followHIM - 2 Kings 2-7 -- Part 1 : Dr. Krystal Pierce

Episode Date: July 1, 2022

Are prophets ever popular? Dr. Krystal Pierce returns to explore the spiritual and physical scattering of Israel and the many miracles of Elisha, oracles, and the sons of the prophets.Please rate and review the podcast!Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.co/old-testament/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Executive ProducersDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: Marketing & SponsorLisa Spice: Client Relations, Show Notes/TranscriptsJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Rough Video EditorAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsKrystal Roberts: French TranscriptsIgor Willians: Portuguese Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-piano

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith. And I'm John, by the way. We love to learn. We love to laugh. We want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow Him. Welcome, my friends, to Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith. I am your host. I am here with my double portion co-host, John, by the way. John, by the way, when I think of you, I think of the term double portion. I have no idea why other than I've just read Second Kings, but- I'm twice as insignificant as you think I am. No, but you're doubly important. You're doubly significant.

John, we love you. Everyone in this audience loves John, by the way. Okay. Skip to the next part. Skip to the end. John, like I just said, we're going to be in the book of second Kings and we have a returning star. Tell everyone who is joining us today. Yes. I'm so glad we have Dr. Crystal V. L. Pierce back again. She helped us as we were talking about Noah. And just to refresh everyone's memory, she was born in Logan, Utah, raised in Taylorsville, also lived in, I love saying this, California, Idaho, crossed the ocean, Egypt, and Israel. She received a PhD in Egyptian archaeology and Near Eastern languages and cultures from UCLA and an MA and BA in Near Eastern Studies from UC Berkeley.

She's taught classes on Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the BYU Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies, UCLA and UC Berkeley. Crystal and her husband, Professor George Pierce, whom we have also had on the program, have two children and live in Vineyard. And so we're really happy to have you back and excited that we have you for such great stories in the Old Testament. Yeah, I'm happy to be back. Happy to talk about Elisha. We love Crystal Pierce on this program. And just so everyone knows who's listening, Crystal Pierce is this sweet and genuine and brilliant in person as she is on this program. And just so everyone knows who's listening, Crystal Pierce is this sweet and

genuine and brilliant in person as she is on this show. She really is. She's a star in the religion department. Not only is she amazing, but she also informs everybody. Hank, one of the things that I hear from people that talk about the podcast is, oh, I love your guests. I can't believe the variety you have and the different areas that people know about. And I'm like, I know, isn't it great that there are so many people with such varied, broad education who are so strong in their testimonies of the gospel and are willing to come on and help us. So again, thank you for being here. Hey, John, speaking of people who listen to the podcast, we got a message from Amy Nye,

who says she listens to hours of the podcast because she has a lot of gardening and lawn mowing to do. She says, I listen to on average four to six of your podcasts every work day, weather permitting. So Amy, we just wanted to send our love to you. Thanks for the message. John, four to six episodes a day. Oh, I think I need to try to speak better. I don't know if I could listen to me that long, so I'll be quiet today. So Crystal, today we're in a book that I don't know if the average Latter-day Saint goes,

you know what? What I was reading the other day was the book of 2 Kings, but yet it's got some fantastic stories, really faith promoting and beautiful. How should we get into this lesson? The specific chapters, John, you're our manual guy. Our specific chapters are chapters 2 Kings 2 through 7. Okay. So Crystal, how come the second book of Kings is commonly called the fourth book of Kings? So we can answer that by turning to the first book of Samuel, actually. And if you look at the subtitle, it says the first book of Samuel, otherwise called the first book of the Kings. So, first Samuel is officially the first book about the Kings, and then second Samuel is the

second. And then first Kings becomes the third book about the kings. And then the fourth book is 2 Kings. So hopefully that makes sense that 1 and 2 Samuel are those first two books about the kings of the northern and southern kingdoms. I love it. That's great. The second book of kings commonly called the fourth book of kings. Not confusing at all. If we're going to jump into 2 Kings, we should probably just

start with the first chapter. That kind of sets us up with what's happening with Elijah and Elisha at this time and really helps us understand the context. Let's say that one of our listeners is pretty new and they don't quite understand how we went from Joshua and Judges to Kings. What happened? Give us the five-minute pitch. It's interesting because Elijah and Elisha are meant to remind us of Moses and Joshua, even more than everything that comes in between Joshua and Elijah. We are supposed to hearken back to them. And a lot of the things they do, a lot of the places they go are meant to show us, and we'll see even a reverse conquest in a way. They kind of follow in these footsteps and some of the miracles that they do as well.

We're meant to kind of think back, way back to the Exodus and the conquest and connect them with that time when things were good right at the beginning, when they were just getting established and trying to do what they're supposed to do and follow the covenant. As I've been following along this year, it seems Moses takes us out of Egypt. Joshua brings us into the promised land. Let's keep the covenant and we're going to be great. This is going to work. Along the way, we decided, no, we'd rather have a king. The Lord said, that's a bad idea. And Israel said, the other nations have one. We want one.

We want to be like everybody else. We had our first three. We had Saul, David, and Solomon. I think, John, as we read through those, it seems like we went 0 for 3 on kings. Yeah, they could start out good and not end so well. And I don't want to say they're bad because Brother Goodman was the one saying, don't overlook all the good they did because of things that went wrong. But you're right in that all three things went south towards the end of their reign. Then we split into two. We split and we have the northern kingdom of Israel based in the capital of Samaria, and then the southern kingdom of Judah, of course, set in Jerusalem. Unfortunately,

a lot of the king's names are the same. So we get the same names of kings ruling in the north and the south at the same time and then replacing each other. It can get a little bit confusing. This is called the divided kingdom period. It's helpful to get some clarification here right when we start. So let's do this. We have our two kingdoms and Christo, you said there's kings in both. Yes.

Kings in the north, kings in the south. Kings in the north, kings in the south. Kings in the north said at Samaria, when we get into second kings here, we kind of start with a king in this northern area. Important what you just mentioned, northern kingdom, southern kingdom. So if memory is serving me, first when Moses came out, 12 tribes divided up the land among the tribes, generally speaking, and then they became a divided kingdom. Northern kingdom called Israel, political Israel. Samaria is the capital.

Southern kingdom, Judah. Jerusalem is the capital, mostly the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. Tribal areas are pretty complicated, but for the most part, yeah. When we talk about the 10 tribes, we're talking about those in the political Israel, not house of Israel, but the land called Israel. And that is the northern kingdom. I think that's helpful. Before we jump into the kings, there were kings in the northern kingdom and kings in the southern kingdom. And these guys that we're talking about today, Elijah and Elisha, they're not kings.

They're sent to the kings. Is that right, Crystal? Yes. Like today, there was more than one prophet, seer, and revelator because they had such wide areas to cover. Many times there would be a prophet in the north and one in the south, and sometimes even more than that. There was even what they call the sons of the prophets, this company of the prophets. So, there were many, many prophets during this time. They were supposed to be the king's advisor, advise the king with representing God and what God would want for both of these kingdoms. And that's how I've always thought of Isaiah as an advisor to kings. Now,

that's jumping way ahead, but isn't that kind of Isaiah's role was an advisor to kings? Yes. According to the redactors, there's not a good king in the North. There's not a single one. They go for like O for 20. It seems like even when they mention something good that a king did, they follow up immediately, but they did other bad things. Sometimes we make good decisions. Sometimes we don't. And sometimes people are known for their bad decisions as

opposed to their good ones. And the authors also in the Southern kingdom, they're pretty good. Some. Of the time. Yeah. Yes. We've got our divided kingdoms. We've got them both having different kings, kings in the North, kings in the south. You've got prophets coming to both, as you said. What's going to happen? Let's place this where it is in the timeline. We know what's come before.

What's going to come after this, Crystal? So eventually, some of these outside kingdoms are going to come in and take over both Israel and Judah, and they will lose their kings. A lot of the people will be sent into exile, into different places. Eventually, some of them will return as well. Yeah. When I teach this in my class, my students are always pretty excited to find out that's exactly where Lehi fits in. Exactly. And so, he was contemporary of Jeremiah and some of these other prophets as well. We can also bring in the Jaredites and Mulek and what happens with him surviving and his father being blinded and all the other sons being killed and taken into captivity.

There are some really good connections with the Book of Mormon here. The chapters we're studying today happens when there's still two kingdoms and there's two kings, one in the north, one in the south, and Elijah and Elisha are coming to talk to those kings and let them know what the Lord has to say. Yes, exactly. So I remember in seminary hearing about the Babylonian captivity. That's what Lehi prophesied of. But what we've just mentioned is first, there's kind of an Assyrian captivity with those 10 tribes in the northern kingdom. And then what, 120 years later is the Babylonian captivity.

Did I get that right? So that we can kind of think of those two times when they're carried off. Yes, definitely. They sort of overlap in the places where everybody ends up spread out all over the place. In Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, the Americas. A scattering of Israel, right? Yeah. Sometimes people were scattered as sort of a punishment or a consequence. And sometimes people were scattered for protection and to save them. And that's basically the Lehites. They were

scattered to protect themselves. And they identify themselves as part of the exile, as part of the scattering, but that they have this promise that they will be gathered and be able to see the Lord, which happens. Pete That kind of seems like a lot of the stories we're reading in the Book of Mormon in here is scatter, gather, scatter, gather, scatter, gather. I had to practice saying that a few times to be able to do it, but doesn't it seem like it kind of goes back and forth? And sometimes it's you, you lose your testimony, then you lose your real estate, you get scatterbrained,

and then you lose your land. And then how do you get gathered? You get gathered in your testimony, and then you get gathered to lands or to stakes of Zion, maybe in our day. I think that's perfect. This idea of a spiritual scattering and not only losing religion and beliefs, but your identity as part of the house of Israel and who you are as a person. And then the more physical scattering, losing the land of your inheritance. And then when it comes back and the spiritual gathering has to be done first before the physical gathering will happen. I think Laman and Lemuel asked that to Nephi. Is this, according to things, temporal or spiritual?

And Nephi's like, uh-huh. Yeah. So the northern kingdom is going to be scattered first, then the southern kingdom. And the Lord is sending prophets before this scattering, probably to let them know, one, you're going to get scattered. Or if you don't turn things around, you're going to get scattered. And two, when you do get scattered, just know the Lord hasn't forgotten you. You'll come back. Everyone will have a chance to be gathered eventually. That's what we're working on today. We're still working on gathering everyone. You know what's funny, Crystal, is the parts of the Book of Mormon that talk about the gathering

are the ones we skip. Second Nephi, Jacob 5, and the second day of the Savior's visit. Those are the major gathering chapters. And everyone's kind of like, oh, second Nephi, skip that. Oh, Jacob 5, skip that. Sure seems like President Nelson has been emphasizing that gathering, hasn't he? He's definitely, I would say, a prophet of the gathering. And I love that because it comes up so often in the Book of Mormon, like you said. It's easy to tie that in and say, this is what we're doing.

This is our job right now. And depending on what tribe you're from, you have different responsibilities in the gathering. The students love figuring out, oh, what tribe am I from? What part do I play? It's really exciting. I remember it clicking in one day. Why is Nephi so obsessed with the scattering and gathering of Israel? He's living it.

Right. And I think that it's fun to hear Nephi remind his people who they are. Because I think when they lost their real estate, they kind of lost part of their identity. And he had to tell them, hey, we got a new area code, but we are house of Israel. And the promises still apply to us. And the obligations still apply to us. And then even when Jesus comes in third Nephi, you are my sheep. I have not forgotten you.

And that same kind of a thing, you may feel scattered, but I know exactly who you are and where you are and kind of reaffirms their identity for him. And I love that statement that we may not know where everybody's been scattered, but the Lord knows exactly where every single person is. That's why he's the gatherer. He's the one that we're all gathering. He's the good shepherd. Yeah. Yeah. And Krista, one other thing, doesn't the Book of Mormon teach us, like you said, he scattered them not to punish them, but to save them. That's Jacob 5. I love

this tree. I've got to scatter it in order to save it. Zenos's allegory is very much about how can we keep saving the trees, the trees that are the wild trees and the tame tree, and how can we keep mixing everyone to try and save the whole vineyard? That's what we're trying to do. We often talk about a fortunate fall, and I like to tell my class, maybe we could call this a fortunate scattering, because by scattering the house of Israel, the Lord was blessing all, starting that, blessing all the families of the earth, which is part of the Abrahamic covenant.

By scattering them everywhere, we're living in a time where you'd be hard pressed to find anybody who isn't part of the house of Israel once they get their patriarchal blessing and go, oh, blessings are yours too. Exactly. I think this is right on. So we've done a full picture. Let's come back. There's two kingdoms, Northern Kingdom, Southern Kingdom, kings in both. What's going to happen here, Crystal? Well, should we just jump into chapter one and kind of do our setting here? The very first verse kind of throws out there that this place called Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab.

And that's all we get for here. So this actually will get picked up again in chapter 3. And we can actually talk about Moab and why it rebelled and what all of this means. But if we look at verse 2, we get to talk about a king named Ahaziah. And Ahaziah was one of these kings. He was the eighth king of Israel and based in Samaria. So this northern kingdom that we've been talking about. He was a son of Ahab and Jezebel.

So that kind of puts things in context as well. He didn't reign for very long, only a couple of years. And we kind of find out why here, because he actually had an accident. It says in verse 2 that he fell through a lattice and was hurt. He was hurt enough that he thought he might not survive these injuries. We have found the palace in Samaria, Omri's palace. He was the one who originally built it. It does have a second story. This lattice is probably the same way we would think of a lattice, like a wooden grid to let in light and to provide some shade. So, he's fallen through this. He wants to know if he's going to survive. So, he decides,

and remember, he's the king of Israel here, to turn to this deity named Baal-Zabub, which is quite the name, I think, for a deity here. Baal has come up quite a bit before this. Maybe we feel familiar with him. Of course, this is a title and name of many different gods. And it just means Lord in Ugaritic. Are you saying the word Baal does, Crystal? Yeah, Baal does. It's fine to say Baal or Baal even. That's totally fine. And we're told this is the god of Ekron. Now, Ekron is a Philistine town sort of on the border today, Telmikne, the border between Judah and Philistia. So, he wants to send messengers to ask Baal-Zebub. There's not a definite consensus on what god this is. Some people think it refers to this other god in Ugaritic, Baal-Zabul. He was a god of the underworld. This is why this title, Beelzebub in Greek, gets tied to Satan in the New Testament, because he was a god of the underworld. Now, Baal is this storm god. He can control

lightning and thunder, and on his stela, he's shown holding a lightning bolt. He's the god of storms and he can control the rain and the wind and all of these sort of natural elements. And this is going to be a big thing because with Elijah, especially, he has a lot to do with sort of contending with the followers and worshipers and prophets of Baal. And that's what we just encountered in the first Kings when we talked about Elijah and the priests of Baal up on top of the mountain. You just said that he contended with them before. And that was that really miraculous one where fire fell and licked up the sacrifice and everything. Ahab and Jezebel, they liked Baal and Asherah a lot.

They built altars and they served him and her and had these groves of trees or poles that were dedicated to Asherah. With Elijah, this was one of the main things that he had to deal with and handle was, how do I turn everybody, including the king and the queen, back to the God of Israel because of the effect they have on their own people. How do I turn Israel back to the true God? And this was an issue of his. We even see this here with Ahaziah. He's turning to this other God. And Zabub in Hebrew means fly. So, this is where we get the Lord of the flies, Baal Zabub. So, Lord of the flies. He's sometimes associated with death or disease, where flies might be.

So it's possible that's why Ahaziah is, I'm going to turn to this, this other God, this God that may have to do with helping people overcome diseases or death, as opposed to turning to the God of Israel. So Ahaziah wants to turn to this God. So he decides to send messengers. An angel of the Lord comes to Elijah. Just a little bit about Elijah here, even though he's first mentioned in 1 Kings and we get a lot of information about him there. He is called the Tishbite, which usually refers to a place of birth or residence.

The issue is we don't really know where Tishbe is. We don't really know exactly where he's from, probably in the area of modern Jordan. Elijah goes to the messengers and he says, okay, so he's the king of Israel. Why is he not going to the God of Israel to ask if he's going to recover from these injuries? He gives an oracle, he prophesies right then and there that the king is going to die from these injuries, that he will not survive. The messengers return, never having made it to the prophets of Baal-zebub, go back and tell the king. The king, of course, is not happy with this and wants to know who was this person who made this horrible oracle about me that I'm going to die. He says, well, what did he look like?

And I love it because in verse eight, they tell him he's hairy. That's what they say. They say he was a hairy man. You know, and they talk about what he's wearing, this girdle of leather about his loins. So like a loincloth of animal skin. And this is one of, seems to be one of Elijah's defining physical features is that he is hairy. He has hair everywhere. Sometimes people debate, oh, well, maybe it's talking about his cloak, this famous mantle, this cloak that he has. And I'm sure that was hairy, but the way they sort of describe it, his person was hairy as well.

And what's funny is the king knows exactly then who it is. He says, okay, it's Elijah. And it's great because his description given here of Elijah is similar to one given for John the Baptist. And of course, they have this connection, right? Being the messenger that comes before the face of the Lord and everything. Yeah, it looks like that footnote is right there, the Mark 1, 6. Elijah seems to be the Lord's messenger to some pretty rotten kings. I feel bad for him.

Every time the Lord calls on him, he's, hey, you know that really mean king? Yeah, go give him a message. And Elijah's got to be thinking, okay, who needs friends? Why is it always me? And even before this with Ahab, it's funny. One of my favorite things is Ahab and the kings are having some problems. They want to ask the prophet. And Ahab's like, well, I know this prophet and they're talking about Micaiah and we could ask him what we should do, but I don't really like him because

he always says mean things to me. So, let's not go talk to him. And it kind of becomes the prophets. They're meant to warn and to help give guidance and things like that, whether it's positive or negative, they're going to do what the Lord tells them to do. Do you remember President Nelson at BYU, prophets are not popular. And it's funny because even Micah later says, if a prophet is popular, it's probably because they're being paid to say what they're saying.

He brings it up as an issue, only a hundred years after this, these false prophets, you give them enough money, then they're gonna tell you exactly what you wanna hear. It's a problem. President Nelson at BYU, September 17th, 2019, in which he says, it is precisely because we do care deeply

about all of God's children that we proclaim his truth. We may not always tell people what they want to hear. Prophets are rarely popular, but we will always teach the truth. I think you're right on. We have prophets today who are doing the exact same thing. Yeah, and it's important, and it shows that they're just saying what God wants them to say, whether it's positive or negative. And it's up to us to interpret that and internalize it and figure out what we're supposed to learn and do with that. That's a comfort.

Why would we want to rely and listen to them if we were unsure whether they were just trying to say what we wanted to hear or not? It'd be worthless. You need somebody in your life that will tell it like it is. Wow, John, I've never thought of that, but that's really good. I remember really respecting my high school football coach, Bill Jacobson, because I knew he'd tell me the truth. If I did terrible, he was going to tell me I did terrible. He wasn't going to say, well, here's all the reasons it was good. He was like, no, that was awful. What you just did was awful. Here's how we can improve. We've had our colleague Brad Wilcox on here before. And almost every book I've written, I've sent to him.

And he's been so great. He's read it. And I love having Brad. Some people will just, oh, that's great. Brad will tell me exactly. And that's why I want his feedback more than anyone else. Because he'll tell me good, bad. He'll tell me exactly.

And he's trustworthy that way. And so maybe that's a good parallel to bring up for the prophets. They're going to tell us like it is and that's valuable. Yeah, that's not a negative. That's a positive. Sometimes I tell my students, you know, if the prophet or an apostle or somebody says something and you immediately want to sort of balk and say, whoa, I don't know about that, then that's a perfect time to stop and think, why am I getting a little defensive or balking at this? And to really

think about it as opposed to, I agree, I agree, I agree. This is easy. This is easy. Those moments are the moments we really should think about. Right, Crystal. I would say, welcome to the scriptures. If you hear a prophet say something and you're like, I don't like that, then welcome to the Bible and the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants, because that seems to be the case almost every time. There's an old saying, I think the first time I heard it was attributed to Brigham Young, but I think it's an older saying than that, that the gospel is here to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.

Crystal said you can introspect and say, now, wait a minute, I got to think about this. Do I need to get in line here? Let me process this because I want to get my heart right with God. Yeah, and that's really what happens here. 2 Kings 1, go give him a message. I don't think he's going to like this message, but okay. Who was it that gave that message it was elijah don't shoot the messenger he says well this hairy guy and the king knows it's elijah

and so he says well we need to go take care of this we're gonna go find elijah he sends a hundred soldiers to hunt him down elijah's on top of a hill as he usually is on top of mountains and hills and this is where he is, which is perfect, right? Because we associate temples and hills and mountains and holy spaces. It's funny because the soldiers call him a man of God. They say, hey, man of God, come down from the hill. And Elijah says, well, you know, if I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume the soldiers. And this ends up happening. And this isn't the first time Elijah has called down fire from heaven. It's interesting because we've already talked about how Baal is the god of these

natural things, these disasters or things that can happen. In the ancient Near East, when they say fire from heaven, they're usually referring to actual lightning bolts. Baal is the one who controls lightning. In this case, it's very clear that Elijah is showing, no, Jehovah is the one who controls the lightning. It's this fire and the power that comes from fire, which can be both destructive and purifying, represents the power of God. And this is why, you know, Moses interacts with this burning bush. And we have some of these other relationships with fire. So, this is really definitely meant to show the soldiers and anybody reading that it is Jehovah that controls the fire from heaven and not Baal.

The lesson is clear in verse 16. Thus saith the Lord, for as much as thou hast sent messengers to inquire of Beelzebub, the God of Ekron, it is not because there is no God in Israel to inquire of his word. Therefore thou shalt not come down off that bed, which you are gone up, but shall surely die. We're going to make this very clear. He gives the same oracle and the king keeps sending soldiers. Finally, they asked for mercy, but he gives the same oracle. He says it hasn't changed.

This is true. And this is what he wants you to know. And it's interesting because when we talk about Baal and Asherah and Astarte, and especially among the judges, this was a huge problem, worshiping these gods. Sometimes we have trouble connecting with this, right? I'm, worshiping these gods. Sometimes we have trouble connecting with this, right? I'm not worshiping Baal and Asherah. This is not an issue for me. A couple of weeks ago, George and I are the Sunday school teachers for the oldest group of teenagers in our ward. We just got a new name, Springwater Sixth Ward.

Hey, shout out to the Springwater Sixth Ward. Our teenagers, we love you guys. So we talked about this. We said, okay, so we're not worshiping Baal and Asherah and our prophets aren't saying, don't do this. But what are we worshiping instead? And they came up with this great list of things that they say, you know, people today are focused on.

Things they came up with, phones, money, cars, clothes. They even said celebrities or work. We came up with this great definition of anything that you engage a lot of your time in or a lot of your effort or your money is something that is your Baal, is your Asherah, as opposed to God. Or with Ahaziah, who are you turning to when you're in trouble, when you're worried? What do you turn to? And I love it because we can connect with this. We just do it in a little bit different way.

Crystal, that was so good. Who do you turn to? What do you turn to when you are in trouble? There's your God. There are all kinds of answers to that, but this is meant to show God has the power. He's the one that can help you. He's the one who knows your story and who you are and everything that you've done. Not these other things, not the phone or the internet or celebrities. It's the same story for Ahaziah. It's God who has the power.

Instagram reels might make you be distracted for a few minutes, but it's not going to bless your life like the Lord can if you'll just go to him. Imagine if I prayed as much time as I spent watching Instagram Reels. I think I'd be translated. Definitely. All right. So goodbye, Ahaziah. It's sayonara, Ahaziah. Sayonara, Ahaziah. Let'sonara Ahaziah sayonara

Ahaziah let's mix as many languages here as we can I mean that was a great joke sayonara Ahaziah

where are we going next okay so Ahaziah I don't know I don't know where we're going

but we're gonna go there we're gonna let's just all go together. Ahaziah doesn't have a son. So, next up on the throne is his little brother Joram or Jehoram, and also a son of Ahaz and Jezebel. And I don't think we've mentioned a time period yet here. So, let's definitely mention that at this point when Jehoram comes to the throne, we're about in the 840s. So 840s

BC is this is about where we're at. So that puts us about 120 years away from the first destruction from the Assyrian captivity. Yeah. Before the prophet Isaiah. Yes, exactly. 740. Yeah. So we're still a ways away from that. So we can remember who Elisha is, where he came from. So he's called the son of Shaphat of this place called Abelmehola, which is west of the Jordan on the bank of the Jordan, probably tell Abu Sus today. And in the story, if you remember, Elijah's in a cave and he's feeling pretty down about what's been happening with Ahab and Jezebel. And one of the things the Lord tells him is that your apprentice is going to be this man named Elisha.

And so he goes out to find him and Elisha is out plowing fields. He's got a lot of yoke of oxen. I think it talks about a dozen yoke of oxen. Elijah casts his mantle on him, sort of designating him as his apprentice, the next prophet. It's interesting because they don't seem to accept Elisha as well as they accepted Elijah. And we'll see this in hints. I sort of want to introduce it now, but we'll see hints of this as we go through.

When you say they, you're not talking about the kings because they didn't like Elijah. I think they realize that he was a man of God. Oh, okay. And so they refer to him as a man of God. Sometimes we'll ask him for help off and on, but you're right. They didn't like him, I think, because of what he said to them. But I'm also talking about just the people, and we'll talk about the sons of the prophets here in a minute. They also seem to struggle with moving from Elijah to Elisha, that he's the next one, and this causes some problems. So, we do hear that they're both in a place called Gilgal. That's chapter 2, verse 1. There are many places called Gilgal, including a beautiful garden in Salt Lake City. This is probably not the Gilgal that they're talking about.

So the best known one is by Jericho. And since they spent a lot of time in this area, that's probably about where they're there. Elijah tells Elisha, it's a tongue twister here to get between these two names. Stay here, stay in Gilgal. I need to go to Bethel. And of course, Elisha says, I'm never going to leave you. So we're going to go together. As the Lord liveth. It's a vow. It's an oath. He vows. It's three times. Verse two, verse four, verse six, the same thing. And I think it might be nice, Crystal, to talk about

what that means. I know Hugh Nibley does. I know we see it in the Book of Mormon, as the Lord liveth. When you say that, what are you saying when you do that? It's a strong vow. This is actually where we get this commandment not to take the Lord's name in vain. Actually, originally comes from this. Do not vow on the Lord. Do not use his name if you are not going to keep your promise, if you are not going to keep your vow. Because he's basically saying on the life of the Lord, I am vowing to do this. And so that's the strongest thing you can say or do for a prophet to say it, right?

That's serious. It's really serious. And that's why it's interesting that when he goes to all these places, Elijah keeps telling him to stay. It almost feels like he's trying to get rid of him or something. But- It reminds me of my high school life. It's like, why don't you stay here?

I'm going to continue on. But it's interesting because when he gets to Bethel, which is a very, it's a religious site. This is a site where they were worshiping. There were these calf shrines. A lot of people in the Old Testament spent time there, the patriarchs, the conquest, the settlement, Samuel, it housed the ark. And so, in verse 3, we're introduced to this group called the sons of the prophets. There's a group of them at Bethel. Sometimes this is translated as company of the prophets, sometimes school of the prophets, which is, should sound a little bit familiar with our church history. So this was a group of people who were being trained for the profession of a seer. They were trained by the main prophet, so Elijah.

And there were different groups of these in different cities. They would go through some of the procedures. You see them come up. Sometimes they would use them to go and give oracles or receive oracles. When you say oracle, what do you mean by that? Like a prophecy, kind of. So usually an oracle would be a king or somebody asks a question like Ahaziah did. Is this going to happen?

Or where should we go? What should I be doing? Is this good or bad? And then the oracle, then the prophet would answer and he would give a prophecy about that. And the prophecy is called an oracle. Today, we sometimes call the prophets oracles. Yeah. And so it's all connected.

They still give oracles, revelations, prophecies. You can kind of use these interchangeably. But the oracle was definitely, I have a question and now I'm going to get it answered as opposed to just a prophet receiving revelation. And this is kind of the difference between Elijah is he just receives revelation. He doesn't even have to ask a question. He's receiving information from God. But some of these sons of the prophets, so they were called the sons. He was called the father, sort of this honorific title that he's their leader. And some of the sons, they could perform oracles. They could ask a question and get an answer,

but it was Elijah who was the main prophet who would receive this direct information from God. Oh, okay. There is a phrase that I had never really noticed before that has come up in many of the chapters we've covered previously, and that is the sons of Belial talking about those that are wicked. And it's kind of fun to see this contrast. So here we've got the sons of the prophets as opposed to those sons of Belial. I had never noticed that before until this year have come follow me, the sons of Belial and how often that kind of came up. Do you think the modern school of the prophets, that name came from them perusing these books?

I think so. Because sometimes it is translated as school of the prophets, and it was a way to go and learn how to receive prophecy. What's interesting is Elisha did not come from the sons of the prophets and the school of the prophets. This seems to kind of cause a problem for him and them accepting him as their new leader, as the new father, as they would refer to it.

I think when we go through prophetic succession, so the succession of prophets, sometimes we struggle too, I think. We have a favorite prophet, maybe from our childhood or, you know, while you're on your mission or something, and you like the way he does things and the way he talks and maybe his background, where he came from, and then maybe the new prophet is different. And sometimes I think we also say, wow, they do things really different. And sometimes we expect the prophets to be very much the same, and this isn't the case. Even in the Old Testament, these prophets are very different from each other.

Wow. You're calling me out a little bit here, Crystal, because I still think of Gordon B. Hinckley when someone says, who's the prophet? I'm like, Gordon B. Hinckley. And it's not that I don't love President Monson and President Nelson. I do. And I accept them totally as prophets, but you're right. My heart, in any way, is wrapped to President Hinckley. I can see myself here.

I'm really grateful for that because it gives us flexibility. I mean, when I was called to be bishop, I thought, is there a mold of bishop or can I just be me with that calling? Do you know what I mean? I struggled with that. And I said to my wife one day, well, I guess the Lord called me so I can still be me, right? And it doesn't mean I won't repent and strive and everything, but can I still be me or do I have to be different? And I love that we can look and see for me, Hank, my mission call was signed by President Kimball. And so I thought of him as the one who called me and I love that each one of them I've just come to love. My favorite is in fast and testimony meeting when someone says a different prophet, they don't even mean to. And I love it because the prophets, they kind of have things

they focus on that they're known for, like the Book of Mormon or building temples or the gathering. And it's hard for us to shift. It's to shift gears and realize that these prophets, they're different. They're real people who came from different backgrounds and they're going to have be told different things by the Lord that they're meant to focus on. And this happens with Elijah and Elisha. And the more we can be ready to accept the next prophet and what he wants us to do, I think the better off we are. I remember when they did, I think it was President Nelson's, was it a birthday celebration? And they had an interview with President Oaks and President Eyring. And one of the things that I thought was so fascinating as a window into President Nelson was they said, he's a surgeon.

In that kind of work, if you have an idea during a surgery, you do it right now. There's a why not now, I think, that President Oaks and President Eyring said with President Nelson. There's a why not now. If we're talking about this, why don't we do this right now? The thought that comes to me with President Nelson is hasten my work. Let's do this right now. I love that we can see those kinds of things you're talking about, those differences, and yet they have the mantle, they are the prophet. I remember when President Monson stood up for the first time as president of the church, and there was something different about him. I don't know what else to call it besides a mantle. Yeah. I felt in my heart and soul, this is God's prophet right now. And let's talk about that word because again, I go back to the first time I heard the word

mantle, that meant the fireplace. So what does it mean here? So the mantle is referring to some sort of cloak or robes that they're wearing that we know for Elijah were made out of animal skin and probably had fur or hair on it. And that's part of his hairiness feature. And it symbolized the prophet and his power, the prophetic power, his relationship with God. And that's why when Elisha was next up, he drops his mantle onto him, his cloak to say, the Lord has chosen him symbolically.

Wow. Interesting. So it's very similar to Moses' staff because he's going to use it to divide the water. Yes, exactly. So while he's at Bethel, the sons of the prophets tell Elisha that Elijah is going to be taken by the Lord that day. They're informing him, this is the last day that you'll have with Elijah. Elisha's response is, yeah, I know. I know. That's why I'm trying to stay with him, even though he's moving from city to city to city. Once again, he tells him, stay here. Stay at Bethel. I need to go to Jericho. Elisha again says, I'm never leaving you. This is great. They end up going to Jericho. The sons of the prophets at Jericho tell him the same thing. And then Elijah says, please stay at Jericho. I need to

go to the Jordan. Again, he says, well, I'm going to go with you. And instead of kind of looking at this as, wow, Elijah is really trying to lose Elisha here and leave him in all these cities, that we'll see by the time we get to the point of Elijah's exit that they're actually following the order of the cities of the conquest in reverse. So, they do get to the Jordan River. It says 50 sons of the prophets are watching them. Elijah takes the mantle, the cloak, the sign that he's the prophet, and wraps it up, hits the waters, divides the Jordan, and they're able to cross over on dry ground. And of course, we immediately think of Moses and Joshua crossing the Red Sea, of course, but also crossing the Jordan River with the ark. We are meant to definitely connect Elijah with Joshua and Moses at this point, especially Moses. This is great. This is definitely the place where we can talk about more of these connections with Moses

and Joshua. So he went from Gilgal to Bethel to Jericho to crossing the Jordan, which I mentioned is sort of a reverse conquest. We are definitely supposed to connect Elijah with these two. And I think it's not only us. I think the sons of the prophets who are sitting here watching are also seeing this and know about this connection. So, Crystal, would it be like we're going from Nauvoo to Independence to Kirtland back to Palmyra and you're like, okay, there's definitely a reverse order to this. Yeah. So, it's almost like a reverse pilgrimage.

And these sites that were part of the conquest come up quite a bit with even after Elijah's gone and Elisha is continuing on. We talked about the conquest with the other Dr. Pierce. We did. You two like holding hands in the podcast saying let's. It's like chiasmus or something. It's a chiasmus. It's a Pierce chiasmus. I hear him saying things, whispering things in my ear right now. I can hear him saying,

mention this, say this. Oh, the marriage of two Bible scholars. This is so fun. We need to have you on together. I want to see that. We need to have him on together. Great idea. We would do it. And I'm sitting here thinking, I want to be in the Springwater Sixth Ward. I want to see that. We need to have them on. Great idea. We would do it. And I'm sitting here thinking, I want to be in the Springwater Sixth Ward. I want to hear that Sunday school class. So. Right. I may show up one day in disguise. I'll wear a hairy disguise and come in. Will you play this for them to the 17 and 18 year olds of the Springwater Sixth Ward?

Do you realize who your teachers are? Do you realize who you have? Unfortunately, because of this, we get a lot of visitors in our class, like stake presidents and the bishop and everyone. I don't know. It's a lot of pressure. It's a lot of pressure. Sorry, Crystal. We have tickets to see if you can get in. We have a lottery to see if you can come in our class today.

It's hard. But those teenagers, they are so smart. I just, I can't believe how much they connect with all of this. When we bring it up, they say, ah, okay. So what you're saying in modern terms is this. And I'm like, yeah. Wow. Sure. That's a great skill, Crystal.

So, I love it. You've taught them well. Yeah. So, after they cross the Jordan, Elijah asks Elisha, he says, what would you like from me before I leave? Because they all know that he's going to leave soon. And Elisha asked for something really interesting. He says, I would like a double portion of your spirit. A double portion of thy spirit be upon me. That's in verse 9 of chapter 2. John, when I made that your adjective today, I thought it was just asking for a double portion of dinner.

So sorry about that. I know, because that's me when it comes to mashed potatoes. I just like, hit me again. So what does he mean by this, Crystal? Like, I want twice your power? Initially, traditionally, that's how it was interpreted, that Elisha is saying, hey, I want to be twice as good as you are at being prophet. And it's interesting, people kind of bring this up because Elisha ends up performing twice as many miracles as Elijah does. And so people say,

see, this is what it means. But in reality, what he's really asking for, this double portion thing should be related to this birthright blessing, the inheritance blessing of the first son, the heir. In ancient Israel, the eldest son would either receive all of the father's wealth and land and house and all of those things, or he would receive a double portion. And his brothers, his little brothers would only receive a single portion. And so, what Elisha is really asking here is, I want to be your heir. I want to be your successor. And even though the Lord has already designated him like this, he wants to make it very clear that he is the next prophet. He's going to follow in the footsteps of Elijah and that anybody who's watching or listening should realize this, that he is the successor.

Wow. I would never have connected that to the double portion. That's great. Yeah, I think that's where the footnote goes. And that was really helpful this year to learn, well, why was the birthright blessing such a big deal? Well, because you got a double portion. A responsibility to take care of the other members of the family as life continued, as I understood it. So that helps a lot. Yeah, and we see this happen with Joseph, even though he's one of the youngest sons. He is the first son of the second wife.

And so after Reuben loses the birthright, Joseph gets it and he gets his double portion through his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. We see this all throughout the Old Testament, this idea of the double portion. And this is what Elisha is asking for. The sons of the prophets are there and he wants to make sure that everybody realizes that he's up next. And then Elijah responds with, thou hast asked a hard thing. Yeah. Yeah, he says it's difficult. Yeah, I wonder, Crystal, I used to take that as you've asked something that's really difficult for the Lord to give. Now I'm

seeing it because of what you told us. Thou hast asked a hard thing, meaning you've just taken on a big responsibility. That's what it feels like almost. That's a good way to look at it. Okay, if that's what you really want type of a thing. You know what you're asking for. Be careful what you pray for. And I think Elisha realizes it too, because once Elijah's gone, he's like, oh, wait a minute. Did I ask for this? Okay. I don't know if I'm ready. So, in verse 11, we have one of the greatest exits in the entire Old Testament. Well put. I like that. I like calling it an exit here, but I love it.

It says they're walking and talking, these two men, and then appears a chariot of fire and horses of fire, parts them asunder. I can imagine this. They get parted and Elijah goes up in a whirlwind to heaven. There's so much to unpack here, what's going on with Elijah. This is quite a comprehensive exit here. A chariot of fire, horses of fire. You just told us fire was the presence of God. Yes. So, it's perfect because Elijah has this relationship with fire. And so, of course, this is the way that he's going to go.

In the ancient Near East, they did believe that many of the gods actually were driven around by chariots and charioteers who were their servants. And this was part of their hosts, their heavenly armies. And so, the chariot comes down to pick up Elijah is huge. This chariot had to have come from God. And we actually read in the book of Abraham that God uses wind and fire as a chariot. So they had these concepts, these ideas that he has control over all aspects of creation, fire, wind, water, all of these different parts of creation. Wow.

You know, it's interesting that we talk about chariots here. This is something from church history that I'm just going to throw in. This is from Lorenzo Dow Young, who is Brigham Young's little brother. He says that when he was younger, he had a dream and he was super young. Sorry. He had a double portion of young. He was younger. He said, quote, in the dream, the Savior was in a carriage. It was driven by his servant. The carriage stopped near me and the Savior inquired where my brother Brigham was. After informing him, he further inquired about my brothers and our father. After I had answered all his inquiries, he stated that he wanted us all, but especially wanted my brother Brigham. This was before any of them came in contact with the restoration. Interesting little story. The Savior is in a

chariot in the dream of Lorenzo Dow Young. You guys ever heard that? Either of you? I haven't. I haven't heard that. It fits in perfectly with this idea of the Lord is also a divine warrior and protector and will fight for all of us. It's perfect that he rides around in this chariot. I mean, that's what the hosts of heaven sometimes refers to, the armies of angels that are out there. I'd never heard that. Because again, as a kid, when I heard the host, oh, that's the guy with the towel over his arm who says, welcome to Chukarama. I'll take you to your table.

The host of heaven. That is the host. Welcome to the buffet. I remember the aha moment when I learned at some point, probably seminary, no, Lord of Hosts means Lord of Armies. Oh, and that's a different kind of host than a Chukarama. Crystal, you mentioned this double portion. I really like what you taught us here. I think I've read before that there are seven miracles listed for Elijah and that there are 14 listed for Elisha.

Do you think the writer did that on purpose because of this chapter 2, verse 9? Yeah, I think so. Do you think the writer did that on purpose because of this chapter 2 verse 9? Yeah, I think so. It's meant to show that he's a double Elijah in a way, or he's supposed to have this double portion and doing double the miracles. But this number 7 has some symbolic meaning. So then the word in Hebrew is Shiva. It's almost the exact same word that means completion or fullness or something is finished. It definitely is symbolic. And we'll see that that number show up. I mean, it shows up all over the Old Testament and even in terms of 700 or 70 or 7,000, any form of seven, it usually

symbolizes that this is complete, that whatever we're talking about here is done. I want to speak a little Hebrew, Shiva? Shiva. I mean, and it's different, of course, depending on what part of Israel and if it's male or female, but for the most part, Shiva. Why do languages have to be so hard? Shiva. Okay. complete or finished full or finished to be complete finished perfected as opposed to perfect like flawless morally flawless but instead you're complete yeah that you've made your complete circle and jesus might be saying in the sermon amount be there for Shiva. Complete. Complete. Yes. Yes, definitely. What happens to Elisha without Elijah? Okay. So let's look again at verse 11 and we can talk a

little bit about what happened to Elijah because we have these horses and the chariots of fire and this whirlwind. It's interesting because this is also the location of Moses's exit, we'll call it. And we know that Moses was translated. So, we're near Mount Nebo after crossing the Jordan River. We're told Elijah also was taken to heaven without tasting death. For Moses, we're told that he was taken to heaven without tasting death. For Moses, we're told that he was buried by the hand of the Lord and they don't know where his tomb is. We have this connection between these two. We call this translation. We know that they were translated and in the Old Testament, we don't get a lot of information about what that means.

What does it mean to be translated and why is someone translated? If we turn to the Book of Mormon, we have three individuals who are translated at the time of the Savior. These are three of his disciples and we get a lot of information about translated beings there. So, if we turn to 3 Nephi 28 verse 8, we find out that they will never endure the pains of death, that they will continue living until Jesus Christ comes again. And this doesn't necessarily seem to be the case for all translated persons, But for these three disciples, and as well as John the Beloved, we're told that they will stay until Jesus Christ comes back, so the second coming, and then they will be resurrected. So now we know that because someone is translated does not mean that they've been resurrected yet. But they won't taste death, it says. If we skip down to verses 38 and beyond.

We're still in 3528. Yeah. We find out that their bodies are changed so that they cannot die. They also cannot feel pain or sorrow except for the sins of the world. So they have this empathy. Satan has no power to tempt them. The powers of earth cannot hold them. The main purpose is given in verses 26 to 29. And it says that that purpose is so that they can minister to all nations and gather Israel. This is definitely related to the translation of Elijah and Moses,

but theirs is a little bit different. There is another purpose that they were translated. Because they're the only two, right, that we know of in the Old Testament that were translated. We have Enoch. We're told Enoch and his whole city is translated. In the Book of Mormon, Alma the Younger, there's sort of a rumor that he was translated because he's compared to Moses, like just kind of disappearing. He's kind of walked off. Well, and I think this is an important point because we don't want people to think translated means resurrected because who was the first fruits? Who was the first to be resurrected? Well, that was Christ.

That's Christ, yeah. Yeah, and that's perfect. They couldn't be resurrected yet, but they needed to keep their bodies. For Elijah and Moses, this is because we know that they had to return to do something very specific. Malachi at the very end of the Old Testament tells us, right, Elijah will come back and turn the hearts of the fathers and the children. Elijah needed to return. He needed to keep his body. We know that he has returned more than once. One of these was on the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter, James, and John and Moses. And this was to return the keys of the priesthood to the earth. This is beautiful. The Lord sure plans ahead. He's like, I need those guys to have bodies.

So get them up here. If it's the same spot, I'm going to go find that spot and see if there's a platform nine and three quarters that I can get through to take that chariot ride. That sounds fun. As long as you are translated correctly. That was perfect. We believe in Hank as long as he has been translated correctly.

Why have I never used that joke? I hate it when you tell me jokes that I should have been using for the last 20 years. I'm going to use this. Oh, me too. I'm writing it down. You got an arm coming going to use this. Oh, me too. I'm writing it down. You got an arm coming out the wrong side.

Oh, shoot. I haven't been translated correctly. My urine where my thumb should be. George is going to love that. I love the Mount of Transfiguration. Because then we can talk about the difference between transfiguration and translation, which everybody always gets confused. And this is why Moses ends up with horns in all of the Renaissance.

Yeah, they don't know how to portray him. Really? Yeah. So, when Moses is transfigured and the light comes off of him, and Jerome was translating this, the Latin Vulgate. And he's like, I don't think it's light. I think it's probably that similar word horns. So, when you're transfigured, you grow horns. And so, that's why Moses has horns everywhere. That was St. Jerome that did. I didn't know that.

Yeah. It was Jerome who decided, you know what? It's probably not light. It's probably horns. It's the same word, the word Karen. I've seen those statues of Moses with horns. I was showing him in the Holy Land recently. Have you ever seen that? And the funny thing is my dad, he had a number of accidents in the Navy and he got a couple of scars right there on both sides of his head. He joined the church after he got home from World War II, but when he went on a mission after he was married, which is another wonderful story,

in New England, people asked him, because they thought Mormons had horns. Have you ever heard that, people that thought that? Oh, yeah, I remember that. I've heard that. My dad was like, yeah, I had mine removed, and he showed them the scars. That's perfect.

He was translated correctly. He got those. Okay, I want to ask you one thing that I loved. You said this place where Elijah went up into heaven was near the same place as Moses, near Nebo. I get that right? Yeah. That's the same place. That's what she said. Because that right? Yeah. That's the same place.

That's what she said, because that's why I'm going to go look for platform nine and three quarters. Yeah. Right there. And of course, we don't know the exact place. I'm going, Crystal. Right.

It's over in Jordan, right? The general area. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so it's another connection with Moses. Yeah, I love that. If you're driving from Petra to Amman, do you get anywhere near it? John, have you ever made a stop there, Nebo?

Yes. And isn't there a little map that shows like, here's where you can see if you look here, all this. And because Moses doesn't have a tomb, I think there's a pretty big memorial to Moses. In verses 14 to 18, it's the sons of the prophets say, okay, now Elijah's spirit rests on Elisha. And then immediately say, can we go look for Elijah? Where is he? They're still not accepting Elisha. Even though they come out and say this, oh, well, now you have the cloak and the mantle.

They say, well, we're going to still go look for him. And Elisha says, no, you're not going to find him. Like the Lord has taken him up. They still say, no, we're going to go look for him. And they go and look for three days, which is another one of these completion numbers. And then they come back and I love it. Elisha's kind of like, I told you, you weren't going to find him. This is definitely related to some of the issues that Elisha has after this with kind of being in the shadow of Elijah, trying to live up to who he was, what they expect him to be. Then we get to the water. Okay. In verse 19 of chapter 2, the men of Jericho ask Elisha to help them with a problem.

And the problem is that there's no water, they say, and the ground is barren. This is definitely a reference, again, back to Joshua. After Joshua conquered Jericho, if you remember, he kind of put this curse on the city. Part of this curse was that the spring, the natural spring that's by Jericho, would not bring forth good fresh water. And this was part of this curse. There's a history of water problems with this spring. It was causing death in young people and old people, but also infertility. People think it may have come from two things. Either one, they found these snails there that might have carried these parasites with the

blood disease. Other people think there was radioactivity in the rocks. But whatever it was, the water, which when you think of a spring, you think of fresh, good, clean, pure water, was not good. It was poison. People relate this to Joshua kind of cursing the city after the battle of Jericho. Elisha says, well, bring me a new, it says cruise in verse 20. So, this is just a dish or a bowl or a flask, something like that. He says, bring salt. And he's going to pour this salt into the spring, which I think we would immediately think that does not make the water drinkable. It makes it even less drinkable with salt water. But what's interesting here is salt shows up quite a bit in the Old Testament and the New Testament. And it was very symbolic of covenants and especially the Mosaic covenant. So, in

Leviticus, the people are told that when they bring their meat offerings to sacrifice, that they needed to be salted. And it was called the salt of the covenant. And as the meat was preserved through the salt, so would Israel be preserved by the Lord. And this was supposed to remind them of how he preserved them through the Exodus and escaping Egypt and getting to the promised land. And so, there was some belief that the salt, you know, representing the covenant and preservation and purification, that putting it back into the spring water, the salt, that it would purify the water and bring the covenant back and basically remove the curse from Jericho. Wow. And Jesus is going to say, you are the salt of the earth, right? Yeah,

maybe an extra level. Be the covenant, right? Represent the covenant, be the salt of the earth. And he mentions, don't lose your flavor because salt is used for flavor and preservation, but this is, it's all related. It all comes together. And they believed that the good properties of the salt could be transferred into the water and overtake the bad properties of the water. Pete I had a seminary teacher friend who wrote a great youth talk called Light and Salty and talked about those terms that the Lord was trying to have the house of Israel aspire to, to be light and to be salt. And so, I like that extra level of meaning when Jesus says you're the salt of the earth, to have salt there in verse 20. So, thank you for that.

Chris Crystal, I'm always looking for ways to apply for our listeners. Would it be okay for me to say that a principle here is healing comes through covenants, through making and keeping covenants? Do you feel like that message is coming through here in this chapter that if my marriage is struggling or my relationships with my children are struggling or anything else in my life feels barren, it feels like poisonous, get to the covenants. Get to those covenants. Yeah, absolutely. And definitely the idea of if you have broken a covenant, that you can return and you can heal that break. Jericho had been cursed and now Elisha comes and is able to reverse this curse through using the salt that represented the covenant. So for us too,

in the same way that we may be lacking or feeling like something is wrong, then yes, I think turning to covenants, mending covenants and things like that would definitely help. Howard W. Hunter, 1979, he talked about healing the daughter of Jairus. And these are not just the words of the faith of a father torn with grief, but are a reminder to us that whatever Jesus lays his hands on lives. If he lays his hands on a marriage, it lives. If he is allowed to lay his hands on the family, it lives, which is one of my favorite statements of President Hunter. And that's got to be through covenants.

That's how we allow the Savior to lay his hands on us is if we make and keep covenants. Do you know what I like there too is it helps me with my priorities when there's so many demands on your time in your life to say, who have I made covenants with? That helps me look at my wife, the Lord, who have I made covenants with? And it helps me align my priorities when I have something I want to do. Please join us for part two of this podcast.