#497 Shall We?

Then Elisha said, Hear ye the word of the Lord; Thus saith the Lord, Tomorrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gate of Samaria.

2 Then a lord on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of God, and said, Behold, if the Lord would make windows in heaven, might this thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.

3 And there were four leprous men at the entering in of the gate: and they said one to another, Why sit we here until we die?

4 If we say, We will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there: and if we sit still here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us fall unto the host of the Syrians: if they save us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die.

5 And they rose up in the twilight, to go unto the camp of the Syrians: and when they were come to the uttermost part of the camp of Syria, behold, there was no man there.

6 For the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host: and they said one to another, Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us.

7 Wherefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents, and their horses, and their asses, even the camp as it was, and fled for their life.

8 And when these lepers came to the uttermost part of the camp, they went into one tent, and did eat and drink, and carried thence silver, and gold, and raiment, and went and hid it; and came again, and entered into another tent, and carried thence also, and went and hid it.

9 Then they said one to another, We do not well: this day is a day of good tidings, and we hold our peace: if we tarry till the morning light, some mischief will come upon us: now therefore come, that we may go and tell the king's household.

10 So they came and called unto the porter of the city: and they told them, saying, We came to the camp of the Syrians, and, behold, there was no man there, neither voice of man, but horses tied, and asses tied, and the tents as they were.

11 And he called the porters; and they told it to the king's house within.

12 And the king arose in the night, and said unto his servants, I will now shew you what the Syrians have done to us. They know that we be hungry; therefore are they gone out of the camp to hide themselves in the field, saying, When they come out of the city, we shall catch them alive, and get into the city.

13 And one of his servants answered and said, Let some take, I pray thee, five of the horses that remain, which are left in the city, (behold, they are as all the multitude of Israel that are left in it: behold, I say, they are even as all the multitude of the Israelites that are consumed:) and let us send and see.

14 They took therefore two chariot horses; and the king sent after the host of the Syrians, saying, Go and see.

15 And they went after them unto Jordan: and, lo, all the way was full of garments and vessels, which the Syrians had cast away in their haste. And the messengers returned, and told the king.

16 And the people went out, and spoiled the tents of the Syrians. So a measure of fine flour was sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, according to the word of the Lord.

17 And the king appointed the lord on whose hand he leaned to have the charge of the gate: and the people trode upon him in the gate, and he died, as the man of God had said, who spake when the king came down to him.

18 And it came to pass as the man of God had spoken to the king, saying, Two measures of barley for a shekel, and a measure of fine flour for a shekel, shall be to morrow about this time in the gate of Samaria:

19 And that lord answered the man of God, and said, Now, behold, if the Lord should make windows in heaven, might such a thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.

20 And so it fell out unto him: for the people trode upon him in the gate, and he died. 2 Kings 7 KJV

This is the way of darkness, and I remember it in the mountains that it would always seem a bit farther away, there was always more time. Once I wandered so far in and along the creek, who am I kidding, more than once, but this time it was a night without the moon, and the sun was dipping behind the mountains. I can still see, just one more cast, one more trout, and I have him, but one more bigger one, and then it all the sudden looks a bit desperate. I did not dress for the cool, damp night nor did I listen to the warning that my eyes had measured out. It was one of those nights up there, where the clouds and fog move in and as I walked back up the path along the creek, I could hear the water but not see it. I could feel the ground but not see the path, and after losing it a time or two, and uncertain of my feet, I decided to wade the creek. It gets that dark, and the light is now a long way off. If you lay down, you may not get up again. I see a flicker in the distance, and someone is yelling out a measure of barley for a shekel. That is light up ahead, not the sun, but enough for now. I just have to hope it doesn't go away and keep walking toward it. 

The king's right hand man does not believe the prophet of God, and while it may seem far fetched, this is Elisha, who has spoken the word of God faithfully. You will see it my friend, but you will not enjoy the riches of it as one who believed. You will not stand in the way of it, block the door to it as if what you would not acknowledge now, belongs to you then. It will not be for you to rule over God's bounty, to be the keeper of the gate, the means of dispersing this grace. Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess, yes, God could open the skies, like the time of the people's wandering in the desert, when He gave them the manna from heaven that they so came to loathe. You won't decide how God does this, you do not have a box big enough to put Him in, but this is what will happen tomorrow.

Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. 13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. 15 As it is said,

“Today, if you hear his voice,

do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”

16 For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? 17 And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? 18 And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient? 19 So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. Hebrews 3: 12-19

Four lepers, those who are unclean, and marked as so with an outward sign, live outside the wall, as it is written. They would normally have given anything to go into the city, but it is death in there. They could stay where they are at, outside the wall, where they are near to what is no longer their hope, or they can go to what is their enemy by birth. We could go there, and we could state the obvious, that we are sick and starving, and ask for mercy, for we have nothing suitable to offer in return. We can die a horrible slow death of starvation here, or hope for mercy and at the worst die quickly there. What shall we do? They go, and they walk at twilight, not sure of what they will find, but when they get there, it is not how they thought. It is nothing like the worst of even the best of their imaginings. They would have been happy with crumbs, to have food thrown at them like dogs, but the possibility of death cannot be found, where is thy sting? They eat to their hearts content, this must be the first time they have had a reason to laugh in a while, to know tears afresh. Though they are full, it occurs to them to store up against such a time as this, and they hide some and again, but then something has changed. We cannot keep this thing a secret, this is too big for us to keep for ourselves, and this light should not be hidden, but held high. We do a great wrong if we do not go and share what we have found, and give freely what we have received freely. 

Now it is the weak, the sick, the base and not respectable things of this world, those who have been brought low, who will now go back and share with those who not so long ago thought themselves to be well. It is never the righteous that need to repent, it is only the sick who need a physician, but they are starving and have seen a wretchedness in themselves that they did not think possible. This army that they were so afraid of, that they did not have the strength of themselves to chase away, ran from the amplified sound of 4 lepers. They were chastised and overcome by the volume of an army that wasn't there. To God be the glory. Now those that hear cannot yet believe, but their hearts are broken and tired. It is a few that will go first to test the testimony of the witnesses. They come and see the place where the Syrians were, and nothing is there. The tomb is empty. And so the people came and they spoiled the camp, and sold the excess, so the prophecy was fulfilled. The king put his man there to control the gate, to order the way, but the people trampled him as they nailed their 95 theses on the door of the market. He who didn't believe may not eat it, nor shall he stand in the way.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. Matthew 23: 13