The Best Thing I Never Knew I Needed

2 Corinthians 1:20 New Living Translation (NLT)

20 For all of God’s promises have been fulfilled in Christ with a resounding “Yes!” And through Christ, our “Amen” (which means “Yes”) ascends to God for his glory.

As I look back over my life and I think things o-over



Just kidding!! But seriously, when I look over life and begin to think about what God has done, especially in the last 9 months of my life. I never asked God for any of this. I was okay in Augusta going to a larger ministry working my way to a better career. I was doing alright. It reminded me a lot of the Shunamite woman. 

2 Kings 4:8-10 New Living Translation (NLT)

Elisha and the Woman from Shunem

8 One day Elisha went to the town of Shunem. A wealthy woman lived there, and she urged him to come to her home for a meal. After that, whenever he passed that way, he would stop there for something to eat.

9 She said to her husband, “I am sure this man who stops in from time to time is a holy man of God. 10 Let’s build a small room for him on the roof and furnish it with a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp. Then he will have a place to stay whenever he comes by.”

So here we are. This woman is doing better than alright. She's wealthy. How many of you know there's a difference between wealthy and rich? Wealth means it is sustainable money. Rich means it came quickly. My granddaddy used to always "Anything that come fast ain't gon last." I never wanted to be rich, always wealthy. And here we are now in the middle of the pandemic and there are people who are rich, begging for the same stimulus check that the rest of us want. But wealthy people? They're alright. But most people don't want to work for wealth. They want the get rich quick schemes. 

Luke 12:48 New Living Translation (NLT)

48 But someone who does not know, and then does something wrong, will be punished only lightly. When someone has been given much, much will be required in return; and when someone has been entrusted with much, even more will be required.

But that's a conversation people aren't ready to have yet. God never said what the requirements were. Your requirements may be that you have to sit down for a season. It may mean that you'll have to be talked about for a season. It may mean that you have to be in isolation for a season. For this woman, she was wealthy but she was still faithful to God and respected people of God, like Elisha. 

See, Elisha was a prophet, which means he is sensitive to God's voice. Not only that but from time to time he prophesies, meaning he becomes the mouthpiece of God, and he also operates in the prophetic, meaning he does what God does. The Shunamite woman knew that and she respected it. She honored it. She used her gifts to honor him. 

1 Peter 4:10 New Living Translation (NLT)

10 God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.

This woman had the ability to sustain wealth. Because she had wealth, she used it to make room for Elisha in her home. She used her gift to serve the servant of God.  

Here's the thing about God. Even when you're doing what He asked you to do and you think that nobody is paying it any attention, God is always watching. 

Hebrews 6:10-11 New Living Translation (NLT)

10 For God is not unjust. He will not forget how hard you have worked for him and how you have shown your love to him by caring for other believers,[a] as you still do. 11 Our great desire is that you will keep on loving others as long as life lasts, in order to make certain that what you hope for will come true.

He watches as you serve. He watches how you serve. Are you doing it with an attitude? Or are you doing it with the love of God? This woman didn't just say "Oh, he can sleep on the couch whenever he comes to visit." She built a whole room and furnished it for him. She put her best foot forward. Because she served well, Elisha says "What can we do to help her?" "How can we make things better for her?" She didn't ask him for anything. She didn't serve with expectation of being reimbursed in some way for what she did. She did it with love. 

Psalm 37:4 New Living Translation (NLT)

4 Take delight in the Lord,
    and he will give you your heart’s desires.

 I'm not going to lie, I have never served so much in my life. I always serve my leaders well. There were so many nights that I went without sleep just to make sure my pastors and apostles had everything they needed. Like this past March, my niece and I literally had no sleep because we were going day in and day out to ensure that our apostle's birthday service was as perfect as it could be. I didn't do it with expectation. I did it because my leaders deserved to have the very best. I'm telling you what I know. I gave because it is in my heart to give. The more I gave, the more God began to show up. There is no way I would be able to close deals with multi-million dollar brands within a week of creating my LLC. I couldn't do it on my own. 

2 Kings 4:14-17 New Living Translation (NLT)

14 Later Elisha asked Gehazi, “What can we do for her?”

Gehazi replied, “She doesn’t have a son, and her husband is an old man.”

15 “Call her back again,” Elisha told him. When the woman returned, Elisha said to her as she stood in the doorway, 16 “Next year at this time you will be holding a son in your arms!”

“No, my lord!” she cried. “O man of God, don’t deceive me and get my hopes up like that.”

17 But sure enough, the woman soon became pregnant. And at that time the following year she had a son, just as Elisha had said.

The Shunamite woman never asked for anything. Elisha made it his business to do something for the woman. She never asked for a child, but Gehazi saw that she didn't have a child and said Elisha should give her a child. What's happening here? Scripture says that if you delight yourselves in the Lord, He'll give you the desires of your heart. Nobody knew she wanted a child. There's some things that we desire that not everyone doesn't know about. When you serve God in excellence, He deals with those things. Sometimes those things are the things we never knew we needed. They're suppressed desires. 

If yall don't know anything else about, know that I have a love for psychology. My bachelor's degree is actually in psychology. There's a thing called suppressed memories. A lot of times, when people go through things, especially those things that are very very traumatizing, they tend to put them in the back of their minds. To be honest, some of our suppressed desires are suppressed memories of disappointment because we thought God would do something at a certain time or by a certain time and He didn't do it so we pushed it to the backs of our minds and continue to serve God as if we never desired those things. 

2 Kings 4:18-30 New Living Translation (NLT)

18 One day when her child was older, he went out to help his father, who was working with the harvesters. 19 Suddenly he cried out, “My head hurts! My head hurts!”

His father said to one of the servants, “Carry him home to his mother.”

20 So the servant took him home, and his mother held him on her lap. But around noontime he died. 21 She carried him up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and left him there. 22 She sent a message to her husband: “Send one of the servants and a donkey so that I can hurry to the man of God and come right back.”

23 “Why go today?” he asked. “It is neither a new moon festival nor a Sabbath.”

But she said, “It will be all right.”

24 So she saddled the donkey and said to the servant, “Hurry! Don’t slow down unless I tell you to.”

25 As she approached the man of God at Mount Carmel, Elisha saw her in the distance. He said to Gehazi, “Look, the woman from Shunem is coming. 26 Run out to meet her and ask her, ‘Is everything all right with you, your husband, and your child?’”

“Yes,” the woman told Gehazi, “everything is fine.”

27 But when she came to the man of God at the mountain, she fell to the ground before him and caught hold of his feet. Gehazi began to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone. She is deeply troubled, but the Lord has not told me what it is.”

28 Then she said, “Did I ask you for a son, my lord? And didn’t I say, ‘Don’t deceive me and get my hopes up’?”

29 Then Elisha said to Gehazi, “Get ready to travel[a]; take my staff and go! Don’t talk to anyone along the way. Go quickly and lay the staff on the child’s face.”

30 But the boy’s mother said, “As surely as the Lord lives and you yourself live, I won’t go home unless you go with me.” So Elisha returned with her.

So now the woman has her son and he dies. There's nothing more disappointing than to think that God has fulfilled a promise and the promise is no longer here. I can only imagine what this woman was feeling at this moment. 

It is in times like those where you're going through the imaginable that your faith is built. I'm telling you. 2015 to 2019 where the hardest years of my life. 2016 I thought I was going to be out of here for real. IT was in that time where my faith was built. I had to learn who God was for myself. You'll never know who God is if you haven't experienced Him in that capacity. 

The Shunamite woman took all the strength she had and went to see Elisha. 

Let's pause for a moment here. Her hsuband didn't even understand what was going on. It was the Sabbath day. God rested on the Sabbath. Here's the thing the Bible says that when a man finds a wife he findeth a good thing and obtaineth favor. Favor shows up when your faith goes against everything that makes sense. Women, we can be a little emotional sometimes, we jump to conclusions, we do the irrational from time to time. But our faith matches our deeds. 

Her faith says "even though it ain't alright right now. It's going to be alright." She reminded God of what He said. She didn't ask Him for a son, but He said she would have one, and if God be God I know that He'll perfect that concerning me. I know that I can't fix this thing on my own, but with God all things are possible. So even though I don't understand why this happened, I know who can solve it. It is the God of all. 

Of course, God came through. He performed the miracle but it was because of her faith. It was because of her servitude. It blessed her with the son she never thought she needed. It was this same son that built her faith.