Transforming the Insignificant into Divine Abundance

### Bible Study Discussion Guide

#### Bible Reading
1. **2 Kings 4:1-7** - The story of the widow's oil.
2. **1 Samuel 17:40-50** - David and Goliath.
3. **Exodus 14:15-16** - Moses parts the Red Sea.

#### Observation Questions
1. What was the widow's initial situation in 2 Kings 4:1-7, and what did she have in her house? ([07:54])
2. How did the prophet Elisha instruct the widow to use her small jar of oil? ([12:54])
3. What was the outcome when the widow followed Elisha's instructions? ([15:50])
4. How did David defeat Goliath with seemingly insignificant tools? ([17:21])

#### Interpretation Questions
1. Why do you think God chose to use the widow's small jar of oil to perform a miracle? What does this say about God's ability to use what we consider insignificant? ([12:54])
2. How does the story of David and Goliath illustrate the theme of God using ordinary objects for extraordinary purposes? ([17:21])
3. What does the act of emptying oneself of pride, doubt, and past failures symbolize in the context of spiritual growth and divine intervention? ([20:40])
4. How does seeking wise counsel and valuing the voices God has placed in one's life contribute to experiencing divine breakthroughs? ([23:21])

#### Application Questions
1. Reflect on a time when you felt your resources were inadequate. How did you respond, and what can you learn from the widow's story about trusting God with what you have? ([09:21])
2. Identify an area in your life where you feel you have "insignificant" resources. How can you offer this to God in faith, similar to how the widow offered her small jar of oil? ([12:54])
3. What practical steps can you take to empty yourself of pride, doubt, and past failures to make room for God's blessings? ([20:40])
4. Think of a situation where you need divine intervention. What steps of obedience can you take, similar to the widow gathering jars, to invite God's supernatural provision? ([23:21])
5. Who are the wise voices in your life that you can seek counsel from? How can you actively listen and apply their guidance to your current challenges? ([23:21])
6. How can you cultivate a habit of making prayer your first response to challenges, rather than a last resort? ([12:09])
7. Reflect on the story of David and Goliath. What "slingshot and stone" do you have in your life that God might use for a significant purpose? ([17:21])

Day 1: Embracing Divine Sufficiency
In moments of scarcity, it's vital to recognize that God's provision often transcends our expectations and limitations. The story of the widow's oil reminds us that what we have, no matter how small, can be multiplied by divine intervention. This perspective invites a reassessment of the resources at one's disposal, encouraging a belief in the potential for God's miraculous provision in our lives. [14:26]

2 Corinthians 9:8 - "And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work."
Reflection: What resources do you currently view as insufficient, and how can you offer them to God in faith for His multiplication?

Day 2: Ordinary to Extraordinary
The biblical accounts of David and Moses demonstrate that ordinary elements, when blessed by God, can lead to extraordinary victories and miracles. This principle challenges believers to trust that God can use the most mundane aspects of their lives to achieve His purposes, encouraging a faith that looks beyond the natural to the supernatural. [17:21]

1 Samuel 17:49 - "Reaching into his bag and taking out a stone, he slung it and struck the Philistine on the forehead. The stone sank into his forehead, and he fell facedown on the ground."
Reflection: What ordinary "stones" do you have in your life that God might use for His glory?

Day 3: The Strategy of Emptiness
Letting go of pride and past failures is not a defeat but a strategic posture for receiving God's blessings. As one empties themselves, they make room for new growth and divine intervention. This act of surrender aligns with God's will, preparing us to be filled with His presence and purpose. [21:03]

Isaiah 57:15 - "For this is what the high and exalted One says—He who lives forever, whose name is holy: 'I live in a high and holy place, but also with the one who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.'"
Reflection: In what areas of your life do you need to practice emptiness to make room for God's work?

Day 4: Obedience Invites Miracles
The widow's act of gathering jars before the oil could flow exemplifies the importance of obedience to divine instruction. It is through our practical steps of faith that we can set the stage for God's miraculous interventions. This obedience is a tangible expression of our trust in God's promises and power. [23:37]

James 2:22 - "You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did."
Reflection: What is one step of obedience you can take today to demonstrate your faith in God's promises?

Day 5: Valuing Community and Counsel
The journey of faith is not meant to be walked alone; the wisdom and support of a community are invaluable. By seeking and valuing the counsel of those God has placed in our lives, we can navigate challenges with greater clarity and confidence, moving closer to our divine destiny. [23:37]

Proverbs 15:22 - "Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed."
Reflection: Who are the advisers God has placed in your life, and how can you engage with them more intentionally to seek God's direction?

I’ve been long enough to know you can't be moved by what you see for the promises in God to come to pass. To come to pass, if we were moved by everything that we see, the values you may be experiencing or have experienced, things that are not looking in your favor right now or in the past, push past it knowing that God has very, God has so much more for you.

So my word right now is don't be moved by what you see, be moved by what you believe in. God has exceedingly abundantly evolved more than you can think or even imagine.

I'm gonna go ahead and get started here this morning. Great seeing you, Pamela, Minister Duane, great seeing you as well. Nika, great seeing you as well, ma'am. Nakeesha Jones, great seeing you this morning. A birdie told me all over social media that it is your birthday. So happy birthday to you. Well, I actually knew before social media said it, but happy birthday to you on today, ma'am.

Okay, let's go ahead and get started for the time we do have left here. I want to look at Second Kings Chapter four as our foundation of our time together today. Then we'll just jump in and out of some prayer.

But Second Kings Chapter four, it's a story of the widow woman who had a little cruise, a little jar of oil. Her expectation for her future, her expectation for her family was bleak. What she had was not sufficient enough to allow her to live any longer than the next few weeks.

And so she shared with a prophet what she had in her house. And it was a little small in her eyes and probably in all of our eyes, it would have been accurate. What she had was a very insignificant jar of oil. And that after using that insignificant small remnant of oil, she was going to ultimately die, her and her son, because there was a famine in the land and that was not going to be enough to sustain her.

And I believe that some of you, some of us in the midst of our 21 days of prayer and fasting, that we're dealing with things that will not sustain us beyond the next few days. For some of you, the next few hours, the next few days, the next few months, maybe like the widow woman, it was as relates to what you're going to eat.

For some of you, it could be mental, it could be spiritual, it could be psychological, that what you have, you only have enough word, you only have enough faith, you only have enough strength to make it for the next few days. Except God gives you a miracle, except God does something that is outside of your own strength and outside of your own power. Your future looks bleak. You're not going to be able to survive except God step in.

And I don't know about you, I have been there before. I have been there even recently, maybe not as it relates to eating, but as it relates to the things that God is asking me to do, there is not enough to fulfill the vision, if you would.

And so this woman found herself in 2 Kings chapter 4, this widow had nothing but an insignificant cruise of oil. And look what the scripture says here in 2 Kings chapter 4, as you think about what is your insignificant thing, what is the stuff that is not enough for you to live beyond, or to go beyond, or to trust beyond, or to hope beyond.

It said, the wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, "Your servant, my husband is dead," she said, "and you know that he revered the Lord. He was a man of God, if you will. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves."

And so the two boys I have, he's going to take them and make them slaves to pay off the debts. She said, or Elisha replied to her, "How can I help you?" And that's the question. I believe that you're asking God in prayer, that you're believing God for in prayer, that you're seeking God for in prayer, you're seeking for healing, you're seeking for deliverance, you're seeking for the resources to get that new home, you're seeking for the resources, or you're seeking for a new career, a new dream, whatever the specificity of it is.

I believe that God is asking you this morning, "How can I help you?" I believe that God is sending someone in your life, in your spirit, that is asking the question, "How can I help you? What do you need today?"

Elisha replied to her, "How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?" Elisha is already working on a way of bringing victory in this lady's house. And I believe, as both you and I, we are seeking God's face, that we have decided, we have made the decision to extend our prayer time, our worship time, by getting in the presence of God, seeking his face as it relates to our situations.

Why? Because prayer still works. Prayer should not be our last resort. Prayer should be our first resort. When you find yourself in a situation, in a circumstance, prayer should be your last resort.

This woman, if you would, as she is speaking to the prophet, as she's speaking to the man of God, Elisha represents, in this case, a physical manifestation of God in the earth. He is not God, but because he hears from God, because he represents God, this dialogue, if you would, this conversation that this widow woman is having with the prophet, it is in the similitude of her having a conversation with God, that God is asking her, the prophet is asking her, "How can I help you? And what do you have in your house?"

And she said, "Your servant has nothing there at all, but except a small jar of oil." He asked her, "Hey, what do you have in your house?" And that's my question to you right now. What do you have?

Let's not talk about what you don't have to go forward. Let's not talk about what you don't have to build your trust, to restore the broken areas in your life. What do you have? As insignificant as it may be, I believe that God is going to challenge you to look for the insignificant things in your life, and he wants to use those, he wants to use that as a tool to bring forth a supernatural manifestation of the very thing that you are believing for.

She says, "All I have in my house, except a small cruise of oil." And my question to you right now, as God is working on your miracle, as God is ready to move on your behalf and to begin to manifest the very thing that you're needing, what is the thing that you're overlooking in this season that God wants to use as the tool to bring forth a miracle in your life?

I pray right now, maybe you don't know what that insignificant thing is. You don't know who that person is, where that place is at. But I pray, I declare that right now that the eyes of your understanding are being enlightened and that you're going to begin to see value and worth in the insignificant things in this season of your life.

And those are going to be the very tools, the very weapons, the very catalyst that God is going to use to bring breakthrough, hallelujah, to bring healing, to bring open doors in your life.

What is the insignificant thing in your marriage? Yes, everything in your marriage may be broken, but you're still in the same house. What is the insignificant thing in your life right now that you can use as a catalyst for God to bring a miracle in your life?

Now, tell me, am I making sense? Tell me, is this speaking to you right now?

He replied, she replied, "All I have is an insignificant jar of oil in my house." Elisha said to her, "Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don't ask for just a few. Then go inside. Once you get these jars, once you get these bottles, if you would, then I want you to go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons and pour oil into all the jars. And as each is filled, put it one to the side."

She left him, shut the door behind her and her sons. They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. She kept pouring. She kept pouring this insignificant jar of oil. She kept pouring.

It says when all the jars were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another." But he replied, "There is not a jar left." And the Bible says at that point, it was at that point that the oil flowing began to cease.

I don't want you to miss the miracle in that the prophet said to her, "Go, what do you have?" She says, "I have an insignificant jar of oil, only enough oil in my house to last for a few days to bake some cakes, maybe to make a meal with. And after this runs out, I'm going to spend the next few days, maybe a week, and I'm going to begin to get famished and my body's going to begin to get weak because of starvation and me and my boys, I am going to ultimately die."

And I want you to see here that God is asking you and God is saying to you, Angelo, Nikia, Daphne, Alicia, Paul, "What do you have in your house? What's the one thing that's in your house, in your heart, in your mind, in your spirit, in the relationship that your sons and daughters do?"

You're talking about everything that's not working, everything that is broken. What is the one thing that we can take right now and use as a tool to bring a miracle in your life?

David, all he had was what? An insignificant slingshot and a rock. And what was that slingshot and a rock in the face of a Goliath? It was insignificant. It literally could not do anything. But in the face of God, in the hand of God, that insignificant slingshot and a rock became a weapon. It became a tool that God was going to use, that God used to bring down Goliath.

Listen, there was nothing special about the slingshot. The only thing that made the slingshot effective and powerful is because David was moving under the power and the presence of God and the anointing of God rested on it.

Listen, I don't care how insignificant that thing looks in your life. I don't care how insignificant you think your word is or your opinion is. When God sits on your opinion, when God is sitting on your word, when God is sitting on that slingshot and a rock, it is anointed and it can do impossible things.

What about Moses, who had that staff, his staff that he was walking on that was literally used to hold up his weight as he was getting older? That insignificant staff, God used that same staff to part the Red Sea.

Come on somebody, what is the insignificant thing that is in your life that we're now a little bit over a week into our 21 days of prayer and fasting and you're saying, "I don't have anything. I don't have the tools to make it work. I don't have the tools to open the door."

I'm telling you, for some of you, I believe in God for some crazy things right now that what I have is not significant enough. The resources, the next campus, come on somebody, I don't have in my own strength what it's going to take for Hope City to manifest in the next 10 years because God is speaking to me what it took you 10 years to do, you're going to do it in one year this upcoming year.

Now, I don't have what it takes to manifest what we manifested in 10 years, but what I do have, come on somebody, what I do have that may seem to be insignificant. When you commit it to God, when you put it in the hand of God, he's looking to do the miracle with that.

Father, I pray and I prophesy that you're about to do miracles, that you are about to do the supernatural with the insignificant things in the lives of the individuals that are listening to me right now.

I declare that Angelo, his business is about to go to another level, that you're going to increase him beyond his expectation because he's going to take the little wisdom he does have, he's going to take the little knowledge he does have, he's going to take the influence he does have, he's going to take the couple of trucks he does have, and God, he's going to submit that thing, he's going to commit that thing to you, and you're going to bring the right people at the right time to give him exactly what he needs to accelerate the vision and the plans that he desired for his own life.

I hope this is resonating with somebody right now.

Now, think about those jars. He told her to go out and get as many jars as you can, and what did she do? What did they do? They brought her back empty jars.

I want to say to you right now, let's empty yourself. Let's empty yourself of your pride, empty yourself of how you've always done it, empty yourself about what they have to say about it, empty yourself about everybody else's opinion, empty yourself of your fears, of your doubts, of yesterday's failures, empty yourself of doing it the wrong way in one season, and now let's recalibrate yourself, and let's do it right in this season, and forget about what people will say when you empty yourself, because they're going to see it as a loss, but I'm telling you, empty yourself and let it go for you in this season.

It is not a loss, it is you emptying yourself so that you can make room for the miracle that God is about to manifest in your life. You have to bring empty vessels, empty yourself right now. Bring some clean vessels right now, clean heart, clean mind, a clean hand, not a perfect one, but one that's saying, "God, I want to do it your way. God, I trust you. God, I believe you."

Even when I fell down, I wanted to get back up. Why? Because a just man falls seven times, and he or she rises back up again, and maybe you failed in your faith, maybe you failed in your expectations, but I declare that right now, while people are waiting for you to fall, you're going to keep on standing.

A statement I told someone last week, they felt like everybody was waiting for them to fall. I simply said to them, "Well, if they're waiting for you to fall, you just keep on standing," and I want to tell you the same thing today. If you are expecting to fall, if people are expecting you to fall, don't fall, just stand. Keep on standing and trusting and believing God for the manifestation of what you know he has in store for you.

Right now, Father, I declare, I prophesy that they are putting on the whole armor of God so that they can stand in the midst of opposition, so they can stand in the midst of fear, so they can stand in the midst of what seems to be like. Knowing and trusting God that you're about to give them a supernatural process, a supernatural miracle, and what's going to make it supernatural is that you're going to do your part in the natural, and God's going to take his super and put it on your natural, and that's what's going to make it supernatural.

If the woman was not willing to obey the prophet by going to get the vessels, by obtaining those vessels, she would not have received the overflow that God desired to bring in her life, and I believe some of you may be fasting, you are praying, you're seeking the face of God, you must now move into a place of obedience.

You must now move. You can't say, "I have this crucial oil, and I believe in God to do A, B, and C." No, follow instructions. What is the instructions of the Lord? What is the instructions of the man that God, the voices that God has placed in your life? For in the multitude of counsel, there is safety.

Come on, somebody. Who are the voices that you value in your life and that you trust in your life? Honor that voice, and I believe that God can speak through that voice to nudge you and to shift you into what you should be saying and what you should be doing in this season here to manifest the breakthrough, to manifest the miracle in your life.

Empty us right now, Father. Clean us right now and watch us here. Make us available. Make us available for what you desire to do.

Think about it. He said, "Go and get as many vessels as you can." He says, "Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars." He said, "Don't ask for just a few," and I believe for some of you, you've been asking for just a few. You've been only doing enough to get by. You're just doing enough to say you showed up, but I believe right now you've got to put your faith way out there. You've got to put your expectation way out there.

He says, "Don't go just get a few vessels. Go get many vessels," and once she got those vessels, the Bible says she kept pouring and she kept pouring and kept pouring, and it became a point that she said to them to bring me more vessels. Then even if there is not a jar left, and then the scripture says, "Watch us here."

1) "I don't care how insignificant that thing looks in your life... when God is sitting on that slingshot and a rock, it is anointed and it can do impossible things." [18:38] (Download)

2) "Let's empty yourself of your pride, empty yourself about what they have to say about it, empty yourself of your fears, of your doubts, of yesterday's failures, empty yourself of doing it the wrong way in one season." [21:03] (Download)

3) "If they're waiting for you to fall, you just keep on standing, and I want to tell you the same thing today. If you are expecting to fall, if people are expecting you to fall, don't fall, just stand." [22:21] (Download)

4) "You must now move into a place of obedience. You must now move. You can't say, I have this crucial oil, and I believe in God to do A, B, and C. No, follow instructions." [23:37] (Download)

5) "What is the insignificant thing in your marriage? Yes, everything in your marriage may be broken, but you're still in the same house. What is the insignificant thing in your life right now that you can use as a catalyst for God to bring a miracle in your life?" [14:26] (Download)

6) "What do you have in your house? What's the one thing that's in your house, in your heart, in your mind, in your spirit, in the relationship that your sons and daughters do?" [17:21] (Download)

7) "Prayer should not be our last resort. Prayer should be our first resort. When you find yourself in a situation, in a circumstances, prayer should be your last resort." [11:49] (Download)

8) "As God is ready to move on your behalf and to challenge you to look for the insignificant things in your life, he wants to use those as a tool to bring forth a supernatural manifestation of the very thing that you are believing for." [13:07] (Download)