In a Watchman Nee devotion from A Table in The Wilderness he says,

Faith is a most important factor in God's service, for without it there can be no truly spiritual work. But our faith requires training and strengthening, and material needs are a means God uses toward that end.

It is not difficult to profess to have faith in God for a vast variety of intangible things.

We may even deceive ourselves in this, simply because there is nothing concrete to demonstrate how lacking in faith we really are. But when it comes to financial needs, to food and drink and hard cash, the matter is so practical that the reality of our faith is at once put to the test.

If we cannot trust God to supply the temporal needs of the work, what is the good of talking about its spiritual needs? We proclaim to others that God is the living God. Let us prove his livingness in the very practical realm of material things.

Nothing will so establish in us the confidence in him we shall certainly need to know when those other, spiritual demands come.


2 Kings 4:38-44 (Amplified Bible) says,

38 Elisha came back to Gilgal during a famine in the land. The sons of the prophets were sitting before him, and he said to his servant, Set on the big pot and cook pottage for the sons of the prophets.

39 Then one went into the field to gather herbs and gathered from a wild vine his lap full of wild gourds, and returned and cut them up into the pot of pottage, for they were unknown to them.

40 So they poured it out for the men to eat. But as they ate of the pottage, they cried out, O man of God, there is death in the pot! And they could not eat it.

41 But he said, Bring meal [as a symbol of God's healing power]. And he cast it into the pot and said, Pour it out for the people that they may eat. Then there was no harm in the pot.

42 [At another time] a man from Baal-shalisha came and brought the man of God bread of the firstfruits, twenty loaves of barley, and fresh ears of grain [in the husk] in his sack. And Elisha said, Give to the men that they may eat.

43 His servant said, How am I to set [only] this before a hundred [hungry] men? He said, Give to the men that they may eat. For thus says the Lord: They shall be fed and have some left.

44 So he set it before them, and they ate and left some, as the Lord had said.


There have always been famines in this world.
Some take place in nations; some take place in certain families and in certain homes, even in nations where there is no famine.

This world's system is fickle, and we cannot depend upon it.  But we have another government, the Kingdom of God.  At Christmas time we magnify this verse from Isaiah chapter 9 that a son is given and a child is born, but look what it says about the government.

Isaiah 9:6-6 (Amplified Bible) says,
6 For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father [of Eternity], Prince of Peace.

7 Of the increase of His government and of peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from the [latter] time forth, even forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

We can and should be living in the Kingdom of God now, and can be progressively experiencing His financial provisions now, in spite of and in the face of famine on this earth much like the story above in 2 Kings.

How?  By hearing God speak.  Do whatever is needed in your life to hear God's voice.  Faith comes when you hear Him speak, and faith is the currency that will bring our needs to us.

Matthew  6:33 says,
“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

Larry Chkoreff

December 23, 2010