Grace: Divine Illumination. 2 Kings
6:8-23
We have seen that some of
these episodes seem rather odd when we first go through them because there is
no specific statement at the end of them that really focus us on why they are
in the Scriptures. So that forces us to stop and think a little more deeply
about why it is that God is including these events in the narrative of 2 Kings.
Why is it important to learn these things? Why was it important for Israel to have these types of things happen in their
history? What is it that God is trying to communicate to Israel at that time in their history? If we don’t really
understand that then when it comes to taking these episodes and applying them
over to the church age and to our spiritual life we can run agro8und on all
sorts of various problems. So it is important o focus on how these string
together, and the beautifying element in each of these episodes is the grace of
God towards a rebellious people. God is extending His grace to the northern
kingdom of Israel because they are out of fellowship as a nation,
disobedient to God and have rejected Him. They have gone into idolatry and this
has been going on now for some seventy years or so, ever since the split of the
northern kingdom from the southern kingdom and the idolatry that was first
introduced by Jeroboam 1st.
As a background for
understanding what happens in 2 Kings 6, starting in v. 8, we are to be
reminded of what Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount. Fundamentally the
Sermon on the Mount was Jesus confronting the Pharisees with their pseudo
righteousness based on a legalistic, superficial interpretation of the Mosaic
Law: that if people just did certain overt activities it would make them righteous.
Jesus is challenging their whole concept of righteousness and the central
passage, we might say, of the Sermon on the Mount was, “If your righteousness
does not exceed that of the scribes and the Pharisees then you will not see the
kingdom of heaven.” The point is that in their culture they thought the perfect
example of a righteous person was a Pharisee. We look at the Pharisee through
the lens of Jesus’ teaching, so we look at them as being superficial and
hypocrites. But in their culture there was nobody more moral, no one more
involved in the worship of the temple and what appeared to be the worship of
God than a Pharisee. So if someone came along and said that their righteousness
wasn’t good enough for God, and that you have to have greater righteousness,
then how in the world could any of us ever be approved by God? So the Sermon on
the Mount of when Jesus gave His correct interpretation of the Mosaic Law and
the righteousness required by the Mosaic Law in contrast to the interpretation
of the Pharisees.
In Matthew 5:43ff Jesus
said, NASB “Matt 5:43 “You
have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL
LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy. But
I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven…’” Jesus’ point here is
to illustrate grace; that in the life of the believer grace should be a
characteristic, and as the individual believer is dealing with people who may
spitefully use you, abuse us, not have respect for us as an individuals, who
may antagonize us, that we are to love our enemies as we love those who are our
friends and those who support us. That is grace, and it is ultimately depicted
at the cross because God loved those who were hostile to Him so much that he
sent His Son to die on the cross for them. As believers we are to emulate the
love of God to those who are hostile to us. That is grace orientation. That is
the background theme that is being illustrated in a number of these episodes in
2 Kings.
The next episode starting
in 2 Kings 6:8 has to do with a military conflict that is taking place between
the Arameans to the north (roughly the area of modern Syria and Lebanon) and
the northern kingdom of Israel. Since the time of Solomon there had existed a
state of hostility between the Aramaen nation to the north that had its capital
in Damascus and the Jews to the south. Following the division of Israel that hostility intensified so that by the time of
Elijah, but specifically Elisha, military hostilities with the northern kingdom
had become a regular factor in the life of the citizens in the northern kingdom
of Israel. To understand way God is allowing this constant
attacking by the Syrians we need top put this within the framework of the
Mosaic Law. In 1 Kings chapter eleven we see the description of Solomon’s fall
into idolatry. As he succumbed to the influence of all of his foreign wives he
began to compromise on his love for Yahweh,
the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He allowed to construction of temples to
the false gods to the point where he became involved himself in idolatry.
We have to understand the
significance of idolatry in Israel in light of the Mosaic Law. The Mosaic Law has a
prelude to it that summarizes the underlying principles of the Law, and that is
known as the Ten Commandments. At the beginning of these commandments are these
six verses that focus on the mandate that God gave the nation: to have
exclusive loyalty and allegiance to Him. Exodus 20:2 NASB “I am
the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” Notice how He defines
Himself again and again as the God who brought them out of the land of Egypt. [4] “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any
likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water
under the earth. [5] You shall not worship them or serve them; for
I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on
the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,
[6] but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to
those who love Me and keep My commandments.” The foundational mandate of the
Mosaic Law is complete, total, unadulterated allegiance to God. So when
idolatry occurred this was not just an act of spiritual infidelity, it was an
act of treason against the true King of Israel who was God. So it has political
as well as religious significance. As God gave them the Law he also identified
in the Law that if there was a violation by the nation then God would bring
certain devastating consequences on that nation. That included military
conquest, as we see in Leviticus chapter twenty-six—five stages of increasing
intensity of divine discipline on the nation for their disobedience, and this
is the framework for understanding what is happening in all of these books that
follow the Mosaic Law. We can’t understand the rest of the Old Testament if we
don’t understand Leviticus 26. The rest of the Old Testament is either the
outworking of the blessing or the cursing (judgments on Israel) depending on whether they were obedient or
disobedient to God.
When Solomon succumbed to
idolatry God finally announced a judgment on him in 1 Kings 11:12 and he told
Solomon that He would take the kingdom from him—not in his lifetime but from
his son—and it would be torn in two. The northern ten tribes would be one
nation and the southern two tribes would remain as one nation, not because of
Solomon but because of the covenant that God had made with Solomon’s father,
David. There would always be a descendant of king David on the throne of Judah. So with that Solomon began to experience the
collapse of his great empire, the time of great peace and prosperity that God
had given him because of his obedience to God when he was young. What we read
in the rest of 1 Kings 11 is that God began to raise up various external
enemies as well as internal opposition. One of those external enemies that God
raised up at that time involved the rise of this new entity if Aramea in the
north that would be centered in Damascus.
As the northern kingdom
was in violation of the Mosaic Law God began to discipline that nation, and
they had a history of political instability, one dynasty following upon another
dynasty, numerous wars and consequences. One of those consequences involved a
war with the southern kingdom during the time when Asa was the king of Judah in the south and Ba’asha was the king in Israel. Ba’asha began to fortify the border with Judah in preparation for an attack. This obviously
disturbed Asa and he wanted to something to distract Ba’asha so he bribed
Ben-hadad I in Syria to invade from the north. That would cause Ba’asha to turn around and
put all of his forces back in order to protect the nation and get his focus off
of Judah.
Following the initial
attack by Ben-hadad when he took the northern part of the kingdom (around 880 BC), from that
point down through the time of Ahab,
Syria had dominance in that part of the northern kingdom.
Even during the time of Ahab there were conflicts, but then there were two instances
when the Syrians attacked (1 Kings 20, 21) and were defeated. But a strange
twist occurred in 853 (not recorded in Scripture) when Ahab and Ben-hadad
entered into an alliance against the Assyrians who were coming in from the
north east, and they were able to defeat Shalmaneser III. We know about that
because it is commemorated on a monolith that Shalmaneser erected and he
mentioned both Ben-hadad and Ahab on it. But following that there was a falling
out between Ben-hadad and Ahab, and Ahab went to Jehoshaphat, the king of the
south, to see if he would join him in an attack against the Syrians at
Ramoth-Gilead. That is when Ahab was killed. Ever since that defeat by the
Syrians at Ramoth-Gilead there had been these consistent hit-and-run raids by
the Syrians in to the northern kingdom of Israel and that had led to tremendous instability. All of
that is God bringing judgment t and discipline on the northern kingdom in light
of these promises in the cycles of discipline.
To summarize this, what we
see is that Israel was in disobedience to God. They had violated the
Mosaic Law, they were worshipping false gods which was an act of treason as
well as religious apostasy, and so as a nation they were out of fellowship and
in rebellion towards God. Individually there were very few who were even saved,
but nationally there was a corporate representation there. They are in covenant
with God which pictures them as being redeemed by God as a nation, so that has
an analogy with us as individuals—as a nation they were saved but they are out
of fellowship and under discipline. Nevertheless we see that God is continuing
to initiate and to be kind to them so that they would return to Him. He
continued to send His messengers, Elijah and Elisha, to the northern kingdom even
though they had completely rejected Him. This is a demonstration of God’s
grace, a demonstration of loving your enemies. Israel is at enmity with God and is a spiritual enemy of
God, and yet God is demonstrating His love to them by sending Elijah and Elisha.
This has two applications
for us. First, it has an application in relation to salvation. Romans 5:8 NASB
“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us.” There is an analogy between Israel as being an enemy of God and God continuing to send a
message of grace through the prophets to them and our salvation. Every human
being is born spiritually dead and at enmity with God, hostile to God.
Nevertheless, God in showing His unconditional love sent His Son, the Lord
Jesus Christ, to the earth to die for our sins and to pay the penalty for our
sins. Second, it helps to understand God’s grace toward us in our spiritual
life. We often go through times in our spiritual life when we are in rebellion
against God, when we are like the northern kingdom of Israel and have succumbed
to the idols in our lives—not of metal or wood but the idols of our
circumstances, the idols of the details of our life where the details of our
life are more important than our relationship to God. But God constantly works
in us as believers by the Holy Spirit in order to bring us back to Himself.
That includes divine discipline and punishment. Hebrews 12:5, 6. Even though we
are out of fellowship and under divine discipline we are still the recipients
of God’s grace. At the same time He is always working to pull us back, to cause
us to turn back to Him, to confess our sins and to return in fellowship. 1 John
1:9. That is what is being pictured here in terms of Israel’s relationship to God. As we go through this episode
what we should think of is that God’s treatment of the enemies of Israel, the Syrians, is to teach something to Israel about God’s grace towards them. Just as the Aramaens
or Syrians were the enemies of the northern kingdom, so Israel had become the enemy of God. And what God is doing in
His grace by showing His grace in this episode to the Syrians in being kind to
them at the end, and treating them the way He does, is to illustrate to the
northern kingdom that if they would return to Him then He would also treat them
in love and grace and kindness.
The problem that is faced
here initially by Beh-hadad is that as he is making war with Israel and he sits
in the private council chambers with his chief generals to make the secret
plans to attack Israel, by the time they get ready to carry them out the
Israelites already know what is going to happen and they have marshaled their
troops to that particular area and are prepared for the attack. So the king of Syria begins to suspect that there is someone within his
inner circle who is a spy. So the first three verses, 8-10, describe the fact
that God is still working in the southern kingdom and even though He is
allowing the Syrians to attack He is still dealing with the northern kingdom in
grace. He sent Elisha to them and He tells Elisha what the plans of the enemy
are so that he can then inform the king of Israel so that they can be prepared to resist the attacks
from Syria. That teaches us the principle that even while we are
under divine discipline God is still extending His grace to us. It also teaches
us that God is our real protector, the one who is the solution to all of the
problems and issues in our life, not whatever it is that we are putting in
front of Him. Life is not going to be a success because we have mastered
certain psychological techniques of life or because we have managed to develop
certain psychological orientations. Life is a success only if we have submitted
to the authority of God and we are living according to His Word. We have to
learn to trust Him above everything else. God is working to teach that
principle in the northern kingdom. They have to learn to trust God and not
their own resources. That is why it is the prophet of God who is the one who
provides their solution.
Psalm 40:4 NASB
“How blessed is the man who has made the LORD his trust, And has not turned to the proud, nor to
those who lapse into falsehood.” That is, trusting in God and not those who put
forth alternative solutions, alternative paths to happiness and meaning and
success in life.
Psalm 118:8, 9 NASB
“It is better to take refuge in the LORD Than to trust in man. It is better to
take refuge in the LORD Than to trust in princes.”
Psalm 146:3 NASB
“Do not trust in princes, In mortal man, in whom there is no salvation.”
Jeremiah 17:5-8 NASB
“Thus says the LORD, “Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind And makes
flesh his strength, And whose heart turns away from the LORD.
For he will be like a bush in the desert And
will not see when prosperity comes, But will live in stony wastes in the
wilderness, A land of salt without inhabitant. Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD And whose
trust is the LORD. For
he will be like a tree planted by the water, That extends its roots by a stream
And will not fear when the heat comes; But its leaves will be green, And it
will not be anxious in a year of drought Nor cease to yield fruit.”
Two principles we see
here. First, no matter what our circumstances may be our only hope is in the
Lord. Do not put your hope in education, in success, in working for a strong
company with the expectation that God is going to protect you in times of
economic crisis, in politicians, political parties or political agendas. Our
hope, our confidence is in the Lord and Him alone. The second is to recognize
that God is always going to deal with you as a believer in grace, even when we
are in rebellion towards Him. God is always reaching out to us in grace, giving
us the opportunity to recover, the be restored to fellowship and to move
forward in our spiritual life. This is what he is doing in all of these
episodes related to the northern kingdom of Israel.
Now we come to one of those interesting little episodes.
The king is informed that it is not some spy that is telling the king of Israel
what is going on but it is the prophet of God, Elisha. So he is going to send
one of his divisions into the northern kingdom in order to capture Elisha in
order to prevent him from giving away his secret plans.
2 Kin 6:8-13 NASB
“Now the king of Aram was warring against Israel; and he counseled with his servants saying, ‘In such
and such a place shall be my camp.’ The man of God sent {word} to the king of Israel saying, ‘Beware that you do not pass this place, for
the Arameans are coming down there.’ The king of Israel sent to the place about which the man of God had told
him; thus he warned him, so that he guarded himself there, more than once or
twice. Now the heart of the king of Aram was enraged over this thing; and he called his servants
and said to them, ‘Will you tell me which of us is for the king of Israel?’ One of his
servants said, ‘No, my lord, O king; but Elisha, the prophet who is in Israel, tells the king of Israel the words that you speak in your bedroom.’ So he
said, ‘Go and see where he is, that I may send and take him.’ And it was told
him, saying, ‘Behold, he is in Dothan.’”
Dothan was a place where Joseph had had some dealings in his
lifetime so it has a historical background in Israel. It is located in the Jezreel Valley about 12 miles north of the capital of the northern kingdom which is
Samaria.
2 Kings 6:14 NASB
“He sent horses and chariots and a great army there, and they came by night and
surrounded the city. [15] Now when the attendant of the man of God
had risen early and gone out, behold, an army with horses and chariots was
circling the city. And his servant said to him, ‘Alas, my master! What shall we
do?’” He is filled with fear and runs to Elisha. [16] “So he answered, ‘Do not
fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.’”
Elisha shows how any believer focused on the Lord should respond. He does not
panic. The problem we have as believers living in this modern or postmodern era
is that we do not think in terms of the spiritual arena that surrounds us. We
are not always aware that as we are moving through life we are shoving our way
through crowds of angels. We are surrounded by angels who are witnessing and
observing everything that we do. On one level we walk by faith and not by sight,
but we let our thinking be dominated so much by the empirical—what we see is
that which is real, so we are functional empiricists and we don’t think in
terms of the reality of the angelic conflict that surrounds us. Too often we
are like the servant of Elisha and we don’t have our eyes opened by the truth
of Scripture.
Elisha is going to pray
for his servant’s eyes to be opened and then he is going to pray for the
Syrians’ eyes to be closed, and we see this enlightenment that comes from
spiritual truth. 2 Kings 6:17 NASB “Then Elisha prayed and said, ‘O LORD, I pray,
open his eyes that he may see.” And the LORD opened the servant’s eyes and he saw; and behold, the
mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.”
Suddenly he realizes that he is not outnumbered but those poor Syrians are
outnumbered by the forces of God. That reality wasn’t something that was true
for Elisha at that time in history, that is a reality that is true just as much
for each of us today. Remember that in the New Testament Paul said we are to
walk by faith and not by sight. We have to understand that reality is what
God’s Word says it is, not what we perceive with our senses. Though we cannot
perceive the armies of angels that surround us it does not mean that it is any
less true.
Then Elisha prays that the
Syrians’ eyes be closed. 2 Kings 6:18 NASB “When they came down to
him, Elisha prayed to the LORD and said, ‘Strike this people with blindness, I
pray.’ So He struck them with blindness according to the word of Elisha.”
Now Elisha has to take care of them. They were sent to capture Elisha but he
ends up turning the tables on them. [19] “Then Elisha said to them, ‘This is
not the way, nor is this the city; follow me and I will bring you to the man
whom you seek.’ And he brought them to Samaria. [20] When they had come into Samaria, Elisha said, ‘O
LORD, open the eyes of these {men,} that
they may see.’ So the LORD opened their eyes and they saw; and behold, they were
in the midst of Samaria. [21] Then the king of Israel when he saw them, said to Elisha, ‘My father, shall I
kill them? Shall I kill them?’” The king Israel’s reaction was pure human viewpoint, flesh-oriented
sin nature response. Notice how pagan and barbaric he is. They can’t even
defend themselves and he just wants to kill them. Elisha is going to treat
these enemies of the state in grace. [22] “He answered, ‘You shall not kill
{them.} Would you kill those you have taken captive with your sword and with
your bow? Set bread and water before them, that they may eat and drink and go
to their master.’” Love your enemies; be gracious to them. [23] “So he prepared a great feast for them; and when they
had eaten and drunk he sent them away, and they went to their master. And the
marauding bands of Arameans did not come again into the land of Israel.”
What are we to learn from
this? The message for the northern kingdom to learn from God is that in the
same way that these Syrian raiders were enemies of the northern kingdom Israel was the enemy of God. Just as Elisha demonstrated
grace and kindness to these enemies of the nation so God was constantly
reaching out in grace and kindness to the rebellious apostates Jews in the
northern kingdom, God was constantly offering them the opportunity to return to
Him and He would fully bless them. It is again a message of grace. God reaches
out to us, not on the basis of who we are and what we do but on the basis of
who He is and what Jesus Christ did for us on the cross.
Illustrations