Oh, we should praise the Lord. There’s another one. Not use notes—just speak from my heart.
We need to really praise the Lord for what He does in the hearts of our young people. We need to support them and hold them before the Lord. It’s awesome. It’s awesome.
As we come to the study of God’s Word, there’s a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable. The word indispensable means that we cannot do without it. We can’t take it for granted, overlook it, or forget it. It’s indispensable.
That principle is total reliance upon God’s Holy Spirit. We have a miracle Book. It is given by the breath of God. It is God-breathed; it is inspired. It is from heaven. It is the Word of God; it is the Word of the Lord.
And only the Lord can interpret this to our hearts. Only He can show Himself through this precious, precious Book.
Let me share one Bible verse with you, and then we’ll look back into the Word—to Elisha. Recently, my heart was moved in John 2:23-24.
Now when He was in Jerusalem at the passover, during the feast, many believed on His name, beholding His signs which He did.
If the passage ended there, it would mean one thing. But it didn’t end there. Listen to the next verse. Let me back up again:
Many believed on His name, beholding His signs which He did.
But Jesus did not trust Himself unto them, for that He knew all men.
What a terrible thing—to come to a weekend like this, believe on His name, and observe the signs He is doing, with the possibility that, though we entrust ourselves to Him, He will not entrust Himself to us because He knows our hearts.
And because He needed not that any one should bear witness concerning man; for He Himself knew what was in man.
Any place but in the presence of God, we can fake it. Any place, we can get away with it. But don’t play with the Lord, brothers and sisters.
We’re going to call out and ask God to reveal Himself. We want self-disclosure. We want God to make Himself known. And it is possible that He will not disclose Himself to us because He knows what is in us. He knows our hearts.
What a shame if He does not disclose Himself to us. He does not disclose Himself to everybody. May God reveal Himself.
Let’s pray and ask the Lord to deliver us from the type of belief that would not allow Jesus to commit Himself to us.
Father, we thank You for Your precious Word and Your many, many promises that You would meet those who would come, trusting the Holy Spirit to open the eyes, illumine the heart, and unveil the Savior. Lord, we call upon You now, and we ask You to disclose Yourself.
We pray that we might be able to believe in such a way that You would commit Yourself to us. Oh, work it in us, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
I’ll ask you to open your Bibles, please, to 2 Kings, chapter 1.
We’re looking this weekend at this marvelous servant of the Lord, Elisha—the man who looked like Jesus: the One who was a friend to the helpless, who cleansed the leper, multiplied loaves, raised the dead, communicated life after he himself was dead, reached out to the Gentiles, came unto His own and His own received Him not, and knew what was in man.
We’re looking at him because God has called you to look like Jesus, and He has called me to look like Jesus. If we study, in seed form, this Old Testament illustration of a man who looked like Jesus, maybe we can pick up a secret or two about how God creates a person like that.
Now, you’re not in the dark, so I’ll be very candid and tell you: there are not many Elishas in the church. There are not many people—men and women—who look like Jesus.
This morning, we looked at some principles we called preparation, or the preliminary things. The man who looks like Jesus must be prepared, as God prepared Elisha. This is not optional.
We have divided these lessons into two looks at the man and two looks at the message that man held. The man who looks like Jesus is the Christian, and the message is the gospel. Nothing could be simpler than what we’re going to look at this weekend: our Lord Jesus Christ and the grace of God. That’s what it’s all about. It’s always the same message.
Let me review the principles we looked at this morning without developing them. If God is going to bring a man—or a woman—to look like the Lord Jesus, the first truth is the first thing recorded in Elisha’s life: God visits us by His grace unsolicited. Elisha was not expecting it. God just showed up.
When God shows up, man must respond. The grace of God came to Elisha through the instrumentality of Elijah, who laid the mantle on his shoulders and called him. Elisha responded in unquestioning surrender: a willing, total, joyful laying down of everything so that he could respond to the grace of God.
The second indispensable principle in anyone serious about being like the Lord Jesus is desire—thirst. He has to want it. God is not going to force anything on anybody. They have to desire it.
Elisha had a passion for what was called the double portion, or the double blessing. I was talking to Jake just before we came up here, and I was moved by something he said: “I fear that one of the greatest things missing among God’s people is desire. God has so much more to give than we want to receive.”
I don’t know if you’re familiar with the author Frederick Faber. He’s real good; he’s real bad—it depends on what you pick up. Anyway, in his poetry he’s real good:
The lack of desire is the ill of all ills;
Many thousands through it the dark pathway have trod.
The honey, the wine of predestinate wills,
Is a jubilant pining and longing for God.
Elisha had that jubilant pining and longing for God. Without that, there can be no person who is like the Lord Jesus.
Finally, we looked at the last principle illustrated in 2 Kings 2:10. Elijah said, “If thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee.” It has to do with focus, vision, and seeing—not with these eyes, but with these eyes.
Elisha desired to be alert to the spiritual world, to the invisible world. He was called to a tremendous task amid amazing distractions: to keep focus.
You want to be like the Lord Jesus? That is how Elisha started. You have to respond to the grace of God, want it, and determine in your heart that you will be focused on spiritual reality. Those are fundamental and foundational principles: responding to His grace, desiring God’s best to be poured out in your life, and being willing to look beyond this world and focus on the Lord.
When we closed this morning, I called attention to the fact that these principles were the starting point of Elisha’s experience, not the goal. There are many wiles of the devil, and I think two of his tricks are especially aimed at those earnest to know the Lord and go forward with Him.
The devil loves to make a goal out of a starting point. If he can do that, you’ll never begin. It is always out there: “Someday I’ll be surrendered. Someday I’ll be filled with the Spirit. Someday I’ll trust the Lord fully. Someday I’ll be sold out. Someday I’ll desire God’s best.” It never comes. That is why it is a starting point.
You may say, “Well, I hope, at the end of this weekend, to have those three characteristics: total surrender to the Lord, a great desire for God’s best in my life, and focus on the spiritual world.” Well, if you desire that at the end, you had better have it at the beginning, because it is a starting point.
The other clever trick of the devil is this: if he does not make a goal out of a starting point, he makes by-products become goals. A by-product is not the goal. The knowledge of the Lord is the goal.
Rest is not the goal; that is the by-product. Joy is not the goal; that is a by-product. Peace is not the goal; that is a by-product. Spiritual gifts are not the goal; that is the by-product. Holiness is not the goal; that is a by-product.
Don’t run after those things. You run after the Lord, and those things come. You run after those things, and you miss the goal and the by-product together. Oh, may God deliver us from those terrible wiles.
When we left off in our discussion, I was pointing out the difference between having the mantle of God on your shoulder and having the mantle of God in your hand—appropriated, claimed by faith.
The mantle was on Elisha’s shoulders before he surrendered to the Lord, before he expressed any desire for a double portion, and before he was tested concerning his spiritual vision. But when he picked up the mantle, he had already surrendered to the Lord.
You cannot have the mantle in your hand until you have totally surrendered to the Lord and responded to His grace; until God has put in you a passion just to know Him and to have His best in your heart; and until God has worked in you the determination to be focused, no matter the distraction, no matter how great the whirlwind, no matter what is breaking all around you. “I’m just going to keep looking to Jesus.”
Then you pick it up, and now life begins. I know some of you have already picked up the mantle, and your life has begun.
This evening, I would like us to take our next look at the man. Let’s look at his life and ministry. If I have embraced the mantle and gone through those other principles, what will my life and ministry look like?
In these opening chapters, God gives four stories—four miracles—and in those miracles He lays out what we can expect in our lives. Tonight, we will take an overview. Lord willing, tomorrow we will break them down and look at the details.
In 2 Kings 2:14, we have the first of four miracles. The first is the crossing of the Jordan. The second is the healing of the waters of Jericho. The third is the curse upon the young men of Bethel, when the bears came out of the woods. The fourth is in the wilderness, where the trenches were dug and God gave a supernatural supply of water.
Those are the first four miracles that take place in Elisha’s life. That is a lot of ground to cover in one evening, so I will just touch the revelation of the Lord. We are not studying all of 2 Kings; we are looking at God’s heart in the life of this wonderful servant.
When I call the crossing of the Jordan the first miracle after Elisha picked up the mantle, you understand how I am using the word miracle. I mean when God does some supernatural thing and, for a moment, suspends the laws of nature.
I told you this morning that Elisha’s complete surrender was a miracle. His desire for the fullness of the Lord was a miracle. His focus without distraction was a mighty miracle. But now I am speaking of a miracle that you can see with these eyes, where God does something very wonderful.
In 2 Kings 2:8, the last miracle Elijah did was the first miracle Elisha did:
Elijah took his mantle, and wrapped it together, and smote the waters, and they were divided hither and thither, so that they two went over on dry ground.
Right after Elijah was caught up, the mantle came down, and Elisha picked it up.
He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back, and stood by the bank of Jordan.
And he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and smote the waters, and said, Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?
And when he also had smitten the waters, they parted hither and thither: and Elisha went over.
What truth is illustrated by the opening of the Jordan? What can I expect in my life if God makes me an Elisha, if I pick up the mantle? The first answer is this: I can expect God to open the way before me.
I can expect a life of faith. What you see at the beginning was true of Elisha’s whole life and ministry. As soon as he took that mantle, God began to supernaturally open the way before him and remove hindrances that were otherwise in his way.
No obstacle can stand in the way of someone who has learned to pick up the mantle, who has appropriated the Lord by simple faith. Then God begins to open the way.
Where was Elisha going? He was going to minister to God’s people. Oh, it took a mighty miracle of God to bring him to the place where he could minister to God’s people. It is always a mighty miracle when God calls you to minister to His people. God has to open the way, dry up the hindrances, and remove the obstacles.
If I am prepared by God as Elisha was, I can expect what happened at the beginning to be characteristic of my whole Christian experience—not just at the beginning.
You may say, “When Elijah was alive, Elijah opened the Jordan River by his faith. Now he is gone, and Elisha is going to open the river by his faith.” But look at 2 Kings 2:14. Elisha said, “Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?” Elisha was not trusting Elijah or Elijah’s faith.
Faith will not dry up any river. God will dry up a river, but faith will not. Some people have faith in their faith; they trust their trust. God has not called you to trust your trust. He has called you to trust the Lord—to trust in Jesus.
This was not the first time God had opened the Jordan River. About five hundred years earlier, God had opened the Jordan in the days of Joshua. Then He did not use a mantle. What did He use? He used the ark of God.
It was not to bring one man over; it was to bring a whole nation over. The ark was God’s picture of Christ for the group. The mantle is God’s picture of Christ for the individual.
By this miracle, God was saying, “Elisha, you have chosen to follow Me and embraced Me. Now I am going to open the way before you. The God of the distant past is your God. I am the same God who opened the river for the group five hundred years ago, and now I am going to open the river for you.”
Elisha could have thought, “How in the world am I ever going to get across the river? The southern tribes have the ark, and I do not have the ark.” But God says, “That is no excuse. When you do not have the ark, you have the mantle. The ark is for the group, and the mantle is for the individual.”
Someone here might say, “My family is not trusting the Lord. I am not from a Christian family.” That is no excuse. You have the mantle. It does not matter what the group is doing.
You may say, “You do not understand my church. They are not following the Lord.” That is no excuse. You have the mantle. Or you may say, “America has turned from the Lord. What can we expect?” I will tell you what you can expect: pick up the mantle. God will open the way for the individual even when the group does not follow.
Right away, Elisha learned that God would open the way, that God could be trusted, and that the path would be supernatural.
I am not going to take the time to do it, but I have an idea that I could start in the front row and go row by row, person after person, and you could testify, “It is true. When I embraced the Lord in His fullness, He began to open the way. He began to open doors and remove obstacles that I could not believe.”
It would probably be very profitable to do that and not even finish the message. It would be such a rich testimony time. What will my life look like? Testimony after testimony after testimony: God did impossible things.
When He did it, the fifty sons of the prophets stood on the banks with their mouths and eyes wide open in amazement. Elishas are rare. Somebody serious about just wanting the Lord is rare. When somebody just wants the Lord, other Christians stand around and cannot believe what God does for them—the doors God opens and the rivers God dries up.
As the first miracle summarized the kind of life you can expect, the next miracle summarizes the kind of ministry you can expect. Elisha had a supernatural life, a miracle life, and he had a miracle ministry.
If I am serious and have picked up the mantle, what will my ministry look like? God gives us three stories—three miracles—which tell the story. Where will you find Elisha? What will he be doing? To whom will he minister?
The first characteristic is found in 2 Kings 2:19:
And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the land miscarrieth.
And he said, Bring me a new cruse, and put salt therein. And they brought it to him.
And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast salt therein, and said, Thus saith the Lord, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or miscarrying.
So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha which he spake.
What will the ministry of the man of God look like? God is going to use him to bring spiritual blessing. He is going to remove the curse and bring the blessing of the Lord. It is a very positive story.
The place we are talking about is Jericho—the same Jericho that Joshua marched around. At the end of that seven-year war, a curse was put on Jericho by Joshua.
Joshua charged them with an oath at that time, saying, Cursed be the man before the Lord, that riseth up and buildeth this city Jericho: with the loss of his first-born shall he lay the foundation thereof, and with the loss of his youngest son shall he set up the gates of it.
—Joshua 6:26
People were afraid of that curse for many years. Hundreds of years went by, and Jericho was not rebuilt. But in the days of Elijah, when Ahab was king, Jezebel was queen, idolatry was rampant, and God was put aside, people scoffed at the curse of God and rebuilt Jericho.
The record is in 1 Kings 16:34:
In his days did Hiel the Beth-elite build Jericho: he laid the foundation thereof with the loss of Abiram his first-born, and set up the gates thereof with the loss of his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the Lord.
That word was five hundred years old, but God remembered His Word. The man who rebuilt Jericho lost two sons in the building of the city. The city was rebuilt, and people moved in. It was wonderful—except that the curse went beyond the death of two children.
Evidently, the curse was on the city itself and on the water supply. The situation of the city was pleasant, but the water was bad and the land miscarried.
The word translated unfruitful can be misleading. Do not get the idea that Jericho was a desert or a desolation. That is not how it was at all. The word literally means that the ground cast forth its fruit; the fruit did not come to fruition. It is the Hebrew word for miscarriage.
If you went to Jericho in the spring, your eyes would be deceived. You would find green grass, green leaves, buds on the trees, and blossoms on the trees. But as the fruit came closer to harvest, it would suddenly miscarry. It would wither, rot, and fall rotten to the ground.
Year after year, this happened. It looked so good on the outside, but everything miscarried—barrenness, miscarriage, abortion, death.
There are some people like Jericho. They look pretty good to these eyes and to all around them, but they get so tired of miscarrying. They want to do it. They seek the Lord. It is going to work—and then it does not work. There is no fruit in their lives.
So they come to the altar, sign another card, raise their hand, cry, and go into the counseling room. Then they go back, and it is barren again. They sin; they have no victory in their lives. It is barren over and over and over again.
Those people will seek out Elisha. That is his ministry. Those who look so good, desire fruit, but do not know what to do—they will hunt out Elisha.
They will not go to the seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal. It is interesting that the sons of the prophets had set up a Bible school right there in Jericho, but the people did not go to them. They did not go to the Bible school.
When you have barrenness in your life, you do not want anybody to know about it. “I want them to see my buds, leaves, and blossoms and think I am doing pretty well in the Lord. Then I will go backstage and cry and weep, because I know there is something awfully wrong.”
Then one day, you hear about Elisha—the man who looks like Jesus—and you seek him out. The man of God will always do what Elisha did here: he will deal with the cause of barrenness, the cause of constant miscarriage, the cause of not being able to bring fruit to fruition.
The cause lies way down deep in the spring, in the source, on the inside.
Jericho’s situation was perfect. It had a perfect climate and a great water supply. But the spring, the source, the essence of it, was messed up. How many people, like Jericho, have a great situation—a great church and a great church background? They are situated wonderfully. It should not be happening, and yet in their lives there is barrenness.
The ministry of the man of God is going to be blessing. He is going to remove the curse. But watch God’s method, because God’s method here is everlastingly the same.
First, the man of God always goes to the polluted spring. He does not chop off weeds at the surface. He does not merely deal with symptoms. If somebody comes and says, “I am having a real struggle with immorality in my life,” the man who looks like Jesus goes right to the spring. He knows what is wrong.
The man of God always goes right to the spring—to the heart of it. Then he throws salt in the spring.
There is evidence that salt is a picture in the Old Testament of God’s Holy Spirit. Leviticus 2:13 says that you could not offer a sacrifice to the Lord without salt. There are passages that speak of a covenant of salt.
Perhaps others see more than I see, but I am inclined to think along the line of identifying with a rejected Savior-King. When we identify with Christ, we put salt in the wound. People use that expression when they mean someone is doing more harm than good. But it is an amazing picture here that God would cure impure water with salt.
Let me give an illustration. A woman is being badly treated by her husband. Maybe she is being terribly abused and brutalized. She needs help.
Suppose she goes to the sons of the prophets. What might they say? “Your husband needs help. I suggest counseling.” Then they would set up a counseling session, because that man is messed up and doing bad things. They might recommend books—wonderful how-to books. Then they might ask heart-searching questions about his childhood: “Were you ever nursed as a child? Was there asbestos in your kindergarten?”
I do not want to play with this, but that is not the spring. That is not the source. That is not where Elisha goes.
Elisha goes and throws salt in the spring. The same woman comes and says, “Man of God, you have got to help me. My husband is abusing me terribly. What should I do?” And the answer is, “Look to Jesus.”
Salt in the spring. “Do not tell me that. Give me something practical.” “Just look to Jesus.” That is the only answer the man of God has.
The drug addict comes and says, “What should I do?” And he says, “Look to Jesus.” He goes right to the spring and gives the real answer: salt. Look to Christ in reality.
The person says, “You have got to give me more than that. I want something practical. You are not helping me. Do not keep saying, ‘Look to Jesus.’” The man of God says, “All I have is salt. That is all I have.”
Then he says, “Now wait and see.” Some people throw their hands up in despair: “That is no answer. I need something better than that.” But blessing will come. That is the blessing of the Lord.
Let us look at the second miracle, because it is a little different.
He went up from thence unto Beth-el: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth young men out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.
And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she-bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two young men of them.
—2 Kings 2:23-24
My son Daniel—you know him, some of you do—shaved his head bald. He is bald as bald could be, and he has that verse on his wall. He calls it his favorite Bible verse: “Go up, thou bald head.” He absolutely mutilated the text on that.
What can I expect if I am serious about the Lord? You say, “A ministry of blessing.” That is part of it. Here is the other side: a ministry of cursing, a ministry of warning and judgment. In Jericho, Elisha removed the curse; at Bethel, he brought the curse.
If you have a King James Version, you might be confused by the word children. It can make you think of little kids. What happened here was not playground teasing or little children making fun of the prophet.
The same word was applied by Solomon to himself when he was twenty years old. It was used of the sons of Jesse when Samuel gathered them. So they were probably teenagers or young men, perhaps in their twenties.
There were more than forty-two. The passage says that forty-two out of their number were torn. This was a gang, not a little band of children making fun of a prophet. The Septuagint adds that they pelted him with stones. We do not have that in our translation, but if that tradition is true, this incident may have rescued Elisha and saved his life.
When they said, “Go up,” it evidently referred back to Elijah going up. They were saying, “Why do you not go with him? What are you doing coming up here? We do not want you.”
This happened on the way to Bethel. You say, “Does not Bethel mean house of God?” Not in that day. It had been the house of God when Jacob had his vision of the Lord. But in 1 Kings 12, a golden calf was set up at Bethel.
The prophets Hosea and Amos would not even call it Bethel. They changed the name to Beth-aven—house of vanity. It is a terrible thing when the house of God becomes the house of vanity.
These were rejecters. They did not want the prophet, the message, or the Lord. They had their golden calf, and the man of God was walking right into the stronghold of Satan. They said, “Get out. Go away. We do not want you.”
What can I expect as a man of God, if I am going to look like Jesus? I can expect those who are open and say yes to God to be blessed. I can expect those who are closed and say no to God to be cursed. That is also part of our message.
Some commentators try to blame Elisha for being a big meanie, for calling bears out of the woods. He did not call bears out of the woods. He said, “The Lord curse you.” He had no control over bears. God did that.
If he had said nothing and bears had suddenly come out of the woods and attacked those people, we would say, “What a terrible tragedy.” But because God was brought into it, it was not merely a tragedy. It was a judgment of the Lord.
My natural heart wants to be a blessing; I do not want to be a curser. But sometimes God calls us to speak a stern warning. Blessing to those who say yes; judgment to those who say no.
Remember, this is seed form. Listen to the fully developed form of this same truth:
For we are a sweet savor of Christ unto God, in them that are saved, and in them that perish;
To the one a savor from death unto death; to the other a savor from life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things?
—2 Corinthians 2:15-16
God loves the rejecters at Beth-aven. He even established a school of the prophets there and sent the man of God there. But if they continually say no, then as a stern necessity of His holy character, there must be judgment.
There is one more miracle. What can I expect if I really lay hold of the Lord and His mantle? I can expect God to open the path before me and do supernatural things for the rest of my life. I can expect God to use me for blessing, and my life that looks like Jesus will attract those who are barren and fruitless.
I can also expect to be a message of warning to those who reject the Lord. But there is another miracle here. For a while, I did not understand how it fit. I think I see a little connection, though there is still a lot of fog on this.
In 2 Kings 3, this truth is illustrated: the man of God will be available to bring restoration to those who have messed up.
People who have blown it are not going to find much comfort among the sons of the prophets. Christians can look down on them and say, “You blew it. You messed up.” But the man of God will always be there for the person who has blown it.
In chapter 3, the spotlight goes on a believer—a man of God—who had messed up terribly. This was the third time he had messed up, and it was the third time with the same sin. Every time, a prophet had been sent to rebuke him. His name was Jehoshaphat.
Jehoshaphat was from the south. He was a good man, but he made an unholy alliance. He linked up with the wrong crowd. He identified with the ungodly. Twice out of three times, it almost cost him his life, and he did not learn.
He joined forces with two ungodly kings: Jehoram from the northern kingdom and the king of Edom. I am not going to deal with the whole chapter or discuss whether it was a righteous war or an unrighteous war. Unrighteous.
But I want to focus on the unholy alliance this man made. Jehoshaphat had no business connecting with these two kings.
The king of Moab hath rebelled against me: wilt thou go with me against Moab to battle?
And he said, I will go up: I am as thou art, my people as thy people, and my horses as thy horses.
—2 Kings 3:7
With these eyes, when the armies got together, you could not tell who was who. They all looked alike: “My people are as your people, my horses are as your horses.” Every now and then, a Christian gets in with the wrong crowd. His horses look like their horses, and his men look like their men. Looking with natural eyes, you cannot tell whether he is a Christian or not.
The three kings—Jehoram, Jehoshaphat, and the king of Edom—went out to solve a problem that was not the real problem. Moab had refused to pay tribute, so they thought Moab was the problem. But God was dealing deeper. He was dealing with His child who had messed up.
And the king of Israel went, and the king of Judah, and the king of Edom; and they fetched a compass of seven days’ journey: and there was no water for the host, and for the cattle that followed them.
—2 Kings 3:9
They thought they had a common enemy. “Who is your enemy?” “Moab—that is our enemy.” No, it was not. God was going to engineer the situation and change their enemy. God said, “Your enemy is thirst. You are not going to die from Moab; you are going to die from thirst.”
They went seven days without water. The animals were dropping dead, the soldiers were tired, and everybody was dying of thirst. The three armies were ready to perish.
Then this compromiser said:
Is there not here a prophet of the Lord, that we may inquire of the Lord by him?
—2 Kings 3:11
You say, “Better late than never.” God brought them into the wilderness, to the place where they were about to die of thirst. With these eyes, you could not tell the difference among the three kings. But in one of them, on the inside, way down deep, there was a spring. It began to cry out: “Is there somewhere a prophet, a man of God?”
I am suggesting that one ministry of the man of God is that he will be available for the one who has messed up terribly and has nowhere else to go. They need somebody who looks like Jesus.
Elisha was just there. He was available. What was he doing down there? Why did he go? Everybody has an idea, and I have my own, but I have no way to prove it.
I think the incident with the bears had to tear him up. I went to Moody Bible Institute, and there was someone down the hall from us who had been mauled by a bear. You should have seen his face—unbelievable. But he gave testimony of how God used that scar to bring him to the Lord. It was a glory scar for him.
If I were Elisha, and bears had come because I cursed, and forty-two people had been mauled, I would want to get away. This is not in the Bible; it is just my guess. I think he went down into the desert by himself and set up a tent. But it does not matter why he was there. He was there, and God arranged it.
Perhaps the men searching for water saw his tent in the wilderness. One of the soldiers said, “I know there is a prophet out here. Remember that man who used to pour water on Elijah’s hands? He is out there.” Jehoshaphat said, “The word of the Lord is with him. Let us go.”
They came to Elisha’s tent. Again, with natural eyes, the three kings looked the same. But listen to what Elisha said:
What have I to do with thee? get thee to the prophets of thy father, and to the prophets of thy mother.
…
As the Lord of hosts liveth, before whom I stand, surely, were it not that I regard the presence of Jehoshaphat the king of Judah, I would not look toward thee, nor see thee.
—2 Kings 3:13-14
With these eyes, you could not tell the difference. But the man of God saw the difference because he was not looking with these eyes; he was looking with these eyes.
I wondered why Elisha did not lecture Jehoshaphat: “What are you doing with this crowd? His mother is Jezebel. His father was Ahab. What are you doing with their idolatry? Did you not learn two times before?” Elisha did not say a word like that.
Instead, he encouraged him. He said, in effect, “I see in this man a godly man.” That is why people seek out the man of God: they are not condemned. The man of God will not tear them down.
A person may mess up, get involved with the wrong crowd, enter an unholy alliance, and take on an unequal yoke. Where will he go? He will get beaten up in many places in the church. He needs somebody who looks like Jesus.
The man of God can see what the Lord sees. He sees the thirst that God has put within the heart. What hope the Lord gives.
Elisha said, “Bring me a minstrel.” God has used music to prepare the heart to receive revelation from Him. “Bring me a minstrel. I need to be prepared to receive a great word from God.”
God saw the thirst in Jehoshaphat, even though he had messed up and gotten involved with the wrong crowd. Down in his heart, there was a thirst. So the miracle would be about thirst.
God gave the word: “Make this valley full of ditches.” Dig holes. After being thirsty for seven days, how would you like that assignment?
What is a hole? What is a trench? It is nothing. It is a receiver. God lays down a principle here that He will develop in the story of the widow’s vessels: God is ready to give as much as we are ready to receive.
You dig one hole, you get water in one hole. You dig five holes, you get water in five holes. You dig ten holes, you get water in ten holes. “I am ready to give as much as you are ready to receive.”
It is very similar to the widow: “Go out and borrow vessels, not a few.” God says, “I will fill every one you borrow. I will stop when you stop.”
At nine o’clock in the morning, at the time of the sacrifice, every trench they dug was filled with water. There was no sound of wind and no rain. It was simply a miracle of God, and God filled it up.
The enemy thought the water was blood and believed the armies had destroyed each other. Victory came out of it. But the point I want you to see is that this man who had messed up terribly came to the man of God, and the man of God said, “All you can give God is a hole—an emptiness—a receiver.”
You say, “I have nothing to give God.” Yes, you do. Give Him a trench. He will fill it. You bring God the ability to receive. The more you receive, the more He will give.
At the end of the story, God broke the alliance. His man went home, and the rest were judged. God was concerned about that man.
Let us close with a review. If I have really laid hold of God, what can I expect? I can expect a miracle walk. All the days of my life, God is going to open the way before me.
If I have really laid hold of God, I can expect Him to bring into my life those who are barren, that I might bring down the blessing of God for them by putting salt in the spring.
For those who say no, I can expect that God will bring His judgment.
For those who have messed up, I can give them a word: God is ready to meet you. The problem is not the problem. They thought the problem was Moab: “We have Moab everywhere.” But the problem is not your husband, your wife, your job, your finances, your health, your school, your personality, your lack of opportunity, your past, or your present.
Your problem is thirst—the desire to go after Him. That is the problem He wants to solve.
Oh, may God call out of us Elishas.
Someone may say, “Everything you are saying sounds so good, but I have not finished wrestling with God over the surrender issue. I am not an Elisha. The mantle is around my shoulders, but it is not in my hand. I have not yet asked God to fill me, pour His life into me, and make me focused. I get distracted by everything.”
All right, then find an Elisha. Maybe you are Jericho. You are barren, and you fooled everybody. They look and say, “What a nice situation. What a great city. How wonderful are your blossoms.” But you know there is no fruit in your life.
Seek out one of these men of God. Seek out an Elisha. Let him pray with you. Let him put some salt in your spring.
Maybe you have messed up. You have entered an unholy alliance and associated with the ungodly in an unhealthy way. You are afraid someone will condemn you. Find somebody who looks like Jesus.
They are going to see down inside that there is a thirst God has put there. Restoration—come on back. If you are not Elisha, at least find one, so that God can meet you this weekend.
If you are one of the sons of Bethel, just playing with it, and in your heart mocking everything, I feel sorry for you.
Father, we ask that You would raise up Elishas—men like You, men who can trust You to open the way before them; men and women who have a ministry of curing the barren land, receiving those who need full restoration, and bringing them back to You.
Lord, will You work that in our midst even this evening? We know that from time to time You use us to bring the stern message of warning and judgment.
Work all these principles in our hearts, we ask, in Jesus’ name.