Don't Bury Your Provisions

-Rich Meyers

I wanted to give you a word of wisdom about something that's been on my heart. It’s from Genesis 22 where God asked Abraham to take his son out and sacrifice him as a show of faith. And Abraham, being faithful, did that. And Abraham looked up and there in a thicket, he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed as a burnt offering instead of his son. And so Abraham called the place, the Lord will provide. To this day it is said, on the mountain of the Lord, it will be provided. Abraham declared the Lord Jehovah Jireh, the Lord who provides. That’s something that the Lord has really taught me or put on my heart recently—to focus on what God has given me.

I've been taking inventory of all the things God has given me--big, small, medium. I am really amazed at his provision for my life. It wasn't always like that. I've definitely gone through times I was completely focused on the things that I didn't have. Have you ever done that? Think, obsess, worry about everything you don't have? It creates quite a misery. And it created a misery in me. It creates misery in most of us when we focus on those things, and it paralyzes us because we spend all of our emotional, physical, spiritual and mental energy on those things that don't even exist in our lives.

The Word challenges us to be faithful with what we have. We can't be faithful with things that we don't have. We can only be faithful with what we have. So if we take inventory of what we don't have, our energy is misplaced, and we miss the amazing provision God has given each one of us.

Each one of us is uniquely created to invest in the kingdom of God. He's given us gifts and talents which only we possess, with a heart and a personality perfectly designed to use those provisions for his glory. Hopefully you believe that.My experience is these gifts and talents are usually something seemingly small, ordinary, even normal.

Let's take, for example, something like compassion. Not all of us, but most of us have compassion. We can exercise that personality trait, that gift with those around us. When we begin to use that gift or that talent for His glory, God can do amazing things with it. God can grow our compassion into something which can bring comfort to many people.

That's just one example. There's many examples of small things in our lives that we can use for His glory. I want to challenge us today that we may have possibly buried some of the provisions that the Lord has given us because we wrote them off as insignificant.

Remember the parable of the mustard seed? Sometimes we consider faith as a noun, something that I have, something that God has given me. But faith is also something that we can exercise as a verb. We can actually turn faith into an action. And God promises us that when we use something small in us, it's like a mustard seed. With faith it can grow into a huge tree, a giant tree. And that's definitely true. When we apply faith to our giftings and use them for his glory, we can turn them into something very large for the kingdom of God.

My challenge for you this morning is stop focusing on things you don't have. Take inventory of what He has provided and use it for His kingdom and His glory. When we use what we have faithfully, we can see the amazing things that He can do with it.

Father, we pray that you would give us wisdom to know the provision that you've given us and be thankful for what you've given us. Father, we pray that we can use it for your glory, for your kingdom and all those things that we don't have. Your word says that when we seek first your kingdom and your righteousness, all those other things that we don't have will be added to it, Father.

We pray this morning, Lord, for your presence. We know you're with us, Father. We want to glorify you. We want to worship you, want to give you honor and praise this morning. Amen.