This incident is rich in suggestiveness. It may be employed to illustrate the rapid changes of human fortune; the crushing weight of cumulative trials; or the practical sympathy of a true prophet who is never so faithful in his calling as when he visits the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and exerts his influence in their behalf. There are, however, considerations suggested by the particular method adopted in this case which throw light upon God’s way of giving, and indicate, not obscurely, the terms upon which we, who have no miraculous interpositions to expect, may become recipients of His continual bounty.
I. In the communication of his grace the most high makes the confession of our helplessness the condition of his help. The sense of need must be awakened before He will bestow the required aid. “Tell me what hast thou in the house?” wasa question intended to fathom the depth of the woman’s poverty. Until this insufficiency of all human resource has been felt and acknowledged, the Divine assistance will not be sought and cannot be given. The Saviour in His miracles of mercy made it apparent that He did not interpose until all human help had failed. When He was about to feed the multitudes He asked the disciples, “How many loaves have ye?” and measured the limits of ordinary means before drawing on the infinite capabilities of Omnipotence. The trembling sufferer who sought to touch His robe had tried all other measures before resorting to Him. The disappointed fishermen were obliged to admit that they had taken nothing ere they could be gladdened by a great success. So is it still. The choice gifts of God are withholden from the self-complacent and lavished on the needy--“He hath filled the hungry with good things, but the rich He hath sent empty away.”
II. He enriches us by the multiplication and increase of previous gifts. It would be equally easy for Him to work without means, but He chooses rather to work by them. “What hast thou in the house?” is something more than a gauge of poverty; it is a wholesome reminder that in the poorest lot there is some remnant of former possessions, some basis for present hope. The multitudes whom our Lord miraculously fed might have been relieved by the creation of an altogether new and strange provision; but He used such common food as was available, and then multiplied the stock till every need was met. The persuasion of our helplessness does not warrant our neglect of such opportunities and the use of such talent as we have. Too often we covet fresh interpositions of Divine power when we have at our command previous gifts whose energy is unexhausted, and former experiences which may fitly stimulate activity and encourage hope. Moses held in his own hand the simple instrument whereby with God’s blessing he would compel attention to his words (Exo_4:2); and if not in our hands, we may have in our house that which, like the widow’s oil, shall be multiplied by the bounty of Him.
III. He measures his bestowments by our capacity to receive. While there is an empty vessel to hold it, His grace continues to flow. He entrusts talents “to every man according to his several ability.” A preoccupied heart has no room for the Saviour. He is “gladly received” when He is eagerly waited for (Luk_8:40). In the dispensation of spiritual gifts the same rule obtains--“He giveth more grace,” and again more, according to the ardour of our wishes and the measure of our preparedness to receive His favours. Still as of old--“He satisfies the longing soul, and fills the hungry soul with goodness” (Psa_107:9), drawing out our desires, and at the same time enlarging our capacity.
IV. He delights to exceed the requirements of present need. Not content to give enough to satisfy the clamorous creditor, He supplied a store for the maintenance of the widow and her sons for some time to come. The fragments left after each feast in the wilderness far exceeded the original provision. This generosity is a conspicuous feature in all the communications of grace. David was overwhelmed at the bounty of which he was the recipient, yet what he held in possession was small compared with future blessings secured to him by promise (2Sa_7:19). Jacob, in like manner, after giving up all hope that he should ever see Joseph again, was constrained to acknowledge that God had far exceeded his most sanguine expectation. “I had not thought to see thy face; and lo, God hath showed me also thy seed” (Gen_48:11). (Robert Lewis.)
When the oil flows
Now, if I may venture to be fanciful for once, let me tell you of three vessels that we have to bring if we would have the oil of the Divine Spirit poured into us.
I. The vessel of desire. God can give us a great many things that we do not wish, but He cannot give us His best gift, and that is Himself, unless we desire it. He never forces His company on anybody, and if we do not wish for Him He cannot give us Himself, His Spirit, or the gifts of His Spirit. For instance, He cannot make a man wise if he does not wish to be instructed. He cannot make a man holy if he has no aspiration after holiness. Measure the reality and intensity of desire, and you measure capacity. As the atmosphere rushes into every vacuum, or as the sea runs up into, and fills, every sinuosity of the coast, so wherever a heart opens, and the unbroken coast-line is indented, as it were, by desire, in rushes the tide of the Divine gifts. You have God in the measure in which you desire Him.
II. Another vessel that we have to bring is the vessel of out expectancy. Desire is one thing; confident anticipation that the desire will be fulfilled is quite another. And the two do not certainly go together anywhere except in this one region, and there they do go, linked arm-in-arm. For whatsoever, in the highest of all regions, we wish we have the right without presumption to believe that we shall receive. Expectation, like desire, opens the heart. There are some expectations, even in lower regions, that fulfil themselves. Doctors will tell you that a very large part of the curative power of their medicine depends upon the patient’s anticipation of recovery. If a man expects to die when he takes to Iris bed, the chances are that he will die; and if a man expects to get better, death will have a fight before it conquers him. All these illustrations fall far beneath the Christian aspect of the thought that what we expect from God we get. That is only another way of putting, “According to thy faith be it unto thee.” It is exactly what Jesus Christ said when He promised: “Whatsoever things ye ask when ye stand praying, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.”
III. Lastly, one more vessel that we have to bring is obedience. “If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine.” Desire, Anticipation, and Obedience. These three must never be separated if we are to receive the gift of Himself, which God delights and waits to give. All spiritual possessions and powers grow by use, even as exercised muscles are strengthened, and unused ones tend to be atrophied. (A. Maclaren,D. D.)
The oil and the vessels
So long as there were vessels to be filled the miraculous flow of the oil continued, and it only ceased when there were no more jars to contain it.
I. This is true in reference to our providential circumstances. So long as we have needs we shall have supplies, and we shall find our necessities exhausted far sooner than the Divine bounty.
II. The same principle holds good with regard to the bestowal of saving grace. In a congregation the Gospel is as the pot ofoil, and those who receive from it are needy souls, desirous of the grace of God. Of these we have always too few in our assemblies.
III. The like is true with regard to other spiritual blessings. All fulness dwells in our Lord Jesus, and, as He needs not grace for Himself, it is stored up in Him, that He may give it out to believers. The saints with one voice confess “Of His fulness have all we received.”
IV. The same truth will be proved in reference to the purposes of grace in the world. The fulness of Divine grace will be equal to every demand upon it till the end of time. Men will never be saved apart from the atonement of our Lord Jesus, but never will that ransom price be found insufficient to redeem the souls that trust in the Redeemer. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Spirit of God supplying the need of the Church
The multiplication of the oil ran parallel with the demand of each successive vessel. As the sons brought them they became full. Whatever their size or shape, they were carried back, and set down, filled to the brim. When all were quite full, she bitterly lamented that there was not a vessel more. It is so that the Spirit of God has been supplying the need of the Church from that moment in the upper room, when the risen Lord began to pour Him forth. Vessel after vessel has been brought; men like Ambrose, Chrysostom, Augustine, Luther, John Knox have been filled, and still the stream of oil and grace of spiritual plenitude and anointing is being poured forth. (E. B. Meyer.)
