Never in the course of Israel’s history had the moral condition of the nation been so low as in the reign of Ahab. Of this weak and wicked man we read, he “did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him.” The law was broken; the worship of idols was all but universal; men bowed down to the golden calves at Bethel and Dan; false prophets conducted their rites in Jehovah’s land. Under the leadership of the king and his wife, the nation had apostatized from Jehovah, and proved itself ripe for judgment.
Nevertheless, God lingered over this judgment-doomed nation. Instead of overwhelming the people with the judgment they deserved, God sent Elijah to expose their condition and recall them to Himself. The life and miracles of Elijah were one long witness against the nation’s utter apostasy from the moral law and the worship of Jehovah. The years of drought, the fire from heaven, the destruction of the prophets of Baal, the judgment of the captains and their fifties, the doom pronounced against the king in the vineyard of Naboth, and the letter to the apostate king of Judah, foretelling a coming plague, were all solemn denunciations of prevailing evils.
Alas! the ministry of Elijah only brought to light the utter ruin of the nation in its responsibility. It clearly showed not only that the nation had broken the law and sunk into idolatry, but that prophecy–which recalls a failing people to God–was entirely powerless to effect any restoration. In spite of a ministry accompanied by the warning signs of a famine on earth and fire from heaven, the prophet of God was rejected by a blinded nation. Having fulfilled his ministry, the faithful but rejected prophet forsook the land by way of Jordan –the river of death–and was taken to heaven by a whirlwind.
Thus, as far as Israel was concerned, all was over. The nation had utterly failed to secure or maintain the blessing of God on the ground of the fulfillment of its responsibilities. Apparently nothing remained but the execution of the judgment they deserve. Here, however, we are permitted to see the wonders of the ways of God. For God uses the wickedness of man to disclose the resources of His own heart. Man had utterly failed, and God had shown that He is not indifferent to sin. In His own time He must act in judgment. Nevertheless, God reserves to Himself His sovereign rights of grace.
Thus, instead of cutting off the nation in judgment, God fell back on His sovereign grace. On the one hand, He secured for Himself a remnant that had not bowed to Baal; on the other hand, He sent to a guilty nation a ministry of grace for every one who had faith to avail himself of it. This ministry, being one of grace, could not be confined to the bounds of Israel. Its source laid outside the land, and, while sent to Israel, was available to the Gentile.
Elisha was the chosen vessel to carry this new ministry to a ruined world. As one has said, Elisha “completes by a ministry of grace in the power of life what Elijah had begun in righteousness against idolatry.” Thus it becomes manifest that the ministry of Elisha wears an entirely different character to that of his great forerunner. Moreover, the manner of life of the two prophets, while in keeping with their respective ministries, was of necessity wholly different. Elijah led a life, for the most part, remote from the haunts of men; Elisha moved among the masses, on familiar terms with his fellowmen. Elijah was found by lonely streams, in desert ways and mountain caves; Elisha was found in the cities of men, and the camps of kings. Elijah was entertained by a humble widow of Zerephath; Elisha was the guest of the rich woman of Shunem.
These differences of life were beautiful in their season. It was fitting that the one who has been rightly described as “the sworn enemy of all persons and institutions which interfered with the honor of the Lord God of Israel” should lead a life of strict separation from the nation that he so sternly condemned. Equally right that the one whose great mission is to declare the mercy of God to a guilty world, should freely move among men.
Nevertheless, the prophets were alike in their holy separation from the evils of the times. If Elisha moves among his fellows as the intimate of kings and, at times, the companion of the great of the earth, he is wholly apart from the evil of their lives. He brings mercy to the guilty but walks apart from their guilt. He enriches others with the blessings of heaven, though content to remain a poor man on earth. As another has so truly said, “It was for others he occupied his resources and strength in God.
He was rich, but not for himself. Thus he meets the inconveniences of nature; without a purse he relieves the poor; without a commissariat he feeds armies; the deadly thing he makes harmless; without bread he gives food to a multitude, and gathers fragments; without medicine he heals disease; without armies or soldiers, he defeats enemies; in famine he supplies a nation; though dead he communicates life.”
May we not add that, in all these shining ways of grace, Elisha is leading our thoughts to that far greater One who became poor that we through His poverty might be rich. In the spirit of Elijah, the great forerunner of Christ had dwelt in desert places, there to bring to light a godly remnant, and there to denounce the evils of a wicked and adulterous generation. Thus he prepared the way of the Lord, who, as the Son of Man, came “eating and drinking” with the children of men, as He moved among the needy crowds, dispensing the grace of God in a ruined world.
Elisha is first brought to our notice in the Lord’s charge to Elijah, in the day of the prophet’s despondency. Disappointed at the failure of his mission, embittered against the professing people of God, and occupied with himself. Elijah had, spoken well of himself and nothing but evil of God’s people. He imagined that he alone was standing for God, and that the entire nation was against him, seeking his life to take it away.
Elijah has to learn that the Lord has other instruments to carry out His government; other servants to maintain a witness; and, among the Lord’s people, seven thousand that have not bowed the knee to Baal. Thus Elijah has to retrace his steps from Horeb and anoint Elisha, the son of Shaphat, as prophet in his room.
How often in our day, with its increasing corruption, we, with our limited outlook, may be led to imagine that the work of God depends on one or two devoted servants of the Lord, and that with their removal all testimony for the Lord will cease. We have to learn that though servants pass, God remains, and has other servants in preparation. Unknown to us, God has His hidden ones who have not bowed to prevailing evils.
In obedience to the Lord’s word, Elijah departs from Horeb to seek Elisha. The one chosen to take the place of the prophet is not found among the great men of the earth. In choosing His servants God is not restricted to the great and noble. He may indeed employ the rich and the learned, kings and priests, as He sees fit. But at times He pours contempt on all our pride by taking up a man from the humblest walks of life to perform the highest spiritual service. He can use a little maid to bless a great man; He can take a lad from the sheepfolds to be the leader of His people Israel; He can use the betrothed of a carpenter to bring into this scene the Saviour of the world; and having, brought the Saviour into the world, He can use some lowly fishermen to turn the world upside down. Thus He calls a simple farmer from following the plow to be the prophet of his age.
Moreover, those that God calls to His service are not idle, ease-loving men of the world. Elisha is patiently pursuing his calling “plowing with twelve yoke of oxen before him, and he with the twelfth,” when the call comes. So David, in an earlier day, was keeping the sheep when called to be king. And the disciples of a later day were casting their nets into the sea, or mending nets, when called to follow the King of kings.
It is upon this busy man that Elijah casts his mantle, an act that may signify that Elisha is called to take the place, exhibit the character, and act in the spirit of its owner. And thus the spiritual instincts of Elisha would appear to interpret the act, for we read, “He left the oxen and ran after Elijah.” If, however, there is a divinely given readiness to follow Elijah, there is a natural reluctance to leave his loved ones. So he can say, “Let, me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow thee.” Elijah’s answer throws the responsibility of responding to God’s call entirely upon Elisha. “Go back again,” he says, “for what have I done to thee?” He will use neither force nor command. No pressure shall be put on Elisha: he is left to discern the import of Elijah’s action, and he is free to “go back” to his loved ones, or go forward with the rejected and persecuted prophet.
If Elisha’s actions betray some looking back to the things that are behind, they also prove him to be an overcomer that celebrates his surrender of his things by providing a feast for others. In his day, as one has remarked, he sold what he had and gave to the poor. Having thus finished with his earthly calling, “he arose, and went after Elijah, and ministered unto him.” The man that until then had patiently pursued the daily round, toiling in the field, is now to be prepared to show forth the wonders of God’s grace by following Elijah as his servant and companion.