Selah – Pause and think about that…the following is an excerpt from “Streams Devotional” that made me “stop to consider” our current (April 2020) situation. After reading the story about the widow and Elisha from 2 Kings, I re-read this text.  It speaks deeply to me.  I pray that it blesses you, also.

Go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons.  2 Kings 4:4 (NIV)

(The widow and the jars of olive oil with Elisha)

“This is an ingredient in God’s plan of dealing with us.  We are to enter a secret chamber of isolation in prayer and faith that is very fruitful.  At certain times and places, God will build a mysterious wall around us.  He will take away all the supports we customarily lean upon, and will remove our ordinary ways of doing things.  God will close us off to something divine, completely new and unexpected, and that cannot be understood by examining our previous circumstances.  We will be in a place where we do not know what is happening, where God is cutting the cloth of our lives by a new pattern, thus where He causes us to look to Him.

“Most Christians lead a treadmill life – a life in which they can predict almost everything that will come their way.  But the souls that God leads into unpredictable and special situations are isolated by Him.  All they know is that God is holding them and that He is dealing in their lives.  Then their expectations come from Him alone.

“Like this widow, we must be detached from outward things and attached inwardly to the Lord alone in order to see His wonders. [from Soul Food]

“It is through the most difficult trials that God often brings the sweetest discoveries of Himself. [from Gems]”

Streams in the Desert Devotional, L. B. Cowan, 1997; April 5, page 143

04/18/2020