The advert in the Samaria Times might have read something like this.
“Situation Vacant: prophet of God, to lead a band of prophets. Must be diplomatic and useful in battle and famines. Miracles, especially raising the dead, an advantage.”
Of course, Elisha didn’t become one of the most influential prophets in Israel’s history by answering a newspaper advert. So how did he end up “in the hot seat” as Elijah’s successor and God’s representative to Israel for 50 years in the ninth century BC? It all started with Elijah calling Elisha to follow him.
1 Kings 19 “19 So Elijah went from there and found Elisha son of Shaphat. He was ploughing with twelve yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the twelfth pair. Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him.”
Elijah’s cloak was a symbol of his gifting and calling as a prophet. When Elijah went and put his cloak on Elisha’s shoulders, he was symbolically inviting him to become a prophet too. Elisha responded to the call as we would hope we would when God calls us. He said yes.
“20 Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah. ‘Let me kiss my father and mother goodbye,’ he said, ‘and then I will come with you.’”
Elijah’s reply at this point may appear confusing.
‘Go back,’ Elijah replied. ‘What have I done to you?’
Different translations can help us see the meaning here. The New Living Translation says, “Go on back, but think about what I have done to you.”
The Message reads, “Go ahead,” said Elijah, “but, mind you, don’t forget what I’ve just done to you.”
With Elijah’s blessing, Elisha said goodbye to his family. And then he did something else.
“21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them. He burned the ploughing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.”
Elisha’s response to God’s call gives a perfect example of how anybody should respond when God calls them to serve him.
It began with the CALLING
Elisha didn’t become a prophet because he woke up one day and thought, I’d like to be a prophet. He became a prophet because Elijah called him to. In turn, Elijah only did that because God told him to. Just a few verses before in 1 Kings 19 verse 16 God had said to Elijah, “Anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet.” So actually it was God who called Elisha to become a prophet. And that’s the way it should always be in God’s service. Ministers don’t become ministers because they want to – but only because God calls them into pastoral ministry. Missionaries only become missionaries when God calls them to the mission field. Deacons and Home Group Leaders and people working with children and young people and indeed anybody who is serving God should only do so when God calls them to. God’s call to Elisha came through Elijah. Sometimes God’s call comes to us when ministers or church leaders or wise friends say, “have you ever thought about doing so and so.” I wonder, what might God be calling YOU to do today? Elisha heard God calling him through Elijah, and he responded to it. But he didn’t become a prophet immediately. Before he could become Elijah’s successor, Elisha had to become his assistant.
“Then Elisha set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.”
Elisha became Elijah’s attendant, his helper. The same word was used of Joshua’s relationship with Moses. Delivering God’s unpopular messages of judgment to Israel would not be easy. Elisha needed a period as an attendant, a time of training, of growing, of learning from his Spiritual Elder before he could take over the role of Prophet to God’s people.
A very biblical word for this process would be
DISCIPLESHIP
Elisha became Elijah’s disciple. The idea of discipleship isn’t very fashionable in the church today. Many people want to get stuck into a job straight away – they don’t like the idea of spending time as an apprentice or an assistant. On the contrary, the truth is that whatever the role in the church or in the world, everybody benefits from an opportunity to learn from somebody more experienced, being trained and encouraged and supported. As a chemistry teacher I was so grateful to learn from senior colleagues, and starting a minister I spent five years as Assistant Minister before I had my own church. Whatever the task in church life, Deacons, Home Group Leaders, Youthwork and Children’s Work, it is good to learn from those who have been doing the job for years. Passing on the baton of service in the church. If the great prophet Elisha needed to start off as an apprentice, so do we.
God called Elisha to a period of years of discipleship. And that took
COMMITMENT
“21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them. He burned the ploughing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.”
When the Romans invaded Britain 2000 years ago, the emperor Julius Caesar famously said, “if you want to take the island, burn the boats.” With no way to retreat, the soldiers would have no alternative but to march forward. Elisha didn’t burn his boats or his bridges but instead he did burn the plough and the oxen which were his livelihood. No turning back. For Elisha this was a radical break with the past. He was giving up everything he knew, to follow God’s calling to a new destiny, with a new lifestyle, and new priorities.
Calling, discipleship, commitment. Elisha would need one more very important thing before he could step into the hot seat as God’s prophet to Israel. But I’m not allowed to talk about it today because that is next week’s subject, so you’ll just have to come back for that. No spoilers.
So what does this story of how God makes a prophet have to say to Christians today? Elisha was CALLED. In the church it is not only prophets and ministers and missionaries who are called. All Christians are called by God. We are called from darkness to light and from death to life. We are called to be God’s children. We are called to be holy, set apart for God. We are called to tell other people about Jesus. Supremely, we are called to follow Jesus – just like Jesus called his first disciples.
Mark 1:14 “… Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 15 ‘The time has come,’ he said. ‘The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!’
16 As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. 17 ‘Come, follow me,’ Jesus said, ‘and I will send you out to fish for people.’ 18 At once they left their nets and followed him.”
“Come, follow me.” DISCIPLESHIP is not just for Old Testament prophets and ministers and missionaries. Christians are called to repent and believe the gospel and we are also all called to become disciples of Jesus. The Bible only uses the word “Christian” three times and the word “believer” only 30 times. Much more often, around 100 times, the Gospels and Acts talk about people being followers of Jesus, and following Jesus. That is what God calls Christians to do. To be the people who obey that simple command. “Follow me.” And then the New Testament word which is used over 300 times to describe followers of Jesus is “disciple”. Jesus was a Rabbi, a teacher, and those who followed him and learned from him and whose lives were shaped by him were called his disciples. All Christians are called to be disciples of Christ.
Discipleship is about learning. It is about obedience. And it is about passion. Somebody once said, “If one tenth of what you Christians believe is true, you should be ten times as excited as you are!” So the church needs to be making disciples. That is precisely what Jesus commanded his followers to do in Matthew 28:19. Make disciples. Part of that process is learning from older and wiser and more experienced Christians. There are many things in life which we learn by watching others. The piano teacher, the driving instructor, the personal trainer and the life coach all show us HOW TO do what we want to do. The best way to learn to speak French is to spend time with a Frenchman. So also in the Christian life there are individuals who inspire and encourage us by their passion in prayer, their boldness in evangelism, their commitment to holiness and their complete devotion to God. From their examples we learn skills, attitudes and character. We learn hospitality, patterns of prayer and devotional reading. We learn how to cope with life. We seek to imitate their work/life/church balance. We are fired by their wisdom, zeal and love. They are our role models. We catch their faith. As other people share their lives with us, we learn from them how to share our own life with other people. So much in the Christian life is better caught than taught! We need to be making disciples.
Older Christians – is there a young Christian you are supporting and teaching and encouraging in the early years of their faith? By your word and example?
Younger Christians – is there an older Christian you look up to and are learning from and sharing with and praying with?
Making disciples, one-to-one. The late Jascha Heifetz was a child prodigy. He became the highest paid virtuoso violinist in the world by the age of 18, and was widely regarded as the greatest in the twentieth century. When he retired from performing he became a professor of music. Heifetz explained his change of career like this: “Violin playing is a perishable art.” “It must be passed on as a personal skill; otherwise it is lost.” Living the Christian life is the same – it is a perishable art which must be passed on. We need to be making disciples.
And discipleship demands
COMMITMENT
Commitment is not just for prophets and ministers and missionaries. When Jesus said “Follow me” to Simon and Andrew, we read, “18 At once they left their nets and followed him. They left their nets.”
“19 When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John in a boat, preparing their nets. 20 Without delay he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.”
Like Elisha, those first disciples gave up everything they knew, they left their nets and their lives behind to follow Jesus on the road. They were completely committed. Some people are only involved in following Jesus – others are committed to him. It was the great tennis player Martina Navratilova who once said, “The difference between involvement and commitment is the difference between ham and eggs. In ham and eggs the chicken is involved but the pig is committed.” Being a true disciple of Jesus requires commitment. As Billy Graham said, “Salvation is free, but discipleship costs everything we have.”
Commitment is for every Christian. Remember what Jesus said to his disciples. “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross (daily) and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24). And another saying is even more challenging: “those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.” (Luke 14:33). Jesus deserves nothing less than our total commitment to him.
We just sang Stuart Townend’s hymn:
“I will feed the poor and hungry, I will stand up for the truth;
I will take my cross and follow To the corners of the earth.
And I ask that You so fill me With Your peace, Your power, Your breath,
That I never love my life so much To shrink from facing death.”
God calls every believer to follow in the steps of Elisha the prophet: calling, discipleship, commitment. Dedication, devotion, sacrifice. If this all sounds very hard, very costly, very, demanding, that is exactly what it is. But don’t be discouraged. Let me leave you with some inspiring words from the missionary martyr Jim Elliott. “That man is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.” Calling. Discipleship. Commitment. Because Jesus is worth it!

I saw a sign once in the shop in Colchester Zoo. “Unattended children will be sold as slaves”. For the family of one of the community of prophets murdered by Queen Jezabel, that was not a joke. That was exactly the situation the impoverished widow was facing in this morning’s story of the prophet Elisha and the poor widow. This is one of my favourite passages in the whole of the Old Testament, and I am sure you will soon see why. Here is a woman in desperate need. Speaking on behalf of God, the prophet Elisha responds to the woman with a wonderful question.
How can I help you? What can I do for you?
Here is the offer of help God graciously makes to anyone and everyone. But we only hear it at those times in our lives when we turn to God for help. What can I do for you? How can I help you?
God asks each one of us the same question. What do WE need from God? There are so many different kinds of need – so many hurting people. Facing the cost of living crisis, with the prices of food and fuel and energy going up so quickly, coming so soon after all the struggles of the Covid pandemic, many people now can’t make ends meet and are finding themselves in debt, as this poor widow had done. Very many people need wisdom to find the right way forward in these pressing circumstances. How can I help you? Wisdom was the thing that King Solomon asked for when God asked him that same question.
1 Kings 3 5 At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, ‘Ask for whatever you want me to give you.’
Solomon could have asked God for riches or power or victory in battle. But he realised his greatest need was very different.
8 Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number. 9 So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?’
We read that: 10 The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. 11 So God said to him, ‘Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, 12 I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. 13 Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for—both wealth and honour—so that in your lifetime you will have no equal among kings.
Many people feel we need the wisdom of Solomon just to cope in these difficult times. What do you want me to give you? How can I help you? What is your answer to God’s question this morning? I think this must surely be God’s favourite question. Because we find Jesus himself asking the blind beggar named Bartimaeus exactly the same thing. We looked at that story in a family service some years back but I haven’t preached a full length sermon about Bartimaeus here at North Springfield. It comes at the end of Mark 10.
Mark 10 46 Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (which means ‘son of Timaeus’), was sitting by the roadside begging. 47 When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’
48 Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’
49 Jesus stopped and said, ‘Call him.’
So they called to the blind man, ‘Cheer up! On your feet! He’s calling you.’ 50 Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus.
51 ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Jesus asked him.
The blind man said, ‘Rabbi, I want to see.’
52 ‘Go,’ said Jesus, ‘your faith has healed you.’ Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.
Since there won’t be time to return to Bartimaeus again, let me highlight the key points of his story this morning, using the first four letters of his name.
Bartimaeus was BLIND. That had trapped him in a life of inescapable poverty. But Bartimaeus knew that Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of David, could help him. He cried out and Jesus heard him and called him to him and asked that wonderful question, “What do you want me to do for you?” Bartimaeus could have just begged for food, or money or for a new cloak. But he was much bolder than that. “Rabbi, I want to see.”
Bartimaeus ASKED for his greatest need, the thing which would transform his life. He asked to be able to see. And then Jesus worked his miracle
Bartimaeus RECEIVED his sight. He could see again. “Your faith has healed you.”
We can also ask, and we also will receive. Jesus made these promises to all his disciples,
Matthew 7 7 ‘Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
Jesus invites us to ask him for whatever we need. Jesus asked Bartimaeus: ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ And Bartimaeus received his sight. In fact, the miracle was even greater than we might imagine. The word Jesus used was sozo, which means “your faith has made you whole”, and even “your faith has saved you.” Bartimaeus asked for his sight but the gift he received was all the blessings of God’s wonderful salvation. How did this happen?
Simply because Bartimaeus TRUSTED in Jesus. “Your faith has healed you.” Bartimaeus put his faith in Jesus. He asked and he received because he trusted. And we can do the same. There’s a four point sermon which is easy to remember. B. A. R. T. Blind Asked Received Trusted. If we had the time I could expand that into ten points using all the letters of Bartimaeus’s name. “Bartimaeus was Blind. He Asked and he Received because he Trusted Jesus.” In the same way, “I May Ask Expecting Undeserved Salvation.” There you go: Bartimaeus – a ten point acrostic sermon. Some people might think that was just showing off. But it’s true – Jesus invites us all to ask Him for whatever we need, even all the blessings of salvation.
What do you want me to do for you? How can I help you? That is the lovely question God is asking all of us this morning. Like Bartimaeus we may need healing. We may need wholeness. People may need to ask for God’s forgiveness and for all the blessings of salvation and new life. We may need God’s wisdom and guidance as Solomon did. Or our needs may be more practical – we may be facing money problems as desperate as the widow who came to Elisha. God cares just as much about “practical” matters as he does about “spiritual” things.
In this time of national mourning, we may be sad and grieving and we need God to comfort us. Facing the cost of living crisis in these uncertain times, people may be anxious or afraid. We may want to ask God to give us his peace. We may need God’s help in all kind’s of ways: for victory over temptation, or power to witness, or the grace to grow in Christ.
“How can I help you?” “What can I do for you?” Elisha asks this poor widow on God’s behalf in our story. But then she doesn’t even need to answer. God already knew her needs, just as God already KNOWS our needs! So the prophet goes on,
“What do you have in your house?” What have you got? (verse 2)
God wants to use US to work his miracles. We may feel we have very little to offer God – but HOWEVER little that is God can use it! The widow answered,
‘Your servant has nothing there at all,’ she said, ‘except a small jar of olive oil.’
The jar was so small that the woman almost forgot to mention it. But it was enough. When we offer God the little we have, however small it may be, he can take and use and transform it and do more than we can ask or even imagine.
“What do you have?” “What have you got?” Each of us have our spiritual gifts and our natural talents. We have our skills and our experience. We have our homes, our money, our possessions, our jobs, our friendships. From time to time it is good to hand all these back to God again. Everything that we have, indeed everything that we are, is given to us by God. We should surrender everything back to God again. He can use all these things to bless us, to bless each other and to bless a needy world. We may not feel we have a lot to give, just a tiny jar of oil, too small to mention, but God wants to use every one of us in his service for his glory! We just need to offer everything back to God as this woman did.
This is the case in our everyday lives, and it is also true in the life of the church. We have seen from Ephesians chapter 4 God wants all of his people to be active in serving Him.
The Good News Translation of Ephesians 4:16 Under Christ’s control all the different parts of the body fit together, and the whole body is held together by every joint with which it is provided. So when each separate part works as it should, the whole body grows and builds itself up through love.
The church will only thrive when each part does its work, when every one of us puts the little we have got into God’s hands for Him to use as He chooses. When each of us use our spiritual gifts, and build each other up by showing true Christian love for each other. “What have you got?” God wants to use EACH and EVERY one of us here in His church.
Back to the plot. “What have you got?” Elisha asked. So we find the poor widow and her sons stepping out in faith and obedience.
3 Elisha said, ‘Go round and ask all your neighbours for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. 4 Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.’
5 She left him and shut the door behind her and her sons.
Can you imagine how foolish that woman felt going round to all her neighbours asking for empty jars. EVERYBODY knew she didn’t have ANYTHING to put in the jars. But the woman and her sons were courageous enough and trusting enough to do as Elisha had instructed. They went out on a limb for God. We don’t need great faith – just faith in a great God, going out on a limb for God.
That is exactly what God calls us to do. To be prepared to step out on a limb for Him. To be prepared to look a little bit foolish telling other people about Jesus. All it takes is a little bit of faith. A little bit of obedience. That’s what the widow did. She trusted, she obeyed, and here comes the miracle!
They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. 6 When all the jars were full, she said to her son, ‘Bring me another one.’
But he replied, ‘There is not a jar left.’ Then the oil stopped flowing.
She just kept on pouring! Vv 5-7
She didn’t have a lot – just a tiny jar of oil. Still she kept on pouring olive oil out of her jar into all the empty jars until there wasn’t an empty jar left. God’s grace is overflowing! God doesn’t just meet her immediate needs – he goes on to do far more than she dared ask or even imagine. Because our God is the God who works miracles!
7 She went and told the man of God, and he said, ‘Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left.’
God’s blessing NEVER runs out. The only limit to God’s working is the extent to which we give Him opportunities to act. How much we are prepared to give of ourselves, our time, our talents, for him to use and transform. How open we are to being channels of HIS love, grace and power. We may not think we have very much “just a tiny little jar of oil, hardly worth mentioning really,” but when we surrender the little we do have to God he can work miracles! “She kept on pouring!” Each of us as individuals needs more of God’s love and grace and power! As a church we all need more of the overflowing grace and love and power of God which just keeps on pouring out!
Just a few weeks ago we thought about the church in terms of the premises, the programme, the people and the presence of God. In the context of our life as a church God asks us, “How can I help you?” “What can I do for you?” That might lead us just to think about the programme of the church. But then God asks, “What have you got?” That will prompt us to thank God for his provision of our premises, and also for all the people He has brought together in this fellowship. Then we read of how the poor widow just kept on pouring, and that will speak to us of the presence of God in our midst, pouring out his power and His Holy Spirit into our lives, blessing upon blessing upon blessing. If any of us want to move on in our individual Christian lives, we need to be open to the working of God the Holy Spirit. Ministers who want to be used by God need the Holy Spirit. And if any church wants to move on with God the secret is the same – we need more of the power and presence of God the Holy Spirit.
“She just kept on pouring”. The blessings God pours down will never, ever run out. Paul reminded the Philippians that God’s grace is always adequate for ALL our needs!
Philippians 4:19 And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
We also have received this same amazing grace of God. We also know the one we have put our trust in. Jesus has died for our sins. We share in his resurrection life and his immortality. We have received the love of God which never lets us go. God will always be faithful. God is not just able, he is much, much, more than able to meet all our needs and take care of us and keep us safe.
She just kept on pouring. God’s grace never runs out. Let me remind you of that story about an ambassador who was looking for a new car. He sent off to all the major manufacturers, Jaguar, Bentley, Daimler asking for the specifications of their top models. The other makes replied with all sorts of details: top speed, brake horsepower, miles per gallon, time to 60 mph, sound system and so on. Rolls Royce sent back a message with just one word on it. “Adequate”. For all of our situations the overflowing grace of God is much more than just adequate! Our God is “more than able”!
She offered to God that tiny jar of olive oil, and with the miraculous power of Almighty God, the woman just kept on pouring. And God will keep on pouring his love and his peace and His Holy Spirit into our lives.
She just kept on pouring. In the same way, we can open our lives to the unlimited possibilities which the Presence of Almighty God brings to us. How can I help you? What do you want me to do for you? What have you got? She just kept on pouring!
Ephesians 3 20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
Let us respond in reflection and prayer.
What are your answers to God’s questions?
How can I help you?
What do you have?
Draw near in faith and obedience – she just kept on pouring!

Which people from the Old Testament do you think get the most mentions in the Four Gospels? Obviously top of the league is great King David with 39 appearances, closely followed by Moses at 38. Abraham is named 32 times. But the next might be a surprise to you. Not Jacob with 14 mentions or Isaac with just 7. It is the prophet Elijah, whose whole story only occupies 5 chapters in the Old Testament, who appears 26 times in the Gospels.
If we are comparing people in the New Testament with those in the Old Testament, when we think of Elijah we would immediately think of John the Baptist. The Old Testament foretold that God would send a Messenger to prepare the way for the nation of Israel to welcome her Saviour the Messiah.
Malachi 4 5 ‘See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes. 6 He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.’
So the Jews were expecting God’s Messenger to come, to prepare the way for the Saviour, and that the Messenger would be Elijah. Jesus actually identified John the Baptist as the fulfilment of those prophecies.
Matthew 11 14 … he is the Elijah who was to come.
John the Baptist was certainly Elijah returning to prepare the way for the Saviour and the day of salvation. But this morning I want us to make a different comparison and see the many ways in which Elijah also foreshadowed the life of Jesus himself.

During Lent we have already thought about three individuals whose lives serve as types, or patterns, for the life of Jesus. Adam brought us condemnation but Jesus bought us salvation. As in Adam all die so in Christ all are made alive. Joseph was the physical saviour of the descendants of Abraham and of the whole region of Egypt. Jesus is the spiritual saviour of everybody who puts their trust in him. Last week we saw how Moses what the saviour of the Israelites, and more than that all the events of the Exodus give us a pattern for the wonderful salvation we received through Christ. Escape from slavery and death to freedom and eternal life – all through the death of Christ our Passover Lamb and the glorious miracle of his resurrection from the dead.
Elijah foreshadowed John the Baptist but there were also many ways in which Elijah’s life pointed forward to Jesus as well. Elijah was a type, or a pattern, of Christ. We can start by pointing out that during Jesus’s ministry there were some people who did identify Jesus was Elijah.
While Jesus and his disciples were preaching throughout Galilee, we read this.
Mark 6 14 King Herod heard about this, for Jesus’ name had become well known. Some were saying, “John the Baptist has been raised from the dead, and that is why miraculous powers are at work in him.”
15 Others said, “He is Elijah.”
And still others claimed, “He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of long ago.”
The disciples reported the same.
Matthew 16 13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’
14 They replied, ‘Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’
The reason people were thinking that Jesus was Elijah was that

BOTH JESUS AND ELIJAH WERE GREAT PROPHETS
Both had an itinerant, travelling ministry.
Matthew 8 20 Jesus replied, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

Both Jesus and Elijah brought God’s love and blessing to the poor and oppressed and even to those outside Israel.

Both Jesus and Elijah were preaching God’s righteousness, calling a nation who had rejected their God to repentance.

Both were hated and feared by the King and by the nation’s leaders, because the common people recognised them as prophets.

Both Jesus and Elijah worked powerful miracles, signs and wonders.
They fed the hungry. They healed the sick. They even raised dead people back to life again. One comparison is particularly significant. They each blessed poor widows in desperate situations. We know the story of Jesus feeding 5000 families with just five loaves and two fishes. But in Elijah’s time, during a desperate famine, God worked a miracle with a jar of flour and a jar of oil which never ran out. A widow and her son were saved. When Jesus gave his first sermon and talked about taking God’s blessings to outsiders, and to the poor and the needy, he compared his ministry to that of Elijah.
Luke 4 24 “I tell you the truth,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. 25 I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. 26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.

Both Jesus and Elijah were despised and rejected by God’s own people.

Both Jesus and Elijah could well be described as “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”

Being God’s messenger always brings opposition and persecution and suffering. You might remember the story of how discouraged and depressed Elijah became, foreshadowing Jesus’s experiences of rejection and suffering. How Elijah just wanted to die. Remember how God appeared to Elijah on Mount Horeb and comforted him, not in the wind, not in the earthquake, not in the fire, but in the still small voice of calm. Elijah as one of the greatest Old Testament prophets pointed forward to Jesus as the greatest messenger from God. And Elijah’s sufferings as a prophet foreshadowed Jesus’s sufferings.

Jesus is like Elijah because
BOTH JESUS AND ELIJAH WON GREAT VICTORIES OVER EVIL.

In the contest on Mount Carmel against the prophets of Baal, God demonstrated his superiority over the false gods of the surrounding nations.
36 At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: ‘LORD, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. 37 Answer me, LORD, answer me, so these people will know that you, LORD, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.’
38 Then the fire of the LORD fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.
39 When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, ‘The LORD—he is God! The LORD—he is God!’
The contest on Mount Carmel was a decisive victory over the false gods who were leading the people away from God.
Throughout his ministry Jesus was defeating the powers of evil.
1 John 3 8 The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.
We thought about this in our evening Zoom Church last week. Jesus did not only come to save human beings from death. At the same time he came to set the world free from the grip of the devil. A large part of that was his ministry of driving out demons, setting free those who were imprisoned by evil.
Matthew 12 28 But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.
29 “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can rob his house.
In that little parable of disarming the strong man, the strong man represents the devil and Jesus is represented by the person plundering his possessions which is a picture of Jesus driving out demons. Jesus was able to command the demons because he had already “tied up” the devil. And Jesus accomplished that at the very beginning of His ministry when he was tempted by the devil in the wilderness. Jesus was tempted. But He did not give in to temptation. Jesus was the first human being ever who did not give in to the devil’s temptations. He proved there that He was stronger than the devil. It was there in the wilderness that Jesus “bound the strong man”. From that point on, the battle was won. Demons would have to obey Jesus every time!
Jesus came to release the prisoners and set the captives free – to set people free from evil by driving out demons. But the decisive victory over the devil and all the powers of evil was won on the cross. Just a few days before he died Jesus said this.
John 12 31 Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. 32 But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.”
The hour has arrived. The hour which Jesus had been anticipating every day of his life was getting very close indeed. It would be a vital hour not just for Jesus but for the whole world, the whole of humanity in every age. Jesus would be glorified – but that would be through his death. The judgment and the salvation of the whole world would hang on that one hour. For Jesus it would be the hour of his departure – the hour Jesus had to leave the world in death. But that be the hour when the devil was finally defeated and the grip of evil on the world would be broken for good. On the cross Christ not only paid the penalty for our sin. He also won the victory over the devil and all the powers of evil.
Colossians 2 13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.
It was by the sacrifice of his death on the cross that Jesus set human beings free from the grip which the devil has over us all. We were slaves of sin – Jesus’s death sets us free.
Hebrews 2 14 Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— 15 and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.
Both Elijah and Jesus went into battle with evil. Just as Elijah won that decisive victory over the prophets of the false god Baal on Mount Carmel, even more so on the cross Jesus defeated the devil and set us free. As we put our trust in Jesus, we share in the benefits of his victory. We have overcome, because he has overcome.
And there is just one more way in which the life of Elijah foreshadowed the life of the Jesus.
SPOILER ALERT! If you don’t want to know how the story of Easter ends, look away now.

Jesus is like Elijah because
BOTH JESUS AND ELIJAH LIVE ON FOREVER
This is how the life of Elijah ends.
2 Kings 2 11 As (Elijah and Elisha) were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. 12 Elisha saw this and cried out, ‘My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!’ And Elisha saw him no more.
Elijah was one of the two people who the Old Testament tells us went straight to heaven without dying. His life had a very happy ending. He was still alive!
In contrast, Jesus was not spared death. But the Bible tells us that his life had an even more glorious end. The tomb was empty. Jesus rose from the dead, never more to die. Elijah foreshadows Jesus because both are alive forever,
And after his resurrection, just as Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind, we read in Acts 1 that Jesus ascended to heaven.
9 After (Jesus) said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. 11 ‘Men of Galilee,’ they said, ‘why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.’
Jesus and Elijah. Mighty prophets, bringing God’s message of judgment and salvation and calling God’s people to repentance. Working miracles, feeding the hungry, healing the sick and even raising the dead. Defeating the powers of evil. And finally triumphing over death, alive forevermore.
Jesus asked in Matthew 16:13 … , ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’
14 They replied, ‘Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’
15 ‘But what about you?’ he asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’
16 Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’

This was the message at the Induction of our dear friend Rev June Love as minister of Southwell Church.

Being a Christian minister is just like juggling with live chickens. When I say “live chickens”, I am NOT thinking about Deacons or church members, however much clucking and flapping and squawking they may often do! I’m thinking about all the different responsibilities Ministers have to juggle with. Preaching. Teaching. Visiting. Counselling. Worship. Weddings. Funerals. Giving a lead. Steering the ship. Evangelism. Training. Enabling. Administration. Union. Association. Ecumenical activities. Prayer. Study. Husband. Family. Friends. All of these areas demand and deserve our time and energy, but each one is as slippery and hard to juggle as a live chicken. And then, just when you feel you are almost succeeding in keeping all these in the air at once, there are all the balls and skittles and flaming torches and live chickens that other people throw your way. “Say pastor, give me a hand will you. I just can’t cope with this ostrich any more. Catch!”
(If anybody wants to read more about Juggling with Chickens, see my blog piece at
http://pbthomas.com/thoughts/?page_id=28

I have some words for June as she takes up her new juggling challenge here in Southwell. But they are words for the church too, and for all of us gathered here. What does God have to say to us from this inspiring story of a widow who was in so much debt that her children were about to be sold as slaves? Here is a woman in desperate need. And into this need the prophet Elisha asks what must surely be God’s favourite question.
How can I help you? What can I do for you?
Actually, God graciously makes this offer to anyone and everyone. But we usually only hear it at those times in our lives when we turn to God for help. “What can I do for you? How can I help you?” What do WE need from God?
That’s a question for all of us as individuals. How can I help you? We may need forgiveness, healing, wholeness, the blessings of salvation. Think of blind Bartimaeus in Mark 10,
“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him. “Teacher,” the blind man answered, “I want to see again.” “Go,” said Jesus, “your faith has healed you.” “your faith has made you whole”
Our needs may be more practical – this widow had money problems– God cares just as much about the “practical” as he does about the “spiritual”. Or we may need peace, or guidance, or victory over temptation, or power to witness or to grow in Christ. Life is full of questions and problems and challenges. From time to time we all need wisdom – and that’s what Solomon asked for when God asked him.
1 Kings 3:5 the LORD appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, “Ask for whatever you want me to give you.” “Give me the wisdom I need to rule your people with justice and to know the difference between good and evil.” The Lord replied “ I will do what you have asked. I will give you more wisdom and understanding than anyone has ever had before or will ever have again.”
“What can I do for you?” God is asking you, June. You will certainly need wisdom. And he’s asking each one of us this afternoon, “What do you need?” “How can I help you?”
But as well as our own personal circumstances, God is asking you as Southwell Baptist church, “What can I do for you? How can I help you? What are your prayers, your hopes, your aspirations for the future as a church?”
Do you want to be a praying church? A spirit-filled church? A loving church? An evangelistic church? A church where people find God? A church with genuine worship? A church with inspiring teaching? A church which welcomes everybody? A church where Christians grow to maturity? A church with all ages together side by side? How can I help you? What kind of church do you want to be?
When people start praying for their church, they usually start by praying for their activities. Programmes matter! When you think about it, most of the time when people talk about church, they actually have in mind the church’s PROGRAMME.
Sometime in the week ahead somebody may ask you how was church this weekend? “It was great,” you might say. “We had the Induction for our new Minister. The sermon was brilliant.” (Well, even ministers can dream!!) But other weeks some people might go home from church saying, “I didn’t get much out of church this week”. What they really mean by that is they didn’t get to sing any of their favourite songs. The reading was boring. And the coffee was cold. People assess their experience of church on the basis of the programme.
People say “I like this church, but I don’t like such-and-such a church.” What they usually mean is they prefer the activities and events offered by that church. Most people don’t choose their church on the basis of its theology, whether it believes and preaches the Bible, whether it is open to the power of the Holy Spirit. Most people choose their church on the basis of the things it does.
So the programme of services and activities and events a church arranges does matter! In order to become the kind of Church God wants us to be, every church needs to get their programme sorted! And that should always be a programme which doesn’t just keep the saints happy but is designed to bring the sinners in and get them saved! “I will build my church,” Jesus promised,” Built UP to Christian maturity. TOGETHER in community. OUT in evangelism and social action. MORE in numbers. Growing WARMER through fellowship, DEEPER through discipleship, STRONGER through worship, BROADER through ministry. LARGER through evangelism. Jesus IS building his church. It is HIS church, not OUR church. “So how can I help YOU?” God is asking Southwell Baptist Church today. “What do YOU want me to do for you?”
How can I help you? Elisha asks this poor widow on God’s behalf in our story – but then did you notice she doesn’t actually have to answer? God already knew her needs – God already knows all OUR needs! So the prophet goes on,
What do you have? What have you got?
God wants to use US to work his miracles. We may feel we have very little to offer God – but HOWEVER LITTLE that is God can use it! The widow answered, “Nothing at all, except a small jar of olive oil.” So little the woman almost forgot to mention it. But it was enough. The little we have is useless of itself. But when we offer up to God the little we have, he can take and use and transform it!
We may feel as individuals that we don’t have very much which God can use. We may feel we aren’t gifted, we aren’t rich, some of us may not be as young and full of boundless energy as we used to be. And as a church we may feel we don’t have much that God can use. We are only a tiny church with so few members. We can’t run all the activities larger churches can. Our worship can’t be as loud (although that may not be a bad thing). But the truth is that however little we may think we have, God can use it to do more than we can ask or even imagine.
What do you have? As a church, what have you got? Starting from now, you have a minister! You have a June! June, you have your training, your experience, your spiritual gifts, your time and energy. You may feel totally inadequate and ill-equipped for the new juggling challenge before you. And that’s true! No minister is competent and gifted enough to keep all those chickens in the air and never drop one occasionally. But as Paul said, “When I am weak then I am strong.” But don’t let anybody forget what the role of a minister is!!
Ephesians 4:11 Christ appointed some to be apostles, others to be prophets, others to be evangelists, others to be pastors and teachers, 12 to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up. … To prepare ALL God’s people for the work of Christian service. It is NOT the task of the minister to do all the works of Christian service herself. It is her joy and privilege to enable and train and equip and encourage and envision the whole church so that ALL God’s people are active in Christian work. 16 Under Christ’s control all the different parts of the body fit together, and the whole body is held together by every joint with which it is provided. So when each separate part works as it should, the whole body grows and builds itself up through love. As each part does its work!
It’s not just down to you June! Every single person in the church has to play their part! Each of us must offer ourselves to God.
What have you got? What has the church got? You have probably already heard about the man who one Sunday discovered the most marvellous church. The worship was heavenly, the teaching inspiring, the fellowship warm and uplifting. Southwell Baptist Church obviously! But when the man went back the next day, the church had gone – vanished – he couldn’t find that church anywhere! How could this be? Oh, he found the building – but he didn’t find the church – because the church wasn’t there – the people weren’t there! The church is the people! What every church has got is its PEOPLE. Church is NOT just what we DO on when we meet together on a Sunday. Church is the people we ARE as Christians 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Often God wants the answers to our prayers to come through each other. The little we have may be just what our neighbour needs. The little time we lovingly give to them. The hospitality. The word of encouragement. God can take so little and make it accomplish so much. What have you got which God wants you to use to help your neighbour?
The programme we arrange has a part to play, but the people are more important than the programme! The programme is just a means to an end, not an end in itself. BEING church is much more about the relationships we form with people than the programme of services and activities we run. Every church needs to discover more and more of what it means to “be church,” to be Christ’s body here on earth. Not meetings and events but relationships and friendships. Not a business but a family.
“What have you got?” God asks. The church ARE the people. Each and every one of us has spiritual gifts, natural talents, hard work, our homes, our possessions, our time, our selves. We must offer all of these to God. Every part doing its work and building each other up by showing true Christian love for each other. The difference between Body of Christ and a human body is that the Body of Christ doesn’t have an appendix. NO part of the Body of Christ is redundant or useless. God has jobs for each and every one of us to do. We may feel we have very little to offer to God. But God delights in taking even the smallest thing and using it and multiplying it for his praise and glory as each of us do what God wants us to do.
A talking dog walked into Job Centre and asked for a job. The Employment Officer was amazed, but quickly said, “There’s a circus in town this week – go and see if they have any vacancies for a dog.”
Next day the dog was back in Job Centre again. “What happened with the circus?” the officer asked.
“Oh that was no use,” the dog replied. “They wanted a performing dog – I’m a bricklayer!”
Some people opt out of church life because they aren’t invited to do the thing they think they are good at or the job THEY want to do. But our responsibility is to play the part GOD assigns us – using the gifts HE has given to do the job HE wants us to do! Belonging to a church is like belonging to an orchestra – turning up for the rehearsals as well as playing in the concerts. It’s like belonging to a football team, playing your hardest every minute so that the team wins, rather than you getting all the glory for an occasional spectacular solo goal. It is when each separate part works as it should that the whole body grows. No opting out!
“What have you got?” God wants to use EACH and EVERY one of us in His church. Because the church are the PEOPLE! And that’s what makes church so interesting. A while back our Deacons were discussing health regulations on selling food to the public at our Christian Aid Coffee Morning. In case anybody suffers from some allergy, every cake needs to be labelled with ingredients and who made it. One of our Deacons had a brilliant idea, “Wouldn’t it be much easier if we just put a sign over the door of the church for everybody to see, “WARNING – MAY CONTAIN NUTS!” Every church ought to have a sign like that over the door! “What have you got?” The church are the people. God has given us each other – nuts and all! We need to learn to appreciate each other and love each other from the heart!
Actually as I think about it, with June as your minister, you may need a slightly different sign. You probably won’t need the word “MAY contain nuts”. But I digress.
What can I do for you? What have you got? Back to the story, where we find the poor desperate widow and her sons stepping out in faith and obedience.
3 Elisha said, “Go round and ask all your neighbours for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. 4 Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.”
Imagine how silly the widow felt asking for empty jars when EVERYBODY knew she didn’t have ANYTHING to put in the jars. But she was willing to go our on a limb for God. Which is exactly what God calls us to do to. To be prepared to step out in faith for God. To be prepared to look a little bit foolish telling other people about Jesus. All it takes is a little bit of faith. We don’t need great faith – just faith in a great God. A little step of faith. A tiny bit of obedience. That’s what this widow did. She trusted, she obeyed, and here comes the miracle!
They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. When all the jars were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another one.” But he replied, “There is not a jar left.”
She just kept on pouring!
God doesn’t just meet our immediate needs – he goes on to do far more than we can ask or even imagine. He is the God who works miracles!! “Sell the olive-oil and pay all your debts, and there will be enough money left over for you and your sons to live on.”
God’s blessing NEVER runs out – the only limit to God’s working is the extent to which we give Him opportunities to act – how much we are prepared to give of ourselves, our time, our faith, our talents, for him to use and transform – how open we are to receiving HIS love, grace and power and to becoming channels of his blessing to others.
Whatever your personal needs this afternoon: forgiveness, healing, wholeness, salvation peace, victory over temptation, power to witness, to grow in Christ, guidance, wisdom, whatever your needs, God’s grace is sufficient for you. Every one of us needs to experience more and more or that overflowing grace and love and power of God which just keeps on pouring out!!
And in the exciting days to come, as Southwell Baptist Church, God’s grace will be more than sufficient for you! “She just kept on pouring!” Out of his glorious riches in Christ Jesus, God will just keep on pouring his grace and his power and His Spirit into all our situations. God’s grace is sufficient for ALL our needs!
We just need to ask – and then leave space for God to work. WHAT WE NEED is that overflowing grace of God! The programme is important. The people are more important. But the most important thing in what it means to be the church is the PRESENCE of GOD. Jesus promises in Matthew 18:20 Where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them. That’s exactly what church is – 2 or 3 who are in the presence of Jesus – people meeting God! The whole purpose of the programme, the whole reason we gather together as the people of God, is to bring us to the point of an encounter with the PRESENCE of God. If God isn’t here, we aren’t church at all! It is the presence of the Risen Christ in the midst and the activity of God the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers that transforms a group of very ordinary people us into the church, the Body of Christ, the Living Temple where God dwells by His Holy Spirit. And when God is present, there is no limit to His love and grace and power! She just kept on pouring!
Years ago an Ambassador was looking for a new car so he sent off to all the major manufacturers, Jaguar, Bentley, Daimler asking for the specifications. Top speed, brake horsepower, mpg, time to 60 mph, sound system and so on. Rolls Royce sent back a message with just one word on it – “adequate”.
For all of our situations – the overflowing grace of God is much more than just adequate! “What can I do for you?” God is ready and willing to meet all our needs as individuals and as His church. As we freely hand over to him however little we have to offer, his “more than adequate” blessings will just keep on pouring into our lives! She kept on pouring!
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, so much more than we can ever ask for, or even think of, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)

When we are really hungry we might say “I could eat a horse!” But on occasions people have become much more desperate than that. Some have become so hungry they have stolen food. Some have become so desperate that they would kill to be able to eat. And there was that story a few years ago when a plane crashed in the arctic and the survivors were so starving that they actually ate the flesh of those who had died in the crash. That is how desperate the Israelites who were trapped in the besieged city of Samaria had become.
2 Kings 6 25 There was a great famine in the city; the siege lasted so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter of a cab of seed pods for five shekels.
26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
27 The king replied, “If the LORD does not help you, where can I get help for you? From the threshing floor? From the winepress?” 28 Then he asked her, “What’s the matter?”
She answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give up your son so we may eat him today, and tomorrow we’ll eat my son.’ 29 So we cooked my son and ate him. The next day I said to her, ‘Give up your son so we may eat him,’ but she had hidden him.”
30 When the king heard the woman’s words, he tore his robes.
Truly a desperate – life and death situation! But into that disaster God brought
MIRACULOUS DELIVERANCE
2 Kings 7 5 … When they reached the edge of the camp, not a man was there, 6 for the Lord had caused the Arameans to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a great army, so that they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings to attack us!” 7 So they got up and fled in the dusk and abandoned their tents and their horses and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.
In that desperate situation God had provided a miraculous rescue – but none of the Israelites in the city knew about it. They thought they were still trapped. Only four men knew the true. Four men who were the most desperate because they suffered from a dreaded skin disease. So they were outcasts, banished from the city.
2 Kings 7 3 Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate. They said to each other, “Why stay here until we die? 4 If we say, ‘We’ll go into the city’—the famine is there, and we will die. And if we stay here, we will die. So let’s go over to the camp of the Arameans and surrender. If they spare us, we live; if they kill us, then we die.”
5 At dusk they got up and went to the camp of the Arameans.
And so it was that these four outcasts discovered the wonderful truth.
When they reached the edge of the camp, not a man was there!,
The Arameans had all run away. The enemy was defeated, the siege was over, suffering was ended! Once again God had saved his people! No wonder the four lepers celebrated!
8 The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.

This story has an obvious parallel, of course. The situation in the world around us today is truly desperate. We may not see people starving to death on our doorsteps – although the problems to millions of families caused by poverty and debt in this country are bad enough. But just watch the news and you will hear of chemical weapons being used in Syria and more than a million child refugees who have had to abandon homes and sometimes families to escape that country.
Tensions between the West and North Korea and also with Iran remain high. The dictator Robert Mugabe has begun his seventh term as president of Zimbabwe despite evidence of widespread fraud in the elections. The world is as much of a mess as it has ever been.
But God has already provided a miraculous deliverance from this desperate situation. God has given his Son Jesus Christ to be the Saviour of all who put their trust in Him. Christians have already experienced this wonderful rescue. The power of Christ which is sufficient for every situation. The God who meets all our needs through the riches of His grace in Jesus Christ. In many ways Christians are like those four lepers who discovered and experienced God’s deliverance of the city.
Those four men were really enjoying all the benefits of that amazing rescue. But then they realised something very important.
2 Kings 7 9 Then they said to each other, “We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace.”
They had a MESSAGE TO DELIVER
“We have good news – we shouldn’t keep it to ourselves!” Those four men knew that the enemy was defeated. They knew that the people in the city could be saved. They knew that people who were starving did not need to die. They knew they should not keep such wonderful amazing life-saving news to themselves!
10 So they went and called out to the city gatekeepers and told them, “We went into the Aramean camp and not a man was there—not a sound of anyone—only tethered horses and donkeys, and the tents left just as they were.” 11 The gatekeepers shouted the news, and it was reported within the palace.

And Christians are just like those four men. We also have a message to deliver. It is perfectly right for us to be enjoying the blessings of the good news of Jesus Christ for ourselves. But it would be completely wrong for us to keep that message to ourselves. We have to share it!
Jesus came with a message of Good News! From the very beginning of his ministry this was the message Jesus brought.
Luke 4 18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 19to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
Good news for the poor. Freedom and healing and deliverance and God’s blessing! And those blessings are not just for some elite group of people. The blessings of salvation would not be reserved for God’s chosen people Israel any longer. They would be offered to everybody! God’s blessings will be for everyone who puts their faith in Jesus! This is the wonderful message all Christians have been given to deliver. We should not keep it to ourselves!
Of course, any message about salvation can get a sceptical response.
2 Kings 7 11 The gatekeepers shouted the news, and it was reported within the palace.
12 The king got up in the night and said to his officers, “I will tell you what the Arameans have done to us. They know we are starving; so they have left the camp to hide in the countryside, thinking, ‘They will surely come out, and then we will take them alive and get into the city.’ ”
People are often suspicious of a message which brings good news. Thankfully at least one person realized that the sensible thing to do would be to investigate and see if the message is true.
13 One of his officers answered, “Have some men take five of the horses that are left in the city. Their plight will be like that of all the Israelites left here—yes, they will only be like all these Israelites who are doomed. So let us send them to find out what happened.”
That will always be the sensible thing to do. If somebody brings you good news – check it out! And that is what they did.
14 So they selected two chariots with their horses, and the king sent them after the Aramean army. He commanded the drivers, “Go and find out what has happened.” 15 They followed them as far as the Jordan, and they found the whole road strewn with the clothing and equipment the Arameans had thrown away in their headlong flight. So the messengers returned and reported to the king. 16 Then the people went out and plundered the camp of the Arameans. So a seah of flour sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley sold for a shekel, as the LORD had said.

The message was true! The siege was over! The people in the city were saved, not in the least by their own efforts but entirely by God’s miraculous deliverance. They were rescued because the four lepers had passed on the good news as they were obliged to do. But let’s just think a bit more about their motivation for speaking out.
MOTIVES FOR SPEAKING
First of all they were surely joyful and grateful for their own experiences of being saved.
8 The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.

They had food and drink. They had taken plunder and humanly speaking these outcasts were richer than they had ever been in their lives. Unless they were totally self-centred, we would expect those four men to want other people to share in those blessings as well. They would want other people to live rather than to die!

But then they had a second motive for speaking.

9 Then they said to each other, “We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace.”

It would have been morally wrong for those men to stay silent. Knowing good news but keeping it to yourself would be morally wrong! God would prefer it if Christians shared the Good News of Jesus Christ out of joy and gratitude rather than out of a sense of duty. But God would prefer it if we shared the gospel out of duty, or even out of a fear of punishment, rather than us staying silent and never sharing the gospel at all!
Remember the apostle Paul’s motives for speaking as he shared the gospel.
1 Corinthians 9 6 Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! 17 If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward; if not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. 18 What then is my reward? Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so not make use of my rights in preaching it. …. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.
Paul was ready to do whatever it takes to share the gospel! So should we!
By the way, did you notice the sense of urgency the four men felt?
2 Kings 7:9 If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace.”
They were lepers and outcasts. So they were taking a big risk in even approaching the city gates. But they didn’t wait until morning. People were dying!! As soon as they recognised the enormous responsibility they faced, the men went at once to deliver the good news. The message of the gospel is no less urgent today! We have a message to deliver about a miraculous deliverance. “This is a day of good news. We should not keep it to ourselves!”
I am always moved by the story is told of a messenger who was sent by a great king to the governor of his prison to deliver an important message. But it was a hot day and the messenger was thirsty so he stopped off at a taverna for a tequila on the way. He was still thirsty so he had another tequila. Then a little siesta. Then another tequila. And another. So it was dusk when the messenger finally arrived at the prison and he heard the bell tolling as yet another prisoner was executed. The messenger delivered his message to the prison governor. Of course, it was a pardon for the man who had just died.
“This is a day of good news. We should not – we dare not – keep it to ourselves!”

The definition of a pessimist is you give him a polo mint and he’ll complain about the hole! By nature I am a pessimist. Among the great characters of literature, I relate best to Eeyore the donkey in Winnie the Pooh, or Puddlegum the Marshwiggle in the Narnia books, or those Shakespearean soothsayers who go around cheerfully declaring, “Woe, woe, and thrice woe!” My book on statistics tells me that the odds are at least 5 to 4 that the light at the end of the tunnel is going to be the headlamp of an approaching train. So you will guess that my favourite characters on television are the ever-gloomy Toby Zeigler from the West Wing, and even further back, that dour Scots undertaker on Dad’s Army, Corporal Fraser. Whenever something happened, good or bad, Corporal Fraser would always say, “Doomed – we’re doomed!” So you will immediately realise why I like the Good News Bible translation of this story about Elisha.
2 Kings 6:13 When he was told that Elisha was in Dothan, 14(the King of Aram, Israel’s enemies) sent a large force there with horses and chariots. They reached the town at night and surrounded it. 15Early the next morning Elisha’s servant got up, went out of the house, and saw the Syrian troops with their horses and chariots surrounding the town. He went back to Elisha and exclaimed, “We are doomed, sir! What shall we do?”
Elijah was facing big PROBLEMS
The King of Aram was very angry. All his attacks on Israel were being thwarted and he suspected he had a mole in his own camp. But the reality was that God was warning the Israelites through Elisha the prophet. So the King of Aram sent a whole army of soldiers and chariots to capture Elisha. They surrounded Dothan and when Elisha’s servant saw all these troops and horses and chariots he was terrified. No way of escape. “We’re doomed.”
Sometimes we face problems – sometimes big problems. Illness. Bereavement. Crises at work or in the family. Sometimes we can feel as desperate as Elisha’s servant did – sometimes it can feel as if we are doomed! But we can learn a lot from the way Elisha faced this crisis.
15 When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. “Oh, my lord, what shall we do?” the servant asked.
16 “Don’t be afraid,” the prophet answered. “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”

Elisha knew that He was serving God – and that God would protect him.

17 And Elisha prayed, “O LORD, open his eyes so he may see.” Then the LORD opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.

Then his servant saw what Elisha could already see – “those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”
When we feel doomed, when we feel completely overwhelmed and trapped by our problems, we also need to see things from God’s perspective. We need our eyes opening to see that those who are with us are more than those who are with them. The apostle Paul put it this way.
Romans 8 31 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
We are not doomed! With God on our side – who can be against us! Elisha’s servant saw that they were completely protected by the armies of the Lord, horses and chariots of fire. God had sent his angels to protect them. We need our eyes opening to see what God gives us to help us through the hard times. Four ways to help us!
GOD’s POWER
Elisha had already seen God’s power released in His life in a number of miracles. There was the widow who was given a jar of oil which never ran out so she could feed her family and pay her debts stop her sons from being sold into slavery. And we saw the miracle as God healed Naaman the Commander of the Syrian Army from leprosy.
As an Israelite Elisha also knew all about God’s Almighty power at work in Creation. And then there were all the events of the Exodus, the plagues on Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, and the provision of Manna from heaven and water from the rocks during forty years in the wilderness. And God had given the Israelites victory over their enemies so many times as they took possession of the Promised Land, from Joshua and Gideon all the way through to great King David. The God of Israel is indeed the Almighty God!
Of course, as Christians we can also look back to the power of God in the ministry of Jesus. The blind made to see, the lame made to walk, the deaf made to hear, lepers healed, even the dead raised back to life again. And we can see the power of God in the greatest miracle of all, the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead! And God promises that power is released into our lives by the Holy Spirit.
So whatever problems we may be facing, may God open our eyes to see His Almighty power at work in our lives. With God’s power on our side, we definitely always have more on our side than anybody else does on theirs!
God’s power. Then we also need to see our situations from the perspective of
GOD’S PRESENCE
Whatever problems we may face, we never face them alone. God is always with us! Elisha knew that God was with Him. He was surrounded by the army of the Lord and the chariots of fire. God will always be with His chosen people. For us as Christians, Jesus has promised that He will be with us always.
Matthew 28:20 “Surely I am with you always to the very end of the age.”
And even more than that, as Christians we have God the Holy Spirit living inside us! When we feel doomed, when we feel trapped, when we feel all alone, God calls us simply to “Be still, and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10)
We need only to stop struggling and worrying and recognised the presence of God in our situations.
“His Spirit in us releases us from fear. The way to Him is open, with boldness we draw near.
And in His presence our problems disappear.Our hearts responding to His love.
Jesus – we celebrate your victory! Jesus – we revel in your love!”
God’s power and God’s presence. Then we need to see our situations from the perspective of
GOD’s PURPOSES
Elisha knew God was in control of his life. Elisha knew God was guiding him to fulfil His divine purposes. And God has a divine purpose and a plan for each of our lives. Sometimes that path will not be easy. The only way to the resurrection is through the cross. It was Spurgeon who said, “There are no crown-wearers in heaven who were not cross-bearers here on earth.”
Hebrews 12 2 Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
God does not promise us an easy ride – but He does promise us safe arrival at our ultimate destination!
Romans 8 28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
God has a plan for each of our lives and he also has a plan for us as His church. If the going ever seems rough it does not mean that God has abandoned us. It just means we have to learn to trust in God a little bit more!
When through the deep waters I call you to go.
You will not be swamped by the rivers of woe.
For I will be with you, your troubles to bless
And sanctify to you life’s deepest distress.
When through fiery trials your pathway shall lie.
My grace all-sufficient will be your supply.
The flame will not hurt you, my only design
Your dross to consume and your gold to refine!
God’s power. God’s presence. God’s purposes. Then we also need our eyes opening to
GOD’s PROMISES
Elisha knew the God of Israel is a faithful God – the God who always keeps His promises. We may feel that we are doomed. We may feel that we are not waving but drowning, going under for the third time. But whatever our problems, at any point we can reach out and claim God’s promises. Listen to these wonderful promises God makes to you and me – to anybody who needs His help!
2 Peter 1 3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
And hear these words of Jesus Himself for anybody who is struggling this morning.
Matthew 11 28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
In lifesaving you are taught not to try and rescue a drowning person while they are thrashing about trying to save themselves. The correct thing to do is to wait until they have given up struggling because then they will be ready to receive help. Sometimes when we are busy struggling trying to sort out our own problems in our own strength God can’t help us. We are too busy worrying and panicking! Sometimes God leaves us until we realise we are doomed! Until we realise that without God we can do nothing. THEN God will step in and help us. If you are feeling doomed this morning – that’s alright. Because NOW is the time for God to open your eyes and discover you have much more on your side than you can possibly imagine! You have God’s power, God’s presence, God’s purposes and God’s promises.
Romans 8 31 … If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Pride. Avarice. Gluttony. Lust. Sloth. Envy. Anger. Those are the so called “seven deadly sins.” But which is the deadliest? Which is the most dangerous for us in 21st Century Britain? Which sin is the most common?
Probably the answer is avarice: greed, selfishness, materialism. Of course greed is not a new sin. Jesus warned his disciples against greed on four separate occasions and the apostle Paul warned the Colossians against greed, which is idolatry. (Colossians 3:5)
But this morning we see greed in the life of Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the prophet. This story gives us two examples to follow, an opposite example of a sin to avoid, and a solemn warning of the seriousness of sin and the certainty of God’s judgment.
We saw last week how God miraculously healed Naaman, the Commander of the Syrian Army, of leprosy. Naaman couldn’t buy his healing. He couldn’t earn or deserve it. Naaman didn’t have to perform any complicated ritual or accomplish some difficult task. Naaman just had to trust and obey. Elisha the prophet commanded him to go and bathe in the river Jordan seven times. Naaman trusted God and obeyed the prophet – and God healed him of his leprosy.
2 Kings 5 14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.
15 Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel.
Understandably, Naaman wants to express his gratitude to Elisha the man of God.
15 Please accept now a gift from your servant.”
16 The prophet answered, “As surely as the LORD lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing.” And even though Naaman urged him, he refused.
Here we have the first good example for us to follow:
ELISHA’S GIVING
Elisha served God for what He could GIVE, not what he could GET. Not for possessions or for financial reward. His motives for serving God were entirely pure. There’s a challenge for every Christian, and especially for anybody serving God in the church as a minister or in a position of leadership. Why are we serving God? For God’s glory? Or for less noble motives? Because there are some who serve God for their own glory. For the reputation it brings them in the church.
Psalm 37 says this.
3 Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture.
4 Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart

It is as we delight ourselves in the Lord and not in the things of this world, that God purifies our hearts, so that the desires of our hearts become to please God and glorify Him, not simply to acquire wealth or possessions.
Elisha served God for what he could GIVE, not for what he could GET. There is a challenge for all of us in that beautiful prayer.
TEACH US GOOD LORD, to serve you as you deserve.
To give and not to count the cost.
To fight and not to heed the wounds.
To toil and not to seek for rest.
To labour and not to ask for any reward,
Except that of knowing that we do your will.
Elisha is not only the good example we find in this story. We also see
NAAMAN’S DISCIPLESHIP
Remember how the miracle of his healing brought Naaman to a place of faith.
14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.
15 Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel.
Naaman the Syrian, the foreigner, came to put His trust in the God of Israel. He wants to express his gratitude in tangible form.
15 Please accept now a gift from your servant.”
But Elisha refuses that offer. God does not need our gifts, our wealth or our possessions. But more than that expressing his gratitude, Naaman realised he couldn’t just go back to Syria and carry on as before. His life had to change.
17 “If you will not,” said Naaman, “please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the LORD.
Naaman was determined that from that point onwards he would only offer sacrifices to the Living God, the God of Israel. That’s why he believed he needed some earth from Israel, so that he could stand on Israel’s soil and worship the Lord wherever He was. And more than that, Naaman realised that his job as commander of the Syrian Armies would create difficulties for him as he carried out his duties.
18 But may the LORD forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I bow there also—when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the LORD forgive your servant for this.”
Naaman recognized the difficult situation he would face and looked for Elisha’s guidance and blessing in that.
19 “Go in peace,” Elisha said.
Naaman did not only trust and obey for the one miracle of his healing. Naaman’s life was transformed and gives us a lovely example of trust and obedience and commitment for the months and years to come. How inspiring and refreshing it is to see the difference that gratitude and faith and obedience make in the life of a new believer.
But then, in stark contrast to the good examples of Elisha and of Naaman, we see that dreadful sin to avoid:
GEHAZI’S GREED
After Naaman had traveled some distance, 20 Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said to himself, “My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the LORD lives, I will run after him and get something from him.”
21 So Gehazi hurried after Naaman. When Naaman saw him running toward him, he got down from the chariot to meet him. “Is everything all right?” he asked.
22 “Everything is all right,” Gehazi answered. “My master sent me to say, ‘Two young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.’ ”
23 “By all means, take two talents,” said Naaman. He urged Gehazi to accept them, and then tied up the two talents of silver in two bags, with two sets of clothing. He gave them to two of his servants, and they carried them ahead of Gehazi. 24 When Gehazi came to the hill, he took the things from the servants and put them away in the house. He sent the men away and they left.

Gehazi had everything going for him. He was Elisha’s servant, just as Elisha had been servant of Elijah. His name means “valley of vision.” Gehazi had been there when Elisha had performed his great miracles. Elisha involved Gehazi in his ministry – indeed Gehazi was Elisha’s confidant. Gehazi was his apprentice. Yet he turned his back on Elisha, and on his destiny as apprentice, all for personal gain. He didn’t care about becoming a man of God, only a man with wealth and property and possessions. You might have hoped that just being with Elisha, and seeing all those miracles, would have helped Gehazi rise above temptation. But greed is so powerful. Gehazi was even tempted to build his lies on Elisha’s reputation and exploit the miracle that God had just worked in Naaman’s life, pretending that the gifts would be for God’s work. Pretending to be representing God, Gehazi was just lying and cheating and stealing.
Elisha served God for what He could GIVE. Gehazi was serving God for what he could GET. He wasn’t serving God for God’s sake, for God’s glory. Gehazi was serving God as a means to an end. There are many people who have fallen into that same trap. Exploiting the blessing and power of God for personal gain, for riches or power or prestige instead of giving all the glory to God.
The history of the church is tarnished with examples of corruption and greed and power-seeking, through the centuries and even today, and not only in some of the churches of Africa but even in churches in Britain. We cannot sweep under the carpet the ways that some of the great American “tele-evangelists” have fallen to the temptations of greed and popularity and immorality – and some of them were Baptists. The second letter of Peter warns the church against false teachers who are motivated only by greed.
2 Peter 2:1 But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves. 2 Many will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. 3 In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up.
We must be on our guard against the false gospel of “health, wealth and prosperity” which is around even in England. Christians do NOT worship God so that He will prosper our businesses or give us safe comfortable lives. That is not how it works!
Gehazi was motivated by one simple question – “what’s in it for me?” The attitude which says, “enough is never enough.” The businessman Donald Trump once said, “You can’t be too greedy.” I saw a satirical cartoon of a Christian worship leader introducing a song with these words.
“I’d like to share a song with you which the Lord gave me a year ago. And even though He did give it to me, any reproduction of this song in any form without my written consent will constitute infringement of copyright law and give me the right to sue your pants off!”
There is a very famous American church with a famous minister who has written a number of famous books. I was on the mailing list for that church to let me know what resources they were offering to the wider church. But one day they sent me an email telling me that in future if I wanted to receive details of sermons and drama scripts and ideas for services I would have to pay to subscribe to their mailing list. It was bad enough that I would always have had to pay to see their sermons and other resources. Now I would have to pay just to see the titles of the things I would then have to buy.
What’s in it for me? Somebody wrote a sermon on this passage which he entitled “Gehazi International Ministries” or GIMMI for short. It breaks my heart to say that Gehazi lives on in too many (inverted commas) “great” churches. So many compromise the gospel to gain earthly riches. So many compromise their worship, or invite the ways of the world into their churches and into their lives, just so they can get something out of it for themselves.
And there could still have been a happy ending to this story – if only Gehazi had repented. By divine revelation Elisha knew everything that was going on. So he gave Gehazi an opportunity to confess his sin.
25 Then he went in and stood before his master Elisha.
“Where have you been, Gehazi?” Elisha asked.
“Your servant didn’t go anywhere,” Gehazi answered.
26 But Elisha said to him, “Was not my spirit with you when the man got down from his chariot to meet you?
It is a sure sign when somebody lies to cover up their sin that they know what they have been doing was wrong. “I didn’t go anywhere. It wasn’t me. I wasn’t even there.” This story could have ended so differently – if only Gehazi had confessed and repented. But He didn’t. Elisha confronted Gehazi with his sin and so he faced
GOD’S JUDGMENT
26 … Is this the time to take money, or to accept clothes, olive groves, vineyards, flocks, herds, or menservants and maidservants? 27 Naaman’s leprosy will cling to you and to your descendants forever.” Then Gehazi went from Elisha’s presence and he was leprous, as white as snow.
This may seem harsh. But it is realistic. It is a vivid warning that the bars which shut many people out of heaven are made of silver and gold. Jesus commands his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount,
Mathew 6 19 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Martin Luther said each person needs three conversions, a first conversion of the mind, a second conversion of the heart, and a third conversion of the wallet! We must all turn away from the false god of Money to serve the true and living God.
The day after multi-billionaire Paul Getty died two women on a bus were talking. One asked, “How much did he leave?” Her friend replied, “Everything.”
John Calvin said this. “There is no middle ground. Either this world must become worthless to us, or it will hold us bound by an intemperate love of it.”
Elisha had his priorities right.
26 … Is this the time to take money, or to accept clothes, olive groves, vineyards, flocks, herds, or menservants and maidservants?
The urgency of doing God’s work leaves no space for personal gain or ambition or reward. There’s no profit in being a prophet.” Gehazi’s attitude was, “What’s in it for me.” And that attitude will always bring down God’s judgment. Greed will always cut us off from God. Jesus said something which rich Christians always find hard to accept and to live by.
Luke 14 33 Any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.
What’s in it for me? Simply to labour and not to ask for any reward, any recognition, any compensation, except that of knowing that we are doing God’s will.

The advert in the Jordan Times might have read something like this.
Wanted: prophet of God, to lead a band of prophets. Must be diplomatic and useful in battle and famines. Miracles, especially raising the dead, an advantage.
Well, Elisha did not become one of the most influential prophets in Israel’s history by answering a newspaper advert. So how did he end up “in the hot seat” as Elisha’s successor and God’s representative to Israel for 50 years in the ninth century BC?
You remember the story from last week, how Elijah the prophet was stressed out and worn out and burned out after the conflict with the prophets of the false god Baal on Mount Carmel. You remember how God cared for Elijah and revealed His Almighty power to him, and spoke to him in that still small voice of calm, that gentle whisper. And then God gave Elijah somebody to share the burden with, a sidekick, Elisha.
1 Kings 19 15 The LORD said to Elijah, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16 Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet …

ELISHA WAS CALLED

19 So Elijah went from there and found Elisha son of Shaphat. He was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the twelfth pair. Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him.

His cloak was a symbol of the prophet’s gifting and calling. And Elijah went and put his cloak on Elisha’s shoulders. Elisha’s response to God’s call gives a perfect example of how somebody should respond when God calls them.
20 Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah. “Let me kiss my father and mother good-by,” he said, “and then I will come with you.”
“Go back,” Elijah replied. “What have I done to you?”
21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them. He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his attendant.

Elisha didn’t just burn his bridges. He burned his plough and he burned his oxen. No turning back! For Elisha this was a radical break with the past. To follow God’s calling to a new destiny, with a new lifestyle, and new priorities.
Elisha was called. In the church it is not only ministers and missionaries who are called. All Christians are called by God. We are called first to be, before we are called to do. We are called from darkness to light and from death to life. We are called to be God’s children. We are called to be holy, set apart for God. And we are called to follow Jesus. We are called to serve God and to tell others about Jesus.
1 Peter 2 9 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
But answering God’s call to follow Jesus is only the beginning! A new Christian needs to grow in their faith and learn to serve God in the church and in the world.
And as we go on in our Christian lives we need to be open to the call of God to serve him in other ways. In the church, working with the children or as a youth leader. As Deacon or Home Group Leader. Maybe to serve God as a missionary or as a minister?
ELISHA WAS DISCIPLED
21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them. He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his attendant.

Elisha became Elijah’s attendant, Elijah’s helper. Elisha became the Apprentice. The same word is used of Joshua’s relationship with Moses. Elisha needed a period as an attendant, a time of training, of growing, of learning from his Spiritual Elder before he could take over the role of Prophet to God’s people.
Elisha was discipled. By that I mean, Elijah took Elisha as his disciple. That is a vital part of passing the faith on from generation.
And Christians need discipleship. Learning and growing. Not just at the start of our Christian lives but all through our Christian lives. We need to be disciples of Christ. But part of what that means is that we learn from other older, wiser, more experienced Christians. They disciple us.
There are many things in life which we learn by watching others. The piano teacher, the driving instructor, the personal trainer and the life coach all show us HOW TO do what we want to do. The best way to learn to speak French is to spend time with a Frenchman. So also in the Christian life there are individuals who inspire and encourage us by their passion in prayer, their boldness in evangelism, their commitment to holiness and their complete devotion to God. From their examples we learn skills, attitudes and character. We learn hospitality, patterns of prayer and devotional reading. We learn how to cope with life. We seek to imitate their work/life/church balance. We are fired by their wisdom, zeal and love. They are our role models. We catch their faith. As other people share their lives with us, we learn from them how to share our own life with other people.
Older Christians – is there a young Christian you are supporting and teaching and encouraging in the early years of their faith? By your word and example?
Younger Christians – is there an older Christian you look up to and learn from and share with and pray with.
Especially for people starting out in the Christian faith we have a little course called Making Disciples One to One for New Christians. It is a series of eight meetings where you get together with a mature Christian to talk about what it means to be a Christian and how we can be sure of our faith. You talk about prayer and Bible study and witnessing and about the power of the Holy Spirit. If you would be interested in doing that course, have a word with me and I will suggest somebody you could meet with. Elisha had his time being Elijah’s apprentice, and Christians can benefit enormously from being discipled.
And then Elisha was being trained for the job God had for him to do as prophet of Israel. We need that kind of apprenticeship in the life of the church. Training for the next generation of Deacons and Home Group Leaders. Passing on the baton of service in the church.
Elisha was called. Elisha was discipled. But to be God’s prophet, to lead the band of prophets and become advisor to the King, Elisha needed more than that. Elisha would need God’s power to do God’s work. And he received it!
ELISHA WAS EMPOWERED
After many years with Elisha learning from Elijah as his apprentice, at the end of his life Elijah took Elisha out across the Jordan back into the desert.
2 Kings 2 9 When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?”
“Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied.

Remember in those days the Jewish custom was that the first-born son and heir would receive the privilege of a double portion of the inheritance. Elisha asks for the first-born’s share of the Spirit of God who empowered Elijah to be God’s prophet.

10 “You have asked a difficult thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours—otherwise not.”
11 As they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. 12 Elisha saw this and cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his own clothes and tore them apart.
13 He picked up the cloak that had fallen from Elijah and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. 14 Then he took the cloak that had fallen from him and struck the water with it. “Where now is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” he asked. When he struck the water, it divided to the right and to the left, and he crossed over.
15 The company of the prophets from Jericho, who were watching, said, “The spirit of Elijah is resting on Elisha.” And they went to meet him and bowed to the ground before him.

In the Old Testament God the Holy Spirit came upon specific individuals at specific times for particular purposes. In particular it was the Holy Spirit who inspired the prophets. The Spirit of God who inspired Elijah now rested on Elisha to make him God’s prophet.
For Christians it is different. Every Christian receives the Holy Spirit when we start the Christian life and are born again. It is the Holy Spirit which makes a person a Christian.
Acts 2 38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”
It is this gift of the Holy Spirit which makes a person a Christian. Every Christian has the Holy Spirit living and working inside them, making them like Jesus, helping them to pray and to understand the Bible,
And it is the Holy Spirit who inspires Christians and empowers them to serve God and to tell others about Jesus. And God will keep on filling us with His Holy Spirit again and again, as much as we need to be able to say and do the things He wants us to do.
The apostle Paul said this to his apprentice Timothy, who at a young age was leader of the important church at Ephesus.
2 Timothy 1 6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
We all need to fan into flame the gift of God which is in each one of us. Some people thing if we have discipleship and training, that is enough. Other people think if we have the anointing of the Holy Spirit, that is enough. If we want to serve God in the church and in the world we need both!
I was going to call this sermon, “How God makes a prophet.” Elisha’s story reminds us how God wants to take and use every one of us. Every Christian is called by God. Not just prophets, not just ministers, not just missionaries. God has work for every one of us to do. Then every Christian can benefit from being discipled, having some time as an apprentice. And every Christian needs to be empowered by God by the Holy Spirit.
The world is full of “back seat drivers.” Full of good advice but never ever getting in the hot seat. And there are some back seat Christians too with lots of good ideas about what “somebody else” could do but never getting into the hot seat and doing those things themselves. Elisha was called. Elisha was discipled. Elisha was empowered. Then God put him into the hot seat as prophet. God wants to use us to change the world! Back seat Christians or hot seat Christians?

“I just can’t cope. It’s too much! I’ve had enough. I give up!” Have you ever felt like that? That is exactly how Elijah felt. It should have been the best day of his life. The God who answers by fire had just won the decisive victory over the prophets of the pagan false god Baal. The false prophets had been executed. God was calling His chosen people back to their covenant with Him. The three and a half years of drought was over and God had sent rain, all in answer to Elijah’s prayers.
So Elijah should have been on top of the world, over the moon, celebrating. Instead we find the prophet sick as a parrot, depressed, in despair, running for his life and giving up hope. Because like all God’s prophets, like everybody in the Bible, Elijah was just as human as you and me. Elijah was just as susceptible to discouragement and even depression as we are. So here in 1 Kings 19, right after the conflict with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, we find Elijah ready to give up, just as of any of us might! We’re going to look at Elijah’s problems and then at God’s solutions, and if anything here fits with your life or mine as it is at the moment, then God will help us too when we get to the point of saying, “I’ve had enough, I just can’t cope!”
ELIJAH’s PROBLEMS
OPPOSITION
1 Kings 19:1 Now Ahab told Jezebel everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. 2 So Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah to say, “May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like that of one of them.” 3 Elijah was afraid and ran for his life.
Ahab the King of Israel had married Jezebel who was daughter of the King of the Sidonians and she led him into worshipping the false god Baal. More than that, Jezebel and Ahab were systematically murdering all the prophets of the one true God. No wonder that when Jezebel sent a messenger threatening to kill Elijah, he was afraid and ran for his life. Sometimes the pressures piling against us can be so great that we just want to run away and hide!
EXHAUSTION
After the contest with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel Elijah was worn out. He was physically, mentally and spiritually exhausted. Christians are not free from the limitations of our human bodies, even when we are doing the Lord’s work. In today’s language therapists might well say that Elijah was suffering from “burn out”. When somebody works all-out towards some goal, gives everything then can, then when the task is completed whether it ends in failure or success a person can end up absolutely exhausted. They can lose energy and motivation and even interest in life, and that is the point Elijah had arrived at.
3 Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, 4 while he himself went a day’s journey into the desert. He came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” 5 Then he lay down under the tree and fell asleep.

He prayed that he might die. “Take my life.” “I might as well be dead.” There were reasons why Elijah felt that way. After all he had done, after all he had given, the results were disappointment after disappointment. The Israelites had NOT turned back to God. And Jezebel was STILL out to kill him. After the “high” of Mount Carmel, there was nothing to show for it. Just – nothing. It must have seemed as if all his effort, all his courage, all his faith had been wasted. I am sure Elijah felt a sense of anti-climax. He must have felt as though he had failed. We can all experience that feeling – even if we haven’t actually failed, if an outcome is not what we were expecting or hoping for. Feelings of failure are perfectly natural, perfectly human.
LONELINESS
Jezebel and Ahab had been murdering all the Lord’s prophets. So Elijah complains,
10… “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
I am the only one left! That had certainly been true on Mount Carmel, all along against 450 of the prophets of Baal. I am the only one left. We can all feel like that sometime, all alone, abandoned, even if it isn’t actually the case. Sometimes we try to tackle our problems all by ourselves, when actually there are other people around who would be able to help, if only we would let them.
So Elijah descends into SELF PITY
“I might as well be dead.” It’s all too much Lord! Sometimes our situations may appear to be too much, too hard, too painful. We just can’t cope. We can’t see any way out. We can’t see any way forward. It’s all too much! But although our problems may be too much for us, no problems are too much for God!
Elijah faced all kinds of problems: exhaustion, fear, loneliness, disappointment, self-pity. All the classic symptoms of what today we call stress. Elijah the stressed-out, worn out, burned out prophet. But let’s turn and see God’s solutions for Elijah’s situation, which can be God’s solutions for us too.
GOD’S SOLUTIONS
STEP BACK FROM THE PROBLEMS
Sometimes we are just too close to a situation. We can’t see the wood for the trees. Too often people will just battle on regardless as things get worse and worse. The starting point is to take a step back and recognise there is a problem, and if at all practical make time to sort things out. So God takes Elijah out of the situation, out into the desert.
SLEEP, FOOD and DRINK
4 while he himself went a day’s journey into the desert. He came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” 5 Then he lay down under the tree and fell asleep.
All at once an angel touched him and said, “Get up and eat.” 6 He looked around, and there by his head was a cake of bread baked over hot coals, and a jar of water. He ate and drank and then lay down again.
7 The angel of the LORD came back a second time and touched him and said, “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” 8 So he got up and ate and drank.
EVERY problem can be partly resolved by a proper diet and some good nights’ sleep. We all need the right balance of physical, mental and spiritual activities to flourish. Skipping meals, or eating lunch at your desk, is not a healthy lifestyle. Drinking lots of coffee or energy drinks to make up for lack of sleep is a recipe for disaster. We talked a few weeks ago about God and Rest, the Biblical principle of taking one day in seven to be physically, mentally and spiritually refreshed. Especially when everyday life is stressful, it is so important to take a break now and then. Take a holiday! Ideally get away from it all for at least a couple of weeks! Life will look a lot better and problems a lot smaller.
Of course sometimes poor sleep patterns or unhealthy eating habits can be symptoms of an underlying illness which can be physiological or can be psychological. If a person is struggling with feelings of discouragement or depression or despair it is always important to visit the doctor and see if there is a medical cause. All kinds of illnesses can drag us down and leave us feeling so bad that we can’t think straight.
A VISIT TO MOUNT SINAI
The angel of the LORD came back a second time and touched him and said, “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” 8 So he got up and ate and drank. Strengthened by that food, he traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. 9 There he went into a cave and spent the night.
And the word of the LORD came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

Horeb was another name for Mount Sinai, the place where God had given the 10 Commandments and the nation of Israel had been formed. When we are feeling far away from God it can be good to make our way back to where we have met God in the past, where we have felt close to God in the good times. Back to a place where we know God can be found. That’s why it is important in the dark times not to neglect personal Bible Study and prayer, or Worship or Home Groups. It is good for each of us to have special places for prayer, where we find it easy to pray. Obviously it can also be helpful to talk to the Minister, or to a good Christian friend.
ENCOUNTER WITH GOD
For most people facing most problems, the answer to their needs and fears and anxieties is to be found within God Himself. Doctors and counsellors and psychiatrists have their place, but God our Father is the Great Physician and Jesus the Great Healer and the Holy Spirit the Great Comforter. God has the answers – if only we will turn to Him. Elijah’s encounter with God had four elements to it.
1 Seeing God’s Power
11 The LORD said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.”
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.

We serve the ALL MIGHTY God. Nothing is impossible for God. No problem is too great for Him to overcome!
2 Hearing God’s voice
And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

We all need to hear God’s words of love and care and encouragement, especially in the difficult times. We need God’s words of guidance and practical advice.
15 The LORD said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus.
3 Knowing God cares for us.
Tell my people I love them. Tell my people I care.
When they feel far away from me, Tell my people I’m there.
4 Knowing that God can and will help us!
We need to claim God’s promises of help and strength and grace. We can look to the experiences of the apostle Paul for encouragement.
2 Corinthians 12 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Philippians 4 13 I can do everything through him who gives me strength.
19 And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
Whatever problems we face, God CAN help us. And God WILL help us!
SHARING THE LOAD
If you have worries, if you have fears, if you are struggling or feeling discouraged or depressed – then TELL SOMEBODY. God gives Elijah somebody to share the load with – a sidekick, Elisha.
16 Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet.
We may feel we are all alone, but we do not need to be alone. In fact, Elijah wasn’t the only one left. And there wasn’t just Elisha either.
18 Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him.”
We may feel we are facing our problems by ourselves, but there are others who can help. If you ever need to, you can talk to your minister. Or you can talk to Christian friends. You are not alone! We can all help and support one other, just by listening and praying for each other.
Galatians 6:2 “Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfil the law of Christ.”
Often we will find that other people have gone through the same kinds of struggles as we may be facing and so their experiences can help us.
2 Corinthians 13 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. 5 For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows.
Elijah was one worn out, stressed out, burned out prophet. But God cared about Elijah. About the opposition he faced and his fears and his loneliness and his self-pity. And God had the answers to Elijah’s problems: step back from the situation, sleep and food and drink, a visit to Mount Sinai where God could be found, sharing the load, but supremely an encounter with the Living God Himself.
We may have needs ourselves. We certainly all have friends who are facing all kinds of problems. We can come to God and find His strength and His healing and His peace!

I want us this evening to receive our Scripture reading as our Anglican friends would, with a suitable response. So at the end of the reading I will say, “This is the Word of God,” and you will respond, “Thanks be to God for His word.”
Our reading this evening is from the Second book of Kings chapter 2 verses 23-25
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some youths came out of the town and jeered at him. “Go on up, you baldhead!” they said. “Go on up, you baldhead!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the youths. 25 And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.
“This is the Word of God.” “Thanks be to God for His word.”
My question for this evening is very simple. Two bears maul 42 of the “yoofs” of the parish, just for calling Elisha, “Baldy.” In what possible sense is that story “God’s Word.” What does that passage have to say to us in Chelmsford in the 21st Century?
The story of Elijah in the previous chapter raises similar questions. The King of Israel called Ahazia had an accident and sent messengers to consult the false god Baal-Zebub to see if he would recover. On the way the messengers met Elijah. Elijah rebuked the messengers for going to a false god instead of consulting the one true God of Israel and sent back the cheerful message, “You will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die.”
When he received this message Azariah was not happy and sent a captain with 50 men to summon Elijah to him. We read
1 Kings 1 9 … The captain went up to Elijah, who was sitting on the top of a hill, and said to him, “Man of God, the king says, ‘Come down!’ ”
10 Elijah answered the captain, “If I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men!” Then fire fell from heaven and consumed the captain and his men.
The King sent another captain with another fifty men and exactlythe same thing happened.
12 “If I am a man of God,” Elijah replied, “may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men!” Then the fire of God fell from heaven and consumed him and his fifty men.
“This is the Word of God.” “Thanks be to God for His Word.”
But here’s the question. What kind of God sends down fire from heaven and kills two lots of fifty messengers? In what sense is that story the Word of God? What does that passage have to say to us in Chelmsford in the 21st Century?
There are many similar examples in the Old Testament but let me choose one more. After Moses led the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt, after they had received the 10 Commandments and while they were wandering around in the wilderness for 40 years, a Levite called Korah led a rebellion against Moses and Aaron. Korah was supported by 250 of the leaders of the community. They were complaining that the people were still stuck in the wilderness instead of being comfortably settled into the Promised Land. This is how the story of Korah’s rebellion ended in Numbers 16.
28 Then Moses said, “This is how you will know that the LORD has sent me to do all these things and that it was not my idea: 29 If these men die a natural death and experience only what usually happens to men, then the LORD has not sent me. 30 But if the LORD brings about something totally new, and the earth opens its mouth and swallows them, with everything that belongs to them, and they go down alive into the grave, then you will know that these men have treated the LORD with contempt.”
31 As soon as he finished saying all this, the ground under them split apart 32 and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them, with their households and all Korah’s men and all their possessions. 33 They went down alive into the grave, with everything they owned; the earth closed over them, and they perished and were gone from the community. 34 At their cries, all the Israelites around them fled, shouting, “The earth is going to swallow us too!”
35 And fire came out from the LORD and consumed the 250 men who were offering the incense.
“This is the Word of the Lord.” “Thanks be to God for His Word.” This time it was 250 men consumed by fire from heaven. How is that “the Word of the Lord”? What does that passage have to say to us in Chelmsford in the 21st Century?

Some people say “It never happened.”
Particularly the rise of historical criticism in the 19th Century has left many people in the church and most people outside it thinking that the narratives in Scripture which challenge our understanding simply never happened. Many people say that stories of God sending bears, or fire from heaven, or indeed working miracles of healing and deliverance, just never happened. They were made up by priests or scribes.
I reject that view. Either you believe in a God who can work miracles or you don’t. Either you accept that God raised Jesus from the dead, or you don’t. If you accept the greatest miracle of all, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, then all the other miracles, the parting of the Red Sea and fire from heaven are all possible. There is no rational basis for accepting the truth of some miracle stories but not others. Either God did all of these things or none of them happened and we might as well all go home.
A more subtle variation of this would be to say that the events happened, but the theological interpretation of the events we find in Scripture is incorrect. So yes, the bears came and mauled the youths, but some people think the writer of 2 Kings was mistaken to suggest that this was God’s response to Elisha uttering a curse. Yes the ground opened up and swallowed Korah, but some people say that was just a coincidental earthquake and nothing to do with Moses. It happened, but God did not do it. When Ananias and Sapphira dropped down dead in Acts 5 some people say that was just a coincidence and not God’s judgment on them for lying to the apostles. Some people say that Peter was heartless or cruel or spoke rashly or was basically just wrong to say that they died because they lied to the Holy Spirit.
I don’t want to take too long dealing with this. When Christians say that God inspired the Bible, we mean that God inspired to writers to make records of important events which are historically reliable. But we also mean that God inspired the writers with correct theological understandings of those events. So it is a consquence of our understanding of the inspiration and the reliability of Scripture that if the Bible says that God did something, God did in fact do it.
“Progressive revelation.”
The events of the Exodus happened three and a half thousand years ago. Elijah and Elisha lived around ….. BC Those were simpler days. God had to speak in dramatic ways so that people would believe in Him. People nowadays have the whole history of God’s revelation of Himself and of God’s purposes of salvation unfolding. So God doesn’t need to send bears or bring down fire from heaven any more. One particular variation of that understanding goes like this.

“That was the God of the Old Testament. We follow Jesus, the God of the New Testament.”
God has now revealed Himself in Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, the image of God, the exact likeness and representation of His being. So if we want to know what God is like, we look supremely to Jesus. And we understand the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament. We understand fire from heaven in the light of what Jesus said and did.
Luke 9 51 As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; 53 but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem. 54 When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” 55 But Jesus turned and rebuked them, 56 and they went to another village.
There may have been fire from heaven with Moses and the prophets in the Old Testament. But in the New Testament Jesus refuses to call down fire from heaven to destroy his opponents, and rebukes his disciples for even making the suggestion! So whereas fire from heaven may have happened thousands of years ago, fire and bears don’t fit into the New Covenant or God’s relationship with Christians or with the church today.
If we want to understand the bears and the fire from heaven stories properly we need to think very hard about how we interpret the Bible.
We need to understand how narratives work in Scripture.
We talked about this in our series on Understanding the Bible. In particular we looked at the story of Ananias and Sapphira in the New Testament and the story of Gideon laying out a fleece in the Old Testament. In those evenings we made the following points.
Historical PRECEDENT is not NORMATIVE, but it may indicate what is NORMAL and certainly indicates what is POSSIBLE.
PRECEDENT – historical events recorded
NORMATIVE – obligatory for all Christians
NORMAL – common but not universal experience
POSSIBLE – may happen to some
Narratives record what happened – not “what should have happened” or “what ought to happen every time.” What happens in a narrative could be “an example to follow” OR “a sin to avoid” – and the Bible doesn’t usually tell us which!
All narratives are selective and incomplete. Narratives are recorded to achieve the author’s purpose, not to answer our questions.
The Bible teaches us
Doctrine – what we believe
Ethics – how to behave
Practice – the things we do
Narratives act as ILLUSTRATIONS and EXAMPLES of doctrine, ethics and practice. We should interpret what we learn IMPLICITLY from narratives by what is taught EXPLICITLY elsewhere, e.g. in words of God or Jesus or prophets, or letters
So when we looked at the story of Ananias and Sapphira, struck down dead for lying to the apostles in Acts 5, we learned a number of lessons from that narrative. We read that Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events. (Acts 5:11, NIV). So in the 15 years covered by Acts 1-12 this stood out as a particularly significant but also a very unusual event! We saw that Acts 5 does NOT teach us that Christians must give all their money to the church. On the other hand, it is a good thing if Christians give money to the church and it is good if Christians are generous to the poor. Acts 5 does NOT teach us that all Christians who tell lies will be punished by death, or that lying to God is the worst sin of all. But the passage is a solemn warning that telling lies IS wrong and that God MAY punish in dramatic ways Christians who sin. Acts 5 does NOT show us that God will always give church leaders spiritual gifts to tell them about the sins of Christians. But God MAY give church leaders spiritual gifts to tell them about the sins of Christians and also God MAY bring our secret sins to light. The heart of what the author Luke wants us to learn from the narrative of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5 is that even Christians can still be tempted sometimes. God is still a Holy God. And God will sometimes punish sin in dramatic ways, so we should definitely resist temptation! We learned those things from the story of Ananias and Sapphira, and that was in the New Testament. So what can we properly say about the fire and the bears in the lives of Elijah and Elisha?
Incidents of “Fire from heaven” had a specific part to play in God’s plan of salvation and his self-revelation.
When God sent fire down from heaven and destroyed those who were sent to arrest Elijah, that was to protect Elijah and to emphasise the authority of the prophet as God’s appointed messenger. When God sent the bears to maul the “yoofs” that was because they had insulted God’s appointed messenger, and in doing so those young men had insulted God Himself. When the earth opened up to swallow Korah and fire from heaven came to destroy 250 community leaders, that was restore the authority of Moses and Aaron over the whole nation of Israel.
Stories like that play a specific part in God’s revelation of Himself and God’s plan of salvation for His chosen people Israel, for the church and for the world. So what do they have to say to us today?
I don’t agree with those people who would prefer to tear those passages out of the pages of Scripture. Too many people, and too many Christians, only read the passages of the Bible they find easy or comfortable. Too many professing Christians in these days are making their reputations and their fortunes by rejecting many of the things which the church has believed for two thousand years. I firmly believe that the whole of the Bible is the Word of God. Not just the stories of Jesus. Not just the New Testament. Not just the comforting words but disturbing words.
In particular many stories in the Old Testament teach us two things. The first is that God is a holy God, a God of justice and righteousness. God is Love and we see that love in the face of Jesus Christ. But God is also holiness and justice. God and His prophets are not to be mocked!
So those stories also serve as warnings for us, even for Christians today. Bears and fire from heaven and the earth swallowing people up. The ten plagues on Egypt and even before that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the story of Noah and the Flood show us that God is not only Saviour but also judge. And we find these kinds of warnings in the New Testament as well as the Old, not least in the story of Ananias and Sapphira.
Hebrews 12 25 See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks. If they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, how much less will we, if we turn away from him who warns us from heaven? 26 At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” 27 The words “once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, 29 for our “God is a consuming fire.”
The God of the New Testament is still the God of the Old Testament. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is still the God of bears and of fire from heaven. Our God is indeed a consuming fire. And we should never forget it!