Poem July 13, 2020 Issue

“What hast thou in the house?”

Lona Ingwerson

Elisha asked this of a woman desperately in need.
He was asking what she already had.
How does this apply to us?
In many ways.
We are all guilty of worrying about the problem,
about what’s missing,
be it physical, financial, emotional.
When the suggestion above is posed to us,
what have we to be grateful for?
What do we already have?
Can we focus on that
rather than the emptiness?
What would Elisha say?
Would he ask us as well,
“What hast thou in the house?” ¹
And would we too realize we had an abundance of oil,
a heart filled and running over?
Filled?
With what?
Oil!²
Heavenly inspiration …
charity …
prayer …
consecration …
gentleness.
And is that sufficient to meet our need of the moment?
Forever!
“And the oil stayed.”