Joseph Prince - Little Become Much In God's Hands
This is an excerpt from: Much More Restoration Is Coming!
God never asks for what you don't have. He asks for what you have, all right? To Moses, who was stammering and stuttering, and he was shepherding the flock at the back side of the mountain, Mount Sinai. When God, He saw the burning bush, and God spoke to him for the first time, he fell down and he was trembling. And then he said, "I can't speak. I stammer. I'm not eloquent". Then God says, "What is that in your hand"? God never asks you for what you don't have. To you, you despise little things that you have. My house only have, you know? God says, "What do you have? What is that in your hand"? A rod.
Listen, with that rod, he fed and led three million people for 40 years in the wilderness. Because when God takes what you give Him, even the little things, God puts His Spirit and His power on it. A woman whose husband had passed on, and the husband owed a lot of money and the creditors are coming to claim her sons as slaves because the husband did not pay for it, all right? There are the money lenders, they are coming, okay? And then Elisha came in, another miracle of Elisha, a miracle of grace, and Elisha says to her, what? What did he say? "What do you have in the house"? Isn't it obvious they are now in abject poverty. They have nothing. And we always say, "I have nothing," and yet there's something. I was tempted to go down. I was reminded not to go down.
Pastor, you become shorter. No, they are concerned that I'll fall off, you see? They do not know sometimes, one day it will happen, I just walk there and I walk back again. That may happen. Ha ha ha, all right, because I always have problems walking, right? So that's my weakness. In my weakness, His strength is made perfect, amen? Yeah, it's not because you got something else. Okay, back to this again. Don't distract me. I said last moment, right? It's your fault. Okay, listen. He asked, "What do you have in your house"? and she says, "I only have a small, small flask of oil". "Okay, go borrow empty jars. Go borrow empty vessels". Empty vessels, right? Not hard to find. Okay, never mind. You get the joke, you get the joke.
"Find empty vessels that make a lot of noise. Okay, go find an empty vessel, all right? Bring them into... okay, now start pouring". Now, again, calling those things that are not. You don't pour a little flask, a little, small flask of oil, but when she start pouring, the more she poured, the more she poured, the more she poured, the more she poured, the more she poured, the more she poured. The more Jesus plucked pieces of bread to give to His disciples, the more was given, and He kept on giving until the people says, "Enough"! And after that, 12 basketful left over, amen. And after that, Elisha asked, "Bring me one more jar, one more empty vessel," and the son says, "No more. We collected only these ones," and the oil stopped.
The oil didn't stop because not enough supply from heaven. The oil stopped because they limited Him. They limited the supply. The limitation is always our side. God's side has no limit. Like the Bible says, "They limited the Holy One of Israel". And yet Elisha says, "Sell all these empty vessels now full of oil, pay off your debt," and listen, not just pay off your debt, "live off the rest". Hundred and twenty percent. Can you see that? This woman that we read about, "Restore to her all that's hers and her land, and every proceed, every benefit, every profit from the day she left until now," seven years. Are you with me so far?
He never asks you for what you don't have. It's always, "What do you have"? Ah, this is just, ah, just a small, you know? That shows we despise small, small things. We don't realize how God can use. Like I told God last time, He says, "I'm gonna use you to speak to many," He said. I said to the Lord, "No, I..." I pitied Him, you know? I felt for the Lord. I said, "Lord, I'm a stutterer. I'm a stammerer". And the Lord says, "I'm gonna use that". I said, "Lord, I surrender this to You. If You can use this, I surrender it to You". That's why I always know, I always remember there is a Jacob's tie about me in this area. I know what it was, amen, and it doesn't mean that today I depend upon my ability or whatever. I dare not. Before I come up to preach, I always ask the Lord, all right, "Give me that rhema Word". It's gotta be a rhema Word. I pray for all of you, amen.
Even like praying in the flow of the Spirit and all that, I do not know until the last moment, okay? I do not know. Sometimes He will leave me like that to depend on Him, 'cause sometimes my preparation is my strength and He doesn't want me always to... So sometimes God does things like this. I hope you understand a bit of the ways of God. It's not like the ways of man. And I pray that this will give you the assurance that whatever you have lost, in this kairos year of the right time and the right place, it's all coming back. And not just coming back what you have lost in a repaired way like the way man would do it, but in God's way, worthy of His glory, worthy of His omnipotence, amen. When God does it, it's not like man, amen? It's gonna be great, hallelujah. But don't expect the manner of man, all right? Expect sometimes it may come from places you least expect. You are going for a trip, you are going for a meeting, along the way you bump into someone.
So happens that woman came when... King was saying, "Gehazi, tell me more. Tell me more. Tell me what Elisha did". And this part, he must have told the king a lot of stories about Elisha, but this part is about raising the son. "This is the woman"! And that will happen to you. And that's why when these things happen, the reason we have a theme of the year, God gives a theme of the year in beginning of the year so that when it happens, you know it's God. Without the theme of the year, you might not. Just say, "Oh yeah, I'm lucky, yeah". That's the worst thing you can say, okay? Lucky.
Friend, He's got your back. He will provide for you. I didn't even show you Romans 5, the one that you all know. It says in verse 17, there are five "much more," right? It says what? "For if by one man's sin," offense, Adam's sin, all right, people died, "death reigned," right? It goes on to say, "Much more those," all of you, "who receive," what? "Abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness will," what? "Reign in life". That's the "much more". That's not being preached. We are just happy to saved, happy to be reconciled, instead of seeing the "much more we shall be saved from wrath". Future, amen? Having the assurance.
And for the lack of that, people are suffering depression, and fear, and all kinds of, you know, all kinds of crazy doctrines come out of that, amen. Or here, this area, instead of reigning in life, oh, God expects us to just wait for Jesus to come and then just barely get by. No, friend. "Reign in life" means reign in life! Not under, in life. What does a king do? He reigns. That's why when you speak, there's power. And it happens much more those who receive abundance of grace, these twins, all right? Abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness. And that's why I preach on these two so much, why? I want you to reign in life, and so you will in the name of the Lord Jesus. But always remember it's because of what Jesus has done. And all the people said, "Amen".