In this passage of scripture,
we see where God is concluding the ministry of the prophet Elijah. Elijah, God's prophet, he was
the main prophet for a time in the northern kingdom under ungodly
kings. We saw last week Elijah dealing
with the wicked king Ahab. and all that he went through
there. And now his service, his ministry as God's prophet is
coming to an end. And he's going to hand it over
according to God's commandment to a man named Elisha. And that
was first pointed out to Elijah back over in 1 Kings chapter
19. Look over there, just turn back
a few pages to 1 Kings 19, and look at verse 15. It says here
in 1 Kings 19, 15, it says, the Lord said unto him, go, return
on thy way to Damascus. to the wilderness of Damascus,
and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria,
and Jehu, the son of Nimshi, shalt thou anoint to be king
over Israel, and Elisha, the son of Shaphat of Abimelech,
shalt thou anoint to be prophet in thy room. So that's where
God told Elijah, you see, your ministry is over, now Elisha's
gonna take over. And there's probably an issue
of age there. But here, over in 2 Kings chapter
two, this is where it's revealed that the Lord would take up Elijah
into heaven by a whirlwind. Look down at, where is it, verse
11. Now this, I want to go ahead,
that's not the focus of the message this morning. We're going to
focus on the mantle and what that represents. But everybody,
this is a point of curiosity. A lot of times, you know, when
we read about Elijah and we read about others, but it says in
verse 11, When Elijah put the mantle on Elisha, it says, and
when it came to pass, as they still went on, this is Elijah
and Elisha walking to Jericho, I think it is, and it says, they
went on and talked that behold, there appeared a chariot of fire
and horses of fire and parted them both asunder and Elijah
went up by a whirlwind into heaven. Now, before I say anything about
that, look over in Malachi chapter four. That's the last chapter
of the Old Testament. But turn over there just for
a moment and I'll get to that in a minute. Now what happened
to Elijah? He was taken up by a whirlwind
in a chariot of fire unto heaven. And there's a lot of different
ideas about that. Some people think that Elijah
was taken straight to heaven without dying. and they equate
it with Enoch, who was taken up, who did not see death. And
they say, well, that Enoch and Elijah are now in heaven, and
they're waiting to return. And I'm not gonna go into all
this, I know it may raise your curiosity, and we can talk about
it, and I've got messages on it. But you know, there are a
lot of people who say that Enoch and Elijah are the two witnesses
of Revelation 11. I don't believe that. I don't
believe that's true. But I don't have time to go into
all that today. But what happened to Enoch and
Elijah? Well, here's some things we do
know. Number one, we know that it's appointed unto men once
to die, and after that, the judgment. So death, physical death, is
inevitable for all of us. So settle that, you know. Number
two, in the end, this vile body is gonna be changed in a twinkling
of an eye. This vile fleshly body is not
going to exist in heaven. It cannot. And number three,
in the Bible, when it talks about heaven, it could be talking about
one of three things. It could be talking about the
throne of God, It can be talking about outer space, where the
sun is and the stars, or it can be talking about the sky. Now
my own personal view, and my own personal view of this, along
with Enoch, is that they didn't die, that God just removed them
from one place to another. Where they were, for example,
Enoch, it says that he was translated. in Genesis chapter five. And
then over in Hebrews 11 it says that he should not see death.
And then we read about Enoch's prophecy in the book of Jude.
And his prophecy was one of judgment upon men for their sins. And
you know that brings out anger in people. How many times were
the prophets threatened with death? The apostles with death? Preachers of the gospel under
ungodly governments threatened with death, and how many times
were they actually killed for that? All the apostles except
John were martyred, and so what I think happened to Enoch is
that he was going to be killed because of his message, and God
took him and moved him to another place where he wouldn't be killed.
And if you look in Hebrews 11, when it mentions Enoch and it
mentions some of the prophets, after that it says, I can't remember
which verse it is, maybe verse 13, I may have it marked in your
lesson there. It says, these all died in the faith. Well, that would include any,
it doesn't say these all died except Enoch. So what I think
happened, what I believe has happened here in Elijah that
he was taken up into the sky and moved to another place. And
in fact, if you'll read 2 Kings later on, you find out that Elijah
wrote a letter to one of the evil kings of the Northern kingdom. Well, did he write that from
heaven and send it down? I think he was just retired because
of his age and all that. And Elisha was given the manna.
But look at Malachi chapter four. This is the last two verses of
the Old Testament. And here's what it says. It says,
behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet. Now, and he says,
before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord,
and he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and
the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and
smite the earth with a curse. Now, what's that talking about?
Is Elijah gonna come back from the dead or come back from heaven
and then die? What is? Well, the Lord himself. Now, I've got this listed in
your lesson in the first couple of paragraphs here. And you can
read that, I won't go into all that today. But basically, the
Lord himself said that that prophecy is not Elijah personally, but
it's John the Baptist. And you remember the scribes,
they always taught that Elijah was gonna return before the Messiah
would come. And you remember when John was,
when he came, they asked him, are you Elijah? And John said,
no, I'm not Elijah. Well, what that is, Elijah was
considered to be a prime example of the whole prophetic message
of the Old Testament. You remember when Christ sat
down with his disciples before he ascended, he taught them out
of the scriptures, the law of Moses, the prophets, and the
Psalms, the things concerning himself. And Elijah is sort of
a personification of all that, the prophetic tradition, the
prophetic message, which concluded in John the Baptist. And the
Lord himself, you can look at those scriptures, Matthew 11,
Matthew 17, where he talks about that that prophecy in Malachi
four here, the last two verses of the Old Testament, was fulfilled
when John the Baptist came as the forerunner of Christ, of
which he's mentioned in Malachi chapter three as the one who
would come before Christ. And that was the fulfillment
of the whole prophetic message. Also remember this, you remember
when Christ took James and John and Peter to the mount where
he revealed himself, transfigured, the Mount of Transfiguration?
You remember who he spoke with? They got a vision there. It was
a vision of Moses who represented the law and a vision of Elijah
who represented the prophecy. And what did they talk about?
They spoke of his death, his decease. which he should accomplish
at Jerusalem. So what that's talking about
in Malachi is the summation and the conclusion, the fulfillment
of the whole prophetic school and truth and tradition, and
it's under the heading of Elijah, fulfilled by John the Baptist,
who was the forerunner of Christ. Y'all may think I'm crazy or
whatever, but you look at that and see what you think. But anyway,
let's go back to 2 Kings 2 now. This is where Elijah, look at
verse one, it came to pass when the Lord would take up Elijah
into heaven by a whirlwind, that Elijah went with Elisha from
Gilgad, and then they journeyed. Verse two, Elijah said unto Elisha,
tarry here, I pray thee, for the Lord hath sent me to Bethel.
And Elisha said to him, as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth,
I will not leave thee. So they went down to Bethel.
Now what you see here is the old prophet Elijah sort of discouraging
the young man, the younger prophet, Elisha. In other words, it's
kind of like he's saying, well, this is a hard road to hold now
to be a prophet in the northern kingdom under all of these wicked
kings. And you can read about Elijah
and his problems, how he stood firm by the grace of God against
the prophets of Baal. And then later on, he ran like
a scared rabbit from Jezebel. I mean, all of these things.
Remember, and he got to the point where, you know, he said, am
I the only one Lord? And the Lord revealed to him,
he said, I have 7,000 that have not bowed the knee to Baal. So
Elijah was a, he was sort of like Jeremiah in the sense he
was a weeping prophet, but he was, you know, the Lord accomplished
his purposes through Elijah. So Elijah is trying to discourage
Elisha. Look at verse three, the sons
of the prophets were at Bethel, came forth to Elisha. Now, as
they went through these towns, Other prophets came, there were
other prophets there. I don't know how many, but there
weren't a whole lot. And they gathered with them.
Elijah was their leader. And it says, they came forth
to Elisha, and they were recognizing this. It says, and said unto
him, knowest thou that the Lord will take away thy master from
thy head today? And he said, yea, I know it,
hold ye your peace. Just be calm, Elijah's gonna
be taken. And he says in verse four, and
Elijah said unto him, Elisha, tarry here, wait here. I pray
thee, for the Lord hath sent me to Jericho. And he said, as
the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. So they came to Jericho. Now,
Elisha is portraying here the spirit of God. This, you know,
Elijah's discouraging him from a human point of view, but Elisha
is portraying here, look, this is God's will. God has appointed
me to this, and I'm not gonna quit. I've got no choice here
now, see, this is God's work. And he says in verse four, Elijah
said unto him, Elisha, I pray thee, for the Lord hath sent
me to Jericho. And then verse five, it says, and the sons of
the prophets that were at Jericho came to Elisha and said unto
him, knowest thou that the Lord will take away thy master from
thy head today? And he answered, yea, I know
it, hold your peace. This is on this journey. And
Elijah said unto him, Terry, verse six, Terry, I pray thee
here, for the Lord hath sent me to Jordan. And he said, as
the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee,
and they too went on. And verse seven says, and 50
men of the sons of the prophets and stood to view far off, and
they too stood by Jordan. And verse eight, now look at
verse eight, and Elijah took his mantle and wrapped it together
and smote the waters, that's the waters of the Jordan, and
they were divided hither and thither so that they too went
over on dry ground. Now there's the prophet's mantle.
What is that mantle? Well, it was a cloak. It was
like a robe, a covering. And it was a symbol of the prophet's
calling. It was a symbol of the prophet's
covering, his protection. It was a symbol of the prophet's
authority. A symbol of the prophet's truth
and power, all coming from God. That's what the mantle was. They
say it was probably made of sheepskin. That would be certainly appropriate
because that kind of reaches back to the slaying of the sheep
and the bloodshed and all of that. But this mantle, it was
a large, loosely fitting garment made of animal skin and prophets
were known to wear the mantles. Prophet Samuel, he wore a mantle.
And when the Lord revealed that Elisha would follow Elijah as
God's appointed prophet, Elijah cast his mantle upon Elisha. And that's back in first Kings
19, 19, and then we'll see it here too. And so that mantle
was very important. It was, like I said, it was everything
to the prophet. And so here we see Elijah taking
that mantle. He struck the waters of the Jordan
and the waters parted. the Jordan River, and they went
over on dry ground. What does that remind you of? That reminds
you of the Red Sea, doesn't it? How Moses, you know, when God
parted the Red Sea and the children of Israel went on dry ground. And of course, all of that, all
of that is a picture of Christ, who is our mantle. Because Christ
is our, he's our authority, What we preach and what we believe
is not based upon any man's authority, not even Elijah and Elisha, but
it's based upon God's authority revealed in God's word. God said
of his son, when Christ was baptized, picturing his person and his
work, when he told John the Baptist that thus it behoove us to fulfill
all righteousness, God spoke from heaven. in authority, and
he said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, hear
ye him. And so what are we to do? What
was the prophet to do? The prophet wasn't preaching
by his own authority, or on his own word, he was preaching by
the authority of God. Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5
and verse 20, we beseech you as ambassadors of Christ. And
so what do we need to do? What do you need to do? Now I'm
gonna talk about this in the main message today at 11, that
what you need to, it is my responsibility to try as best I can to make
sure that what I'm preaching to you is the word of God and
not the word of Bill. And I hope it's my word in the
sense that I possess it and I believe it, but it's the authority of
God. It's your responsibility to test
me by the word of God. Just like Isaiah said later in
Isaiah 820, to the law and to the testimony, if they speak
not according to this word, there's no light in them. So that's the
task that we have here now. Am I teaching, preaching, proclaiming
God's word by God's authority? And that's what that mantle represents.
As Paul said in 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians, if we preach
Christ crucified and risen from the dead as he's identified and
distinguished in the Bible, God's word, then we have the authority
of God. That's the mantle. It's Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? Well, the
Bible says, God's word says, God's authority says that he's
God manifest in the flesh. That's who he is, God-man, the
one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, the
God-man, the word made flesh dwelling among us, the one who
was made of a woman, but also made under the law. And then
what did he accomplish? That's his glorious work, his
finished work. That's what we preach. We don't
preach a gospel of things that you must do in order to attain
or maintain salvation. We preach a gospel of a finished
work that guarantees the salvation of every person that God chose
before the foundation of the world, whose names are written
in the Lamb's book of life, who are justified in Christ, forgiven
of their sins by his blood, justified before God based upon his righteousness
imputed, who are regenerated and called out by the Holy Spirit
in that invincible calling, believers. who believed the authority of
God's word. That mantle was a cloak. You
know, often in the scriptures, the wearing of a cloak or a covering
is a picture of righteousness. Back over in Genesis chapter
three and verse 21, when Adam and Eve had their fig leaf aprons
on, and that represented man's efforts to cover and hide his
nakedness by his efforts, his works. Fig leaves that they got
and gathered and sewed together. And they wore them and they thought,
well, that's gonna hide our nakedness, but it wouldn't because they
were still ashamed. And God came along and he removed those fig
leaf aprons and what did he put in place of it? Animal skins,
a covering, a cloak. Now that doesn't mean that our
righteousness is nothing but outward in our physical bodies
or anything. That represents the imputation,
the charging, the reckoning of the merits of the righteousness
of God in Christ to our persons for our justification. That's
what this mantle represents. Our mantle is Christ. He's our
authority. He's our truth. All the truths
of the Bible find their fulfillment in the person and work of Christ.
The gospel we preach is the gospel of God's grace, sovereign grace,
conditioned on the Lord Jesus Christ, by whose blood we're
forgiven of all our sins, by whose righteousness we stand
right with God, completely, eternally, and without change. And so that's
what this mantle represents. And you know, I thought about
this, you know, in this passage here where it talks about how
Elijah, he took the mantle, and he struck the waters, or Elijah,
he struck the waters of the Jordan River, and they were divided,
verse eight, and it says, so they too went over on dry ground.
You know what those waters represent, just like back in the Red Sea.
The water represents our sins, which would consume us and drown
us, unless they're removed. Over in the book of Romans, chapter
five and verse 20, it talks about where sin abounded. And the picture
there is where sin overflowed us like a flood. That's our problem,
see, in our foe, in Adam, we fell into sin and death, and
by nature, we're drowning in a sea of sin, within and without. That's total depravity. And unless
those sins are removed some way, and we can't do it, we can't
remove it, we may try, but even our efforts are sinful, unless
those sins are removed by the power of God in Christ, they'll
consume us. And that's why he said, where
sin abounded, grace did much more abound. The grace of God,
and then verse 21 of Romans 5, that's where it says, that as
sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. That's
what that mantle represents. He took that mantle and struck
the waters and they parted and Elijah and Elisha went over on
dry ground. So when we think of this cloak,
think of that. The mantle can also be seen as
a symbol of the anointing of the Holy Spirit whom God graciously
gives to all whom he brings to faith in Christ, the people of
his choosing, that power of God. Now, you know, If we were reading
the Bible like we read the myths and the legends of men, you know
what we'd be talking about? We'd be talking about the magic
cloak. Like there's some magic cloak that God gave. And we'd
probably have legends about people looking for that magic cloak
and all of that. The cloak itself was nothing. That physical cloak. But what
God did, he used that cloak as a symbol, and you might even
say a conduit, through which he showed his glory, his power,
his truth. This is not a magic cloak, there's
no such thing. You know, what was it, years
ago, they found the Shroud of Turin, and you know how they,
I'm sure they've got it somewhere, and people go up and try to touch
it and get healed and all that stuff, like it's magic. That's
not the Bible, that's not the authority of God. This mantle
is special, not because it has any magical qualities in it of
itself, but because of who it symbolizes, who it represents. It represents Christ, the power
of God, the truth of Christ. And think about it, our mantle,
which is Christ, is every true preacher's and every true believer's
assurance of forgiveness of all our sins. by the blood of Christ,
whereby God will not impute our sins to us. Blessed is the man
to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Our mantle, which is
Christ, establishes the authority and the power of the message
of the gospel which we witness to this world. And that's what
it represents. Well, look at verse nine again. Or look at verse nine, rather.
And it came to pass when they were gone over, that is over
the Jordan, Then Elijah said unto Elijah, ask what I shall
do for thee before I be taken away from thee. And Elijah said,
I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me. Now
that indicates something of what Elisha knew what Elijah had gone
through. And he realized how difficult
it was. This was not just show and show. pomp and circumstance
here. Elisha knew that it was a difficult
road, and if he was going to walk that road, it had to be
by the power of God. The power of man couldn't do
it. I think about what I'm gonna preach in 11. I'm not gonna preach
the whole message here, but it says it's required of a steward
that he be faithful. Well, that's right. That's what's
required of me. That's what's required of you.
But faithfulness is part of the fruit of the Spirit. You don't
have it by nature. If it were up to us and left
to our own power, we wouldn't be faithful. We'd forsake it
in a minute. God has to keep us, and that's
what Elisha is saying here. Give me a double portion of the
Spirit, the courage, the power, the grace. that God gave you. And it says in verse 10, look,
he said, thou hast to ask a hard thing, not hard in the sense
of it's hard to do. I mean, whatever God wants to
do, it's not hard for him, but it's a serious thing. is something
that we have to think about. And he says, nevertheless, if
thou see me when I'm taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee,
but if not, it shall not be so. In other words, when Elijah's
saying, if you see me taken up into the sky and removed, however
you think about that, he says, if you see me, that'll be done
to you. You'll have a double portion. If not, you won't. So
he's just simply relating to him the purpose of God in all
this. And verse 11 says, and it came to pass as they still
went on and talked that behold, there appeared a chariot of fire
and horses of fire. That represents the power of
God. That's what that's all about. You know, back then, chariots
and horses were like what we would say tanks. and big guns and things like
that, that was power. You remember the chariots and
the horses of Pharaoh who chased after the children, the Hebrew
children, and they went down into the Red Sea and God destroyed
them. So here God appears in his power,
horses of fire, and parted them both asunder and Elijah went
up by a whirlwind to heaven. And verse 12 says, and Elisha
saw it. And he cried, my father, my father,
the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof. And he saw
him no more and he took hold of his own clothes. Now look
at this. He took hold of his own clothes and rent them in
two pieces. He took off his own clothes.
In verse 13, he took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell
from him and went back and stood by the bank of the Jordan. What
a great picture of faith in Christ and repentance of dead works. When that mantle of Christ, His
authority, His truth, His righteousness and beauty, when we see the glory
of God in Christ, what do we do? We take off in repentance
our own filthy rags, our own, our best works, our best efforts. Paul said, I count it all but
dung that I may win Christ and be found in Him. Not having mine
own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through
the faithfulness of Christ. That's a great picture of that.
took hold of his own clothes, rent them in two pieces. Just
like we repent of our sins and our idolatry, turning to Christ,
take up also the mantle, Christ is our mantle. And verse 14 says,
he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and he smote
the waters and said, where is the Lord God of Elijah? Now you
notice anything about that? Where is the Lord God of Elijah?
He didn't say where is Elijah, did he? He knew Elijah was safe
and secure in the hands of God wherever he was. If you believe
he went to heaven and he's there now waiting to come back, I know
this, he's safe and secure. If you believe like I do that
God just took him to another place and retired him for a few
years, he's safe and secure. Where is Elijah? We don't know
for sure. Later on, like I said, you can
read through 2 Kings and you'll see where he wrote a letter and
sent it to one of the other kings of Israel, the northern king.
But either way, here's the point. Where is the Lord God of Elijah? That's the key. You know, Prophets
come and go, God sends them, he uses them, he takes them away.
Preachers, pastors, they come and go, God uses them and he
takes them away. What's your question? Well, I
got to have that preacher, gotta have that pastor. No, where is
the Lord God? That's the key. Where's Christ
in the preaching? And it says in verse 14, when
he also had smitten the waters, they parted hither and thither,
and Elijah went over. He took the same cloak, the same
mantle that Elijah, and parted those waters. You see, whenever
we hear preachers, what we're looking for is, are they preaching
the same Christ, the same gospel, the same word, the same truth?
It's not where is certain preachers, this preacher, that, it's where
is the Lord God? Where is Christ in that message? That's what we're concerned with.
Are they preachers of righteousness? And if they are, what righteousness
are they preaching? That's what we need to be concerned
with, not who they are and what their credentials are and how
much we even like their personality or whatever. What gospel do they
preach? Because if they preach any other
gospel, What does the Bible say? What does God's authority say?
Let him be anathema. Let him be anathema. So where
is the Lord God of Elijah? Well, our mantle is Christ. Okay.