God’s Principle for Economic Growth

ThanksLiving: 365 Days of Gratitude

God’s suprarational laws apply to you as much as they did to the characters in the Bible. But like them, you have to trust. When he calls you to give—even if it is your last—give, and he will prosper you. Now you can’t manipulate his economic laws for your own purposes, but when you bring your needs and desires to him and he tells you to risk trust, do it, and his favor is guaranteed. Whenever, wherever and however he calls you to step out, do it in obedience, trusting God to bless you, and he will. That is his inviolable, universal, eternal law of kingdom economics.

Going Deep // Focus: 2 Kings 4:1-6

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.” Elisha asked, “What can I do to help you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” She replied, “Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil.” Elisha said, “Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbors. 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.” So she did as she was told. Her sons kept bringing jars to her, and she filled one after another. 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.

God is not irrational. He has revealed himself so that we can understand him with our rational mind. And forever, we will be exploring the wonderful depth and breadth of God and his ways. Even into eternity, we will be pursuing the unlimited riches of who God is and how he acts within his created order. God is knowable, and for that we are and will be forever grateful.

But there is far more to God that we do not know than what we do know—and it will always be so. Even in eternity, with unlimited capacity for intellectual growth, God will be way ahead of us. By definition, we will never reach the full capacity of God’s brilliant mind. If we did, God would cease to be God and we would assume that role. And that is not going to happen. One of the things that will make eternal life so endlessly and indescribably exciting, purposeful and fulfilling is this very thing: the pursuit of the mind of God.

God is not irrational, but he is rationally knowable. Yet with the things of God that we cannot grasp, we might say that God is suprarational. That is, God is not understandable by human reason alone; he is beyond rational comprehension. And when we come into circumstances that fit into that category, we are asked to trust. And for those who put their trust in the wisdom and kindness of God in those beyond-comprehension-moments, there is a 100 percent guarantee of satisfaction and blessing:

But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence. They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit. (Jeremiah 17:7-8)

That is the eternal testimony of the great heroes of our faith. Speaking for them all, the psalmist declared, “No one who hopes in you will ever be put to shame.” (Psalm 25:3).

Such is the lesson Elisha is teaching the desperate widow in 2 Kings 4. She had been married to a man who was a part of the school of the prophets, but his untimely death has left her and her children in dire straights. So she comes to Elisha for help with a creditor who is threatening to foreclose on her home. She will be left not only in grief over the loss of her husband, she will be destitute, evicted from her home, and at the mercies of a cruel economy.

So what does Elisha tell her to do: Take a risk and trust. She was to borrow as many jars from her neighbors as possible. Then she was to go behind closed doors and began to pour what little oil she had left into those jars. And trust!

Obviously, when she and her sons were told to go throughout the neighborhood to borrow the jars, they would have to explain this “irrational” concept to curious lenders. They would have to risk reputation; they would have to risk an investment of trust to obey God. Trust is exactly what they did, and then the miracle happened: Enough oil flowed from one small flask to fill all the jars they had borrowed. When they ran out of jars, the oil stopped flowing, but they had enough to sell at the market at a handsome profit. They risked faith, they trusted God, they acted in obedience, and in so doing, they unleashed God’s suprarational law for their economic growth—which met their need, and then some.

God’s suprarational laws apply to you as much as they did to the characters in the Bible. But like them, you have to trust. When he calls you to give—even if it is your last—give, and he will prosper you. Now you can’t manipulate his economic laws for your own purposes, but when you bring your needs and desires to him and he tells you to risk trust, do it, and his favor is guaranteed. Whenever, wherever and however he calls you to step out, do it in obedience, trusting God to bless you, and he will. That is his inviolable, universal, eternal law of kingdom economics.

That is God’s economy. And he desires for you to live within it!

Going Deeper With God: Do you have a need? Ask God for his direction, then trust him ruthlessly. Step out in obedience. Risk faith. Then wait for God to answer, because he will—and then some.

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