Read 2
Kings 4-5 & John
4:1-30
To discover:
As you read consider what these
miracles tell us about Elisha.
To ponder:
The seven miracles (4v1-6v7) mark
Elisha out as superior to the other prophets (4v9, 5v8). A number also show the
LORD is ready to bless those who acknowledge or serve him. Although the widow’s
boys were to be treated as hired hands and released at the Jubilee (Lev
25v35-41), their enslavement would leave her not just lonely, but without
anyone to tend her land. Elisha’s question “how can I help?” (see also 4v13) reflects
God’s readiness to help his people in need. The miracle itself portrays Elisha
as like Elijah (1 Kgs 17v13-16), and teaches how abundantly and precisely God
can provide for us - even materially.
Elisha
also patterns Elijah with respect to the Shunammite’s son (1 Kgs 17). Whereas
the previous miracle implicitly commended those who revere God (4v1), this
commends those who use their wealth for hospitality, and especially in
providing for those who speak God’s word (Heb 13v2, Lk 8v3). Thankful, Elisha
seeks to do her good, and his servant Gehazi notes she has no son and an old
husband, meaning no son was likely! And so with allusion to God’s promise to
Abraham and Sarah (Gen 18v9-15), Elisha promises the woman a son, which she
recognises as a significant miracle (4v16). However, the boy dies. The woman
lays him on Elisha’s bed, and hurries to get him. Her husband questions why she
was going immediately, presumably because he expected her just to be wanting to
let Elisha know. But, we see she is acting with astounding faith. Distressed
but not despairing, she twice says everything is “all right,” before grasping
Elisha’s feet in supplication. It may be God kept the situation from Elisha so
that he would send Gehazi first, and that his failure would demonstrate how
Elisha was needed (consider Christ in Mk 9v17-29). Whatever, after some effort in
prayer and action, the boy is restored to life.
In
what follows Elisha is God’s means of providing food by turning a poisoned stew
edible for a group of prophets during a famine, and (prefiguring Christ) feeding
a hundred with surplus from just twenty loaves and some corn – “according to
the word of the LORD.” Whether wealth, life, or food then, God can provide. But
the surprise in what follows, is that he is prepare to act even for those
outside of Israel.
God’s
governance of all that happens is seen by the offhand note that he had used
Naaman in giving Aram
victories. One captive was an Israelite, who expresses faith in telling
Naaman’s wife that he should visit Elisha to be cured of his leprosy. On
receiving a letter from Naaman’s king, the king of Israel
however showed himself lacking such faith, looking to himself rather than to
God (5v7). It’s a reminder our first act in a crisis should be prayer.
Naaman
proudly considered Elisha’s instructions and lack of personal attention beneath
him. His servants’ pleading affirms the importance of obeying God’s word (5v13).
And the requirement of washing in the Jordan
may be intended to demonstrate God’s special presence in the land, stressing it
is his power at work not Elisha’s. So Naaman responds that “there is no God in
all the world except in Israel”
and requests earth from the land. He then commits to sacrificing only to the
LORD - although asking forgiveness for when he is required to accompany his
master to his god’s temple. This is an astonishing confession in a day when it
was assumed each nation had its own god. And so the foreigner is washed clean
not just of his leprosy.
Elisha refuses to profit from this act of God
(5v26). Gehazi, however, degrades it by displaying greed rather than joy, lying
to Naaman and Elisha, and so being punished with Namaan’s leprosy on him and
his descendents. (Elisha’s comment that his “spirit” was with Gehazi when
speaking to Naaman, suggests a vision in which he was in some sense supernaturally
there.)
Praying it home:
Praise God for his readiness to
abundantly provide. Pray that he would make you more prayerful, instinctively
turning to him when in need, rather than to yourself.
Thinking further:
To read the NIV Study Bible
introduction to 2 Kings, click
here.
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