Heaven, We Have a Problem!

II Kings 2:19-22

And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

20 And he said, bring me a new cruse, and put salt therein. And they brought it to him.

21 And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt in there, and said, thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land.

22 So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha which he spake.

In the passage in II Kings, the men of the city come to Elisha the prophet and they tell him in essence, “We have a problem. From the outside everything looks pretty good, but we have a problem.”

I'm just going to get straight to it this morning - some of you have a problem!  How long are you going to keep going around the same mountain, fighting the same battles, struggling with the same addictions, wrestling with the same fleshly lusts and desires, falling down at the same place, and giving in to the same temptations again and again, before you are willing to admit you have a problem?

If you can’t look at a pretty woman without lust rising up in your heart you have a problem!  If you can’t see somebody else blessed without becoming jealous, critical, and envious, then you have a problem!  If every time things don’t go your way you get drunk, or high,  or run to the fridge and gorge yourself, you have a problem!  If you still get angry and resentful and hold a grudge every time somebody says something about you or disagrees with you, you’ve got a problem!  If you can’t keep your gossiping tongue off your brothers, sisters, and pastor, then you have a problem!

My question for you today is: How long are you going to put up with attitudes, addictions, hang-ups, and lusts of the flesh that are self-destructive, and in absolute disagreement with the Word of God before you call on the only name that can release you from your chains? You need to cry out to Jesus and say, "Heaven, we have a problem! “Help me Jesus, I have a problem!”

The only problem that cannot be overcome in Jesus’ name, is the one you will not admit to having. The first major step to a turnaround and a breakthrough is admitting, like the men in the text, that you have a problem.

The next step is taking your problem to the right place.  I believe in AA and other 12-step programs.  They save lives when the person following the steps understands that the only power that can change our situation is the power of God.  But recovery programs are just Band-Aids applied to the surface if you don’t go spiritually deep enough and deal only with the fruit, but not the root.  The only power that can change the root is the power of God.

These men in II Kings took their problem to the right place.  You have to know where to go when you have a problem. You don’t take your car to the dentist to get it fixed, you don’t ask a plumber to fix your teeth, and you don’t want a preacher operating on your brain.  They may all be nice people, but you have to go to the right person when you have a problem or the problem just gets worse. 

You may have some good friends that will pray with you when you ask, but I don’t care how good a friend they are, you are not going to get the deliverance you need sounding out your problems to people who are struggling with the same problems you are.

David said: when my heart is overwhelmed, lead me to that rock that is (higher) than I.  When you’re in a fight, in a struggle wrestling with an Issue, whether it’s spiritual, financial, emotional, or sexual, whether it’s an addiction or a bondage or a habit.  You better go to someone that is higher than you, someone who has that under their feet, someone who is not wallowing in the same mess, you need someone who can show you what it looks like to be free. You need Jesus!

They said to the prophet: This place is pretty, we like the neighborhood. It is a nice place, we like the view, and from all outward appearances, everything looks good.  But the water is naught, the water is cursed, it carries some kind of poison in it and it is making the ground barren.  In other words: It’s killing our future.  It was not killing the men, the women, or even the trees, it was killing the fruit.

We need some men in our country who are concerned with more than pretty, we need some men who desire purity and power, and that more concerned about being good, than just looking good.  We need men who cry to God, “We have a problem!”

The Word says that the water was causing the women to miscarry.  That means nothing was being carried to full term.  Nothing was being birthed.  I’m writing today to some of God’s people that have let something into your heart and it has poisoned your lifestream.  You’ve become unproductive, your life has become barren, you have no joy, no peace, you have no passion for life, and you’re full of bitterness and anger and resentment and unforgiveness.  You’ve let envy, jealousy, and strife creep into your heart, and now even when something good is initiated, it ends up drying up and dying because your lifestream is poisoned.

Proverbs 4:23 “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.” (KJV)

"Above all else, guard your affections. For they influence everything else in your life." (TLB)

Until you get that poison out of your heart your life is going to be barren, you will poison every relationship, every endeavor will be fruitless, and you will make people miserable.  You will poison your ministry, and everything you say and do will carry the toxin of the poison in your heart, and no one will want to be around you.

The biggest problem that most people have is that they want to blame everybody else.  We want to blame it on the preacher, the boss, the wife, the husband, the rebellious kids, all those hypocrites in the church, or the devil.  We want to blame it on our environment, where we were born, what we didn’t have, or what we couldn’t do.  The truth is that we all have things we could complain about, but there can be no change or deliverance until we admit, the problem is me.

There is an old spiritual that says, “It’s not my brother or my sister but it’s me O lord, standing in the need of prayer.”

These men said: Everything around us is not the problem, it’s in the stream, it’s the bitter waters that are cursing the ground and we are losing our future: no babies are being born, no fruit is being produced in our lives.  These men made a decision that day to fight for their future and to fight for their destiny. 

One of the devil’s greatest fears is that you will become who you are destined to be and do what you are destined to do.  You have a divine D.N.A. that was put in you when you were born again. Every time the devil looks at you, he sees your potential.  The devil believes in you more than you believe in yourself and he is afraid of that seed you carry, that potential to become what God has ordained you to become, and he wants to kill the seed before it’s ever born.  Satan is a dream killer! He wants to destroy your future!

The men of the city said in essence, “This is not right and we do not accept it.  It is not normal and we are not satisfied just to be in a pretty place and watch our destiny being stripped away from us.  We have a problem, but we’re going to the problem solver.”

They decided their future was worth fighting for!

I wonder how many reading this believe that your future is worth fighting for?  How many are willing to fight for your children to be delivered from the hand of the enemy, and fight for the destiny of your grandchildren?  Fight for your marriage, fight for your health, fight for your ministry, fight for your God-given destiny?

I’m trying to tell you, if you want it you are going to have to fight for it.  The devil ain’t going to sit back and watch you waltz into your destiny without a fight.  Those children, grandchildren, future prophets, apostles, pastors, teachers, and evangelists are not going to walk into their callings without somebody fighting for them.

There are so many today who have lost their fight, lost their fire, and lost their passion.  They’ve settled down, and they’re satisfied just to know they're saved and not going to hell. All dressed up on Sundays, looking apostolic, maintaining the standards of the church, "having a form of godliness, but denying its power" (2 Timothy 3:5). They don’t care about anybody else.  They’ve become barren, unproductive, sterile, and unable to reproduce.  No spiritual births, no power to heal the sick or cast out devils or deliver the bound and the oppressed.

We need in the church of Jesus Christ, both men, and women, believers who are willing to stand up and say:  We are not satisfied with pretty, we don’t want to just be politically correct, we don’t want to draw a crowd just to watch them wither and die on the branch because the water is bitter.  We need believers who will come to Jesus and say, "Heaven, we have a problem!"

Come and heal our land, Jesus, come heal the bitter waters of our hearts through the purifying power of your Word.