identified a number of things over which we have victory. One thing noticeably absent from Paul’s list is the past. The past does not hinder God from loving us, but it can separate us from experiencing His love if we allow it to.)

Philippians 3:12-14 12Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. 13Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, 14I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

(Paul revealed his own methods for overcoming the past. The word “press” means to pursue. Paul focused on his destiny and pursued it with all the energy and zeal that he once used when he persecuted the church. His energetic “reaching forward” to other things and determining to obtain God’s highest for his life enabled him to overcome his past. He shut the door on things behind him by continuing to forcibly knock on the door in front of him.)

Psalm 78:41-43 Again and again they £tempted God, And pained the Holy One of Israel.42They did not remember His power, The day when He redeemed them from the adversary,43When He performed His signs in Egypt And His marvels in the field of Zoan,

(The release of heavens abundance is often determined by our response here on earth. We have limited the Lord by our own unbelief and disobedience.)

2 Corinthians 9:6-8 6Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. 8And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed;

Luke 6:38 “Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure—pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return.”

(We need supernatural resources of heaven released on our behalf. One of the keys to living in the supernatural realm is in this aspect of living by faith: 1. If we give He will be sure that we are given to. 2. If we will faithfully prepare for His miraculous powers we will not be disappointed by what transpires. The widow woke up one day in debt, in fear of losing her sons to slavery, but with an insignificant jar of oil God changed her life. Just like the widow our job is not primarily to feel but to obey and pour.)

1 Corinthians 1:27-29 27but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, 28and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, 29so that no man may boast before God.

(The foolish things, the weak things, the base things, the despised things, even things that do not exist, are the very things that God chooses to glorify Himself. God used the humiliation and utter weakness of Jesus Christ’s death on the cross to defeat Satan. If God’s principle of weakness to destroy demonic strength was important enough to be included in His original strategy, then it should be important to us now:
1. God will use what men will often disregard.
2. We must learn to identify our resource. )

Summary:

The acorn contains a forest; it just does not look like it. The jar of oil contained the solution to the impending poverty and slavery the widow woman faced. She just did not see it at first. God hides His power and ability in small places and puts them in every life. Our challenge is to recognize them in our own lives and handle them in such a way that His potential can be unlocked.

Sign-up on the Albert Finch Ministry web-site:
http://afministry.ning.com/