In the world you will have affliction

We continue with the text of the widow who approached Elisha for help in a time of great need. This woman cried out as we have to cry out loudly before God when we are in need.

This woman also appealed to the record so to speak of service to the Kingdom of God on the part of her husband who was a servant of the Lord, and we were saying that we have to live credit-accumulating lives so to speak.

Again: we are not talking about a Gospel of works, we are talking about that God honors those who serve Him and love His Kingdom, and as the Bible says, those who seek first the Kingdom of God and His justice, and then they know that the other things will come in addition.

We have to live diligent lives in favor of the Kingdom of God, investing and sowing in normal times in things that affirm the Kingdom of God because this will redound in future blessing for our lives.

A third principle that I see here is that this woman tells Elisha that: "The creditor has come to take two of my children for servants." This woman suffers two major crises in her life in this text: number one, she loses her husband, a servant of God, and second, these creditors come to take her children to pay her husband's debt.

Adversity, suffering, trials will come into the lives of God's children. The fact that we serve the Lord and do His Will, and live just lives does not mean that we will not go through tribulations and trials. The trials will come to the people most loved by God and who live in greater holiness.

Sometimes we think, and we are told in many preaching, that if we are in the Will of God, everything will be victory and everything will be fine, and we will always have the money we need, and we will never get sick, and we will never have problems; it is quite clear that this is not the case.

The Lord Jesus Christ said, "In the world you will find trouble." Now, he added: "But trust me, I have conquered the world." There are times in the Christian life when trials are going to come, difficulties are going to come, illnesses are going to come, and you know what? the answer is not going to come immediately if they do. There are many Christians that I know who have all the faith in the world and all the holiness in the world, and they are diagnosed with a disease, and they have to live the rest of their lives going to the doctors and taking pills, and as much as they cry out and They ask the Lord with all the faith in the world, they do not receive the healing they so desire, and in that there is also a promise from God, to live in victory, to learn from trials and to grow, and to be stronger, and to advise others, and to be more humble, and to be people of greater dependence on God, and that our character is more and more like the character of Christ.

That is to say that the tests are not necessarily a demonstration of lack of faith or of lack of holiness, or of punishment from God or the power of the devil in our lives. Now, I emphasize that when we find ourselves in testing situations we cannot just lower our heads, drop to the ground and let the devil beat us as he pleases and accommodate as with a fatalistic kind of resignation to problems and crises. .

When problems come into our life we have to do what this woman did: gird up our loins, ask with all authority and contend for our solution, our provision, our liberation.

The Bible is very clear in that sense. When we find ourselves in situations of need we must cry out to the Lord and do everything in our part to get out of the problem, but we have to understand that problems are going to come into our lives and that we will not necessarily always have the solution that we need. need.

Now, the Bible is very clear to show us that there are resources, there are solutions, there are doors that can be opened, we have to ask and it will be given to us, to touch and it will be opened to us, to seek and we will find, I think that is the preference of the Word of God, is to promise us a solution when we are in situations of need. Now, when we are in situations of need we have to say: Father, I am going to do everything in my power and I am going to leave the last word to You.

The important thing is that, that we understand that trials can come in the spiritual life of God's children. Note that this woman's husband is not resurrected by the prophet. Elisha raised other dead but did not raise her husband, but the solution comes through a minor provision, greatly miraculous such as the multiplication of oil but it is not the optimal solution that the resurrection of the husband would have wanted to have been.

God has His way of operating and responding to our needs. What we have to understand is that difficult situations can come into our lives but we have to, come before the Lord and present our cause, and do everything on our side and then leave the result to the Lord.

This woman had a need and it was not an indication of lack of faith in her husband who died or in her who was now suffering a difficult situation, but what she does is come before the Throne of God through the prophet and ask for a solution to your problem.

Let us understand that this world is a world where marital problems will come, problems for our children, health problems, financial problems, work problems, human relationships, this happens in life. We live in a hostile world, a fallen world, a world penetrated by the devil and his hosts of evil that want to wreak havoc on our lives, and when the struggle and crisis come, we cannot die, doubt our faith, doubt our God but to look for a solution and face the problem, and look for the answer that God has for our life.

We will continue our study in our next session, God bless you.