Participants: Shelley Quinn (Host), Paul Ratsara
Series Code: IAA
Program Code: IAA000486A
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00:01 Did you know that God has invisible resources
00:04 available to you? 00:05 Join us today on Issues and Answers and find out 00:08 what they are. 00:40 Hello, I'm Shelley Quinn and once again we are so happy 00:44 that you are joining us today on Issues and Answers. 00:47 Well we are going to be talking about the invisible resources 00:53 of God, and also joining us once again is Dr. Paul Ratsara 00:57 who is pastor and he is a president, he is the president 01:03 of the Southern Africa Indian Ocean Division of 01:08 Seventh Day Adventists Church, which is a long title Paul. 01:12 Very long one, yes. 01:13 Oh, so thankful that you have come back again today, we 01:18 so enjoyed the three studies that you did on Jacob and 01:23 learning how God can take someone from being alone 01:28 and abandoned to where they've got a purpose in life, 01:31 He's got a plan for all of our lives and how He can turn 01:36 our trials into testimonies. It's just been really good. 01:39 But today you want to start in 2 Kings, chapter 6. 01:46 Yes, it is really a joy to be here and it's a privilege to 01:51 have this time studying the Word of God together. 01:53 Um, 2 Kings chapter 6 talks about a part of the life of 02:07 Elisha. Elisha the prophet of God, and here we can find 02:16 through, we can learn from his experience, how we are going to 02:21 carry on, what power do we have available, made available by God 02:28 for us to be victorious in life? 02:31 We have studied that God wants to be our personal God 02:35 and He must be our God. My God, not just an intellectual 02:43 knowledge, but it has to be a personal God encounter. 02:49 He is my God, -Relationship. - Relationship with God, 02:55 and we can deepen our relationship through prayer, 03:02 through Bible studies and through meditations of His word. 03:06 The word of God, we eat the living bread of the Word of God. 03:14 But now, life is a journey, we need strength to carry on 03:20 to continue this journey. 03:22 We don't want to be just a weak traveler, we want to be strong 03:29 in the Lord and God has provided that, but many times 03:34 we, we... maybe we are not aware of what is available or we, 03:39 we are aware, but we are not using them and that 03:43 is the reason why today we are going to talk about 03:47 the resources available, with the power available to us, 03:54 and we can learn from the life experience of Elisha and 04:02 his assistant, his servant. 04:05 You see, starting verse eight, 2 Kings 6:8, 04:12 we can see here two nations fighting against each other. 04:19 Verse 8. 04:33 We can see here the war strategy by the king of Syria. 04:40 He said ok, I'm going to conquer Israel...What I'm going to do... 04:45 we are not going to have a frontal attack, 04:49 we are going to set an ambush. We are going to hide somewhere 04:53 and we need to take them by surprise, that way our victory 05:01 will be tremendous. So he had the meeting with his servants, 05:07 his generals said they discuss about this and he said 05:12 that is a great strategy, and simply meant it 05:14 and they implemented it. 05:17 I can imagine an army just hiding somewhere 05:22 and they made sure that the children of Israel, the army of 05:26 Israel would pass by, and they just being there and no one 05:31 knew this plan except them. 05:34 Um, then they tried the first time. They waited and waited 05:40 and waited, the army of Israel did not pass by that place. 05:45 They were so disappointed and they said ok, let's try again, 05:51 and they tried again the same thing and finally in verse 10... 05:58 Then the King of Israel sent someone to the place of which 06:03 the man of God had told him, thus He warned him and he was 06:07 watchful that not just once or twice in verse 11 06:12 therefore the heart of the King of Syria was greatly troubled 06:16 by this thing and he called his servants and said to them.. 06:22 He wanted to know why, why is it that this plan, 06:28 this well planned strategy, it doesn't work. 06:32 He's wondering why the King of Israel knows in advance 06:37 what he is about to do. 06:38 - Yes and his only explanation is that one of his generals 06:44 must be a traitor. 06:45 Yeah. And he was determined... Finally he said that I 06:48 must catch that one because I cannot continue to work 06:51 with a traitor. 06:53 So he summoned these generals, his servants as it is said here, 06:57 and he started his speech. He said in verse 12, um, 07:03 verse 11. Will you not show me which of us is 07:09 for the King of Israel? 07:11 And this is the King of Syria speaking. -Yes! Yes, ok! 07:16 The King of Syria said look one thing is sure, 07:20 one of you must be a traitor. 07:21 One of you instead of being loyal to us, 07:25 you are loyal to the King of Israel. 07:29 - Sharing our battle strategies. - That is the only explanation. 07:34 I could imagine it was so silent in that room 07:38 because that means death. That means trouble. 07:42 So maybe they looked around... Who is that traitor? 07:47 And it was silent, and finally, it's probably one of these 07:52 trusted general, general, and then he said here in verse 12, 07:59 And one of his servants said: None my lord, ok, 08:06 but Elisha the prophet who is in Israel, tells the King of Israel 08:12 the words that you speak in your bedroom. 08:15 Oh, that is a ha ha moment. He said oh, I can see now 08:22 and he was relieved that all these generals, 08:26 all these servants were still loyal to him. 08:30 He might have been relieved, but at the same time... 08:32 I wonder how, how frightened he was to think that 08:36 Elisha the prophet who's nowhere around, 08:39 that God is telling Elisha every word that the 08:42 King of Syria speaks in his bedroom, God's telling Elisha 08:46 so that Elisha can tell the King of Israel. 08:48 It must have been frightening at the same time. 08:51 Yeah, it must have been frightening at the same time. 08:52 So they said ok, let's change our battle strategy 08:58 and we will read this in verse 13. 09:02 So he said, go and see where he is, "that I may send 09:08 and get him." And through the intelligence and through all of 09:13 this, they told him and it was told him saying surely 09:19 he's in Dothan. - Now he is after Elisha. 09:22 After Elisha, so the Elisha must be brought to him alive, 09:27 alive or dead. And therefore, they decided how many people 09:34 I'm going to send. It is so amazing here, 09:37 they said maybe you know, to capture a man, just a man, 09:43 maybe two or three. - One little prophet. 09:45 Three or two or five or so would be enough, but 09:53 they did not want to miss this opportunity. Um, verse 14. 09:59 Therefore he sent horses and chariots and a great army 10:06 there, just to capture a man and they came by night and 10:12 surrounded the city. That was a well-planned thing 10:16 so we are going to surround the city so you will never 10:20 escape from us, and they implemented that. 10:24 So early morning, early morning the servant of the man of God 10:30 Elisha...Verse 15... Arose early and went out 10:34 there was an army surrounding the city with horses and 10:40 chariots and his servants said to him, to Elisha... 10:46 Alas my master, watch our window. Mmm, hmm. 10:51 That was a difficult situation. This is man's extremity, 10:56 and it will show. We will see that man's extremity 11:00 is God's opportunity. When we reach our extremity, 11:05 God will show that that is opportunity. 11:10 But for the young man, the servant, it was extremity 11:16 indeed. -And how fearful to wake up and see... 11:20 You know, to be just the servant in the prophet 11:23 and to wake up and see an army all around you, surrounded, 11:29 to know that their intent would be to kill them. 11:31 It must have been extremely an alarming event that 11:37 you just though, we're about to die. 11:39 I saw when the servant of Elisha was afraid. 11:45 We cannot blame him. - Yeah. -Yeah, it is true. 11:48 They are talking about the great army, 11:50 they are talking about chariots and horses, the equivalence of 11:54 tanks and all of these... surrounding the city. 11:59 He said alas, we are done, we are doomed, there is no 12:04 way, where there is no way out here and it is true, 12:08 he was very realistic, he analyzed there's twelve here. 12:13 There's twelve here, just him and Elisha and here we 12:18 have the great army, and they said this march here, 12:23 there is no way we can match this army. 12:27 But look at the answer of Elisha. 12:32 Verse 16. So he answered, "Do no fear", 12:37 for those who are with us are more than those who are 12:43 with them. I can think of the young man, he said, 12:50 oh, Elisha is too old, he cannot even count. 12:54 - He's lost it. He cannot even count. 12:55 Look, me and him, we are more than this great army, 13:01 but the problem here is a problem of vision, because, 13:08 the young man, he only saw the visible resources, 13:14 the visible reality, the visible reality and he acted 13:19 accordingly, he counted accordingly. 13:22 So his counting was correct, 13:25 but the counting of Elisha was even more correct. 13:31 - Because of his spiritually eyesight. Because for him 13:33 spiritual eyesight. 13:35 So him, he was just limited by the physical eyesight 13:40 and that's why verse 17 and Elisha prayed, he prayed. 13:47 and he's praising and he said Lord, I pray, open his eyes 13:53 that he may see. That means before he saw, 13:57 but he didn't see. Um hum, His vision was limited 14:02 to the just the reality, the concrete reality. 14:06 There is another reality that he did not see. 14:10 You must have another kind of eyes to see 14:14 that invisible reality. For invisible reality you need 14:19 another kind of eyes and that is through prayer. 14:23 So Elisha prayed for his servant, Oh God, this young man, 14:30 he only see's what he sees, but he doesn't see the invisible 14:35 reality. So he prayed, then here in verse 17 14:44 Then the Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw. 14:51 So before this, he didn't see. - Yes. And what he saw and 14:57 behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots on fire, 15:03 all around Elisha. Halleluiah! The mountain... 15:06 So the more here when you go to the original word, 15:11 it is more than more. It is not only more in quantity 15:16 but in strength and in rank. So it is more qualitatively 15:22 and quantitatively, more than... - Oh, and he says there is more 15:27 than those who... - Yes, more, so it is more... 15:30 It says, do not fear for those who are with us are more 15:35 than those who are with them. 15:37 So the more is very significant and it is true. 15:41 Look, the army of the King of Syria, they are made of 15:48 human beings, and horses, and chariots, and look at the 15:53 army of the Lord. And behold the mountain was full of horses 15:58 and chariots of fire all around Elisha. And you see, the army 16:05 of the Syrian, the Syrian, they just surrounded, 16:10 surrounded the town, the city. But the army of the Lord... 16:16 Behold the mountain is full of horses. -Amen. 16:20 So quantitatively, the number was bigger, but when it comes to 16:26 the strength as we know, that the fire consumes wood, 16:31 consumes flesh, so it is more. So when Elisha said don't be 16:37 afraid because those who are with us are more than who are 16:44 with them. It is true, in all senses. um. So ah, now 16:52 they see the same thing, the same thing, not only Elisha... 16:58 That must have been a life changing experience 17:00 for the servant. To have spiritually eyesight given 17:04 to him to where he could look and see the invisible resources 17:08 of God. I mean...we all need this type of experience 17:13 but I can't imagine that life would have ever been the same 17:17 for him after that. - Never, never. And here we can 17:20 already apply this in our lives. - Amen! 17:23 You see many times, um, we just limit God, many times you put 17:29 God in a box. -Yes. Even in our little bitty prayers. 17:34 Little bit, and we act when we plan. We plan only according 17:41 to the visible resources. When you see oh no, don't do that, 17:46 is too big. No, it's not too big for God. It's too big for us, 17:52 because we only see many times what we see. 17:55 But with God, He has more resources, and this is 18:00 throughout the Bible. 18:01 For example, "The Feeding of the five thousand". 18:04 Man and of course with children and so on. 18:07 So the visible resources. The visible resources just the bread 18:13 and the fish, and the disciples. The disciples said there is 18:16 no way we can feed these people, the only solution is that 18:20 let them send them away so that they can take care of themselves 18:23 but Jesus said NO, give them something to eat. 18:27 And someone said how, how many trucks of bread and fish 18:32 that we can feed these. And Jesus said, what do you have? 18:37 Then they looked around and they just found a simple 18:42 lunch, and Jesus said, "Well get with this", 18:45 we are going to feed these people. 18:47 For Jes...for the disciples, for them it is just visible 18:51 resources, but for Jesus Christ both the visible and invisible 18:57 resources. And you know faith is a comforter. 19:01 When you pray in faith, the visible resources would be 19:06 converted into visible resources, and this happened 19:11 with the disciples and it happened here as well. 19:14 The visible, we will... many times you talk about human 19:19 resources, manpower, all of this, but we don't talk about 19:23 Divine Power, Divine Resources and the angels and God himself. 19:29 So we need not to limit ourselves with what we have, 19:35 we are just limiting God. God is willing to do more 19:41 like here. And many times because of our lack of spiritual 19:47 eyesight, the work of God can suffer. 19:50 Our plan, we can do more if we take into consideration 19:55 the invisible one knowing that we have more resources 19:59 than what we have now. 20:00 And it's all done under the guidance of the Holy Spirit 20:04 because we see here, Elisha prayed. 20:06 I mean this is not presumptuous what you are speaking of. 20:09 - No, no. -It's not that we just say oh, let's just go do this, 20:11 God will provide. It's seeking God in prayer and 20:15 seeing what His plan is, but His plans are almost... 20:18 I should say always bigger than our plans it seems. 20:21 - It is.- So this is something, it's a very important lesson 20:25 to learn, and it's one...What amazes me Paul 20:29 is that sometimes God can move like this in your life 20:34 and provide you with invisible resources. And the very next 20:39 time you are questioning one more time, you forget about it, 20:44 it's just like He fed the three thousand, but then again 20:48 He fed the five thousand, and again they were questioning. 20:51 So it's a matter of always staying tuned in by prayer 20:55 isn't it? -This is faith and prayer, and God likes 20:59 doing this. For example: The children of Israel, 21:03 and there was talk, it was... that was the extremity again 21:07 when the faced the Red Sea. 21:10 You might...speaking...they... It was finished, there's no way, 21:16 there's no way that they can face the army of the Pharaoh 21:20 and the Red Sea didn't have a bridge, and they didn't have 21:24 a boat to see that so the visible resources there were just 21:29 very limited, and they could not swim, it was too big, so 21:33 how are they going to do this? And God said look, look, 21:37 just stand still and see what God will do. 21:43 - And then almost gains... almost doing something 21:45 in the reverse. Man thinks he needs all of this huge army... 21:50 God winnows it down to the faithful number, 21:54 the really faithful and then God gives them 21:57 invisible resources... That is faith... 22:00 So we need to believe that God has this visible resources. 22:06 And my favorite author Ellen White talks about these 22:12 she said, we should not lament of this content of what we have 22:16 because God has invisible resources. 22:20 - Amen. -And we through trust, we can develop this... 22:25 Ok, quickly let's wrap up with the end of the story. 22:30 So with the eyesight now, with the young man and Elisha 22:36 then they approached the army, they approached the army. 22:40 And another prayer in verse 18. 22:43 It said Elisha prayed to the Lord to Him, 22:46 and said strike these people, I prayed with blindness 22:50 and destruct them with blind- ness according to the word 22:54 of Elisha. So they have lost their sight, even their 22:59 physical sight...Can you imagine a blind army? 23:02 General blind and simple soldier blind and Elisha said 23:08 Now Elisha said to them, this is not the way, 23:13 nor is this the city. Follow me and I will bring you to the man 23:17 whom you seek, but he led them to Samaria. 23:21 Samaria is the capital city of Israel. Can you imagine? 23:26 So, now they came to capture Elisha, but they were captured 23:33 by God, by God and Elisha now led them, led them to Samaria 23:41 and there, then they realized that God opened again their 23:46 eyes and they realized that they were trapped. 23:49 They were inside of the capital city of the enemy 23:56 and there the King of Israel said, this is my chance, 24:03 these people are giving me too much trouble, 24:05 I'm going to finish them. But Elisha said, Elisha said 24:11 here...My Father. Ok, verse 22. 24:32 And then verse 23. 24:51 Here we can have a great lesson. You see, I can see that these 24:58 is this kind of presenters of the gospel. 25:01 The feast that we are talking about here represents 25:06 the gospel, the spiritual food that we can give to the world. 25:11 and to the world. When we have the spiritual eyesight, 25:15 when we have this experience and we are not only limited 25:20 by the visible resources, but invisible resources, 25:23 then we can feed for God, you can feed the world. 25:28 This world is hungry, this world is desperate. 25:31 What we need now is people with the spiritually eyesight 25:38 and asking God by faith to use the spiritual resources, 25:45 spiritual resources that God has already planned for us. 25:50 But above all, let's apply this to us personally. 25:53 You see, um, in this life we encounter troubles 26:01 and difficulties and many times we...our challenges are too big 26:07 and we are wondering, how can I face this? 26:12 Many times we feel overwhelmed because we only see... 26:20 We are just like the young, young man. 26:23 You know there are two kinds of Christians, 26:26 the category of the young man before, 26:29 before of course he found his eyesight and the category 26:33 of Elisha. Um, we should not limit ourselves. 26:37 So when you face challenges and when we have big projects, 26:42 we need, we need not to be overwhelmed by any of those. 26:48 We just need to ask God, God, give me that eyesight 26:53 and help me. And even to over- come temptation in life 26:57 overcome challenges and trials. We are not alone in this. 27:02 God, God is with us. 27:05 - And I see one more lesson here is that when God through His 27:10 invisible resources gives us great victory. 27:12 He wants us to turn around and be gracious to our enemies. 27:15 To love our enemies...- That's true. To share the gospel 27:18 and that is what He is showing here. -To share, 27:20 to share the love of God... This is actually the love of 27:24 God and the reconciliation here as it said, came no more 27:29 into the land of God. We are ambassadors of Christ 27:33 and to have the ministry of reconciliation. 27:37 So to wrap it up is just to say God is with us 27:44 and we have the visible and invisible resources. 27:48 Absolutely! 27:49 Paul, we have so enjoyed the number of weeks that 27:52 you have been with us. Thank you so much. 27:54 Thank you for your dedication to God and for the study 27:57 that you do personally because that is why you have something 28:01 to share with us. God bless you. 28:03 For those of you at home, I hope that his whole concept 28:08 study 2 Kings 6, a little more. Get into the Bible study 28:13 and realize that God has invisible resources 28:17 available to you because God promises that He will 28:21 give us "Victory in Christ Jesus". |
Revised 2016-11-30