Elisabeth Elliot: If my life is broken when given to Jesus, it may be because pieces will feed a multitude when a loaf would satisfy only a little boy.

Lisa Barry: Jesus? love was broken and spilled out in obedience to His Father. If we are to be followers of Christ, then it means our lives should be broken and spilled out, too. Is that the way you feel today? Well, Elisabeth Elliot will tell you that it just might be that your suffering will feed the spirits of a multitude. Find out more as we begin this Wednesday edition of Gateway to Joy. Here?s Elisabeth.

Elisabeth Elliot: It was when my second husband was dying of cancer that this became a powerful, liberating principle in my life, as though many of you know who have gone through someone who has cancer or some of you who yourselves have cancer. You know what it?s like when you wake up and what, Amy Carmichael used to call, "The worst times when all life?s molehills become mountains"?those hours between 2:00 and 4:00 in the morning. If you wake up at those hours, you just lie there, just thinking of all the hideous possibilities that may be in store for you. It becomes only possible to maintain any kind of equilibrium spiritually.

I was in agony over the things which the doctors were predicting that they might have to do to my husband before he died. I thought death couldn?t be much worse. I?d rather they just leave him alone. I can?t bear all these hideous things that they were predicting.

One night as I was lying there, I just simply said to the Lord, "I don?t have anything left to offer to You, except my fear and my pain." The Lord brought to my mind the verse from Psalm 51:17: "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart." If that?s what you have, that is what you offer?material for sacrifice.

My body was material for sacrifice. It did not belong to Jim Elliot, until God brought us together in marriage. It belonged only to God, solely to God, not to me. So I began to learn this tremendous lesson during Ad?s illness. If all I have to offer is a broken heart or a broken spirit, that is what God is waiting for.

Then I remembered one night as I sat pondering these things, words that came back to me from one of the speakers that had come to Wheaton. We had, five days a week, compulsory chapel for the whole four years that I was there. I could probably not mention more than ten talks out of all those chapels that I had heard.

One of them I certainly never forgot was from a missionary who made this statement: "If my life is broken when given to Jesus, it may be because pieces will feed a multitude when a loaf would satisfy only a little boy."

Think of that little boy, whose lunch was preempted by the disciples. When Jesus told the disciples, "You give them something to eat," of course they said, "Well, where in the world are we going to find enough to eat for this tremendous crowd?" I like that little parenthesis in there. It says, "Jesus said this to test them." He knew what He was going to do.

But they came with this pitiful little lunch of five loaves and two fishes. I often wonder if the poor little boy gave it up willingly or if they just took it. But whatever the case was, I don?t believe that that little boy ever forgot Jesus or ever regretted the sacrifice.

Of course, the disciples had no way of knowing what in the world Jesus was going to do with five loaves and two fishes, but He simply received them. The offering was received into His wounded hands?not yet wounded at that point. He thanked His Father and He broke the bread and He gave it to His disciples. It was as the disciples went around among the rows of five thousand, or fifteen thousand counting women and children, that the loaves and the fishes were obviously multiplied in the hands of the apostles. God made that possible. That was a miracle. But it was because Jesus received this pitiful lunch, and it was offered back to His Father. If your life is broken when given to Jesus, it may be because pieces will feed a multitude when a loaf would satisfy only a little boy.

Now how exactly do I show forth the life of Jesus here and now in this world? What form does the manifestation of the divine life take in my body, in this particular day, with this particular pain? I can?t answer that for you, but day by day there is the manifestation of the divine life being represented through us. Let?s ask ourselves, "What do others see when they look at us?"

Point two: The consolation of obedience. Ezekiel 24:15-18 is a seemingly obscure passage that we don?t hear much about, but I have been just greatly blessed and taught by this little sort of parenthesis in there. Ezekiel says that the Lord spoke to him and said, "Son of man, I am about to take the delight of your eyes away from you at a stroke, yet you shall not mourn or weep, nor shall your tears run down. Sigh, but not aloud; make no mourning for the dead. Bind on your turban. Put your shoes on your feet. Do not cover your lips, nor eat the bread of mourners." He was not to carry out any of the usual rituals for someone who was bereaved.

And Ezekiel said, "So I spoke to the people in the morning," as he was assigned, "and in the evening my wife died. And on the next morning, I did as I was commanded."

Ezekiel offered himself in obedience, along with his suffering. "In the evening my wife died. In the morning I did as I was commanded." Ladies and gentlemen, I do not think we have a right to prolong our mourning, to ignore the normal carrying out of what God has given us to do, either because of joy or because of sorrow. We are still meant to do the next thing. It is in that obedience?that quiet, simple, humble obedience?that I have found the greatest peace and the greatest consolation.

A number of years ago, a conference was going on and I happened to be one of the speakers. On a Sunday morning, when a certain man was going to preach, he received a cable from Brazil saying that his son-in-law had just been killed. As we were having a prayer meeting, all the other speakers?I think I was the only woman among them. There were three or four men. We were just having prayer early in the morning on Sunday when this cable arrived.

So the rest of the men immediately said, "Of course, we will not expect you to deliver the sermon this morning. We?ll take care of it. Somebody else can do it." The man said, "No. I want to do it." And everybody else was just dumbfounded. "Oh, no. We would never expect this. You have phone calls to make, things to do. I know you?re just devastated by this news. Be assured that we will take care of it."

The man continued to protest each of the other?s continually giving their reasons why, "Oh, no, we would never ask you to do this." As is my wont, I waited until the men had had their say. But I felt, in a sense, qualified to say something, which perhaps the rest of them were not qualified to understand because of the loss of my husband. I had realized how comforting it is to have work to do. It was that work, and that overwhelming work that I had on the jungle station, that had carried me through one day at a time, doing the next thing.

So I simply said, "I can understand why our brother here wants to deliver the sermon that he has prepared, and I don?t think that we should deny him that privilege. I have discovered that there is no consolation like obedience." This brother was nodding his head vigorously. The other men capitulated and said, "Yes. You can do it."

I had a letter from a lady who told me that when she was just a child, her father died. Her mother was left absolutely destitute because the lawyers that were in charge of the husband?s finances had made off with virtually all of them. When they came home from the funeral, they came back to an empty house. She said, "My mother picked up a broom and started to sweep the kitchen." That became a watchword in this lady?s life. "Pick up the broom." It doesn?t make any difference what is happening?there is something to do, some obedience to carry out. That was the beginning of the step-by-step unfolding of God?s provision and will for that little family.

May I offer to you again a definition of suffering: Having what you don?t want and wanting what you don?t have. Paul said, "These little troubles, which are really so transitory, are working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are unseen."

We can offer up our pain. We can offer up our destitution, our devastation, whatever we think is like end of the world. It?s not the end of the world. There is something to do.

A young woman that I know had come to some seminars and I had been talking about these sorts of things, and particularly the simple matter of presenting your body as a living sacrifice and doing the next thing, whatever that may be. Her mother died during the night. She and her sister were with their mother. She had been ill for a long time. But she was at home, and the two daughters sat by the bedside until her mother died. She died at 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning.

My friend Terri wrote me a letter and she said, "Elisabeth, you will be pleased to know that as soon as it got light, I threw open all the windows. I let the sunshine in. I got fresh flowers, put them in vases. I stripped the bed. I made up fresh linen on the bed. I cleaned the whole room, and it was wonderful. I did the next thing."

Lisa Barry: That?s a line we often hear Elisabeth quote. Some of you might be interested in hearing the entire poem from which it comes. We?d be happy to send you a copy of that when you write to us. It?s called DO THE NEXT THING.

We?d also like to remind you that we thrive and survive on the gifts that people like you are kind enough to send. God has intentionally made us dependent on Him through you, so we always have someone to be accountable to. If you can send a financial gift today, you can be assured it will be used in a way that honors God.

Here?s our address: Gateway to Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Or call toll-free: 1-800-759-4JOY. Lastly, you can dial up our Web site at gatewaytojoy.org. You can order books and find much more. That address again is gatewaytojoy.org. Today?s program has been a production of Back to the Bible.

This is Lisa Barry, thanking you for listening. I hope you?ll join us again tomorrow when we meet again for Gateway to Joy.