“Everything comes to us that belongs to us if we create the capacity to receive it.”- Radindranath Tagore

After yesterday’s activities, just before I went to bed to catch some sleep, this phrase flashed through my thoughts “God will bless you, but what’s your capacity?” So, I began to ruminate on this thought for the various possible meanings and why it came at this point in time. First, I found out that the word ‘capacity’ has different meanings and could be used in different contexts also. For instance, advanced English dictionary defines it as ‘the number of things or people that a container or space can hold’. This could mean that whatever you can handle per time is a function of your capacity at that moment. What a lorry of probably sixteen tires can do for instance, cannot be compared with what a car of four tires can do. It can then be deduced that what you get or do is simply a function of your capability at that moment in time.

Does it then mean that God looks at our capacity before he releases His blessings on us? In a bid to satisfy my curiosity, I went into the scriptures to find out whether this assertion could be consistent with the written word of God. The story of a widow in 2Kings 4:1, a wife of one of the sons of the prophets, readily comes to mind. Her husband, a prophet died suddenly and before his death, he was owing certain folks some money which he was unable to pay back. Usually, the tradition in those days was when parents owed money, and couldn’t pay, they give up their children to go serve as slaves with their creditors until the period that is equivalent to the amount of money being owed. This system is known as “debt slavery’. Although it is no longer in practice today, however some parts of Indian still practice this system (Uttar Pradesh, India) in which human rights advocates have called a form of “modern day slavery”.

So, the creditors came to take away this widow’s two children to come pay their father’s debt as the tradition requires. The woman ran to Elisha for some rescue (knowing fully well that Elisha also is a prophet), and probably he might be able to intervene. But Elisha asked her in verse 2- “tell me, what do you have in the house?” This no doubt is a question of the woman’s capacity to receive the blessing he was about to release upon her through the power of God. Invariably, what the prophet was telling her was “woman, don’t shortchange yourself, prepare for abundance”. At the end of the day, the woman was the one that determined how much oil she got by the number of containers she was able to borrow. Many of us at one time or the other has asked God to do something extra ordinary in our lives in which we do not have the capacity to handle or properly manage that which we have asked for. Capacity is all that matters in receiving the blessings as God will never give us something that we are not ready for.

How many containers are you borrowing? What kind of vision do you have for your life? God’s supernatural resources are unlimited, how much of it are we willing to enjoy? The answers to these questions are largely dependent on us and not God. God would not want to waste his resources on anyone who cannot adequately manage it, and this is why Isaiah said in the 54^th chapter of his book, from verse 2-3 that  “enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations: spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes; for thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left; and thy seed shall inherit the gentiles, and make the desolate cities to be inhabited” (KJV). Notice from the scripture above that before the blessings were pronounced, the recipient’s capacity was first and foremost expanded, according to the word of the Lord.

You see, there is nothing like “God isn’t blessing me or us”, this is not the truth. Maybe we are the ones who hasn’t built enough capability to receive what he has planned to bless us with. How do I know this? Romans 10:12 says “For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him” (KJV). God is not a partial God, if he has blessed one, he can sure bless the others. Having established that God is more willing and able to bless, the question then is how do we build capacity for God’s blessing? The answer to this question is simple and straightforward. In the book of Acts 20:32, Apostle Paul in clear terms made us to understand that the word of God is a master-builder. The more we sink and absorb it, acting upon it; the end process of it is capacity-building. In a nutshell, the word of God is a necessary tool for capability building.

Secondly, get rid of every thought of limitations and negativity that the devil constantly minister to our minds. Without overcoming this, the blessings of God might not be able to flow in. The mind is indeed a powerful tool through which God works with to bless us. The devil also understands this fact and that is why he constantly attacks the mind. He usually will come with thoughts of negativity, limited beliefs in what God will do in our lives, negative views of life and how we cannot have everything we desire in life. This is how the devil works. But the more we set our mind on the word of God and constant renewal of the mind to it will go a long way to help. I hope this article has blessed you in some ways. Please feel free to drop your comments after reading. God bless you and have a fabulous weekend.