Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Take a Risk! | Historical Books | 2 Kings 2:15-25

Episode Date: September 26, 2025

How do you handle uncertainty? Are you afraid of the unknown? When is right to take a risk? In today's episode, Jeff shares how 2 Kings 2:15-25 encourages us to take faithful risks for the Kingdom. If you're listening on Spotify, tell us about yourself and where you're listening from! Read the Bible with us in 2025! This year, we’re exploring the Historical Books—Joshua, Judges, 1 & 2 Samuel, and 1 & 2 Kings. Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: 2 Kings 2:15-25

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jeff Parrott. There are few things that people avoid as much as change. In 1988, the researchers William Samuelson and Richard Zekhouser explored this pervasive human preference for stability in an article entitled Status Quo Bias in Decision Making. Their academic work detailed how our default leaning toward the status quo makes us avoid novel options and moments of decision making. Here's how the Wharton School describes this status quo bias.

Status quo bias is a cognitive bias based in emotion. Change naturally invites risk, and people may be uncomfortable putting themselves in situations where the outcome is uncertain. This tendency to keep things the way they are can have a considerable effect on how people behave in virtually any aspect of life. It's so true. We see it in our lives, don't we? Status quo bias can show up in so many ways, yet it often sidelines us in the big life decisions we make. Should I change my major, even though it doesn't make sense to other people? Should I change my career track, even though it doesn't make sense on paper? Should I take on the risk of this new project, this new relationship, this new passion,

this new location, knowing that the only thing I know is the unknown? Research and anecdotal evidence show that for the most part, we really do prefer stability in the face of these questions. We avoid the potential risks of change, and we settle into the familiar. And this bias toward the familiar is comfortable, but it's also hazardous. our fear of uncertainty can keep us from taking risks that potentially alter the trajectory of our lives in beautiful ways. And while we could apply the status quo bias to big life arenas like school and family and the workplace, today I want us to think about it in terms of a relationship, our relationship

with our Creator God. Because one thing is clear when we look at the story of the Bible and the stories of God's work in people's lives. God regularly calls us to leave the comfort of the status quo and cling to the crucible of transformation. Change is a constant flow of gospel movement. But God doesn't call us to simply change for the sake of being somewhere new or doing something new. God calls us to change for the sake of becoming someone new. When we let our emotional preference for stability interfere with the movement of God's kingdom in our lives, we get complacent in naming and fighting sin. We settle for closed groups of community that are insular and static. We filter kingdom callings through the lens of comfort, labeling of choices with words like risky or reckless instead of words like faithful.

Simply put, the status quo bias can cause us to stiff arm the stirring of the Holy Spirit. And of course, this penchant for stability isn't new. It's an ancient preference that seeps into our daily choices here and now. Our passage in Second Kings today presents us with two very different responses to change, ultimately showing us two very different ways of seeing and living before the living God. Now, as we get ready to approach God's word together, let's pause and ask for His grace to move through our time. Heavenly Father, thank you for the gift of life and for the gift of breath. God, thank you for the gift of your word. We bring before you our joys and our sorrows, our anxiety and our excitement, our calendars and our contingencies. God, meet us in the space. Jesus, help us abide in you

and remain in you as we engage with your truth. Holy Spirit, we ask you to graciously move in and through this time in Second Kings. And as we read your living word, may it read us and restore us to new life with you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. All right, let's set up some context for our time together. Earlier in 2nd King's chapter 2, the prophet Elijah was taken up into heaven, leaving his protege, Elisha, behind as the prominent prophet for God's people. Our passage today begins with the prophets from Jericho wondering if Elijah is somehow still present. Maybe God just moved him to a different location and placed him on a mountain or in a valley somewhere.

After three days of searching, these prophets come to the conclusion that, yes, the venerable Elijah is in fact gone, and it is Elisha, who will now be the new spokesperson for God. And that leads to a big question for God's people. Now that Elijah's gone, will Elisha be a fitting vessel for God in a time of uncertainty? That question is answered by two seemingly disparate stories that work together to not only confirm the calling of Elisha, but also, create change in the hearts of God's people as his kingdom advances. Verse 19 picks up with the people of the city of Jericho, asking Elisha for help with a city-wide

problem. Here's verse 19. The people of the city said to Elisha, look, our Lord, this town is well situated, as you can see, but the water is bad and the land is unproductive. All right, let's pause for a moment. Notice how these people in Jericho approach Elisha. with a posture of humility, with need, a posture of surrender. The water in their city is bad. Their land is unproductive. Scholars note how these physical realities point to the prevailing presence

of death and decay in the city of Jericho. It is a lifeless place in need of change. And the people are humbling themselves, surrendering that need for change to Elisha and ultimately to God. Elijah responds by asking for a new bowl with salt in it. He's not asking for that because the salt will do anything itself, but because that salt will be a symbol of God's life-creating, life-changing power. Let's pick up in verses 21 through 22. Then he went out to the spring and threw the salt into it, saying, this is what the Lord, Yahweh, says.

I have healed this water. never again will it cause death or make the land unproductive and the water has remained pure to this day according to the word elisha had spoken now elisha's encounter with the people of jericho is this really wonderful picture of people rejecting the status quo and surrendering to the life-creating life-changing power of god if they would have preferred stability that would lead to death they're in a decaying place, but instead they opted for a surrender that leads to life. Now, as our passage continues, verses 23 through 25 portray a very different response to God's kingdom movement. Let's read that whole section and then make some observations, picking up in

verse 23. From there, from Jericho, Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. Get out of here, Baldi, they said, get out of here, Baldi. He turned around and looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled 42 of the boys. And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria. All right. So this is one of those passages that probably strikes us as really odd, if not even problematic in some ways. Why does Elisha curse the boys who were jeering at him. Why do two bears subsequently maul 42 of the boys? And what difference does a passage like this make for our lives today? All right, let's start by zooming out for a moment

and notice where Elisha is. He's now in the city of Bethel. That's where he's going. Now at this point in the biblical story, Bethel is a place of rampant rebellion and idolatry. And this makes more sense out of the mob of boys yelling at Elisha to get out of town. And we don't exactly know why the boys refer to Elisha as baldy, whether they're making fun of his physical appearance on his head, maybe deriding his status as a prophet of the Lord. We're not sure. But either way, the message is clear. They do not want the truth of God from the messenger of God in their city. In trying to get God's prophet to leave the city, they are ultimately trying to get God himself. out of their city, out of their lives. In place of a saving God, they want the status quo,

the comfort of their sin. Now earlier, the city of Jericho was full of physical death and physical threats to life, but this city, Bethel, is just as full of death as Jericho. It is a spiritually barren place. And to remain in that status quo of rebellion and sin would only lead to more death. Bethel is this place that desperately needs to change, yet it's also a place that resists the movement of God's kingdom, preferring the illusion of stability in sin. Now this text in Second Kings, it presents us with two very different cities, with two distinct views of change and two divergent views of God. Jericho asked for the healing presence of God, but Bethel asked for the presence of God to head out. While Jericho is this picture of God's mercy on people who surrender to his love,

Bethel is a picture of God's judgment on people who reject his love. For the people of God in the era of the historical books, these encounters not only authenticate Elisha as a bona fide spokesperson for God, they articulate the need for ongoing change and transformation in light of God's advancing kingdom. That same openness to change is presented to you and to me today. The Old Testament scholar Brian Ocker distills the point of this passage with some pointed questions. How do you approach the anointed one of the Lord? Do you come to him with the humble request, heal me?

Or with the mocking command, leave me? What about you? How have you been approaching the anointed of the Lord? How have you been responding to the movement of God's kingdom in Jesus? Are you clinging to the status quo like Bethel? Or are you surrendering like Jericho? The power to surrender isn't something that we can conjure up on our own. It is a gift of God's grace, purchased in the life, death, resurrection, and reign of Jesus

over all things now. To surrender to him is to cling to him. to cling to the one who already holds us and holds all things together. In uncertain times like ours, the status quo can sometimes feel like the safest option. But because we're held in the care of the unchanging one, we can surrender to a life and to a love that will change us and change the world. We can have the relentless hope of becoming healed people

who extend God's life and love to a land in need of healing. Heavenly Father, you are good and you do good. We praise you as the living God who creates life and restores life. Jesus, we depend on you and your power to surrender. Would you heal us with your loving presence? Holy Spirit, help us exchange the status quo for surrender. whatever surrender looks like for us today would you empower us to do it by your grace for your glory in your story we pray in jesus name amen