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We finished our last study with:

2 Chronicles 21:20

20 Jehoram was thirty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem for eight years. He passed away, to no one’s regret, and was buried in the City of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.

Before we turn the page and continue with the kings of Judah, we need to look instead at what was happening in Israel, to the north.

(Similar to the chapters spent on Elijah, there now follows several chapters recording the events in Elisha’s life, before we return to the more historic sections.)

If you had been studying Elijah, you would have read about the anointing of Elisha as his successor (2 Kings(b))

I picture Elijah and Elisha as quite different characters. Elijah older and more serious, Elisha his junior – more a miracle-worker; but both with a burning faith in the one true God.

We pick up Elisha’s story with a bit of a recap.

Read 2 Kings 2:1

1 When the LORD was about to take Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal.

Elijah and Elisha were then on the east side of the Jordan.

Read 2 Kings 2:11-12

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.

Elisha now had to literally take up the mantle of Elijah and demonstrate that he too had faith in a miracle working God. First though ‘he took hold of his own clothes and tore them apart. ’ Demonstrating the end of his past life, before stepping forward into the new.

Read 2 Kings 2:13-14

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.

Confirmation to the watching prophets, but more importantly, confirmation to Elisha himself. From now on, having crossed his Jordan, he would be a changed man.

Read 2 Kings 2:15-18

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. 16 “Look,” they said, “we your servants have fifty able men. Let them go and look for your master. Perhaps the Spirit of the Lord has picked him up and set him down on some mountain or in some valley.”

“No,” Elisha replied, “do not send them.”

17 But they persisted until he was too ashamed to refuse. So he said, “Send them.” And they sent fifty men, who searched for three days but did not find him. 18 When they returned to Elisha, who was staying in Jericho, he said to them, “Didn’t I tell you not to go?”

Elisha had been transformed! He knew that Elijah’s spirit was resting on him and for that reason alone he knew that the prophets search would be in vain.

Elisha will now immediately be tested

Read 2 Kings 2:19-22

19 The people of the city said to Elisha, ‘Look, our lord, this town is well situated, as you can see, but the water is bad and the land is unproductive.’

20 ‘Bring me a new bowl,’ he said, ‘and put salt in it.’ So they brought it to him.

21 Then he went out to the spring and threw the salt into it, saying, ‘This is what the Lord says: “I have healed this water. Never again will it cause death or make the land unproductive.”’ 22 And the water has remained pure to this day, according to the word Elisha had spoken.

How odd – but then several of Elisha’s miracles could be called odd – he certainly had ‘the spirit and power of Elijah’ (Luke 1:17) but he was quite different. So how did salt make water drinkable? It didn’t – the Lord did! (v21)

Read 2 Kings 2:23-25

23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. ‘Get out of here, baldy!’ they said. ‘Get out of here, baldy!’ 24 He turned round, 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 boys. 25 And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.

Rather like Elijah and the companies of soldiers (2 Kings 1:9-15), here again we are faced with what may look like ‘overkill’!

I tried to imagine a large group of teenage boys bent on trouble, surrounding this lone prophet. By himself Elisha was helpless, so he effectively called to the Lord for help. It seems the boys were not killed, simply injured; but the lesson had been taught and Elisha was free to go on unmolested.

(The word for ‘mauled’ here means ‘torn open’ – different to the word used in 1 Kings 13:26-28 which means ‘destroyed’)

I found it interesting too that rather than go direct to Samaria, he took a 30 mile diversion in order to visit Mount Carmel. We will read later that by then he was living there (2 Kings 4:25).

In order to set the scene, 2 Kings now has to leave Elisha – but only briefly.

Before Elijah had died, King Ahab had been killed and his son Ahaziah had taken over. But he died within two years, and his younger brother Joram (Also confusingly sometimes called Jehoram) became king.

Read 2 Kings 3:1-3

1 Joram son of Ahab became king of Israel in Samaria in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and he reigned for twelve years. 2 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, but not as his father and mother had done. He got rid of the sacred stone of Baal that his father had made. 3 Nevertheless he clung to the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit; he did not turn away from them.

So was he good or bad?

It seems that he disagreed with the worship of Baal, but instead preferred to worship the golden calves made by Jeroboam. Of course, in God’s eyes that also was evil (v2).

There now follows an account of the war with Moab that we covered in our last study 2 Kings(e). There we read that Joram asked Jehoshaphat (king of Judah) for help.

He in turn asked if there was a prophet that could be trusted, and one of Jehoshaphat’s own officers suggested that they should visit Elisha.

The Moabites were defeated, but it seems that the war did not end well. The last verse of chapter 3 ends ‘The fury against Israel was great; they withdrew and returned to their own land’.

Now we can return to Elisha.

Read 2 Kings 4:1

1 The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, ‘Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the Lord. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves.’

The phrase ‘cried out’ is elsewhere translated ‘scream for help’ (Deuteronomy 22:24). We can understand the distress of this lady who has just lost her husband, and now her two boys – her only potential source of income, are about to be taken too.

Read 2 Kings 4:2

2 Elisha replied to her, ‘How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?’

‘Your servant has nothing there at all,’ she said, ‘except a small jar of olive oil.’

‘nothing . . . . except’

How often we might think we have nothing to offer, or give, or use, simply because in our eyes it is insignificant. Not realising that God can actually use it – or us – in ways which we have to admit, are miraculous!.

Read 2 Kings 4:3-4

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.’

Why ‘shut the door’?

Maybe to avoid any possibility of calling out to the neighbours to come and watch, which might have turned her into some sort of conjuror.

Jesus often performed miracles in secret. Otherwise the miracle itself would become the focus of attention, rather than the Lord who worked the miracle.

Read 2 Kings 4:5-7

5 She left him and shut the door behind her and her sons. 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.

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.’

Some of the borrowed jars must have been quite large. As she poured from her ‘small jar’ into the first pot and found it simply kept pouring, I wonder what she felt?

Not only was it enough to pay her debts but so much more - it was enough for her and her family to live on too.

The Lord always gives ‘so much more’!

Read 2 Kings 4:8-13

8 One day Elisha went to Shunem. And a well-to-do woman was there, who urged him to stay for a meal. So whenever he passed by, he stopped there to eat. 9 She said to her husband, ‘I know that this man who often comes our way is a holy man of God. 10 Let’s make a small room on the roof and put in it a bed and a table, a chair and a lamp for him. Then he can stay there whenever he comes to us.’

11 One day when Elisha came, he went up to his room and lay down there. 12 He said to his servant Gehazi, ‘Call the Shunammite.’ So he called her, and she stood before him. 13 Elisha said to him, ‘Tell her, “You have gone to all this trouble for us. Now what can be done for you? Can we speak on your behalf to the king or the commander of the army?”’

She replied, ‘I have a home among my own people.’

Did you notice it was not Elisha but his servant who spoke to the woman (possibly there was a language barrier), and that Elisha hinted that he had access to high officers of state.

But we have already been told that she was ‘well-to-do’ and she really was happy with her situation. Of course she would not tell Elisha of her secret desire – he would obviously not be able to help her there.

14 ‘What can be done for her?’ Elisha asked.

Gehazi said, ‘She has no son, and her husband is old.’

It has often been said that servants know more about the household than their employers. Gehazi had picked up on her feelings that Elisha had missed.

Read 2 Kings 4:15-17

15 Then Elisha said, ‘Call her.’ So he called her, and she stood in the doorway. 16 ‘About this time next year,’ Elisha said, ‘you will hold a son in your arms.’

‘No, my lord!’ she objected. ‘Please, man of God, don’t mislead your servant!’

17 But the woman became pregnant, and the next year about that same time she gave birth to a son, just as Elisha had told her.

This reminds me of Rachel’s response to the Lord telling Abraham that he will have a son by her. She couldn’t believe such a thing was possible, but the Lord said ‘Is anything too hard for the Lord? (Genesis 18:11-15)

Read 2 Kings 4:18-25a

18 The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers. 19 He said to his father, ‘My head! My head!’

His father told a servant, ‘Carry him to his mother.’ 20 After the servant had lifted him up and carried him to his mother, the boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died. 21 She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and went out.

22 She called her husband and said, ‘Please send me one of the servants and a donkey so I can go to the man of God quickly and return.’

23 ‘Why go to him today?’ he asked. ‘It’s not the New Moon or the Sabbath.’

‘That’s all right,’ she said.

24 She saddled the donkey and said to her servant, ‘Lead on; don’t slow down for me unless I tell you.’ 25 So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel.

By now the boy was old enough to walk to where his Father was working in the fields, but not so old that he couldn’t be carried and held on his mother’s lap. She must have been distraught.

Why didn’t she share her grief with her husband?

Possibly he didn’t share the same level of faith as his wife, and would have told her there was nothing anyone could now do.

The single word here rendered with the phrase ‘that’s all right ’ (v23) might be better translated ‘it will be alright’. Her faith in Elijah, strengthened by the birth of her son, was very strong – but maybe it would not be not strong enough if her husband were to question her more.

It was then afternoon. Carmel was 20 miles away and she couldn’t walk that far, so needed the donkey.

Read 2 Kings 4:25b-26

When he saw her in the distance, the man of God said to his servant Gehazi, ‘Look! There’s the Shunammite! 26 Run to meet her and ask her, “Are you all right? Is your husband all right? Is your child all right?”’

‘Everything is all right,’ she said.

The same word again: ‘it will be alright’. She couldn’t unload her grief to a servant.

Read 2 Kings 4:27-29

27 When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, ‘Leave her alone! She is in bitter distress, but the Lord has hidden it from me and has not told me why.’

28 ‘Did I ask you for a son, my lord?’ she said. ‘Didn’t I tell you, “Don’t raise my hopes”?’

29 Elisha said to Gehazi, ‘Tuck your cloak into your belt, take my staff in your hand and run. Don’t greet anyone you meet, and if anyone greets you, do not answer. Lay my staff on the boy’s face.’

Now it was obvious to Elisha what the problem was. He too would possibly need a donkey to travel that distance, but his servant was a fit young man, and possibly his staff could symbolise his presence as Elijah’s cloak had done at the Jordan (2 Kings 2:14).

Read 2 Kings 4:30-33

30 But the child’s mother said, ‘As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.’ So he got up and followed her.

31 Gehazi went on ahead and laid the staff on the boy’s face, but there was no sound or response. So Gehazi went back to meet Elisha and told him, ‘The boy has not awakened.’

32 When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch. 33 He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the Lord.

How reminiscent of Elijah and the widow’s son (1 Kings 17:17-22).

What was Elisha to do? All he could do was pray.

Maybe he knew what Elijah had done when faced with a widow's son, and he too laid himself on the boy – the boy was dead, and cold.

Read 2 Kings 4:34

34 Then he got on the bed and lay on the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out on him, the boy’s body grew warm.

No, this was not mouth-to mouth resuscitation! This was the Lord’s doing!

Read 2 Kings 4:35

35 Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room and then got onto the bed and stretched out on him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

I can only imagine Elisha was pleading with the Lord as he walked back and forth. What were his feelings when the boy sneezed?

Read 2 Kings 4:36

36 Elisha summoned Gehazi and said, ‘Call the Shunammite.’ And he did. When she came, he said, ‘Take your son.’ 37 She came in, fell at his feet and bowed to the ground. Then she took her son and went out.

Like us, the writer of 2 Kings seems to have run out of time, so has cut this story short! I’m sure there was much more he could have said but now we are simply left to imagine it.