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ELISHA SEES TOMORROW!
On Friday of this past week I received a note from one of the assistant principals
at Chandler High School asking me to submit lesson plans for Friday, April 11th,
by the 9th, of the same week, as she intends to observe me on that day, Friday.
I intend to reply to her note with one of my own. For I need to tell her that
on April 14th, Monday, I'd be glad to let her know what I did in class on the
previous Friday. But if she expects me to tell her what I'm going to do Friday
on Wednesday of that same week that's asking a lot from a mere mortal. As Yogi
Berra once observed:
"It's tough to make predictions, 'specially about the future."
Nevertheless, that is exactly what Elisha did when Ben-Hadad and the army of
Aram (Syria) laid siege to Samaria. The siege lasted so long that those within
resigned themselves to the inevitable - death by starvation. Then, when the
king was at wit's end, when he was ready to blame Elisha, and anyone else, for
all that had befallen Israel, our God who sees the end from the beginning spoke
to Elisha's heart. In II Kings 7:1 - 2 we read:
Elisha said (to the king and the officer on whom the king leaned), "Hear
the word of the Lord. This is what the Lord says: About this time tomorrow,
a seah of flour will sell for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel
at the gate of Samaria."
The officer on whose arm the king was leaning said to the man of God, "Look,
even if the Lord should open the floodgates of the heavens, could this happen?"
"You will see it with your own eyes," answered Elisha, "but you
will not eat any of it!"
Years ago, the Ford Motor Company had a commercial that said:
"If you could see tomorrow the way it looks to us today, you would say
incredible."
The commercial lasted, as I recall, for less than two weeks. Advertising the
future didn't click with the public. We listened to what Ford was telling us,
we quickly took into account automotive history, and said, "Yeah, sure".
We, in our cynicism, knew that tomorrow's car, regardless of which company produced
it, wouldn't be anything really new. Yes, it would be new in time, maybe it
would even be new in overall quality, but it would not be radically new as suggested
by the Ford Motor Company.
In essence, Elisha said, "If you could see tomorrow the way it looks to
God today, you would say incredible." The officer on whom the king leaned,
a cynic through and through said, "Yeah sure, like that's going to happen."
Elisha assured him that it would happen. He told the officer that "He would
see flour and barley on sale for ridiculously low prices, but he wouldn't taste
any of it." Again the officer on whom the king leaned snickered, but Elisha
wasn't joking.
Meanwhile, by the city gate four lepers sat with lacerated stubs, stubs that
held up signs asking for, hoping for, longing for, a handout. They had long
since been counted among the dead by others, now they too counted themselves
among the dead. For it had been several days since anyone had brought them scraps
off the table. They knew, as everyone knew, that the end was near. We pick up
their story, and the story of Elisha's tomorrow, in II Kings 7:3 - 20. We read:
3 Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate. They
said to each other, "Why stay here until we die? 4 If we say, `We'll go
into the city' --the famine is there, and we will die. And if we stay here,
we will die. So let's go over to the camp of the Arameans and surrender. If
they spare us, we live; if they kill us, then we die." 5 At dusk they got
up and went to the camp of the Arameans. When they reached the edge of the camp,
not a man was there, 6 for the Lord had caused the Arameans to hear the sound
of chariots and horses and a great army, so that they said to one another, "Look,
the king of Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings to attack us!"
7 So they got up and fled in the dusk and abandoned their tents and their horses
and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives. 8 The men
who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They
ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid
them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and
hid them also. 9 Then they said to each other, "We're not doing right.
This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until
daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let's go at once and report this to the
royal palace." 10 So they went and called out to the city gatekeepers and
told them, "We went into the Aramean camp and not a man was there--not
a sound of anyone--only tethered horses and donkeys, and the tents left just
as they were." 11 The gatekeepers shouted the news, and it was reported
within the palace.
12 The king got up in the night and said to his officers, "I will tell
you what the Arameans have done to us. They know we are starving; so they have
left the camp to hide in the countryside, thinking, `They will surely come out,
and then we will take them alive and get into the city.'" 13 One of his
officers answered, "Make some men take five of the horses that are left
in the city. Their plight will be like that of all the Israelites left here--yes,
they will only be like all these Israelites who are doomed. So let us send them
to find out what happened." 14 So they selected two chariots with their
horses, and the king sent them after the Aramean army. He commanded the drivers,
"Go and find out what has happened." 15 They followed them as far
as the Jordan, and they found the whole road strewn with the clothing and equipment
the Arameans had thrown away in their headlong flight. So the messengers returned
and reported to the king. 16 Then the people went out and plundered the camp
of the Arameans. So a seah of flour sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley
sold for a shekel, as the LORD had said. 17 Now the king had put the officer
on whose arm he leaned in charge of the gate, and the people trampled him in
the gateway, and he died, just as the man of God had foretold when the king
came down to his house. 18 It happened as the man of God had said to the king:
"About this time tomorrow, a seah of flour will sell for a shekel and two
seahs of barley for a shekel at the gate of Samaria." 19 The officer had
said to the man of God, "Look, even if the LORD should open the floodgates
of the heavens, could this happen?" The man of God had replied, "You
will see it with your own eyes, but you will not eat any of it!" 20 And
that is exactly what happened to him, for the people trampled him in the gateway,
and he died.
The lepers were realist. They knew that today was the tomorrow they worried
about yesterday which proved that they weren't always wrong. So by the end of
the day, believing that the worst that could happen to them was that they would
be killed, they stumbled toward the camp of the Arameans. This was a clear case
of assisted suicide.
But as they approached the camp with fear and resolve born out of desperation
they discovered the army that wasn't there. The camp was utterly deserted. They
cautiously knocked on the door of one tent and then another. In weakness with
a voice that was barely audible they said, "Hello, is anyone in there?"
With each tent their voices became louder and louder. Within thirty minutes,
after enjoying a 44 oz. drink and a snack or two, they were shouting, "HEY!
WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU GUYS!"
It didn't take long for them to become convinced that they had this well-supplied
camp all to themselves. It was like being in one of the Mega-Wal-Mart stores
with not a clerk in sight. Everything, I mean everything, was there for the
taking.
Everywhere they looked they saw food, spears, CDs, shoes, clothes of all sizes
and colors, after shave lotion, gold, silver, jewelry, knives, and anything
else you would find in a well-stocked Wal-Mart. Well, they went wild. They grabbed
a shopping cart and just started loading it up with goodies.
Then, as they raced from tent to tent, it hit them. If they continued in the
direction they were going, they would wind up where they were headed. Instinctively,
they knew that what they were doing was wrong. Perhaps the greatest miracle
in this story, the miracle that is so easily overlooked, is that in the midst
of this all-out shopping spree their conscience spoke to them loud and clear.
They knew they had to go back and tell the good news to the king and others.
And they knew that the "good news" could not wait until morning.
So they hurried back and told the king. The king, as you might guess, was skeptical.
He figured it was some sort of trap. He figured that the Arameans simply wanted
to lure the Israelites out into the open where they could easily be slaughtered.
Besides, could he really trust the word of lepers?
The king, and everyone else was cautious, and who could blame them. Good news,
really good news, is hard to believe. Bad news, news that doesn't surprise us,
is readily soaked up, but good news is questioned. That's why Elmer Kelton in
one of his novels said, "Good news travels afoot. Bad news rides a fast
horse."
So it makes sense that the king would check out this inconceivable story of
the four lepers. It makes sense that our neighbors, our coworkers, our acquaintances,
and our friends question us when we tell them, by word or deed, that we are
new creatures in Christ. For it is inconceivable to them that the God of the
universe would come, in human form, and die for us so that we may live. But
God's miracles, when they really happen, can stand up to close scrutiny.
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