21 Days: Day 8

Welcome to 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting. And today we're going to be talking about the prophet Elisha, not the prophet Elijah. And we're going to be in Second Kings chapter four. And we're going to be talking through verses eight through 37. But I'm not going to read all of them to you.

I'm going to summarize the story a bit and read a couple of verses. But Elijah meets this woman and she opens up her home to him when he is traveling through. And he stays at her home and they build this relationship, and eventually he tells this woman that her and her husband are going to have a child, and her immediate reaction is to say, don't say that to me.

Don't get my hopes up. I don't appreciate that she is fearful of that moment, that his words are going to lead to empty promises. But eventually she does have a child and he grows up and he's working in a field, and he comes back to the house and he has a headache, and he dies shortly after. And upon his death, she does some incredible things and this is what we see.

So if you go to verse 22 in your Bible, it starts with this. It says she called her husband and said, please send me one of the servants and a donkey so I can go to the man of God quickly and return. Why go to him today? Her husband asked. It's not the new moon or the Sabbath.

And she said, that's all right. She saddled the donkey and said to her servant, lead on, don't slow down for me unless I tell you. So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When he saw her in the distance, the man of God said to his servant, look, there she is! Run and meet her and ask her, are you alright?

Is your husband all right? Is your child all right? And her response was, everything is all right. Even though her son had just died. She responds and says everything is all right. And what we see in this moment is that she has two very different reactions from the beginning when he interacted with her, to now when she is interacting with the prophet Elijah, because when she first talked to him and he said, you are going to have a child, she immediately responded with fear and she said, absolutely not.

Do not tell me that. And then when she experienced the faithfulness of God in her life and God provided for her, she now trust him. And so when this tragedy happened, when she was in a moment of her deepest, darkest despair, she pursued resurrection. She said, you know, I can trust the faithfulness of God, and I can trust that God is going to provide for me.

And so instead of planning a funeral, she went and she shot resurrection. And so Elijah and his servant went back, and they actually healed the boy and raised him back to life in the name of God. And we see this powerful miracle happen. But I think her two reactions are so fascinating. I think after she experiences the faithfulness of God, then she pursues the Lord's provision in her life.

Recently, I just had my very first baby 12 weeks ago. I'm still trying to figure out life and I was expecting, you know, poopy diapers. I was expecting spit up over everything. I was expecting no sleep. And all of those things have come to fruition in my life. But what I was not expecting is to battle with severe postpartum anxiety.

And over these last 12 weeks, I have faced that. And I have thought worst case scenario about everything. I have wondered if anything good would ever happen in my life again because of these thoughts that would race through my mind. And I was reading this story, and I saw her reaction to this darkest moment where her son died and she still ran after resurrection, she still trusted that God would provide because she has experienced his faithfulness.

And when I reflect back on my life, I can say with confidence that I have experienced the faithfulness of God. And so why am I not trusting that he will provide me peace in the midst of this anxiety? Why am I not trusting that he will deliver me from these anxious thoughts controlling my life? And so God has been speaking to me.

He's saying God or he's saying, give it to me. He's saying, trust that I will provide. Trust that I will take care of you and your family in the midst of this, because you have experienced my faithfulness. We sang this song recently and high school Bible study and it starts with this line blessed assurance. And blessed assurance is the holy and sacred confidence that you can have that God will provide for you.

That when you have a relationship with him, you have an assurance in your life that you can have an eternity with him. And so while I'm still facing these anxious thoughts and each and every single day, I have to pray over my mind, I have to pray over my family. Lord, provide me that blessed assurance. Provide me that assurance that you will take care of us in this season.

And I am choosing to run towards resurrection in my life. And so, church, I ask you today, where do you need to run towards resurrection? Where do you need to choose to believe that God will provide for you in the midst of your battles? Where are you running away from God when you need to run towards him? Now let's pray.

God, thank you so much for today. Thank you for the way that you are speaking and moving through our lives. Lord, I ask that you just help us to surrender the things that are controlling us. I ask that you help us to just, trust in your provision. It's easy to say that we trust you, but help us to believe that so that we are not controlled by anything else, Lord, but the fact that you are guiding and leading us in this life, Lord, we give you our anxieties.

We give you our fears, we give you everything that controls us. That is not just your love. Lord. Lord, we invite you into this next season and we trust you with our whole hearts and that in your holy name we pray. Amen.