There is No Restraint

...for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few.

1 Samuel 14:6

Do you ever have those days when you just want to plug your ears, close your eyes, and sit in the corner? 

On my blog, Pages for the Dark Horses, I advocate for a new orphan every week. A Dark Horse of the Week as we call them. Every week I see another little child without a home. Some of them are sick, and I am broken that they must face their illness alone. Others are emotionally broken, and my heart aches for them to find healing. And still others are asking for a home, they long for a family, and I just about can't stand it! WHERE ARE THE FAMILIES LORD?!?! 

These little ones need Christ, they need a home, they need to know they are special and wanted. 

You'd think that if I'm advocating then I shouldn't be so upset, you'd think that because I write novel after novel to bring a voice to orphans I'd be complete, you'd think because I have 6 adopted siblings I'd feel I'd done my part. But the passion inside of me for the dying and homeless orphans around the world never ceases. Some days I think all these things make it worse! I know they're there! I've heard them cry! I've seen the brokenness they are in, up close and personal! 

And sometimes I get discouraged. The need is so great but there is nothing more that I can do.

One morning I was listening to my audio Bible while I got ready for work, and heard a familiar story of Jesus feeding the 5000. Then it went right into the story of Him feeding the 4000 and I wondered at the contrast in the stories. 

When He fed the 5000 He had 5 loaves and 2 fish. When He fed the 4000 he had 7 loaves and a "few" fishes. 

When I went on my walk I asked the Lord of these stories. He reminded me that 7 is the number of completion. When He fed the 4000 He had a complete amount, when they had all been filled, they took up 7 baskets of fragments. It remained complete.

When He fed the 5000 He had only 5 loaves. A few shy of "complete" still when all had been filled, they took up 12 baskets of fragments. They started with what seemed so small and yet in the end had more than they had when they'd started with seven!

Then the Lord reminded me of Jonathan's words to his servant in 1 Samuel 14:6 - ...for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few.

Sometimes I feel I can't do enough for the sake of the Gospel in this one lifetime that I have, but it says in 1 Corinthians 3:6-7 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase.

We don't need to do anything more than just be obedient. As Jesus once scolded His disciples in Matthew 16:9 "Do you not yet understand, or remember the five loaves of the five thousand and how many baskets you took up?

The Lord brings the increase. 

We give what little we feel we have and He feeds thousands!

...for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few.

1 Samuel 14:6