Even when Elisha didn’t know that, another prophets inform him as a lot: the corporate of prophets at Bethel after which one other firm of prophets at Jericho drill it residence, painfully. Twice he’s requested: “Have you learnt that right now the LORD will take your grasp away from you?” (vv. 3a, 5a).5 Elisha replies that he already is aware of—particularly now!—after which tells them to close up about it. He’s clearly not completely satisfied in regards to the state of affairs and he doesn’t want annoying individuals, prophets or not, well-meaning or in any other case, reminding him about it (vv. 3b, 5b).6
Elisha is aware of and so Elisha persists. He refuses to remain behind however goes with Elijah to the ultimate cease: someplace throughout the Jordan, into no-man’s land, into the desert. To get there, Elijah should carry out one final miracle. He takes his mantle, the identical one he used to cowl his face when he encountered God on Mount Horeb, the mountain the place God made covenant with Israel (1 Kgs 19:13); and the identical mantle he had draped over Elisha’s shoulders when God picked him as his successor (1 Kgs 19:19)7—he took that mantle, rolled it up as if it have been a stick, and struck the waters of the Jordan River. And the waters parted! To this facet and that, and the 2 of them, Elijah and Elisha, crossed over on dry floor (2 Kgs 2:8). If this sounds to you a bit just like the E book of Exodus and the E book of Joshua remixed and mashed up, you’re precisely proper. We’re not merely within the Transjordanian desert; we’re in God’s nation, miracle-land, the place something can occur.8
And it does! However not earlier than a remaining dialog between Elijah and Elisha. The good elder prophet asks the good prophet-to-be what he needs from him earlier than he departs. Elisha is hungry and so he asks massive: please, he says, let me have a double portion of your spirit. In Hebrew, he asks for 2 mouthfuls (pî-šənayim).9That’s lots to swallow! No marvel Elijah says in reply, “you’ve got requested a tough factor.”10 Nevertheless it’s potential, Elijah continues, if you’ll be able to see what occurs subsequent; however if you happen to can’t—if you happen to don’t see it, it received’t.
However we already know that Elisha is not going to forsake his beloved Elijah. And so he will see—and he does! As they stroll alongside, the 2 of them are all of a sudden separated by a chariot and horses of fireside and Elijah is taken up,11 in a whirlwind or tempest—in a fantastic, turbulent storm—as much as heaven.12 Although he’s been shadowing Elijah all day, Elisha remains to be caught off guard by this. He’s overwhelmed, stunned, frightened—maybe the entire above! He cries out to Elijah, “My father, my father!” Elijah was that type of determine for him and in additional methods than one. However Elijah was but nonetheless much more, as a result of Elisha subsequent calls him by the very factor that he’s witnessing: “Elijah,” he says, “The chariot of Israel and its riders!” (v. 12).13 We are able to perceive “my father, my father!” simply sufficient, however this different type of tackle to Elijah is curious and perplexing. It appears that evidently Elisha is saying that the prophet Elijah is Israel’s true chariot and horsemen.14 Mentioned in another way, when you’ve got a prophet like Elijah, you don’t want a standing military. (Take into consideration that for a minute!)
However all of a sudden Elijah—value an entire military after which some—is gone. And that state of affairs entails an excessive amount of doubt, fear, and despair. And so Elisha tears his garments in distraught mourning. Who is aware of how a lot time elapses between that and what occurs subsequent, however Elisha finally goes over and picks up the mantle that fell from Elijah amidst the storm and the hearth and the horses. Elisha picks it up and heads again residence. However the Jordan stands between him and civilization, and so he hits it with the mantle, identical to Elijah did. However nothing occurs. And so he asks a query: “The place is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” (v. 14).15
That could be a fascinating query, once you cease to consider it.
I imply, Elisha ought to know the reply to that query: The Lord, the God of Elijah, is the One who simply took his grasp to heaven. That’s what the corporate of prophets instructed him, twice no much less, and he mentioned he already knew it earlier than they mentioned it. After which Elisha noticed it along with his personal eyes—noticed the chariot and horses of fireside, the whirlwind; noticed the mantle fall earthward.
However he nonetheless asks the query in all its poignancy: The place is God, now that the good prophet Elijah is gone? And we discover ourselves asking it too: The place is God, now that our nice buddy and prophet Walter is gone?
That’s the query, isn’t it? That query asks what is going to change into of us, these of us left down right here, within the absence of somebody who taught us a lot and so nicely about the one One value figuring out, somebody who knew the Holy One among Israel so intimately. What are we speculated to do now?
And so we ask: The place, now, is the God of Elijah? The place, now, is the God of Walter? Is God solely with Elijah, up there in heaven someplace? Is God solely now with Walter, now that God has obtained him? What about all of us left down right here, prophet-much less? What are we speculated to do?
We’re asking that query, aren’t we? “The place is the God of Elijah?” and “The place is the God of Walter?”
Be aware how that query is posed by Elisha in Kings. It isn’t simply “the place is God?” however “The place is the God of Elijah”—or, for us, the God of Walter. God is called and recognized on the subject of our nice prophets, about whom God cared a lot that God spoke to them as somebody does with a buddy (cf. Exod 33:11).16 It’s not simply us lesser sorts, un-prophetic people, asking about God’s basic whereabouts, calling on a non-descript God to be current in our nice time of absence. No. Elisha’s query entails and invokes Elijah. And so ours does the identical with Walter. The place is the God of Elijah? The place is the God of Walter? Certainly, when God hears these nice names, the names of God’s beloved prophets and interlocutors, God will spring into motion, turning absence into presence.
And so it’s!
“Elisha took the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him and…struck the water once more” for a second time.
“And the water was parted to the one facet and to the opposite, and Elisha crossed over” (2 Kgs 2:14).
The place is the God of Elijah? Right here. Not simply there within the fireworks, or up within the heavens, within the turbulent transportation of our expensive departed within the religion. Positive, sure, there. However not solely there. No. Additionally right here. Right here.
Elisha struck the water as soon as. Nothing. He then requested his poignant query, summoning the Lord to his facet due to Elijah: “The place is the God of Elijah?” Then he struck the water a second time. Then one thing occurred. The query, you see, generated the miracle. The water parted and he crossed over.
Some interpreters have thought that Elisha’s two hits of the Jordan versus the one by the good Elijah, proves Elisha is barely second finest.17What Elijah does with ease, Elisha accomplishes solely with twice the hassle. No servant is larger than their grasp, you would possibly say (see John 13:16). However I believe the 2 strikes reveal one thing else as a substitute, or not less than one thing extra—particularly, that Elijah’s cloak all by itself isn’t going to do the job. The Phrase of God isn’t some parlor trick; you don’t conjure it up with a magician’s wand. One faucet of the mantle received’t do something if it lacks—take heed to this—if it lacks the Spirit of the Lord.
The query “The place is the God of Elijah?” precedes the second strike—and that’s the strike that proves efficient. It isn’t nearly Elijah, that’s, and definitely not nearly his gown, for heaven’s sake. It’s in regards to the Spirit of the Lord God of Israel, it’s about Elijah’s Lord and God, who works miracles on the planet, together with the continuity of prophets, regardless of the departure of a fantastic one.
These different prophets who waited throughout the river notice what has occurred as quickly as they see Elisha: “Elijah’s spirit rests on him,” they exclaim (2 Kgs 2:15). “Apostolic succession,” we’d say, even with out the laying on of palms!18 However regardless that Elijah should clearly be gone for his spirit to now relaxation on Elisha, these different prophets can’t think about a world with out Elijah. They wish to go seek for him. However after all Elijah is to not be discovered “as a result of ‘he’s risen’”!19
Which brings us to the New Testomony lesson. The overall scene in Acts 1 is essentially no totally different than 2 Kings 2. The prophets—make that the disciples—are as soon as once more in disaster: Jesus is about to depart them. They need solutions. Most of all they need a fast repair. They need the Lord to revive the dominion to Israel proper about now. What they get in response is, like Elijah’s reply to Elisha, not fully reassuring. “You’ve requested a tough factor” (2 Kgs 2:10). So, not but is the reply. “It’s not so that you can know,” Jesus says to them (Acts 1:7). However after that slight reproof, he does encourage them: his departure isn’t about loss solely, it’s additionally about present—the approaching of the Holy Spirit, which allows devoted and efficient witness. Right here and past (v. 8).
However, you already know, the apostles are type of gradual—type of like us. And so, after Jesus ascends and a cloud hides him from view, they stand there, staring, ready (vv. 9-10a). I think about they have been questioning: What now? The place is God now? The place is the God of our Lord Jesus? And, then, all of a sudden, they don’t seem to be alone and deserted, however reassured: This Jesus—two heavenly messengers inform them—this Jesus will come again in the identical approach you noticed him go (vv. 10b-11). The clouds will roll again, in the future, identical to these waters within the Jordan River approach again when with Elijah, sure, but in addition with Elisha.
So these are our texts, 2 Kings 2 and Acts 1. And now that we’ve walked by way of them I hope you’ll agree that they do certainly give us sources for our life now, now that Walter has been taken up from us. There will be little question that we don’t like that information, that we want it weren’t true. We’d be completely satisfied to have fifty prophets go search for Walter as a result of possibly he’s gone someplace to talk or possibly he’s again in his examine writing one other guide! And there will be little question that we mourn the information of Walter’s departure, even when we don’t bodily rend our garments. And there will be little question that we marvel in Walter’s absence, what’s subsequent? Who will converse for us? Who will converse to us? The place is God in all this? The place is Walter’s God?
