40 Minutes In The Old Testament - 2 Kings 3:16-4:17 (Episode 324)

Episode Date: July 14, 2022

Who does God want to win this battle and what exactly does "shall" mean? Elisha multiplies a jar of oil to help a widow. And a wealthy couple decides to build Elisha a room on their roof and in return Elisha makes an incredible promise. Chad and Daniel discuss all of this. Have a listen! HWSS National Conference 1517 Podcast Network 1517 YouTube Donate

Welcome to another episode of 40 Minutes in the Old Testament. 40 Minutes in the Old Testament is a 1517 podcast network podcast. You can go to 1517.org slash podcast and check out all the other podcasts that are living over there. while you're over there make sure you go check out the events page because the registration is now open for the here we still stand national conference you don't want to miss that you want to get registered for that you want to attend that in october october 13th through 15th with chad with me with a whole bunch of other people great speakers great music great food great times had by all you want to be in that all by registering there's also a link in the show notes that will

take you right to the events page, and you can register it up. Chad, we are in 2 Kings chapter 3. Some kings have decided to go to war, and now they're wondering if they should have inquired the word of the Lord from maybe a prophet. So who's this prophet that they need to inquire from? Well, Elisha is the new guy. Elijah's gone. Elisha is the new capital P prophet, and Elisha's like, yeah i'm not really a big fan uh of you uh oh king and i wouldn't normally give you the time of day but uh since jehoshaphat's with you uh tell you what go find me a musician yeah he's uh he's got to have the the harp if he's gonna if he's gonna prophesy i find it interesting too i don't think i mentioned this last time that he's with them you know it's not like uh they're

not in israel they're uh in the transjordan river the transjordan area they've gone south through Edom, and they're working their way up to attack the Moabites, but Elisha has tagged along with the army, so he's there, and we're about to hear what he has to say. Now, this is pretty fascinating stuff, because it's easy to kind of get the impression, as we're going through this, that everything that Elisha says is exactly what God wants to happen. There's a little trick here so when we get to the very end we're going to have to i mentioned that i did mention this in the last episode you get to the very end you have to go back and rethink exactly what was what was happening so we'll pay careful attention to what he says and what he what he doesn't say

so they call the musician the hand of the lord comes upon elisha and here's what he says so we're in second kings 3 16. thus says the lord i will make this dry stream bed full of pools for thus Thus says the Lord, you shall not see wind or rain, but that stream bed shall be filled with water so that you shall drink you, your livestock and your animals. So that's the first thing that's going to happen. So Elijah, we've talked about several times, is the prophet of fire. He calls fire down from heaven on Mount Carmel, and he calls fire down from heaven a couple of different times to burn up 50 soldiers. So he's very much connected with fire. Then you get to Elisha, and he's much more of a water prophet.

We've already seen how he healed the waters in Jericho. He's about to provide water here. Later on, he makes an axe head float in water. He's also the prophet who uses the water of the Jordan to heal Naaman. So we're shifting from Elijah, fire, now to Elisha, water. And so this is going to be the second miracle connected with water that we see. So they're thirsty. They've been traveling for several days.

everybody's running out of water and so elijah's going to take care of that but then he goes on to say verse 18 that really providing this water is nothing he says this is a light thing in the sight of the lord god can snap his fingers provide the water he's got something else in store too he says he will also give the moabites into your hand you remember that that's why this whole military campaign started the moabites rebelled and so the northern king teams up with the southern king they grab the Edomites, who are under the thumb of the people of Judah. So we have really three armies traveling together to attack the Moabites from the south. So he will also give the Moabites into your hand, and you shall attack every fortified city and every choice city. Let me

pause there just for a second. So the Hebrew verb there for attack is nakah. That's a typical verb for striking or smiting someone. Now, the ESV does translate it properly as attack. You could also use strike or something like that. But the NIV translated that as overthrow, which was a mistake. Because first of all, the verb does not mean overthrow. It means to attack or to strike.

And secondly, a mistake, because as we'll see in just a minute, they don't overthrow every fortified city. And so in mistranslating that verb, you kind of get the impression that this was a false prophecy because that's not what that's not what comes to pass so he says you shall attack every fortified city in every choice city and now things get really weird here shall fell every good tree and stop up all springs of water and ruin every good piece of land with stones now why is this strange because if you go back

to deuteronomy chapter 20 as part of the laws about how the israelites are to conduct warfare we read that if you go against a city, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an axe against them. So is there a contradiction here? Is Elisha telling them that they are to break the laws of warfare that are outlined in Deuteronomy chapter 20, or something else happening? So here's what I think is happening. The verbs here are, you shall, you shall. This is not a this is not a command from god to do this elijah is simply telling them here's what you're going to do he doesn't say this is god's will he just says hey this is what's going to happen when you begin to attack you're going to strike this city you're going to take up your

axes and chop down all these trees and stop up all these springs of water but it's kind of subtle but he doesn't say that this is exactly what god wants you to do right right so yeah we i think because of the the old king james translation of the ten commandments we we always hear the word shall as a command when it could just as easily be a prophecy it could just as easy to be a promise i mean uh the ten commandments work that way in one sense where god certainly says you shall have no other gods before me okay that sounds like a command like that's something that he wants you to to obey like you're not you shall you're not supposed to do that but think about this, also in the new heavens and the new earth, what's true? We shall have no other gods before

him. That's just a description of what will be the case. It's a promise as much as a command, that this is how my people will be. They shall love the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. They shall love their neighbor as themselves. Now, obviously, we're not doing that now. Maybe we're trying to, we're failing to, but one day that statement will be true about us, and that shall won't be a command, it'll be a description. yeah it'll it'll shift from an imperative into an indicative right this is the way things are so here i think we're we hear that we hear the shall as uh as an imperative it's not an imperative form but just simply a description of what's going to take place i do love in this text too i do love

i mean you touched on this and it's not really important it's just like some of the color of the bible elisha's like yeah all right um here's what i'm gonna do like god's gonna do this stuff and don't worry, it's a light thing for him. I feel like this is a dig at you had to bring out a prophet and, you know, hey, that's the Lord. I'm going to make this dry stream bed full of water. It's just going to have water everywhere, and you're going to get to drink it. You're not going to see any rain or wind,

but you're going to have some water here. And don't worry about it. This is a light thing for God to do. I do think this is a dig at the idolatrous kings uh particularly an idolatrous king saying like you know you could have this god for to for whom this kind of stuff is no big deal as opposed to like having to wait until you're in a jam and go find a prophet what are you doing with all these idols the thing that you really need right now isn't even a big deal for him that's a great contrast do you feel like that's what he's doing

oh yeah oh yeah you can see elisha doing that uh yeah it's you see this repeatedly where it's sort of an insanity going on here with idolatry because they go after the false gods who are not able to give them the very things that they need right so they're clamoring for for rain for instance during all those years of famine during the uh when when elijah was still around and the the god of thunder the god of rain bale never gives it to him so why are you worshiping him he's he's he's incapable of providing that which you desire from him all the while Well, God, without a second's thought, could have provided the rain for you. So I think that is part of the insanity of sinful people,

that we tend to run after those things that will do us the most harm and run away from those things which will do us the greatest good. That kind of is the essence of what idolatry is. You're running right into the flames. You're running into death itself, thinking that this is the source of good, while all the time the good is what you left behind with the one true God. So, yeah, this is a great example of Elisha proving that by this light thing that God can do for you. Yeah, if this was like the Dan Price translation of the Bible,

it would be like this thing that you really need is it's like lifting a feather to God. You may consider converting. Yeah. He's ready and waiting, right? I'm his prophet. He's right here ready to do for you what you need. And that's what he does. Verse 20 says the next morning about the time of the offering of offering the sacrifice.

Behold, water came from the direction of Edom to the country was filled with water. So this water just, you know, miraculously appears without any wind or without any rain, just like just like Elisha had promised. So it's coming from the very land that they have passed through on their way up to where Moab is. And we'll hear more about this water in just a second. Verse 21 says, when all the Moabites heard that the king had come up to fight against them, everybody grabs their armor, youngest to oldest. So we have, you know, basically they're grabbing every possible soldier from 15 up to 50. They're called, they draw up there at the border.

they uh they get up early in the morning they're ready to fight and verse 22 says that the sun shone on the water so this water that god miraculously miraculously provided and when it did the moabites saw the water opposite them as red as blood there's actually a play on words here so edom at dome in hebrew is very similar to the word for red which is adom so it's basically E-D-O-M, whereas red is A-D-O-M. So this water that comes from Edom is Adom. It's red as blood. So this is kind of the other part of the miracle. Not only does God provide water so they can drink, but also now he's going to trick the enemy into thinking that there's been this great battle, so much so that the water runs red with all the blood that's been spilled.

so verse 23 tells us what they think has happened they say to each other this is blood the kings have surely fought together and struck one another down now then moab to the spoil so all the moabites are tricked they think that there must have been some sort of internal disagreement and strife erupted and the northern soldiers fought the southern soldiers who may be joined in fighting the Edomite soldiers, they've all attacked each other, killed each other, so much that blood has run down, filled the water. And so they think, hey, this is going to be simple. They've already fought each other, so all we have to do is basically go in and have a

mopping up operation, and we'll take the spoil, we'll take some prisoners, and it'll be an easy day on the battlefield. So they rush in, in other words, thinking they really don't need to be prepared. And they're soon to find out that it was the opposite. So verse 24 says they came to the camp of Israel. And when they did, the Israelites rose and struck the Moabites till they fled before them. And they just keep going on. They says they went forward, striking the Moabites as they went. So they're basically, they catch these guys by surprise. They think it's going to be an easy victory. It's not. They're driven backward and they run behind them, killing them

as they go. And then it stopped there. Verse 25 says they go on to their cities. They begin to overthrow some of the cities and on every good piece of land, every man threw a stone until it was covered. Slight exaggeration there, but I guess they're doing what they can to ruin the land. They stop up the springs of water. They chop down the good trees and they do all this and everything's just going great for them until they come to a place called Kir HaReshit. Now, Kir HaReshit was the capital of Moab. So they're probably

striking on all these Moabite villages and maybe some larger towns. But when they come to the capital, when they come to Kir HaReshit, things turn around for them. It says that the slingers surrounded the city and attacked it. So kind of interesting side note here. When we think about, we probably talked about this, but it's been too long ago. I can't remember. But when we talk about uh david's sling or his slingshot typically we have the wrong image in mind i mean we we tend to think of the piece of forked wood that you attach your rubber bands to and you shoot marble sized rocks that's not the kind of slings that were used back then slingers were part of every military operation you had swordsmen you had spirit you had guys with spears you had uh guys

with bows and you had slingers and these guys were were deadly uh they probably some of actually some of the best soldiers out there because they could they could launch those stones larger stones with with extreme accuracy from a long distance so probably your two as far as like projectiles arrows and stones would have been the best back in ancient warfare so you have the slingers they're surrounding they're attacking the city you got stones flying through the air left and right so what's going to happen verse 26 says the king of moab saw the battle was going against him so he's made it off the battlefield he's inside the capital city he sees things are not going well and so he tries first of all to break through the ranks of those who are attacking so he takes 700

swordmen to break through opposite the king of edom but that falls apart that fails and now he's out of options except for one thing there's there's only one more thing that he can do it's the most extreme thing that could be done in this situation and he chooses to do it verse 27 says that he took his oldest son the one that was supposed to reign in his place so this was the one who was going to take over after after he died and he offered him as a burnt offering on the wall of the city. Afterward, we're told that there came great wrath against Israel, and they, this is the part that I told you to wait for. This is the very end of the very closing sentence of this chapter. So there came great wrath against Israel, and they withdrew from him and returned to their

own land. Now that's the shock of this whole thing. You have two kings, one from the north, one from the south you got the the edomite king joining they've made this long march difficult the only way they made it is through the prophet providing them with with this water and they heard the prophet say you shall do this and you shall do that and they got the impression that oh well we've got it made then uh elisha says we're supposed to do this and we're supposed to do this and so we do that and they think that everything's gonna go great for them until they get to the capital city, and lo and behold, the king up on the city wall offers his son as a human sacrifice. And as a result of this, we're told that great wrath came against Israel. There's

some ambiguity there. Does that mean that God was somehow wrathful against them? Does that mean that the wrath was, as it were, fired up among the Moabites, and they were able to just force their way through the ranks and to overthrow Israel. Like I said, it's ambiguous. It's kind of hard to say which is which. But this great wrath came against Israel, and as a result, the Israelites were defeated. They had to go home. They weren't able to accomplish that which they set out to do. Now, to me, this sentence then makes us go back and rethink this whole scenario, this whole military campaign. First of all, why were they exacting such a heavy tribute from the Moabites to begin with? Was that just, or was that too much? Secondly, did God ever want

them to do this? They didn't consult God before they went on this. They waited until they were in dire straits before they even talked to his prophet. And they purposely broke the Torah's rules of military engagement by cutting down all these these trees as they were working their way through the enemy territory so you kind of left the end of this chapter saying so was any of this approved by god to begin with or did god as it were maybe tricked isn't the best word but did he use their own evil desires to show them that they had gone down the wrong path to begin with Did he give them, as it were, what they wanted until he brought them to the point of realizing that when they got what they wanted, ultimately, that ends in defeat itself? Yeah, this is a little bit tricky, for sure, because, you know, you read it, obviously, we're not like, well, this guy sacrificed his son, and it worked.

You don't want to read it like that. Obviously, I think that you have to assume that this wrath that falls against Israel is either from God— it could be that the people, the soldiers saw this and this somehow fueled them to make a surge and this kind of stuff. But either way, because of what we know about battles that we've read so far, if God wants Israel to win this war, they do. They will, yeah. so so whether they have five soldiers that will win if god wants them to win right and so whether it's the people just got really um you know amped up and they said like he sacrificed his own son

like like we have to you know we gotta find your courage boys we have to do this whether it's that or whether it's the wrath of god just uh turning on them either way it's god using it whichever it is to thwart this battle. He does not desire them to win it. Yeah, I think it's a great example, I think, of the fact that because you think you know God's will does not necessarily mean that you do. I mean, I'm sure that the king thought that they had God's will figured out. This is exactly what he wanted them to do. They've even, you know, got the prophet along to make sure that that they're going to get what they get what they want well if you're if you're not if you're going against the very words that god has given you then your uh your your confidence is misplaced

well what it shows you is that you have you have a king here and a people here who are ignorant of what their own scriptures say because when elijah says you shall this you shall that they don't even realize that it's in direct violation because they're so far removed from the the word of god and this is this is what happens hey yeah somebody should have said hey uh but deuteronomy yeah but nobody yeah but nobody knows but nobody knows that right because i mean this is the whole we've said this numerous times this is the whole thing when god is always telling you that he wants you to listen to him it's not it's not so much about uh obedience and and i need you to do exactly what i say because i'm god and and i demand to be uh to be obeyed he's more that he

wants you to know his what his word to you is and he wants you to hear it he wants you to listen to it right well they've long stepped away from that so much so that they don't even realize that the words of that elijah is saying are in direct violation of the things that god has said They're not just willfully disobeying. I don't even think they realize that it's in violation because it's been so long since any of them have explored what God has spoken to them that they have no idea what Deuteronomy says. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. I mean, if someone is engaged in idolatry, and especially in a state-sponsored idolatry, well, then the last thing that you want people hearing about and reading about are the various scriptures which condemn that sort of behavior. So why would you spend any time having Deuteronomy read or studying Deuteronomy or having Deuteronomy preached in your region if this word is going to condemn that which has been sponsored and promulgated by the state?

And so, yeah, the word basically was useless to them because they knew they were rebelling against it. And so it was ignored. And this then led to the result that we see here at the end of chapter three. So that is chapter three. We're going to make a real hard shift here to a much different kind of story. That was all about politics and nations being involved and the military conflict. conflict. And so kind of a much bigger perspective. Chapter four is going to take us into a much narrower framework where we're going to hear about basically a family. The first story is going to be about a wife, a widow in particular. This is still about Elisha, except now it's going to be focused upon what he does for those who are in need. In fact, we're going to see throughout

chapter four, multiple miracles that Elisha performs. And no surprise that the basic way in which these miracles work are going to provide the template for the miracles that Jesus himself is going to perform. So when Jesus multiplies the loaves, he's going to do something that's very similar to exactly what Elisha is going to do in this chapter. Or when Jesus heals, doesn't heal, but when he resurrects the widow's son, he's going to do something very similar to what happened with Elisha in 2 Kings 4. So this becomes the miraculous prophetic pattern that is going to be followed by Christ, who comes as the prophet, the spokesman of God. And we'll start out here with this first one, where he's going to take care of the widow,

who's about to have to surrender her two children to a creditor. So it starts out this way. The wife of one of the sons of the prophets cried to Elisha. So the sons of the prophets are the ones that we've heard about several times. Elisha seems to have kind of, I guess, taken over leadership of this group. Elijah was more of a loner. He was always just kind of doing his own thing until he brought Elisha in. But Elisha seems to be working much more with a broader group of prophets.

So this is the wife of one in this prophetic group. She cries to Elisha and says, your servant, my husband, is dead. And you know that your servant feared the Lord, but the creditor has come to take my two children to be his slaves. So whatever the financial situation of this family had been with the death of the husband, now they're in a really bad situation. They owed money. They can't pay the money back. there uh of course back then there is no there's no net there's no social net to catch people when their lives are falling apart they have to rely upon family members no declaring bankruptcy

for these people huh yeah there's no yeah there's no declaring bankruptcy there's there's there's nothing you can do that what you do is you you rely on your family you rely on the people around you and that's sort of what she's doing here uh elisha is going to kind of act as a kinsman redeemer. He's going to step in and he's going to perform the duty for her that a redeemer should have performed. He's not going to do it directly like by giving her money, but he's going to provide the means whereby she can make money. He's going to actually kind of start a business for her, if you will, based upon a miracle that he performs. So the creditor is coming to seize the only thing that she has of value and those are her two children who are going to be then

basically uh sold into into slavery elisha says to her well what do you want tell me what do you have in your house and she says all i've got in my house is a jar of oil this is a different level of poverty here yeah i imagine that so what do you got left well you know i got a i got a you old beater for a car and uh you know i've still got my you know all my stuff in my kitchen and my my bed and blah blah blah blah i get a little bit of money my bank account no she's got a jar of oil no bread no silver and gold tucked away somewhere all she has is a jar of oil so he says here's what i want you to do uh go go out to like to your neighbor's houses and I want you to borrow all the vessels that they have,

empty vessels, and not just a few of them. I mean, I want you to like buy the arm loads. You go to your neighbor across the street, you go to your neighbor down the street, and you simply say, you have a jar? Is it empty? Well, let me have it. Then he says, go in, shut the door behind you,

and you and your sons, I want you to pour into all these vessels. And as soon as one is full, well, then set it aside. so i love that he really doesn't tell her i mean not explicitly what's going to happen i mean he sort of does and he sort of doesn't she's got to be thinking what i've just got a jar of oil that's all i've got so this is this is an act of faith on her part she does believe the word of the prophet so that's that's what they do they they gather all this up uh she goes uh shuts the door behind her with her sons and she pours and they just keep bringing vessel

after vessel after vessel to her and then finally she says okay this one's full bring me another one and her son says to her well that's it we're out there there is there is no other and at that point the oil stopped flowing so she comes and she tells the man of god which is the typical expression here that's used repeatedly to describe who elisha is he's not really called a prophet as much as It's called A Man of God. So she comes and she tells the man of God what had happened. And here's what he says. He says, basically, go and make yourself some money.

Go sell the oil and pay your debts. And then you and your sons can live on the rest. So you've got all this oil from all these vessels that have been filled. So take whatever you need, sell it, use that money to pay the creditors so you don't lose your sons. and then whatever you're able to sell whatever money you're able to make from the rest of it well there you go there's your there's your nest egg you can live you can live on that this is very similar not very similar but similar to the miracle that elijah performed when elijah went to stay with a widow at zarephath all she had left was a jar of flour and a jug of oil

so she at least had some some flour along with the oil but those never ran out until the famine was over. And so this is an Elijah-like miracle that Elisha performs. And it's only the first. He takes care of this widow. And beginning of verse 8, we're going to hear about how he is able to take care of another woman who's not a widow. She's married. And this is a multi-layered story. We'll see how he cares for her by, first of all, providing her with a son, and then later taking care of that son when he falls ill and dies. So verse 8 says that one day, Elisha was on the move, and he comes to a place called Shunem. So if you remember back in the start of 1 Kings, when David was still with us, he was an old man. He couldn't stay warm in bed,

and so they searched the whole land for the most beautiful virgin they could find so she could be a bed warmer for uh for david and they found one her name was abishag and she was from the same place she was called a shunamite and shunamites are those from the city of shunam so we've heard about this place before and elisha's there for some reason and we're told a wealthy woman lived there literally in hebrew it is a uh isha gonna law which is you would translate that literally as as a great woman but as is kind of typical of that adjective great it can mean a lot of different things it can mean great in the sense of good it can mean great in the sense of big it also can mean great in the sense of wealthy so probably that's the best

translation here she was a great woman in that in that she had wealth and uh she urged him to to stop and to to have him be able to eat some food so whenever he passed that way he would just stop there. I mean, it makes perfect sense. If he's traveling around a lot and he's found someone who is always willing to provide him with a plate of food, that's where he's going to stop. So after a while, she says to her husband, look, I know that this is a holy man of God who is continually passing our way. He's coming here. He's coming there. He's always stopping by for a plate of food. It's obvious to me that he is not just a man of God, but he's a holy man of God, meaning that he is god's chosen instrument through whom to teach to work miracles so she has an idea

verse 10 says she's speaking to her husband she says i tell you what why don't we add on to our house let's make a small room on the roof with walls and we'll put inside there a bed a table a chair and a lamp so that whenever he comes to us he can go in there this is actually quite an amazing thing when you when you think about it so imagine that there is a uh there's a preacher that comes through your town every once in a while you really like what he does um and you say to you say to your husband you know what why don't we just add on to our house so that anytime this preacher comes through, he'll have a place to stay.

We've fed him several times, but it's time we add a whole other bedroom onto our house for this guy. Now listen, you fans of 40 Minutes in the Old Testament, if any of you want to, you know, create additional rooms to your houses for when Chad and I come

wandering through town, just know that there's biblical precedent for such a thing. Just make sure we have a bed, a table, a chair, a lamp, and probably TV, too. Yeah, yeah. Throw that in. Different times, different times.

It is a great example of the impact, I suppose you would say, that Elisha was making on certain people. I mean, think about the context where this is happening. The Northern Kingdom is full of idolatry. That's kind of the official religious stance that's happening there. But that's kind of from the top down, right? This has always been coming from the kings and the queens, and it's filtering down to everybody else. But bear in mind, I guess don't get the idea that every single person in the northern kingdom was a worshiper of Baal.

Certainly there was a lot of it, but this woman proves that there were plenty of exceptions out there. And not just exceptions, but people who were willing to make great sacrifices to care for the prophet. And it's also, and I got this from Peter Lightheart's commentary, he points out that, I mean, what a great contrast here. So you have, you know, these fancy temples where Baal is worshipped. There's a lot of power. There's a lot of riches there. You know, everybody, fame, everybody knows about these. But where is the real prophet of God?

Well, he's in this little room on top of this house in the town of Shunem. He's got his bed, his chair, his lamp. Yeah, that's exactly everything he needs. And it's kind of interesting, too, because some of the language that's used here is actually used for pieces of furniture in the temple. So the word that's translated as lamp is menorah. So he's got his menorah in there. And the word translated as chair is keseh, which could also mean throne. and uh the table is shulhan which is sometimes used for like the table of the bread of the

presence so you have this is sort of a little a little temple if you were and that's where the man of god is he's got his menorah he's got his throne and he's got his table so if you want to know where god was at work well forget about dan and bethel forget about these you know these these big worship sites where baal was being worshipped and you have asherah being worshipped that's not where God's at. God is with this one guy in this one town, in this one room on top of this woman's house. God sometimes likes to hide in those places. He's not where you might expect him to be. So we have the room constructed. Verse 11 says, one day he came there. He's traveling around, and he turned into his chamber to rest there. He goes into his room, and he's taking it easy.

And he said to his servant, and this is the first time that we meet this guy. His name is Gehazi. He's going to be kind of a, what's the literary term for it? Kind of like a bumbling sidekick of someone. You know, we encounter these people sometimes in TV shows and in literature and in plays and whatnot. so he's not just not just a servant but he's the sidekick who never really gets it he's always making mistakes i mean the only maybe maybe this is the best example but i kind of picture dwight from the office yeah yeah he's he's sort of like that you know he's a little he's a little

different uh he never quite really gets it uh a little strange and gehazi is going to pop up in several stories, he's like that. He never really seems to get fully on board with what's happening with the prophet. But this is the first time that we meet him. We're going to see him in several different stories coming up. So he said to Gehazi's servant, call the Shunammite. For some reason, he doesn't say her name. He just says, call this Shunammite. So call the woman. And when he had called her, she stood before him, and he said to him, that is to say, Elisha said to Gehazi, say now to her, see, you have taken all this trouble for us. What is it to be done for you? Would you have a word spoken on your behalf to the king or the commander of the army?

And she answered, I dwell among my own people. Let's kind of pause here for a second. isn't this kind of strange you've got elisha the prophet you got his servant gehazi and it's not strange that he says to a servant hey uh go you know go call the shunammite woman that's not strange what is strange is when she gets there he doesn't speak directly to her yeah she's there the servant is there yeah he's it's from our perspective it's uh it's not really it's not a very polite thing i mean if there are three if you and i are in the room with uh with eric say will you use eric as an example and i turn to you and say dan i mean we're like all in the same room dan um would you tell eric yeah i mean i'd be like well these guys to go get us some supper

these guys are having a disagreement they're not they're definitely not speaking yeah it's a it's it's really a kind of an odd odd scenario uh i don't i don't really honestly don't know what's going on there i thought at first well maybe it's a language issue you know maybe she speaks uh a dialect or something he doesn't know but gehazi does but that argument fell apart because later in the chapter they they do address each other directly so i don't know uh maybe somebody will figure it out for me but whatever it is he says to her uh through gehazi basically what can i do for you you've done a lot for me what can i do for you to help you out And she says, I dwell on my own people, which probably means, hey, I'm I'm not interested in kings and generals and all of that.

I've got I've got my own people. So he says, well, then what what can be done for you? And Gehazi steps in. This is this is the one this is a shining moment for Gehazi because he's like, well, I've got an idea for her. She doesn't have any kids. She has no son. And her husband's husband is old. so he said call her and when he called her she stood in the doorway and he said at this season about this time next year you shall embrace a son and she says she's in shock she says no my lord oh man i've got don't lie to your servant in other words please don't make me promises that you can't keep but verse 17 says that's exactly what happened the woman conceived she bore a son about that time the following spring as elisha had said to her i'd love to there's more i want to say about that but

we're go ahead well i love that response i mean you talk about like hitting a nail right in the head like what can we do for this woman and she's like nothing then he's like how about this i'll give you a son she and she's like beside herself and uh sort of a word coming from god that you believe is too good to be true and so you said man don't lie to me it's the one thing i want more than anything else in the whole world. So don't make a promise if you can't keep it. And lo and behold, that's exactly what happens. And I did want to say more about that

in connection with a parallel situation back in Genesis when God appears to Abraham and Sarah and promises them a child. But we'll save that for the beginning of the next episode. But that's where we'll start out next time. All right. Yeah, we are out of time. Next week, we will get into this son.

we got a story involving him Chad will do some back and Genesis tie-ins but you're going to have to wait for all that until next week, Chad, I will see you then alright, see you then Thank you.