2 Kings 2 - 7 (Re-run)

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign. [00:00:15] Speaker B: Welcome to the weekly Deep Dive podcast on the Add On Education Network. The podcast where we take a look at the weekly Come follow me discussion and try to add a little insight and unique perspective. I am your host here in the studio with my friend and the show's producer, Nate Pyfer What's up, Nate? It's. It's been a little while. [00:00:35] Speaker A: I know. Sorry for everybody that we're coming in a little late this week. [00:00:38] Speaker B: My. My fault. So I had a quick trip to North Carolina this last weekend that ended up turning into a business trip that kind of blew out to a longer quick trip. So I just trying to get it squeezed in there. We couldn't make it happen. So this was coming a little bit late, but it's good to be back. It's good to be recording. [00:01:00] Speaker A: It is good to be back and recording. What are we talking about this week? [00:01:03] Speaker B: This week we're talking about the Ascension of Elijah. [00:01:07] Speaker A: Elisha or Elijah? [00:01:08] Speaker B: Elijah. [00:01:09] Speaker A: Okay. I always get the two mixed up. [00:01:13] Speaker B: Yeah. The rise, I guess you can say if Ascension means rise, it's also the Ascension of Elisha, but differently. [00:01:22] Speaker A: Right. [00:01:22] Speaker B: He's not ascending into heaven. He's ascending into the role that Elijah vacates for him. And if I say this funny, and if I've said this funny in the past, my apologies. I served my mission in Mexico, Spanish speaking, and they always say Elias and Elijah and Elisha are so similar. The J versus sh, almost the same word. And somehow with that I in Spanish being an E, I picked up saying Elisha to distinguish between the two. And even now saying that sounds weird. Elisha, Elisha. [00:02:00] Speaker A: Okay. [00:02:01] Speaker B: Anyhow, two very different names. Elijah is Eliyahu, which means my God is Jehovah, and Elisha, Elioshia means My God is salvation. So two very different names, but they've come so close. They sound so similar. And we'll be talking about mostly Elisha today. Some very interesting stories and some very interesting questions I think are going to be brought up here that we can answer. Before we dive in too far into that, though, I just wanted if this is appropriate. Nate, give a quick shout out to Emily Crapo. She invited me on her podcast and this is going to be. She asked us to cover Isaiah 40:49 with her. So it's probably going to come out a little bit later this year. But to catch some of her content, she has a podcast to Know Him CFM or to Know Him. Come Follow me. So. So give her a listen. I really appreciated the opportunity to record with her and work with her, it was a pleasure, a fun experience, and good recording. [00:03:04] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:03:05] Speaker B: All right, is there anything else we needed to hit before we start? [00:03:07] Speaker A: Correct. A date from last podcast. [00:03:09] Speaker B: That was it. So immediately upon recording, as. As we got home, this was something that was just kicking me. I said in the podcast that Elijah came to the Gentiles on April 6, 1830, which is the day the church was restored. Obviously, it was not that day. The day he came to the Gentiles, in this case, the Kirtland Temple to Joseph Smith, was after the dedication of the Kirtland Temple, April 3, 1836. So excuse me for. For the date mix up. That's been. That's been grinding on my nerves ever since I said it. My apologies. [00:03:51] Speaker A: We still trust you after that quick edit that you. None of you listening will even know what was said or what I had to edit out. Let's keep moving. [00:04:00] Speaker B: It felt as awkward as it sounded. [00:04:02] Speaker A: Yep. [00:04:03] Speaker B: Okay. [00:04:04] Speaker A: We can say that when the. When. When things aren't recording. Okay, let's keep going. [00:04:09] Speaker B: All right, this is going into Elijah, and the story starts off, and we're picking up in 2 Kings, chapter 2, with Elijah going and running a couple errands, talking to the sons of the prophets in Jericho and Elisha following behind him like a little lost puppy dog. And Elijah keeps trying to get him to go home and telling him to stop following him. And I think that's a fair, honest question. Why is Elijah so adamant that Elisha not follow him? And why is it still counted righteous to Elisha to continue following a prophet that continually tells him to leave? He's disobeying a prophet. Right. So why is this a good thing? And I think it is a fair question what is going to happen here and what everybody knows. In fact, even the sons of the prophets are trying to talk Elisha out of this act. They are saying, do you not know that this is the day Elijah is going to ascend into heaven? There is going to be a storm. Elijah is going to be playing Pecos Bill here, riding a twister up into the beyond. This is not a very safe activity to be participating in. I think part of Elijah is concerned for Elisha and going into a storm, knowing that this is not the safest of places to be. But also, Elisha is following him because he asks something important from Elijah. He asks for a double portion. And I like that it says that, a double portion, because the role of a double portion is what you give to the firstborn in a family. And we've talked about the firstborn throughout the podcast. I don't want to go into too much detail through it here, but suffice it to say, when a father leaves an inheritance to his family, you've got the women in the family get married, and their husband is going to provide an inheritance for them, their land, and take care of it, and they're going to be part of their family. The sons are going to receive an inheritance from their parents. But if they have any sisters that are unwed, they are lost in the mix. They need to be taken care of. So the father gives a double portion to the firstborn son. Not as like, hey, here's a bunch of wealth and status, but as a responsibility, a burden, a charge to take care of his unwed sisters, to be like the father and continue to provide and take care of that family and bring that extra responsibility on. [00:07:04] Speaker A: Perfect. [00:07:05] Speaker B: And I find that it's fascinating in this case with Israel, because Israel, as we know the story with Elijah and Ahab, has gone somewhat apostate. The thing is, if Israel is leaving the Lord's care because they're turning to worship foreign gods, now here you have an unwed wife. If you look at a woman and her relationship with Jehovah as a covenant, a marriage relationship, and they've turned away. It's almost like in this family, you have an unwed sister or wife that needs to be taken care of. And as a prophet, you're taking that burden to try to restore Israel or help Israel or take care of Israel in the absence of a husband. So it's kind of interesting that Elijah is asking for this double portion. He knows kind of what he's getting into, and he knows how Ahab has been with the king and how historically northern Israel has been. These kings and these prophets that we're focusing on are the northern kingdom, as opposed to Judah in the south. So that was his request. And Elijah is telling him, that's not mine to give you. I'm not the father in this relationship. I'm not the one that hands out the inheritance. That's not up to me. And to make it clear up to God, he tells him, if at the time I go up, you see me and you see what's going on, then we'll know that God has chosen you. And I will cast my garment down to you and you can receive that mantle, that portion, that responsibility, and he becomes that successor. But it's not clear. Even Elijah is hesitant as he's alive, to make it clear to everybody else that I am passing this mantle on to Elijah. Which is going to explain some of the ambiguity, is Elijah, Elisha is returning from this incident. And as the sons of the prophets and everyone else starts to question whether or not he has that responsibility. So they go on their way. Elijah hits the water with his mantle. The water parts. Cool story. And we've talked about parting the seas. We don't need to talk about it here. Now they get to where he's going to be ascended. He goes up, and Elijah sees it's not just a storm. He's in a chariot of fire. And then Elijah throws the mantle down, and he receives it. He goes back and strikes the water, and it parts for him. And here we see the succession and the rise of him filling this role. But as he goes back to the sons of the prophets, they're saying, look, maybe Elijah's still alive. You shouldn't be taking this responsibility on. He got carried up in a storm, but maybe he's somewhere in the mountains. We need to send a search party, make sure he's okay. And much to Elisha saying, no, no. Finally, he relents, and they send out 50 men, and they can't find him anywhere. And so the Jews kind of get this legend that Elijah got carried up, but he will be returning. Now we get to one of the more curious stories in the Bible. It says in 2 Kings that there is a group, and they call it, of little children who start mocking Elisha as he's returning. And they say, go up thy bald head. Go up thy bald head. Elisha turns, looks at them, and curses them. And two she bears come out of the woods and tears 42 of them apart. That seems a little harsh for a bunch of school kids out on the playground making fun of some prophet as he goes by. Like, respect your elders. That seems like a hard way to teach that lesson. I know. [00:10:55] Speaker A: Kids can be annoying, man. [00:10:56] Speaker B: I still think it's a valid lesson. We should respect our elders, particularly the Lord's anointed. Don't speak evil of them. But there's something more going on here. What you have is not a story of little children. The Hebrew word for little in this case means insignificant, useless, worthless. And so it could be diminutive as little children. But more likely, these people were menacing to society. And when they say children, the word naar is the same Hebrew word they use to describe the man that raped Dinah. It means youthful. Youthful in the sense that he's looking for a bride. In this case, you have young men, and these young men are a menace. Useless to society. They are being critical and they're not supportive. They're not supporting the prophet. And when they say, go up, this is a reference to how Elijah went up in a chariot of fire. And they're saying, if he went up in a whirlwind, if you're as good as him, why don't you go up, too? Because we don't want you here. Go, go, go ride. Go play Pecos Bill somewhere else, because we don't want you. And the last thing is, when they're saying bald, this is saying without the hair. And remember, in Elijah chapter one, in Elijah chapter one, in Second Kings, chapter one, they describe Elijah as being a hairy man. Not to say that he's necessarily got a ton of hair on his head, but maybe what they're doing is referring to the way that he dressed. Think of John the Baptist, who wore a hairy raiment of camel's hair girded about with leather on his loins. There is some Jewish traditions describing a special garment that they wore as a symbol of their priesthood authority. And they're challenging that priesthood authority and saying, you don't have that authority. You don't have the hair. That's what they're meaning by this. If you did just ride up into a whirlwind and be gone. [00:13:00] Speaker A: So they're not just being mean to an elderly person or being mean to a prophet, but they're menaces to society directly challenging his authority in a very inappropriate way. [00:13:15] Speaker B: Right, that's it. [00:13:16] Speaker A: So about this bear, though. I mean, it's kind of a. It's kind of a brutal ending. But, I mean, I don't know. Is that the lesson? It's just like, be very careful. Is this. Is this the. Is this kind of the curse God and die situation here? [00:13:31] Speaker B: Well, it's interesting because you have a mother bear, right? And if you're at this time of year, maybe it's springtime, maybe you've got some young cubs here, and the mother bear is being very protective of her cubs. So here you have this cub. Elisha is very young. He's a new prophet. And God is being very protective of his cub here. How is he going to guide Israel? How is he going to, as we talked about that double portion, take care of this and bring her back to the presence of the Lord. If you've got all of these young men who are the same age as him, his peers undermining him and rejecting him and challenging his authority. [00:14:16] Speaker A: Love it. Let's keep going. [00:14:17] Speaker B: All right, next we have the Story of the Northern Kingdom having Moab rebel out from under them. They were paying their tribute. 100,000 sheep, 100,000 goats with their wool. Pretty good tribute, right? They don't want to see that go away. And when Moab rebels and says, we're not paying this anymore, they go to the Southern kingdom. Jehoshaphat. [00:14:39] Speaker A: Wait. Jehoshaphat. [00:14:41] Speaker B: Jehoshaphat. [00:14:42] Speaker A: Was he holy? [00:14:43] Speaker B: Holier than thou? [00:14:44] Speaker A: No. Holy Jehoshaphat? No. You've never heard this saying? [00:14:47] Speaker B: What? [00:14:48] Speaker A: You've never heard the saying holy Jehoshaphat? [00:14:50] Speaker B: No. [00:14:50] Speaker A: Okay, well, there you go. I know that. Other people have, because that's a saying. [00:14:55] Speaker B: Where's the saying? [00:14:56] Speaker A: Wait, is it Jumping Jehoshaphat? Holy Jehoshaphat. There's something in there. Keep going. [00:15:00] Speaker B: You've lost me, Nate. [00:15:01] Speaker A: Nah, dude, I haven't yet. I'm looking it up right now. Keep going. [00:15:04] Speaker B: Holy Jehoshaphat. [00:15:05] Speaker A: I'm telling you, that's a saying. [00:15:07] Speaker B: All right? He was holy. He was extremely righteous. In fact, if it wasn't for him, Elijah would have. Elijah. If it wasn't for him, the Northern kingdom would have perished. [00:15:20] Speaker A: Dang it. It's jumping Jehoshaphat. [00:15:22] Speaker B: Jumping Jehoshaphat. [00:15:24] Speaker A: Okay. Keep going. [00:15:25] Speaker B: Okay. And, hey, this story here, when Israel goes to reconquer Moab, and they ask for Jehoshaphat and southern kingdom Judah to help them out, they get in a bind where they don't have enough water for their support animals. If their animals die, then they don't have any food to support themselves. They die. The whole army dies. If all of the army dies, then who's going to protect Israel and Judah? Then the kingdoms die. And if the kingdoms die, I mean, that's it. No more Israel. So they find themselves in fairly dire circumstances. And Jehoshaphat says, do you not. Is there not a prophet of the Lord here? And they say, well, yeah, we've got Elisha. And the king's like, anybody but Elisha, please. And so they say, let's go visit him. He'll know what to do. And they visit him, and Elisha is like, if it wasn't for Jehoshaphat, I would ignore you and wouldn't even care. Like, I could care less about you. And he had issues with his father, Ahab, obviously. Anyways, he gives them the command to go and dig trenches, which requires a large amount of faith. That's something I hope you notice throughout all of the stories we talk about today is that the Lord doesn't just deliver them. He always requires them to do something first. On a hot day in a desert area when you have no water, digging hundreds of trenches for all of your animals is not exactly a high priority. But they do it because the Prophet told them to, and they believed that they would be saved if they did it. So here they are digging all of these trenches, and then the Lord fills the trenches with water, saves them, and then they are able to conquer Moab, and Israel is preserved. And we're going to talk about this maybe at the end as we wrap this all in together, but I'm looking at how the Lord saves them. Sometimes when we need saving, it comes through a friend or a brother or someone else, even if we don't necessarily want to be saved. Look at how, for the sake of Jehoshaphat, for the sake of Judah, the Lord steps in and delivers Israel. I don't know if you have a take on that, Nate. [00:17:50] Speaker A: I do have a take on that. Jumping Jehoshaphat actually comes from this story, not because Jehoshaphat was jumping around. And in fact, Jehoshaphat in this story is very firm, right. And staying put and standing still. But the saying might be coming from the fact that he was righteous and commanded his people to pray and worship God, and in doing so, might have been dancing or jumping around or whatever that worshiping thing would be like. So that's where jumping Jehoshaphat comes from. And I'm shocked that you've never heard that saying before. [00:18:27] Speaker B: Jumping Jehoshaphat. [00:18:29] Speaker A: Jumping Jehoshaphat. It's time to move on, Jason. [00:18:31] Speaker B: All right, the next miracle we see from Elisha is there's a woman whose husband was a son of the prophet. So he followed the Lord. He was obedient, he was righteous. But he also had a debt that he had incurred, and he was working to pay off this debt. It is not like he just went into debt irresponsibly. Maybe he did, but he had kind of a payment plan. He was doing work, and it was going back to pay the debt. Unfortunately, though, before he can finish paying the debt off, he dies, because he dies and the debt is outstanding. As we read earlier in Numbers, [00:19:13] Speaker A: if [00:19:14] Speaker B: you are in debt and can't pay that debt, then the consequence is slavery. She's got two sons, and her two sons are going to go into slavery for their father's sake, and they'll have to serve for six years. On the seventh year, they'll be able to go free. But for any mom, losing their sons for six years to slavery for something that Their sons didn't do. That's huge. She's devastated. So she goes to Elisha, she explains the situation to him, and she asks for help. And I love Elisha's response here, because again, he doesn't say, I'll deliver you. Here, here's the money. Let me pay for them. Let me pay your debt. Instead he asks her, what do you have to pay that debt with? She's coming to him for a solution, and he's turning it back on her. Let me help you solve this. What resources do you have available? I'm not going to go pay that debt. I'm not going to go put myself in debt. What do you have? Let's work with that. And the only thing that she has in her possession of any value is a vessel full of oil. And then again, we have this call to faith. I want you to go and borrow as many empty vessels as you can. For as little sense as this might make, she does it. She goes and borrows as many vessels as she can. And then he instructs her to fill each vessel with oil until it fills up. So here she is filling all of these vessels, and the oil never runs out. She's able to fill all of the vessels with oil. Then he says, go sell what you have and pay the price that your husband owed so that your sons can go free. And I see here an image of. We have two stories that are like this. This one, these sons are going into bondage not for any fault of their own, but something that their parents had done. And the Lord is creating a miracle to pay that price and set them free. But he's also doing it by using the resources and magnifying what they have and through their own industry, multiplying it so that it will work. The other instance, or. Did you have something you want to say? [00:21:37] Speaker A: Yeah, I just wanted to highlight the symbolism too, of the atonement in this story, which is again, those. The Adam fell. That men might be right. The idea that because the original father fell or. Or was in a debt that he couldn't pay, that his children or us, right. We. There's still that we. We have to pay that debt back or because of sin, we are in bondage or in slavery. But the idea that the Christ's atonement for us is eternal and is. Is without end. Right. There's just. There's just some, you know, obviously the oil and blood references with, you know, the oil press and various things. But anyways, just. There's just obviously some kind of Beautiful, subtle imagery in there of the atonement. [00:22:37] Speaker B: There's a lot here. And it's beautiful in a way that sometimes people are in a situation. We've talked, you know, nurture versus nature, environment versus, you know, some things. The way you were raised, the way that you are, well, raised by your parents, and the situation that you come from and the environment you come from. Maybe you do things a certain way because you don't know any better or because that's how you were treated, or because that's how you went under. And you look at it and say, okay, why are they behaving the way they are? They're under a bondage or. Or a difficult situation in life. Not from their own choosing, maybe, perhaps, but because of what happened before them or the situation their parents left them. And it's not to say that the Lord's atonement doesn't apply to them to be able to save them. The other situation that we're going to see in bondage is a man who's chopping a tree. And so some of the sons of the prophets say, let's go and build this house together and go live in this other city. And Elisha says he'll follow them and go with them. And as they're working, one of the laborers is chopping a tree, and the axe head flies off the handle into water. And as iron head, it sinks down to the bottom. And he says, I am undone because the axe was borrowed. So this isn't a situation that his parents left on him. This is something that he himself did. He went and put himself in deb debt by borrowing this, and he put himself in further debt by maybe being careless not maintaining the ax. The head was loose and it flew off as he was working. If you break or lose something that you borrowed, you have to pay restitution. And restitution in the Old Testament isn't just restoring the axe, but restoring more than the axe. And this guy didn't have enough to pay for an axe in the first place. His actions have now cost him a debt that he cannot repay for carelessness or whatever the case may be on his deal. He is now going to have to sell himself into servitude and be a slave for six years, just like these two boys work for six years and be left off on the seventh because he can't pay his own debt. So he turns to Elisha and says, master, what do I do? That ax was borrowed. And the image of Christ stepping in on this one is very significant because Elijah goes and cuts a branch out of a tree. And the branch, if we haven't talked about it, I feel like we have. But the branch is very symbolic. It is used in the Old Testament, the branch as a name of Christ, as a title of him. We read in Isaiah, when it's talking about the Lord, Messianically, it says, as a tender root, he grows up as a branch in dry ground, as a rod in dry earth he pushes out. He is a branch from the house of David. This branch is what's going to save this man from being a servant. And the branch, you see it when Christ rides triumphantly into Jerusalem and people are lined up and having the palm branches and showing them. And you see the branch with the rod of Aaron, and it sprouts and shows that it buds, because any branch connected to Christ, the true branch, is going to bring forth fruit. And you see it. Christ is the tree of life and the symbol of the menorah and the garden. So this has a lot of symbolism tied back to the Savior. [00:26:46] Speaker A: He. [00:26:47] Speaker B: He is the branch. And through the power of the branch, the axe head's able to float. And water is a symbol of tribulation. Right. Drowning, when you're called to go through a lot of tribulation, Joseph Smith says he had to swim through deep waters was his lot in life. So as you're swimming in deep waters, think about the Jaredites who had to cross the sea. You think of the Nephites who had to cross the sea. You think of baptism as a journey through life, going through tribulation, passing through these waters to get to the other side. [00:27:21] Speaker A: You've got Jonah. [00:27:23] Speaker B: You've got Jonah who gets swallowed by [00:27:25] Speaker A: the big fish, who is a representative [00:27:28] Speaker B: of Jesus, pulling him out of waters [00:27:31] Speaker A: in Moby Dick, because we talked about that last week. [00:27:34] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:27:35] Speaker A: Remember, the great Leviathan is a symbol of Christ, who saves him from the rough seas in Jonah and the Whale [00:27:44] Speaker B: and Noah, who's saved from the seas. [00:27:47] Speaker A: You've got Peter walking on the water. You got all the dudes hanging out in the boat in the middle of [00:27:52] Speaker B: the sea, the storm on either side that he's focusing in on [00:27:58] Speaker A: a lot of water symbolisms. [00:28:00] Speaker B: And maybe it's worth a slight tangent, mate. [00:28:04] Speaker A: I love slight tangents. We're doing good on time. Let's go. Let's get there. [00:28:08] Speaker B: I love the dual nature of symbolism, and we've already seen it a couple times here, just in these few passages. Water is used as the water of life, a fountain that never fails. And this Idea that living water, a fountain of living water. But it's also used as a symbol of tribulation. Right. This axe sunk through the water and he has to pull it and death. And so how can you use a symbol so beautiful, life giving, as also a symbol of death? [00:28:46] Speaker A: Well, look at the branch, this thing that sprouts up and gives life. But also the thing that the branch was hung on, crucified, the tree of [00:28:56] Speaker B: death, the tree of knowledge that Adam and Eve partook of. And you have Christ representing life as the branch being affixed to a cross, which was a branch of a different nature. [00:29:06] Speaker A: A dead tree. [00:29:07] Speaker B: A dead tree of death. [00:29:09] Speaker A: Yes. Some amazing stuff in there. [00:29:13] Speaker B: And a Hebrew insight on this. When you see a word in Hebrew that ends in im, it is plural. We've talked about this. Urim, meaning lights, thummim, completions, perfections, Elohim, gods. If you have it with an aim ending, it means dual. Mitsrayim means two Egypt, Upper Egypt, Lower Egypt. That is the Hebrew word for Egypt, Mitsrayim. The Hebrew word for water is Mayim, which is dual. So you almost have this dual nature even there, through the waters. The water, it can be life giving, but also in the creation, the waters of chaos. And the Spirit of God breathes upon the face of the waters. But even within the creation, you have the waters bringing forth life and the animals coming from the waters. And through destruction, creation, you have this dual nature. You see it with the hand of God, because that same hand can be stretched out to smite you, or stretched out to save you. The destructive nature of fire. In the last days, the earth is going to be burned and you think of hell, you think of fire and brimstone. But then when you look at the description of where the Lord resides in his throne, they say it's a throne of fire. The scriptures we just read today, Elijah was carried up in a chariot of fire. And the gates to heaven are fiery gates that you have to pass through. And it is a refiner's fire. That being said, let us get back into the story of this widow who had lost the son and who is reaching out to Elisha to save his life. He sends his servant Gehazi to go and lay his staff on the child and raise him from the dead. And then she decides to stay with Elisha and come with him afterwards. And when they make their way to the house, the child is still dead, even though the servant had put the staff on him. It kind of reminds me in the New Testament when the disciples had gone to cast the spirit out, and they couldn't do anything. And then when the master shows up, they're like, hey, how come we couldn't cast the spirit out? And he says, this kind goes out by fasting and prayer alone. There's a little bit of a character flaw with Geassi here, and we don't see it until the very next story. So Elisha completes the miracle, brings him back from the dead. And when we get to the story of Naaman, Naaman is the captain of the Syrian army, but he's also a leper. Most of us are familiar with the story where Naaman comes to Elisha because actually, on the king's recommendation, a servant woman from Israel, who, the king, head of Syria, had been conquering parts of Israel and deporting some of them and taking some of them captive. So he has this Israelite woman who worshiped God, but she's still fairly loyal. As they hear about the situation of Naaman, and he's such a great guy and they love him. And she tells the king, there's a prophet in Israel that can heal him. So the king sends a lot of money and a recommendation to the king of Israel, saying, I am sending you, my captain of the guard, my captain of the armies, with all of this money. I need you to receive him and heal him. And the king of Israel is not looking at this like, this is a blessing, like, I would rather not even keep any of the money, because what happens if I can't heal him? Then the guy dies, and Syria is going to destroy us, wipe us off the face of the earth. And they tell him, look, do we not have a prophet in Israel? Let's get Elisha. He can do this and send Naaman to Elisha. And Elisha sends Geassi, his servant, to go talk to him. So this is a slight in and of itself, right? If you're an important person, you don't send an ambassador to go meet with the president. You send a president to meet with the president, someone on equal footing. So he sends a servant to go meet with this powerful man. And then he tells him, go and bathe yourself seven times in the Jordan River. And the Jordan river was disgusting. And he's like, look, I am a powerful man. I'm a mighty man. This is below me. The servant's below me, the river's below me. Doing all of this is just. He went away furious. And the servant with him makes a very powerful statement in saying, had he commanded you to do something great, wouldn't you have done it, then how much more would you do something that is so simple like this? And I feel like there is so much of us that can relate to that statement. How much of us, if God asks us to go do some mighty thing, go fight in a war, go do something crazy, or go fight against Goliath. And maybe this is a little bit of a slam on David, like he's willing to stand up and go fight Goliath and go do all of these impressive things as a king. But in his personal life, he lets the small things erode. Maybe it's a dirty thing to do. Some of the small things that seem beneath us, maybe we look at the typical Sunday school answers as something that's below us, like bathing in the Jordan river, and we neglect to do them because there's no honor, there's no glory in that, and we let those small things slide. So Naaman's humbled. He bathed seven times in the river. He's healed. We know this part of the story. He goes back to Elisha and he says, thank you, I've got here. He actually says, I will worship your God from here on out. Jehovah is the only God, and I will no longer worship the BAAL or the Baalim or any of the other gods. And he has laden on his donkey items that he was going to sacrifice to the Baalim, the gods, these other gods. And he has no more use for these. So he tells Elisha, why don't you take these as a gift? I will give these to you. And Elisha says, no, no thanks. I'm not interested. I'm not doing miracles for money. And also, if you remember back in early times, in the Numbers, you're not supposed to take anything that was supposed to be consecrated or dedicated to foreign gods that was supposed to be an abomination and destroyed. So he turns him down. And as he's leaving, Geassi, his servant, chases him down and says, wait, we do have need of that stuff. There's two people that showed up and they could really use it. So how about I take that off your hands and I'll bring it back? That's what Elisha told me to tell you. Thank you so much. And he said, give me a talent of silver, which is a lot of money. And he pulls Naaman here, pulls kind of a Christ on this and saying, okay, I'm not going to give you just one talent. I'm going to give you two talents of silver and two changes of clothes. So he takes this goes back and Elisha says, you think you can hide that from me? The leprosy that Naaman had is now yours. And so Geassi becomes a leper and kind of cursed and outside. So again, you have this story of this outsider, almost like Huriah the Hittite or Ruth. When you have the outsider stepping up and being the better man, the better person, the better follower of God, while Israel is sliding or decaying or going through this bad transition, we get to this gets really kind of messed up, okay, because Syria then tries to kill Elisha, right? And Naaman is the captain of the army for Syria. So Syria keeps sending these little raiding parties in to ambush the king. Elisha keeps telling the king, hey, by the way, Syria's going to lay an ambush here and saving the king's life and the king's armies multiple times. And the king's furious and says, who's the spy in my house that keeps telling Israel what my plans are? And they say, there's no spy. They have a seer prophet, Elisha. He knows exactly what you're thinking. Okay, then let's take him out. Where is he at? And he's in this small valley and the hosts of the Assyrians are surrounding him and they get intimidated. And this is where Elisha opens the eyes of his servant. And they see that there's more for us than against us. Powerful story of the chariots and all the armies, the host of the Lord that they see. There's a whole lesson in and of itself on that, but we're just going to keep rolling. Elisha strikes them with blindness. And this can't be a physical blindness, but more of maybe of a mental blindness. They're confused, they don't know where they're at. And Elisha says, here, let me guide you to where you're going to find Elisha. And so they're following Elisha to go find Elisha and he takes them a four hour journey into Samaria, where now the king of Israel has got them surrounded. And the king's like, should I kill them all? And he's like, no, no, don't kill them all. This is to let them know that the Lord of Israel is God. And maybe some of those people were converted that day. It says that Syria did not attack Israel. Again, which is not true. Which might be another question you guys have. Why does it say like in the very next verse that Syria attacked Israel? What they're saying is Syria did not send any more of these small raiding parties out. They kept getting Foiled. Every time. They got foiled by all these ambushes didn't work. So now instead of this tactic, they didn't do that tactic anymore. Syria is sending the entire army out to go destroy Israel. They surround Samaria, and because they're surrounding Samaria, they can't get any supplies in. It gets so bad that they're selling pigeon dung for food. [00:39:56] Speaker A: Oh, come on, bro. [00:39:58] Speaker B: Yeah, A donkey's head and pigeon dung are fetching a high price in the market. And as the king is ruined and worried about the safety of his people, and he's walking along the walls, a woman approaches him and says, look, me and this other woman made a deal that we would eat her baby the first night, and then the second night we would eat my baby. Oh, no, no, excuse me, I said that backwards. We would eat my baby the first night. Second night, we would eat her baby. So last night I boiled up my child and we ate the child. There's no other food to survive. And tonight it's her turn, and she's reneging on the deal and won't let me eat her kid. And the king is so distraught that this is what Israel has descended to, he tears his coat and he's devastated. And he says, that's it. Let's kill Elisha. Somehow this is his fault. He sends a messenger to kill Elisha, and Elisha is sitting there and he says, hey, a messenger is on his way to go kill me from the king. It's probably a good idea to go lock the door and not let him in. So he goes and bars the door, and it gives time because the king is on the way, following the messenger to make sure this gets carried out. It gives a chance for the king to catch up. And Elisha says, hey, king, come on in. Let's talk about this. And he says, trust the Lord. This time tomorrow, there will be so much food in the markets of Samaria that the price is going to be super cheap. Like, you're not going to be selling pigeon dung. Like, the price of normal food is going to be cheap because you have so much. And one of his lords of the king, not the king himself, but one of his servants, says, how is that happening? Is this going to be, like, cloudy with a chance of meatballs? Is the Lord going to open up the windows of heaven and food's going to rain down upon the earth? And Elijah says, oh, it will happen. The thing is, you won't live to see it. Oh, so you have a group of lepers in Samaria that Can't be part of the city. They have to separate themselves out. So they live at the outskirts of the city, near the gate, near the city wall. And they are at the point where, like, we can't stand this anymore. We're just going to go try to raid the Syrian army and see what we can find. And it's right as it's getting evening, they decide to do it. At dusk, they sneak out of the city, they go into the Syrian camp, and none of the Syrians are there. So they just start eating all of this food. And then they say, this is wicked of us. We can't just sit here and enjoy it when all of Israel is starving. We got to let them know that something's up. The Syrians are gone. So they go back into the city and they tell them what's going on. And the king says, this is a trap. We're going to go out there to get their food and they're going to ambush and kill us all. Let's just send five horsemen out. They end up sending five horsemen and two chariots to go see what's going on. And they chase the Syrian army. Come to find out the Syrians heard a sound as if it was the Egyptian army or another large army coming to deliver Israel. And they were so panicked, they ditched everything they had and just left. And so they're fleeing and dropping supplies all over the place. They report it to the king. The king takes the one servant that he had that was kind of mocking Elisha and puts him in charge of the order of the city to make sure that the people orderly leave to go and get supplies. And the people are so hungry, they end up trampling him to death. And Elisha's prophecy is fulfilled. [00:43:50] Speaker A: Do we have anything to learn from that or is that just it? [00:43:53] Speaker B: Yeah, actually all of these stories. And I think this is why we kind of have to hit every one of these a little bit. When we talked about Elijah, his name, Eliyahu, My God is Jehovah. Look at his crowning moments and what he did right. He builds this altar and has all the priests of BAAL come. And his whole point was, how long are you going to limp on both sides? You've got to choose. My God is Jehovah. And it was always showing why Jehovah is God. Now you have the next stage. Eli o' Shea or Elijah. My God is salvation. All of these stories are showing you different ways and how God can save us. Whether it's because your friend is righteous, who's coming in and helps you make a right decision. In the case of Jehoshaphat, whether it's because something that your parents did that you're not responsible for, and now you're destined to live a life of servitude because of it. And he saves us or redeems us from the mistakes of our parents or those who want to turn away from that or find hope in that, or whether it's your own doing that's led to you having to sink within the bottom of the waters and God raises us and saves that axe from the waters and pulls us up, out, or the staff that's being laid on. All of these are examples that point us to a savior. God saving Naaman from leprosy, God saving Israel from the siege. God saving over and over and over again. And the cool thing is in all these stories, the instance of faith, if you want salvation, he's going to ask you to show that you believe, to hold on against hope and dig the trenches in the desert when you're hot, or go out and lay the staff on them, or do whatever it takes to listen to his word and believe. Because his isn't just a God. He's a God of salvation. And these are all the different ways in which he offers salvation to his children. [00:46:08] Speaker A: Fantastic. Fantastic. All right, do we know what we're talking about next week? [00:46:13] Speaker B: You know, every time I take a stab and guess, we're always wrong. [00:46:18] Speaker A: So how about this? [00:46:18] Speaker B: I'm way off. [00:46:19] Speaker A: How about this? Thank you everybody for continuing to listen to our podcast, even though we're not exactly sure what is next we week every week. But we do appreciate you listening. Please send any questions or comments. What a fantastic way to wrap that up. Jason, by the way, that's. We. We kind of talked about this a little bit last week, but I, I did want to just maybe highlight this one more time that the beautiful part about Elijah was really as a. With. With him being, you know, my goddess, Jehovah, one of the, one of Jesus's, not one of like the. The role that Jesus has played is to make us at one again with God. Right? Yes. And. And I love that even in the story where his God Jehovah is more powerful than baal, even during that process, he was still unifying Israel again under the correct God. He. He had the 12 stones representing the 12 tribes and rebuilding the altar, kind of like you had mentioned. And I do love that the Elisha story is following that in again, saving or making us at one again with God, no matter the circumstances that we either find ourselves in or put ourselves in. So that's a fantastic way to wrap that up. [00:47:41] Speaker B: Beautiful progression. First believe and then act where you believe. [00:47:45] Speaker A: Oh, it's great. It's beautiful stuff. Okay, well, we will know what we're talking about next week when that comes. So thank you for listening. Please send us any questions. And until next week, see ya.