- What does it appear that God is doing Ahaziah's life?
- God is trying to get his attention, he is creating crises
- Moab rebellion (although it is not complete, only the early stages) -- political crisis
- Fall through the lattice -- personal crisis
- Intervention by Elijah -- spiritual crisis
- What is Ahaziah doing?
- Seeking anyone but God
- (in the passages that follow) trying to kill Elijah
- Why does Ahaziah want Elijah to come before him?
- He thought he could force a reversal of the prophecy
- It shows complete contempt for God and his chosen prophet
- There is some word play on man ('ish) of God coming down and fire ('sh) coming down
- What is the result of Ahaziah's refusal to humble himself before God? His death, and removal of his lineage from the ruler ship
- And why is this result, because God does not kill people for a lack of belief?
- Because Ahaziah is the King, he is the leader over the people. Therefore his actions affect more than just himself
- Leaders are held to a higher standard, especially our response to crisis
- The King should be the spiritual leader of the nation (in Israel's covenant relationship with God) -- does not arguably apply to other countries
- What does Joram do that might be in response to the lessons God was teaching Ahazaiah?
- He does a partial cleanup, but is not fully committed to seeking God
- I'm not sure if this is a continuation of the rebellion that started with Ahaziah or not
- Three kings head out to attack: King of Israel, King of Judah, and the King of Edom
- It is not clear who came up with the brilliant idea of taking 100K plus men through a seven-day march through the desert (seems to be Joram's idea)
- The result of the march is a crisis
- The passage shows us one of the big differences between the kings, what do you see?
- Jehoshaphat takes the lead in inquiring of God during the crisis
- Not sure why Jehoshaphat did not inquire earlier, although he might have and it is not recorded. Maybe God is trying to teach Joram how to handle crises
- Jehoshaphat's actions are in stark contrast to Ahaziah's and Joram
- As a result of the water, Moab thinks they see blood (three kings fighting against each other) and rush out to get the booty
- Consequently, they are not in battle lines when they meet the three kings
- The result is a huge and easy victory for the three kings
- And the lesson for the King is that the leader of God's people must seek God
- APPLICATION: All of us have some leadership responsibilities, either at work or in our families. God calls us to those positions of responsibility. The best thing we can do as a leader is to seek God in crisis, and even better seek God in the everyday happenings of life
- Two more crises follow. In one case a poor women and her children, after the husband's death, are to be sold into slavery to pay off their debts
- She goes to God's prophet in her crisis, and God answers in a miraculous way
- The other case is a rich women, who on her own initiative provides a place for Elisha to live when he is in town
- She is very quick to stress that she has no needs or desire
- She is childless but she is somewhat content with that situation
- Content may not be the correct word as she specifically does not want to get her hopes up
- Which means, that she really did want a child
- She did not want to pray for one, because she did not want to be disappointed
- I can relate, because when our son was sick, I was tired of the emotional swings and the easiest thing was to never get overjoyed because then I couldn't be disappointed
- But when you prevent yourself from experiencing joy, to a certain extent, you are not really living, you are just numbing the pain of life
- Life has joy and pain. It can make sense with a proper view of God
- Elisha decides to petition God for a child and she has a child in her old age. But then she is confronted by a crisis as her child dies (just what she was afraid would happen)
- The situation for saving the child's life is very difficult (even Elisha has crises)
- APPLICATION: Crises, problems, difficulties are all natural times to turn to God. We can't avoid them. They are a product of a fallen world that has rejected God, independent of our own actions. The world is in decay. We can't stop living in order to avoid pain. We can't try to avoid our need to turn to God -- subtly, the stoic Christian is really just a person to afraid to deal with God. He doesn't necessarily have more faith because of his response to crisis, he may just be hiding his fear of pain
Note: 2 Kings begins with the story of Elijah's translation to Heaven (chapter 2) and ends with Israel's translation to Babylon (Constable, 2010).
2 Kings 1:1-8 (NIV) After Ahab's death, Moab rebelled against Israel. 2 Now Ahaziah had fallen through the lattice of his upper room in Samaria and injured himself. So he sent messengers, saying to them, "Go and consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, to see if I will recover from this injury."
3 But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, "Go up and meet the messengers of the king of Samaria and ask them, 'Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going off to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?' 4 Therefore this is what the Lord says: 'You will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!'" So Elijah went.
5 When the messengers returned to the king, he asked them, "Why have you come back?"
6 "A man came to meet us," they replied. "And he said to us, 'Go back to the king who sent you and tell him, "This is what the Lord says: Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are sending men to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!" '"
7 The king asked them, "What kind of man was it who came to meet you and told you this?"
8 They replied, "He was a man with a garment of hair and with a leather belt around his waist."
The king said, "That was Elijah the Tishbite."
2 Kings 1:13-17 (NIV) So the king sent a third captain with his fifty men. This third captain went up and fell on his knees before Elijah. "Man of God," he begged, "please have respect for my life and the lives of these fifty men, your servants! 14 See, fire has fallen from heaven and consumed the first two captains and all their men. But now have respect for my life!"
15 The angel of the Lord said to Elijah, "Go down with him; do not be afraid of him." So Elijah got up and went down with him to the king.
16 He told the king, "This is what the Lord says: Is it because there is no God in Israel for you to consult that you have sent messengers to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron? Because you have done this, you will never leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!" 17 So he died, according to the word of the Lord that Elijah had spoken.
Because Ahaziah had no son, Joram succeeded him as king in the second year of Jehoram son of Jehoshaphat king of Judah.
2 Kings 3:1-11 (NIV) Joram son of Ahab became king of Israel in Samaria in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and he reigned 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.
4 Now Mesha king of Moab raised sheep, and he had to supply the king of Israel with a hundred thousand lambs and with the wool of a hundred thousand rams. 5 But after Ahab died, the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel. 6 So at that time King Joram set out from Samaria and mobilized all Israel. 7 He also sent this message to Jehoshaphat king of Judah: "The king of Moab has rebelled against me. Will you go with me to fight against Moab?"
"I will go with you," he replied. "I am as you are, my people as your people, my horses as your horses."
8 "By what route shall we attack?" he asked.
"Through the Desert of Edom," he answered.
9 So the king of Israel set out with the king of Judah and the king of Edom. After a roundabout march of seven days, the army had no more water for themselves or for the animals with them.
10 "What!" exclaimed the king of Israel. "Has the Lord called us three kings together only to hand us over to Moab?"
11 But Jehoshaphat asked, "Is there no prophet of the Lord here, that we may inquire of the Lord through him?"
2 Kings 3:11-20 (NIV) But Jehoshaphat asked, "Is there no prophet of the Lord here, that we may inquire of the Lord through him?"
An officer of the king of Israel answered, "Elisha son of Shaphat is here. He used to pour water on the hands of Elijah."
12 Jehoshaphat said, "The word of the Lord is with him." So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom went down to him.
13 Elisha said to the king of Israel, "What do we have to do with each other? Go to the prophets of your father and the prophets of your mother."
"No," the king of Israel answered, "because it was the Lord who called us three kings together to hand us over to Moab."
14 Elisha said, "As surely as the Lord Almighty lives, whom I serve, if I did not have respect for the presence of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, I would not look at you or even notice you. 15 But now bring me a harpist."
While the harpist was playing, the hand of the Lord came upon Elisha 16 and he said, "This is what the Lord says: Make this valley full of ditches. 17 For this is what the Lord says: You will see neither wind nor rain, yet this valley will be filled with water, and you, your cattle and your other animals will drink. 18 This is an easy thing in the eyes of the Lord; he will also hand Moab over to you. 19 You will overthrow every fortified city and every major town. You will cut down every good tree, stop up all the springs, and ruin every good field with stones."
20 The next morning, about the time for offering the sacrifice, there it was — water flowing from the direction of Edom! And the land was filled with water.
2 Kings 4:8-21, 27-28 (NIV) 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 came 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."
14 "What can be done for her?" Elisha asked.
Gehazi said, "Well, she has no son and her husband is old."
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. "Don't mislead your servant, O man of God!"
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.
18 The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers. 19 "My head! My head!" he said to his father.
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.
...
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'?"
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