Verse 8 then the king of syria
warred against israel And took counsel with his servants saying
in such and such a place shall be my camp And the man of god
sent unto the king of israel saying this is elisha Sending
word to the king of israel saying beware that thou pass not such
a place for there the syrians are come back That's what the
king of Syria just said. We're gonna come, we're gonna
camp here, and we're gonna ambush the Israelites. They warred against
Israel, verse eight. So the king of Israel sent to
the place which the man of God told him and warned him of, and
saved himself there not once nor twice. So Elisha warned the
king of Israel more than once about where the Syrians were
camping. so that he could avoid being
ambushed by them. Several times, not just once
or twice, but quite a few times. Therefore, verse 11, the heart
of the king of Syria was sore troubled for this thing. And
he called unto his servants and said unto them, will you not
show me which of us is for the king of Israel? There's a traitor,
there's a spy in the camp. Somebody's telling our enemy
our whereabouts. It's the only way this could
happen. Verse 12, though, and one of his servants said, none,
my lord, O king, but Elisha, the prophet that is in Israel,
telleth the king of Israel the words that thou speakest in thy
bedchamber. He knows all your secrets. And he said, go and spy where
he is. Let's find this Elisha and deal
with his problem. that I may send and fetch him,
and it was told him, saying, Behold, he is in Dothan. Therefore
sent he thither horses and chariots and a great host, and they came
by night and compassed the city about. And when the servant of
the man of God was risen early and gone forth, behold, and host
compassed the city, both with horses and chariots. And his
servant said unto him, Alas, my master, how shall we do? And he answered, fear not, for
they that be with us are more than they that be with them.
And Elisha prayed and said, Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes that
he may see. He didn't trust the servant to
just trust him. He prayed to the Lord, you show
him and he'll believe you. And the Lord opened the eyes
of the young man, and he saw. And behold, the mountain was
full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha. When they came down to him, Elisha
prayed unto the Lord and said, smite this people, I pray thee,
with blindness. And he smote them with blindness
according to the word of Elisha. Elisha said unto them unto these
this host of Syrians. This is not the way Neither is
this the city follow me and I will bring you to the man whom you
seek But he led them to Samaria Now he didn't lie to them you
think about that he didn't lie to them This is who you're gonna
take you through the one you're looking for And it came to pass, when they
were coming to Samaria, that Elisha said, Lord, open the eyes
of these men, that they may see. And the Lord opened their eyes,
and they saw, and behold, they were in the midst of Samaria.
And the king of Israel said unto Elisha, when he saw them, my
father, shall I smite them? Shall I smite them? He said it
twice. Sounds like he wanted to smite
them. And he answered, thou shalt not
smite them. Wouldst thou smite those whom
thou hast taken captive with thy sword and with thy bow? In
other words, would you take prisoners of war and then just kill them? They didn't do that then. Set
bread and water before them that they may eat and drink and go
to their master. And he prepared great provision
for them. They had eaten and drunk he sent
him he sent them away, and they went to their master so the bands
of Syria came no more into the land of Israel So in this story,
there's Israel You've always got to think about the spiritual
Who's who in the spiritual? teaching of this well It's not
unclear Israel is the people of God Israel is God's elect
In type and picture that's who they were and that's who they
represent the king of Israel is the Lord Jesus Christ The prophet of Israel also the
Lord Jesus Christ Christ is prophet priest and king in God's kingdom
and unbelievers enemies of Israel
and her king the Syrians clear as a bell those that oppose the
king of Israel and Then in this story, there's
a believer who can't see things the way they are Until the Lord
shows him Now these Syrians are all of us by nature We're all
by nature the children of God's wrath And we are enmity our natural
mind is enmity against God We're by nature the children of wrath
even as others We hate the Lord Jesus Christ so much by nature
and people don't understand this about themselves But the Lord reveals it to us
in his word We hate the Lord Jesus so much by nature that
we're not happy just avoiding him. We want him gone. We want him dead. We want to
rid ourselves of his authority and his grace. It's what we did
on Calvary. That's our mission. That's our
will. He released them unto the people's
will and our will was to slay the Son of God and we do it in
our hearts every day The enmity is removed So these enemies plot
to kill the king of the Jews That's the Son of God. That was
the name written above his cross in three languages But there's
a problem with their plan The whole time that we spend in this
world hating God hating his son trying to rid ourselves of him
He knows our every thought He controls our every step. He determines
success and failure. He determines what we do, where we go, what
happens when we get there. He determines everything. He
runs this show. And he knows everything we think.
When we're laying on our bed at night, he knows what's in
our heart. He's the king of glory. He's
the sovereign you can't win this war because Christ is sovereign. That's why The outcome is completely in
his hand as we see at the end here shall I smite them The king could do whatever he
wanted to do And that's how it is with us Will dispose of you and me exactly
as he pleases We can't win we don't win unless
he defeats us and then we win Is that what happened to Jacob
the Lord brought him down and then said you've been successful
with God That's salvation We win when
we lose. So the enemy arrays themselves
against God's prophet, but Elisha says the word and
they're struck blind. Now we skipped a good portion
there and for good reason, we're gonna come back to that part
about the servant waking up and seeing what he saw, and saying
what he did, and learning what he learned. But Elisha, when
the enemy comes down to Elisha, he prays to God to strike them
blind, and they're struck blind. Now consider this. These men
were blind already in the spiritual sense, in this picture, because
they hate God. They think that they can defeat
Christ and be God themselves. That's blindness. But when God struck them blind
physically, now they know they're blind. So you see what this pictures. They're fighting against God
and they know it. They know it. You think about
this. Everybody knew who Israel was. Everybody knew who the God
of Israel was. Everybody knew who Elisha was.
Elisha didn't do the things that he did up until that point without
everybody knowing he was the man of God and he had power. He had authority. So they're
trying to kill the king, the prophet and the king of God's
people and they know it. They know that's what they're
doing. But Elisha, they went on in their
rebellion in spite of that, and that's just blindness. That's
our spiritual blindness by nature. Elisha just made it so that they
knew that they were blind. They can't deny it now. And so
it is with us by nature. We're born blind. We're born
blind. We're the man in John chapter
nine. We're blind from our birth, spiritually speaking. Remember
Saul of Tarsus, how blind was the Apostle Paul before he knew
the Lord, killing and imprisoning God's sheep? You remember that
one man when they took counsel as to what they were gonna do
with the disciples? Because a notable miracle had been done, they couldn't
deny that, but they hated these. They hated Christ and everybody
that spoke for him. So they're taking counsel together
whether to put them in prison or kill them or what are we gonna
do with these idiots? You know, they hated him so bad
and that one man said be careful now Think about what you're gonna
do here If their God is a myth this will
come to nothing But if he's not you're fighting against God Well, that's what Saul was doing
That guy said that. Happily, you'd be found to fight
even against God. He said it like that because
it's so stupid to do something like that. What's dumber than
that? To fight against God Almighty.
If He is the God that they say He is, and you're going to oppose
Him? Really? And yet, that's the business
Saul was in. So how blind was he spiritually,
killing and imprisoning God's sheep, God's servants? And the
Lord said, you're persecuting me when you do that. And then
he was struck blind in a way that he couldn't deny. He was struck blind in a way
that he had to confess, I'm blind. The Lord opened his eyes to his
condition by shutting his eyes. And what happened then? Lord,
what would you have me do? What would you have me do? That's
salvation. That's what God does when he
converts a sinner. So the spiritual lesson here,
God's got to make us realize and experience how spiritually
blind we are, how foolish we are. He's got to put us out of
business. That's what he did for Saul.
He put him out of business. And that's what Elisha did here
in our text. How much fighting and what kind
of fighting are they gonna do not being able to see anything? Remember what our Lord said to
the Pharisees in John 9, 39. Turn over there with me. Let's
look at this, if you would, please. This is the lesson here, by them
being struck blind. Elisha could have prayed, strike
them dead, couldn't he? If that's not what happened,
make them blind. John 9, 39, and Jesus said, for
judgment I am coming to this world, that they which see not
might see, and that they which see might be made blind. He just made a blind man see
and of course, that's a clear picture. He's saying now that's
why I came into the world To in that same fashion make blind
dead Diseased Hopeless sinners See live Be at peace To make those that see to be
blind And some of the Pharisees which
were with him heard these words and said unto him are we blind
also And you can imagine the spirit in which they asked that
question, you know, we're the we're the authorities on theology
Are we blind also and Jesus said unto them if you were blind you
wouldn't have any sin and You see, that's the kind of blindness
he was talking about when he said, I came to make blind men
see, to make them see, to make them see the son of God
as he is and themselves as they are and find in Christ all of
their hope. When that happens, your sins
are gone. The burden of your sin and your
own experience is gone. Your sins have always been gone
because of the lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
But one day you found out about it. Your eyes were opened to
the fact, my sins are gone. I can't answer all the religious
questions, but I know this man came along and now I see. If you were blind, you should
have no sin, but now you say, we see, therefore your sin remaineth. That's what our text is talking
about. He shut them down. That's got to happen to you.
When God saves you, that's what's gonna happen to you. You're gonna cry out in a spiritual
sense what Bartimaeus cried on that street that day. Lord, that
I might receive my sight, have mercy on me. I don't deserve anything, but
it would be merciful, so merciful if you would make me see. Notice what Elisha said to them
in verse 19. Elisha said unto them, this is
not the way. Is that clear? The path you're
on is not the path. That's not what you need to be
doing. That's not where you need to
go. Defying God. Determined to destroy God's king
and God's prophet. That's not the way. That's not
it. There is a way. and you're never going to find
it because you're blind. Again, they were blind before
they were blind. They're not going to find the
way. They're the enemies of God, and they're not going to find
out any different. They're spiritually blind. They're goners. This ain't it, and you ain't
going to find it. You've got no way to get there. Blindness without the ability
to do anything about it, and our blindness has fatal consequence. You fight against God and you
will perish forever. Forever you'll perish. We can't
see, know, or ever find the way. Except you be born from above,
you can't even see the kingdom of God. Much less enter into
it, you cannot enter What's the solution? We'll look at what
Elisha said next. Follow me. I'm going to take you where you
need to be. There's a decision that needs to be made, but not
by you. I'm going to take you there.
I'm going to take you to the one you're looking for. You just
don't know it yet. Christ is the way. Elisha, God's
prophet, is the way. They didn't need for him to tell
them the way. They still couldn't have found
it. He is the way. Following him is the way. That's
how it is with us. This is not an instruction book
on how to get to heaven. Christ is heaven. Christ is salvation. This is not how to be saved.
Christ is how to be saved. This is a hymn book. Follow me. Where are we going? To the king. We're gonna go see
the king. And look at the way, what he
said, the man that you seek, one you're looking for. Wasn't
that true in more ways than one? That's who they really wanted.
They were only going to Elisha because they're trying to get
to the king. When they tried to kill the king
and the people of God, Elisha got in the way. I'm gonna take
you to the one You're looking for By the way, he's the same
man that you hate so much that you're trying to kill him and
his people That's where we're going the enemy Look at Acts
chapter 4 with me, please Acts 4 10 Going to the king Be it known
unto you all and to all the people of Israel that by the name of
Jesus Christ of Nazareth Whom ye crucified whom God raised
from the dead by him that this man stand here before you hold
This is the stone which was set at naught of you builders That's
not the way Hating the Son of God is not
the way of This is the stone that was set at naught of you
builders, which has become the head of the corner, and neither
is there salvation in any other. The one that you hate, the one
you despise, the one that you're trying to kill, the one that
you've murdered already in your hearts, and that those that despise God,
which is all of us by nature, murder in their hearts every
hour. Every hour that they live on
in their pride and self-righteousness and self-reliance, every hour that they live thinking
that they're God, they crucify the Son of God in their hearts. But if you're going to be saved, this is the one you're looking
for. For there is none other name
under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. You've got to come before your
mortal enemy and throw down arms. And your eternal soul hangs upon
his decision. That's how you come now. Don't
make any decisions when you come before God. You come for his verdict. You come saying, Lord, if you
will, you can make me clean. Lord, I'm not worthy that you
should even come under my roof, but if you just say the word,
just say the word. Your soul hangs upon what he
decides. And in the beautiful, interesting
exchange between God's king and God's prophet here, we see the
dilemma of all dilemmas solved. Shall I smite them? Shall I smite
them? He had every right to do it.
He had the authority to do it. He had every reason to do it,
didn't he? Would anybody have complained? Would anybody have
been able to oppose Him in that decision? These people came here
to kill me and all of you too. As sovereign, just, uncompromising
God of heaven and earth, God has every right to destroy those
who have stormed His throne. Those who have defied his throne
ought to be cast in hell. But the voice of the gospel of
the Lord Jesus Christ speaks and says, thou shalt not smite
them. Thou shalt not smite them. Reckon that these people still
had their weapons at this point Their swords have been taken
out of their hands Mine too, how about you mine, too? They're prisoners of war That's
what he said in it Would you take somebody at gunpoint as
prisoner and then just kill them anyway? But they are at the mercy of
the king, and God delights to show mercy. That is why we live tonight. Because God delights to show
mercy to sinners. That's the only reason. Not because
you decided to, but because he decided. What's to be done with them then? Set them free, but before you
do, give them something to eat and drink. Don't throw them in
prison. This is how God saves a sinner.
Does it even make any sense in that story? That would be stupid.
To let those that came to kill you go. And let's feed them,
by the way, before we send them home. Not a good strategy, really,
if you think about it. But that's how God saves sinners.
He sets them free. But not before He gives us the
bread and water of life. Himself The Lord Jesus himself
he causes us to feast Upon his person God in human flesh the
sovereign Christ of God He said if you eat not my flesh and drink
not my blood there's no life in you Give it to him give it
to him It says bread and water in verse
22 because Christ is the bread of life and he's the living water
that flows from the throne of God. But look how it's described
in verse 23. He prepared great provision for
them. Reckon what that was. What can
the king of Israel lay on the table, you reckon? Great provision. Give them bread and water and
set them free. It's Christ who is the bread
of life. We eat his body by faith. We
partake of him, who he is. He's God in human flesh, who
he is. The king of Israel. The sovereign
of all governments. All of the government is on his
shoulders. A child that's born, but a son
given. Feast upon him his person and
we drink the sustenance of our soul is what he did for me What
he did for me And feasting upon him we're set
free if the Sun shall make you free your plum free Notice in verse 23 it says they
went to their master and Doesn't say they went back to
the king of Syria. The wording is important, isn't
it? We know that in the earthly story, that probably means the
king of Syria. But listen, they went to their
master. You know what that looks like
when God saves you in a spiritual sense? They came to Jericho,
Mark 10, 46, and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples,
a great number of people a great number of people blind
Bartimaeus the son of Timaeus sat by the highway side begging and When he heard that it was
Jesus of Nazareth He heard who it was he heard
who he heard who He began to cry out and say Jesus
thou son of David have mercy on me and And many charged him
that he should hold his peace. Now why would anybody do that? Somebody's asking for mercy,
and you're telling them to shut up? Why would they do that? Because
he was making a scene, don't you imagine? He wasn't just whispering
it. It was obnoxious. He was screaming
for mercy. And Jesus stood still. Commanded
him to be called and they called the blind man saying unto him
be of good comfort rise he That's our comfort he He calleth thee And he casting away his garment
rose and came to Jesus and Jesus answered it said unto him what
wilt thou that I should do unto thee and the blind man said unto
him Lord That I might receive my sight It just so happens that's why
the Lord came into this world to make blind men see And Jesus said I do Go that way
Go that way He didn't need a stick anymore.
He didn't need a CNI dog. He didn't need anybody to help
him. Go your way. Thy faith hath made thee whole.
And immediately he received his sight and went his way. Where
was that? He followed Jesus in the way.
That's what going to your master means in the spiritual sense when God
saves a sinner. This is the way. This is the way. Christ said,
I am the way. Notice that the enmity is gone
now. You see that? They didn't come back anymore.
I know that in the earthly story, that was temporary. I've read
ahead a little bit, but the wording again is key here. No more did
they come. Swords no, no more. Did they
come with a war plan? No more you see that So the bands of Syria came no
more no more fighting No more enmity Because the Lord Jesus Christ
turns enemies into loving sons Now let's look for a minute at
the believer in this story is this you Is this you even though
the Lord had already ordered all of this? And the Lord clearly
was in complete control all the way along in this story This
servant of Elisha Verses 15 through 17 was afraid Let's look at those verses again
15 through 17 when the servant of the man of God was risen early
and gone forth behold and Host compass the city both with horses
and chariots and his servant said unto him alas my master
How shall we do? And I want us to notice that
particularly. Is this anybody here tonight? Is this anybody
you don't know what to do? What are we going to do? What
am I going to do? He was afraid and he didn't know
what to do. Well, believer. Are you a servant of the man
of God? Are you a servant of God's prophet? Believer, in order to not be
afraid anymore and to know what to do also, you need to know that God is
for you and nobody can be against you. You need to put your trust
in the Lord. Don't worry about what people
can do. Don't worry about what this world can do. Don't worry
even as a believer about the treachery of your own wretched
heart. Just look and see that the victory
is yours because of your Savior. He's sovereign. He's in control. He is almighty. It's not the
way the circumstances seem to indicate. It's not that way. Don't live like that. Don't live
looking at the circumstances. Don't live looking at the problems.
Don't live looking at the secondary means. Don't live trusting them. Look to the one whose army is
arrayed for you. God is for us who can be against
us. Trust Him, look to Him, rest
in Him. You imagine that was a relief
to this man when he saw that God was on his side? How shall we do? Look with me at Mark 6.45. God is sovereign and his grace
is saving. It's almighty. He's not going
to let you go. Mark 6, 45. And straightway, the Lord constrained
his disciples to get into the ship and to go to the other side
before unto Bethsaida while he sent away the people. And when
he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray. And
when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea,
and he alone on the land. And he saw them toiling and rowing,
for the wind was contrary unto them." He could have made it
easier for him, you reckon? This man commands the winds and
the seas. He saw them toiling. He saw them
rowing. He saw them striving. He saw
them struggling. And he watched over them. That was his will for them. But he's watching them over him
the whole time. The wind was contrary to them.
That's OK. Everything's going wrong. I'm
doing everything I can here, and I'm just getting further.
I'm taking two strokes forward, and then I'm falling three strokes
back. It's all right, the Lord sees
that. He sees you that way. He's watching you. And about the fourth watch of
the night, he cometh unto them. Has the Lord ever done that for
you when you're in the storm? He cometh unto them walking upon
the sea, showing He didn't come swimming. I reckon the Lord could
swim. Don't you think he was able to
swim? But he came letting them know beyond a shadow of a doubt
that he's the master of the sea. He's the master of the storm.
The winds aren't contrary to him. They do exactly what he
wants them to do. Waves obey his will. He came unto them walking upon
the sea and would have passed by them. Why in the world? He would have passed by them,
but when they saw him walking upon the sea, they supposed it
had been a spirit and cried out. He did this whole thing in such
a way that they would cry out, afraid, not knowing what to do. All of their rowing and striving
was getting them nowhere. The winds were contrary, and
the winds are stronger than us. The waves are a problem for us. So they cried out, for they all
saw him and were troubled, on top of them being Endanger of
their lives at the mercy of the sea in an earthly sense They
thought that he was a spirit come to do them harm and immediately
he talked with them Sayeth unto them be of good cheer And you
know when somebody says that to you, I'm thankful for that,
you know be it's gonna be okay, but How do you know? Has everybody ever said that
to you? And you thought, well, I appreciate your intention there, but are
you gonna make it okay? But the Lord didn't give him
an empty promise. He said, be of good cheer. It's
me. It's me. It's me. That's how we live in this world.
That's how we don't despair. That's why the storm doesn't
take us under. Because it's him. It's me, be not afraid. And he
went up unto them into the ship. And the wind ceased, and they
were sore amazed in themselves beyond measure. And they wondered
at that. They wondered. I want to show you one more passage
of scripture in closing. 2 Chronicles 32, if you'd turn
over there, please. 2 Chronicles 32. 2nd Chronicles 32 to You may
remember this story. We went through this and About Hezekiah and how that the
enemy had come and camped themselves against Israel in this story
to verse 2 and when Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib was come
and that he was purposed to fight against Jerusalem here we are
again God's enemies coming to destroy his people, to destroy
his king. He took counsel with his princes
and with his mighty men to stop the waters of the fountains,
which were without the city, because this enemy is going to
come and besiege them. And they're thinking, why give
them a free supply of water? We're going to shut this down
so that they don't have that on their side as an advantage. They did help his mighty men
to stop the waters which were without the city, and they did
help him. Verse four, so there was gathered much people together
who stopped all the fountains and the brook that ran through
the midst of the land, saying, why should the kings of Assyria
come and find much water? Also he strengthened himself
and built up all the wall that was broken and raised it up to
the towers. and another wall without, and
repaired Milo in the city of David, and made darts and shields
in abundance." He got ready. He started battening down the
hatches. And prepared himself for war. And he said, captains
of war, verse six, over the people, and gathered them together to
him in the street of the gate of the city and spake comfortably
to them, saying, be strong and courageous, Be not afraid, nor
dismayed for the king of Assyria, for all the multitude that is
with him, for there be more with us than with him. Oh, don't be afraid, because
look at all the provisions that we've gathered, and look at the
shields and the spears that we've made. Look at all of the training
that we've done. Look at the preparations. Don't
be afraid, no? He didn't mention any of that.
He said, be not afraid, because we're in the majority. Because this is how we see it.
This is the way we look at it. This is the reality of it right
here. With him is an arm of flesh. We're outnumbered. We're outgunned. But with us is the Lord our God
to help us and to fight our battles. Every enemy that we have as a
sinner including the sinner me Has been vanquished by him by
him You shall not have to fight in
this war And to fight our battles and
the people rested themselves upon the gospel The good news
that Christ is victory. They rested themselves upon the
words of Hezekiah, king of Judah. Notice one thing in closing,
that the horses and the chariots of fire that the servant of God
woke up and saw, that when his eyes were opened that he saw.
What were they there for? They didn't defeat armies of
of the Syrians They didn't fight the Lord solved
that problem in a different way didn't he What purpose did these
chariots and horses of fire serve then? To cause God's servant
to cause us To not fear anything or anybody in this world because
if God is for us who can be against us Doesn't look like they ever shot
a flaming arrow But they set God's servant at
peace is that important to our God that you rest in him tonight You're in the hand of God's Son
and nobody can pluck you out like David wrote in Psalm 56
3 what time I am afraid I Will trust That's what he does for us and
he opens our eyes that we might trust in him.