God's Solution - Elisha and the Widow's Oil - Lesson 4

In our last lesson about Elisha and the Widow's Oil we saw that a widow was in distress because of a debt, and she reached out to the church for help.We looked at her situation and the main points to consider for us today:

1. She does not have any close family and so she comes to Elisha as her pastor and in the role of kindsman redeemer. Leviticus 25 describes this process.
2. Her husband was a Godly man, "one of the sons of the prophets" part of Elisha's team. Bad things can happen to godly people.
3. The young couple had gotten into debt, perhaps student loans to tide them over until he could get a job as a prophet, or a home loan that was underwater. 
4. The seriousness of debt hits home. The children are to be sold to pay the debt obligation.
5. The young husband did not have adequate life insurance or an emergency fund to care for his young family.
6. Elisha asks the widow to identify her need. 
7. Elisha asks what resources she has inside the house. He asked her to make a simple budget. 
8. Elisha asks the widow to go outside the house for part of the solution. Seems like an odd request. Go get some empty containers from your neighbors
9. She is responsible for both the searching the house for resources and for going outside the house to find vessels. 

In this lesson, let's look at  how God provides for the widow.