The Call of God: The Story of Elisha

I want to address some very basic questions in the message today – the answers to which make each day of our lives different from people in the world at large. Are you in this world by chance or by the intentional and purposeful decision of a Creator? Are you a product of fate or are you placed here for a purpose? Did you just happen or is there a reason you exist? More simply: When you get up in the morning and go to work or school or church, is there a purpose guiding what you do?

Countless movies, books, works of art, and music lyrics address these questions. For example, they lie at the heart of Victor Hugo’s classic work, Les Miserables. In the musical version of Hugo’s work, a young revolutionary sings on the night before many of his friends would die on a barricade:

Will the world remember you when you fall?
Could it be your death means nothing at all?
Is your life just one more lie? (English lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer)

I contend that unless there is a God like the God we believe in – who created the world for a purpose and who is involved in working out his purposes in individual lives and in the world more generally – then the answer to the young revolutionary’s questions is a resounding yes. Our lives and deaths have no ultimate meaning if there is no personal and eternal God involved in the universe. Because of that, I contend that you and I will not find real and meaningful life in our world until we come into relationship with our Creator and allow him to guide us day by day to live the life for which we have been created. In other words, if your life will have meaning, you need to believe in the biblical assertion that God has a call for you.

I know that when I make that kind of claim, I walk into countless complex questions about how this looks in our everyday lives. Many of you have written me about those questions throughout my years here:

• Does the call of God mean that all people are meant to be pastors or missionaries? No.
• Does this call mean that one day we all should expect to hear a voice out of a burning bush telling us everything about our futures so that we will never have to wonder again what we are to do? No.
• Will this call be out of keeping with the ways and morals of Scripture? No.

What Am I Saying?

• I am saying that God made you for a reason.
• I am saying that every day and moment of your life matters.
• I am saying that God has a mission in this world and this mission includes both what God wants to do in you and what God wants to do through you.
• I am saying that even when we are not sure why we are doing certain jobs, or why we are going through trials, or why we are stuck in awkward relationships – that God is still at work.

There is a way we are to live in those times. God will use the good times and bad times – even those that seem trivial or senseless to us – to do his work in us and, more than that, to use us as his representatives in this world.

So, let’s hear God’s Word today as he teaches us through his interaction with a man named Elisha. Let’s look at his story and then consider some lessons God would have us learn about his call.

The Story

In 1 Kings 19, we read first about the famous prophet Elijah who on one day experiences a miraculous victory over the false prophets of Baal and then on the next has to be comforted by God in the midst of Elijah’s depression. Elijah has been on the run with a bounty on his head. He’s been hiding in caves and feeling utterly alone in his commitment to God. In other words, Elijah’s life was tough. If you and I had met him, we wouldn’t have said, “I want the kind of life he has.” Still God would not let him wallow in self-pity. Instead, in 19:15-16, God sends him out to anoint three people for service – two of them to politics and one to prophetic ministry. The Bible gives us details about the life of following God’s call for only one of them, i.e., Elisha. What does the Bible tell us?

Part 1: A rich and comfortable man living the life many would want to live.

When we meet Elisha in 1 Kings 19:19, we are introduced to a man about whom people in his world would have said, “Now, his is the kind of life I want to have.” In a remarkably concise way, the Bible lets us know Elisha was a wealthy man. This may be difficult for us to see but the Bible reports that he was in charge of 12 yoke of oxen – and that he personally was driving the 12^th pair. It’s very clear that Elijah was the owner. Only a rich man would have this many animals – and it’s likely that although twelve yoke were working one field on that day, he probably owned even more.

And, Elisha almost certainly had a good family life. Elisha’s desire to go back and wish his parents goodbye is so different from the Elijah we read about in vv. 13-14 – who is covering his face in disgrace, who feels completely alone, and who thinks everyone is out to kill him. So, in few words, the Bible is putting Elisha’s life of wealth and success in sharp contrast to that of Elijah the prophet who was on the run, isolated from relationships, and living in caves.

Part 2: A call from God to what most would call a much less appealing life.

In v. 19, Elijah walks up to this wealthy man and throws his prophet’s cloak over him. This was a visible manifestation of Elisha being the one who was God’s chosen successor to Elijah. This act of throwing a cloak over someone still is something we talk about in our culture. When a succession plan is set up for a leader, it’s still sometimes called the “passing of the mantle.”

But, let’s think a moment about that mantle. This was the cloak that Elijah had been wearing in what seemed to be his unending flight from evil King Ahab. Elijah had been on the run and wearing it for at least three years. That mantle almost certainly was filthy, worn and smelly! Would you have wanted Elijah to throw it over you?

So, which one of these lives would you have chosen – Elijah’s or Elisha’s? If you’re a parent or grandparent praying for your offspring to hear God’s call, which life would you have prayed for? Be honest here. We would choose Elisha’s every time, wouldn’t we? We often view a life in obedience to God and being blessed by God to be a life of material comfort, career success, etc., etc. And, sometimes it may be. God calls his people to all sorts of lives. But, the issue for a follower of Jesus is never personal success or comfort in the eyes of the world. The issue is being in the place God wants us. That’s where true life is to be found. And, Elisha was open to it – and ready for it.

Part 3: The thrill of knowing his life matters.

Elisha does not reject the filthy mantle. Far from it. Instead, in vv. 21 he throws a huge party for the whole community to celebrate. He kills and cooks up all the oxen. This was going to be a feast even bigger than a wedding celebration. Why does Elisha throw a party after hearing that his life will change from comfort to danger – from riches to poverty? What’s happening is this: Elisha is declaring to his family and friends, “I know I have everything that you think matters. I have a comfortable life and a lot of wealth. But, life has to be more than that. I’ve known that a long time. Deep down, you should know it too. And I’ve found my life. At least, I’ve found it! I now know that God knows me and that he’s made me for a reason. I will live in obedience to his call. Woohoo!!”

I wonder if his parents were as excited about this as Elisha was. Would you have been? Make note right now: Real joy comes when we begin to live the way we were created to live.

Part 4: The faithful waiting that is often a part of God’s call.

We come to phase 2 of Elisha’s story in 2 Kings 2:8ff. 18 years have passed. That means that after hearing God’s call and throwing his feast, Elisha had served for 18 years simply as Elijah’s assistant. Now, I know that it’s important to have times for training and internship – but 18 years? And let me add that Elisha had probably not been all that young when God’s call had come to him. In 1 Kings 19, his parents had still been alive. But, Elisha had, for whatever reason, become the family decision-maker. He had full authority to slaughter the oxen and to throw the party. Perhaps his father was already frail. We aren’t told. However, it’s doubtful that Elisha was a teenager when Elijah first threw his cloak over him.

After 18 years, it’s clear that Elisha has some doubts about whether he had understood God’s call correctly. And he wants Elijah his mentor to hold his hand a bit. Elijah’s role as God’s main spokesman – one in the line of Moses and Joshua – is confirmed as he takes that cloak out, strikes the Jordan River with it, and, lo and behold, it parts just like it had for Moses and Joshua of old (2:8). But, according to 2:7, 15, there were at least 50 other prophets involved in God’s ministry. So, Elisha says to Elijah, “Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit (2:9).”

When Elisha asks for this, he isn’t asking for more power that Elijah had. No, a double portion is what the firstborn in the family received. He’s asking Elijah, “Am I really the one who will receive your mantle? Will you confirm that I am to be the one who will be God’s spokesman in the line of Moses and Joshua as you have been?” But, Elijah doesn’t answer directly. Instead, he says, “That’s not my decision to make. That’s God’s decision – not mine. But, if you really need to be sure, then I’ll tell you this: God will give you the chance to see me when I am called away.”

This is so much like what had happened back in 1 Kings 19:20. Elisha asked Elijah, “May I go back and say goodbye to my family?” And Elijah had said, “Who am I to tell you that? This is not my calling but God’s. His approval the one you have to seek.”

And, God does confirm his call to Elisha. Elisha sees God take Elijah away. And – well, let the force of God’s Word speak to you from 2 Kings 2:13-14. Elisha then picked up Elijah’s cloak that had fallen from him and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. He took the cloak that had fallen from Elijah and struck the water with it. “Where now is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” he asked. When he struck the water, it divided to the right and to the left, and he crossed over.

What a story! What do we learn from it?

What is God saying?

#1: The Need for a Call: All who are made in God’s image need a sense of God’s call to live well?

If you have all the world has to offer without a sense of God’s call, you will not find a life that has any sense of purpose. Elisha had everything but it was nothing without a purpose for which to use it. Pastor Tim Keller introduced me to this special edition of the NY Times Magazine at turn of the millennium called “The Me Millennium”. It opens by saying that the modern era began when we threw God out of the center of the universe and put ourselves in the center. And, when this happens, we lose any real purpose for living – not one that lasts. Yet, that’s the way most people live. Listen to just one of the articles written by a man named David Samuels from Manhattan’s west end called In the Age of Radical Selfishness: What it's like being 30-something, overpaid and totally disconnected.

(When) my girlfriend and I broke up, I had concluded that our problem wasn't just sex, or high-pressure careers, or guilt, or the boredom inherent in serial monogamy. We had no direction – no vision for the future – in our relationship. Our inability to imagine a future together was not ours alone. It was a symptom of a larger fracture or collapse, involving however many hundreds of thousands of people in their 20's and 30's who seem to lack any sense of necessary connection to anything larger than their own narrowly personal aims and preoccupations. In the aftermath of the civil rights movement, women's liberation, and other changes, basic laws of social gravity had lost their pull for us. We have thought: We are free to be white or black, gay or straight, to grow our hair long or shave our heads, have children or not, watch television until 3 in the morning and otherwise exist outside the traditional roles and rules that had burdened and constrained our parents. But this freedom from age-old constraints was accompanied by a weightless feeling that attached itself to even the most fundamental decisions. Why bother? Why get married? What are families for?

The harder I concentrated back then, the hazier that promise -- that living for self was real living -- became. The problem is that the self was never meant to save us from death, or imbue our lives with meaning and purpose. The self is the root of selfishness, and selfishness is what makes us unhappy.

The world has been saying for decades now that the only way to find real life is to be free from anything outside ourselves telling us how to live. We are told in countless ways that we’ll enjoy life only when we focus on ourselves. “Do something for yourself,” we’re told. “You deserve it. You’ve earned it.” The implication is that real living is everyone living for his/her own happiness. And the result of that is no happiness at all.

I declare to you today: God has made you for a reason. Whatever else you hear in this message today, hear that God did not make you by mistake or by chance. But, the life for which we were created takes place not when we take charge but when we seek God and respond in obedience to him.

#2: The Faith Required In God’s Call: The call of God does not exclude times of waiting and wondering. I do not want you to be surprised when you surrender to God’s call and then find yourself waiting to see how it all will play out. Elisha waited 18 years. And, throughout those years he remained obedient to God and served God’s people. So, what if you don’t get into that college you wanted to get into? What if you do not yet have that spouse or those children that you would appoint to yourself if you were the one in charge of the universe? What if you do not yet have that job you so deeply desire and feel you need? I encourage you to remain faithful to studying God’s Word, to show God’s love to each one who crosses your path, to pray, to worship with us as God’s people, and to be a good steward of your time, talents and treasures even as you wait for further guidance from God to come. Do what Elisha did. How long? Start with 18 years and then see what God does.

#3: The Breadth of the Call: The call of God is to all sorts of places and roles in this world. Elijah anointed three people for service one day – and only one was to professional ministry. Two were to politics – of all places. And God calls his people to all careers, to different schools, and to all kinds of situations.

As Ajith Fernando proclaimed it from this pulpit several years ago: “There are no God-forsaken places in this world.” Not prisons. Not politics. Not the unemployment lines. Not Islamic cultures. Not atheistic communistic nations. Not our public schools. Not our great state universities. Not the science labs at Cal Tech. Not your family. Not the intensive care wards of our hospitals. God calls his people and sends his people into every area and arena of this world and says, “Live for me there. Speak for me there.” When you go into a place, God’s representative goes there. When a person enters into a conversation with you, he enters into a conversation with someone called by God to speak of him and live for him.

#4: The All-Encompassing Nature of God’s Call: The call of God changes our perspective on each moment and each decision of life. On good times and bad. On times of wealth or poverty. We know that what we’ve been made for cannot be taken away by anything in this world. Our lives are not random. God is present in our world and in our lives. He calls us to himself and then he calls us to go out and live for him. He’s called you here today. What did he call you here to hear? If you haven’t heard it yet, let me summarize what I believe he would have you to hear:

*God wants you to be encouraged – He knows you and what’s happening in your life. He will use you wherever you are for when you and I go to a place, we go as those who are called by God himself.

*God wants you to be open to anything. He might send someone across your path whom he has prepared to hear a word of blessing or of salvation from you. Be alert.

*God wants you not to be surprised if the life he gives you today is different from the one you might have chosen. His ways are not our ways. Someday we will see that his ways are always wiser and better.

Who are we?

We are a chosen people! We are God’s special possession – chosen and called to declare the praises of him who called us out of darkness and into his wonderful light.

From 1 Peter 2:9