Luke 9:3 And He said to them, “Take nothing for your journey, neither a staff nor a bag, nor bread, nor money; and do not even have two tunics apiece.”
Jesus sent the twelve on an assignment but told them to take nothing with them.
He gave them power and authority and asked them to completely trust God to provide their every need along the way.
I wonder if any of them were tempted to disobey. To sneak just one thing with them, just in case God didn’t come through?
Jesus did not care if they had access to all they needed for themselves. He told them to leave it all and trust.
This is a living, breathing example of “Seek first the Kingdom of God and all these things will be added to you.”
Notice too, that the provision came as they obeyed, not before. It came along the way.
This is important.
God often provides as we go and do what He says. It is rare to see Him frontload the journey with all we will need to get to the end of it.
How about a story?
I was teaching children’s church. 3-5 year olds.
I happened to wake up very tired and unmotivated. I got ready but I was kind of grumbling to God about it as I did.
I remember saying to Him, “God, I don’t feel anointed for this today. Maybe I should just arrange for someone else to do it.”
His response floored me. “You aren’t doing anything yet. Why would you feel anointed for something you’re not doing? When you get there all the strength, stamina, energy, and anointing you need will be there, too.”
And it was. I arrived at church and God met me in that classroom to do everything that I needed to do that day.
I didn’t need an anointing to get dressed and do my make-up. I wasn’t really looking for it. I was tired and looking for an excuse. I was leaning on myself and my own strength.
So, this isn’t about what we typically think about when we think of provision, and yet it was provision. Provision is simply what we need in the moment.
We like provision to be everything we need for the week, the month, the year, the project. We don’t like it to come as it’s necessary, but that is the very thing Jesus asked the disciples to trust – that God would provide what was needed, as it was needed, whatever that happened to be.
The more we learn to trust that He really will provide where He guides; that He truly knows what we need before we need it, and is more than able to provide it for us as we follow Him, the more peace and stability we will journey with.
It is a mistake to assume that because He is God, He is unaware or unfamiliar with what we need.
He created us. He lived among us as a man. He was living as a man when He told the disciples to leave everything behind and go. He is intimately familiar with what we need. He is also familiar with what we want, and what we think we need.
It is we who often don’t see and distinguish properly between need and desire, necessity and convenience, essential and comfortable.
We will live much more contented, satisfied lives in Him when we learn to rightly make these distinctions.
Do we trust ourselves? Do we trust the provision that we have in our hands or our ability to take care of ourselves on our own? Do we pride ourselves in our self-reliance?
God invites us out of self-reliance, which is limited by who we are, what we have, and what we can do; and into God-reliance, which gives us access to the Source of an unlimited supply of all we could ever need for life and godliness; for obedience and to fulfill His perfect plan and purpose for our lives.
