2 Kings 6, verse 8. Listen to the word of God. 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, Beware that thou pass not such a place,
for thither the Syrians are come down. 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. Therefore the heart
of the king of Syria was so troubled for this thing. And he called
his servants and said unto them, Will ye not show me which of
us is for the king of Israel? 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. And he said, Go and spy where
he is, that I may send and fetch him. And it was told to 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, an 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. 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. Amen. Let's just stop there this
morning. We can continue the story another
time. I just want to draw a couple
of points from the verses that we've been thinking about here.
And I want to say this right at the very beginning. If we
could see what God can see, what a different
view we would have of this world. God knows and sees all things. And the Bible tells us in 1 Samuel
chapter 16, the Lord seeth not as man seeth. For man looketh
on the outward appearance but the Lord looketh on the heart. And that's something that boys
and girls and mums and dads and old grandpas and grannies like
me should remember, that God sees our hearts. God knows what's going on inside
us. We look on the outside, but God
sees what we are thinking. He knows what we are saying.
He understands what we are doing and the motives that we have. God sees our heart and nothing
is hidden from him. Because we only see natural things,
because we only see outward things, and because we cannot see spiritual
things, this world can sometimes appear to be a frightening place. And when this young man in the
story that we've got before us today saw the predicament that
he was in, there he was in the city of Dothan, just a little
city, and it was completely surrounded by enemy soldiers. They had come
as a great host from the king of Syria. They had come with
their spears and with their swords, with their horses and their chariots,
and they came down to the city of Dothan, and in the nighttime,
they completely surrounded it so that no one could escape. and they were ready to arrest
Elisha, the prophet of God, because of what he was able to do to
protect the King of Israel. The young man was frightened.
He saw that there was a much greater strength and a much greater
power out there on the part of the soldiers of Syria. than they
had to defend themselves in the city of Dothan. But what he failed
to see, because he couldn't see as God sees, he couldn't see
spiritual things, he failed to see that there was an even greater
power on the mountaintops surrounding the soldiers of Syria. that shone with the glory of
God himself, horses and chariots of fire. The king of Syria had
been trying to attack and kill the king of Israel, but God knows
what's going on in men's hearts and men's minds, and he had informed
Elisha of the plans of the king of Syria. And Elisha warned the
king of Israel, so that the King of Israel was always able to
thwart and obstruct the plans of the King of Syria. Ben-Hadad
was his name, and he schemed and he plotted with his generals
in Damascus in order to do harm to the people of God. Ben-Hadad is long gone and dead. But there are Ben Haddads all
over the place. And they scheme and they plan
to hurt the people of God. But we still have our Elisha. We still have our prophet. We
still have our king. We still have our God upon the
throne. And he knows exactly what the
enemies of the people of God are thinking and planning and
trying to do. Elisha watched over Israel and
our Lord watches over us. So while this world might appear
frightening because we can only see so much, we know that we
have someone in whom we can trust because he sees and knows all
things. When the young man saw all this
host of the Syrians surrounding, he was frightened and he says
to Elisha, how shall we do? What are we going to do? What is going to happen to us? And I'm guessing that that young
man couldn't understand why Elisha wasn't all concerned and anxious
like he was. It was early in the morning.
Maybe he thought Elisha hasn't properly wakened up yet because
if he was really awake, he would know how dangerous this situation
is. But of course, Elisha understood
perfectly. He knew that God was in control. And he knew that Ben-Hadad and
his soldiers could do no more than God would allow them to
do. And he knew that these Syrians
were in much greater danger from the chariots of fire than he
and his servant were in Dothan from the Syrian soldiers. And
Elisha said to himself, if only this young man could see the
hosts of God surrounding, he would know that he had no need
to be afraid. So Elisha prayed for the young
man. And this is lovely because here is Elisha the prophet. He
knows what's going to happen. He knows that this young man's
anxiety is unfounded. But so that he might comfort,
so that he might reassure, so that he might give a blessing
to this young man and ease his consternation, he prays, Lord,
I pray thee, open the young man's eyes that he may see. And what did he see? He saw a
mountain full of horses and chariots. I think it's a lovely picture.
I see in my mind's eye concentric circles. You know what a concentric
circle is? There's Dothan, right there.
Just a little city, just a little town. And round about it are
all the Syrian soldiers. And round about them are the
army of God. You see, nothing was out of God's
control. And the youth who could see the
army of the Syrians now was enabled to see the army of God. We can see natural things, but
it takes God the Holy Spirit to open our eyes to see spiritual
things. Natural things, physical things
and spiritual things are different. But we know that these two worlds,
the natural and the spiritual, are existing side by side. And while we, because of the
limitations of our physical abilities, cannot see that spiritual, then
we will always be blind to it. But if the Lord opens our spiritual
understanding, if the Lord gives us eyes to see and ears to hear
spiritual truths, then it will open up to us a completely new
dimension in which the power of God is manifested and revealed. And I'm not saying that we're
going to see fiery chariots on the hilltops. but we are going
to, by faith, see and understand and know that there is comfort
and there is confidence and there is peace to be had in the midst
of the outwardly frightening circumstances of this world because
we know that God is in control and God is in charge. There's
a little saying in Psalm 105, verse 15, it says this, Touch not mine anointed, and
do my prophets no harm. That's a lovely verse. That was
the Lord that was speaking. And he said, don't you touch
my people, and don't you do my prophets any harm. And when God
speaks, no one can speak against him. All the Lord's people are
the Lord's anointed. That's what we are. We are anointed
because we are in the Lord Jesus Christ who is the Messiah of
God. That's what the word Messiah
means. It means anointed. And if we
trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, if we've put our faith in Christ,
if we have committed our well-being and our safety into the hands
of Christ, then we are under the protection of the anointed
one. And if no one can touch Christ,
if no one can touch the anointed one, then no one can touch us. It's like the mother hen that
covers her wings over her baby chicks, and no one can get through
her in order to attack the babies. And that's what we have in the
Lord. We are safe because we are the
Lord's little ones, and nothing happens to us that is not for
our good and for God's glory. In Matthew 18, verse 10, the
verse says, take heed, that's a warning, not to us, but to
the men and women of this world, if they would only listen, but
Ben Hadad doesn't listen. Ben Hadad was a little bit silly,
did he think that Elisha knew where he was camping in order
to get the King of Israel and wouldn't know that he was coming
to get him at Dothan? How silly was that? Take heed
that he despised not one of these little ones. For I say unto you
that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my
Father which is in heaven. So here's our lesson for this
morning. Just because we cannot see the power of God outwardly,
naturally, That does not mean that he is not protecting us
and guarding us because he is every day. If we trust him, he
is faithful and he will keep us safe. Salvation means being
safe. That's what the word means. Salvation
means being safe. Safe now in this world and safe
for all eternity. In a little while, we're going
to be speaking about Abraham, a man called Abraham. And at
one time in Abraham's life, God told him, fear not, Abraham,
I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. And Abraham believed
God. It's my prayer today, this morning
for you, that the Holy Spirit will open your eyes like he opened
this young man's eyes in the city of Dothan. He will open
our eyes to spiritual truths. He will open our eyes that we
might see the Lord Jesus Christ. He might open our eyes so that
we see him as our shield, our protection, our defender, our
deliverer, and our saviour. our saviour from sin, our saviour
from ourselves, our saviour from Satan, and all our enemies. May it be so. For his name's
sake. Amen.