You know, we as Christians must bring as many to Christ as possible and when Elisha told
the widow, he said I want you to get that oil that you've got and I want you to go borrow
some vessels and he made this statement, he said, borrow not a few.
And really that is the purpose of Christianity.
That is the purpose of you as a Christian.
That is the purpose of our church.
That is the purpose of very good baptism.
That's why in six weeks we're going to be having this, you know, bring your friend Sunday
and bring somebody to church with you and try to bring somebody.
You say, why do you do those things?
Why do you go out and knock on doors and invite people to church and try to preach the gospel
to somebody and try to show them from the Bible how can they be saved?
Why did you go out this week, Pastor Jimenez, for like 25 hours this week in the pouring rain
while your fingers were freezing with an umbrella knocking on people's doors trying to preach
the gospel and this week, by the way, we said this, seven people accepted Jesus Christ as
their Savior.
You say, why do you do that?
Why do you go around all the sacramental time and pick people up and bring them to church
and invite people to church and call them on Saturday night and say, hey, you coming today?
And some people say, yeah, we're coming.
And some people say, no, we're not coming.
Why do you do that?
And here's why.
Because Elijah told the widow, he said, I want you to take that oil you've got.
He said, I want you to go out into your community.
He said, I want you to go abroad.
He said, I want you to go out to your neighbor's house, to your friend's house, to your family
member's house.
He said, I want you to go out and search vessels.
And she said, well, how many vessels you want to make?
And he said, borrow not a few.
He says, not a few.
He said, I don't want you to just bring a few of them.
He said, I want you to bring a couple.
He said, I want you to bring a lot.
He said, I want you to bring as many as you can find.
He said, just go out and knock on every door.
He said, go out and talk to every person.
He said, go out and invite every person and just borrow as many as you can.
Why?
Because they can be filled with the Spirit of God.
Because they can get saved.
Because the moment they get filled with the Holy Ghost, that is when they believe.
And that's when they got saved.
That's when they got sealed with the Spirit of God.
I read for you there Matthew chapter number 28, verse 19.
That's where we find what we refer to as the great commission.
And there's three things that God tells us to do in this commission.
Well, really, four.
He says, go ye therefore.
Now, when he says ye, that's referring to you.
That's referring to the Christian.
He says, go ye therefore and teach all nations.
Well, what are we teaching them?
The gospel.
What are we teaching them?
That they're a sinner.
What are we teaching them?
That their sin has condemned them to hell.
What are we teaching them?
That Jesus Christ paid for their sin when he died on the cross, when he was buried,
when he rose from the grave.
He did that as a payment for their sin.
And if they were simply to believe in him and ask him and confess to him for salvation,
they would be saved.
That's what we're teaching them.
He told the widow, he said, hey, go abroad and get vessels.
The vessels represent humans.
They all represent the Holy Ghost.
He said, bring those vessels and bring them here.
He said, borrow not a few.
He said, just bring as many as you can.
He said, bring them to church.
He said, bring them to the soul and bring them to the place where they can get filled
with the oil.
He said, borrow not a few.
But look at verse three again.
Second Kings chapter number four and look at verse three.
Are you a second king still?
I don't know where I told you to go.
Look at second Kings chapter number four.
Look at verse three.
The Bible says, then he said, go by all thee vessels abroad of all thy neighbors, even empty
vessels, borrow not a few.
And when thou art come in, thou shalt shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons.
And look what it says, and shall pour out into all those vessels.
And thou shalt set aside that which is full.
So she went from him and shut the door upon her and upon her sons who brought the vessels
to her and she poured out.
And it came to pass when the vessels were full that she said unto her son, bring thee
yet a vessel.
And he said unto her, there is not a vessel more.
And the oil stayed.
Do you see the last part of that, verses that the oil stayed?
The Bible says they went out and they found all these vessels.
They went out and they borrowed.
And I'm sure they borrowed not a few.
I'm sure they brought many of them.
And they brought all these vessels and when they round them all up, they brought them
into her house and they closed the door.
And the Bible says that she began asking her sons, give me a vessel.
And they would hand her a cup and they would fill it with oil.
And as soon as she was done with it, she set aside and she said, give me another vessel.
And they would hand her a cup and she would fill it with oil.
And she put that one aside and she said, give me another vessel.
And they did this.
And when they got to the last one, she said, hand me a vessel.
And her son said, there's no more vessel.
And then the Bible says when they were out of vessels, when there was no more cups to
fill, the Bible says the oil stayed.
You know what this teaches us?
First of all, it teaches us this.
She could have filled as many vessels as she brought.
John 4 13 says this, Jesus answered and said unto her, whosoever drinketh of this water
shall thirst again.
But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, he shall never thirst.
But the water that I shall give him shall be in a well of water springing up into everlasting
life.
John 11 26 says, and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.
Believe yourself this.
Does that sound like Calvinism in the Bible?
Does it sound like God, you know, decides who's going to die and go to hell and who's
going to get saved?
Or does it sound like God is just saying, hey, whosoever will may come?
Does it sound like God is just saying, whoever wants to come, whoever wants to get filled,
there's enough oil, just come.
If you would come, I will fill you with oil.
But here's the only time God has stopped is when a vessel doesn't come.
It's whosoever.
It's anybody.
And we find that in the story, as many vessels as they brought, there was enough oil.
So we learn from that that she could fill as many vessels as she brought.
But the flip side to that is this.
This is what you got to think about.
She could fill as many vessels as she brought, but she could only fill as many as she brought.
Does that make sense?
Do you understand what I'm saying?
She could fill as many as she wanted to bring, but she could only fill as many as she could
bring.
The Bible says this, 2 Corinthians chapter number 4 and verse 3, it says, but if our
gospel be hid.
You say, what does the word gospel mean?
Well, the word gospel means good news.
And the Bible tells us the good news of the Bible and the gospel of the Bible is the death,
burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
It's the message that Jesus died on the cross and was resurrected in order to pay for our
sins.
And the Bible says, if our gospel, if our message, if our preaching be hid, here's what
the Bible says, it is hid to them that are lost.
See, the thing is, any vessel she would have brought would have been filled.
But any of the ones that she didn't bring, they went without being filled.
This means it was her job to bring as many as possible.
See, the thing is, God says, hey, whosoever will call upon the name of the Lord shall
be seen.
He says, whosoever, you know, believes on him shall not perish but have everlasting
life.
He says, anybody who comes, he said, I'm not willing that any should perish, but that
all should come to repentance.
He says, any vessel you bring are filled with oil.
But here's the catch, you got to bring them.
Here's the catch, if they don't come, if they don't come to be filled, he said they'll
never be filled.
When they brought the last vessel, they poured the oil and as soon as they were done, they
looked inside and the Bible says, no more oil.
The oil stayed.
They filled as many as they brought, but they could only fill as many as they brought.
And that's why, you know, that's what the Great Commission's about, that's what the
gospel's about, that's what Bring Your Friends Sunday is about, that's what all of it is
about.
It's about you going up and you getting somebody saved, you going up and you bringing somebody
to church.
You going up and you getting somebody baptized or bringing them to get baptized.
You going up and getting people and bringing people, why?
Because we can only get filled, those who we bring.
In the same way that she got rewarded.
In the same way that she got paid.
Not because she filled the vessels, because she didn't fill the vessels, right?
God filled the vessels.
But she got paid on how many vessels she brought, how many vessels she got filled, how many
people she got saved.
The Bible says, who then is Paul?
And who is Apollos?
But the ministers by whom he believed, even as the Lord gave to every man.
I have planted and Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
Who filled the vessels?
God did.
So then neither is he that planteth anything, neither is he that watereth, but God did give
it the increase.
Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one.
And every man shall receive his own reward according to his own what?
Labor.
For we are labors together with God.
Ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
The Bible says that you're going to receive a reward, widow.
You're going to be able to sell these vessels, widow.
And you're going to be able to make money off of these vessels, widow.
And you're going to get a reward, widow.
But it's all dependent on how many vessels you bring.
And that's why he said, borrow not of evil.
And the thing is that if you're saved this morning, the Bible says you're going to get
to heaven one day and God is going to have what he calls the judgment seat of Christ.
And at that time, he's not going to judge you based on your sin.
He's just going to, it's just a time to reward you as a Christian.
It's a time to give you riches.
It's a time to give you honor.
It's a time to give you crowns, the Bible says.
It's a time to give you, he's going to give you kingdoms to rule over at the millennial
reign of Jesus Christ.
He's going to reward you, but he's going to reward you based on this thing, your labor.
How much did you work?
And I just want to answer this question.
How many vessels have you brought to Jesus Christ?
How many vessels have you had the opportunity to see God pour his oil and his Holy Spirit
into the life of a human being and be sealed with the spread of God and be saved?
Because the sad thing is that the average Christian you know has never brought another
Christian, I'm not talking about bringing them to church, I'm talking about bringing
them to Christ.
I'm talking about getting them saved.
You know that the average Christian has never, like I had the opportunity this week seven
times, has never had the opportunity or never had the privilege to take the word of God
and open the Bible and show a sinner and show somebody, you know this is what we do when
we go out to the door and open the door and we invite him to church and then I'll ask
him this question.
I'll say, do you know for sure if you died today you'd go to heaven?
And somebody will say something like, you know what, I'm not sure, I've never thought
about it.
And I'll say, well may I show you from the scriptures and the average Christian has never
had this privilege to take the Bible and show them from the scriptures and say, look, the
Bible says that you're a sinner and the Bible says that there's a payment for your sin,
there are wages for your sin, which is death, which is hell, which is the lake of fire,
but you don't have to go there, Jesus Christ died for you and they never had the opportunity
to do this, to bow their heads with a sinner and ask Jesus, like the Bible says, confess
with their mouth and believe in their heart and get them saved.
The average Christian has never done that with another person.
So what's the challenge for this morning pastor?
Borrowing out a few.