John 11:32 Now when Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet, saying to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” ESV

Here is the greeting Mary the sister of Lazarus. We know from the telling that Jesus waited four days in order to glorify God and demonstrate power over death itself. It will come of no surprise that I am not Jesus. Neither have I been given command to raise the dead.

This is my first post in a week. I will not apologize for not tending to daily blog commitment. Someone I love was told he had an aortic aneurism. This is a very serious condition so we left immediately for the hospital some three hundred miles away. I committed myself to showing up. I put down all other responsibilities and tended to the more pressing need.

I am retired so this is easier for me than most people. I have no boss to answer to except one, my Lord. What would my Lord have me do?

John 13:35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

Demonstration of that love cannot be a text message saying good luck. While I did not lay hands on hi and heal him, I did weep and prayed, and showed up. Of the three, showing up was the one that meant the most to him. So I feel I was obedient in faith to serve my Lord in serving my brother in Christ.

The only pressing question let is this. Can I do it for someone I don’t like?

Matthew 5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

2 Kings 4:2  And Elisha said unto her, What shall I do for thee? tell me, what hast thou in the house? And she said, Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil.

The oil, a foreshadowing of anointing, is all she had, yet her emotions said she had nothing to offer, her house was empty. We are reminded of the five thousand that Jesus fed with nothing but five loaves of bread and two fish. When they had their fill to eat, twelve full baskets remained.

Here in 2^nd Kings, we are not feeding a multitude of appetites, we are pouring out the anointing and seeing what it means to the individual to whom the anointing fell upon. Interestingly enough, Elisha instructed the woman to get as many empty vessels from her neighbors as possible. His words at the end of verse 3, “not a few”. She was instructed to fill her neighbor’s empty vessels with the anointing. This was the result.

V6 And it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said unto her son, Bring me yet a vessel. And he said unto her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil stayed.

She still had all that she began with and had lost nothing, even though she had filled all the empty vessels of all her neighbors. Here, a woman of no substance, could not exhaust the anointing that was upon her, it is everlasting, it remains.

Luke 4:17-19 And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

The anointing remains, why have you not poured it out upon the empty vessels that are your neighbors?